Sunday, July 17, 2011
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Monday, July 11, 2011
South Sudan
South Sudan, officially The Republic of South Sudan, is a country in East Africa. Its capital and largest city is Juba, located in the southern state of Central Equatoria. The landlocked country is bordered by Ethiopia to the east; Kenya to the southeast; Uganda to the south; the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the southwest; and the Central African Republic to the west; and the Republic of Sudan to the north. South Sudan includes the vast swamp region of the Sudd formed by the White Nile, locally called the Bahr al Jabal.
What is now South Sudan was part of the British and Egyptian condominium of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and became part of the Republic of Sudan when independence was achieved in 1956. Following the First Sudanese Civil War, the Southern Sudan Autonomous Region was formed in 1972 and lasted until 1983. A second Sudanese civil war soon developed and ended with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement of 2005. Later that year, southern autonomy was restored when an Autonomous Government of Southern Sudan was formed. South Sudan became an independent state on 9 July 2011 at midnight (00:00) local time following a referendum held in January 2011 in which nearly 99% of voters opted for separation from the rest of Sudan.
South Sudan has applied to join the Commonwealth of Nations, the East African Community, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank. The country was declared eligible to apply for membership in the Arab League as well. The United Nations Security Council plans to meet on 13 July 2011 to formally discuss membership for the Republic of South Sudan; and shortly thereafter, it is widely expected that the General Assembly will vote on a resolution to accept the new nation as the 193rd member state of the United Nations.
History
There is little documentation of the history of the South Sudan until the beginning of Egyptian rule in Sudan in the early 1820s and the subsequent extension of this rule into the south. Information before that time is based largely on oral history. According to these traditions, the Nilotic peoples—the Dinka, Nuer, Shilluk, and others—first entered South Sudan sometime before the 10th century. During the period from the 15th century to the 19th century, tribal migrations, largely from the area of Bahr el Ghazal, brought these peoples to their modern locations. The non-Nilotic Azande people, who entered South Sudan in the 16th century, established the region's largest state. The Azande are the third largest nationality in South Sudan. They are found in the Maridi, Yambio, and Tambura districts in the tropical rainforest belt of Western Equatoria and Western Bahr el Ghazal. In the 18th century, the Avungara people entered and quickly imposed their authority over the Azande. Avungara power remained largely unchallenged until the arrival of the British at the end of the 19th century. Geographical barriers prevented the spread of Islam to the southerners thus enabling them to retain their social and cultural heritage as well as their political and religious institutions.
John Garang de Mabior led the Sudan People's Liberation Army until his death in 2005 The Azande have had difficult relations with the neighbours, namely the Moro, Mundu, Pöjulu, and the small groups in Bahr el Ghazal, due to the expansionist policy of their King, Gbudwe, in the 18th century. The Azande fought the French and the Belgians, the Mahdist to maintain their independence. Egypt, under the rule of Khedive Isma'il Pasha, first attempted to colonise the region in the 1870s, establishing the province of Equatoria in the southern portion. Egypt's first governor was Samuel Baker, commissioned in 1869, followed by Charles George Gordon in 1874 and by Emin Pasha in 1878. The Mahdist Revolt of the 1880s destabilised the nascent province, and Equatoria ceased to exist as an Egyptian outpost in 1889. Important settlements in Equatoria included Lado, Gondokoro, Dufile and Wadelai. In 1947, British hopes to join South Sudan with Uganda were dashed by the Juba Conference, to unify North and South Sudan.
It is estimated that South Sudan region has a population of 8 million, but given the lack of a census in several decades, this estimate may be severely distorted. The economy is predominantly rural and relies chiefly on subsistence farming. In the middle of the 2000s, the economy began a transition from this rural dominance and urban areas within South Sudan have seen extensive development. The region has been negatively affected by two civil wars since Sudanese independence – the Sudanese government fought the Anyanya rebel army from 1955 to 1972 in the First Sudanese Civil War and then the Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M) in the Second Sudanese Civil War for almost twenty-one years after the founding of SPLA/M in 1983 – resulting in serious neglect, lack of infrastructural development, and major destruction and displacement. More than 2.5 million people have been killed, and more than 5 million have become externally displaced while others have been internally displaced, becoming refugees as a result of the civil war and war-related impacts.
A referendum was held from 9 to 15 January 2011 to determine if South Sudan should declare its independence from Sudan, with 98.83% of the population voting for independence. (The results for that referendum were released on 30 January 2011.) Those living in the north and expatriates living overseas also voted. This led to a formal independence on 9 July, although certain disputes still remain such as sharing of the oil revenues as an estimated 80% of the oil in the nation is secured from South Sudan, which would represent amazing economic potential for one of the world's most deprived areas. The region of Abyei still remains disputed and a separate referendum will be held in Abyei on whether they want to join North or South Sudan. The South Kordofan conflict broke out in June 2011 between the Army of Sudan and SPLA over the Nuba Mountains.
South Sudan is at war with at least seven armed groups with tens of thousands displaced. In the SPLA's attempt to disarm rebellions, they have burned scores of villages, raped hundreds of women and girls and killed an untold number of civilians.
What is now South Sudan was part of the British and Egyptian condominium of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and became part of the Republic of Sudan when independence was achieved in 1956. Following the First Sudanese Civil War, the Southern Sudan Autonomous Region was formed in 1972 and lasted until 1983. A second Sudanese civil war soon developed and ended with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement of 2005. Later that year, southern autonomy was restored when an Autonomous Government of Southern Sudan was formed. South Sudan became an independent state on 9 July 2011 at midnight (00:00) local time following a referendum held in January 2011 in which nearly 99% of voters opted for separation from the rest of Sudan.
South Sudan has applied to join the Commonwealth of Nations, the East African Community, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank. The country was declared eligible to apply for membership in the Arab League as well. The United Nations Security Council plans to meet on 13 July 2011 to formally discuss membership for the Republic of South Sudan; and shortly thereafter, it is widely expected that the General Assembly will vote on a resolution to accept the new nation as the 193rd member state of the United Nations.
History
There is little documentation of the history of the South Sudan until the beginning of Egyptian rule in Sudan in the early 1820s and the subsequent extension of this rule into the south. Information before that time is based largely on oral history. According to these traditions, the Nilotic peoples—the Dinka, Nuer, Shilluk, and others—first entered South Sudan sometime before the 10th century. During the period from the 15th century to the 19th century, tribal migrations, largely from the area of Bahr el Ghazal, brought these peoples to their modern locations. The non-Nilotic Azande people, who entered South Sudan in the 16th century, established the region's largest state. The Azande are the third largest nationality in South Sudan. They are found in the Maridi, Yambio, and Tambura districts in the tropical rainforest belt of Western Equatoria and Western Bahr el Ghazal. In the 18th century, the Avungara people entered and quickly imposed their authority over the Azande. Avungara power remained largely unchallenged until the arrival of the British at the end of the 19th century. Geographical barriers prevented the spread of Islam to the southerners thus enabling them to retain their social and cultural heritage as well as their political and religious institutions.
John Garang de Mabior led the Sudan People's Liberation Army until his death in 2005 The Azande have had difficult relations with the neighbours, namely the Moro, Mundu, Pöjulu, and the small groups in Bahr el Ghazal, due to the expansionist policy of their King, Gbudwe, in the 18th century. The Azande fought the French and the Belgians, the Mahdist to maintain their independence. Egypt, under the rule of Khedive Isma'il Pasha, first attempted to colonise the region in the 1870s, establishing the province of Equatoria in the southern portion. Egypt's first governor was Samuel Baker, commissioned in 1869, followed by Charles George Gordon in 1874 and by Emin Pasha in 1878. The Mahdist Revolt of the 1880s destabilised the nascent province, and Equatoria ceased to exist as an Egyptian outpost in 1889. Important settlements in Equatoria included Lado, Gondokoro, Dufile and Wadelai. In 1947, British hopes to join South Sudan with Uganda were dashed by the Juba Conference, to unify North and South Sudan.
It is estimated that South Sudan region has a population of 8 million, but given the lack of a census in several decades, this estimate may be severely distorted. The economy is predominantly rural and relies chiefly on subsistence farming. In the middle of the 2000s, the economy began a transition from this rural dominance and urban areas within South Sudan have seen extensive development. The region has been negatively affected by two civil wars since Sudanese independence – the Sudanese government fought the Anyanya rebel army from 1955 to 1972 in the First Sudanese Civil War and then the Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M) in the Second Sudanese Civil War for almost twenty-one years after the founding of SPLA/M in 1983 – resulting in serious neglect, lack of infrastructural development, and major destruction and displacement. More than 2.5 million people have been killed, and more than 5 million have become externally displaced while others have been internally displaced, becoming refugees as a result of the civil war and war-related impacts.
A referendum was held from 9 to 15 January 2011 to determine if South Sudan should declare its independence from Sudan, with 98.83% of the population voting for independence. (The results for that referendum were released on 30 January 2011.) Those living in the north and expatriates living overseas also voted. This led to a formal independence on 9 July, although certain disputes still remain such as sharing of the oil revenues as an estimated 80% of the oil in the nation is secured from South Sudan, which would represent amazing economic potential for one of the world's most deprived areas. The region of Abyei still remains disputed and a separate referendum will be held in Abyei on whether they want to join North or South Sudan. The South Kordofan conflict broke out in June 2011 between the Army of Sudan and SPLA over the Nuba Mountains.
South Sudan is at war with at least seven armed groups with tens of thousands displaced. In the SPLA's attempt to disarm rebellions, they have burned scores of villages, raped hundreds of women and girls and killed an untold number of civilians.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Aviation Week : Israel, U.S. Strike F-35 Technology Deal
Coutesy: http://www.aviationweek.com
Jul 1, 2011
By Alon Ben-David, Amy Butler, Robert Wall
Le Bourget, Le Bourget, Le Bourget
A major obstacle blocking Israel’s purchase of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter has been cleared, perhaps signaling that the U.S. is relaxing its hard-line approach to exporting JSF technologies that may be crucial to securing additional foreign sales.
The U.S. has been cautious about sharing sensitive technologies for the stealth fighter, but existing program partners and international competitions—such as in Japan—are increasing pressure on it to do so. The breakthrough comes as more international JSF partners near buying decisions. However, the added numbers will likely have only little impact on the debate about the F-35 unit cost, since initial procurement numbers for non-U.S. buyers are relatively small compared to the Pentagon’s purchases.
By far the most contentious fight over F-35 technology has centered on Israel, which wants to adapt the aircraft to use indigenously developed electronic warfare (EW) equipment. After strongly resisting this for some time, Washington now has agreed to allow Israeli F-35s to be rewired so that Israeli EW systems can be installed on the aircraft. That would allow Israel to gradually add indigenous EW sensors and countermeasures on its fighters once it receives its first squadron.
With that deal in hand, officials for both the Israeli air force and Lockheed Martin expect the $2.7 billion contract for the procurement of 19 or 20 F-35As will be signed by early next year.
“I believe that Israel could receive its first F-35s in late 2016,” Tom Burbage, Lockheed Martin’s general manager of the F-35 program, tells Aviation Week. A senior Israeli air force official, who until recently was concerned about delays in the program, says the schedule agreed upon is “very satisfactory.”
The Israeli air force initially presented a long list of unique and costly requirements for the JSF, but it has accepted that its first F-35s will be almost identical to those of the U.S. Air Force, with only Israeli command, control, computers, communications and intelligence (C4I) systems installed in them. The plans to add Israeli EW systems, air-to-air and air-to-ground munitions as well as an external fuel tank, were approved in principle but will be deferred in order to protect the budgetary framework and delivery schedule.
Until recently, Israel insisted that only its own EW systems would be suitable to meet the developing anti-aircraft threat in the region, such as the deployment of SA-17 and SA-22 air defense systems in Syria. But now, claims the Israeli air force official, “the F-35s we will receive will be more than ready to meet those threats.”
According to the program schedule, Israeli F-35s will be manufactured within the seventh and eighth low-rate initial production (LRIP) lot. The LRIP 5 cost is being negotiated by the Pentagon and Lockheed Martin. “Israel could still be the first international customer to receive the JSF,” says Burbage.
One issue that remains to be settled between the two countries is when Israeli air force crews will begin training on the F-35s and on whose platforms. Burbage says training could commence in 2016, but it is for the Pentagon to decide which aircraft will be made available for Israeli training.
Facing a series of tectonic shifts in the region, some perceived as threatening, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are drafting a new work plan for 2013-17. The underlying assumption of the plan is that the dramatic changes in the Middle East could turn peaceful neighbors to the country’s south, such as Egypt, and to the east, such as Jordan, more hostile to Israel. The IDF consequently aim to build a larger, more flexible force that will be capable of dealing with more than the traditional northern front of Syria and Lebanon. The Israeli air force claims to be the only service with that flexibility, and it calls for accelerating the plan to procure 75 F-35s by 2030.
In the coming years, the air force will begin decommissioning dozens of its aging fighters, such as F-16A/Bs and F-15A/Bs, and with only 20 new F-35s, its fighter fleet will reach its lowest point ever.
However, there is strong competition for funding. Israeli ground commanders argue that because of the potential threat that the giant and modern Egyptian army would be turned against Israel, it is necessary to establish an additional mechanized division, equipped with Merkava tanks and the new Namer armored personnel carrier. The production of the Merkava-based Namer was moved to General Dynamics Land Systems in the U.S. in order to enable Israel to procure them using U.S. military aid funding, the same funding source used to acquire the F-35s.
Still unclear is whether the U.S.-Israeli deal means Washington is recognizing that it needs to be more pragmatic in terms of JSF technology controls to secure international deals. Program officials do note that any foreign buyer will have the same level of stealth with which the U.S. will operate.
A key test of how much the technology transfer approach has changed will come in Japan, which recently issued a request for proposals for new fighters. Japan has specified a high degree of technology transfer and work on the program, with an expressed interest in a domestic assembly line. U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. C.D. Moore, deputy director of the JSF program, says the government is working closely with Lockheed Martin and engine provider Pratt & Whitney to put together an attractive deal. However, he also points out that Japan has ranked capabilities as the most important source selection criteria, even ahead of industrial participation and life-cycle cost.
