Emirates Evening Post - folds into the Sunset!

A total of 400 employees on three tabloid newspapers of a Dubai-based media group were caught by surprise on Sunday when they were informed through a memo that the company had stopped functioning as of April 22.

The three newspapers are Urdu Express (morning daily), Arabiya (Malayalam afternoon tabloid) and Emirates Evening Post (English afternoon tabloid), which was launched three years ago. The publisher, Press Centre and Art Production, posted a notice saying that the National Media Council in a letter dated February 14 instructed the company to stop printing and publishing its newspapers.

It is believed the three newspapers had no licence.

Read More - 400 employees of shutdown dailies face uncertain future - Gulf News

The Emirates Evening Post was the only evening paper being printed in English in the UAE. Just less than a year back, the newspaper had revamped their logo and come out with a fresh layout and design.

The Emirates Evening Post along with its Urdu and Malayalam sister papers cornered a small yet loyal readership which allowed it to thrive despite stiff competition from larger newspapers like Gulf News, Khaleej Times, 7 days and Emirates Today.

The three options given to the staff - "go on a long leave, resign or take a release" clearly reflects the uncertainty of the future of the newspaper. It's coverage and emphasis lay in UAE centric stories. The paper was also acknowledged for its social and local reporting.

It will be a loss for the newspaper community, among whom the Emirates Evening Post will be fondly remembered as a launch pad for many journalists who today are in the mainline UAE English newspapers. It is never a good day when a newspaper closes down.


Related Articles:
UAE's only evening newspaper closes - Arabian Business.com
400 employees of shutdown dailies face uncertain future - Gulf News

Passing of the Old Guard. Boris Yeltsin 1931 -2007

Boris Yeltsin 1931 - 2007 (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianchenko)

Moment of History: Boris Yeltsin stands on a tank to defy coup. ~AP

Former president Boris Yeltsin, the first Russian President after the fall of the Soviet Union, died on Monday at the age of 76 according to a statement from the Kremlin.

Russian politicians have remained for young adults, names from history text books which have an aura and awe from the mention of their names and ideologies. Yet most of the younger adult generation would only remember the era of the fall of the mighty USSR under the leadership of Michael Gorbachev to a new Russian Federation under the new president Boris Yeltsin.

For most young adults as myself remember the live coverage from Parliament headquarters in Russia on BBC and CNN in 1991 of Boris Yeltsin on a tank. The importance or impact of those images did not seem of much importance in those years. But reflecting back to those years, one cannot help thinking how inadvertently television gave us a ring side view of events which stand out as landmarks in 20th century politics.

Boris Yeltsin became a household name worldwide overnight in August 1991, when he mobilized the people of Russia from the top of a tank turret to protest and successfully thwart the attempted coup against Micheal Gorbachev. On 6 November, 1991 Yeltsin decreed the dissolution of the Communist party on Russian territory. Then on 8th December, Yeltsin and the presidents of Ukraine and Belarus proclaimed the dissolution of the Soviet Union. It was the death of a superpower. One of the two powers which had the world on the edge with the threat of nuclear annihilation in the height of the Cold War with the other existing super power USA.

Yeltsin's death may not have the relevance or even a tinge of importance to the present college going generation, who can claim he was from of a time before they can remember. Yet, today with his passing it should be noted with a tinge of nostalgia rather than that one of sorrow that the world is silently witnessing the passing of statesmen who changed irrevocably the world we live in today. They were the men, when at the height of their power held the world's destiny in their hands. The men who shaped the world we live in after the shadows of the world wars and cold war. Boris Yeltsin with Michael Gorbachev will be remembered as the last of the Old Guard of a Russia, once under the red legacy of the Communist USSR.

