ESTABLISHED 1965 www.caymancompass.com – 50 CENTS – WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 High of 89 Low of 77 Slight to moderate with wave heights of 3 to 5 feet. EDITORIAL | PAGE 4 MOTORISTS SNARL ABOUT EVENT-RELATED TRAFFIC SNARLS WORLD | PAGE 7 POMPEO MEETS SAUDI KING ON WRITER’S DISAPPEARANCE 2018 ANNUAL TOURISM CONFERENCE How much tourism is too much? JAMES WHITTAKER jwhittaker@pinnaclemedialtd.com Balancing quantity with quality should be a key consideration for tourism desti- nations like the Cayman Islands, according to two guest speakers at the 2018 Annual Tourism Conference. Economist Marla Dukharan, the keynote speaker at the event at the Westin resort, said Tuesday the issue was a deep philosophical question that many islands across the Carib- bean were facing. “Do you really want more tourists, or do you want more spend per tourist?” she asked. She said the Cayman Islands was the “gold standard” in the region for a well- run economy and praised the new national tourism plan and the process government has gone through, including a business case and environmental impact study, as it considers the cruise port development. But, she said, the island would also need to determine what level of tourism it considered optimal in the long term. “Most countries are just trying to grow numbers,” she said. “There is an optimal number of ar- rivals. You don’t want to grow ad infi- nitum; you don’t want to grow forever and end up crowding out locals. “It is about quality versus quantity. In- sofar as you have hotel rooms to fill, you want quantity, but there comes a point where you ask, how many more hotels are you going to build, how many more planes can you land. Don’t you just want to have more quality and more spend per capita rather than just con- tinuing to grow?” TRINIDAD BANK ACQUIRES MAJORITY OWNERSHIP IN CAYMAN NATIONAL Another amendment needed to finalize sale KEN SILVA ksilva@pinnaclemedialtd.com The Republic Bank Trinidad and To- bago (Barbados) Ltd. has acquired majority ownership in local bank Cayman National Corporation Ltd. According to an announcement on the Cayman Islands Stock Exchange, the Republic Bank has bought 54.15 percent of Cayman Na- tional stock at US$6.25 per share – a US$3.25 premium of what the stock was trading at be- fore the offer was announced in early August – which is a roughly US$143 million transac- tion. Republic Bank said that it is still com- mitted to purchasing up to 74.99 percent of the stock, and that its offer to shareholders is open through Monday. However, the finalization of the acquisition is still subject to government and regulatory approvals, as well as another amendment to Cayman National’s articles of association to allow a single entity to own more than 10 per- cent of the bank. While a vote was held at a shareholders meeting last week to remove a provision that prevents more than 10 percent of shares being issued to any entity, there is another restric- tion in the articles stating that the bank’s di- rectors shall decline to register any transfer of shares that result in an entity owning more than 10 percent of Cayman National. That restriction also needs to be removed, but was not voted on last Tuesday “as a result of an administrative oversight,” according to a notice on the Cayman Islands Stock Exchange. Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen dies at age 65 SEATTLE (AP) – Paul G. Allen, who co-founded Microsoft with his childhood friend Bill Gates before becoming a billionaire philanthropist who invested in conservation, space travel, arts and culture and professional sports, died Monday. He was 65. Mr. Allen, a regular visitor for many years to the Cayman Is- lands, died in Seattle from com- plications of non-Hodgkin’s lym- phoma, his company Vulcan Inc. announced. Mr. Gates said he was heart- broken about the loss of one of his “oldest and dearest friends.” “Personal computing would not have existed without him,” Gates said in a statement. “But Paul wasn’t content with starting one company. He chan- neled his intellect and compas- sion into a second act focused on improving people’s lives and strengthening communi- ties in Seattle and around the world. He was fond of saying, ‘If it has the potential to do good, then we should do it.” Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella called Allen’s contributions to Canadian company to acquire 75 percent stake in SOL Canada-based Parkland Fuel Corporation is acquiring 75 percent of the Caribbean fuel supplier SOL Investments Ltd. for US$1.21 billion. SOL Investments’ parent company SOL Ltd. will, in turn, buy 12.16 million Parkland shares for about US$33 per share. That will give SOL Ltd. a 9.9-percent ownership stake in Parkland, according to the announcement from the two companies. For more on this story, see page 10. - PHOTO: TANEOS RAMSAY PLEASE TURN TO PAGE 6 » Paul Allen PLEASE TURN TO PAGE 6 » PLEASE TURN TO PAGE 6 »2 REGIONAL NEWS WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 • CAYMAN COMPASS • Matinees Daily (matinee price before 6pm) • Seniors $8.00, Mon-Fri Before 6pm • Additional charges apply per 3D/VIP tickets Cayman Cinema@cbcinema6cbcinema6 SATURDAY NIGHT: For your viewing pleasure, minors under the age of 18 will not be admitted to any film starting after 6pm, unless accompanied by their parent. - WEDNESDAY - 640-FILM (640-3456) A STAR IS BORN (R) 1:00 VIP I 3:50 I 6:40 VIP I 9:30 VENOM (PG13) 1:15 3D I 4:00 VIP I 6:50 I 9:15 3D 9:40 VIP I 10:00 NIGHT SCHOOL (PG13) 1:30 I 4:15 I 7:15 I 9:50 BLOCKBUSTER RE-RELEASE: STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI (PG13) 3:25 I 9:20 GOOSEBUMPS 2: HAUNTED HALLOWEEN (PG) 12:15 I 2:30 I 4:45 I 7:00 SMALLFOOT (PG) 5:20 I 7:40 BLOCKBUSTER RE-RELEASE: INCREDIBLES 2 (PG) 12:45 I 6:40 Honduran migrant caravan crosses Guatemala border, US-bound ESQUIPULAS, Guatemala (AP) – Hundreds of Honduran mi- grants surged over the Gua- temalan border under a broiling sun Monday hoping to make it to new lives in the United States, far from the poverty and violence of their home nation. Police stopped the mi- grants at a roadblock outside Esquipulas for several hours in the afternoon, but the trav- elers refused to return to the border and were eventually allowed to pass. They arrived in town as night fell, exhausted by the day’s heat, hobbling on blis- tered feet. Few carried