Australia and Italy are expected to be among the next countries ready to commit to buying JSFs, likely placing their first contracts as part of next year’s LRIP 6 package. Turkey is expected to come soon after. Although the Norwegian government recently put forward a proposal to buy the first four F-35s of its larger procurement, the actual contract for that deal may not be signed for another three years.
Meanwhile, Denmark is planning a fighter competition and is expected to make a choice quickly. Pending elections in Copenhagen could even see an acceleration of the competitive time line. The F-35 would face stiff competition from the Boeing F/A-18E/F, Saab Gripen and Eurofighter Typhoon.
Photo Credit: U.S. Air Force
Jul 1, 2011
By Alon Ben-David, Amy Butler, Robert Wall
Le Bourget, Le Bourget, Le Bourget
A major obstacle blocking Israel’s purchase of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter has been cleared, perhaps signaling that the U.S. is relaxing its hard-line approach to exporting JSF technologies that may be crucial to securing additional foreign sales.
The U.S. has been cautious about sharing sensitive technologies for the stealth fighter, but existing program partners and international competitions—such as in Japan—are increasing pressure on it to do so. The breakthrough comes as more international JSF partners near buying decisions. However, the added numbers will likely have only little impact on the debate about the F-35 unit cost, since initial procurement numbers for non-U.S. buyers are relatively small compared to the Pentagon’s purchases.
By far the most contentious fight over F-35 technology has centered on Israel, which wants to adapt the aircraft to use indigenously developed electronic warfare (EW) equipment. After strongly resisting this for some time, Washington now has agreed to allow Israeli F-35s to be rewired so that Israeli EW systems can be installed on the aircraft. That would allow Israel to gradually add indigenous EW sensors and countermeasures on its fighters once it receives its first squadron.
With that deal in hand, officials for both the Israeli air force and Lockheed Martin expect the $2.7 billion contract for the procurement of 19 or 20 F-35As will be signed by early next year.
“I believe that Israel could receive its first F-35s in late 2016,” Tom Burbage, Lockheed Martin’s general manager of the F-35 program, tells Aviation Week. A senior Israeli air force official, who until recently was concerned about delays in the program, says the schedule agreed upon is “very satisfactory.”
The Israeli air force initially presented a long list of unique and costly requirements for the JSF, but it has accepted that its first F-35s will be almost identical to those of the U.S. Air Force, with only Israeli command, control, computers, communications and intelligence (C4I) systems installed in them. The plans to add Israeli EW systems, air-to-air and air-to-ground munitions as well as an external fuel tank, were approved in principle but will be deferred in order to protect the budgetary framework and delivery schedule.
Until recently, Israel insisted that only its own EW systems would be suitable to meet the developing anti-aircraft threat in the region, such as the deployment of SA-17 and SA-22 air defense systems in Syria. But now, claims the Israeli air force official, “the F-35s we will receive will be more than ready to meet those threats.”
According to the program schedule, Israeli F-35s will be manufactured within the seventh and eighth low-rate initial production (LRIP) lot. The LRIP 5 cost is being negotiated by the Pentagon and Lockheed Martin. “Israel could still be the first international customer to receive the JSF,” says Burbage.
One issue that remains to be settled between the two countries is when Israeli air force crews will begin training on the F-35s and on whose platforms. Burbage says training could commence in 2016, but it is for the Pentagon to decide which aircraft will be made available for Israeli training.
Facing a series of tectonic shifts in the region, some perceived as threatening, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are drafting a new work plan for 2013-17. The underlying assumption of the plan is that the dramatic changes in the Middle East could turn peaceful neighbors to the country’s south, such as Egypt, and to the east, such as Jordan, more hostile to Israel. The IDF consequently aim to build a larger, more flexible force that will be capable of dealing with more than the traditional northern front of Syria and Lebanon. The Israeli air force claims to be the only service with that flexibility, and it calls for accelerating the plan to procure 75 F-35s by 2030.
In the coming years, the air force will begin decommissioning dozens of its aging fighters, such as F-16A/Bs and F-15A/Bs, and with only 20 new F-35s, its fighter fleet will reach its lowest point ever.
However, there is strong competition for funding. Israeli ground commanders argue that because of the potential threat that the giant and modern Egyptian army would be turned against Israel, it is necessary to establish an additional mechanized division, equipped with Merkava tanks and the new Namer armored personnel carrier. The production of the Merkava-based Namer was moved to General Dynamics Land Systems in the U.S. in order to enable Israel to procure them using U.S. military aid funding, the same funding source used to acquire the F-35s.
Still unclear is whether the U.S.-Israeli deal means Washington is recognizing that it needs to be more pragmatic in terms of JSF technology controls to secure international deals. Program officials do note that any foreign buyer will have the same level of stealth with which the U.S. will operate.
A key test of how much the technology transfer approach has changed will come in Japan, which recently issued a request for proposals for new fighters. Japan has specified a high degree of technology transfer and work on the program, with an expressed interest in a domestic assembly line. U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. C.D. Moore, deputy director of the JSF program, says the government is working closely with Lockheed Martin and engine provider Pratt & Whitney to put together an attractive deal. However, he also points out that Japan has ranked capabilities as the most important source selection criteria, even ahead of industrial participation and life-cycle cost.
Australia and Italy are expected to be among the next countries ready to commit to buying JSFs, likely placing their first contracts as part of next year’s LRIP 6 package. Turkey is expected to come soon after. Although the Norwegian government recently put forward a proposal to buy the first four F-35s of its larger procurement, the actual contract for that deal may not be signed for another three years.
Meanwhile, Denmark is planning a fighter competition and is expected to make a choice quickly. Pending elections in Copenhagen could even see an acceleration of the competitive time line. The F-35 would face stiff competition from the Boeing F/A-18E/F, Saab Gripen and Eurofighter Typhoon.
Photo Credit: U.S. Air Force
Arab News : Expatriate tenants feel the heat of rent hikes
By FATIMA NAVEED ARAB NEWS
Published: Jul 3, 2011 21:47 Updated: Jul 3, 2011 21:47
JEDDAH: Expatriates across the Kingdom are suffering due to the steep increase in rent prices, leaving them feeling the pinch.
A large number of tenants said they are suffering at the hands of merciless landlords who increase prices according to their moods. They added that landlords’ pockets have become bottomless wells and they are driven by greed.
Pleas to authorities to pass a law to regulate price increases have fallen on deaf ears.
Currently, there is no clear law regulating hikes in rent. In Dubai, landlords cannot increase rents by more than 5 percent annually.
An interesting trend has also started to occur where landlords are buying villas, demolishing them and constructing new buildings there. They say there is more profit in leasing out apartments due to the lack of laws.
An opinion echoing among all expatriates is that landlords are only increasing prices because everyone else is doing the same.
They said not only are the rent hikes unreasonable, the landlords have adopted a “pay up or leave” policy as they know due to the shortage of houses other desperate tenants will pay up.
Suisse Group AG estimates that the Kingdom will need 2 million homes by 2014 to keep up with the demands of a population that has quadrupled over 40 years.
Expatriates who can afford rising rent prices said they have trouble finding suitable accommodation and often end up settling for something that is not only expensive, but also in poor condition.
They added that the rent increase is not in line with any pay rises they receive, putting a huge burden on them. “Nowadays, a four or five bedroom apartment is being leased at SR20,000 plus. I had to change my apartment because the landlord increased the price from SR15,000 to SR19,000,” said business development executive F. Ali, who lives in Jeddah’s Al-Faisliyah district.
“Another major problem with the rent increase is that landlords are not offering any incentives. The buildings are old and have very little or no maintenance. The price increases are being used to fill the landlord’s pockets and nothing is being done to maintain the building, so residents are losing either way,” said Ali.
L. Ansari, an expatriate doctor who lives in Alkhobar, considers a hike in rent a big issue. Being a father of three, he is especially frustrated due to the rise in school fees.
Ansari also mentioned that in Alkhobar the rent of a two bedroom apartment is at least SR20,000, making it difficult to find an affordable, decent-sized home. To cope with the rising prices, Ansari and his wife are both working.
R. Bhatti, who lives with his wife and two children in Riyadh and is employed in the private sector, is also facing a difficult time in his life due to the rent hikes.
Their rent increased from SR24,000 to SR25,000, an increase that was enough to force them to move to a smaller apartment in the same building.
The new two-bedroom apartment does not have a living room and only one bathroom, despite costing the same to rent as their previous apartment.
Bhatti’s company rent allowance is SR18,000 and the rest comes out of his pocket.
On average, his monthly rent is SR2,100, while the company allowance is SR1,500. The extra SR600 puts a strain on his finances because he only makes SR5,000 a month. He also pays SR3,000 a month for his children’s school fees. Bhatti is left with SR1,400 every month to run his house and meet expenses such as groceries, fuel and supplies. To make ends meet, both husband and wife are working.
H. Kassem is an expatriate who had expressed serious concerns on the increase in rent prices. He works as a marketing manager in the private sector.
He was living in a compound but it was demolished and all the expatriates there were asked to vacate. If they wished to return there, they were offered a place at a much higher price.
Kassem said finding a new place was extremely difficult and attributed it to the shortage of good homes available in Jeddah.
Published: Jul 3, 2011 21:47 Updated: Jul 3, 2011 21:47
JEDDAH: Expatriates across the Kingdom are suffering due to the steep increase in rent prices, leaving them feeling the pinch.
A large number of tenants said they are suffering at the hands of merciless landlords who increase prices according to their moods. They added that landlords’ pockets have become bottomless wells and they are driven by greed.
Pleas to authorities to pass a law to regulate price increases have fallen on deaf ears.
Currently, there is no clear law regulating hikes in rent. In Dubai, landlords cannot increase rents by more than 5 percent annually.
An interesting trend has also started to occur where landlords are buying villas, demolishing them and constructing new buildings there. They say there is more profit in leasing out apartments due to the lack of laws.
An opinion echoing among all expatriates is that landlords are only increasing prices because everyone else is doing the same.
They said not only are the rent hikes unreasonable, the landlords have adopted a “pay up or leave” policy as they know due to the shortage of houses other desperate tenants will pay up.
Suisse Group AG estimates that the Kingdom will need 2 million homes by 2014 to keep up with the demands of a population that has quadrupled over 40 years.
Expatriates who can afford rising rent prices said they have trouble finding suitable accommodation and often end up settling for something that is not only expensive, but also in poor condition.
They added that the rent increase is not in line with any pay rises they receive, putting a huge burden on them. “Nowadays, a four or five bedroom apartment is being leased at SR20,000 plus. I had to change my apartment because the landlord increased the price from SR15,000 to SR19,000,” said business development executive F. Ali, who lives in Jeddah’s Al-Faisliyah district.
“Another major problem with the rent increase is that landlords are not offering any incentives. The buildings are old and have very little or no maintenance. The price increases are being used to fill the landlord’s pockets and nothing is being done to maintain the building, so residents are losing either way,” said Ali.
L. Ansari, an expatriate doctor who lives in Alkhobar, considers a hike in rent a big issue. Being a father of three, he is especially frustrated due to the rise in school fees.
Ansari also mentioned that in Alkhobar the rent of a two bedroom apartment is at least SR20,000, making it difficult to find an affordable, decent-sized home. To cope with the rising prices, Ansari and his wife are both working.
R. Bhatti, who lives with his wife and two children in Riyadh and is employed in the private sector, is also facing a difficult time in his life due to the rent hikes.
Their rent increased from SR24,000 to SR25,000, an increase that was enough to force them to move to a smaller apartment in the same building.
The new two-bedroom apartment does not have a living room and only one bathroom, despite costing the same to rent as their previous apartment.
Bhatti’s company rent allowance is SR18,000 and the rest comes out of his pocket.
On average, his monthly rent is SR2,100, while the company allowance is SR1,500. The extra SR600 puts a strain on his finances because he only makes SR5,000 a month. He also pays SR3,000 a month for his children’s school fees. Bhatti is left with SR1,400 every month to run his house and meet expenses such as groceries, fuel and supplies. To make ends meet, both husband and wife are working.
H. Kassem is an expatriate who had expressed serious concerns on the increase in rent prices. He works as a marketing manager in the private sector.
He was living in a compound but it was demolished and all the expatriates there were asked to vacate. If they wished to return there, they were offered a place at a much higher price.
Kassem said finding a new place was extremely difficult and attributed it to the shortage of good homes available in Jeddah.
Arab News: Expert warns Nitaqat may trigger flight of expat funds
By IBRAHIM NAFFEE ARAB NEWS
Published: Jul 4, 2011 23:42 Updated: Jul 5, 2011 01:04
JEDDAH: A financial expert has warned of the possibility of foreign workers withdrawing their funds from Saudi banks over concerns about future job prospects in the Kingdom under the Nitaqat system.
Fearing their inability to continue working in the Kingdom, many of the estimated 8 million foreign workers may seek to transfer whatever local savings they have to their home countries. Some estimates put the amount of deposits in Saudi banks by foreign workers to be as much as SR15 billion.
Al-Riyadh newspaper reported recently that the volume of investments made by foreigners in the Kingdom’s retail sector alone amounted to SR140 billion. Nearly 80 percent of this vital sector is dominated by expatriates.
Yasin Al-Jafari, a prominent financial expert, told Arab News that most foreign workers are ignorant of the goals of the new Nitaqat program as well as the required percentage of Saudization in each sector. Under Nitaqat, companies are classified by their compliance to quotas of Saudi employees, and can have their ability to recruit or retain foreign workers curtailed for noncompliance.
“Most foreigners think that the required percentage of Saudization in various sectors is a potential threat to them. A majority of expatriates who work with the companies that come under the red category (of noncompliance) are scared. Believing that it is impossible to get their iqamas renewed, they are now transferring their banking investments and savings,” he said.
Indeed, under Nitaqat rules, companies in the red category — meaning they do not have enough Saudi employees — will not be able to renew work visas for their foreign employees following a six-month grace period.
