Countess's hat of fox-fur brings brush with the RSPCA(Electronic Telegraph)
Prince Rainier has surgery(Electronic Telegraph)
Reluctant king eases subjects into new era(UK Times)
Fury as 'King M-6' reforms status of Moroccan women(The Independant)
Netty's News for the Past couple days
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Countess's hat of fox-fur brings brush with the RSPCA
By Neil Tweedie
THE Countess of Wessex said yesterday that she had been guilty of an error of
judgment in wearing a fox-fur hat during her weekend visit to Switzerland.
The admission followed criticism from animal rights groups over her choice of
hat, which she had purchased in the ski resort of St Moritz as temperatures
plummeted. Her embarrassment was compounded by questions over the funding of the
Swiss visit, with her recently acquired royal status being suggested as the main
reason why she had been given free hospitality at the resort.
The 35-year-old Countess addressed the matter of her headwear when she was
confronted by journalists as she arrived at the offices of her public relations
company R-JH in Mayfair. "I think it was an error of judgment on my part," she
said. The RSPCA was among the several bodies who criticised her choice.
Yesterday a spokesman said: "We believe that people should look for alternatives
that are just as fashionable but do not cause the suffering of animals."
But Buckingham Palace was quick to come to the countess's defence, pointing out
that she had purchased the hat on the spur of the moment only because of the
freezing temperatures in St Moritz. "She had no intention of upsetting anyone,"
said a spokesman.
The Countess spent five days in St Moritz, staying at the Badrutts Rosewood
Palace Hotel. Her room, which cost at least £250 per night, was provided free of
charge by the owners. After flying economy on a British Airways flight from
London to Zurich, the Countess transferred to a Learjet which took her and other
travellers on to St Moritz. She was then ferried from the airport to the hotel
by a courtesy Rolls-Royce.
During her stay, which was described as part business, part pleasure, she mixed
with celebrities and various European royals who were attending the Cartier Polo
World Cup on Snow competition. She also managed to do some skiing.
Jo Vickers, who runs her own PR company in London, was also on the trip. She
said the Countess had been dismayed by the publicity which her visit had
attracted. Miss Vickers said: "It's a storm in a teacup. Everybody was buying
extra gloves, extra hats - it was about minus 25 degrees. A couple of days
before it had been sunny and then it went really cold. Sophie just went to a
shop and bought a hat. As far as her receiving free hospitality, the only things
she did not pay for were her room and the meals she ate at various events."
Miss Vickers said the Countess had paid for the Learjet, which forms part of a
regular service between Zurich and St Moritz, together with other passengers.
The price for the 20-minute journey had been between £400 and £500. What method
of payment had been used was not clear. It meant that she could avoid a
four-and-a-half-hour journey to the Alpine resort by train. The Rolls-Royce was
a car that was owned and operated by the hotel.
Miss Vickers added: "Would she [the Countess] just get on a British Rail train
here and go anywhere for four and a half hours? At the end of the day, if anyone
was given the choice between a 20-minute flight and a long train journey, in her
position, what would they have done?" Miss Vickers said that she had suggested
the trip to Switzerland.
Her company handled the PR for the whole Rosewood hotel group, while the
Countess and her partners in R-JH handled publicity for one of Rosewood's
hotels, the Lanesborough in London. The Badrutts Rosewood Palace was the newest
addition to the Rosewood chain, and the Countess had used the visit to acquaint
herself with its facilities. She had also met executives from another of her
clients, Elysium, an international travel club.
Miss Vickers said that it was common for public relations executives to enjoy
free goods and services from the companies who employed them because it was
essential to know what they were representing when they were trying to place
articles in the press. "Whatever she [the Countess] does, she is going to be
dogged. I admire her for sticking to the point and trying to be a
businesswoman," she said.
~*~
Prince Rainier has surgery
SURGEONS removed a part of a lung from Prince Rainier of Monaco yesterday to
carry out checks on a "nodular formation", his office said.
The statement said the operation in the principality's cardiological centre had
been scheduled in December after surgery on the 76-year-old prince's aorta. The
prince had a heart bypass operation in 1994. It gave no further details but said
a medical bulletin would be issued later.
