Emir receives call from Turkish PM

HH the Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani received yesterday a telephone call from Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

The contact dealt with relations between the two countries and developments of the situation in the region.

Scrap  companies asked to seek MoE permit

The Ministry of Environment (MoE) has warned some scrap companies against the collection, storage, and recycling of used batteries and vehicle engines without getting a prior permission, according to a report in local daily Arrayah yesterday.

The MoE has asked such companies to apply to the ministry for the related permits, indicating that any violation will be considered as a breach of Law No. 30 for 2002, concerning environment protection, which classified such items as dangerous waste.

Reliable sources pointed out that the MoE would grant such permits for all the companies that meet the demanded standards that guarantee tight control on such type of materials and avoid any adverse consequences to the environment.

Further, the licensing process would make it easy to identify the companies and parties concerned that deal with these products and eventually ensure more secure handling of them to avoid any misuse or harmful effects, the ministry added.

Algeria minister confident
of Arab Summit’s success

Algerian Foreign Minister Mourad Medelci has expressed confidence in the ability of Qatar to ensure the success of 24th Arab Summit, due to be held in Doha this month despite the difficult circumstances the region is going through.

In an interview with Qatar News Agency (QNA), Medelci said the summit will be held amid a lot of Arab issues that  require finding solutions.

Although the Algerian foreign minister acknowledged that the summit will be held under difficult circumstances, he expressed confidence in Qatar’s leadership and the Arab leaders. “That will make us optimistic that the Doha summit will be successful,” Medelci said.

In response to a question about the most important topics on the agenda, Medelci said there are many topics, such as the Palestinian issue and the Arab-Israeli conflict, that will be submitted to the summit for consideration by the Arab leaders apart from the Syrian crisis, topics related to the joint Arab action and the development of the Arab League and its specialised organisations including the establishment of the Arab court of human rights.

He added that the summit’s agenda will address primarily in its political aspect the Palestinian issue and the stalled peace process because of Israel’s intransigence and defiance of the international community and failure to acknowledge the political process.

Medelci said that in the economic aspect, the summit will touch on important topics directly related to the Arab world that requires a comprehensive political will which is available, and moreover the Arab leaders are keen on promoting the joint Arab action to the best possible levels, noting that the difficult circumstance the Arab region is passing through would exacerbate the already difficult economic situation which is affected by the repercussion of the global economic crisis.

On the political mobilisation in Algeria, Medelci said that Algeria was moving steadily towards sustainable growth and prosperity. He noted that Algeria has already gone through its process of change back in the eighties when it implemented political and economic reforms.