Al-Jafri noted that a large number of foreigners with investments in business and commercial sectors have started withdrawing their investments. Their investments in the capital market alone account for between SR4 billion and SR5 billion.
Farouk Al-Khateeb, professor of economics at Jeddah’s King Abdulaziz University, said that transfer of investments by foreigners would not pose any threat to the Kingdom’s economy thanks to the vibrant policies being pursued by the government. He sees no possibility of foreigners withdrawing a bulk of their banking investments.
“There could be a withdrawal of about 15 percent of the volume of investments amounting to SR10 billion to SR15 billion. Also, there is no possibility of any foreigner selling or transferring his investments in mutual funds due to the steep fall in the value of their stocks.” he said.
According to Al-Khateeb, foreigners are now passing through a phase under which they are closely watching the situation and the state of affairs with regard to the implementation of the Nitaqat system. “For them, it is too early to decide on taking their investments out of the Kingdom,” he pointed out.
Mohaib Ali Akbar, an Indian national, said he was not sure whether he could continue for more years in the Kingdom after the implementation of the Nitaqat system.
“I am now seriously thinking of withdrawing my savings from Saudi banks and buying a house or real estate in my native place,” he said.
Mohaib, who works as administrative manager of a foreign-owned company, said that there have been unconfirmed reports and rumors about the fallout of the Nitaqat program. “But one thing is for sure: private companies would be forced to increase the percentage of Saudization and reduce the number of foreigners as the only way to come out of the red category. Hence, many of our colleagues are seriously thinking of sending their families home in preparation of facing the worst scenario,” he said.
Farouk Hamdi, who works with a contracting company in Jeddah, voiced his fear over the risk of his iqama not being renewed in view of the fact that his company is in the red category. “This situation is forcing me to withdraw the money that I have invested in the local bank over 13 years and transfer the funds to my country, Egypt,” he said.
Published: Jul 4, 2011 23:42 Updated: Jul 5, 2011 01:04
JEDDAH: A financial expert has warned of the possibility of foreign workers withdrawing their funds from Saudi banks over concerns about future job prospects in the Kingdom under the Nitaqat system.
Fearing their inability to continue working in the Kingdom, many of the estimated 8 million foreign workers may seek to transfer whatever local savings they have to their home countries. Some estimates put the amount of deposits in Saudi banks by foreign workers to be as much as SR15 billion.
Al-Riyadh newspaper reported recently that the volume of investments made by foreigners in the Kingdom’s retail sector alone amounted to SR140 billion. Nearly 80 percent of this vital sector is dominated by expatriates.
Yasin Al-Jafari, a prominent financial expert, told Arab News that most foreign workers are ignorant of the goals of the new Nitaqat program as well as the required percentage of Saudization in each sector. Under Nitaqat, companies are classified by their compliance to quotas of Saudi employees, and can have their ability to recruit or retain foreign workers curtailed for noncompliance.
“Most foreigners think that the required percentage of Saudization in various sectors is a potential threat to them. A majority of expatriates who work with the companies that come under the red category (of noncompliance) are scared. Believing that it is impossible to get their iqamas renewed, they are now transferring their banking investments and savings,” he said.
Indeed, under Nitaqat rules, companies in the red category — meaning they do not have enough Saudi employees — will not be able to renew work visas for their foreign employees following a six-month grace period.
Al-Jafri noted that a large number of foreigners with investments in business and commercial sectors have started withdrawing their investments. Their investments in the capital market alone account for between SR4 billion and SR5 billion.
Farouk Al-Khateeb, professor of economics at Jeddah’s King Abdulaziz University, said that transfer of investments by foreigners would not pose any threat to the Kingdom’s economy thanks to the vibrant policies being pursued by the government. He sees no possibility of foreigners withdrawing a bulk of their banking investments.
“There could be a withdrawal of about 15 percent of the volume of investments amounting to SR10 billion to SR15 billion. Also, there is no possibility of any foreigner selling or transferring his investments in mutual funds due to the steep fall in the value of their stocks.” he said.
According to Al-Khateeb, foreigners are now passing through a phase under which they are closely watching the situation and the state of affairs with regard to the implementation of the Nitaqat system. “For them, it is too early to decide on taking their investments out of the Kingdom,” he pointed out.
Mohaib Ali Akbar, an Indian national, said he was not sure whether he could continue for more years in the Kingdom after the implementation of the Nitaqat system.
“I am now seriously thinking of withdrawing my savings from Saudi banks and buying a house or real estate in my native place,” he said.
Mohaib, who works as administrative manager of a foreign-owned company, said that there have been unconfirmed reports and rumors about the fallout of the Nitaqat program. “But one thing is for sure: private companies would be forced to increase the percentage of Saudization and reduce the number of foreigners as the only way to come out of the red category. Hence, many of our colleagues are seriously thinking of sending their families home in preparation of facing the worst scenario,” he said.
Farouk Hamdi, who works with a contracting company in Jeddah, voiced his fear over the risk of his iqama not being renewed in view of the fact that his company is in the red category. “This situation is forcing me to withdraw the money that I have invested in the local bank over 13 years and transfer the funds to my country, Egypt,” he said.
Arab News: King wants all graduates given jobs
JEDDAH: Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah instructed the private and public sectors in the Kingdom to provide more employment opportunities to all graduates and other employment seekers.
The king also congratulated graduates of all levels of education in the country in the weekly meeting of the Council of Ministers at Al-Salam Palace in Jeddah on Monday.
In the meeting, the king called on the Arab countries that are currently passing through political disturbances to give priority to national security and stability and avoid bloodshed.
The king also welcomed the efforts of France to revive Israeli-Palestinian negotiations on the basis of the withdrawal of Israel to 1967 borders. The negotiations should begin with talks on borders of Israel with Palestine and security as a preliminary step to settle the core issues such as Jerusalem and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state under a time schedule that does not exceed one year, the Council of Ministers said.
The council also congratulated UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on his re-election, Culture and Information Minister Abdul Aziz Khoja said in a statement to the Saudi Press Agency after the Cabinet meeting.
The king also briefed the Council of Ministers on his discussions with Jordan’s King Abdallah, who visited him Sunday, and on the message he received from Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari. The king affirmed the strong relationship between Saudi Arabia and Jordan.
The council approved a new pay scale for the medical staff in the armed forces with allowances in parity with medical professionals in civilian hospitals.
The council also approved the inclusion of the director general of the Anti-Narcotic Directorate to the membership of the National Anti-Narcotic Commission.
The council authorized the minister of justice to conduct discussions with his French counterpart on a draft agreement of cooperation in the field of justice.
The council approved an amendment to a clause in the National Plan for Response in Radiation and Nuclear Emergencies for increased periodic review by the Permanent National Committee for Response in Radiation and Nuclear Emergencies at the rate of once annually in the first three years and after that once in two years.
The cabinet also approved appointments of Yusuf Al-Khozaim and Adnan Bustagi as ministers plenipotentiary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Marwan Ismail as a legal adviser at the General Secretariat of the Council of Ministers. The council also appointed Abdullah Al-Dahmesh as the secretary-general of courts in the Ministry of Justice.
Meanwhile, King Abdullah met with visiting Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah and discussed bilateral relations.
The king also congratulated graduates of all levels of education in the country in the weekly meeting of the Council of Ministers at Al-Salam Palace in Jeddah on Monday.
In the meeting, the king called on the Arab countries that are currently passing through political disturbances to give priority to national security and stability and avoid bloodshed.
The king also welcomed the efforts of France to revive Israeli-Palestinian negotiations on the basis of the withdrawal of Israel to 1967 borders. The negotiations should begin with talks on borders of Israel with Palestine and security as a preliminary step to settle the core issues such as Jerusalem and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state under a time schedule that does not exceed one year, the Council of Ministers said.
The council also congratulated UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on his re-election, Culture and Information Minister Abdul Aziz Khoja said in a statement to the Saudi Press Agency after the Cabinet meeting.
The king also briefed the Council of Ministers on his discussions with Jordan’s King Abdallah, who visited him Sunday, and on the message he received from Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari. The king affirmed the strong relationship between Saudi Arabia and Jordan.
The council approved a new pay scale for the medical staff in the armed forces with allowances in parity with medical professionals in civilian hospitals.
The council also approved the inclusion of the director general of the Anti-Narcotic Directorate to the membership of the National Anti-Narcotic Commission.
The council authorized the minister of justice to conduct discussions with his French counterpart on a draft agreement of cooperation in the field of justice.
The council approved an amendment to a clause in the National Plan for Response in Radiation and Nuclear Emergencies for increased periodic review by the Permanent National Committee for Response in Radiation and Nuclear Emergencies at the rate of once annually in the first three years and after that once in two years.
The cabinet also approved appointments of Yusuf Al-Khozaim and Adnan Bustagi as ministers plenipotentiary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Marwan Ismail as a legal adviser at the General Secretariat of the Council of Ministers. The council also appointed Abdullah Al-Dahmesh as the secretary-general of courts in the Ministry of Justice.
Meanwhile, King Abdullah met with visiting Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah and discussed bilateral relations.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Arab News : Nitaqat: Firms face Sept. 10 deadline
By MUHAMMAD AL-SULAMI ARAB NEWS
Published: Jun 20, 2011 01:15 Updated: Jun 20, 2011 01:57
JEDDAH: The Ministry of Labor has given private companies and establishments three months to comply with the Nitaqat program, which aims to improve employment opportunities for Saudis.
Ministry spokesman Hattab Al-Anazi said companies would have until Sept. 10 to ensure they are fully compliant and added labor offices would continue to provide all services to them as usual during this period.
He said companies employing nine people or less would not have to adhere to the program, but would be treated according to the directory of foreign manpower recruitment that will be published later on the Nitaqat website.
The spokesman asked private establishments to amend their data in such a way that they conform to the Nitaqat program.
He said companies should make sure their data are consistent for the benefit of recruitment offices, the Ministries of Labor and Interior and the General Organization for Social Insurance (GOSI).
The spokesman asked establishments which have not registered at the GOSI to do so. He also said all Saudi employees of the organization should be registered on the "Tameenat Online" website.
Data for the Nitaqat program can be obtained from the GOSI's database to find out the number of Saudi employees and the Ministry of Interior to find out the number of the foreign workers.
Published: Jun 20, 2011 01:15 Updated: Jun 20, 2011 01:57
JEDDAH: The Ministry of Labor has given private companies and establishments three months to comply with the Nitaqat program, which aims to improve employment opportunities for Saudis.
Ministry spokesman Hattab Al-Anazi said companies would have until Sept. 10 to ensure they are fully compliant and added labor offices would continue to provide all services to them as usual during this period.
He said companies employing nine people or less would not have to adhere to the program, but would be treated according to the directory of foreign manpower recruitment that will be published later on the Nitaqat website.
The spokesman asked private establishments to amend their data in such a way that they conform to the Nitaqat program.
He said companies should make sure their data are consistent for the benefit of recruitment offices, the Ministries of Labor and Interior and the General Organization for Social Insurance (GOSI).
The spokesman asked establishments which have not registered at the GOSI to do so. He also said all Saudi employees of the organization should be registered on the "Tameenat Online" website.
Data for the Nitaqat program can be obtained from the GOSI's database to find out the number of Saudi employees and the Ministry of Interior to find out the number of the foreign workers.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
The New York Times : 2 Top Lawyers Lost to Obama in Libya War Policy Debate
By CHARLIE SAVAGE
Published: June 17, 2011
WASHINGTON — President Obama rejected the views of top lawyers at the Pentagon and the Justice Department when he decided that he had the legal authority to continue American military participation in the air war in Libya without Congressional authorization, according to officials familiar with internal administration deliberations.
Jeh C. Johnson, the Pentagon general counsel, and Caroline D. Krass, the acting head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, had told the White House that they believed that the United States military’s activities in the NATO-led air war amounted to “hostilities.” Under the War Powers Resolution, that would have required Mr. Obama to terminate or scale back the mission after May 20.
But Mr. Obama decided instead to adopt the legal analysis of several other senior members of his legal team — including the White House counsel, Robert Bauer, and the State Department legal adviser, Harold H. Koh — who argued that the United States military’s activities fell short of “hostilities.” Under that view, Mr. Obama needed no permission from Congress to continue the mission unchanged.
Presidents have the legal authority to override the legal conclusions of the Office of Legal Counsel and to act in a manner that is contrary to its advice, but it is extraordinarily rare for that to happen. Under normal circumstances, the office’s interpretation of the law is legally binding on the executive branch.
A White House spokesman, Eric Schultz, said there had been “a full airing of views within the administration and a robust process” that led Mr. Obama to his view that the Libya campaign was not covered by a provision of the War Powers Resolution that requires presidents to halt unauthorized hostilities after 60 days.
“It should come as no surprise that there would be some disagreements, even within an administration, regarding the application of a statute that is nearly 40 years old to a unique and evolving conflict,” Mr. Schultz said. “Those disagreements are ordinary and healthy.”
Still, the disclosure that key figures on the administration’s legal team disagreed with Mr. Obama’s legal view could fuel restiveness in Congress, where lawmakers from both parties this week strongly criticized the White House’s contention that the president could continue the Libya campaign without their authorization because the campaign was not “hostilities.”
The White House unveiled its interpretation of the War Powers Resolution in a package about Libya it sent to Congress late Wednesday. On Thursday, the House speaker, John A. Boehner, Republican of Ohio, demanded to know whether the Office of Legal Counsel had agreed.
“The administration gave its opinion on the War Powers Resolution, but it didn’t answer the questions in my letter as to whether the Office of Legal Counsel agrees with them,” he said. “The White House says there are no hostilities taking place. Yet we’ve got drone attacks under way. We’re spending $10 million a day. We’re part of an effort to drop bombs on Qaddafi’s compounds. It just doesn’t pass the straight-face test, in my view, that we’re not in the midst of hostilities.”
A sticking point for some skeptics was whether any mission that included firing missiles from drone aircraft could be portrayed as not amounting to hostilities.
As the May 20 deadline approached, Mr. Johnson advocated stopping the drone strikes as a way to bolster the view that the remaining activities in support of NATO allies were not subject to the deadline, officials said. But Mr. Obama ultimately decided that there was no legal requirement to change anything about the military mission.
