GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan is being treated in a hospital in Dubai for a heart condition, but his condition is not serious. The BBC reports that “his departure has fuelled speculation in the Pakistani media that he may be on the verge of resigning”, reports that the government denies.
Reuters credits a source as saying he has had a minor heart attack, not his first.
Zardari, the husband of murdered former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, has been in office since 2008. He has recently been linked to leaked memos that led to the resignation of Pakistan’s envoy to the US.
International sports, tennis
Dubai (GenevaLunch)- Novak Djokovic increased the pressure on the number two spot of the ATP rankings with another crushing victory over Roger Federer in the final of the Dubai Open. The Serbian, currently ranked third, confirmed his position as the top player of 2011 following his win over the Swiss player at the final of the Australian Open. Djokovic won 6-3 6-3 as Federer committed a series of errors.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The number of regular flights to Russia is being increased by both Swiss and Aeroflot for the winter ski season, Geneva’s Cointrin Airport says. Aeroflot has added an additional evening flight every day to Moscow-Sheremetyevo airport, while Swiss is adding four flights a week between Geneva and Moscow-Domodedevo.
Emirates will begin daily flights between Dubai and Geneva in June 2011, according to the airport.
The unfolding drama of the thriller-style assassination of Hamas commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, in Dubai in early 2010 is taking investigators to Poland.
German prosecutors are confirming that a man in Poland may have fraudulently obtained a German passport used in connection with the Hamas murder and are seeking his extradition.
The request is expected to strain relations with Israel, country both Poland and Germany have close ties with.
Background: GenevaLunch
Link to the full story: Time/Yahoo News
Ireland is expelling an Israeli diplomat over the near-certain manufacture of eight fake Irish passports by an agency of the Israeli government, says Foreign Minister Micheal Martin, in a veiled reference to Massud, the Israeli secret service. The passports were used by agents who carried out the murder of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai in 2009. Martin noted that the Irish government had come to “the inescapable conclusion that an Israeli government agency was responsible for the misuse and, most likely, the manufacture of the forged Irish passports associated with the murder of Mr Mabhouh” following an investigation. It worked closely with the UK and Australia during the investigation. They, too, have expelled Israeli diplomats over the affair.
Links to other sites: BBC, Irish Times
Dubai police are now saying that Hamas military commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was first drugged with a muscle relaxant, then suffocated in a hotel room. They believe evidence is more clearly pointing to Israel’s Mossad undercover agency, but Israel has not commented on the latest details or its possible role. Police Sunday 28 February said the drug, succinylcholine, was used to make it appear the victim had not struggled, possibly in order to stage what would look like a natural death.
Links to other sites: Dubai police report, Reuters
The number of suspects in the murder of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai in December has now grown to 26, say Dubai police, with Australian passports reportedly used. Australia called in the Israeli ambassador and issued a sharp warning that it will not tolerate any government condoning or being behind the theft of its citizens’ passports, with suspicion growing that Israel was behind the murder. Australia has reportedly warned Israel in the past not to use Australian passports for its espionage activities. The Israeli government has said there is no proof that Mossad, its secret service, is involved. Some of the Australians identified, who are living in Israel, were shocked to learn of what appears to be several cases of identity theft.
The unfolding drama of the thriller-style assassination of Hamas commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, killed 20 January at the al-Bustan hotel in Dubai, leaves a growing number of questions unanswered, and Britain is now joining the investigations. Stephen Lander, the head of Serious Organized Crime Agency (Soca) and former MI5 (British secret service) boss, has been put in charge of looking into the apparent use of British passports by the team of 11 who staged the murder. Austria and France are involved in trying to track the murderers.
It is unclear if passports were forged, stolen, or valid documents. Israeli spy agency Moussad appears to be a strong suspect as the organization behind the killing, but Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said Wednesday 17 February that there is no proof of this, while not denying that Israel may have been involved. Rafi Eitan, a high-ranking Mossad official, denies any involvement by the group, according to Haaretz.
Confusion over the passports reigns, with Ireland and Britain saying they believed passports for their countries were likely forged. Meanwhile, Haaretz reports that “Men with the same names as seven of the 11 suspects whose European passport photos were distributed by Dubai this week reside in Israel, and those reached by reporters insisted their identities had been stolen and noted the pictures were not a match.
“Six of the men are Britons who immigrated to Israel. The seventh is an American Israeli, whose name Dubai said was on a German passport used by one of the assassins.” The Jerusalem Post says the Israeli immigrants were astonished to find their names on the list of suspects issued by Dubai.
