RIYADH: The Kingdom Holding company headed by the Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal which says it plans to launch a new Arabic television news channel in partnership with the Fox network.
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Saudi Prince to launch TV news channel
LONDON: Britain’s new coalition government will not lecture India and Pakistan over their relationship, Foreign Secretary William Hague said Thursday ahead of an upcoming trip to Islamabad.
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Prince William, Speculation is rising amongst royal spectators that there could be a royal engagement in June due to a clear diary for the month of June which is quite unprecedented.
Unless Harry pops the question to Chelsy it is almost certainly going to be Prince William aged 27 and Kate Middleton aged 28 who will be getting engaged.
The couple’s extensive courtship could result in marriage by the end of the year with a possible date in November for the wedding.
Writing on her website ‘The Daily Beast’, Tina Brown, who was a close friend of Prince William’s late mother, has speculated on the dates of the 3rd and 4th of June run high as potential dates for the engagement.Prince William and Kate
Apparently there is historical precedent for a royal marriage in November seeing as the Queen and Prince Phillip also did the same back in 1947.
This could be a very royal 2 years approaching with Phillips 90th birthday looming and the Queens Diamond jubilee in 2012 so the icing on the cake would be Prince William settling down with his long term love and close companion Kate Middleton.
Personally I think this is fantastic news and the news could not come at a better time.
The nation is in a serious identity crisis coupled with a cultural, economic and zeitgeist depression engulfing us, a royal wedding is like a breath of fresh air.
Let’s hope we have the carnival spirit that accompanied Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer’s wedding. I remember that day in 1981 when every street in Britain came out in celebration.
LOS ANGELES: Director Bigelow Makes History With Hurt Locker, Kathryn Bigelow made Oscar history Sunday night, becoming the first woman to win best director at the Academy Awards for her gritty Iraq war saga “The Hurt Locker.”
Bigelow’s film, which also won best picture, follows the dangerous daily existence of an Army bomb defusal team. It earned six Oscars, including one for Mark Boal’s original screenplay, based on his time as a journalist embedded with such a unit.
“There is no other way to describe it — it’s the moment of a lifetime,” Bigelow said, her voice quivering. She dedicated the award to the military men and women serving in Iraq, Afghanistan and around the world: “May they come home safe.”
Bigelow was the fourth woman nominated for the prize, following Sofia Coppola for 2003’s “Lost in Translation,” Jane Campion for 1993’s “The Piano” and Lina Wertmuller for 1975’s “Seven Beauties.” She was the front runner heading into the Academy Awards.
Barbra Streisand, director of films including “Yentl” and “The Prince of Tides,” walked out on stage to present the category.
“Well, the time has come,” Streisand said before announcing Bigelow’s win.
Bigelow also bested ex-husband James Cameron, who was up for directing the sci-fi blockbuster “Avatar” — and she’d been sitting directly in front of him all night during the Oscar ceremony. Much has been made about the former spouses competing against each other, but their split was amicable and the two since have supported each other professionally. As Bigelow’s victory was announced, Cameron could be seen clapping and saying, “Yes, yes.”
Backstage, reporters repeatedly tried to coax her to dish on her ex, but she was abidingly diplomatic.
“I think he’s an extraordinary filmmaker,” she said, when asked what it was like to beat him.
Bigelow had already been a pioneer for decades, having built a career making action pictures like “Point Break” and “K-19: The Widowmaker,” usually male-dominated territory. But at the Directors Guild of America Awards, where she won the top honor, Bigelow said: “I suppose I like to think of myself as a filmmaker” — not a female filmmaker.
LOS ANGELES: “The Hurt Locker,” a little-seen war film with big backing from the critics, pushed past “Avatar” and other crowd-pleasers to win the best picture Oscar at a Sunday night ceremony here, while its director, Kathryn Bigelow, became the first woman to win the directing award.
“Avatar” and “The Hurt Locker” had come into the night as favorites, but the smaller film took the prize from the bigger in the end.
“There’s no other way to describe it, it’s the moment of a lifetime,” said Ms. Bigelow in accepting her award. It was presented by Barbra Streisand, who announced it with the words, “Well, the time has come.”
Mark Boal, a producer of “The Hurt Locker,” said of his modest expectations when the movie was shot back in 2007, “Hopefully, we would find a distributor and somebody might even like the movie.”
There was no mention of a last-minute embarrassment in which a fellow producer of the film, Nicolas Chartier, had been banned from the show for violating Oscar rules by urging academy members by e-mail messages to vote against a film assumed to be “Avatar,” which had the advantage of a vast budget and enormous popularity.
