RIYADH //A former Saudi Guantanamo detainee who joined al Qa'eda's affiliate in Yemen after completing Saudi Arabia's rehabilitation programme for militants has surrendered to Saudi authorities, the interior ministry announced yesterday.
Jabir Jubran al Fayfi, 35, who was repatriated from Guantanamo in December 2006, fled to Yemen after graduating from the rehabilitation programme. In February last year, he appeared on a list of most wanted Saudis issued by the interior ministry.
Of the 109 Saudi detainees from Guantanamo who had gone through the programme as of June, Mr al Fayfi and 10 others had returned to militancy, joining al Qa'eda in the Arabian Peninsula, according to Abdulrahman al Hadlaq, a senior interior ministry official. Mr al Fayfi is the second of that group of 11 to surrender; Muhammed al Awfi returned to the kingdom in February last year.
During Ramadan, Mr al Fayfi called some officials he had met in the programme "and asked for their help" in returning home, the ministry spokesman, Gen Mansour al Turki said in a phone interview. He added that Yemeni officials assisted with Mr al Fayfi's repatriation.
Mr al Turki said that Mr al Fayfi will now "go through the legal process" with some consideration given to the fact that he turned himself in.
According to US defence department documents, Mr al Fayfi was detainee number 188 at Guantanamo. He denied US accusations that he had trained and fought with al Qa'eda or the Taliban while in Afghanistan.
He told US military interrogators that before going to Afghanistan, he had been a taxi-driver in Saudi Arabia, the documents show. He was born in 1975 in the southern Saudi town of Taif, Gen al Turki said.
Gen al Turki said that of the 85 wanted militants listed in 2009, five have surrendered, six have been killed and two arrested.
Mr al Fayfi's experience, Gen al Turki added, should be an example for "those who've been misled by al Qa'eda to take the same path and surrender".
According to a ministry statement, Mr al Fayfi "realised what wrong he was committing and that he preferred to surrender himself and go back to the right path instead of continuing to be astray".
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
National Editorial: Suleimani has been killed, now we must de-escalate
Mina Al Oraibi: Air strike casts a long shadow over the decade ahead
Jack Moore: Why the assassination is such a monumental gamble
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From Zero
Artist: Linkin Park
Label: Warner Records
Number of tracks: 11
Rating: 4/5
The biog
Hometown: Cairo
Age: 37
Favourite TV series: The Handmaid’s Tale, Black Mirror
Favourite anime series: Death Note, One Piece and Hellsing
Favourite book: Designing Brand Identity, Fifth Edition
Cricket World Cup League 2
UAE squad
Rahul Chopra (captain), Aayan Afzal Khan, Ali Naseer, Aryansh Sharma, Basil Hameed, Dhruv Parashar, Junaid Siddique, Muhammad Farooq, Muhammad Jawadullah, Muhammad Waseem, Omid Rahman, Rahul Bhatia, Tanish Suri, Vishnu Sukumaran, Vriitya Aravind
Fixtures
Friday, November 1 – Oman v UAE
Sunday, November 3 – UAE v Netherlands
Thursday, November 7 – UAE v Oman
Saturday, November 9 – Netherlands v UAE
On Women's Day
Dr Nawal Al-Hosany: Why more women should be on the frontlines of climate action
Samar Elmnhrawy: How companies in the Middle East can catch up on gender equality
The National Editorial: Is there much to celebrate on International Women's Day 2021?
Justin Thomas: Challenge the notion that 'men are from Mars, women are from Venus'
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Name: Qyubic
Started: October 2023
Founder: Namrata Raina
Based: Dubai
Sector: E-commerce
Current number of staff: 10
Investment stage: Pre-seed
Initial investment: Undisclosed
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Disclaimer
Director: Alfonso Cuaron
Stars: Cate Blanchett, Kevin Kline, Lesley Manville
Rating: 4/5
Citadel: Honey Bunny first episode
Directors: Raj & DK
Stars: Varun Dhawan, Samantha Ruth Prabhu, Kashvi Majmundar, Kay Kay Menon
Rating: 4/5
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Nayanthara: Beyond The Fairy Tale
Starring: Nayanthara, Vignesh Shivan, Radhika Sarathkumar, Nagarjuna Akkineni
Director: Amith Krishnan
Rating: 3.5/5
Wicked
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Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
Developer: Treyarch, Raven Software
Publisher: Activision
Console: PlayStation 4 & 5, Windows, Xbox One & Series X/S
Rating: 3.5/5
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How it works
Each player begins with one of the great empires of history, from Julius Caesar's Rome to Ramses of Egypt, spread over Europe and the Middle East.
Round by round, the player expands their empire. The more land they have, the more money they can take from their coffers for each go.
As unruled land and soldiers are acquired, players must feed them. When a player comes up against land held by another army, they can choose to battle for supremacy.
A dice-based battle system is used and players can get the edge on their enemy with by deploying a renowned hero on the battlefield.
Players that lose battles and land will find their coffers dwindle and troops go hungry. The end goal? Global domination of course.
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Singham Again
Director: Rohit Shetty
Stars: Ajay Devgn, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Ranveer Singh, Akshay Kumar, Tiger Shroff, Deepika Padukone
Rating: 3/5
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How to protect yourself when air quality drops
Install an air filter in your home.
Close your windows and turn on the AC.
Shower or bath after being outside.
Wear a face mask.
Stay indoors when conditions are particularly poor.
If driving, turn your engine off when stationary.
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Kanguva
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At Everton Appearances: 77; Goals: 17
At Manchester United Appearances: 559; Goals: 253
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Sheikh Zayed's poem
When it is unveiled at Abu Dhabi Art, the Standing Tall exhibition will appear as an interplay of poetry and art. The 100 scarves are 100 fragments surrounding five, figurative, female sculptures, and both sculptures and scarves are hand-embroidered by a group of refugee women artisans, who used the Palestinian cross-stitch embroidery art of tatreez. Fragments of Sheikh Zayed’s poem Your Love is Ruling My Heart, written in Arabic as a love poem to his nation, are embroidered onto both the sculptures and the scarves. Here is the English translation.
Your love is ruling over my heart
Your love is ruling over my heart, even a mountain can’t bear all of it
Woe for my heart of such a love, if it befell it and made it its home
You came on me like a gleaming sun, you are the cure for my soul of its sickness
Be lenient on me, oh tender one, and have mercy on who because of you is in ruins
You are like the Ajeed Al-reem [leader of the gazelle herd] for my country, the source of all of its knowledge
You waddle even when you stand still, with feet white like the blooming of the dates of the palm
Oh, who wishes to deprive me of sleep, the night has ended and I still have not seen you
You are the cure for my sickness and my support, you dried my throat up let me go and damp it
Help me, oh children of mine, for in his love my life will pass me by.
The Equaliser 2
Director Antoine Fuqua
Starring: Denzel Washington, Bill Pullman, Melissa Leo, Ashton Sanders
Three stars