Region

KUWAIT — Eighteen more people in Saudi Arabia have contracted the potentially deadly Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), bringing the number of cases in the kingdom to 414, its health ministry said on Monday, more than a quarter of whom have died.

The new cases, reported in the past 48 hours, were in the capital Riyadh, the coastal city of Jeddah, and the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, the ministry said on its website.

The spread of the disease is a concern for Saudi Arabia which will host millions of foreign pilgrims in July in Mecca and Medina during the holy month of Ramadan. Millions more are expected in October for the Hajj (the greater Muslim pilgrimage).

So far 115 of the people in Saudi Arabia who contracted the virus have died, the ministry said. Many of those affected have been foreign health workers.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Monday that Jordan had reported a new case the MERS virus. The 28-year-old man from Saudi Arabia is relative of someone previously reported to have MERS, it said.

Countries including Qatar, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Tunisia as well as several countries in Europe have also reported MERS cases since the virus emerged. On Monday Egypt said it was investigating whether a 60-year-old woman had died of MERS.

Last week the United States said it had its first confirmed case of the disease in a man who had recently been in Saudi Arabia. Egypt said it had its first case, also in a man who had been in the kingdom.

Infections of MERS in Saudi Arabia, where it was discovered two years ago, have more than doubled since the start of April, but the total number of deaths has increased at a slower rate.

MERS is a form of coronavirus like the more deadly SARS. It can cause fever, coughing, shortness of breath and pneumonia but it is not easy to transmit between people. The WHO has not advised any travel restrictions for Saudi Arabia.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — An Israeli NGO is on Monday launching a smartphone app that allows users to find the remains of Palestinian villages that now lie inside modern-day Israel.

The launch is timed to coincide with Israel’s 66th anniversary, which begins at sundown, when the Palestinians remember the “Nakba” or “catastrophe” that befell them when Israel came into existence in 1948, and 760,000 of them fled or were forced into exile.

“iNakba” features an interactive map and photos of buildings and houses that Palestinians fled during the fighting which erupted after Israel declared itself independent.

“Many Palestinians have difficulty locating their hometowns and villages [in Israel and the West Bank], because cities or Jewish settlements have been built on top of them,” said Raneen Jeries of Zochrot, the NGO that developed the app.

“There’s a file on each of hundreds of Palestinian villages or cities, and you can find information and see old and new user-uploaded photos about the locality,” she told AFP.

Zochrot, based in Tel Aviv, campaigns for Israelis to recognise the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes, along with their descendants.

The right of return for Palestinian refugees has long been a key sticking point in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, the latest round of which collapsed in late April after nine months of apparently fruitless negotiations.

Israel fears that any flexibility on the issue would open the floodgates to millions of refugees, which would pose a demographic threat to the “Jewish and democratic character” of the state.

Palestinians mark Nakba Day every year on May 15.

“Our aim is to make Israeli Jews aware of the Nakba, which uprooted hundreds of thousands of Palestinians,” said Liat Rosenberg, director of Zochrot.

Palestinians in the diaspora can “follow” their own villages to watch for new information or pictures posted by those who are able to visit them inside Israel, Jeries said.

“Refugees living in Lebanon, for example, can follow their village and each time someone uploads a photo of it or writes a comment, they’ll see an update.”

Zochrot uses maps from British Mandate Palestine (1920-1948) to locate the villages, Jeries said, and marks them on the interactive Google Maps-based app with virtual “pins”.

Rosenberg admitted iNakba might not have the desired impact on most Israeli Jews, but insisted that “left-leaning Israelis will be interested in the app”.

JUBA — South Sudanese troops and rebels battled around a key oil hub on Monday, defying mounting pressure to end four months of civil war despite US threats of “serious implications” if fighting continues.

The government offensive to seize the northern oil town of Bentiu from rebel forces comes just days after a visit from US Secretary of State John Kerry to the capital Juba, where he extracted promises that peace talks would resume to end violence in the world’s youngest nation.

“Let me make clear: If there is a total refusal by one party or the other to engage into a legitimate promise which they agreed on... not only might sanctions be engaged but there are other serious implications and possible consequences,” Kerry said, speaking in the Angolan capital Luanda on the last leg of his African tour.

