Sokhna port welcomes first cruise ships amid ongoing development

Sokhna port welcomes first cruise ships amid ongoing development
On Saturday, Sokhna port welcomed the cruise ship Splendida MSC with 2,826 passengers aboard. (Reuters/File)
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Updated 05 February 2023

Sokhna port welcomes first cruise ships amid ongoing development

Sokhna port welcomes first cruise ships amid ongoing development
  • Movement of vessels ‘working perfectly’ alongside construction, official says
  • More than 3,000 tourists arrived by ship on Saturday

CAIRO: Development work at the Suez Canal Economic Zone is progressing well, a senior official said, with the new berth at Sokhna port recently welcoming its first cruise ships.

Walid Youssef, deputy chairman of the southern part of the zone, said that the circulation and reception of vessels was “working perfectly” alongside the construction work, which was nearing completion.

The development included four new basins and 18 km of marine berths, as well as commercial and logistical areas covering 5.3 sq. km, he said.

The area is served by a rail network stretching 33 km, which also connects to the Sokhna-El Alamein electric train service.

Youssef said there was constant coordination with the relevant authorities to ensure the smooth operation of the port as the work progressed.

On Saturday, the port welcomed the cruise ship Splendida MSC with 2,826 passengers aboard. It was en route from Yanbu to Safaga.

It also received the Emerald Azzurra, carrying 75 tourists from Sharm El-Sheikh, and the Clio, which had traveled from Hurghada with 85 passengers.


UAE slams Israeli decision to permit new settlements in Occupied Territories

UAE slams Israeli decision to permit new settlements in Occupied Territories
Updated 8 sec ago

UAE slams Israeli decision to permit new settlements in Occupied Territories

UAE slams Israeli decision to permit new settlements in Occupied Territories
  • Gulf state reaffirms rejection of violations of international law, threats to regional stability

DUBAI: The UAE has strongly condemned Israel’s decision to allow resettlement in northern West Bank areas, and to permit new settlement units in the Occupied Territories, the Emirates News Agency reported on Sunday.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation reaffirmed the UAE’s rejection of all practices that violate international law and threaten to aggravate regional escalation and instability. 

The ministry also emphasized the importance of supporting all regional and international efforts to advance the Middle East peace process, as well as ending illegal practices that jeopardize the two-state solution, and establishing an independent Palestinian state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital.

 


Iraq’s Kurdistan region to hold elections on Nov. 18 — spokesman

Iraq’s Kurdistan region to hold elections on Nov. 18 — spokesman
Updated 4 min 39 sec ago

Iraq’s Kurdistan region to hold elections on Nov. 18 — spokesman

Iraq’s Kurdistan region to hold elections on Nov. 18 — spokesman
  • The vote should elect both a parliament and a president for Kurdish regions

SULAIMANIYA: Elections will be held in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region of northern Iraq on Nov. 18, the regional government spokesman said on Sunday.
Iraqi Kurdistan President Nechirvan Barzani issued a decree on Sunday and approved the date, KRG spokesman Dilshad Shahab told a news conference.
The vote should elect both a parliament and a president for Kurdish regions which have gained self-rule in 1991.


GCC appeals to US over Israeli minister’s Palestinian comments

GCC appeals to US over Israeli minister’s Palestinian comments
Updated 26 March 2023

GCC appeals to US over Israeli minister’s Palestinian comments

GCC appeals to US over Israeli minister’s Palestinian comments
  • The US State Department said they had found Smotrich’s comments “innacurate, dangerous”

LONDON: The Gulf Cooperation Council said on Sunday it had written to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken condemning controversial comments made by Israel’s finance minister in which he denied the existence of a Palestinian people.

Secretary General Jassem Mohamed Albudaiwi said that the foreign ministers of the GCC had sent the joint letter, which embodied the position of the leaders of the GCC countries regarding the Palestinian cause, Saudi Press Agency reported.

In the letter, the GCC called on Washington “to assume its responsibilities in responding to all measures and statements that target the Palestinian people,” and also called on the US “to play its role in reaching a just, comprehensive and lasting solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

He added that the letter praised the American position which rejected the statements made by Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

Albudaiwi said the 155th session of the GCC Ministerial Council, which was held on March 22 and met in Riyadh, stressed the GCC's support for the sovereignty of the Palestinian people over all Palestinian lands occupied since June 1967, the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital, that guarantees all the legitimate rights of the brotherly Palestinian people, and rejects settlements in the occupied Palestinian lands.

The US State Department said they had found Smotrich’s comments “to not only be inaccurate but also deeply concerning and dangerous.”

Smotrich is part of veteran Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu’s hard-right government that took office in December.