"A man must live like a great, bright flame and burn as brightly as he can. In the end he burns out. But this is better than a mean, little flame.'' ~ Boris Yeltsin

"Russia must enter the new millennium with new politicians, with new faces, with new, smart, strong, energetic people. And we who have been in power for many years already, we must go."~ Boris Yeltsin (Farewell Speech on 1999 New Year Eve)

Boris Yeltsin (R) talks to Communist Party General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev in Moscow in this 1991 file photo. (Alexander Natrus/Reuters)

Former President Bill Clinton (R) wipes away tears of laughter as he leans on former Russian President Boris Yeltsin in New York in this October 23, 1995 file photo.(Rick Wilking/Reuters)

Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat kisses Russian President Boris Yeltsin during their meeting in Moscow's Kremlin in this Feb. 18, 1997 file photo. Associated Press

Related Articles:
Russia plans day of mourning for Yeltsin - Associated Press
Key dates in Boris Yeltsin's turbulent career - Times of India
Boris Yeltsin 1931-2007 - Google News Links
World Leader's Tribute to Boris Yeltsin - Guardian Unlimited
Boris Yeltsin - A picture tribute - Yahoo.com

Collapse of the USSR - 10 years on - BBC News
Eyewitness: Inside Yeltsin's bunker - BBC News

Does a Wall Imprison or Protect?

Areas to be walled off. (Ap/Gulf News)

The grand plan of the allied peace makers in Iraq to build a wall to separate warring communities in Iraq is being met with aghast reactions from people around the world. Can they do that? How can they do that? Is it feasible? The fact remains the wall is being built whether anyone likes it or not.

This will be of no significant surprise to history buffs who know the 'allied peace makers' passion in building walls and enclosed communities. This wall in Iraq is another 'Berlin Wall' or similar to a wall being built all over Palestine. It should also be noted that in history the so called "peace makers" are known and documented for their innovative idea and creation of reservations where Red Indians were herded and kept under lock and key supposedly for their own safety and well being. Will Iraq have separate reservations to keep the warring factions apart? Will it become the next reservation country?

"Resident Khalid Ibrahim said the wall will only divide Iraqis. "This is good if it is temporary, to help the area with security problems. But if this wall stays for the long term, it will be a catastrophe for the residents," Ibrahim said." Gulf News (Sunnis fear wall dividing Iraq)

Politics of today bring to mind stories from childhood which are perfect metaphors for the prevalent situations.

Story: Once upon a time there was a piece of bread and two cats in the same neighbourhood. There was contention for the piece of bread. Obviously there was a judge around, a monkey in this case and the matter was presented to him. He "generously" agreed to resolve the matter by dividing the piece into two equal parts. But Alas! the parts were not equal. The cat with the smaller piece complained. So the monkey took a bite from the bigger piece only to find that it became smaller than the other. Now the other cat complained. Monkey was only too happy to continue offering his services and with each passing iteration ended up with a fuller stomach. Soon the bread piece reduced to an invisible size and the cats returned home being hungry equals!

It cannot be more obvious, as to who is the monkey and who are the cats. Yet, the fact remains that peace to the region will only come when the cats realize that conflicts can only come to an end when they both come to an amicable understanding and do not require the services of the mediating monkey anymore. But as long as the fetters of ethnic community, religion, caste, tribe, nationality, beliefs and ideologies chain humankind, peace is a far cry!

“We learn from history that we do not learn anything from history.”

Related Links:
Sunnis fear wall dividing Iraqis - Gulf News
US general: No end to bomb attacks - Gulf News

Online Profiles - A future self created memorial?

Front Page of DNA newspaper published in Mumbai

Screen shot from Minal Panchal's profile on Orkut.com

~ Freemind Pictures

Can the page you create for yourself on a networking site become your own online memorial?

Can the fact you are a member of an online community emotionally connect with total strangers in the event of your demise? This seems to be the case in the tragic death of Minal Panchal. She was one of the 32 lives taken by a crazed student who went on a shooting spree in the Virgina Tech Campus, before turning the gun on himself.

For the first two days, the media reported Minal Panchal (26) a first year student at Virginia Tech missing while continuously reporting on the death of Indian Professor G V Loganathan (51). As the hours passed, her name spread from one news media to the next resulting in a search for her in the only place people could - "online." The search led to her Orkut profile (a Google networking site) by netizens across the world. The media had no information about her, excpet for testimonials written by her friends on her profile page.

