Qatar Daily News

Vodafone Qatar has been awarded the second fixed line licence by the Qatar telecoms regulator, a company announcement said.

The award of the licence, by the Supreme Council of Information and Communication Technology (ictQATAR), is subject to the change in the company’s articles of association which will be recommended to be approved at an extraordinary general meeting (EGM).

Commenting on the licence award, Vodafone Qatar CEO Grahame Maher said: “Vodafone is delighted as this will strengthen our ability to make a world of difference for all the people in Qatar. The combined strengths provided by the mobile and fixed services will allow us to deliver total communications services to our customers, whilst delivering value to our customers and shareholders.”
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Qatar joined the rest of the world to mark the Earth Hour, a global energy-saving event, with many of the country’s landmark buildings switching off their lights for an hour, from 8.30pm-9.30pm, yesterday.
The campaign is supported by 4,000 cities in a record 125 countries and includes 1,200 landmarks from the Forbidden City to Egypt’s Pyramids and the Las Vegas Strip.
The WWF-run event officially began when New Zealand’s Chatham Islands switched off their diesel generators to leave just 12 street lamps burning and was to end nearly 24 hours later in Samoa.
Among the organiSations that took part in the campaign in Qatar were the Qtel tower (headquarters), the Movenpick Tower & Suites, the Marriott Doha and the British embassy.
Children of British embassy staff also created a collage to mark the event. Read the rest of this entry »

The impact of the $23.5-billion (Dh86.24 billion) Dubai World and Nakheel debt restructuring plan will be manageable for UAE banks, analysts say.

The Dubai Government on Thursday announced a comprehensive set of proposals for Dubai World creditors represented by 97 banks and financial institutions for the repayment of the debts, including a 100 per cent repayment in five to eight years. The government has also agreed to inject $9.5 billion into both entities in exchange for equities that will help them recover from the current financial stress.

“The likely negative impact on the UAE banking system should be manageable without additional support. While all of the details of the restructuring have yet to be clarified, the proposed 100 per cent principal repayment, albeit with extended maturities, and continuing commercial rates of interest, appear to be a more favourable solution than the banks may have feared in the last few months,” credit rating agency Fitch said in an email statement.
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Gloria De Campeao won the $10 million Dubai World Cup in the United Arab Emirates, nosing out the long shot Lizard’s Desire on Saturday to capture the highlight of an eight-race card worth $26 million.

Gloria De Campeao, Lizard’s Desire and Allybar practically hit the wire together. Gloria De Campeao, a 5-year-old bred in Brazil, finished a distant second in this race a year ago.

“He wants to fight,” Gloria De Campeao’s trainer, Pascal Bary, said.
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Car sales fell in Kuwait in 2009 to 119,133 units, from 122,623 in 2008. The impact of the international economic crisis was felt in the Gulf state’s economy; plunging oil prices in the latter half of 2008 and early 2009 had a serious effect on the country’s income, while tightening credit also curtailed economic growth.
The Central Bank of Kuwait (CBK) estimates that the country slid into recession, in 2009, with us estimating a 2.4% contraction.

Some of the top Qatari employers are vying to recruit the best available talent in the market at the ongoing four-day Qatar Career Fair.
RasGas will be participating in the Qatar Career Fair all week as a diamond sponsor and encourages Qatari nationals to visit their stand and learn more about the many career prospects available with the company, an official said.
RasGas Employee, Development and Welfare group manager Erhama al-Kaabi said from the stand: “RasGas participation at the Qatar Career Fair will present opportunities to Qatari talent to enroll in our National Development Programme. There are many exciting careers opportunities to offer to qualified candidates in 2010.” Read the rest of this entry »

Kuwait has so far invested $1.5 billion in Turkey, according to the Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Jaber al-Sabah’s official consultant in Turkey.

The Kuwaiti emir is planning to implement three or four giant projects worth $3 billion in Turkey, said Uğur Akkuş, the group leader of the Sems Turk Kuwait-Turkey investment consultancy company.

“A big portion of the $3 billion investment, which will be implemented in Turkey via Sems Turk, a Kuwait-Turkey investment consultancy company, will be in real estate. We are planning to focus on Istanbul,” Akkuş said. “The company is also interested in Turkey’s hydroelectric power plants as well as its agriculture sector.”

“Everything in the Gulf region relies on imports. Turkey has the potential to become the food storage of the Gulf region in the coming years,” said Akkuş. “Our company is also interested in the Southeastern Anatolia Project [GAP].”
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ABB, the Swiss-headquartered power and automation technology group, has signed a $2.8m contract with Qatar-based contractor, Black Cat Engineering & Construction to design and develop a major integrated Safety Integrity Level 3(SIL 3) and process control solution for a gas pipeline project in Dukhan, Qatar.
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Dubai government-owned airline Emirates said on Tuesday it planned to recruit 2,000 cabin crew in 2010 as it expands its fleet and routes.

The Arab world’s largest airline has hired around 660 cabin crew and more than 60 pilots since March 2009, a statement said. The airline’s total cabin crew stands at 11,000.
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HH the Deputy Emir and Heir Apparent Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani yesterday released the Mus’haf Qatar, the country’s first edition of the Holy Qur’an.

The special edition, which was set in exquisite calligraphy and made into templates for large-scale printing, had been in the making for nearly two decades.

The project cost totalled QR30mn. Read the rest of this entry »