food and some local residents began to organize to help feed them. Some migrants asked for money, others passing a bakery were handed bread. Earlier in the day, the mi- grants arrived at the Gua- temalan border singing the Honduran national anthem, praying and chanting, “Yes, we can.” The group estimated at 1,600 or more defied an order by the Guatemalan gov- ernment that they not be al- lowed to pass. “We have rights,” the mi- grants shouted. Keilin Umana, a 21-year- old who is two months preg- nant, said she was moved to migrate to save herself and her unborn child after she was threatened with death. Umana, a nurse, said she had been walking for four days. “We are not criminals – we are migrants,” she said. Many in the caravan trav- eled light, with just back- packs and bottles of water. Some pushed toddlers in strollers or carried them on their shoulders. Carlos Cortez, a 32-year- old farmer traveling on foot with his 7-year-old son, said poverty back home made it impossible to sup- port a family. “Every day I earn about $5,” Cortez said. “That isn’t enough to feed my family.” The caravan was met at the border by about 100 Guatemalan police officers. After a standoff of about two hours, the migrants began walking again. Outnumbered, the police did nothing to stop them and accompanied them several miles into Guate- malan territory. Officers then set up the roadblock about a mile (2 kilometers) outside the city of Esquipulas, where the migrants had planned to spend the night. The migrants were stuck for about three hours. About 250 police kept them from advancing and told them they had to return to the border to go through immigration. The migrants refused to budge and it appeared they would likely sleep on the highway. But eventually offi- cers let them pass. Some police and Guate- malan civilians offered the migrants water, and some locals drove Hondurans part of the way. Red Cross workers gave medical atten- tion to some migrants who fainted in the heat. The caravan began as about 160 people who first gathered early Friday to de- part from San Pedro Sula, one of Honduras’ most dan- gerous places, figuring that traveling as a group would make them less vulnerable to robbery, assault and other dangers common on the mi- gratory path through Central America and Mexico. Local media coverage prompted hundreds more to join, and Dunia Montoya, a volunteer assisting the mi- grants, estimated Sunday that the group had grown to at least 1,600 people. Police gave their own estimate of around 2,000 on Monday. The caravan formed a day after U.S. Vice President Mike Pence urged the presidents of Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala to persuade their citizens to stay home and not put their families in danger by undertaking the risky journey to the United States. In April, President Donald Trump threatened in April to withdraw foreign aid from Honduras and countries that allowed transit for a similar caravan that set out from the Central American country. That caravan dwindled as the group approached the U.S. border, with some giving up along the way and others splitting off to try to cross on their own. Historian Dana Frank, an expert on human rights and U.S. policy in Honduras, said the caravan could have polit- ical implications in the United States less than a month be- fore the midterm elections. “Whatever the caravan’s origins, some in the United States will be quick to raise alarms about a supposed dangerous immigrant inva- sion, and use that to try to influence the upcoming U.S. elections,” Frank said. “Others will view these migrants with compassion and as fur- ther evidence of the need for comprehensive immigra- tion reform ….” Frank added that the car- avan’s rapid growth “under- scores quite how desperate the Honduran people are – that they’d begin walking to- ward refuge in the United States with only a day back full of belongings.” In San Pedro Sula, where the procession started, sociol- ogist Jenny Arguello said au- thorities wanted to make the mass migration out to be a political event, but it was just poor people fleeing violence. “From my community 20 went and one neighbor came back sad with his little back- pack because when he ar- rived they had already left,” Arguello said. “You see that the need to leave is the pri- ority. The people have already made up their minds and just hearing of the possibility they take off.” Honduras is largely dom- inated by murderous gangs that prey on families and businesses, and routinely sees homicide rates that are among the highest in the world. Late Monday, Mexico’s im- migration authority said in a statement directed at the caravan that agents would have to review them indi- vidually at the border and those who did not meet re- quirements would not be al- lowed to enter. Katie Waldman, a U.S. De- partment of Homeland Secu- rity spokeswoman, said in a statement that the caravan was “what we see day-in and day-out at the border as a re- sult of well-advertised and well-known catch-and-re- lease loopholes.” US: Cuba’s political prisoners are ‘affront’ to democracy UNITED NATIONS (AP) – The United States says Cuba is jailing 130 political prisoners in a “blatant affront” to fun- damental democratic free- doms, but the Cuban ambas- sador to the United Nations said Monday that the U.S. lacks the moral authority to teach other countries such lessons given what she calls the Trump administration’s “agenda of supremacist, racist and xenophobic ideas.” The U.S. formally launched a campaign Tuesday at the United Nations called “Jailed for What?” holding Cuba’s re- gime responsible for human rights violations. In a statement released Sunday, Cuban Ambas- sador Anayansi Rodriguez Camejo demanded that U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres cancel the event. She said the U.S. had itself violated human rights, espe- cially in the use of torture, detention and “arbitrary de- privation of liberty” at its Guantanamo military base, where terrorism suspects have been held for years. She also pointed to U.S. immi- grant policies that have sep- arated parents and children. “The United States lack the morals to give les- sons, much less in this matter,” Camejo said. On Monday, the Cuban diplomat used stronger lan- guage to reject the “Jailed for What?” campaign, telling the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, that