At first messages posted were by friends, asking her to confirm that she was safe, later it quickly turned to condolence messages as the media confirmed her death. From a few hundred scraps, the number of messages have reached 16682 and still counting. Thousands of friends and more importantly strangers who only came to know of her from the news media are posting messages on her profile. What was it about her that connected to the thousands of strangers only linked by the fact they were members of the same networking site?

It is a reflection of changing times where society is redefining the concept of condolence books to using Internet sites as a medium of online mourning. While, students in the United States used Facebook and other networking sites, netizens in Asia logged into Orkut to pay their respects.

The Internet continues to change the way people live their lives. Now it goes one step further. When people sign up into networking sites, they create a page for others to link up and exchange online messages, share videos & photographs and even write testimonials about each other. They even have forums for like minded people to join and discuss issues and events.

Today, it has undergone a transformation as a self created page which has the potential in the future to become an online memorial to yourself, where family, friends and acquaintances from around the world could meet up to share their grief and comfort each other in the event of your death. An errie thought, but a very realistic one.

It may all have to do with the very fact, Orkut users were able to see a picture, a profile to which they would relate too. The little details of her life, such as her likes, dislikes, characteristics, hobbies all filled in by Minal herself or her friends gave her an identity which made her more than a mere number in the list of causalities. "Unintentionally that opened doors for people to be more connected to her death. Its made it more personal for you and me. More real!" ~Nefere

This will not be the last of the outpouring of grief for a victim on a networking site. As the Internet gets more and more public, we allow ourselves to become part of an online world where we do not have to be celebrities to be noticed, but by virtue of being a member perhaps in the future people around the world will share your joys, sorrows and even grieve for you at your passing. The photo albums, videos, blogs and profiles would be the online memorials for people to visit as tribute to the works and life of another common person that they could relate too in a virtual world.

Grief knits two hearts in closer bonds than happiness ever can; and common sufferings are far stronger links than common joys. ~Alphonse de Lamartine (French writer & poet)


Related Articles:
Missing Mumbai student dead - Mumbai Mid Day
Korean’s rage kills city girl Minal Panchal in US shootout - DNA (Mumbai)
Minal's dreams brought her to Virginia Tech from Mumbai - Times of India
Virginia Tech Shooting Leaves 33 Dead - The New York Times
IITians lose one of their 'brightest' - Times of India

Jewel Thieves strike Dubai Mall

From the front page of The Emirates Evening Post (17 April, 2007)

From the Emirates Today front page (17 April, 2007)

From the Khaleej Times front page (17 April, 2007)

From the Gulf News front page (17 April, 2007)

It has been two days since the great Wafi City shopping mall heist which have been discussed bare and analyzed from every angle possible by the whole of Dubai and perhaps every member of the UAE Blogging community. Yet, like all good stories, the real story comes to light, only in the days after the crime when the finer details are revealed by the investigating authorities.

As of today, the cat and mouse game has begun where the cops are on the hunt and the thieves are on the run. The robbery lasted 1 minute and 45 seconds which resulted in a loss of jewellery worth 54 million dirhams.

This is not the first time that a robbery has happened in Wafi City shopping mall. Last year, Ahmed Al Siddique and Sons stores in Wafi City and BurJuman Center were broken into and thieves made off with a number of expensive watches from the stores worth hundreds of thousands of dirhams. That case was quickly cracked by the police.

This robbery however, which happened around 10 p.m. on Sunday night in front of shoppers have been the talk of the town. The malls are the lifeline for most expats in Dubai and the very fact armed thieves could drive in and drive out have made people think twice when visiting malls.

This is not the old Dubai, that one grew up in. The days when shops were left shut without locks, while Friday prayers were held. The old sleepy town where almost every one knew each other . That has passed into the history books. Now, Dubai with its tag line of being a global city is not only attracting tourists and business but also catching the eye of international criminals who are supposedly behind the latest heist.