The administration followed an unusual process in developing its position. Traditionally, the Office of Legal Counsel solicits views from different agencies and then decides what the best interpretation of the law is. The attorney general or the president can overrule its views, but rarely do.
In this case, however, Ms. Krass was asked to submit the Office of Legal Counsel’s thoughts in a less formal way to the White House, along with the views of lawyers at other agencies. After several meetings and phone calls, the rival legal analyses were submitted to Mr. Obama, who is a constitutional lawyer, and he made the decision.
A senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk about the internal deliberations, said the process was “legitimate” because “everyone knew at the end of the day this was a decision the president had to make” and the competing views were given a full airing before Mr. Obama.
The theory Mr. Obama embraced holds that American forces have not been in “hostilities” as envisioned by the War Powers Resolution at least since early April, when NATO took over the responsibility for the no-fly zone and the United States shifted to a supporting role providing refueling assistance and surveillance — although remotely piloted American drones are still periodically firing missiles.
The administration has also emphasized that there are no troops on the ground, that Libyan forces are unable to fire at them meaningfully and that the military mission is constrained from escalating by a United Nations Security Council resolution.
That position has attracted criticism. Jack L. Goldsmith, who led the Office of Legal Counsel during the Bush administration, has written that the administration’s interpretation is “aggressive” and unpersuasive, although he also acknowledged that there was no clear answer and little chance of a definitive court ruling, so the reaction of Congress would resolve it.
Walter Dellinger, who led the Office of Legal Counsel during the Clinton administration, said that while “this is not an easy question,” Mr. Obama’s position was “both defensible and consistent with the position of previous administrations.” Still, he criticized the administration’s decision-making process.
“Decisions about the lawfulness of major presidential actions should be made by the Department of Justice, and within the department by the Office of Legal Counsel, after consultation with affected agencies,” he said. “The president always has the power of final decision.”
Other high-level Justice lawyers were also involved in the deliberations, and Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. supported Ms. Krass’s view, officials said.
Matthew Miller, a Justice Department spokesman, said, “Our views were heard, as were other views, and the president then made the decision as was appropriate for him to do.”
Published: June 17, 2011
WASHINGTON — President Obama rejected the views of top lawyers at the Pentagon and the Justice Department when he decided that he had the legal authority to continue American military participation in the air war in Libya without Congressional authorization, according to officials familiar with internal administration deliberations.
Jeh C. Johnson, the Pentagon general counsel, and Caroline D. Krass, the acting head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, had told the White House that they believed that the United States military’s activities in the NATO-led air war amounted to “hostilities.” Under the War Powers Resolution, that would have required Mr. Obama to terminate or scale back the mission after May 20.
But Mr. Obama decided instead to adopt the legal analysis of several other senior members of his legal team — including the White House counsel, Robert Bauer, and the State Department legal adviser, Harold H. Koh — who argued that the United States military’s activities fell short of “hostilities.” Under that view, Mr. Obama needed no permission from Congress to continue the mission unchanged.
Presidents have the legal authority to override the legal conclusions of the Office of Legal Counsel and to act in a manner that is contrary to its advice, but it is extraordinarily rare for that to happen. Under normal circumstances, the office’s interpretation of the law is legally binding on the executive branch.
A White House spokesman, Eric Schultz, said there had been “a full airing of views within the administration and a robust process” that led Mr. Obama to his view that the Libya campaign was not covered by a provision of the War Powers Resolution that requires presidents to halt unauthorized hostilities after 60 days.
“It should come as no surprise that there would be some disagreements, even within an administration, regarding the application of a statute that is nearly 40 years old to a unique and evolving conflict,” Mr. Schultz said. “Those disagreements are ordinary and healthy.”
Still, the disclosure that key figures on the administration’s legal team disagreed with Mr. Obama’s legal view could fuel restiveness in Congress, where lawmakers from both parties this week strongly criticized the White House’s contention that the president could continue the Libya campaign without their authorization because the campaign was not “hostilities.”
The White House unveiled its interpretation of the War Powers Resolution in a package about Libya it sent to Congress late Wednesday. On Thursday, the House speaker, John A. Boehner, Republican of Ohio, demanded to know whether the Office of Legal Counsel had agreed.
“The administration gave its opinion on the War Powers Resolution, but it didn’t answer the questions in my letter as to whether the Office of Legal Counsel agrees with them,” he said. “The White House says there are no hostilities taking place. Yet we’ve got drone attacks under way. We’re spending $10 million a day. We’re part of an effort to drop bombs on Qaddafi’s compounds. It just doesn’t pass the straight-face test, in my view, that we’re not in the midst of hostilities.”
A sticking point for some skeptics was whether any mission that included firing missiles from drone aircraft could be portrayed as not amounting to hostilities.
As the May 20 deadline approached, Mr. Johnson advocated stopping the drone strikes as a way to bolster the view that the remaining activities in support of NATO allies were not subject to the deadline, officials said. But Mr. Obama ultimately decided that there was no legal requirement to change anything about the military mission.
The administration followed an unusual process in developing its position. Traditionally, the Office of Legal Counsel solicits views from different agencies and then decides what the best interpretation of the law is. The attorney general or the president can overrule its views, but rarely do.
In this case, however, Ms. Krass was asked to submit the Office of Legal Counsel’s thoughts in a less formal way to the White House, along with the views of lawyers at other agencies. After several meetings and phone calls, the rival legal analyses were submitted to Mr. Obama, who is a constitutional lawyer, and he made the decision.
A senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk about the internal deliberations, said the process was “legitimate” because “everyone knew at the end of the day this was a decision the president had to make” and the competing views were given a full airing before Mr. Obama.
The theory Mr. Obama embraced holds that American forces have not been in “hostilities” as envisioned by the War Powers Resolution at least since early April, when NATO took over the responsibility for the no-fly zone and the United States shifted to a supporting role providing refueling assistance and surveillance — although remotely piloted American drones are still periodically firing missiles.
The administration has also emphasized that there are no troops on the ground, that Libyan forces are unable to fire at them meaningfully and that the military mission is constrained from escalating by a United Nations Security Council resolution.
That position has attracted criticism. Jack L. Goldsmith, who led the Office of Legal Counsel during the Bush administration, has written that the administration’s interpretation is “aggressive” and unpersuasive, although he also acknowledged that there was no clear answer and little chance of a definitive court ruling, so the reaction of Congress would resolve it.
Walter Dellinger, who led the Office of Legal Counsel during the Clinton administration, said that while “this is not an easy question,” Mr. Obama’s position was “both defensible and consistent with the position of previous administrations.” Still, he criticized the administration’s decision-making process.
“Decisions about the lawfulness of major presidential actions should be made by the Department of Justice, and within the department by the Office of Legal Counsel, after consultation with affected agencies,” he said. “The president always has the power of final decision.”
Other high-level Justice lawyers were also involved in the deliberations, and Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. supported Ms. Krass’s view, officials said.
Matthew Miller, a Justice Department spokesman, said, “Our views were heard, as were other views, and the president then made the decision as was appropriate for him to do.”
Arab News - Jeddah’s rapist teacher faces execution
By ARAB NEWS
Published: Jun 17, 2011 00:18 Updated: Jun 17, 2011 00:18
JEDDAH: The Court of Appeals in Makkah has filed an urgent lawsuit against a 42-year-old Saudi teacher who allegedly raped 13 young girls, sister publication Al-Eqtisadiah newspaper reported Thursday.
The newspaper quoted Sheikh Abdullah Al-Othaim, member of the Court of Appeals and former chairman of the Summary Court as saying that the criminal would be tried for spreading corruption on earth, a charge which results in a sentence of beheading, crucifixion or dismemberment if proven, according to the Qur'an.
“This is a rare and unbelievable crime in our society,” Sheikh Al-Othaim said, calling on parents to protect their daughters against such criminals.
Meanwhile, Jeddah police spokesman Brig. Misfer Al-Juaid said all evidence collected since 2009 indicated that it was the suspect who committed the rapes. He said many of the victims have identified him.
A DNA test that proved beyond doubt it was the teacher who was responsible for the attacks meant another suspect who had spent six months in custody without charge was released.
Al-Madinah daily reported the suspect, who was also in his 40s, was caught in a village near Makkah and pornographic clips and photos were found on his mobile phone.
It quoted police sources as saying that officers had started to look for other suspects in the case as a number of other rapes took place while the teacher was in prison.
The newspaper also quoted director of education in Jeddah Abdullah Al-Thaqafi as saying that they had so far not received any information or any letter from the police on the detained teacher.
“According to education department rules, he will be sacked if he is absent from his job for 15 days without providing an acceptable excuse,” he said.
Al-Thaqafi expressed the Education Ministry’s strong condemnation of the attacks and said its legal department was also monitoring developments.
Published: Jun 17, 2011 00:18 Updated: Jun 17, 2011 00:18
JEDDAH: The Court of Appeals in Makkah has filed an urgent lawsuit against a 42-year-old Saudi teacher who allegedly raped 13 young girls, sister publication Al-Eqtisadiah newspaper reported Thursday.
The newspaper quoted Sheikh Abdullah Al-Othaim, member of the Court of Appeals and former chairman of the Summary Court as saying that the criminal would be tried for spreading corruption on earth, a charge which results in a sentence of beheading, crucifixion or dismemberment if proven, according to the Qur'an.
“This is a rare and unbelievable crime in our society,” Sheikh Al-Othaim said, calling on parents to protect their daughters against such criminals.
Meanwhile, Jeddah police spokesman Brig. Misfer Al-Juaid said all evidence collected since 2009 indicated that it was the suspect who committed the rapes. He said many of the victims have identified him.
A DNA test that proved beyond doubt it was the teacher who was responsible for the attacks meant another suspect who had spent six months in custody without charge was released.
Al-Madinah daily reported the suspect, who was also in his 40s, was caught in a village near Makkah and pornographic clips and photos were found on his mobile phone.
It quoted police sources as saying that officers had started to look for other suspects in the case as a number of other rapes took place while the teacher was in prison.
The newspaper also quoted director of education in Jeddah Abdullah Al-Thaqafi as saying that they had so far not received any information or any letter from the police on the detained teacher.
“According to education department rules, he will be sacked if he is absent from his job for 15 days without providing an acceptable excuse,” he said.
Al-Thaqafi expressed the Education Ministry’s strong condemnation of the attacks and said its legal department was also monitoring developments.
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Rangers kill youth in Karachi
Extra judicial killing: Rangers kill youth in Karachi
15 Jun 2011 ... KARACHI: Rangers personnel killed a teenager near Shaheed Benazir Bhutto park within the limits of Boat Basin Karachi, Geo News reported.
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16764
Cold blooded killing of youth by Rangers13 Jun 2011 ... KARACHI: In what seems to be a repeat of the Kharotabad incident, Sindh Rangers killed an unarmed young man in Karachi and claimed that it ...
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16785
Youth shot dead by rangers was involved in crime: Malik13 Jun 2011 ... Youth killing: President orders inquiry ... Rangers kill youth in Karachi · Cold blooded killing of youth by Rangers ...
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16789
Karachi incident: President takes notice, orders ... - The News13 Jun 2011 ... ISIALAMBAD: President Asif Ali Zardari Thursday taking notice of the killing of a youth by Rangers in Karachi, ordered investigation into ...
thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16792
Youth killing: No review petition against SC order14 Jun 2011 ... ISLAMABAD: Federation would not file the review petition against the order of Supreme Court of Pakistan (SC) in Rangers youth killing case, ...
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16953
Rangers for people's security, not for killing them, PA told10 Jun 2011 ... Karachi The Sindh Assembly on Thursday condemned the killing of an unarmed youth by Rangers personnel outside the Benazir Bhutto Park in Bo ...
www.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=51664&Cat=4...
Five Rangers officials held over extra judicial killing14 Jun 2011 ... KARACHI: Police have arrested five Rangers personnel involved in killing of a youth in Karachi, Geo News reported.
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16768
PM announces to take action on Karachi incident - The NewsThe National Assembly's standing committee on interior also took notice of the killing of the youth, and has summoned DG Rangers Sindh to appear before the ...
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16783
15 Jun 2011 ... KARACHI: Rangers personnel killed a teenager near Shaheed Benazir Bhutto park within the limits of Boat Basin Karachi, Geo News reported.
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16764
Cold blooded killing of youth by Rangers13 Jun 2011 ... KARACHI: In what seems to be a repeat of the Kharotabad incident, Sindh Rangers killed an unarmed young man in Karachi and claimed that it ...
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16785
Youth shot dead by rangers was involved in crime: Malik13 Jun 2011 ... Youth killing: President orders inquiry ... Rangers kill youth in Karachi · Cold blooded killing of youth by Rangers ...
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16789
Karachi incident: President takes notice, orders ... - The News13 Jun 2011 ... ISIALAMBAD: President Asif Ali Zardari Thursday taking notice of the killing of a youth by Rangers in Karachi, ordered investigation into ...
thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16792
Youth killing: No review petition against SC order14 Jun 2011 ... ISLAMABAD: Federation would not file the review petition against the order of Supreme Court of Pakistan (SC) in Rangers youth killing case, ...
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16953
Rangers for people's security, not for killing them, PA told10 Jun 2011 ... Karachi The Sindh Assembly on Thursday condemned the killing of an unarmed youth by Rangers personnel outside the Benazir Bhutto Park in Bo ...
www.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=51664&Cat=4...
Five Rangers officials held over extra judicial killing14 Jun 2011 ... KARACHI: Police have arrested five Rangers personnel involved in killing of a youth in Karachi, Geo News reported.
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16768
PM announces to take action on Karachi incident - The NewsThe National Assembly's standing committee on interior also took notice of the killing of the youth, and has summoned DG Rangers Sindh to appear before the ...
www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=16783
The New York Times: Pakistan’s Chief of Army Fights to Keep His Job
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/16/world/asia/16pakistan.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha2
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan’s army chief, the most powerful man in the country, is fighting to save his position in the face of seething anger from top generals and junior officers since the American raid that killed Osama bin Laden, according to Pakistani officials and people who have met the chief in recent weeks.
Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who has led the army since 2007, faces such intense discontent over what is seen as his cozy relationship with the United States that a colonels’ coup, while unlikely, was not out of the question, said a well-informed Pakistani who has seen the general in recent weeks, as well as an American military official involved with Pakistan for many years.
The Pakistani Army is essentially run by consensus among 11 top commanders, known as the Corps Commanders, and almost all of them, if not all, were demanding that General Kayani get much tougher with the Americans, even edging toward a break, Pakistanis who follow the army closely said.
Washington, with its own hard line against Pakistan, had pushed General Kayani into a defensive crouch, along with his troops, and if the general was pushed out, the United States would face a more uncompromising anti-American army chief, the Pakistani said.
To repair the reputation of the army, and to ensure his own survival, General Kayani made an extraordinary tour of more than a dozen garrisons, mess halls and other institutions in the six weeks since the May 2 raid that killed Bin Laden. His goal was to rally support among his rank-and-file troops, who are almost uniformly anti-American, according to participants and people briefed on the sessions.
During a long session in late May at the National Defense University, the premier academy in Islamabad, the capital, one officer got up after General Kayani’s address and challenged his policy of cooperation with the United States. The officer asked, “If they don’t trust us, how can we trust them?” according to Shaukaut Qadri, a retired army brigadier who was briefed on the session. General Kayani essentially responded, “We can’t,” Mr. Qadri said.
In response to pressure from his troops, Pakistani and American officials said, General Kayani had already become a more obstinate partner, standing ever more firm with each high-level American delegation that has visited since the raid to try and rescue the shattered American-Pakistani relationship.
In a prominent example of the new Pakistani intransigence, The New York Times reported Tuesday that, according to American officials, Pakistan’s spy agency had arrested five Pakistani informants who helped the Central Intelligence Agency before the Bin Laden raid. The officials said one of them is a doctor who has served as a major in the Pakistani Army. In a statement on Wednesday, a Pakistani military spokesman called the story “false” and said no army officer had been detained. Over all, Pakistani and American officials said, the relationship was now more competitive and combative than cooperative.
General Kayani told the director of the C.I.A., Leon E. Panetta, during a visit here last weekend that Pakistan would not accede to his request for independent operations by the agency, Pakistani and American officials said.
A long statement after the regular monthly meeting of the 11 corps commanders last week illuminated the mounting hostility toward the United States, even as it remains the army’s biggest patron, supplying at least $2 billion a year in aid.
The statement, aimed at rebuilding support within the army and among the public, said that American training in Pakistan had only ever been minimal, and had now ended. “It needs to be clarified that the army had never accepted any training assistance from the United States except for training on the newly inducted weapons and some training assistance for the Frontier Corps only,” a reference to paramilitary troops in the northwest tribal areas, the statement said.
The statement said that the C.I.A.-run drone attacks against militants in the tribal areas “were not acceptable under any circumstances.”
Allowing the drones to continue to operate from Pakistan was “politically unsustainable,” said the well-informed Pakistani who met with General Kayani recently. As part of his survival mechanism, General Kayani could well order the Americans to stop the drone program completely, the Pakistani said.
The Pakistanis have already blocked the supply of food and water to the base used for the drones, a senior American official said, adding that they were gradually “strangling the alliance” by making things difficult for the Americans in Pakistan.
The turmoil within the Pakistani Army has engendered the lowest morale since it lost the war in 1971 against East Pakistan, now Bangladesh, army observers say. The anger and disillusionment stems from the fact that the Obama administration decided not to tell Pakistan in advance about the Bin Laden raid — and that Pakistan was then unable to detect or stop it.
That Bin Laden was living comfortably in Pakistan for years has evinced little outrage here among a population that has consistently told pollsters it is more sympathetic to Al Qaeda than to the United States.
Even a well-known pro-American commander, Lt. Gen. Tariq Khan, who spent more than a year at Central Command headquarters in Tampa, Fla., after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks had fallen in line with the new ultranationalist sentiment against the Americans, a former army officer said.
The anger at the Americans was now making it more difficult for General Kayani to motivate the army to fight against the Pakistani Taliban in what is increasingly seen as a fight on behalf of the United States, former Pakistani soldiers said.
“The feeling that they are fighting America’s war against their own people has a negative impact on the fighting efficiency,” said Javed Hussain, a former special forces officer in the Pakistani military.
Discipline has become a worry, as has an open rebellion in the middle ranks of officers, particularly as rumors circulate that some enlisted men have questioned whether General Kayani and his partner, Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, the head of the chief spy agency, the Directorate for the Inter-Services Intelligence, should remain in their jobs.
A special three-year extension General Kayani won in his position last year did not sit well among the rank and file who perceived it as having been pushed by the United States to keep its man in the top job.
“Keeping discipline in the lower ranks is a challenge,” said Mr. Qadri, the retired army brigadier.
General Kayani’s problems have been magnified by a groundswell of unprecedented criticism from the public, questioning both the army’s competence and the lavish rewards for its top brass, something that also increasingly rankles modestly paid enlisted men.
“Adding to this frustration and public pique is the lifestyle that the top brass of all the services has maintained,” Talat Hussain, a prominent journalist who generally writes favorably about the military, wrote in Monday’s edition of the English-language newspaper Dawn. “This is not a guns versus butter argument, but a contrast between the reality of the life led by the military elite at state expense and the general situation for ordinary citizens.”
Despite the resources the army soaks up — about 23 percent of Pakistan’s annual expenditures — it has appeared impotent since the May 2 raid. The infiltration three weeks later of the nation’s largest naval base by Qaeda commandos that left at least 10 security officers dead added to the sense of disarray.
According to the notes of a participant in the session at the National Defense University, General Kayani acknowledged that Pakistan had mortgaged itself to the United States. The participant declined to be identified because people at the session agreed that they would not divulge what was said.
In making the analogy to Pakistan as a mortgaged house, General Kayani said that if a person gave his house against a loan and was unable to pay back the loan, the mortgage holder would intervene, the participant said. “We are helpless,” General Kayani said, according to the person’s notes. “Can we fight America?”
By JANE PERLEZ
Published: June 15, 2011
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan’s army chief, the most powerful man in the country, is fighting to save his position in the face of seething anger from top generals and junior officers since the American raid that killed Osama bin Laden, according to Pakistani officials and people who have met the chief in recent weeks.
Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who has led the army since 2007, faces such intense discontent over what is seen as his cozy relationship with the United States that a colonels’ coup, while unlikely, was not out of the question, said a well-informed Pakistani who has seen the general in recent weeks, as well as an American military official involved with Pakistan for many years.
The Pakistani Army is essentially run by consensus among 11 top commanders, known as the Corps Commanders, and almost all of them, if not all, were demanding that General Kayani get much tougher with the Americans, even edging toward a break, Pakistanis who follow the army closely said.
Washington, with its own hard line against Pakistan, had pushed General Kayani into a defensive crouch, along with his troops, and if the general was pushed out, the United States would face a more uncompromising anti-American army chief, the Pakistani said.
To repair the reputation of the army, and to ensure his own survival, General Kayani made an extraordinary tour of more than a dozen garrisons, mess halls and other institutions in the six weeks since the May 2 raid that killed Bin Laden. His goal was to rally support among his rank-and-file troops, who are almost uniformly anti-American, according to participants and people briefed on the sessions.
During a long session in late May at the National Defense University, the premier academy in Islamabad, the capital, one officer got up after General Kayani’s address and challenged his policy of cooperation with the United States. The officer asked, “If they don’t trust us, how can we trust them?” according to Shaukaut Qadri, a retired army brigadier who was briefed on the session. General Kayani essentially responded, “We can’t,” Mr. Qadri said.
In response to pressure from his troops, Pakistani and American officials said, General Kayani had already become a more obstinate partner, standing ever more firm with each high-level American delegation that has visited since the raid to try and rescue the shattered American-Pakistani relationship.
In a prominent example of the new Pakistani intransigence, The New York Times reported Tuesday that, according to American officials, Pakistan’s spy agency had arrested five Pakistani informants who helped the Central Intelligence Agency before the Bin Laden raid. The officials said one of them is a doctor who has served as a major in the Pakistani Army. In a statement on Wednesday, a Pakistani military spokesman called the story “false” and said no army officer had been detained. Over all, Pakistani and American officials said, the relationship was now more competitive and combative than cooperative.
General Kayani told the director of the C.I.A., Leon E. Panetta, during a visit here last weekend that Pakistan would not accede to his request for independent operations by the agency, Pakistani and American officials said.
A long statement after the regular monthly meeting of the 11 corps commanders last week illuminated the mounting hostility toward the United States, even as it remains the army’s biggest patron, supplying at least $2 billion a year in aid.
The statement, aimed at rebuilding support within the army and among the public, said that American training in Pakistan had only ever been minimal, and had now ended. “It needs to be clarified that the army had never accepted any training assistance from the United States except for training on the newly inducted weapons and some training assistance for the Frontier Corps only,” a reference to paramilitary troops in the northwest tribal areas, the statement said.
The statement said that the C.I.A.-run drone attacks against militants in the tribal areas “were not acceptable under any circumstances.”
Allowing the drones to continue to operate from Pakistan was “politically unsustainable,” said the well-informed Pakistani who met with General Kayani recently. As part of his survival mechanism, General Kayani could well order the Americans to stop the drone program completely, the Pakistani said.
The Pakistanis have already blocked the supply of food and water to the base used for the drones, a senior American official said, adding that they were gradually “strangling the alliance” by making things difficult for the Americans in Pakistan.
The turmoil within the Pakistani Army has engendered the lowest morale since it lost the war in 1971 against East Pakistan, now Bangladesh, army observers say. The anger and disillusionment stems from the fact that the Obama administration decided not to tell Pakistan in advance about the Bin Laden raid — and that Pakistan was then unable to detect or stop it.
That Bin Laden was living comfortably in Pakistan for years has evinced little outrage here among a population that has consistently told pollsters it is more sympathetic to Al Qaeda than to the United States.
Even a well-known pro-American commander, Lt. Gen. Tariq Khan, who spent more than a year at Central Command headquarters in Tampa, Fla., after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks had fallen in line with the new ultranationalist sentiment against the Americans, a former army officer said.
The anger at the Americans was now making it more difficult for General Kayani to motivate the army to fight against the Pakistani Taliban in what is increasingly seen as a fight on behalf of the United States, former Pakistani soldiers said.
“The feeling that they are fighting America’s war against their own people has a negative impact on the fighting efficiency,” said Javed Hussain, a former special forces officer in the Pakistani military.
Discipline has become a worry, as has an open rebellion in the middle ranks of officers, particularly as rumors circulate that some enlisted men have questioned whether General Kayani and his partner, Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, the head of the chief spy agency, the Directorate for the Inter-Services Intelligence, should remain in their jobs.
A special three-year extension General Kayani won in his position last year did not sit well among the rank and file who perceived it as having been pushed by the United States to keep its man in the top job.
“Keeping discipline in the lower ranks is a challenge,” said Mr. Qadri, the retired army brigadier.
General Kayani’s problems have been magnified by a groundswell of unprecedented criticism from the public, questioning both the army’s competence and the lavish rewards for its top brass, something that also increasingly rankles modestly paid enlisted men.
“Adding to this frustration and public pique is the lifestyle that the top brass of all the services has maintained,” Talat Hussain, a prominent journalist who generally writes favorably about the military, wrote in Monday’s edition of the English-language newspaper Dawn. “This is not a guns versus butter argument, but a contrast between the reality of the life led by the military elite at state expense and the general situation for ordinary citizens.”
Despite the resources the army soaks up — about 23 percent of Pakistan’s annual expenditures — it has appeared impotent since the May 2 raid. The infiltration three weeks later of the nation’s largest naval base by Qaeda commandos that left at least 10 security officers dead added to the sense of disarray.
According to the notes of a participant in the session at the National Defense University, General Kayani acknowledged that Pakistan had mortgaged itself to the United States. The participant declined to be identified because people at the session agreed that they would not divulge what was said.
In making the analogy to Pakistan as a mortgaged house, General Kayani said that if a person gave his house against a loan and was unable to pay back the loan, the mortgage holder would intervene, the participant said. “We are helpless,” General Kayani said, according to the person’s notes. “Can we fight America?”
By JANE PERLEZ
Published: June 15, 2011
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
The New York Times : Pakistan Arrests C.I.A. Informants in Bin Laden Raid
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/15/world/asia/15policy.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha2
By ERIC SCHMITT and MARK MAZZETTI
Published: June 14, 2011
WASHINGTON — Pakistan’s top military spy agency has arrested some of the Pakistani informants who fed information to the Central Intelligence Agency in the months leading up to the raid that led to the death of Osama bin Laden, according to American officials.
Pakistan’s detention of five C.I.A. informants, including a Pakistani Army major who officials said copied the license plates of cars visiting Bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, in the weeks before the raid, is the latest evidence of the fractured relationship between the United States and Pakistan. It comes at a time when the Obama administration is seeking Pakistan’s support in brokering an endgame in the war in neighboring Afghanistan.
At a closed briefing last week, members of the Senate Intelligence Committee asked Michael J. Morell, the deputy C.I.A. director, to rate Pakistan’s cooperation with the United States on counterterrorism operations, on a scale of 1 to 10.
“Three,” Mr. Morell replied, according to officials familiar with the exchange.
The fate of the C.I.A. informants arrested in Pakistan is unclear, but American officials said that the C.I.A. director, Leon E. Panetta, raised the issue when he travelled to Islamabad last week to meet with Pakistani military and intelligence officers.
Some in Washington see the arrests as illustrative of the disconnect between Pakistani and American priorities at a time when they are supposed to be allies in the fight against Al Qaeda — instead of hunting down the support network that allowed Bin Laden to live comfortably for years, the Pakistani authorities are arresting those who assisted in the raid that killed the world’s most wanted man.
The Bin Laden raid and more recent attacks by militants in Pakistan have been blows to the country’s military, a revered institution in the country. Some officials and outside experts said the military is mired in its worst crisis of confidence in decades.