~*~
Reluctant king eases subjects into new era
IT IS not, according to the incumbent, a job you would wish on anyone. But the
sad and unexpected circumstance of his father's death thrust Abdullah II on to
the throne of Jordan, and the feverish pace of economic and social reform that
he has set over the past year has astonished older Middle Eastern potentates.
Interviewed by The Times at his Amman palace yesterday, King Abdullah admitted
that when he was told by his father on January 25 last year that he would be the
next King, 13 days before Hussein died of cancer, his stomach "churned and tied
in knots".
He was moved partly by grief over the impending loss but also at the prospect of
giving up a military career as head of Jordan's special operations for a life
that would plunge his children - Hussein, five, and daughter, Iman, three - into
an international glare.
"The change in my life has gone through 180 degrees," he said. "I had not
expected to be King and didn't particularly wish it. This is not a job I ever
thought would be mine. It is not a job you would wish on anybody."
The King, 38, caught the public imagination by adopting disguises to test,
incognito, aspects of life for ordinary citizens. He may wish that he could wear
disguises more often: he deeply regrets the loss of privacy and "control over my
own life" that the monarchy brings.
He recalled how a trip to see the film Matrix in Washington last year turned
into a ten-car cavalcade with 26 secret service agents. He has been banned from
skydiving and manages only occasional sessions of motorcycle racing when he
spends weekends at Aqaba with his wife, Rania, the daughter of a Palestinian
doctor.
But as a member of a new generation of Western-educated Arab royals, he sees
himself as leading a movement towards democracy, liberal economic policies and
integration with the rest of the world. To the ageing members of his father's
generation, such as Hafez al-Assad in Syria, Saddam Hussein in Iraq, the
ultra-conservative Saudi royal family and Gulf state emirs, this is tantamount
to treason.
Revealing a sense both of the realpolitik of the shrinking world and of the
long-term advantage of leading change rather than having it forced upon him, the
King, sitting at a vast, polished conference table beneath portraits of his
ancestors, did not speak of ideology, Arab nationalism or religious fanaticism.
Using language more suited to the Third Way campaigns of the European Left, he
spoke of "delivery".
"We [in the Arab world] have the talent, we have the people. The people want to
live and live a better life and we should give it to them," he insisted.
Born to Muna Hussein, née Antoinette Gardner, Hussein's second wife, who still
lives in Amman, he was educated at Sandhurst and had a year at Oxford, studying
Arabic and politics, and at Georgetown University. He remains more comfortable
expressing himself in English. His close friends include King Mohammed VI of
Morocco and Sheik Hamad of Bahrain, and he speaks often with Bashar al-Assad,
the son of Syria's Assad, who is expected to succeed the Ba'athist autocrat.
"We're all Western-educated and very good friends. We speak all the time and
compare notes, compare problems - which are all very similar - and share our
experiences about how to solve problems. It's really fascinating. I don't have
that intimacy with the older generation.
"In the countries where the older generation of leaders have not seen that the
world is a village and that they need to modernise, young people are worried
that they are going to be left behind."
Even his critics agreed he set about modernising his realm with youthful vigour.
That, in part, explained the disguises. "For the best reasons, people in the
court often tell me what they think I want to hear. So it made sense to get out
and see things for myself." The idea paid off. Red tape has been slashed and
sightings of the King "have got a bit like Elvis, he's being seen everywhere".
As King Abdullah explained: "It had the effect of making sure that officials
treated everyone like a king."
~*~
Fury as 'King M-6' reforms status of Moroccan women
By Rupert Cornwell
A rise in the legal age of marriage from 15 to 18; polygamy only with the
permission of a man's first wife; an equal right to divorce, and a fair division
of assets between the parties. What could sound more reasonable? In Morocco,
these notions are enough to have wise men warning of civil war.
January 2000 will go down as when the new Moroccan revolution woke up to
reality. It was when Islamic activists shouted down ministers in the capital,
Rabat, and when a government plan to haul the treatment of women from the Middle
Ages to somewhere near the 21st century became the litmus test of King Mohammed
VI's ambitions for his country.
