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ISO 9001:2008 CERTIFIED NEWSPAPER Home | 3 Business | 14 Sport | 22 Prices of Crude oil fell Lekhwiya gear foodstuff and about 2pc on up for new QSL vegetables up Greek woes and season under during Ramadan. weaker market. new coach. SATURDAY 20 JUNE 2015 • 3 Ramadan 1436 • Volume 20 Number 6467 www.thepeninsulaqatar.com [email protected] | [email protected] Editorial: 4455 7741 | Advertising: 4455 7837 / 4455 7780 Umrah pilgrims Emir receives well-wishers drop by 40pc this Ramadan Costs, visas major reasons DOHA: The number of peo- local religious tour operators. ple going to Saudi Arabia for While normally 3,000 to 4,000 Umrah this Ramadan is down people are registered with a by 40 percent compared to pre- Hajj and Umrah operator com- vious years due to high costs pany in Qatar for Umrah during and difficulties in obtaining Ramadan, this year the number of visas for expatriates. registered people with each com- Notwithstanding that this is pany is not more than 500, one Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani received more people, including sheikhs and citizens, who conveyed to him Ramadan greetings at Al the holy month of Ramadan, many operator said. Wajba Palace last evening. Deputy Emir H H Sheikh Abdullah bin Hamad Al Thani, the Emir’s Personal Representative H H Sheikh Jassim bin Hamad Saudi-based Haj and Umrah tour Ibrahim Al Ibrahim, of Taqwa Al Thani, and sons of Father Emir H H Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani were present. operating companies are charg- Company, said his firm was mostly ing exorbitant amounts to provide focusing on Qataris this Ramadan visas for Umrah for expatriates. due to the problem of obtaining Local Arabic daily Al Raya entry visa for expatriates. reported yesterday that while the The daily said soaring costs official rate for an Umrah visa was were also a factor as charges Yemen peace talks collapse in Geneva between 250 and 300 riyals, Saudi by road were between QR1,700 Hajj and Umrah tour operating and QR2,000 for Umrah in the GENEVA: UN-sponsored of “proximity talks” — in which in view of so many lives having progress as we expected ... But it companies were charging between beginning of Ramadan. By air, talks in Geneva on a ceasefire he shuttled between factions who been lost and where a government doesn’t mean that we have failed,” 1,000 and 1,500 riyals. charges were between QR6,500 between Yemen’s civil war par- refused to sit at the same table that is internationally recognised he told reporters. Saudi authorities are issuing and QR9,000. ties ended yesterday without — the two sides agreed in prin- is outside the country. A lot of Hadi’s government has limited number of visas for Umrah Charges by road at the end a deal as Saudi-led warplanes ciple on the need for a ceasefire things didn’t make it easy for us.” demanded that the Houthis, allied this Ramadan due to expansion of Ramadan go up to between staged further strikes on the and withdrawal of forces in keep- He said he would fly to New with Yemeni military units loyal work continuing in the holy city QR2,000 and QR3,000, while by dominant Houthi armed faction ing with UN Security Council York on Sunday to brief the UN to former president Ali Abdullah of Makkah, the daily said. air, rates soar to QR30,000 to and allies, including Republican Resolution 2216. Security Council, where major Saleh, pull out of cities captured Qatari Haj and Umrah oper- QR35,000 per person. Guards. “There is a certain willingness powers also needed to sign off on since last September as a precon- ating companies, as a matter of For people from some Asian More than 2,800 people have from all parties to discuss issues his proposal for a force of civilian dition for a ceasefire. rule, have tie-ups with their Saudi and Arab nationalities it is dif- been killed since an Arab alliance around a ceasefire accompanied observers to monitor any truce Yahya Duwaid of Saleh’s counterparts to help provide stay ficult to obtain Umrah visas, the launched air raids on March 26 by withdrawal... I come out from and withdrawals on the ground. General People’s Congress said: and tour facilities in Saudi Arabia daily said. to try to roll back the Iranian- these few days with a certain Hadi’s foreign minister, Reyad “We had reason to be hopeful and for people they take for Hajj and Al Ibrahim said due to high backed Houthis’ advances across degree of optimism that we can Yassin Abdullah, said talks made optimistic... and we listened to the Umrah from here. costs and lack of visas, there was much of Yemen and reinstate achieve this (in further consulta- no significant headway but