JEDDAH, SAUDI ARABIA // Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz Al Saud died yesterday in New York, where he had been receiving medical treatment.
In a statement, the Saudi royal court said: "It is with deep sorrow and grief that the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud mourns the loss of his brother and Crown Prince His Royal Highness Prince Sultan Abdulaziz Al Saud."
The statement, which was carried on the official Saudi Press Agency, added that Prince Sultan's funeral will be held on Tuesday afternoon in Riyadh at the Imam Turki bin Abdullah mosque.
Sheikh Khalifa, President of the UAE, conveyed his condolences to King Abdullah and the Saudi people and declared three days of mourning, during which flags will fly at half-mast at all UAE government institutions.
Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, Vice President of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, also sent their condolences.
Prince Sultan, 85, was the half-brother of King Abdullah, who is two years older than him.
Prince Sultan, who was the kingdom's deputy prime minister and the minister of defence and aviation, had suffered what was widely believed to have been cancer for a number of years. He underwent surgery in New York in February 2009 for an undisclosed illness and spent nearly a year abroad, recuperating in the United States and at a palace in Agadir, Morocco.
The most likely candidate to replace Prince Sultan as King Abdullah's designated successor is Prince Naif, 77, who as interior minister is in charge of internal security forces.
After Prince Sultan fell ill in 2009, King Abdullah appointed Prince Naif - also his half-brother - second deputy prime minister, traditionally the post of the second in line to the throne.
King Abdullah is now expected to call to session the Allegiance Council to appoint the new crown prince. The Allegiance Council was set up in 2006 soon after King Abdullah became monarch, and is encharged with voting to approve the king's choice of crown prince or nominating its own choice instead.
"The succession will be orderly," Asaad Al Shamlan, a professor of political science in Riyadh, told Arab News. "The point of reference will be the ruling of the Allegiance Council. It seems to me most likely Naif will be chosen. If he becomes crown prince, I don't expect much immediate change."
News of Prince Sultan's death prompted all Saudi state television channels to cancel regular programming and go live to shots from the mosque in Mecca.
Schools were closed early as Saudis reacted to the news of the crown prince's death.
"When I got to the office this morning, I saw many of my colleagues had changed their phone's screensaver picture to show Prince Sultan's image," said Abdullah Al Toaimi, 29, a Saudi Airlines employee. "The mood at the office was sombre. Everybody was offering condolences to everyone else. Many were teary-eyed. This is a sad day for Saudi Arabia. May Allah have mercy on his soul; he was a great man."
Barack Obama, the US president, called the prince a "valued friend" who had helped cement ties between the allies.
Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, emphasised Washington's enduring ties with the kingdom and said Prince Sultan would be missed.
Saudi Arabia has been ruled since 1953 by the sons of its founder, King Abdulaziz, who had more than 40 sons by multiple wives. Whereas King Abdullah has been seen as a reformer - for example, making cautious changes to improve the position of women, such as granting them the right to vote in elections scheduled for 2015 - Prince Naif has been seen as more conservative and closer to the clerics.
With his six brothers, Prince Sultan made up the powerful "Sudairi Seven" faction of sons of king Abdulaziz - all half-brothers of King Abdullah - by a favourite wife, Princess Hassa Al Sudairi.
Prince Sultan was educated in the royal court and was clearly on the rise when named governor of Riyadh in 1947. Over the next decade he served as agriculture minister and then communications minister. King Faisal named him to the defence portfolio in 1962, and he became one of a handful of key princes, including the future King Abdullah and Prince Sultan's full brothers Prince Naif and Prince Salman, who have run Saudi Arabia for four decades.
Robert Lacey, author of The Kingdom, a book on the Al Saud dynasty, described the tall, well-built Prince Sultan as someone who "works and plays hard".
As defence and aviation minister, and the government's inspector general, Prince Sultan oversaw a major build-up of the kingdom's armed forces and the national carrier Saudi Arabian Airlines.
He presided over a military assault on the Grand Mosque in Mecca after Islamist extremists had seized it in 1979.
A series of deals to build up the air force through the arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi in the 1970s and then through Prince Sultan's son Prince Bandar in the 1980s - notably the Yamamah deals with Britain's BAE - were embroiled in allegations of corruption abroad.
Although Prince Sultan at first resisted the idea of allowing US troops to mount an attack from Saudi soil after Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in 1990, his cooperation was essential in the US-led Desert Storm campaign in 1991.
The same was true in the US-led invasion of Iraq of 2003, when US air command operations, aircraft and some troops were stationed in the airbase south of Riyadh that bears his name.
The Saudi side of Desert Storm was led by Prince Sultan's son Prince Khalid, who was then named assistant defence minister in 2001.
His son Bandar was in charge of the kingdom's ties with the United States as ambassador from 1983 to 2005, crafting a close relationship especially with the family of the then-president George W Bush.
ealghalib@thenational.ae
* With additional reporting by Agence France-Presse, Associated Press and Reuters
Dolittle
Director: Stephen Gaghan
Stars: Robert Downey Jr, Michael Sheen
One-and-a-half out of five stars
TOUCH RULES
Touch is derived from rugby league. Teams consist of up to 14 players with a maximum of six on the field at any time.