This was the month one of the most stable Arab countries became a battleground
between modernisers and the forces of conservative Islam.
Little was expected from a shy and untested crown prince, when he succeeded King
Hassan II last July. But "M-6" has transformed the mood of his country.
He allowed the return from exile of Abraham Serfaty, the country's most
prominent dissident and erstwhile political prisoner, and then sacked his
father's dreaded Interior Minister, Drissi Basri. He has twice travelled to the
desperately poor Rif region, the largest source of cannabis for Europe, within
which Hassan II never set foot in 38 years on the throne.
On the Western Sahara dispute, which has weighed on Moroccan international
relations for a quarter of a century, the King hints at a new flexibility.
Unprecedented in the Arab world, he has launched a commission to examine human
rights abuses. Thus far, the King has governed by dramatic gesture. But the
clash with militant Islam over women's emancipation will be a first, perhaps
decisive challenge. The Prime Minister, Abderrahmane El Youssoufi, warned: "If
this fails the whole reform project fails."
Morocco's Islamists are a minority, but a determined one. They have the backing
of conservatives in Mr Youssoufi's eight-party coalition, and a natural
recruiting ground in the mosques and universities.
The ingredients that have stoked Islamic movements elsewhere are only too
visible here: massive unemployment, $19bn (£12.5bn) of foreign debt whose mere
servicing consumes one-third of the annual budget, rampant corruption and vast
disparities between a tiny, super-wealthy elite and masses who live in grinding
poverty.
The illiteracy rate is 50 per cent; as many live on £1 a day or less. Among
women in the countryside, deprived of schooling, jobs and basic legal rights,
those figures rise to 80 per cent or more.
The Islamists claim emancipation of women would lead to the collapse of the
family, destruction of Islamic values and debauchery of every sort.
The government is not sure of victory. Hamstrung by differences within its own
ranks, it has not dared challenge to the Islamists head-on.
All roads lead back to the King, change's best guarantee. The youth of Mohammed
VI – he is 36 – could be a vital asset in a country where half the population is
under 25.
But not only does he wield vast temporal powers in his semi-feudal kingdom. He
is also Morocco's supreme religious authority: directly descended from the
Prophet, and such a man religious activists will take on at their peril. To show
commitment to Islam, the King has grown a beard since he ascended the throne.
Unlike his father, who survived at least two attempted military coups against
him, the King so far has the full loyalty of the army and the police: without
it, he could never last. But the plan to help women will be his sternest test.
"I am not exaggerating," insists Mr Serfaty. "This is capable of leading us into
civil war."
~*~
February 2nd
Prince Rainier III of Monaco underwent surgery. A part of one of his lungs was
removed. It is
said the operation went very well.
King Albert II of the Belgians left the hospital of Aalst, Belgium, this
afternoon. He still needs
some weeks rest it is said.
Animal rights campaigners have accussed Sophie the Countess of Wessex of being
cruel and
out of touch. The Countess bought a fox-fur hat while in the Swiss ski resort of
St Moritz,
because of freezing temperatures. A spokesman of Buckingham Palace said that she
had no
intention of upsetting anyone.
In August and Septemnber Buckingham Palace will open its doors for the public.
Several
rooms can be visited. This years highlight will be the ball-room, the biggest
room of the palace,
which was finished by Sir James Pennethorne in 1856 for Queen Victoria.
February 1st
Until June 25th there is an interesting exhibition in the Rijksmuseum in
Amsterdam, The
Netherlands, called "Een Koninklijk Museum" (A Royal Museum). It gives an image
of the
collection of the Rijksmuseum in which the royal collection and the first Dutch
King Louis
Napoléon (who was king between 1806 and 1810) are in the centre of interest. The
museum
opened its doors on September 15th, 1809.
In spite of all threats of the European Union to break all
business/government-relations with
Austria, when the extreme party of Jörg Haider becomes a part of the government,
the Dutch
Prime Minister said it is no problem that Queen Beatrix goes to Lech, Austria,
for her yearly
skiing-holiday.
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