The Dubai Police having completed a distinguished 50 golden years are now faced with solving crimes worthy of a Hollywood movie on the likes of Ocean's Eleven. While the cat and mouse game continues, people throng Wafi City to get a glimpse of the robbed store while security experts work with Dubai Police on making the mall experience a safer experience!

Related Articles:
Wafi heist: Airports, exit points on red alert - The Evening Post
Selling stolen Graff diamonds in UAE next to impossible: Experts - The Evening Post
Curious shoppers throng mall- The Evening Post
Dubai Police to train security guards - The Evening Post
Dh54m Dubai heist: Hunt continues for armed robbers - Khaleej Times
Wafi robbers 'highly skilled' - Gulf News
Shopping centre employees worried - Gulf News
Armed robbers raid Wafi jewellery store- Gulf News

Jawbreaking Parents!

“Anger is a brief madness.”

~ Horace (Ancient Roman Poet)

Every individual always has this fear what will happen if their parents loose their cool and become angry. But what happens if it is not your parent who is angry but the parent of the person you are fighting with?

"A woman who beat up a teenager causing permanent disfigurement of his teeth, has been ordered by the Federal Supreme Court to pay Dh8,000 as compensation to the father of the victim. The woman had attacked the boy while he was engaged in a fight with her son at the time." ~ Khaleej Times (Woman told to pay damages for injuring teenager)

That woman must have been one powerful lady to cause permanent disfigurement of the teenager she beat up. This is one jawbreaker the none of the two in the fight will forget in a hurry!

“Anger punishes itself”

A twist in Journalistic perspectives?

Do you wonder what journalists hear? Have you wondered, do they write what they hear? Or do they just write what they want to hear despite what may have been said is totally opposite to what was written!

What happens when two reporters speak to the same source and give us two different stories, especially when the two reporters are from the same newspaper group? Please note the contrasting views between Gulf News and its new sister concern the Xpress, pasted one after the other.

Event: Seminar on 'Seismic Hazards in the Gulf'
Speaker: Angus McFarlane, Technical Director of Building Structures, Hyder Consulting Middle East.
Organizer: Dubai Municipality in cooperation with Hyder Consulting Middle East.
Date: 11 April 2007


Gulf News headline: Earthquake risk in Dubai 'lower than that of London'
Xpress headline: Earthquake Risk For Low-Rises

Gulf News: The seismic risk in Dubai is lower than that of London and it is not dangerous as has been reported in some risk assessment reports, said an expert.
Xpress: A major earthquake could “flatten” low-rise neighbourhoods since Dubai’s building code has only quake-proofed buildings five stories and higher, warned a seismic engineer yesterday at a municipal conference.

Gulf News: "There is also no possibility of a tsunami in this region because Arabian Gulf waters are not deep enough to trigger a tsunami," said Angus McFarlane, Technical Director of Building Structures at Hyder Consulting Middle East.
Xpress: Tough revisions are needed to the city’s building code to standardise the future construction of all buildings in Dubai, tall or short, said Angus McFarlane of Hyder Consulting Middle East.

Gulf News: Khalid Mohammad Saleh, Director of the Building Department at Dubai Municipality, ... "While the UAE is relatively safe from seismic activity due to the nature of its soil, there is a growing national emphasis on seismic risk assessment and seismic design requirements for new structures," he said.
Xpress: The current 1997 building code, says McFarlane, imposes tight earthquake design specifications for high-rise construction but completely ignores buildings four stories and under.
Smaller buildings, he said “are stiffer and therefore attract a higher proportion of seismic loading than taller buildings”.

Gulf News:"Minimum distance to Zagros Fault from the UAE is 120km but Dubai is not at high risk in case of any seismic movement on the fault," said McFarlane.
Xpress: McFarlane called the lack of building code coverage for shorter buildings “totally illogical” given that there is a real, but remote, chance of damage from quake activity in what is known as the dormant fault off the UAE coast and highly active areas of southern Iran.