Links to other sites: Al Jazeera, Haaretz, Jerusalem Post, Times, UK and timeline issued by Dubai police on Channel 4 TV, Belfast
The government of Dubai announced a unilateral moratorium on the $59 billion debt mountain of its biggest corporate entity, Dubai World, a conglomerate that owns ports and real estate around the world, 26 November. The government says it has appointed DeLoitte LLP to advise it on restructuring Dubai World.
The news caused stock markets in Europe to decline sharply because of worries that Dubai’s massive investments in companies ranging from Porsche and Daimler to the London Stock Exchange may need to be liquidated. Banks were particularly hit. Rating agencies downgraded the debt of several Dubai government-run companies in response.
Dubai’s ruler, Mohammed Bin Rashid al-Maktoum, dropped several key aides involved in Dubai’s real estate boom 23 November, in order to assert closer control over a sprawling financial empire.
Links to other sites: Bloomberg, Reuters, Wall Street Journal
The city of Puebla, 120 km east of Mexico City, has inaugurated a taxi service for women by women who drive pink cars. In Puebla the drivers undertake 160 hours of first aid and self-defense training before they can drive a pink taxi. Their passengers can preen themselves in two mirrors in the back seat and drive in the knowledge that their whereabouts are tracked by GPS, reports Le Monde. Fares are about 10 percent higher than usual.
Other cities in addition to Mexico City are studying the concept with a view to copying it. Dubai and Moscow already have women-only taxis, reports the Korea Times, which says that Seoul is to introduce the concept in December 2009.
In 2008, 87 women reported being raped in taxis in Mexico City and a woman is murdered every six hours country-wide.
Alinghi in less contentious waters. Photo: © Dinah Roberts
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The oldest, most prestigious sailing competition may be decided in a New York courtroom instead of in the Persian Gulf waters off the Arabian peninsula. The defending team Alinghi, representing Geneva’s Société Nautique de Genève (SNG) put their huge catamaran into the water off Ras al-Khaimah (RAK), United Arab Emirates Saturday 17 October, but a New York judge must still decide whether the venue, traditionally chosen by the defender, may be allowed to stand.
On Saturday, Ernesto Bertarelli, the billionaire backer of Alinghi, called on the BMW-Oracle team to get down to business and start sailing.
South African President Jacob Zuma is in Harare, Zimbabwe today 27 August to meet with members of Zimabwe’s unity government and to convey South African displeasure with the lack of progress in implementing an agreement between President Robert Mugabe’s ZANU party and the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) of Morgan Tsvangirai. He is conveying a message from the South African ruling party ANC, African National Congress, that criticizes Mugabe for his “adolescent and deviant” behaviour. Discord between the two sides in Zimbabwe’s government has left ministerial posts unfilled, and some MDC members of parliament are still in jail. There are rumours that Mugabe is ill and being treated in a clinic in Dubai. He has not been seen in public since Tuesday 19 August. AllAfrica, Mail&Guardian,The Times
Hesham Talaat Moustafa, former chairman of the Talaat Moustafa Group and a politician in Egypt, has been sentenced to death by hanging for ordering the murder of Lebanese singer Suzanne Tamim at her home in Dubai. The security guard who carried out the killing was also sentenced to death. The trial’s proceedings in Cairo, Egypt were gagged by the court when it provoked huge media interest in September 2008. The Talaat Moustafa Group is a major construction company. The singer and Moustafa had had an affair for three years, reports Al Jazeera, that ended several months before her murder, and she had recently married another man.
ACM's new offices, Zurich, Switzerland
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – ACM, the world’s largest currency trader, based in Geneva, Monday announced that is opening a new office in Zurich. The announcement comes on the heels of confirmation last week that it has applied for a banking license. The company told GenevaLunch in October 2008 that it would be applying for a license, partly as a result of changes in Swiss law covering online transactions, but that it intends to maintain currency trading as its principle business.
Police visit more fuss than trouble
Property prices are collapsing, government projects have been called to a halt, abandoned cars sit at the airport and “tens of thousands have left” Dubai, reports the International Herald Tribune. The IHT says that many of the well-heeled foreigners who were flocking to the city even just a year ago are now out of jobs and frightened at their inability to pay huge debts from credit cars, car loans and mortgages.
A British man and woman in the thirties have been found guilty and sentenced to three months in jail each for an encounter they say involved only kissing and hugging on a beach in Dubai, after they met at a champagne party in Dubai. A judge found them guilty of having unmarried sex; the charges could have resulted in a sentence of six years each. BBC
