Law Regulating Internet Media Comes Into Effect
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N IO T IP R C S B U S MONDAY, JULY 25, 2016 SHAWWAL 20, 1437 AH www.kuwaittimes.net National strategy 15-hour mega Rio-bound Froome underway to jam in UK as Indian wrestler cements Tour combat social, France ups Yadav fails great status youth challenges4 border checks7 doping16 test with18 third title Law regulating Internet Min 32º Max 45º media comes into effect High Tide 03:35 & 15: 05 Low Tide Court to hear mosque demolition lawsuit 09:29& 22:01 40 PAGES 40 16942 NO: FILS 150 By B Izzak KUWAIT: A new law regulating all Web-based publica- tions including electronic news services, bulletins, web- sites of newspapers and televisions and alike came into effect yesterday after its bylaws were published in the official gazette. Information Minister Sheikh Salman Al- Humoud Al-Sabah said the law is foe professional online media in a bid to preserve Kuwaiti traditions and count- er extremist ideology. The minister urged all those running online news services to register on the ministry website to obtain the necessary license to operate in the country. Under the legislation, all these services must obtain a license from the government before they can operate. Those in existence have one year to comply with the law. Violations committed by these services will be looked in court under the press and publications law, which stipu- lates hefty jail terms for several offences. During its debate in the Assembly in January this year, the minister insisted the law is aimed at regulating BERCHTESGADEN, Austria: HH the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al- electronic media and it will not apply to personal Sabah receives at his residence in this Austrian city Qatari Father Amir Sheikh accounts, like those of bloggers. Under the law, the Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani and Sheikh Ju’an bin Hamad Al-Thani yesterday. owner and director of all online services must be They discussed brotherly relations between the Al-Sabah and Al-Thani families, Kuwaiti. Violations can be penalized by jail terms of up as well as people of Qatar and Kuwait. The Amir later held a dinner banquet in to 10 years if these services call for the overthrow of the KUWAIT: Minister of Information and Minister of State for Youth Affairs Sheikh honor of Sheikh Hamad and the delegation accompanying him. — KUNA country’s regime. Salman Sabah Al-Salem Al-Humoud Al-Sabah tours the electronic publishing Continued on Page 13 department yesterday. — KUNA (See Page 4) Turkish parties rally together ISTANBUL: Tens of thousands of support- Kemal Kilicdaroglu. “This is a day to unite, ers of Turkey’s ruling and main opposi- a day to stand up against coups and dic- tion parties, usually bitter foes, rallied tatorial regimes, a day to let the voice of together yesterday in support of democ- the people be heard,” he said at the rally, racy following a failed military coup as organized by his secularist opposition Saudis visit President Tayyip Erdogan tightens his CHP but also backed by the ruling grip on the country. Demonstrators held Islamist-rooted AK Party and by other Israel, meet a cross-party “Republic and Democracy” opposition groups. “We are all together in rally in Istanbul’s central Taksim Square in Taksim today. Today is a day we made his- a spirit of unity following the failed coup, tory all together.” Prime Minister Binali govt official in which at least 246 people were killed Yildirim tweeted that “this country’s Turks, JERUSALEM: The head of a rare Saudi delegation to and more than 2,000 injured. Kurds, Alevis” and supporters of the major Israel and the occupied West Bank met a senior Israeli In a rare move, pro-government chan- opposition parties “united together and government official during his trip, Israel’s foreign nels broadcast a live speech from the gave the lesson needed to the putschists”. ministry told AFP yesterday. Foreign Ministry podium by main opposition leader Continued on Page 13 spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon said the meeting between retired Saudi general Anwar Eshki and min- istry Director General Dore Gold took place at the prestigious King David hotel in west Jerusalem but ALEPPO: A Syrian man holds the body of his child after it was retrieved from under did not give further details. the rubble of destroyed buildings following an air strike on the rebel-held neigh- The Jerusalem Post newspaper said Eshki led a borhood of Marjah in this northern city yesterday.