Teams can make as many substitutions as they want during the 40 minute matches.
Similar to rugby league, the attacking team has six attempts - or touches - before possession changes over.
A touch is any contact between the player with the ball and a defender, and must be with minimum force.
After a touch the player performs a “roll-ball” - similar to the play-the-ball in league - stepping over or rolling the ball between the feet.
At the roll-ball, the defenders have to retreat a minimum of five metres.
A touchdown is scored when an attacking player places the ball on or over the score-line.
Our legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
UAE v Gibraltar
What: International friendly
When: 7pm kick off
Where: Rugby Park, Dubai Sports City
Admission: Free
Online: The match will be broadcast live on Dubai Exiles’ Facebook page
UAE squad: Lucas Waddington (Dubai Exiles), Gio Fourie (Exiles), Craig Nutt (Abu Dhabi Harlequins), Phil Brady (Harlequins), Daniel Perry (Dubai Hurricanes), Esekaia Dranibota (Harlequins), Matt Mills (Exiles), Jaen Botes (Exiles), Kristian Stinson (Exiles), Murray Reason (Abu Dhabi Saracens), Dave Knight (Hurricanes), Ross Samson (Jebel Ali Dragons), DuRandt Gerber (Exiles), Saki Naisau (Dragons), Andrew Powell (Hurricanes), Emosi Vacanau (Harlequins), Niko Volavola (Dragons), Matt Richards (Dragons), Luke Stevenson (Harlequins), Josh Ives (Dubai Sports City Eagles), Sean Stevens (Saracens), Thinus Steyn (Exiles)
The rules on fostering in the UAE
A foster couple or family must:
- be Muslim, Emirati and be residing in the UAE
- not be younger than 25 years old
- not have been convicted of offences or crimes involving moral turpitude
- be free of infectious diseases or psychological and mental disorders
- have the ability to support its members and the foster child financially
- undertake to treat and raise the child in a proper manner and take care of his or her health and well-being
- A single, divorced or widowed Muslim Emirati female, residing in the UAE may apply to foster a child if she is at least 30 years old and able to support the child financially
Key changes
Commission caps
For life insurance products with a savings component, Peter Hodgins of Clyde & Co said different caps apply to the saving and protection elements:
• For the saving component, a cap of 4.5 per cent of the annualised premium per year (which may not exceed 90 per cent of the annualised premium over the policy term).
• On the protection component, there is a cap of 10 per cent of the annualised premium per year (which may not exceed 160 per cent of the annualised premium over the policy term).
• Indemnity commission, the amount of commission that can be advanced to a product salesperson, can be 50 per cent of the annualised premium for the first year or 50 per cent of the total commissions on the policy calculated.
• The remaining commission after deduction of the indemnity commission is paid equally over the premium payment term.
• For pure protection products, which only offer a life insurance component, the maximum commission will be 10 per cent of the annualised premium multiplied by the length of the policy in years.
Disclosure
Customers must now be provided with a full illustration of the product they are buying to ensure they understand the potential returns on savings products as well as the effects of any charges. There is also a “free-look” period of 30 days, where insurers must provide a full refund if the buyer wishes to cancel the policy.
“The illustration should provide for at least two scenarios to illustrate the performance of the product,” said Mr Hodgins. “All illustrations are required to be signed by the customer.”
Another illustration must outline surrender charges to ensure they understand the costs of exiting a fixed-term product early.
Illustrations must also be kept updatedand insurers must provide information on the top five investment funds available annually, including at least five years' performance data.
“This may be segregated based on the risk appetite of the customer (in which case, the top five funds for each segment must be provided),” said Mr Hodgins.
Product providers must also disclose the ratio of protection benefit to savings benefits. If a protection benefit ratio is less than 10 per cent "the product must carry a warning stating that it has limited or no protection benefit" Mr Hodgins added.
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SPECS
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Naga
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Liverpool’s fixtures until end of 2019
Saturday, November 30, Brighton (h)
Wednesday, December 4, Everton (h)
Saturday, December 7, Bournemouth (a)
Tuesday, December 10, Salzburg (a) CL
Saturday, December 14, Watford (h)
Tuesday, December 17, Aston Villa (a) League Cup
Wednesday, December 18, Club World Cup in Qatar
Saturday, December 21, Club World Cup in Qatar
Thursday, December 26, Leicester (a)
Sunday, December 29, Wolves (h)
Anghami
Started: December 2011
Co-founders: Elie Habib, Eddy Maroun
Based: Beirut and Dubai
Sector: Entertainment
Size: 85 employees
Stage: Series C
Investors: MEVP, du, Mobily, MBC, Samena Capital
ANATOMY%20OF%20A%20FALL
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EJustine%20Triet%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarring%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3ESandra%20Huller%2C%20Swann%20Arlaud%2C%20Milo%20Machado-Graner%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%205%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
Tips to avoid getting scammed
1) Beware of cheques presented late on Thursday
2) Visit an RTA centre to change registration only after receiving payment
3) Be aware of people asking to test drive the car alone
4) Try not to close the sale at night
5) Don't be rushed into a sale
6) Call 901 if you see any suspicious behaviour
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