In a sense, the awards season had shaped up into a showdown between James Cameron, who directed “Avatar,” and Ms. Bigelow, who was previously married to Mr. Cameron.
Among other winners, Christoph Waltz took best supporting actor at the start of a sluggishly paced ceremony for his bilingual performance as a Jew-hunting Nazi officer in “Inglourious Basterds.” And also, as expected, Mo’Nique won for best supporting actress for her portrait of a terrifying mother in “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire.”
With no excess of modesty, Mo’Nique thanked the academy’s members for showing that “it can be about the performance, not the politics.” The remark was a reference not just to her considerable talent, but to the fact that she had refused to spend time playing the usual Oscar campaign game. Backstage, she blamed the media for trying to stir up a controversy.
Jeff Bridges, a multiple nominee and now first-time winner, took best actor for his gritty portrayal of a broken-down country singer in “Crazy Heart.” A darling of the Hollywood crowd, Mr. Bridges had been seen as the designated winner almost from the moment Fox Searchlight made a last-minute decision to drop the low-budget movie into the Oscar race. “Thank you, Mom and Dad, for turning me on to such a groovy profession,” said the gray-bearded Mr. Bridges, who brought the crowd to its feet in a prolonged ovation as he whooped, hollered and showed obvious joy in the moment.
“Crazy Heart,” one of the evening’s smaller contenders, also took an Oscar for its theme song, “The Weary Kind,” by Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett.
Sandra Bullock, who had been pointed toward an Oscar since winning a bellwether Screen Actors Guild award, won best actress for her performance as a tough and loving contemporary Southern mother in “The Blind Side.” Like Mr. Bridges, she was clearly a favorite of those in the auditorium, though she had never been nominated before and had been best known for romantic comedies like “The Proposal” and the occasional action film, like “Speed.”
“Did I really earn this, or did I just wear you all down?” Ms. Bullock asked her cheering peers.
“Up in the Air” was shut out, although the movie, about a corporate operative who specializes in firing people, had propped up the long awards season with appearances at various prize ceremonies on both coasts and in England by George Clooney, its star, and Jason Reitman, the writer-director.
The show clocked in at a relatively long three hours and 32 minutes, but at times it felt longer than it actually was. That was mostly because the first half was loaded with clip samples and retrospectives, while the latter part moved along with the speed that one of its producers, Bill Mechanic, had promised in advance.
Before the bigger awards were announced, there was a trip back to “The Dark Knight,” as Morgan Freeman explained how sound editors handled a movie from an earlier year, and a lengthy string of excerpts from horror movies, in an effort to reach fans who do not find movies like the “Twilight” series on the show.
The pace had already slowed with the screening of highlights — and the introduction of two recipients, Roger Corman and Lauren Bacall — from an honorary-awards ceremony that had been moved off-camera to a November date, precisely to keep the show from slowing.
This came only a few minutes after a narrator took time to read chunks of script over clips from the best adapted screenplay nominees. But Geoffrey Fletcher, a first-time nominee who won for “Precious,” put some heart in the proceedings as he gasped and seemed to weep in accepting. “I thank everyone,” Mr. Fletcher said simply.
Going into the evening, Mr. Cameron’s 3-D blockbuster, “Avatar,” was expected to dominate the evening along with the smaller, intense film “The Hurt Locker.
Foreign Minister of Saudi Arabia Prince Saud al-Faisal said on Sunday he was heavily concerned with growing insecurity in Pakistan and urged Islamabad to collectively fight militancy. Al-Faisal’s remarks came after he held talks with an Indian leaders in Riyadh.
“Pakistan is a friendly country to us and therefore any time that one sees a dangerous thing in our friendly country, one is not only sorry but worried. We believe it is the duty of all political leaders in Pakistan to unite together, to see that extremism should not find its way to achieve aims in the country. And this can only happen by a united political leadership in Pakistan and we hope that this will be achieved,” al-Faisal told a news conference attended the Indian delegation.
Al-Qaeda-linked Pakistani militants have carried out numerous attacks on members of the security forces over the past couple of years. They stepped up strikes after the army launched an offensive on their main bastion in South Waziristan in October last year.
The Pakistani Taliban, allies of the Afghan Taliban, have lost much ground in the army offensives over the past year. Pakistani action against militants on the border is seen as crucial for efforts to bring stability to Afghanistan, where the US forces are spearheading one of NATO’s biggest offensive against the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Security forces have also carried out several other operations aimed at pushing back militants threatening towns and cities such as Peshawar, the main city in the northwest.