It is mind boggling to think both reporters were at the same press conference! Who was hearing what? Did they all play Chinese whisper or copy it off the press release? The issue does not arise on the possibility of an earthquake, which neither paper deny? Rather, the question is - what are the reporters reporting?

The Gulf News reporter seems to be dismissing all the possible warnings issued by "the expert" and does not even see the bigger story, that buildings 'four stories or under' in Dubai are not earthquake proof - which make up most of Dubai barring SZR, Marina and a a few places in Deira and Bur Dubai! Did the Xpress reporter catch on onto the larger picture of what was being said? You decide!


“We are so cleverly manipulated and influenced by the media and establishments on both the right and left, that the truth has become hopelessly lost in semantics.” ~ Jules Carlysle (Canadian Author and Humorist)


Related Articles:
Earthquake risk in Dubai 'lower than that of London' - Gulf News
Earthquake Risk For Low-Rises - Xpress
UAE plans earthquake monitoring centre - Gulf News
Earthquake hits UAE's East Coast - Gulf News
Bigger quake possible, says academic - Gulf News

Is 1 Terabyte hard disk, enough storage space?

The world's first 1 terabyte Hard Disk (DS 7K1000) from Hitachi

333,000 high-resolution, 3MB JPEG photos; 250,000 MP3s (4MB per song); about 250 hours of high-definition video--the equivalence of about 125 movies--encoded as 9 Mbps MPEG-4 video - that's the capacity of the new Hitachi 1 Terabyte (1000 gigabytes) hard disk released in the market.

In a world where finding enough storage space is like finding parking slots in rush hour traffic. It is a far cry from the early days of the 5.25 Floppy disks (with maximum storage of 360 KB on a double-sided format). Hitachi Global Storage Technologies was the first to announce the 1-terabyte hard disk drive, and Dell became the first computer manufacturer to offer the 1 terabyte hard disk with their systems from March 2007.

With the Dell price tag fixed at around $540 ( around 2,000 AED) for the 1TB drive, it won't be long before it becomes the standard hard disk in systems at home.

There is a saying “No matter how fast your computer system runs, you will eventually come to think of it as slow.” This can rightly be modified to “No matter how much storage your computer system has, you will eventually come to think of it as not enough.”


Related Articles
Official page of the 1 terabyte (1TB) page - Hitachi Global Storage Technologies
Hitachi Introduces 1-Terabyte Hard Drive - PcWorld.com
1-Terabyte-Drive PCs Coming from Dell - PcWorld.com
Dell Starts Shipping PCs with 1TB Hard Drives - DailyTech.com

World bids adieu to The Wizard of ID

Johnny Hart

In life, there are the little things which brighten your day - make you smile at moments when it was most needed. No, it is not the people around you, rather a comic strip in a newspaper, something so small in the pages and pages of information one comes across in a single day. Yet, the words of prehistoric men, ants, turtles, snakes, wizards and a despotic king frozen in the captions were filled with irony, reality and wisdom unmasking the humor in everyday life. That was the magic of Johnny Hart

American cartoonist Johnny Hart, known as the creator of the comic strip B.C. and co-creator of the strip The Wizard of Id, has died of a stroke at his home in Nineveh, N.Y., at 76. The funeral is scheduled for Friday, his wife of 55 years, Bobby, told AP. She said he was working at his drawing table at the time of his death.

Hart's "B.C." strip was launched in 1958 and eventually appeared in more than 1,300 newspapers with an audience of 100 million, according to Creators Syndicate Inc., which distributes it.

After he graduated from Union-Endicott High School, Hart met Brant Parker, a young cartoonist who became a prime influence and eventual co-creator with Hart of "The Wizard of Id" in 1964.

Besides his wife, Hart is survived by two daughters, Patti and Perri. He was a native of Endicott, about 135 miles northwest of New York City, and drew his comic strip at a studio in his home in Nineveh until the day he died.

We will miss your wisdom through your immortal cavemen, animals, wizards and kings. Rest in Peace!

