THULQAADA 23, 1441 AH TUESDAY, JULY 14, 2020 16 Pages Max 47º Min 31º 150 Fils Established 1961 ISSUE NO: 18181 The First Daily in the Arabian Gulf www.kuwaittimes.net Patient denied medicines Concern over Sydney cluster Wildlife reserves threatened Redskins to change name after 2 over unpaid hospital bills 7 as Aussie virus cases surge 12 in Kenya as tourists stay away 14 sponsor pressure over racism Assembly cancels session after virus cases detected Kuwait reports 614 new coronavirus cases, three deaths By B Izzak ease and called on those who attended the although the government has already session to undergo testing. Local media pledged it will pay the difference to any KUWAIT: National Assembly Speaker reported the name of MP Hamdan Al- Kuwaiti employee impacted by the meas- Marzouq Al-Ghanem said yesterday that he Azemi, who denied it and said that his tests ures. decided to cancel a regular session of the were negative. The ministry of health yes- The Assembly was to also discuss the Assembly today after the health ministry terday reported 614 new coronavirus cas- grilling filed by MP Riyadh Al-Adasani detected that a number of MPs and employ- es, of which 378 are Kuwaitis, who have against Sheetan, which is the second in ees are infected with the coronavirus. The been taking top spot for several weeks less than a month. Adasani is holding the Assembly was scheduled to convene today now. It also reported three new deaths. minister responsible for a document he and tomorrow to discuss a number of issues The Assembly was also scheduled to presented to the Cabinet calling for and debate a grilling against Finance discuss a draft law allowing private com- imposing charges and taxes on public Minister Barrak Al-Sheetan. panies affected by the coronavirus pan- services. He also accused him of pushing a Ghanem said he received a letter from demic to reduce salaries of their expat government draft law seeking to borrow health minister Sheikh Basel Al-Sabah and staff, in addition to debating a grilling some KD 20 billion, although the govern- later spoke with him, confirming that an against Finance Minister Barrak Al- ment has enough sources of finance. unspecified number of lawmakers and Sheetan. Rapporteur of the health and But even though Adasani is grilling the employees were infected with the virus. He labor committee MP Saadoun Hammad minister over the debt legislation, the declined to provide details about the said the panel added a new provision to Assembly’s financial and economic affairs names of those infected or suspected of the private sector law stating that it does panel appears headed to approve the law. being infected, adding that some of the not apply to Kuwaiti employees in the pri- Head of the panel MP Safa Al-Hashem said lawmakers and employees have to undergo vate sector. voting on the law will take place on the virus test once again. Ghanem said that The bill allows private sector companies Sunday, adding that there is no objection he took the decision to cancel the meeting to reduce salaries of their employees by for the government to raise debt, provided after consultations with the Assembly up to 50 percent, provided they do not go it can repay. She also said that the coron- office and that a new date will be set for below minimum wage. It also allows the avirus crisis has exposed government the next meeting. firms to ask their employees to take leave finances after projections show this year’s The Assembly held its last session by paying them just 30 percent of their budget deficit will be around KD 15 billion about three weeks ago. The speaker later salaries. Hammad said the provision the instead of the initially-estimated deficit of announced that one of the lawmakers was committee added exempts some 72,000 KD 7 billion. suspected of testing positive for the dis- Kuwaitis working in the private sector, Continued on Page 2 Sudan allows alcohol drinking, Virus has claimed decriminalizes leaving Islam KHARTOUM: Sudan is to allow non- government that took power after over 20,000 lives Muslims to drink alcohol for the first Bashir’s ouster, also announced that time in decades and has scrapped converting from Islam to another reli- across Mideast laws that had made leaving Islam gion would be decriminalized. “No potentially punishable by death, the one has the right to accuse any per- PARIS: The novel coronavirus pandemic has justice minister said. The raft of son or group of being an infidel... this killed more than 20,000 people across the Middle amendments comes a year after threatens the safety and security of East, half of them in Iran, according to an AFP tally Islamist dictator Omar Al-Bashir was society and leads to revenge killings,” based on official tolls. But despite having 907,736 toppled following mass protests he said. Many Muslim-majority coun- reported infections and 20,005 deaths from the against