* With AFP


Tunisia recovers 29 bodies after migrant vessels capsize

Tunisia recovers 29 bodies after migrant vessels capsize
Updated 26 March 2023

Tunisia recovers 29 bodies after migrant vessels capsize

Tunisia recovers 29 bodies after migrant vessels capsize
  • Rome has pressured Tunisian authorities to rein in the flow of people

TUNIS: Tunisia’s coast guard said Sunday the bodies of 29 migrants from sub-Saharan African countries had been recovered after three vessels capsized, the latest in a string of such tragedies.
A series of shipwrecks has left dozens of migrants dead and others missing in the country that serves as a key conduit for migrants seeking to reach nearby European shores.
It comes after President Kais Saied made an incendiary speech last month, accusing sub-Saharan Africans of representing a demographic threat and causing a crime wave in Tunisia.
The coast guard said in a statement Sunday that it had “rescued 11 illegal migrants of various African nationalities after their boats sank” off the central eastern coast, citing three separate sinkings.
In one, a Tunisian fishing trawler recovered 19 bodies 58 kilometers (36 miles) off the coast after their boat capsized.
A coast guard patrol off the coastal city of Mahdiya also recovered eight bodies and “rescued” 11 other migrants after their boat sank as it headed toward Italy.
Fishing trawlers in Sfax meanwhile recovered two other bodies.
Black migrants in the country have faced a spike in violence since Saied’s speech and hundreds have been living in the streets for weeks in increasingly desperate conditions.
People fleeing poverty and violence in Sudan’s Darfur region, West Africa and other parts of the continent have for years used Tunisia as a springboard for often perilous attempts to reach safety and better lives in Europe.


The Italian island of Lampedusa is just 150 kilometers (90 miles) off the Tunisian coast, part of the Central Mediterranean route described by the United Nations as the most deadly in the world.
Rome has pressured Tunisian authorities to rein in the flow of people, and has helped beef up the coast guard, which rights groups accuse of violence.
Italy’s hard-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni warned Friday that Tunisia’s “serious financial problems” risked sparking a “migratory wave” toward Europe.
She also confirmed plans for a mission to the North African country involving the Italian and French foreign ministers.
Meloni echoed comments earlier in the week by Josep Borrell, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, who warned Tunisia risks economic collapse that could trigger a new flow of migrants to Europe — fears Tunis has since dismissed.
Since Saied’s speech, hundreds of migrants have been repatriated in flights organized by their embassies, but many say they fear going home and have called on the UN to organize evacuation flights to safe third countries.
Tunisia is in the throes of a long-running socio-economic crisis, with spiralling inflation and persistently high joblessness, and Tunisians themselves make up a large proportion of the migrants traveling to Italian shores.
The heavily indebted North African country is in negotiations with the International Monetary Fund for a $2-billion bailout package, but the talks have been stalled for months and there is no sign a deal is any closer.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned on Wednesday that unless they reach an agreement, “the economy risks falling off the deep end.”


Israeli group asks court to punish Netanyahu over legal plan

Israeli group asks court to punish Netanyahu over legal plan
Updated 26 March 2023

Israeli group asks court to punish Netanyahu over legal plan

Israeli group asks court to punish Netanyahu over legal plan

TEL AVIV: An Israeli good governance group on Sunday asked the country’s Supreme Court to punish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for allegedly violating a conflict of interest agreement meant to prevent him from dealing with the country’s judiciary while he is on trial for corruption.
The request by the Movement for Quality Government in Israel intensifies a brewing showdown between Netanyahu’s government and the judiciary, which it is trying to overhaul in a contentious plan that has sparked widespread opposition.
The Movement for Quality Government in Israel, a fierce opponent of the overhaul, asked the court to force Netanyahu to obey the law and sanction him either with a fine or prison time for not doing so, saying he was not above the law.
“A prime minister who doesn’t obey the court and the provisions of the law is privileged and an anarchist,” said Eliad Shraga, the head of the group, echoing language used by Netanyahu and his allies against protesting opponents of the overhaul. “The prime minister will be forced to bow his head before the law and comply with the provisions of the law.”
Netanyahu is barred by the country’s attorney general from dealing with his government’s plan to overhaul the judiciary, based on a conflict of interest agreement he is bound to, and which the Supreme Court acknowledged in a ruling over Netanyahu’s fitness to serve while on trial for corruption.
But on Thursday, after parliament passed a law making it harder to remove a sitting prime minister, Netanyahu said he was unshackled by the attorney general’s decision and vowed to wade into the crisis and “mend the rift” in the nation. That declaration prompted the attorney general, Gali Baharav-Miara, to warn that Netanyahu was breaking his conflict of interest agreement by entering the fray.
The fast-paced legal and political developments have catapulted Israel into uncharted territory and to a burgeoning constitutional crisis, said Guy Lurie, a research fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, a Jerusalem think tank.
“We are at the start of a constitutional crisis in the sense that there is a disagreement over the source of authority and legitimacy of different governing bodies,” he said.
If Netanyahu continues to intervene in the overhaul as he promised, Baharav-Miara could launch an investigation into whether he violated the conflict of interest agreement, which could lead to additional charges against him, Lurie said. He added that the uncertainty of the events made him unsure of how they were likely to unfold.
It is also unclear how the court, which is at the center of the divide surrounding the overhaul, will treat the request to sanction Netanyahu.
Netanyahu is on trial for charges of fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes in three separate affairs involving wealthy associates and powerful media moguls. He denies wrongdoing and dismisses critics who say he will try to seek an escape route from the charges through the legal overhaul.
The overhaul will give the government control over who becomes a judge and limit judicial review over government decisions and legislation. Netanyahu and his allies say the plan will restore a balance between the judicial and executive branches and rein in what they see as an interventionist court with liberal sympathies.
Critics say the plan upends Israel’s fragile system of checks and balances and pushes Israel down a path toward autocracy.
The government has pledged to pass a key part of the overhaul this week before parliament takes a month recess, but pressure has been building on Netanyahu to suspend the plan.