the United States “lacks any moral au- thority to judge Cuba, when its current administra- tion drives an agenda of su- premacist, racist and xeno- phobic ideas.” During Tuesday’s launch of the political-prisoner cam- paign, Kelley E. Currie, the U.S. representative on the U.N. Economic and Social Council, plans to focus on an estimated 130 Cuban pris- oners as “an explicit sign of the repressive nature of the Cuban regime,” said a state- ment released by the U.S. State Department last week. Those being held “represent a blatant affront to the fun- damental freedoms that the United States and many other democratic governments sup- port,” it said. Currie added that the Cuban people’s “aspira- tions to live in freedom are key components of Presi- dent Trump’s National Se- curity Presidential Memo- randum of 2017.” The State Department said the Cuban government is silencing its people with “arbitrary detention and spe- cious charges.” The Cubans call the “Jailed for What?” campaign part of the Trump adminis- tration’s escalation of anti- Cuban actions that started 56 years ago with an eco- nomic and financial blockade of the island. Hondurans march in a caravan of migrants moving toward the country’s border with Guatemala Monday in a desperate attempt to flee poverty and seek new lives in the United States. – PHOTO: AP3 LOCAL NEWS CAYMAN COMPASS • WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 SECURE YOUR PROPERTY WITH THE BEST DEALS IN SURVEILLANCE CAMERA SYSTEMS AVAILABLE ANYWHERE ON ISLAND. The Security Centre has three exceptional CCTV deals that just can’t be matched. 3 The Gold Standard: a complete digital, four camera IP system – 4 meg precision viewing at just $1799 The Security Centre guarantees that we will beat any price on a comparable system. Call the Security Centre for your demo today at 949-0004 or visit us online at security.ky 2 The Eagle Eye Special: a high-definition system perfect for the home and small businesses - $1549 All systems offer mobile device access - so you can check on your property remotely. bring an existing security camera system into high-definition – using existing cabling - at just $999 1 The Phoenix HD Upgrade: DoE warns of discarded fishing line danger Department of Environ- ment conservation officers on Saturday rescued a juve- nile turtle that had become entangled in a bundle of dis- carded fishing line, high- lighting the threat those lines pose to Cayman’s marine life. The two officers, who were alerted by a resident, arrived at the scene by pri- vate vessel and a department jet ski. They freed the turtle and released it back into the sea in the Rum Point channel. While this incident had a positive outcome, DoE con- servation officers noted that they were still seeing far too many sea creatures becoming entangled in bundles of dis- carded fishing line. “The conservation offi- cers who responded Saturday pulled in a lot of fishing line from the water,” said Mark Orr, DoE chief conservation officer. “This is another re- minder to the public to please recycle fishing line, rather than just tossing it away.” DoE Research Officer Janice Blumenthal said en- tanglement in discarded fishing line is one of the most serious threats to ju- venile turtles in Cayman. “Fishing line is nearly invis- ible underwater and causes drowning and severe injuries, such as flipper amputations. Even if unwanted fishing line is sent to the landfill, it can continue to entangle birds and other animals. Fishing line takes more than 600 years to degrade.” According to the DoE, its officers placed nearly 40 re- cycling bins for discarded fishing line around the three islands over the past sev- eral years and advised fish- ermen and other members of the public to use those bins, rather than simply casting their old or used lines on the beach or into the sea. Most public boat- launching ramps have a fishing line recycling bin and many fishing stores and dive shops have the bins as well. Whether fishing from the shore or from a boat, in- dividuals are asked to keep the unwanted fishing line until it can be deposited at a recycling location. Cayman has recycled more than 200 pounds of old and dis- carded fishing lines since the bins were set up. Anyone who sees a turtle in danger may contact the DoE via a 24-hour telephone hotline at 938-6378 and should provide as much information about the incident as possible when calling. For more information about fishing line recycling, and/or turtles, visit the DoE website at www.doe.ky. Man arrested on suspicion of indecent assault Police arrested a 28-year- old man suspected of ex- posing himself and inde- cently assaulting a woman as she walked along South Church Street after she filmed her assailant on her cell- phone camera. The video was circulated on social media. The woman told police she had been approached by the man, whom she did not know, as she walked along the road Monday morning. The man made advances to her and began following her, refusing to leave her alone and eventually making unwanted physical con- tact, police said. “The male then inde- cently exposed himself to her, and continued to follow her. She yelled to the male to leave her alone, knocked on the doors of a nearby apart- ment complex for assistance, and filmed his actions with a cellphone camera. “Eventually the male left the area. The video of the male was subsequently circu- lated on social media,” police said in a statement. Officers arrested the man, of George Town, Monday night. He remained in police custody Tuesday. Two men armed with ma- chetes struck another man on the head Monday and robbed him of the chain he was wearing, police said. The robbery occurred shortly after 10 p.m. at an ad- dress on West Church Street. “It was reported that a man had been approached by two males, who bran- dished machetes and struck him on the head, causing minor injuries. The males, who were wearing all black, then made off with the man’s chain,” police said in a statement. MAN ROBBED OF CHAIN IN WEST BAY While this incident had a positive outcome, DoE conservation officers noted that they were still seeing far too many sea creatures becoming entangled in bundles of discarded fishing line. DoE Conservation Officer Carl Edwards assists Saturday in the rescue and release of a juvenile hawksbill turtle that was entangled in fishing line in the North Sound.The islands’ most-trusted news source 4 – EDITORIAL – Opinion&Letters The Cayman Compass welcomes comments, opinions and viewpoints from readers. Letters to the editor can be emailed to editor@pinnaclemedialtd.com, submitted via www.caymancompass.com, sent by post or hand-delivered to the Compass office. PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY: Caymanian Compass Limited (a subsidiary of Pinnacle Media Ltd) Compass Centre Shedden Road, George Town SEND US YOUR VIEWS OR NEWS: P.O. Box 1365 Grand Cayman KY1-1108, Cayman Islands Telephone: (345) 815-0095 Email: newsdesk@pinnaclemedialtd.com ADVERTISE WITH US: Telephone: (345) 949-5111 Email: sales@pinnaclemedialtd.com Website: www.caymancompass.com PUBLISHERS DAVID R. LEGGE AND VICKI L. LEGGE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF DAVID R. LEGGE EXECUTIVE EDITOR PATRICK BRENDEL A MEMBER OF THE INTER-AMERICAN PRESS ASSOCIATION “Give light and the people will findtheirownway” Downtown drivers received an unwelcome surprise last Wednesday when blocked streets caused traffic headaches far surpassing even the usual evening gridlock. The worst part is, the jam was entirely preventable. With advance warning and more thoughtful scheduling, drivers would not have wasted so many extra minutes behind the wheel. Certainly, it was a fine impulse that inspired the National Museum and the Department of Children and Family Services to hold a special event honoring the wisdom and value of our elders in celebration of Older Persons Month. We only wish that organizers had not opted to hold the event on a weekday during peak drive time on some of George Town’s busiest streets. Scheduling the celebration for a different time or over a weekend would have minimized the interrup- tion. A different venue might have avoided the conflict, altogether. With ample warning, many drivers might have chosen alternate routes that evening, saving themselves unnecessary stress. As it stood, organizers’ choice to hold the celebra- tion from 3-6 p.m. on a weekday directly interrupted the normal flow of traffic not only on the closed segments of Harbour Drive and South Church Street but also all the tributaries feeding into those arte- rials. Further complicating matters, the public was not informed that the roads would be blocked off for the celebration until 12:30 p.m. on the day of the event – too late for too many to receive the news. The Compass frequently publishes information about road closures and detours. Those important notices may not be particularly glamorous, but they significantly impact great numbers of our readers. Unfortunately, when notices are issued too late, there is little we can do. We understand why downtown George Town is a preferred venue for a multitude of celebrations, com- memorations and events – from the Queen’s Birthday to the opening of the Legislative Assembly to street dances and parades. The central area is replete with appealing and symbolic backdrops, from the National Museum to the waterfront, the seat of government and Heroes Square. But its structural limitations also must be taken into consideration. Our island has many underused and equally appropriate venues – which may have better amenities, such as parking, ease of ingress and shade. In every case, motorists should have several days’ notice about planned traffic diversions, complemented by temporary signage that warn of road closures well before barricades come into view. After last week’s traffic snarl, the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service announced it intends to tighten requirements for event-related road closures. They ask that organizers submit requests at least a week in advance, which will give the department more time to evaluate and accommodate requests. Police vow to post notices about events-related road closures on the department website and inform local media “as soon as practicable.” The Compass will gladly do our part to spread the word. But perhaps the “Cardinal Rule” for Cardinall Avenue (and its nearby environs) is that organizers must be timely in making their requests for road closures and those who grant or deny those requests must weigh the public and community benefits against the disruption and inconvenience caused by each road closure. Motorists snarl about event-related traffic snarls WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 • CAYMAN COMPASS Who makes and enforces the rules? All of us are subject to many thousands of federal, state, and local laws and reg- ulations, many of which are needlessly oppressive. Who makes these rules, and who enforces them? And at what point are there so many rules that we are no longer free? James Madison, the prin- cipal author of the U.S. Con- stitution, wrote in Federalist No. 62: “It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so inco- herent that they cannot be understood; if they be re- pealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow. Law is defined to be the rule of ac- tion; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?” Americans have long been subject to exactly what Mad- ison warned of. The IRS code is but one example. It is so long and contradictory that no one fully understands it, so we are all subject to being prosecuted under it, even though no wrongdoing was intended. Kings of old often issued decrees or rules that were unjust or made no sense, and the rules could be changed by whim. The solution was to attempt to design systems where people were ruled by law rather than by individ- uals or small groups oper- ating with little constraint. It was, and still is, argued by many that democracy solves much of the problem if laws and other rules need to be voted on by the people or their elected representatives. The problem with that ar- gument is that unrestrained democracies often lead to majoritarianism, where mi- nority rights and individual liberties are voted away and quashed. This distrust of pure democracy is what caused the Founders to create a con- stitutional republic where minority rights and liberties are protected by a difficult to amend constitution. The Founders devised a system of checks and bal- ances that they hoped would constrain unbridled govern- ment. The legislative branch (a two-house Congress) was established to make law. The executive branch was estab- lished to administer the law, and the courts were