So far, US-backed diplomatic efforts have struggled to gain traction, with reports that both the government forces of President Salva Kiir and rebel chief Riek Machar are continuing to commit war crimes that have included mass killings, rapes, attacks on hospitals and places of worship, and recruiting child soldiers.

A January ceasefire was never enforced. Stop-start peace talks in Ethiopia have yet to forge agreement on even the basic agenda, despite warnings from the United Nations that the conflict threatens mass famine and genocide.

“There is accountability in the international community for atrocities, there are sanctions, there are possible... peace making forces, there are any number of possibilities,” Kerry said.

South Sudan’s army spokesman Philip Aguer said there had been heavy fighting on Monday focused on Bentiu, capital of the oil-producing Unity state, a day after government troops moved to wrest back control.

“We are fighting in and around Bentiu to take back control,” he told AFP. “They are resisting but we have the upper hand.”

Rebel chief ‘fleeing’ assault 

Bentiu fell to the rebels last month. They were accused by the United Nations of massacring hundreds of civilians in the process. The town has swapped hands several times.

Despite the fighting, Juba said it was committed to peace talks and that the president remained determined to meet with his archrival, the former vice president turned rebel leader Machar.

“Of course the president [Kiir] is willing to meet face-to-face with the rebel leader [Machar]so that they sit together to bring peace in the country,” foreign ministry spokesman Mayen Makol told AFP, insisting talks would happen “as soon as possible”.

In Ethiopia, rebel and government delegates reaffirmed their commitment to a January deal to open aid corridors into war zones.

Such agreements have been repeatedly flouted in the past but rebel delegate Taban Deng hailed the latest confirmation as a “step towards peace”.

“We have, for the last four days, been looking how best we can save our people through those difficult times, especially now the rain is coming,” regional mediator Lazaro K. Sumbeiywo said.

The imminent arrival of the monsoon season will be a further obstacle to already difficult humanitarian work.

The army said Machar is hiding in remote bush after fleeing the government’s successful capture of his base at Nasir, a riverside town close to the Ethiopian border.

“We are in control of Nasir and all is quiet there, with the forces of Machar on the run,” Aguer said. “We believe he is hiding out somewhere near the frontier with Ethiopia.”

Machar himself has not confirmed whether he will attend peace talks, although Kerry repeated on Monday that the rebel leader had “left the door open” to taking part.

Since it broke out in December, the war has claimed thousands — and possibly tens of thousands — of lives, with at least 1.2 million people forced to flee their homes, many living in appalling conditions in overstretched UN bases and in fear of ethnic violence.

Although it started as a personal rivalry between Kiir and Machar after the latter was sacked as vice president, the conflict has taken on ethnic overtones as clashes pit members of Kiir’s Dinka tribe against Machar’s Nuer.

Production at the oil fields — a crucial asset for the protagonists — has slumped as staff have been evacuated.

“Oil areas have been affected by rebel attacks as they killed the engineers... but in terms of control they are in our hands,” said Aguer.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israel must tackle anti-Arab hate crime with an “iron fist”, a top minister said on Monday as Israeli forces confirmed arresting seven minors over racist graffiti and spitting at a priest.

The Israeli authorities are facing mounting pressure to rein in a spiralling wave of so-called “price tag” hate crimes by Jewish extremists targeting Arab Israelis and Palestinians, with new racist vandalism attacks being reported on an almost daily basis.

And commentators have warned that a continued failure to tackle the phenomenon could end up triggering a violent backlash.

“We must strive to be a state... that fights to the end against racism, against violence and against xenophobia,” Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon said at a memorial day ceremony for fallen soldiers and those killed in terror attacks.

“A state that must fight with an iron fist against the terror which is wrongly called ‘price tag’ — an ugly phenomenon which has no connection to Jewish values and morals, and whose aim is to harm Arabs only because they are Arabs,” he said.

His remarks came as Israeli forces said they had arrested seven Jewish minors over racist acts and vandalism.

Four are suspected of spraying racist graffiti at a building site by an Arab village near Jerusalem, and another three were picked up for spitting at a priest by Jerusalem’s Old City and for carrying flags scrawled with the words “revenge” and “price tag”.