his three-decade rule. tries apply Islamic laws making leav- COVID-19 illness, the Middle East has been rela- Sudan now “allows non-Muslims to ing the faith punishable by death. tively lightly hit by the virus which has killed over consume alcohol on the condition it Bashir, who had enforced such rules half a million people across the globe. doesn’t disturb the peace and they after coming to power in an Islamist- Iran, which has been struggling to contain the don’t do so in public,” Justice Minister backed 1989 coup, was toppled by the outbreak since announcing its first cases in Nasredeen Abdulbari said in an inter- army following mass protests over the February, has reported more than 12,829 deaths OMDOURMAN, Sudan: A man walks by a mural in the Sudanese capital view Saturday evening on state televi- country’s worsening economic crisis. Khartoum’s twin city on July 8, 2020. — AFP and 257,303 infections, according to Sunday’s offi- sion. While Islamic tradition forbids the Sudan’s transitional government, cial figures. With a population of more than 80 faithful from drinking, Muslim-majority installed under a deal between protest A constitution adopted for the groups regularly condemned the top- million, Iran is the 9th worst-affected country in Sudan has a significant Christian leaders and the generals who took three-year transition period omits men- pled autocrat’s treatment of non- the world and has seen the region’s deadliest out- minority. Alcoholic drinks have been charge after Bashir’s ouster, has pur- tion of Islam as a defining characteristic Muslims, especially the Christian break. Infections in the Islamic republic have been banned since former President Jaafar sued a string of reforms including on on the rise since early May, prompting authorities of the state. Official figures say minority. Copts, Catholics, Anglicans Nimeiri introduced Islamic law in 1983, Friday criminalizing female genital muti- to make wearing masks mandatory in enclosed Christians represent only three percent and a number of other denominations public spaces. throwing bottles of whisky into the lation. Women will also no longer need a of Sudan’s 40 million inhabitants, are present in the country but Bashir’s On Sunday the country’s supreme leader Nile in the capital Khartoum. permit from male members of their fam- although Christian leaders say the real regime had driven many of them under- Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called the resurgence “tru- Abdulbari, part of an transitional ilies to travel with their children. figure is much higher. Human rights ground. — Agencies ly tragic” and urged all citizens to help rein it in. In the region covered by Iran in the north and east, Israel in the west and Yemen in the south, the other newspapers was found last week by worst-hit countries are Iraq and neighboring Melt yields old Timothee Mottin, who runs a cafe- Kuwait, regional powerhouse Saudi Arabia and restaurant, La Cabane du Cerro, war-torn Yemen. headlines: Indira perched at an altitude of 1,350 m Iraq is the second-most affected nation in the near the Chamonix skiing hub. “They Middle East with 3,055 deaths and 75,194 infec- are drying now but they are in very tions, followed by Saudi Arabia with 2,181 deaths Gandhi is PM good condition,” Mottin, 33, told AFP. and 229,480 infections. Yemen, one of the world’s “You can read them.” The modest poorest nations, has recorded 464 deaths and CHAMONIX, France: The Mont cafe is around 45 minutes by foot 1,380 infections, while Kuwait has confirmed 393 Blanc glacier in the French Alps from the Bossons glacier where the deaths and 55,508 infections. yields more and more secrets as it plane named after the Himalayan Iran also ranks as the region’s worst-affect melts - this time a clutch of newspa- peak of Kanchenjunga mysteriously country on a per-capita basis, with 153 deaths per pers with banner headlines from crashed. million - 25th worldwide - followed by Kuwait with when Indira Gandhi became India’s Mottin said he was lucky to dis- 90 deaths per million and Saudi Arabia with 63. first and so far only woman prime cover the papers when he did According to the AFP tally, the average number of minister in 1966. The copies of Indian because the ice in which they were deaths in the region is 43 per million inhabitants, newspapers the National Herald and encased for nearly six decades “had against a global average of around 70. The Middle The Economic Times were probably probably just melted”. Once the East represents around 3.5 percent of all global aboard an Air India Boeing 707 that papers have dried out, they will join a deaths, far behind Europe (one third), North crashed on the mountain on January growing collection of found items CHAMONIX, France: A picture taken on July 9, 2020 at the Bossons glacier shows America (one quarter) and Latin America and the 24, 1966, claiming 177 lives.