American officials cautioned that Mr. Morell’s comments about Pakistani support was a snapshot of the current relationship, and did not represent the administration’s overall assessment.
“We have a strong relationship with our Pakistani counterparts and work through issues when they arise,” said Marie E. Harf, a C.I.A. spokeswoman. “Director Panetta had productive meetings last week in Islamabad. It’s a crucial partnership, and we will continue to work together in the fight against Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups who threaten our country and theirs.”
Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, said in a brief telephone interview that the C.I.A. and the Pakistani spy agency “are working out mutually agreeable terms for their cooperation in fighting the menace of terrorism. It is not appropriate for us to get into the details at this stage.”
Over the past several weeks the Pakistani military has been distancing itself from American intelligence and counterterrorism operations against militant groups in Pakistan. This has angered many in Washington who believe that Bin Laden’s death has shaken Al Qaeda and that there is now an opportunity to further weaken the terrorist organization with more raids and armed drone strikes.
But in recent months, dating approximately to when a C.I.A. contractor killed two Pakistanis on a street in the eastern city of Lahore in January, American officials said that Pakistani spies from the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, known as the ISI, have been generally unwilling to carry out surveillance operations for the C.I.A. The Pakistanis have also resisted granting visas allowing American intelligence officers to operate in Pakistan, and have threatened to put greater restrictions on the drone flights.
It is the future of the drone program that is a particular worry for the C.I.A. American officials said that during his meetings in Pakistan last week, Mr. Panetta was particularly forceful about trying to get Pakistani officials to allow armed drones to fly over even wider areas in the northwest tribal regions. But the C.I.A. is already preparing for the worst: relocating some of the drones from Pakistan to a base in Afghanistan, where they can take off and fly east across the mountains and into the tribal areas, where terrorist groups find safe haven.
Another casualty of the recent tension is an ambitious Pentagon program to train Pakistani paramilitary troops to fight Al Qaeda and the Taliban in those same tribal areas. That program has ended, both American and Pakistani officials acknowledge, and the last of about 120 American military advisers have left the country.
American officials are now scrambling to find temporary jobs for about 50 Special Forces support personnel who had been helping the trainers with logistics and communications. Their visas were difficult to obtain and officials fear if these troops are sent home, Pakistan will not allow them to return.
In a sign of the growing anger on Capitol Hill, Representative Mike Rogers, a Michigan Republican who leads the House Intelligence Committee, said Tuesday that he believed elements of the ISI and the military had helped protect Bin Laden.
Mr. Rogers, who met with senior security officials in Pakistan last week, said he had no evidence that senior Pakistani military or civilian leaders were complicit in sheltering Bin Laden. And he did not offer any proof to support his assertion, saying only his accusation was based on “information that I’ve seen.”
He warned that both lawmakers and the Obama administration could end up putting more restrictions on the $2 billion in American military aid received annually by Pakistan. He also called for “benchmarks” in the relationship, including more sharing of information about militant activities in Karachi, Lahore and elsewhere and more American access to militants detained in Pakistan.
American military commanders in Afghanistan appear cautiously optimistic that they are making progress in pushing the Taliban from its strongholds in that country’s south, but many say a significant American military withdrawal can occur only if the warring sides in Afghanistan broker some kind of peace deal.
But the United States is reliant on Pakistan to apply pressure on Taliban leaders, over whom they have historically had great influence.
For now, at least, America’s relationship with Pakistan keeps getting tripped up. When he visited Pakistan, Mr. Panetta offered evidence of collusion between Pakistani security officials and the militants staging attacks in Afghanistan.
American officials said Mr. Panetta presented satellite photographs of two bomb-making factories that American spies several weeks ago had asked the ISI to raid. When Pakistani troops showed up days later, the militants were gone, causing American officials to question whether the militants had been warned by someone on the Pakistani side.
Shortly after the failed raids, the Defense Department put a hold on a $300 million payment reimbursing Pakistan for the cost of deploying more than 100,000 troops along the border with Afghanistan, two officials said. The Pentagon declined to comment on the payment, except to say it was “continuing to process several claims.”
By ERIC SCHMITT and MARK MAZZETTI
Published: June 14, 2011
WASHINGTON — Pakistan’s top military spy agency has arrested some of the Pakistani informants who fed information to the Central Intelligence Agency in the months leading up to the raid that led to the death of Osama bin Laden, according to American officials.
Pakistan’s detention of five C.I.A. informants, including a Pakistani Army major who officials said copied the license plates of cars visiting Bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, in the weeks before the raid, is the latest evidence of the fractured relationship between the United States and Pakistan. It comes at a time when the Obama administration is seeking Pakistan’s support in brokering an endgame in the war in neighboring Afghanistan.
At a closed briefing last week, members of the Senate Intelligence Committee asked Michael J. Morell, the deputy C.I.A. director, to rate Pakistan’s cooperation with the United States on counterterrorism operations, on a scale of 1 to 10.
“Three,” Mr. Morell replied, according to officials familiar with the exchange.
The fate of the C.I.A. informants arrested in Pakistan is unclear, but American officials said that the C.I.A. director, Leon E. Panetta, raised the issue when he travelled to Islamabad last week to meet with Pakistani military and intelligence officers.
Some in Washington see the arrests as illustrative of the disconnect between Pakistani and American priorities at a time when they are supposed to be allies in the fight against Al Qaeda — instead of hunting down the support network that allowed Bin Laden to live comfortably for years, the Pakistani authorities are arresting those who assisted in the raid that killed the world’s most wanted man.
The Bin Laden raid and more recent attacks by militants in Pakistan have been blows to the country’s military, a revered institution in the country. Some officials and outside experts said the military is mired in its worst crisis of confidence in decades.
American officials cautioned that Mr. Morell’s comments about Pakistani support was a snapshot of the current relationship, and did not represent the administration’s overall assessment.
“We have a strong relationship with our Pakistani counterparts and work through issues when they arise,” said Marie E. Harf, a C.I.A. spokeswoman. “Director Panetta had productive meetings last week in Islamabad. It’s a crucial partnership, and we will continue to work together in the fight against Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups who threaten our country and theirs.”
Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, said in a brief telephone interview that the C.I.A. and the Pakistani spy agency “are working out mutually agreeable terms for their cooperation in fighting the menace of terrorism. It is not appropriate for us to get into the details at this stage.”
Over the past several weeks the Pakistani military has been distancing itself from American intelligence and counterterrorism operations against militant groups in Pakistan. This has angered many in Washington who believe that Bin Laden’s death has shaken Al Qaeda and that there is now an opportunity to further weaken the terrorist organization with more raids and armed drone strikes.
But in recent months, dating approximately to when a C.I.A. contractor killed two Pakistanis on a street in the eastern city of Lahore in January, American officials said that Pakistani spies from the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, known as the ISI, have been generally unwilling to carry out surveillance operations for the C.I.A. The Pakistanis have also resisted granting visas allowing American intelligence officers to operate in Pakistan, and have threatened to put greater restrictions on the drone flights.
It is the future of the drone program that is a particular worry for the C.I.A. American officials said that during his meetings in Pakistan last week, Mr. Panetta was particularly forceful about trying to get Pakistani officials to allow armed drones to fly over even wider areas in the northwest tribal regions. But the C.I.A. is already preparing for the worst: relocating some of the drones from Pakistan to a base in Afghanistan, where they can take off and fly east across the mountains and into the tribal areas, where terrorist groups find safe haven.
Another casualty of the recent tension is an ambitious Pentagon program to train Pakistani paramilitary troops to fight Al Qaeda and the Taliban in those same tribal areas. That program has ended, both American and Pakistani officials acknowledge, and the last of about 120 American military advisers have left the country.
American officials are now scrambling to find temporary jobs for about 50 Special Forces support personnel who had been helping the trainers with logistics and communications. Their visas were difficult to obtain and officials fear if these troops are sent home, Pakistan will not allow them to return.
In a sign of the growing anger on Capitol Hill, Representative Mike Rogers, a Michigan Republican who leads the House Intelligence Committee, said Tuesday that he believed elements of the ISI and the military had helped protect Bin Laden.
Mr. Rogers, who met with senior security officials in Pakistan last week, said he had no evidence that senior Pakistani military or civilian leaders were complicit in sheltering Bin Laden. And he did not offer any proof to support his assertion, saying only his accusation was based on “information that I’ve seen.”
He warned that both lawmakers and the Obama administration could end up putting more restrictions on the $2 billion in American military aid received annually by Pakistan. He also called for “benchmarks” in the relationship, including more sharing of information about militant activities in Karachi, Lahore and elsewhere and more American access to militants detained in Pakistan.
American military commanders in Afghanistan appear cautiously optimistic that they are making progress in pushing the Taliban from its strongholds in that country’s south, but many say a significant American military withdrawal can occur only if the warring sides in Afghanistan broker some kind of peace deal.
But the United States is reliant on Pakistan to apply pressure on Taliban leaders, over whom they have historically had great influence.
For now, at least, America’s relationship with Pakistan keeps getting tripped up. When he visited Pakistan, Mr. Panetta offered evidence of collusion between Pakistani security officials and the militants staging attacks in Afghanistan.
American officials said Mr. Panetta presented satellite photographs of two bomb-making factories that American spies several weeks ago had asked the ISI to raid. When Pakistani troops showed up days later, the militants were gone, causing American officials to question whether the militants had been warned by someone on the Pakistani side.
Shortly after the failed raids, the Defense Department put a hold on a $300 million payment reimbursing Pakistan for the cost of deploying more than 100,000 troops along the border with Afghanistan, two officials said. The Pentagon declined to comment on the payment, except to say it was “continuing to process several claims.”
Arab News : New employment rules to shake up Saudi private sector
Coutesy: http://arabnews.com/economy/article454902.eceThere is a striking paradox in Saudi Arabia’s labor market. Expatriates working in the Kingdom send home more remittances than those living in any country in the world apart from the US. Yet youth unemployment among Saudi citizens is higher than every country in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) except Iraq.
Confronting a dilemma of youth joblessness that persists despite reasonable rates of economic growth, Saudi Arabia is unveiling a major overhaul of the long-ineffective plan to nationalize a private sector workforce dominated by foreigners to the tune of nine out of every 10 employees.
The private sector has been creating jobs, but they do not go to Saudis.
This month, the government will inform companies which of four categories — ‘excellent’, ‘green’, ‘yellow’ or ‘red’ — they fall under based on whether they employ enough Saudi nationals to comply with established quotas. Following a grace period, the new Saudization scheme, known as Nitaqat (or ranges in Arabic), would level severe penalties on violators and offer incentives and rewards to those firms meeting quotas.
The government’s ambitious goal: to succeed in creating 1.12 million new jobs for Saudi nationals by 2014, or 92 percent of all new jobs created, as set out in the current development plan.
The previous Saudization quota system required all sectors to have a blanket nationalization rate of 30 percent – although only a third of that was achieved.
The new system is more dynamic, applying 205 categories of quotas that vary based on the line of work and size of the company. In many cases, companies achieving more than 30 percent nationalization would be classified as “excellent”.
The state will impose a six-year cap on residency visas for expatriate workers, if their employers fail to meet quotas.
Companies falling in the ‘red’ category would be barred from renewing the work visas of their expatriate staff entirely, while ‘green’ companies will be entitled to, for the first time, recruit foreign workers freely from the other two categories and transfer their sponsorship visas without their current employer’s consent.
The initial shock of Nitaqat, if enforced with vigor, could lead numerous smaller businesses to shut down, shake already feeble foreign investor confidence in the economy, and further stall the private sector’s recovery.
Private sector growth rates have lagged in recent years well below the six percent minimum we believe is necessary to stimulate enough job creation for a population that is nearing 28 million.
In the medium- to long-term, however, Nitaqat has the potential to introduce much-needed adjustments to wages and efficiency in the private sector, so long as it is supplemented with high-quality training programs at Saudi schools and within companies.
We expect the program will succeed at improving Saudi participation in the private sector.
The private sector must evolve into Saudi Arabia’s main engine for job creation in order to relieve the burden from the state, which has frenetically created jobs for citizens to quell unemployment.
This has led to unsustainable growth in its wage bill and taken a grave toll on public sector productivity.
Beyond the Kingdom, effective implementation of Nitaqat could lead to a downturn in remittances to countries that come to rely on them heavily for foreign currency, and could prompt them to reconsider employment strategies.
Desperate times, desperate measures
Remedying the disparity between recruitment of expatriate workers and nationals in the private sector is one of the biggest challenges facing Saudi Arabia’s labor market.
When authorities conducted a census last year, they discovered that the non-Saudi population had grown more quickly than earlier estimated. Since the 1990s, the ratio of expatriates to the total population remained relatively stable, fluctuating at slightly above or below 27 percent.
But in the past five years this shifted noticeably as recruitment of expatriates intensified during an economic boom that tracked a rise in oil prices between 2003 and 2008. Since 2004, the ratio of non-Saudis to the total population rose sharply, reaching 31 percent of the 27.6 million people living in the country by the end of 2010, according to revised population data. Now, very close to one in every three Saudi residents is a foreigner.
This substantial rise in the expatriate population likely triggered alarm bells among the Kingdom’s policymakers, who had been charged with improving the employment situation for citizens. Many new jobs were created during the boom years, but more often than not they went to foreigners rather than to Saudi nationals.
According to official data, in 2009 alone almost 674,000 new jobs were created in the private sector, and another 42,189 in the public sector. Yet that year, unemployment among Saudi nationals rose to 10.5 percent from 9.8 percent in 2008.
The jump in unemployment, which we believe was more-or-less sustained in 2010, resulted from a particularly sharp increase in the incidence of joblessness among youth. In 2009, some 27.4 percent of Saudis under the age of 30 were without work, including 39.3 percent of those aged 20-24.
Due to the announcement this year that unemployment benefits will be paid for the first time, the official unemployment rate could increase this year as more individuals register their employment status.
Saudi Arabia’s youth unemployment dilemma is acute even by regional standards. International Labor Organization data show Saudi Arabia is second only to Iraq for the highest youth unemployment in the region, and has higher joblessness rates than Tunisia, Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon.