Price tag is the euphemism for nationally motivated hate crimes by Jewish extremists which predominantly target Palestinian property, but have also included attacks on other non-Jews as well as leftwing Israelis or the security forces.

Racist graffiti in Hebrew 

Such attacks, which tend to involve vandalism and trademark racist graffiti in Hebrew, began sporadically in the West Bank several years ago with settlers seeking to exact a “price” for state moves against illegal settlement outposts.

But since then, they have spread into Israel. Despite hundreds of arrests, hardly anyone has been prosecuted, raising questions about the government’s willingness to tackle the problem.

“Burning mosques and churches, desecrating holy books and cemeteries and damaging Arabs’ cars have become common phenomena on both sides of the Green Line,” said an editorial in Haaretz newspaper by Hussein Abu Hussein, a senior figure in the rights group Adalah.

During the first and second Palestinian uprisings (1987-1993, 2000-2005), a single stone thrown at an Israeli bus would see Israel’s Shin Bet security services and police investigators acting rapidly to round up, arrest and prosecute those involved, often within hours, he wrote.

“The Arab public — particularly the youth — suspiciously wonders on social media why law enforcement’s resourcefulness and speed disappear when it comes to Jewish terror. Why doesn’t the Shin Bet get involved? Is it because the victims are Arab?” he wrote.

Ongoing indifference by the Israel authorities could spark “a religious war” with people taking the law into their own hands to protect their holy places, and could easily end in violence if one of the perpetrators were to be caught in the act of desecrating a mosque, he warned.

Last week, the US State Department for the first time included mention of price tag attacks in its global report on terror, saying such incidents were “largely unprosecuted”.

On Sunday, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni said she would back the idea of defining such acts as “terrorism”.

KUWAIT CITY — Two Kuwaiti lawmakers resigned on Sunday, bringing to five the number of MPs who have quit in protest at the parliament’s refusal to question the prime minister on corruption allegations.

MP Ali Al Rashed, a former parliament speaker, and MP Safa Al Hashem, the only female lawmaker in the 50-member house, said they resigned because the situation in the Gulf state has reached a “deadlock”.

“Today, the situation has reached a deadlock. The deviation in the use of monitoring and legislation powers in parliament has led to killing the questioning tool and silencing MPs,” the two lawmakers said in their resignation letter.

On Wednesday, opposition MPs Riyadh Al Adasani, Abdulkarim Al Kundari and Hussein Al Mutairi resigned after the pro-government parliament rejected their demand to question the prime minister over allegations he gave cash handouts to lawmakers.

The three MPs blamed Prime Minister Sheikh Jaber Mubarak Al Sabah, a senior member of the ruling family, for deteriorating public services in the oil-rich Gulf state and took him to task for the temporary closure of two newspapers, claiming the move was aimed at stifling freedoms.

Parliament speaker Marzouk Al Ghanem, speaking in an interview with Al Rai television on Saturday night, said the resignations were a coordinated conspiracy to “dismantle institutions in the country”, including an attempt to force the dissolving of parliament.

Ghanem also said that a number of other MPs are under tremendous pressure to resign and expected that more would quit.

The speaker said Sunday that he met Emir Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Sabah, who has the sole authority to dissolve parliament.

“The emir reaffirmed total backing and full confidence in the national assembly ... and dissolving the assembly now is totally ruled out,” Ghanem told reporters outside parliament.

Ghanem said the emir also stressed that any attempt to destabilise the country will fail.

Under Kuwaiti law, parliament has 10 days to study the resignations. If it accepts them, by-elections must be held within two months.

DONGOLA, Sudan — Alaadeen put himself in the hands of people smugglers to take him somewhere better than impoverished eastern Sudan but he never made it.

The 22-year-old Sudanese man was among 10 illegal immigrants who died when traffickers abandoned their group of about 300 in the scorching desert on the Sudanese-Libyan border, a relative in Alaadeen’s hometown of Kassala told AFP by telephone on Sunday.

“He was looking for a better life,” said the relative who asked not to be named. “Some people with him told us that he had died.”

Alaadeen, whose full name the relative declined to reveal, was the son of a trader doing business on the Sudanese-Eritrean border near Kassala, he said.