estab- lished to interpret the law and constrain the other two branches of government from encroaching on the rights, duties, and prerogatives of the others. What the Founders failed to fully anticipate was the rise of the administrative agencies, where Congress delegated much of its au- thority to make law and rules to agencies nominally within the executive branch, but often with little direct accountability to the legisla- tive, executive, and even judi- cial branches. Congress has every incen- tive to create administrative agencies with the power to make law because it makes it easier for members of Con- gress to claim they have done something about a problem that may or may not exist. So, when an agency does some- thing dumb, destructive, or tyrannical, members of Con- gress can claim they had no direct responsibility. If the courts had done their job by prohibiting, or greatly limiting, the ability of Congress to delegate its law and rule-making powers to unelected bureaucrats, much of the present mess would not exist. Peter Wallison, former General Counsel of the U.S. Treasury, a noted law and economics scholar and an expert in financial regu- lation, has just published an important new book “Judicial Fortitude: The Last Chance to Rein in the Administrative State.” Mr. Wallison provides a concise history of how the rule of law was eroded by ir- responsible congresses and by courts that acquiesced to a legislative branch that clearly exceeded its right to delegate its power as defined by the Founders and the Constitution. Mr. Wallison is a sunny optimist, who argues not all is lost, in that the American courts still have time to take corrective action. He notes that those in the new ma- jority of Justices on the Su- preme Court have evidenced concern about the problem and are likely to rein in some of the excesses in the delega- tion of power by Congress. The book is a good read and adds an important but little understood chapter to American history. As bad as the adminis- trative state is in the United States, it is even worse in many other countries. A major reason for the Brexit vote in the U.K. was that after a thousand years of being in charge of their own destiny, Englishmen were finding, among other things, the shape and size of the cucum- bers they were being allowed to sell was being dictated by unelected EU bureau- crats in Brussels. Globally, people are fed up with being micro-man- aged by far-away govern- ment bureaucrats, who are more concerned about their own powers and perks than the people who have to suffer from rules in which they had no say. People throughout Europe, India, and even China are demanding more local control. Devolution of power from international bureaucra- cies like the U.N., IMF, OECD, etc. to national governments, to regional governments, to local governments, and finally to neighborhoods will result in greater happiness and eco- nomic growth as people reac- quire more control over their own lives and destinies. Richard W. Rahn is chairman of Improbable Success Productions and on the board of the American Council for Capital Formation. © 2018, The Washington Times, LLC. RICHARD W. RAHN5 LOCAL NEWS CAYMAN COMPASS • WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 Visit your nearest branch or learn more at ky.scotiabank.com/aamc #SayYesToMore PUBLICATION: Caymanian Compass JR. PAGE COUNTRY: CAYMAN ISLANDS SIZE: 6.8222” x 11.8975” 4% WITH AN EXTRA CASH BACK ON ALL AMAZON PURCHASES* Apply for Scotiabank / AAdvantage® Mastercard®! New cardholders enjoy an added 4% cash back on all Amazon purchases for the first 6 months.* Your new card also offers a bonus of up to 12,000 AAdvantage miles. PLUS earn AAdvantage® miles always.* *Conditions apply. Bonus offer ends October 31, 2018. Subject to credit approval by October 31, 2018. Offers subject to change without notice. American Airlines® reserves the right to change AAdvantage® program rules, regulations, travel awards and special offers at any time without notice, and to end the AAdvantage® program with six months’ notice. Any such changes may affect your ability to use the awards or mileage credits that you have accumulated. Unless specified, AAdvantage® miles earned through this promotion/offer do not count toward elite-status qualification or Million MilerSM status. American Airlines® is not responsible for products or services offered by other participating companies. For complete details about the AAdvantage® program, visit www. aa.com/aadvantage. Scotiabank issues the Scotiabank/AAdvantage® card. American Airlines®, AAdvantage® and Million Miler are trademarks of American Airlines, Inc.. ®Registered trademark of The Bank of Nova Scotia, used under licence. ™Trademark of The Bank of Nova Scotia, used under licence. ®MasterCard is a registered trademark of MasterCard International Incorporated. Amazon. com, Inc. reserves the right to change the Amazon.com, Inc. conditions of use at any time without notice. For Amazon’s Inc. Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy please visit: www.amazon.com. Say yes to even more rewards 10620 Q3 CC ACT AA CAY Caymanian Compass_JP.indd 12018-08-20 4:46 PM UK coroner records ‘accidental death’ verdict in Cayman crash A U.K. coroner recorded a verdict of “accidental death” at the conclusion of an in- quest Tuesday into the deaths of three British tourists who were killed last year in an East End car crash. The inquest by Her Maj- esty’s Coroners’ Service in Hampshire follows a June in- quest by the Cayman Islands Coroner’s Court that con- cluded “misadventure” had led to the deaths of visitors Mar- lene Elizabeth Wright, 69; Pa- mela Yvonne Mansell, 74; and Ian Geoffrey Mansell, 72; and Cayman resident Shannay Al- exander Delapenha, 22. U.K. Coroner Andrew Bradley of the Basingstoke coroner’s office said the high-speed collision between Ms. Delapenha’s Honda Ac- cord and the rented Kia Rio driven by Mr. Mansell was not intentional. “On May 2, 2017, Ian Man- sell was driving his car along Austin Conolly [sic] Drive in the hours of darkness,” Mr. Bradley was quoted as saying in British media. “He was struck by an on- coming car which failed to navigate a bend and collided with him head on. “The verdict I enter is the accidental death verdict be- cause I don’t think the driver of the Honda set out to kill the Mansells.” The U.K. inquest included a statement