Al-Faisal distanced his government from the Taliban insurgents. “There is no relation between Saudi Arabia and Taliban. Relations were abrogated when Taliban gave sanctuary to Al-Qaeda and since that time till today there has been no relationship between Taliban and Saudi Arabia and that indicates the seriousness we give to that issue,” he said. Saudi Arabia and Pakistan were among the few states, which recognised Taliban government in Afghanistan, but severed ties after 9/11 when Taliban provided safe havens to Al-Qaeda. Saudi Arabia is also worried about growing penetration and increased leverage of Al-Qaeda in adjoining Jordan, Lebanon and Palestine.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is meeting with the Saudi leadership in Riyadh today, hoping to enlist the kingdom in persuading China to support a tougher stand against Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
The talks with King Abdullah and Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal come as Washington is seeking to rally international support for a fourth round of United Nations sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme. The United States and its allies suspect Iran is attempting to develop a nuclear weapon. Tehran denies this, insisting that its nuclear program is peaceful. As part of the ongoing effort to gain support for sanctions against Iran, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in Moscow today.
WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton heads Saturday to Qatar and Saudi Arabia to build the US case for tougher sanctions over Iran’s nuclear plans in meetings with key Arab and Muslim leaders.
Clinton will also pursue the Obama administration’s bid to promote Arab-Israeli peace and “turn the page” on ties with Muslim countries — the latter in a speech to the US-Islamic World Forum in the Qatari capital Doha.
She is departing a day later than planned after her husband Bill Clinton, the former president, had a heart operation on Thursday, but the delay will not cause her to miss any of her meetings, State Department officials said.
Clinton may ask the Saudis — whom she sees Monday and Tuesday following a speech to the US-Islamic World Forum — to offer the Chinese increased oil supplies to try to win Beijing’s backing for sanctions against Iran.
China imports much of its oil from Iran.
“I wouldn’t rule it out that that might be part of the discussions,” a senior State Department official told French news agency when asked whether the chief US diplomat would make such an appeal to the Saudis to win over China.
China appears to be the sole holdout to sanctions among the five veto-wielding members of the UN Security Council, which is also composed of the United States, Russia, Britain and France.
Moscow has hardened its stance toward Iran lately.
During her stop in Riyadh, Clinton is set to meet Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud and Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal. She will meet other Saudi officials in the Red Sea port of Jeddah.
In Doha, she is to meet Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, Qatar’s emir, and Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim Al-Thani, who is both foreign minister and prime minister.
“Middle East peace will be an issue that will be discussed. Iran certainly will be an issue that is discussed,” Crowley said while declining to enter into details about either topic.
She will also hold similar talks with leaders attending the seventh US-Islamic World Forum, including Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Crowley told reporters.
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu will, according to a Turkish diplomat, visit Iran next week to push for a diplomatic solution to the nuclear stand-off.
Iran said on Tuesday that it had started the process of producing 20 percent enriched uranium.
Devastating Haiti Quake Toll to Top 150,000, Haiti’s Communications Minister confirmed in Port au Prince that 150,000 bodies had been recovered from the devastating earthquake that struck Haiti 12 days earlier.
Haiti’s earthquake death toll will top 150,000, a minister said as rescuers located a possible new survivor beneath the rubble of the capital 12 days after the disaster. The United Nations appealed for more troops to be sent in as police struggled to control fresh outbreaks of looting in devastated Port-au-Prince, while a new aftershock rocked the stricken country. It’s very difficult to estimate how many more people might be dead, but the prime minister has spoken of 200,000, she added. Previously, Haitian health officials had quoted a figure of just over 112,000 dead. A 4.7-magnitude aftershock rattled Haiti, 12 days after the original 7.0 earthquake, the US Geological Survey and local residents said, although there were no reports of new casualties.
While on the other side a seven year old Charlie Simpson organised his very own sponsored bike ride around a park in west London, hoping to raise five hundred pounds for food, water and tents, particularly to help the country’s children. But the schoolboy’s eight-kilometre ride around his local park was so successful that he ended up raising more than £65,000. His mother said Charlie’s simple idea had grown beyond their expectations. Charlie will be donating the money to UNICEF who have launched the Haiti Earthquake Children’s Appeal. The children’s charity say that more than half of Haiti’s 9.6 million inhabitants are under 21 years of age and many are in desperate need of clean water, shelter and medical help.