On Sunday Al Sudani newspaper said that the young man and several other Sudanese were among the 10 victims.

The foreign ministry said the dead also included two Ethiopians, an Eritrean, and a victim whose nationality was unknown.

The relative said Alaadeen had gone with the traffickers of his own accord.

“He was taken by smugglers from the Kassala area to Khartoum before going on to Dongola,” a Nile River town about 500 kilometres northwest of the capital, he said.

Libya’s border is more than a day’s drive from there.

The desert region stretching from eastern Sudan up through Egypt to the Sinai Peninsula is a major route for African migrants seeking a better life.

Thousands of Eritreans, in particular, make the journey each year. Many head for Israel while others try to get to Europe.

“Some of them try to go through Egypt. Some of them try to go through Libya,” said a source familiar with the situation.

“They would try to cross the Mediterranean Sea via Libya.”

Sudanese officials announced the rescue of the illegal migrants on Wednesday, saying traffickers had dumped their victims in the border region’s scorching desert, where 10 died.

Sudan’s security service told Alaadeen’s family that he was among the casualties and they had found his identification, the relative said.

Sudanese and Libyan troops initially rescued about 300 hungry and thirsty survivors, but they later came across even more.

A convoy of trucks escorted by security forces from both countries delivered the migrants to safety in Dongola on Saturday after a journey of hundreds of kilometres across the desert.

Women and children were among the survivors who reached the town. Most of the victims appeared to be Ethiopian or Eritrean, but there were some Sudanese as well.

An AFP journalist in Dongola said that the migrants were still at an immigration facility in the town early Sunday.

The International Organisation for Migration told AFP that it hoped to “provide necessary assistance” to the group.

UNHCR, the United Nations refugee agency, has also said it “would stand ready to provide support” should the migrants be refugees.

At Alaadeen’s family home in Kassala, visitors arrived to offer condolences, and to wonder about what drove the young man away.

“I don’t understand why he did this,” said a man who knows the family. “Their economic situation is not bad.”

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israeli forces looking for evidence linked to a recent attack on a mosque were mobbed overnight by around 100 demonstrators at a West Bank settlement, a spokeswoman said Sunday.

As concerns grow over the spiralling number of hate crimes by Jewish extremists against Palestinians and Arab Israelis — euphemistically referred to as “price tag” attacks — the Israeli authorities are coming under increasing pressure to tackle the phenomenon.

“Our forces were attacked by about 100 residents, some of whom threw stones,” security spokeswoman Luba Samri said of the incident at Yitzhar settlement in the northern West Bank, a bastion of hardline settlers.

She said Israeli forces went to the settlement to search the house of a couple suspected of involvement in an April 18 attack on a mosque in Umm Al Fahm in northern Israel, in which racist graffiti was written on the walls and the front door was set alight.

Four Yitzhar settlers, including the couple, were arrested last week in connection with the attack after CCTV footage reportedly captured one of their cars at the scene.

Israeli forces said the married woman was released to house arrest on Friday while her husband was due in court on Sunday. The other two were released without charge.

Over the past week, vandals sprayed racist graffiti over another mosque in northern Israel and also targeted an ancient Christian church on the Sea of Galilee, damaging crosses and threatening clergy.

A Muslim graveyard was also defaced and two dozen olive trees were chopped down in the West Bank.

Earlier Sunday, a car was vandalised in the northern town of Yokneam and racist graffiti was left near an Arab village outside Jerusalem.

Such attacks were originally carried out by settlers to enact a “price tag” on Israeli moves to dismantle illegal outposts in the occupied West Bank, but the phenomenon has grown in recent months to an almost daily occurrence, alarming authorities.

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni told army radio on Sunday that she would meet with Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch and top security officials to decide how to tackle the issue, with media reports suggesting the meeting would happen within days.

On Saturday, a former chief of Israel’s Shin Bet, which is responsible for internal security, challenged the agency’s willingness to tackle the matter.

“In the Shin Bet, the expression ‘we can’t’ does not exist, it’s more a case of ‘we don’t want to’,” Carmi Gillon was quoted as saying by public radio.