By bouncing a word, visually, you're putting in an inflection, you know, the way a sentence should be if somebody heard it spoken. And I think a lot of humor depends on inflection, how a person says something. Certain things you could say as a question, and as a statement. ~ Johnny Hart

Wizard of ID by Johnny Hart - www.comics.com

B.C. by Johnny Hart - www.creators.com

Related Articles
'B.C.' Cartoonist Johnny Hart Dies at 76 - Forbes.com
'B.C.' Cartoonist Johnny Hart, 76, Died While Drawing
Cartoon Group President, Others React to Johnny Hart's Death
Other Articles on Johnny Hart's death

Wizard of ID - comic site
B.C. - comic site

Lights out gets you Shopping vouchers!

Today Khaleej Times carried an unusual report where "a woman was given gift vouchers worth Dh.200 and an apology by a shopping centre in Abu Dhabi when it switched off the lights for the night. It seems the woman panicked when the lights were switched off as she was still shopping inside the mall all alone.

“When the lights were switched off, she got scared. Therefore, she complained to us,” said Ahmed Rashid Al Mansouri, Head of the Consumer Protection Section at the department, adding that the complaint was the first of its kind. Shopping centres should not switch off the lights after the end of the official working hours without checking if there’s any shopper left inside, Al Mansouri warned. He said if malls fail to comply with this, strict actions will be taken against them."

With all due respect for the petrified lady, one does wonder where did the shopping centre staff vanish? Did all the employees of the stores leave on the sly leaving behind a customer in the store? So much for security of the shops and an eye opener to the shop owners!

With shopping vouchers up for grabs, shopping center and mall securities better watch out for opportunists hiding in the stores humming - "Baby when the lights go out!"


Related Article
Mall leaves female shopper in the dark - Khaleej Times

Aspirations of Women!

"Take four wives, urges Bahrain MP," on the Gulf News front page (5 April 2007) threw open a debate in context to women's rights and their commodification. The independent Bahraini lawmaker stated his view, "We do not want to have spinsters in the country and we do not want a rise in the divorce rate either. Taking more than one wife is the solution, and I advise that the members of the Council of Representatives should set the example."

His request to his male peers to take four wives, three Bahraini women and one foreigner, in order to help address the issue of the high number of spinsters in the country, is clearly mentioned in the article as uttered in a light tone (what ever that meant).

Today's Gulf News had another article "Aspirations of young UAE women revealed" which stated, "The majority of Emirati women would prefer spinsterhood to being a second wife, according to statistics revealed at a workshop held at one of the leading universities in Sharjah."

The article also stated that the research among Emirati women revealed that 65 percent planned on working immediately after graduating from university, while only one per cent planned to stay at home.

This is a positive sign of women's empowerment and awakening in the UAE, by a new generation who want equality of genders and wish to make meaningful contributions in the once conservative Middle Eastern society.

On March 8th, International Women's Day, a Gulf News article on women around the world, mentioned "Women in the Islamic republic have been pushing for equal rights and the nullification of a law allowing men in Iran to have four wives. And in Afghanistan, two million girls have returned to school since the fall of the ultraconservative Taliban regime - but widespread discrimination and domestic violence persist..."

Noeleen Heyzer, executive director of the UN Development Fund for Women, said "89 countries currently have legislative provisions on domestic violence, 104 countries have made marital rape a crime, 90 countries have provisions against sexual harassment, and 93 states prohibit trafficking of women and men."

Today's article stating the aspirations of the UAE women and the apt reply to the "Four wives Solution" by a fellow Council Member Hassan Al Dossari, who stated "Please, just speak for yourself" are to be seen as positive signs of gender equality and empowerment which is silently sweeping the region.

However, the first article "Take four wives, urges Bahrain MP" noted that, "Latifa Al Gaood, the only woman in the lower council, preferred not to comment". A point to ponder indeed! "Men are not the enemy, but the fellow victims. The real enemy is women's denigration of themselves." ~Betty Friedan, American Feminist & Social Activist.