from Royal Cayman Islands Police Sgt. Lenford Butler. Mr. Butler said a marked police car that night registered the Honda passing at a speed of 57 mph in a 30 mph zone. “The police officer engaged the car’s blue lights. The Honda continued on the east- bound lane towards the bend. “Due to the fact the Honda was travelling at a greater speed, the force of the Honda pushed back the Kia,” Mr. Butler is quoted as stating. “The Honda did not follow the curvature of the right hand bend and drifted over the centre line. “The driver of the Kia didn’t have time to react to the Honda.” The Honda was later found to be uninsured and unlicensed, and was also car- rying 121 conch out of season. The Mansells and Ms. Wright had been vacationing in the Cayman Islands at the time of the accident and were staying at Morritt’s Resort in East End. Police officers examine the scene of the two-car collision in which four people died in East End on May 2, 2017. A U.K. coroner has recorded a verdict of ‘accidental death’ in the case. PAC MEMBERS ATTEND PUBLIC SPENDING CONFERENCE IN LONDON Two members of the Public Accounts Committee, Bernie Bush and Austin Harris, are in London this week to attend a conference on public spending. Mr. Bush, who is Deputy Speaker of the Legislative As- sembly, and Mr. Harris, who is a councilor in Premier Alden McLaughlin’s ministry, are attending the 6th Annual Public Accounts Committees Symposium and Workshop. The symposium, hosted by the International Centre for Parliamentary Studies, brings together members of regional and national public accounts committees from across the Commonwealth and British Overseas Territories “to equip them with knowledge and practical experience to ensure government expenditures are effective, economical and effi- cient,” according to a govern- ment press release. “The primary role of the PAC is to provide financial scrutiny, in conjunction with the Auditor General’s Office, of government spending,” said Mr. Harris in the release. “Its work is essential to building public trust; therefore, at- tending workshops like these enables PAC members to better understand the com- plex accounts it scrutinizes in order to ensure both account- ability and value for money.” The symposium, which runs from Oct. 15 to 19, covers areas such as scrutiny of public accounts, building an efficient working relation- ship between the Public Ac- counts Committee and audit institutions, fostering an en- vironment of value for money, how to measure the efficiency of private and public sector companies that provide ser- vices to the public, and as- sessing the impact of the Public Accounts Committees while holding stakeholders to account. Delegates from Kenya, Ghana, the Solomon Islands, Australia, Tonga and the United Kingdom are also attending the conference. Members of the Cayman Islands Legislative Assembly, Austin Harris, left, and Bernie Bush, right, with Mark Dean, symposium chairman, at the 6th Annual Public Accounts Committees Symposium and Workshop in London this week.The islands’ most-trusted news source 6 WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 • CAYMAN COMPASS the company, community and industry “indispensable.” “As co-founder of Mi- crosoft, in his own quiet and persistent way, he cre- ated magical products, ex- periences and institutions, and in doing so, he changed the world,” Mr. Nadella wrote on Twitter. Mr. Allen, an avid sports fan, owned the Portland Trail Blazers and the Se- attle Seahawks. He and Mr. Gates met while attending a private school in north Seattle. The two friends would later drop out of college to pursue the future they envisioned: A world with a computer in every home. Mr. Gates so strongly be- lieved it that he left Harvard University in his junior year to devote himself full-time to his and Allen’s startup, originally called Micro-Soft. Mr. Allen spent two years at Washington State University before dropping out as well. They founded the com- pany in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and their first product was a computer lan- guage for the Altair hobby- kit personal computer, giving hobbyists a basic way to program and op- erate the machine. After Mr. Gates and Mr. Allen found some success selling their programming language, MS-Basic, the Se- attle natives moved their business in 1979 to Bellevue, Washington, not far from its eventual home in Redmond. Microsoft’s big break came in 1980, when IBM Corp. decided to move into personal computers and asked Microsoft to provide the operating system. The first versions of two classic Microsoft products, Microsoft Word and the Windows operating system, were released in 1983. By 1991, Microsoft’s operating systems were used by 93 percent of the world’s per- sonal computers. Mr. Gates and Mr. Allen became billionaires when Microsoft was thrust onto the throne of technology. With his sister Jody Allen in 1986, Mr. Allen founded Vulcan, the investment firm that oversees his business and philanthropic efforts. Mr. Allen also founded the Allen Institute for Brain Sci- ence and the aerospace firm Stratolaunch, which has built a colossal airplane designed to launch satellites into orbit. He has also backed research into nuclear-fusion power. Over the course of sev- eral decades, Mr. Allen gave more than $2 billion to a wide range of interests, in- cluding ocean health, home- lessness and advancing sci- entific research. “Millions of people were touched by his generosity, his persistence in pursuit of a better world, and his drive to accomplish as much as he could with the time and resources at his disposal,” Vulcan CEO Bill Hilf said in a statement. Vulcan worked with the Cayman Islands Department of Environment in 2016 to repair a West Bay coral reef that had been damaged when Mr. Allen’s boat, the M/Y Tatoosh, dropped an- chor on the reef in January that year. Mr. Allen subse- quently came to a financial compensation agreement with the Cayman Islands government and that money – the sum was undisclosed – was used to pay for the first of four mega-yacht moorings for the islands. Mr. Allen was on the list of America’s wealth- iest people who pledged to give away the bulk of their fortunes to charity. “Those fortunate to achieve great wealth should put it to work for the good of hu- manity,” he said. In 1988 at 35, he bought the Portland Trail Blazers professional