Riyadh Vows OPEC Won't Cut Output Even at $20 a Barrel
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SUBSCRIPTION WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 24, 2014 RABI ALAWWAL 2, 1436 AH www.kuwaittimes.net Delay in N Korea’s Torture leaves Spot-on GCC rail Internet long-term Napoli beat tied to route collapses after psychological Juventus to land grab?5 Sony27 hack scars29 Super19 Cup Riyadh vows OPEC won’t cut Min 06º Max 19º output even at $20 a barrel High Tide 00:08 & 14:16 Low Tide Cartel loathe to lose business Gulf can ‘hold out’ 07:47 & 19:37 40 PAGES NO: 16382 150 FILS • RIYADH: OPEC will not cut oil production even if the price drops to $20 a barrel and it is unfair to expect the cartel to reduce output if non-members do not, Saudi France ups security after attacks Arabia said. “Whether it goes down to $20 a barrel, $40, $50, $60, it is irrelevant,” the kingdom’s Oil Minister Ali Al- PARIS: French Prime Minister Manuel Valls stepped up Naimi said in an interview with the Middle East Economic security nationwide yesterday following three successive, Survey (MEES), an industry weekly. In unusually detailed apparently unrelated attacks that left one man dead, in a comments, Naimi defended a decision by the bid to ease growing unease in the country. While the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, motives behind the incidents- a knife attack on police whose lead producer is Saudi Arabia, last month to main- and two car rampages onto passers-by - remain unclear, tain a production ceiling of 30 million barrels per day. the violence has jarred nerves after repeated jihadist calls The decision sent global crude prices tumbling, wors- for “lone wolf” action in France over its fight against ening a price drop that has seen them fall by around 50 Islamic extremism. Valls stressed that the three incidents percent since June. Slower were “distinct”, urging the French to keep calm while demand growth and a stressing security would be heightened. “Two hundred to stronger dollar have also con- 300 extra soldiers will be deployed in the coming hours” tributed to the slump. Saudi on top of 780 forces already mobilised, he said live on tel- Arabia has traditionally acted evision. to balance demand and sup- Security patrols will also be increased in shopping ply in the global oil market areas, city centres, stations and on public transport, he because it is the only country added. The violence began on Saturday when a man was with substantial spare pro- shot dead after attempting to enter a police station in the duction capacity, according central town of Joue-les-Tours while shouting “Allahu to the International Monetary Ali Al-Naimi Akbar” and attacking three officers with a knife, two of Fund. The kingdom pumps about 9.6 million barrels per whom were seriously injured. Then on Sunday evening, a day but Naimi said it is “crooked logic” to expect his coun- driver ploughed into pedestrians in Dijon in the east, try to cut and then lose business to other major produc- injuring 13 people and also shouting the same Islamic ers outside OPEC. phrase which means “God is Greatest” and has in the past The increasingly competitive global oil market has been used by extremists when waging violent attacks. NANTES: Municipal police patrol the Christmas market in this western French city yesterday, a day after a seen daily United States output rise by more than 40 per- Continued on Page 13 man rammed into shoppers with his car. — AFP cent since 2006, but at a production cost which can be Continued on Page 13 Fadhl calls for scrapping restrictions on concerts Tameemi: Apply environment law By B Izzak win the approval of religious groups. Sheikh Salman Al-Humoud Al-Sabah He said the restrictions have to take a “brave decision to bring KUWAIT: MP Nabil Al-Fadhl yester- proved to be a complete failure and back happiness into the country”, day called on the information minis- led to a number of negative phenom- adding that he will send a number of ter to scrap restrictions on musical ena including encouraging people to questions on the issue to the minis- concerts and parties in the country, leave the country on holidays, assist- ter. Fadhl, an independent lawmaker imposed under pressure by Islamist ed the spread of extremism among with liberal-secular views, said on MPs a decade ago. The lawmaker said youth and others. Fadhl said that the Monday he has submitted a petition that the restrictions or the so-called conditions that forced the govern- to the constitutional court challeng- regulations for concerts were issued ment to accept those restrictions no ing an article in the constitution that in 2004 after Islamist MPs threatened longer exist and accordingly, there is prevents granting Kuwaiti citizenship to grill the then information minister, no reason for the restrictions to con- to