A ministerial commission grouping ministers of Foreign Affairs, Justice, Legal Affairs and Interior has been assigned by the Cabinet to further discuss an agreement on fighting terrorism that was approved by the United Nations on December 9 1999.
The parliament has already endorsed an agreement on resisting bombings despite the objection of many MPs.

Political parties have expressed their concern about the agreement which they say would make Yemen subject to more external pressures.

The People’s Coordination Committee for encouraging people to economically boycott the US, was formed in Sana’a last week.
Sheik Abdullah Bin Hussien Al-Ahmer, Speaker of Parliament, was chosen as chairman of the committee and Farag Bin Ghanem, former Prime Minister, was chosen as vice-chairman. The committee membership includes secretaries general of the Yemeni parties of Islah, Nasserite, Socialist, Ba’ath, Al-Haq, and People’s Forces Union and Engineer Faisal Bin Shamlan, former Oil Minister, Chairman of Parliament Independent Bloc and Dr. Abdul-Aziz Al-Maqaleh, president of Sana’a University.

A speech ceremony was held to celebrate the National Day of the handicapped on Sunday evening in the Center of Culture. A number of disabled were honored for their creativity in many fields. Show of Products of the handicapped Association, organized by Sam Electronics Company LTD, was inaugurated last Saturday. The show that included paintings and posters depicting suffering of the handicapped will continue until 18th of the current month.

An extraordinary Session for the members of the civil society organizations in cooperation with the follow-up committee of the post-Beijing activities project. The meeting introduced the new head of the project Miss Nadwa Al-Dawsary and discussed the working plan and elected for the coordination council.
Five associations were formed for managing the communication net between the non-governmental organizations. Those associations are elected every three months. The tasks of the coordination committee are to follow up the activities approved in the working plan of the net, propagating for the net and inviting membership of other associations to the net, marketing the programs of member associations in the net, supporting the associations, determining the tasks among them, and preparing future working plans.

Statistics have shown that the disabled in Yemen total more than 1400,000 people among whom 928200 children and 765,000 children less than 18 years old. The statistics have also indicated that the problem will be worse in the future when the number of the handicapped increases every year. The problem will worsen due to many social and health factors and lack of facilities.

A military group evacuated Queen Arwa Mosque last week upon arrival of more than 50 cars carrying Buhras who wanted to practice their rituals inside the mosque causing a state of anger and resentment among local people. Inside the mosque people were able to hear them weeping, asking for blessings, beating chests, etc. The delegation included a number of girls who had a bath in the mosque bathrooms for blessing.

Meet Opposition Secretaries General
Representatives of the European Union, EU Deputy Non-Resident Ambassador and director of the Democratic Institute met a number of opposition parties secretaries general and Yemeni political personalities in Sana’a last Tuesday. They discussed nature of the constitutional amendments and the local elections that would be held in early 2001.

Iftar meals the Charitable Society for Social Welfare provided for mosques and group Iftar centers during the first ten days of Ramadhan reached 1500 meals serving thousands of people, said Dr. Hameed Ziad, secretary general of the society. He added that efforts of the society to provide Iftar meals for Traffic-police, Policemen, prisoners, students and distribute foodstuffs to poor families were enhanced day by day.
During the first 10 days of Ramadhan more than 264,772 people and 24,854 families benefited from the project.

Sharyoof-2 is a 1612m deep exploration oil well, 1120m west of proven Sharyoof-1 well, drilled in 12 days with 100% core recovery by lucky Rig 905 of China ZPEB. Its tested oil production is up to 16,150 barrels per day on top of Sharyoof-1 that was officially announced earlier to be of 5,000 barrels daily production, Mr. Lui Xiangang, Senior Manager Marketing, ZPEB told the Yemen Times.
Beside Rig 905, ZPEB dug three other wells and conducted two work-over jobs at Block 32. It has recently brought Tasour field at Block 32 on production. According to official sources, the Sharyoof field at Block 53 and Tasour field at Block 32 will add primarily 50-80 thousand barrels of crude oil a day to Yemen’s oil production by the year 2001.

The Ministry of Public Health and United States government held on Sunday, December 10, 2000, handing over ceremonies of clinical equipment, consisting of 127 items delivered through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to Amran and Masyab Health Centers in Amran and Sana’a Governorates. The cooperation began in the 1990’s with the “Options for Family Care Project” that helped 28 primary centers and health units in Hodeidah, Hajja, Hadramout and Lahj. The 29 kits value is $840,500 and their distribution is underway in Sana’a, Hadramout, Shabwah, Al-Baida, Dhamar, Taiz, Amran, Mareb, Al-Dalae, Ibb, Al-Mahweet, Hajja and Abyan. Since 1990, USAID has invested $10,000,000 in improving maternal and child health care in Yemen.

Informed sources of the Ministry of Finance expected that oil and minerals revenues in Yemen will reach 329 billion rials in 2001. The sources added that volume of oil and minerals revenues will increase to 329,35 billion rials and that our country will export 59,9 million barrels next year. Production of gas is expected to rise to 425 thousand metric tons.

A speech ceremony was held last Saturday in Abyan and the International Amnesty Organization work was inaugurated on the occasion of the Universal Declaration Human Rights marked on December 10. Many political personalities attended the ceremony which was sponsored by Ms Ilham Abdulwahab, Chairman of the Supreme Council for Coordination with the Yemeni groups.
This ceremony, held at the hall of Faculty of Education - Zanjibar, coincided with the Coordination Council and International Amnesty Organization agreement on establishing Group No 14 in Abyan.

den and Lahj Organization organized, yesterday, a seminar under the theme “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” where specialists from groups of the Amnesty International Organization discussed many topics about woman, child, sexuality and punishment.
Many govenorates have seen similar activities and seminars in which the attendants discussed the violations of human rights and achievements made in this field in the past years.