Time for a private sector shake-up
In its current five-year development plan, the government wants the number of Saudis employed by the private sector to grow 5.3 percent per year.
Of an estimated 1.22 million new jobs it estimates will be created between 2010 and 2014, some 1.12 million of them, or 92 percent, should go to Saudi nationals, according to the plan’s stated objectives.
Yet up to now the private sector has perpetuated the Kingdom’s employment quandary rather than alleviated unemployment among nationals. As many young Saudis struggled to find work, 982,420 work visas for foreigners were issued to the private sector in 2009, more than double the number granted in 2005, Ministry of Labor data show.
Data for 2010 has yet to be released, although the labor minister said in May that two million visas were granted to foreign workers in the past two years.
Some 6.21 million of a total 6.89 million private sector employees in 2009 — or nine out of every 10 — were non-Saudis, up almost 30 percent from 2006.
The trends are not surprising when pay expectations and skill level are considered. Private sector companies have greater incentives to employ foreign labor, particularly from South and Southeast Asia, because foreigners tend to demand lower wages than Saudis and are highly skilled.
As a result, there are few incentives to improve training programs.
Private sector firms have not been motivated to change the status quo because they save money due to the economy’s low-wage equilibrium and the government had not been aggressive in enforcing previous Saudization policies.
The new Nitaqat scheme could drastically alter this equation by forcing companies to hire nationals, invest more in training and increase wages if they want to stay in business.
Companies falling in the 'red' and 'yellow' categories, and hence do not employ enough Saudi nationals, will be unable to renew visas of their expatriate staff or issue new visas unless they reach compliance in the number of Saudi employees they hire.
Nitaqat assigns different nationalization rates according to the size and activity of companies - so smaller companies have smaller overall quota requirements than larger ones do.
As an example, a small company in the wholesale and retail sector wanting to attain 'green' status should have 10 percent - 26 percent nationalization, whereas a medium-sized firm needs 17 percent - 33 percent and large firm should have 24 percent - 34 percent, according to Ministry of Labor documents.
Given the skewed balance of employment in the private sector toward non-nationals, as many as 30 percent of private sector companies, mainly smaller in size, will struggle and possibly be forced to shut down as a result of the policy if it is widely enforced.
The Ministry of Labor said one out of every five companies falls in the 'red' category, while the majority are 'green'.
Red companies often have fewer than 10 percent Saudi nationals working for them, in many cases less than five percent. In the longer term, new companies will likely be founded on higher national labor content and could focus on productivity from the onset to save costs, but dependence on low skills will not change overnight.
Wrong side of the line
Companies falling in the 'red' category - those that "resist the Saudization process" - will be unable to get new licenses, renew their licenses, renew their employees' visas or hire new foreign labor.
By the end of November, companies falling in this category will have all work permit renewal services suspended.
Firms with a 'yellow' label will be able to renew work permits on the condition that employees have not spent more than six years in Saudi Arabia until February 23, 2012, but their rights to new visas and transfers ends by September 10.
By contrast, businesses that have complied with quotas will benefit from incentives.
Those falling in the "excellent" and "green" categories will be able to recruit workers from the other categories without having to obtain their employer's consent - which had been a drawback of the current system.
Talented expatriates who have been working in the country for years are key beneficiaries of the new system, by encouraging companies to compete in order to retain top talent.
The Ministry of Labor also said it intended to lift a ban on 70 professions now restricted to Saudis.
Further, 'green' companies will benefit from a streamlined visa approval process that would grant their employees visas within 10 days as the ministry moves toward decentralizing visa issuance.
If the private sector responds dynamically, there could be some much needed and welcome mergers and acquisitions that take place in order to enable smaller firms to be better able to cope with higher wages and training costs.
But small- and medium-sized enterprises have tended to be disfavored for government contracts and they may also have a harder time enforcing quotas due to their small size and inability to afford the extra costs associated with hiring nationals.
The policy could, hence, hamper the development of the SME sector if nationalization requirements provide difficult to implement. Quotas do not address the lack of incentives in private sector work for national jobseekers.
With Nitaqat, the cost of doing business in Saudi Arabia is likely to rise, although demand among Saudis may also rise if more are employed, thus providing greater overall momentum in the economy.
Confusion over the program risks shaking already weak investor confidence, potentially leading to a decline in foreign direct investment (FDI) as companies wait to see how the program will be implemented.
This would hurt the private sector's recovery and dampen the country's effort to support its most-important engine for job creation. A robust private sector growing at six percent or more each year is needed to create jobs for the Saudi population.
We expect the private sector to grow 3.7 percent this year, up from 2.7 percent in 2010, too low to have a meaningful impact on job creation. Still, a less open immigration policy and sub-optimal growth may be a necessary precondition of improving the job situation for Saudis.
Pay adjustments
Yet the benefits of the program may outweigh the short-term costs.
Compelling the private sector to move away from its reliance on cheap expatriate labor and pay higher wages is the right step longer term. Saudis will have greater incentive to invest in improving their skills to get better-paying jobs in the private sector, which would in turn enhance their buying power, and boost aggregate demand.
Currently, private sector companies do not offer as high of pay and benefits as the public sector, so Saudi nationals tend to incline toward government jobs. Some 866,774 Saudi nationals worked in government sectors in 2009, according to SAMA data, 92 percent of the total workforce.
Shorter working hours, comfortable pension schemes and higher overall pay have made the public sector the employer of choice.
But it is the private sector that needs to carry the economy and cater to the needs of the job market.
The average private sector wage in 2009 was SR3,137 for Saudi nationals — considerably below wages for many public sector jobs.
The state raised the minimum wage for a public sector job to SR3,000 this year — and the pay scales reach multiples of that based on the position and tenure.
Private sector jobs need to, over time, pay the same or more than the public sector in order to entice Saudis with higher skills and improve productivity.
Setting and enforcing minimum wages for private sector employment and limiting the working day officially to eight hours could help boost the numbers of Saudis working in private sector roles, in addition to offering them pension plans similar to those offered for the public sector.
Only part of the solution
Moving away from a blanket quota for nationalisation toward a dynamic system whereby quotas are more reasonable and most companies comply with them is a smart move by the Saudi government.
Still, forcing the private sector to be more proactive in employing Saudi nationals is only part of the solution.
The education system has been unable in the recent past to produce enough qualified graduates who are able to fill crucial jobs in the kingdom. Humanities and arts remain the single-largest majors chosen by Saudi students, accounting for 41 percent of total university graduates in 2009.
Yet what are needed are specialists in technical, engineering, science, computer science and medical programs.
The Ministry of Higher Education is working toward rectifying this skills gap, but it will take many years before the skills makeup of the population changes to suit the needs of the economy and reduce the need for foreign talent.
There is a danger, too, that Saudi nationals will be hired just to boost official employee counts, but will not be active participants in the companies they are working in. Hiring Saudis who are not productive just to have them on the payroll will simply exacerbate productivity challenges and do little to rectify longer-term job market imbalances.
The long-term goal should be to create an education system and jobs market that is able to rely on a highly skilled indigenous labor pool. But this will demand drastic shifts in cultural perceptions of work and entitlement.
One of the troubles with nationalization policies in the Gulf region has been that citizens will often take jobs, and private sector firms will invest in training them only to have them hop to new positions for higher pay at the earliest opportunity.
This mentality needs to change as it has curtailed efforts to offer on-the-job training.
The quota system should take into consideration the difficulty in recruiting citizens for certain positions.
At present, Saudis account for more than three-quarters of all management jobs, and form the majority of employees holding clerical posts as well as technicians in humanitarian fields.
They are, meanwhile, very inactive in many fields — auxiliary engineering, industrial, chemical and food industries, and sales positions.
Saudis account for only 14.2 percent of auxiliary engineering jobs, and 19 percent of positions in industrial and chemical industries, CDSI data show.
According to the 2014 plan, even in these areas the vast majority of new Interior to offer 60,000 new jobs to beef up security forces, and create almost 2,000 other jobs in market supervision and regulation.
The state's hiring strategy offers a short-term fix to the joblessness dilemma but it could complicate the success jobs should go to Saudis including, for instance, 85 percent of new jobs in auxiliary engineering.
Such expectations will likely prove to be unrealistic as it will take time before investments in changing the quality of instruction at primary and secondary education are felt in the job market.
It would be better to ease into such requirements gradually, giving the education system and community's work ethos time to adjust.
Otherwise, many companies could face higher human resources costs and lower productivity as more-qualified foreign employees are forced to shoulder the workload.
This could deter many firms from expanding in the kingdom.
Productivity problem
A key barrier facing the Nitaqat programme’s success will be the government’s policy of creating tens of thousands of new public sector jobs this year.
Saudis prefer public sector employment and, as such, private sector firms could face difficulty competing for qualified employees who would prefer civil service jobs.
This month, the King ordered 66,000 jobs created in the public sector for graduate teachers and health diploma holders, including 39,000 jobs in the education sector for women.
The King had earlier this year asked the Ministry of Interior to offer 60,000 new jobs to beef up security forces, and create almost 2,000 other jobs in market supervision and regulation.
The state’s hiring strategy offers a short-term fix to the joblessness dilemma but it could complicate the success of Nitaqat because it may hinder the private sector’s ability to recruit Saudi staff in the medium term. It also promotes inefficiency as productivity per employee will wane further.
Government sector productivity has suffered due to big employee additions without a simultaneous gain in the output of government services.
Since 2004, productivity has fallen quickly in the public sector, primarily as the state struggles to offer citizens jobs in a market that favours expatriates.
Higher productivity is essential because it contributes to better economic growth rates and acts as a sustainable engine for job creation.
Hitting remittances
Another implication of implementing Nitaqat would be the affect on outward remittance flows from the Kingdom.
In 2010, expatriate workers in the kingdom sent home SR98.2 billion ($26.2 billion) in remittances, almost double the value of remittances in 2005, initial estimates released by SAMA show.
The World Bank has ranked Saudi Arabia in second place among the world's biggest remittance-sending countries, only behind the US, which is home to a population that is roughly 11 times larger than Saudi Arabia's.
Remittances from expatriate workers offer a significant source of hard currency income for oil importing states in the Middle East and Asia, such as Pakistan, India and Egypt.
Pakistan is particularly reliant on such flows, with Saudi Arabia accounting for 25 percent of its total remittances in 2010.
Pakistani workers in the kingdom sent home $1.92 billion last year, an amount that has almost doubled in just four years. Saudi Arabia is Pakistan's second-most important source of remittances behind the UAE, and ahead of the US.
Filipino workers in the Kingdom sent home almost $1.5 billion in remittances last year - more than 50 percent of the total from Middle East countries, while remittances from the kingdom also account for almost a third of Bangladesh's total.
Egypt, which counts remittances as among its top sources of hard currency along with tourism and Suez Canal receipts, got $1 billion in remittances from Saudi Arabia in the last fiscal year, although Egypt has become much less reliant on Saudi Arabia as a source of remittances.
In the 2009-2010 fiscal year, 10.3 percent of Egypt's remittances came from the Kingdom, down from almost 17 percent five years earlier. Egypt more heavily relies on remittances from Kuwait (20.4 percent), the US (29 percent) and the UAE (17.7 percent).
While the effort to create jobs for Saudis would likely reduce reliance foreign workers in the long term, this would not necessarily lead to a rapid decline in the number of expatriates working in the country.
With oil prices around $100 a barrel, the central bank's foreign assets at record levels, and fiscal and current account balances likely to remain in surplus, the Saudi economy has the potential witness a good resurgence in private sector activity in the coming years under the right conditions.
As such, a properly functioning private sector encouraging small and medium-sized enterprises would create job opportunities for nationals while continuing to open the door for foreign talent.
This is why authorities must tread carefully with the Nitaqat program to ensure it does not wipe out small firms exhibiting potential for long-term growth. It should be balanced with adequate incentives, more streamlined rules for doing business and obtaining visas, and emphasis on quality training and instructions both in schools and in the workplace.
— John Sfakianakis is chief economist at Banque Saudi Fransi, Riyadh
Confronting a dilemma of youth joblessness that persists despite reasonable rates of economic growth, Saudi Arabia is unveiling a major overhaul of the long-ineffective plan to nationalize a private sector workforce dominated by foreigners to the tune of nine out of every 10 employees.
The private sector has been creating jobs, but they do not go to Saudis.
This month, the government will inform companies which of four categories — ‘excellent’, ‘green’, ‘yellow’ or ‘red’ — they fall under based on whether they employ enough Saudi nationals to comply with established quotas. Following a grace period, the new Saudization scheme, known as Nitaqat (or ranges in Arabic), would level severe penalties on violators and offer incentives and rewards to those firms meeting quotas.
The government’s ambitious goal: to succeed in creating 1.12 million new jobs for Saudi nationals by 2014, or 92 percent of all new jobs created, as set out in the current development plan.
The previous Saudization quota system required all sectors to have a blanket nationalization rate of 30 percent – although only a third of that was achieved.
The new system is more dynamic, applying 205 categories of quotas that vary based on the line of work and size of the company. In many cases, companies achieving more than 30 percent nationalization would be classified as “excellent”.
The state will impose a six-year cap on residency visas for expatriate workers, if their employers fail to meet quotas.
Companies falling in the ‘red’ category would be barred from renewing the work visas of their expatriate staff entirely, while ‘green’ companies will be entitled to, for the first time, recruit foreign workers freely from the other two categories and transfer their sponsorship visas without their current employer’s consent.
The initial shock of Nitaqat, if enforced with vigor, could lead numerous smaller businesses to shut down, shake already feeble foreign investor confidence in the economy, and further stall the private sector’s recovery.
Private sector growth rates have lagged in recent years well below the six percent minimum we believe is necessary to stimulate enough job creation for a population that is nearing 28 million.
In the medium- to long-term, however, Nitaqat has the potential to introduce much-needed adjustments to wages and efficiency in the private sector, so long as it is supplemented with high-quality training programs at Saudi schools and within companies.
We expect the program will succeed at improving Saudi participation in the private sector.
The private sector must evolve into Saudi Arabia’s main engine for job creation in order to relieve the burden from the state, which has frenetically created jobs for citizens to quell unemployment.