there UN proposals today, but what Large number of people go for a huge reduction in the number exiled president Abdrabuh tions) in the coming days,” he told was room for more discussions, they were proposing was not of Umrah during Ramadan but this of people going for Umrah this Mansur Hadi. a press conference in Geneva. although no date had been sched- the standard we were looking for.” year there isn’t much rush, the Ramadan. UN special envoy Ismail Ould “The (opposing) positions that uled for any. “The Houthi delega- AGENCIES daily said, quoting officials from THE PENINSULA Cheikh Ahmed said in five days as you know have been so strong tion did not allow us to reach all See also page 4 Demirel mourned Bin Laden son Obama: Church shooting asked US for shows racism a blight in US death certificate SAN FRANCISCO: In the aftermath of the South Carolina shoot- RIYADH: A son of Al Qaeda ing at a black church, President Barack Obama told US mayors leader Osama bin Laden had yesterday that racism remains a “blight” the US has to “combat asked the US for a death cer- together”. tificate after US Navy SEALS He also reiterated support for gun control legislation, saying trag- killed him, says a letter released edies like the one in South Carolina call for a response beyond grief. by WikiLeaks. Obama voiced confidence that a “shocked and heartbroken” nation The letter is signed by Glen would tighten permissive gun laws, striking a more strident tone after Keiser, US consul general in the Charleston shooting. He said change would come one day, as he Riyadh, and addressed to Abdullah took on detractors who accused him of politicising the deaths of nine bin Laden on September 9, 2011, black worshippers. Describing gun crime as a crisis that “tears at the about four months after a US raid fabric of a community” and “costs this country dearly,” he said: “More killed his father in Pakistan after than 11,000 Americans were killed by gun violence in 2013 alone.” He a decade-long manhunt. “I have accused Congress of failing to act after a mass shooting in Newtown, received your request for a death Connecticut, in 2012 which killed 26 people, including 20 children, at certificate for your father, Osama Sandy Hook elementary school. bin Laden,” Keiser wrote. AFP “We wouldn’t have prevented every act of violence or even most,” See also page 5 Obama said. “We don’t know if it (gun reform) would have prevented what happened in Charleston. No reform can guarantee elimination of violence, but we might still have some more Americans with us. We Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (centre), former president Abdullah Gul (third right), Parliamentary might have stopped one shooter, some families might still be whole. Speaker Cemil Cicek (third left) and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu (second left) attend the state funeral You all might have to attend fewer funerals.” AFP of ninth president and former prime minister Suleyman Demirel at the Grand National Assembly of Turkey in See also page 9 Ankara yesterday. RAMADAN Greenhouse to try strawberry, mushroom production TIMING DOHA: A greenhouse that produces others, in commercial quantities. to grow indigenously if Qatar hopes to set in such greenhouses, Al Khalaf replied in vegetables round-the-year will in the Vegetables are grown organically with- up poultry and dairy farms on a large scale. the negative and said the use of water to Todays Iftar: next two months experiment producing out fertilisers so their quality is very high He cited barley and said it can be grown produce grains is excessive. strawberries and mushrooms on a com- and comparable with those imported from in seven days and fed to animals fresh Setting up hydroponics greenhouses 06:27pm mercial scale. Europe. instead of importing dry barley and using like his is an expensive affair but the gov- Tomorrow’s Imsak: The businessman who owns the green- “That is why our produce are expensive it as fodder. ernment support in the form of free or 03:04am house says it is also possible to grow some since they are organic and of very high Al Khalaf’s greenhouse is hydroponic subsidised land, seed, equipment and infra- types of fruits in his high-tech facility. quality,” Al Khalaf said in remarks to this which uses minimal water and no soil. structure, including water and electricity, In Qatar, there are greenhouses that are daily. He said his greenhouse is the first It uses coconut fibre which reduces the he said, adding other GCC states have been seasonal and grow only vegetables. Fruits such high-tech agricultural facility set need for water. Plans are afoot to expand doing this to encourage production.