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NAJRAN – A Ministry of Health committee investigating the death of a woman while she was undergoing an appendectomy late last year, on Tuesday listened to the testimony of her husband.

Faisal Mansour Al-Makrami, the husband of Arwa, the woman who died on the operation table on the third day of Eid Al-Adha last year, accused the medical team which conducted the operation at King Khaled Hospital here of negligence.

After testifying before the committee, Al-Makrami said the investigation includes all those who dealt with his wifes case from the time she was taken to the hospitals emergency room until she was pronounced dead.

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JEDDAH/TAIF/DHAMAD – Residents and shop workers in a southern Jeddah district are accustomed to seeing Muhammad Sultan running around in the streets scratching his body.

His elderly mother blames herself for her only childs condition. “For 16 years he has suffered from mental illness. I noticed his silence and introversion but I thought it would go away, until he was fired from his job because he had been absent. Maybe my failure to take him to doctors when it first occurred made his suffering worse,” she said.

She said that his condition has worsened recently, to the point where he often “ate the leaves of trees. But he doesnt hurt anybody”, the mother added. She said Muhammad spends his days sitting in front of nearby shops and only comes home to eat or sleep.

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RIYADH – The Shoura Council is scheduled to discuss this week the implications of the decision of the Commission for Information Technology and Communication (CITC) to ban receiving roaming international calls free of charge and the exchange of international calls through a single network at local call charges.

Dr. Khaleel Ibrahim, member of the Shoura Council, said the Council will discuss the commissions decision as part of its discussion of a report on telecommunications and information technology.

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DAMMAM – Indian expatriates are keenly looking forward to the three-day visit of Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh to the Kingdom.
Terming the visit as historic, coming as it does 28 years after the visit by any Indian prime minister, many Indian expatriates feel enthusiastic and are looking forward to present Prime Minister Singh with memorandums on pressing issues facing the community in the Kingdom. Indira Gandhi was the only other Indian prime minister to have visited the Kingdom in 1982.
Members of the Indian community Saudi Gazette talked to spoke of several issues requiring the immediate attention of the Indian government and expressed their hope that all contentious issues would be resolved during the prime minister’s visit.
The hopes and aspirations of the Indian community are given below:

There are a large number of Indian overstayers in the Kingdom owing to various reasons. The immediate attention of the government is required to resolve this delicate issue. I recommend an official request from our government to the Saudi authorities for a general amnesty for these people facilitating their departure to India. 
– K.T.A. Muneer, Overseas Indian Cultural Congress chief organizer
I expect the PM’s visit to be fruitful in strengthening bilateral relations between the two countries.
I hope that Saudi Arabia will hasten the introduction of the Islamic banking system in India accepting the recommendations of the Raghuram Rajan Committee to establish Islamic banking which has been a great success in many European countries and America.

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RIYADH – Sheikh Qais Aal Al-Sheikh Mubarak, a member of the Board of Senior Ulema, has said that it is not permissible to pronounce “takfeer” – accusing Muslims of unbelief – on those who permit “disputable issues” on which scholars are not unanimous. A judge from the Ministry of Justice has also said that “takfeer rulings” may only be issued by the courts of the judiciary.

The scholars have spoken on the issue in response to a fatwa earlier this week from Sheikh Abdulrahman Bin Nasser Al-Barrak in which he deemed lawful the killing of anyone permitting “ikhtilat” – mixing of the sexes – in the workplace or in education.

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JEDDAH – Many parents and teachers are not educating young children properly in matters of belief by using scary stories of punishment in the grave and in Hell. This only serves to create psychological problems and can also result in children disliking their own religion.

Several education specialists and scholars on the Shariah interviewed on the effectiveness of this method and the possible adverse effects on the child suggested more successful ways to educate young children.

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JEDDAH – “Extreme fatwas have come to the fore once again, but this time theyve been met with condemnation in religious and cultural circles”.

So began a report in Al-Watan Arabic daily on Wednesday following the publication of a fatwa the previous day by Sheikh Abdulrahman Bin Nasser Al-Barrak on his official website deeming lawful the killing of anyone permitting “ikhtilat” – mixing of the sexes – in the workplace or in a place of education.

Al-Watan said that “observers were surprised to see the fatwa issued in his name, in which he says: anyone permitting ikhtilat – or ikhtilat that leads to forbidden things – is permitting these forbidden things, and anyone who permits them is a kafir (unbeliever), making him an apostate, and he should be tried and if he doesnt retract his words then it is a duty to kill him”.

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JEDDAH – The recent announcement by Justice Minister Mohammad Al-Issa in Riyadh that a law is being drafted to allow women lawyers to argue legal cases in court in the Kingdom has been widely welcomed by legal experts and social activists.

Dr. Bakr Bin Hamza Khoshaim, member of the Shoura Council, told Saudi Gazette by phone from Riyadh that it is definitely a step forward in the Kingdoms march to progress and in according increasingly more rights to women. “It will benefit wherever applicable, and is certainly good for women,” he added.

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JEDDAH – A leading Saudi scholar believes it is wrong for anyone to try to divorce a woman from her husband based on “tribal incompatibility” as long as the man has been truthful about his background.

Dr. Muhammad Bin Ahmad Al-Saleh, a member of the International Council at Imam Muhammad Bin Saud Islamic University, said a wifes family has no right to backtrack and demand a divorce for their daughter under these circumstances.

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The fragrant smell of oud, a view of the beautiful doors of the Prophets Mosque from her window, and a book on her lap are some of the early memories of Suhaila Zain Al-Abidin.

It is these abiding memories that have served as a spur for her later work. Today she is a member of the National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) and serves on the board and is vice-president of the studies and consultations committee and the scientific committee. The NSHR is an independent body, with no affiliation to any government agency. Its work is governed by declarations and covenants of the Arab League, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, the United Nations and its agencies, as long as it does not violate Islamic law.

Growing up in Madina, Zain Al-Abidin was home schooled with her two sisters from elementary level until she was ready to enter university. She graduated with a bachelors degree in Art History from King Saud University in Riyadh and started masters studies in Islamic History at the College of Humanities at Al-Azhar University in Egypt in 1995.

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