This has led to unsustainable growth in its wage bill and taken a grave toll on public sector productivity.
Beyond the Kingdom, effective implementation of Nitaqat could lead to a downturn in remittances to countries that come to rely on them heavily for foreign currency, and could prompt them to reconsider employment strategies.
Desperate times, desperate measures
Remedying the disparity between recruitment of expatriate workers and nationals in the private sector is one of the biggest challenges facing Saudi Arabia’s labor market.
When authorities conducted a census last year, they discovered that the non-Saudi population had grown more quickly than earlier estimated. Since the 1990s, the ratio of expatriates to the total population remained relatively stable, fluctuating at slightly above or below 27 percent.
But in the past five years this shifted noticeably as recruitment of expatriates intensified during an economic boom that tracked a rise in oil prices between 2003 and 2008. Since 2004, the ratio of non-Saudis to the total population rose sharply, reaching 31 percent of the 27.6 million people living in the country by the end of 2010, according to revised population data. Now, very close to one in every three Saudi residents is a foreigner.
This substantial rise in the expatriate population likely triggered alarm bells among the Kingdom’s policymakers, who had been charged with improving the employment situation for citizens. Many new jobs were created during the boom years, but more often than not they went to foreigners rather than to Saudi nationals.
According to official data, in 2009 alone almost 674,000 new jobs were created in the private sector, and another 42,189 in the public sector. Yet that year, unemployment among Saudi nationals rose to 10.5 percent from 9.8 percent in 2008.
The jump in unemployment, which we believe was more-or-less sustained in 2010, resulted from a particularly sharp increase in the incidence of joblessness among youth. In 2009, some 27.4 percent of Saudis under the age of 30 were without work, including 39.3 percent of those aged 20-24.
Due to the announcement this year that unemployment benefits will be paid for the first time, the official unemployment rate could increase this year as more individuals register their employment status.
Saudi Arabia’s youth unemployment dilemma is acute even by regional standards. International Labor Organization data show Saudi Arabia is second only to Iraq for the highest youth unemployment in the region, and has higher joblessness rates than Tunisia, Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon.
Time for a private sector shake-up
In its current five-year development plan, the government wants the number of Saudis employed by the private sector to grow 5.3 percent per year.
Of an estimated 1.22 million new jobs it estimates will be created between 2010 and 2014, some 1.12 million of them, or 92 percent, should go to Saudi nationals, according to the plan’s stated objectives.
Yet up to now the private sector has perpetuated the Kingdom’s employment quandary rather than alleviated unemployment among nationals. As many young Saudis struggled to find work, 982,420 work visas for foreigners were issued to the private sector in 2009, more than double the number granted in 2005, Ministry of Labor data show.
Data for 2010 has yet to be released, although the labor minister said in May that two million visas were granted to foreign workers in the past two years.
Some 6.21 million of a total 6.89 million private sector employees in 2009 — or nine out of every 10 — were non-Saudis, up almost 30 percent from 2006.
The trends are not surprising when pay expectations and skill level are considered. Private sector companies have greater incentives to employ foreign labor, particularly from South and Southeast Asia, because foreigners tend to demand lower wages than Saudis and are highly skilled.
As a result, there are few incentives to improve training programs.
Private sector firms have not been motivated to change the status quo because they save money due to the economy’s low-wage equilibrium and the government had not been aggressive in enforcing previous Saudization policies.
The new Nitaqat scheme could drastically alter this equation by forcing companies to hire nationals, invest more in training and increase wages if they want to stay in business.
Companies falling in the 'red' and 'yellow' categories, and hence do not employ enough Saudi nationals, will be unable to renew visas of their expatriate staff or issue new visas unless they reach compliance in the number of Saudi employees they hire.
Nitaqat assigns different nationalization rates according to the size and activity of companies - so smaller companies have smaller overall quota requirements than larger ones do.
As an example, a small company in the wholesale and retail sector wanting to attain 'green' status should have 10 percent - 26 percent nationalization, whereas a medium-sized firm needs 17 percent - 33 percent and large firm should have 24 percent - 34 percent, according to Ministry of Labor documents.
Given the skewed balance of employment in the private sector toward non-nationals, as many as 30 percent of private sector companies, mainly smaller in size, will struggle and possibly be forced to shut down as a result of the policy if it is widely enforced.
The Ministry of Labor said one out of every five companies falls in the 'red' category, while the majority are 'green'.
Red companies often have fewer than 10 percent Saudi nationals working for them, in many cases less than five percent. In the longer term, new companies will likely be founded on higher national labor content and could focus on productivity from the onset to save costs, but dependence on low skills will not change overnight.
Wrong side of the line
Companies falling in the 'red' category - those that "resist the Saudization process" - will be unable to get new licenses, renew their licenses, renew their employees' visas or hire new foreign labor.
By the end of November, companies falling in this category will have all work permit renewal services suspended.
Firms with a 'yellow' label will be able to renew work permits on the condition that employees have not spent more than six years in Saudi Arabia until February 23, 2012, but their rights to new visas and transfers ends by September 10.
By contrast, businesses that have complied with quotas will benefit from incentives.
Those falling in the "excellent" and "green" categories will be able to recruit workers from the other categories without having to obtain their employer's consent - which had been a drawback of the current system.
Talented expatriates who have been working in the country for years are key beneficiaries of the new system, by encouraging companies to compete in order to retain top talent.
The Ministry of Labor also said it intended to lift a ban on 70 professions now restricted to Saudis.
Further, 'green' companies will benefit from a streamlined visa approval process that would grant their employees visas within 10 days as the ministry moves toward decentralizing visa issuance.
If the private sector responds dynamically, there could be some much needed and welcome mergers and acquisitions that take place in order to enable smaller firms to be better able to cope with higher wages and training costs.
But small- and medium-sized enterprises have tended to be disfavored for government contracts and they may also have a harder time enforcing quotas due to their small size and inability to afford the extra costs associated with hiring nationals.
The policy could, hence, hamper the development of the SME sector if nationalization requirements provide difficult to implement. Quotas do not address the lack of incentives in private sector work for national jobseekers.
With Nitaqat, the cost of doing business in Saudi Arabia is likely to rise, although demand among Saudis may also rise if more are employed, thus providing greater overall momentum in the economy.
Confusion over the program risks shaking already weak investor confidence, potentially leading to a decline in foreign direct investment (FDI) as companies wait to see how the program will be implemented.
This would hurt the private sector's recovery and dampen the country's effort to support its most-important engine for job creation. A robust private sector growing at six percent or more each year is needed to create jobs for the Saudi population.
We expect the private sector to grow 3.7 percent this year, up from 2.7 percent in 2010, too low to have a meaningful impact on job creation. Still, a less open immigration policy and sub-optimal growth may be a necessary precondition of improving the job situation for Saudis.
Pay adjustments
Yet the benefits of the program may outweigh the short-term costs.
Compelling the private sector to move away from its reliance on cheap expatriate labor and pay higher wages is the right step longer term. Saudis will have greater incentive to invest in improving their skills to get better-paying jobs in the private sector, which would in turn enhance their buying power, and boost aggregate demand.
Currently, private sector companies do not offer as high of pay and benefits as the public sector, so Saudi nationals tend to incline toward government jobs. Some 866,774 Saudi nationals worked in government sectors in 2009, according to SAMA data, 92 percent of the total workforce.
Shorter working hours, comfortable pension schemes and higher overall pay have made the public sector the employer of choice.
But it is the private sector that needs to carry the economy and cater to the needs of the job market.
The average private sector wage in 2009 was SR3,137 for Saudi nationals — considerably below wages for many public sector jobs.
The state raised the minimum wage for a public sector job to SR3,000 this year — and the pay scales reach multiples of that based on the position and tenure.
Private sector jobs need to, over time, pay the same or more than the public sector in order to entice Saudis with higher skills and improve productivity.
Setting and enforcing minimum wages for private sector employment and limiting the working day officially to eight hours could help boost the numbers of Saudis working in private sector roles, in addition to offering them pension plans similar to those offered for the public sector.
Only part of the solution
Moving away from a blanket quota for nationalisation toward a dynamic system whereby quotas are more reasonable and most companies comply with them is a smart move by the Saudi government.
Still, forcing the private sector to be more proactive in employing Saudi nationals is only part of the solution.
The education system has been unable in the recent past to produce enough qualified graduates who are able to fill crucial jobs in the kingdom. Humanities and arts remain the single-largest majors chosen by Saudi students, accounting for 41 percent of total university graduates in 2009.
Yet what are needed are specialists in technical, engineering, science, computer science and medical programs.
The Ministry of Higher Education is working toward rectifying this skills gap, but it will take many years before the skills makeup of the population changes to suit the needs of the economy and reduce the need for foreign talent.
There is a danger, too, that Saudi nationals will be hired just to boost official employee counts, but will not be active participants in the companies they are working in. Hiring Saudis who are not productive just to have them on the payroll will simply exacerbate productivity challenges and do little to rectify longer-term job market imbalances.
The long-term goal should be to create an education system and jobs market that is able to rely on a highly skilled indigenous labor pool. But this will demand drastic shifts in cultural perceptions of work and entitlement.
One of the troubles with nationalization policies in the Gulf region has been that citizens will often take jobs, and private sector firms will invest in training them only to have them hop to new positions for higher pay at the earliest opportunity.
This mentality needs to change as it has curtailed efforts to offer on-the-job training.
The quota system should take into consideration the difficulty in recruiting citizens for certain positions.
At present, Saudis account for more than three-quarters of all management jobs, and form the majority of employees holding clerical posts as well as technicians in humanitarian fields.
They are, meanwhile, very inactive in many fields — auxiliary engineering, industrial, chemical and food industries, and sales positions.
Saudis account for only 14.2 percent of auxiliary engineering jobs, and 19 percent of positions in industrial and chemical industries, CDSI data show.
According to the 2014 plan, even in these areas the vast majority of new Interior to offer 60,000 new jobs to beef up security forces, and create almost 2,000 other jobs in market supervision and regulation.
The state's hiring strategy offers a short-term fix to the joblessness dilemma but it could complicate the success jobs should go to Saudis including, for instance, 85 percent of new jobs in auxiliary engineering.
Such expectations will likely prove to be unrealistic as it will take time before investments in changing the quality of instruction at primary and secondary education are felt in the job market.
It would be better to ease into such requirements gradually, giving the education system and community's work ethos time to adjust.
Otherwise, many companies could face higher human resources costs and lower productivity as more-qualified foreign employees are forced to shoulder the workload.
This could deter many firms from expanding in the kingdom.
Productivity problem
A key barrier facing the Nitaqat programme’s success will be the government’s policy of creating tens of thousands of new public sector jobs this year.
Saudis prefer public sector employment and, as such, private sector firms could face difficulty competing for qualified employees who would prefer civil service jobs.
This month, the King ordered 66,000 jobs created in the public sector for graduate teachers and health diploma holders, including 39,000 jobs in the education sector for women.
The King had earlier this year asked the Ministry of Interior to offer 60,000 new jobs to beef up security forces, and create almost 2,000 other jobs in market supervision and regulation.
The state’s hiring strategy offers a short-term fix to the joblessness dilemma but it could complicate the success of Nitaqat because it may hinder the private sector’s ability to recruit Saudi staff in the medium term. It also promotes inefficiency as productivity per employee will wane further.
Government sector productivity has suffered due to big employee additions without a simultaneous gain in the output of government services.
Since 2004, productivity has fallen quickly in the public sector, primarily as the state struggles to offer citizens jobs in a market that favours expatriates.
Higher productivity is essential because it contributes to better economic growth rates and acts as a sustainable engine for job creation.
Hitting remittances
Another implication of implementing Nitaqat would be the affect on outward remittance flows from the Kingdom.
In 2010, expatriate workers in the kingdom sent home SR98.2 billion ($26.2 billion) in remittances, almost double the value of remittances in 2005, initial estimates released by SAMA show.
The World Bank has ranked Saudi Arabia in second place among the world's biggest remittance-sending countries, only behind the US, which is home to a population that is roughly 11 times larger than Saudi Arabia's.
Remittances from expatriate workers offer a significant source of hard currency income for oil importing states in the Middle East and Asia, such as Pakistan, India and Egypt.
Pakistan is particularly reliant on such flows, with Saudi Arabia accounting for 25 percent of its total remittances in 2010.
Pakistani workers in the kingdom sent home $1.92 billion last year, an amount that has almost doubled in just four years. Saudi Arabia is Pakistan's second-most important source of remittances behind the UAE, and ahead of the US.
Filipino workers in the Kingdom sent home almost $1.5 billion in remittances last year - more than 50 percent of the total from Middle East countries, while remittances from the kingdom also account for almost a third of Bangladesh's total.
Egypt, which counts remittances as among its top sources of hard currency along with tourism and Suez Canal receipts, got $1 billion in remittances from Saudi Arabia in the last fiscal year, although Egypt has become much less reliant on Saudi Arabia as a source of remittances.
In the 2009-2010 fiscal year, 10.3 percent of Egypt's remittances came from the Kingdom, down from almost 17 percent five years earlier. Egypt more heavily relies on remittances from Kuwait (20.4 percent), the US (29 percent) and the UAE (17.7 percent).
While the effort to create jobs for Saudis would likely reduce reliance foreign workers in the long term, this would not necessarily lead to a rapid decline in the number of expatriates working in the country.
With oil prices around $100 a barrel, the central bank's foreign assets at record levels, and fiscal and current account balances likely to remain in surplus, the Saudi economy has the potential witness a good resurgence in private sector activity in the coming years under the right conditions.
As such, a properly functioning private sector encouraging small and medium-sized enterprises would create job opportunities for nationals while continuing to open the door for foreign talent.
This is why authorities must tread carefully with the Nitaqat program to ensure it does not wipe out small firms exhibiting potential for long-term growth. It should be balanced with adequate incentives, more streamlined rules for doing business and obtaining visas, and emphasis on quality training and instructions both in schools and in the workplace.
— John Sfakianakis is chief economist at Banque Saudi Fransi, Riyadh
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