basketball team. He told The Associ- ated Press that “for a true fan of the game, this is a dream come true.” He also was a part owner of the Seattle Sounders FC, a major league soccer team, and bought the Seattle Se- ahawks. Mr. Allen could sometimes be seen at games or chatting in the locker room with players. Mr. Allen served as Mi- crosoft’s executive vice pres- ident of research and new product development until 1983, when he resigned after being diagnosed with cancer. “To be 30 years old and have that kind of shock – to face your mortality – re- ally makes you feel like you should do some of the things that you haven’t done yet,” Allen said in a 2000 book, “Inside Out: Microsoft in Our Own Words.” Two weeks ago, Mr. Allen announced that the non- Hodgkin’s lymphoma that he was treated for in 2009 had returned and he planned to fight it aggressively. “My brother was a re- markable individual on every level,” his sister Jody Allen said in a statement. “Paul’s family and friends were blessed to experi- ence his wit, warmth, his generosity and deep con- cern,” she added. “We apologize for any convenience,” Cayman Na- tional stated in its notice, setting a date of Nov. 7 for the next meeting. The Compass attempted to contact Cayman Na- tional CEO Stuart Dack by phone and email to inquire whether the additional amendment would delay or otherwise affect the sale but did not hear back from him by press time. Despite shareholders voting overwhelmingly to amend Cayman Nation- al’s articles of associa- tion at Tuesday’s meeting, several people spoke out against selling the bank to a foreign entity. “They want this com- pany for a reason. It’s probably because of their image,” businessman A.L. Thompson said at the meeting, speaking of Re- public Bank and Trinidad. “But I don’t trust them, I don’t know who they are, and I don’t trust the whole country.” Cayman National’s Mr. Dack explained at the meeting that Republic Bank has com- mitted to largely maintain Cayman National as it is. “All indications from Republic is that they very much want to leave things as they are at the moment. Cayman National is a very profitable business,” he said at an Oct. 9 meeting. “That’s why they want to leave staff as it is, that’s why they remain on all three islands, and leave the board majority Caymanian. They want to leave the cul- ture of the business intact and to continue to do well, so they can get a return on their investment. That’s re- ally their strategy.” Republic Bank has indeed committed to maintaining Cayman National in its cur- rent form, subject to certain caveats. For instance, Re- public Bank has committed to not institute systematic layoffs or redundancy for at least five years, “unless there is a significant adverse eco- nomic change or compelling business reason to do so,” ac- cording to a Cayman National circular explaining the offer. Acquiring majority own- ership gives Republic Bank other powers, including the ability to pass ordinary and special resolutions at Cayman National meet- ings, which allows it to amend the bank’s articles of association. Additionally, Republic Bank will have the ability to control the composi- tion of the board of direc- tors, subject to the condi- tion that the majority of the board remains Caymanian. Republic Bank intends to appoint its managing di- rector, Nigel Baptiste, and executive director Roop- narine Oumade Singh to the board, according to the circular. The Republic Bank may also have the power to ac- quire minority shares if it buys more than two-thirds of Cayman National. “If the [Republic Bank] acquires more than two- thirds of Cayman National Shares as a result of the Partial Offer, the [Republic Bank] will have the ability to pass a special resolu- tion approving a statu- tory merger which may result in the compulsory acquisition of Shares held by minority shareholders, subject to certain condi- tions,” the circular states, warning, “In that situation, dissenting Shareholders would be entitled only to payment of the fair value of their Shares, which, at such time, may be higher or lower than the offer price of US$6.25 per Share.” Republic Bank Trinidad and Tobago (Barbados) Ltd. was incorporated in Bar- bados in 1999, and is a part of the Trinidad-based Re- public Financial Holdings Ltd., which was originally called Colonial Bank when it was formed in 1837, ac- cording to the organiza- tion’s website. Republic Financial Hold- ings Ltd. has more than $10 billion in assets, owns banks in Guyana, Grenada, Suriname, St. Lucia, and Ghana – as well as having a class B bank in Cayman, Re- public Bank (Cayman) Lim- ited – and has more than 4,000 employees in Trinidad alone, its website states. Ms. Dukharan was speaking generally, rather than about cruise tourism in particular. She said the question was a key consider- ation for destinations across the Caribbean. Bryan Kinkade, publisher of AFAR Media, a travel media company, touched on the same point in a later panel discus- sion. He said larger, faster planes and generally cheaper travel were opening up more and more destinations to a growing middle class all over the world. In some destina- tions in Europe and the U.S., he said “over-tourism” was a bigger problem than at- tracting visitors. “The number of tourists are really starting to have an impact on the infrastructure and the quality of life, as well as with the tourist experi- ence,” he said. “You can only imagine what that would look like here [in Grand Cayman] in five years if not properly managed. “How do you spread people out more? Stingray City with 50 boats crowded around sunset could very quickly become an unsustain- able experience that tourists wouldn’t want to return to.” Ms. Dukharan compared Cayman favorably to its Ca- ribbean neighbors, saying very few other islands had a comprehensive national tourism plan. She said the Caribbean, in general, was losing market share in the tourism industry, partly because of a lack of strategic planning. According to the Interna- tional Monetary Fund, she said, the number of flights was the biggest driver of tourism to a destination. Sur- prisingly, she said, adding new hotels had almost no im- pact in itself on tourism ar- rivals. She also highlighted IMF statistics that show the region as the most expensive in the world on the “week at the beach” price index. Many Caribbean desti- nations, she said, are