On Wednesday, the US State Department for the first time included mention of “price tag” attacks in its global report on terror, saying such incidents were “largely unprosecuted”.

But Israeli forces challenged the finding.

“There’s no comparison whatsoever between criminal incidents with nationalistic motives and terrorist-related incidents,” spokesman Micky Rosenfeld told AFP.

“It is vandalism with nationalistic motives but these are not nationalistic attacks on Palestinians.”

BAGHDAD — Violence in Iraq, including shelling in a militant-held city and an attack targeting Shiite pilgrims, has killed more than 30 people in 24 hours, officials said Sunday.

The bloodshed comes as officials count ballots from the April 30 general election, the first since US troops withdrew in late 2011, and amid a protracted surge in nationwide unrest that has sparked fears of a return to the sectarian killing sprees of 2006-2007.

While officials are quick to blame external factors like the civil war in neighbouring Syria for the heightened violence, analysts and diplomats say widespread anger among the Sunni Arab minority is also a key cause.

In Fallujah, just a short drive west of Baghdad, shelling in southern areas of the city killed 11 people and wounded four, Doctor Ahmed Shami said.

It was not immediately clear who was behind the bombardment, which began on Saturday evening and continued into Sunday.

In a sign of both the reach of anti-government militants and the weakness of security forces, all of Fallujah and shifting parts of Anbar provincial capital Ramadi, farther west, have been out of government control since early January.

The crisis in the desert province of Anbar, which shares a long border with conflict-hit Syria, erupted in late December when security forces dismantled Iraq’s main Sunni Arab anti-government protest camp just outside Ramadi.

Militants subsequently seized parts of Ramadi and all of Fallujah, the first time anti-government forces have exercised such open control in major cities since the peak of the deadly violence that followed the US-led invasion of 2003.

North of Baghdad, a bombing and shooting targeted a bus carrying Shiite pilgrims on Saturday evening, killing 11 people and wounded 21, police and a doctor said.

The pilgrims were returning from Samarra when a roadside bomb exploded on the outskirts of the town of Balad and gunmen opened fire on the bus.

The worshippers had been participating in commemorations marking the death of Imam Ali Al Hadi, the 10th of 12 imams who are key to the Shiite Muslim faith.

His body lies in a venerated shrine in Samarra that also houses his son Hassan Al Askari, the 11th imam.

Funerals for the victims were held on Sunday in southern Maysan province.

Also on Saturday evening, police found the bodies of eight family members shot dead inside their home in a predominantly Sunni area southeast of Baghdad.

It was unclear why the family had been targeted or who killed them.

And on Sunday, a shooting in Baghdad and a magnetic “sticky bomb” on a vehicle west of the capital killed two people, while a suicide bombing in the northern city of Mosul left one soldier dead, officials said.

The bloodshed comes just days after a parliamentary election, with incumbent Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki seeking a third term despite the dramatic deterioration in security and widespread political opposition.

More than 3,000 people have been killed already this year, according to an AFP tally based on security and medical reports.

The unrest is the worst since Iraq emerged from brutal Sunni-Shiite sectarian fighting that killed tens of thousands of people in 2006 and 2007.

DUBAI/VIENNA — Iran has provided the UN nuclear watchdog with information about detonators with possible military applications, under an accord intended to allay concerns about Tehran’s atomic activities, an Iranian news agency said on Sunday.

There was no immediate comment from the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which for years has been trying to investigate suspicions that Iran may have researched how to make an atomic bomb. Iran, which is seeking an end to sanctions hurting its oil-dependent economy, denies any such work.

Diplomats in Vienna, where the IAEA is based, last week told Reuters they did not know whether Iran had so far given the UN body the requested information about fast-functioning Exploding Bridge Wire (EBW) detonators, which can be used to help set off an atomic explosive device but also has civilian applications.

It was one of seven measures Iran agreed three months ago to implement by May 15 under a step-by-step plan for the IAEA to gain more insight into the country’s nuclear work, but the first directly related to the UN body’s long-stalled bomb probe.

As part of the same cooperation pact, IAEA inspectors are this week expected to visit Iran’s Saghand uranium mine and the Ardakan uranium milling facility. Refined uranium can have both civilian and military nuclear uses.

