Day: March 10, 2017

Monia Mazigh’s Hope Has Two Daughter

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By Monia Mazigh, translated by Fred A. Reed Arachnide, 296 pages, $22.95 Monia Mazigh’s latest novel takes readers through a cycle of hope, uprising, despair and hope again in a story of two girls awakened by civil unrest. Hope Has Two Daughters opens in 1984: Nadia nears completing her lycée studies when the bread riots rock Tunisia and rent the fabric of Nadia’s stable but restrictive upbringing. Jump to 2010: Nadia’s daughter Lila, born and raised in Ottawa, reluctantly takes a gap year to learn Arabic in Tunis. Lila is…

UN to award 4 Arab women for pioneering work in science

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Women from Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and the UAE will be honoured at the L’Oréal-UNESCO Prize for Women and Science later this month. The International Rising Talents fellowship will be handed to Tunisia’s Dr Rym Ben Sallem for her research project entitled “the promise of new antibiotics”. Ben Salem was selected from amongst 250 candidates globally who are currently researching their PhD thesis or post-doctoral studies. Joining Rym will be the UAE’s Nazek El-Atab for her contributions to electrical, electronic and computer engineering; Doctor Tamara Elzein from Lebanon with her…

Study finds security tops tourist concerns in holiday choice

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Security is holidaymakers’ main consideration when choosing a destination, a research report released on Wednesday by Bournemouth University and travel search site Travelzoo said. “Since Tunisia happened, safety and security has moved higher and higher up the agenda,” Travelzoo’s European President Richard Singer told Reuters, adding that security was now travellers’ number one concern. A British coroner last week criticised the security arrangements of a Tunisian hotel where 38 tourists were killed by a militant in 2015. The study said it had found that “97 percent of all respondents have…

Tunisia, Algeria sign agreements during Tunisian-Algerian Joint Commission

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The Algerian Prime Minister Abdelmalak Sellal and his Tunisian counterpart Youssef Chahed co-presided on Thursday the 21st session of the Tunisian-Algerian joint high commission during which several agreements were signed between the two neighboring countries. The session of the High Joint Tunisian-Algerian Commission was crowned by the signing of nine cooperation agreements in the economic, logistical, technological and commercial fields. During this session, the two countries also signed a Memorandum of Understanding and of cooperation in the consumer protection and the quality control of products and services. “The volume of…

German Bundesrat says Maghreb states not safe for refugees

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The German parliament’s upper chamber rejected a law that would have allowed quicker deportations to Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria. The decision deals a blow to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s refugee strategy. In the end, the vote wasn’t even close. Led by federal states with left-leaning governing coalitions, a wide majority the Bundesrat shot down a law written by the government and passed by Germany’s lower parliamentary chamber, the Bundestag. It would have declared the Maghreb states – Tunisia, Morocco and Algeria – “safe countries of origin” and thus allowed for  …

Tunisia’s powerful union, industry agree wage hike in private sector

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Tunisia‘s main labour union and largest industry association agreed on Friday to raise wages for about 1.5 million private sector workers, a step aimed at reducing social tension, restoring investor confidence and reviving the economy. The announcement of the 6 percent increase came at a ceremony at the Prime Minister’s office, after weeks of talks between the private business industry group and the UGTT, a powerful labor union that since the 2011 revolution has on occasion intervened in political matters. Wided Bouchamoui, the head of the Chamber of Commerce and…