non-Muslims, saying it was his gift adding that the guidelines were tinue. to “our Christian brothers”. issued to protect the minister and to He called on Information Minister Continued on Page 13 SANTIAGO: A billboard advertises the Turkish soap opera “El Sultan” in the Chilean capital. — AFP Turkish soaps invading Latin America, land of ‘telenovela’ SANTIAGO: The tortured romance between Sehrazat Chilean channel Mega was a struggling network and Onur, the central drama of Turkish soap opera when it bought “Thousand and One Nights” after the “Thousand and One Nights,” is taking Chilean television program was turned down by Canal 13, one of the by storm and reshaping prime time in Latin America, country’s leading broadcasters. The series began airing the land of the “telenovela”. In exchange for the money in March and soon became the most-viewed show of she desperately needs to treat her son’s leukemia, the year, pulling the rest of Mega’s programming by its Sehrazat, a widowed architect, reluctantly agrees to coattails. The channel now has the top news show and spend the night with Onur, her powerful boss, who falls morning program, as well, and is the only Chilean net- hopelessly in love with her, setting off a torrid chain work on track to turn a profit in 2014. That success has reaction that has captivated Chileans for months. sent other Chilean broadcasters scrambling to buy their Dubbed in Spanish by Chilean actors, “Thousand and own Turkish series, including Canal 13. Mega has mean- One Nights” has achieved an audience share not seen in while signed up two more Turkish shows, “What is years in the South American country, reversing the sink- Fatmagul’s Fault?” and “Ezel”. ing fortunes of the channel airing it. The phenomenon Other Latin American networks have taken note. has caused TV executives across Latin America to start Sehrazat and Onur are now playing out their burning importing Turkish series to a region more used to romance in Colombia and set to premier in Uruguay, exporting its own telenovelas - prime-time soap operas Brazil, Ecuador and Peru. such as “Ugly Betty” - around the world. Continued on Page 13 p3.e$S_Layout 1 12/23/14 8:47 PM Page 1 LOCAL WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 24, 2014 Expats caught off guard by visa fines KUWAIT: Many expats were caught by surprise when they went Maj Gen Sheikh Mazen Al-Jarrah said the foreigners’ residency to immigration offices and found they owed a large amount of law will be implemented in its entirety, particularly article 15 money, exceeding KD 1,000 in some cases. Interior Ministry that links the validity of the visa with the validity of the passport. Assistant Undersecretary for Nationality and Residence Affairs Jarrah said the department began implementation of the law by linking the computer sys- tems at all visa affairs depart- ments with passport data, adding that the lack of imple- mentation of the law in the past is no justification for con- tinuing this, because Kuwait is not a “baqala”, and all should operate with a state mentality. Jarrah said the implementa- tion of the law created confu- sion, as many considered it a new decision issued by the Interior Ministry, and are attempting to find reasons for not implementing it although it is a law, and “we cannot take it easy in this regard”. The visa affairs department witnessed chaos Monday as many peo- ple were surprised to find accumulated fines against them for violations as a result of not informing the depart- ment about renewing their passports. “Linking the activa- tion of the law with the com- puter system revealed many expats whose passports regis- tered in the system had expired, while their visas are valid. He said that a two- month grace period was given to update the data, then fines will be calculated at the rate of KD 2 per day,” Jarrah said. About granting violators a grace period to correct their status, Jarrah said that there are nearly 100,000 visa law violators in Kuwait, adding that grace periods were given since 2006, but the majority did not take advantage of it, “so it is not worth giving them a new grace period”. As for Syrian expats, especially that renewal of their passports takes a long time, Jarrah said a study is ongoing about how to deal with them. He said Syrians in Kuwait have special considerations because of the difficult situation in their country. He said the Syrian embassy may be re-opened soon, according to the foreign ministry. —Al-Rai WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 24, 2014 LOCAL KHRS: E-publishing draft law unconstitutional Crime By Faten Omar Crime Report KUWAIT: The Kuwait Society for Report Human Rights organized a seminar on Monday to discuss the draft of a new law that would regulate electronic Cops arrested for drug ‘VIP’ drug publishing, websites, blogs and social media in Kuwait.