I never doubted that equal rights was the right direction.
Most reforms, most problems are complicated. But to me there is nothing complicated about ordinary equality.
~ Alice Stokes Paul, American suffragist leader

Global Warming Could Wipe Out ¼ Of All Species!

Will nature be reduced to a mere shadow on the deserts of the Earth?
Freemind Pictures ©

The United Nations on Friday issued its most dramatic warning yet about the potentially catastrophic effects of climate change on the planet. More than 100 countries represented in the UN's panel on climate change spent a tense Thursday night in Brussels trying to agree unanimously on the language of a final draft.

The report, prepared by more than 2,500 scientists for the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), provides the first confirmation from the entire international scientific community that the burning of fossil fuels by humans is one of the main culprits of global warming.

The report claims that global warming will lead to desertification, droughts and rising seas and that those living in the tropics will be the worst hit -- from sub-Saharan Africa to the Pacific islands. Billions could face water shortages, and ocean levels might rise for centuries to come. It could lead to a sharp drop in crop yields in Africa and bring heatwaves to Europe and North America. Europe's Alpine glaciers will disappear and much of the coral that comprises Australia's Great Barrier Reef will die from bleaching.

"The urgency of this report prepared by the world's top scientists should be matched by an equally urgent response from governments," said Hans Verolme, director of the global climate change program at the conservation organization WWF. "Doing nothing is not an option."

Read the full article "Report Confirms Climate Change Is a Fact",© SPIEGEL ONLINE 2007.


Related Articles
World Scientists: Global Warming Could Wipe Out ¼ Of All Species - NBC 10.com
Scientists, governments clash over warming report - Reuters
Emissions Already Affecting Climate, Report Finds - The New York Times

Read the Full Report at the Official Website of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)

Clean Air is a necessity, not a luxury!

Freemind Pictures ©

Pollution in Dubai! The world's tallest tower under construction, the Burj Dubai appears significantly dwarfed by the smoke or smog in the air. The thick grey haze hanging over Shaikh Zayed Road (SZR) on most mornings is a disturbing sight and one which evokes serious thought on the air we breathe each day.

In a Gulf News article "UAE air samples to be scrutinised", it is interesting to note how researchers commented "We didn't want to capture air from highways which we know is polluted from the exhausts. " Talk about stating the obvious!

"Previous research discovered a level of ozone which was around 30 to 40 per cent higher than the levels over nearby stations in Isfahan and New Delhi. Unnaturally high ozone levels are hazardous to humans, animals and plant health. Different research models show that the region is a hot spot for the level of ozone reacting with petrol chemicals which is a precursor of smog...

The research has been called for and funded by the Ministry of Presidential Affairs in Abu Dhabi and will be undertaken alongside the UAE Meteorological Department and the National Centre for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colorado, USA."

It does not take research, rather it is in plain view as seen in the photograph for the average Dubai citizen to know there is pollution in the air. The Dubai government must be lauded for its strict checks on vehicle emissions from cars, yet we see trucks belching out black smoke as they cart along heavy containers on the various roads of Dubai.

The inconsistent weather around the world and the impact of global warming is fast becoming a reality. The Dubai government has announced an environment plan as one of its top priorities to preserve the ecological balance. However, it must be the top priority for everyone in Dubai and not just the government to take steps in order to reduce this pollution. Communication scientist Marshall McLuhan stated, "There are no passengers on spaceship earth. We are all crew." It is time, we took a stand and did our little parts in saving the environment.

“There's so much pollution in the air now that if it weren't for our lungs there'd be no place to put it all.” ~Robert Orben (US magician and comedy writer)

Related Articles
Mohammad approves Dubai's environmental plan - Gulf News
UAE air samples to be scrutinised - Gulf News
An Inconvenient Truth - Official Site of the 2007 Oscar Winning Documentary on Global Warming

Every path has its puddle

Freemind Pictures ©

“Every path has its puddle” ~ Proverb

Perhaps all we need to do is to look behind us once in a while; to see the patterns we leave in our wake. ~ Nefere

Read "Thunderstorm lashes Dubai"~ Gulf News