Iran’s semiofficial ISNA news agency said on Sunday that the “EBW report has already been submitted” to the IAEA, as well as updated design information about the planned Arak heavy-water research reactor, which was also among the seven steps.

ISNA added: “The implementation of all seven steps agreed with IAEA will be finalised this week.”

West wants more

The IAEA said in a 2011 report that Iran had told the agency that it had developed EBW detonators for civil and conventional military applications. But, “Iran has not explained ... its own need or application for such detonators,” the IAEA report said.

Western officials say it is vital for Iran to address IAEA concerns about what it calls possible military dimensions to the country’s nuclear programme, as part of efforts to end a decade-old dispute that has raised fears of a new Middle East war.

They say information about detonators would be welcome but that Iran must do more in coming months to clear up concerns about suspected atomic bomb research. The two sides are expected to agree on new measures to be implemented after May 15.

“Key will be the next round of [possible military dimensions] topics agreed for discussion,” one diplomat in Vienna said, making clear his expectation that the next phase of Iran-IAEA cooperation would include more such issues.

Another envoy said work to resolve the concerns should be faster. “More has to come,” the diplomat said.

The IAEA’s talks with Iran are separate from negotiations between Tehran and six world powers, but still closely linked as both sets of negotiations are focused on fears that Tehran may be trying to develop the capability to build nuclear bombs.

Iran says its programme is entirely peaceful.

The powers — the United States, France, Germany, Britain, China and Russia — are aiming to reach a long-term agreement with Iran by late July on scaling back its nuclear programme in exchange for an end to international sanctions on Tehran.

ADEN — The army on Sunday killed 40 Al Qaeda suspects, mainly foreigners, and wounded dozens of others on day six of a major offensive in southern Yemen, military officials said.

Most of the “terrorists” were killed in Shabwa province during the ongoing operation against Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the defence ministry said in text messages sent to journalists.

“The majority of those killed or wounded are Saudis, Afghans, Somalis, Chechens and others,” the official Saba news agency quoted a military source as saying.

On Friday, soldiers backed by warplanes killed five suspected Al Qaeda militants in the same province.

Residents there told AFP on Sunday of “exceptionally” heavy artillery fire and air raids targeting Al Qaeda hideouts in the region.

Saba quoted General Ahmed Al Yafie, commander of the Third Military Region, as saying the armed forces were “unprecedentedly ready to face this terrorist organisation”.

“The Al Qaeda elements will not escape death,” and troops will fight them “until they are uprooted from Yemen, which cannot be a home for terrorism,” he said.

Two insurgents were killed and five captured as they tried to advance towards Ataq, regional capital of Shabwa, while a local Al Qaeda commander was killed in a smaller operation in the central town of Baida, according to a military source.

Hours before Sunday’s raid, Saba reported that reinforcements had been sent to Shabwa to “deal with Al Qaeda”.

The offensive began on Tuesday with a setback for the army, when Al Qaeda ambushed a convoy, killing 15 soldiers and taking 15 more prisoner, three of whom were later executed.

But the army operation has since gathered pace, resulting in the deaths of 70 militants and more than 24 soldiers, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Among the Al Qaeda fatalities have been two foreign commanders — Abu Islam Al Shishani, who had Chechen links, and Abu Muslim Al Uzbeki, an AQAP leader in Abyan province who hailed from Uzbekistan.

AQAP — a merger of the network’s Yemeni and Saudi branches — has denied President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi’s allegations that 70 per cent of its fighters are foreigners.

The franchise has been linked to a number of failed terror plots against the United States, and its leader Nasser Al Wuhayshi recently appeared in a rare video in which he vowed to attack Western “crusaders” wherever they are.

The jihadists took advantage of a 2011 uprising that forced veteran strongman Ali Abdullah Saleh from power to seize large swathes of southern and eastern Yemen.

The army recaptured several major towns in 2012 but has struggled to reassert control in rural areas, despite the backing of militiamen recruited among local tribes.

The latest government campaign came after a wave of US drone and other air attacks last month on Al Qaeda bases and training camps killed around 70 militants.

The jihadist group denounced the offensive as a “premeditated military escalation” that came after “the Yemeni defence minister visited Washington to receive the orders of his American masters”.