— AFP delegation of “businessmen and academics” on a mission to promote a stalled Saudi-led 2002 Arab peace initiative. It said that he met Major General Yoav Mordechai, head of the military body that coor- Air strikes hit four dinates Israeli activities in the West Bank and Gaza, and talked Friday in the West Bank to a group of Israeli opposition MPs. hospitals in Aleppo Israel and Saudi Arabia have never had diplomatic BEIRUT: Air raids have hit four makeshift Organization, Syria was the most dan- relations but there have been media reports of intelli- hospitals in Syria’s battered Aleppo city, gerous place for health workers in 2015, gence-sharing in the face of shared concerns about doctors said yesterday, jeopardizing with 135 attacks on health facilities and Iran and the Islamic State group. Eshki and Gold medical care for more than 200,000 des- workers. An AFP journalist in eastern shared a platform in June last year at the Washington perate civilians in rebel-held areas. The Aleppo said heavy air strikes resumed headquarters of the Council on Foreign Relations and bombardment since Saturday has wors- after a brief pause. The Syrian “met to discuss opportunities and challenges in the ened the plight of residents of besieged Observatory for Human Rights said at Middle East,” the council said on its website at the eastern neighborhoods of Syria’s second least five civilians including a child were time. “Their speeches focused on the danger Iran city, where food and medical supplies killed in Sunday air raids. posed to their countries, and they revealed that they are becoming increasingly scarce. The According to the IDA, five hospitals had been in secret discussions for a year, and had hospitals, as well as a blood bank that are left operating in eastern Aleppo, ISTANBUL: People wave Turkish flags and portraits of modern Turkey’s founding Continued on Page 13 was hit, are in the Al-Shaar neighbor- devastated by a regime siege since earli- father Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, during a rally yesterday in Taksim Square. — AFP hood, said the Independent Doctor’s er this month. “Besiegement and the Association, a group that supports clin- decimation of health care constitute war ics in Aleppo. crimes. We demand an immediate end Iran destroys 100,000 satellite dishes It said a two-day-old baby was killed to and accountability for the collective TEHRAN: Iran destroyed 100,000 satellite dishes in the children’s hospital when his oxy- punishment the city faces,” the group and receivers yesterday as part of a widespread gen supply was cut in a raid early on said. Marianne Gasser, head of the crackdown against the illegal devices that author- Sunday. It was the second strike on the International Committee of the Red ities say are morally damaging, a news website same hospital in about nine hours, the Cross in Syria, said the hospital strikes reported. The destruction ceremony took place in IDA said. “After the second strike, we had filled her with “overwhelming despair”. “I Tehran in the presence of General Mohammad to move him (the baby) downstairs to think about the people who died, and Reza Naghdi, head of Iran’s Basij militia, who the bomb shelter, and that’s why he keep dying, again and again. I think warned of the impact that satellite television was died,” said Malika, the hospital’s head about the patients and their families. I having in the conservative country. “The truth is nurse. “The hospital is severely damaged feel for the doctors who want to help that most satellite channels... deviate the society’s and it’s not the first time,” she said, in but can’t anymore,” she said. morality and culture,” he said at the event accord- online conversations with IDA represen- Syria’s conflict erupted in March 2011 ing to Basij News. “What these televisions really tatives seen by AFP. with anti-government protests but has achieve is increased divorce, addiction and inse- Footage posted by the IDA of the since morphed into a complex multi- curity in society.” strike’s aftermath showed agitated doc- front war. At least 280,000 people have Naghdi added that a total of one million tors carrying a tiny baby in a room lined been killed and more than half the pop- Iranians had already voluntarily handed over their with incubators, with sandbags piled ulation have been forced to flee their satellite apparatuses to authorities. Under Iranian high outside the entrance. All four hos- homes, as world powers are increasingly law, satellite equipment is banned and those who TEHRAN: Satellite dishes and receivers are piled before being destroyed during a ceremony pitals and the blood bank were out of drawn into the conflict. distribute, use, or repair them can be fined up to in the Iranian capital yesterday.— AFP service yesterday, the city’s opposition- Repeated attempts, particularly by the $2,800. Iranian police regularly raid neighborhoods Jannati’s comments and said those in charge of eign-based Farsi satellite channels broadcasting run “health directorate” said in a state- United States and regime ally Russia, at and confiscate dishes from rooftops.