com- pounding the problem with excessive airline and airport taxes. In some cases, taxes cost more than the ticket it- self, she said. The Cayman Islands is somewhere in the middle of the pack as far as airport taxes go, levying US$58 per passenger. Ms. Dukharan said it was a “per- verse approach” for Caribbean islands to overtax tourists. “I think we should make it cheaper for people to come here, and when they come, encourage them to spend that money on experiences and goods and services,” she said. She also highlighted the gender gap in the Carib- bean and in the tourism in- dustry in particular, saying there were very few female tourism ministers, CEOs or company owners. She said women were a huge under-used resource, and countries like Iceland had demonstrated that pro- gressive policies on child care and flexible working hours could help bring more women into the workforce and boost the economy. Tourism Minister Moses Kirkconnell also spoke at the conference, highlighting some of the achievements made in tourism in Cayman over the past few years and the fu- ture hotel growth expected in the coming years. Director of Tourism Rosa Harris gave an update on the department’s marketing plans and recent campaigns, including an ad- vertising campaign using ac- tors Grace and Trai Byers to market to couples. CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Trinidad bank acquires majority ownership in Cayman National Paul Allen dies at age 65 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 How much tourism is too much? CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Bryan Kinkade, publisher of AFAR Media, and economist Marla Dukharan speak at Tuesday’s national tourism conference at the Westin resort. - PHOTO: JAMES WHITTAKER Republic Bank will have the ability to control the composition of the board of directors, subject to the condition that the majority of the board remains Caymanian.The islands’ most-trusted news source 7 US airstrike in Somalia targets al-Shabab The U.S. military on Tuesday announced its deadliest airstrike against the al-Shabab extremist group near Harardere, Somalia in nearly a year, killing about 60 fighters. It was the largest U.S. airstrike since one on Nov. 21, 2017, killed about 100 al-Shabab fighters. CAYMAN COMPASS • WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 Pompeo meets Saudi king, prince on writer’s disappearance In Florida, determining hurricane death toll proves elusive TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) – In Florida, a grim task is un- winding slowly: Finding out how many people were killed in Hurricane Michael. The storm that rav- aged Florida’s Panhandle left incredible destruction stretching from the Gulf of Mexico to the state border, but getting a firm grasp on how many died is proving somewhat elusive. The state has officially ac- knowledged just two deaths so far – and one death was in northeast Florida, far from the ground-zero fury of the Category 4 storm. Meanwhile, search and rescue teams have crawled and walked through thou- sands of buildings and ruins for days in places like Mexico Beach, which was virtually wiped out when Michael roared ashore last week. The Associated Press has put the overall death toll at 17 so far, including one death in Mexico Beach confirmed by a search and rescue team and six others confirmed by local officials in Florida. In other states, there are 10 con- firmed deaths. “Unfortunately there are going to more fatalities than people want to admit,” said State Rep. Halsey Beshears, a Republican whose district includes several of the coun- ties hammered by Michael. “If you stayed in Mexico Beach, there’s no way you could have survived. I think more fatalities are going to show up every day.” Joanne Garone Behnke called it “torture” awaiting news about whether her 79-year-old aunt who stayed in Mexico Beach had survived. Right after the storm hit, Brock Long, the chief of the Federal Emergency Man- agement Agency, said he ex- pected the death toll to rise after hearing reports that some people refused to evac- uate before Michael’s landfall. But both Long and Gov. Rick Scott, however, side- stepped questions late Sunday after they returned from an all-day trip to some of the hard-hit communities. “I’m very hopeful that everybody is going to be found alive and that every- body is going to survive this,” Scott said. Right after the storm, state officials said thousands of calls inquiring about missing people came in to authori- ties and nonprofit groups. FEMA did announce Monday that search and rescue teams along with the Coast Guard and National Guard had res- cued or assisted more than 4,000 people in storm-im- pacted areas and that they had checked on thousands of homes and buildings. State officials say they will announce storm-related fatalities once they are certi- fied by local medical exam- iners who have gone through the steps of positively iden- tifying those who died and performing an autopsy to de- termine the cause of death. Part of the problem state emergency officials say is that the medical examiner office responsible for cer- tifying deaths in several of the hardest-hit counties was without power or water until Monday. Plans to bring in a mobile morgue unit were scrapped over the weekend, but state teams did bring in refriger- ated trucks to four cities that can be used for both storm victims and to assist funeral homes that have lost power. Florida officials point out they have used the same process in the past, but this comes amid the po- litical backdrop of what happened in Puerto Rico. Last month, President Donald Trump tweeted that “3,000 people did not die” in the hurricanes that hit the is- land last year. He also falsely alleged that the official death toll was part of a plot by Democrats to make him look bad. Republicans in Florida, including Scott, disagreed with Trump and said they did not dispute the death toll numbers. But for some families, the wait is proving to be unbearable. “I’ve been on the phone to reporters, to fire chiefs, to heads of task force from Miami to you name it I’ve called them. I’ve called every hospital,” Garone Behnke said Monday as she stopped to read a text from the fire chief in Mexico Beach. Another wait and see. “We’re still working on it … we’ll keep you posted,” the text read. ISTANBUL (AP) – Ameri- ca’s top diplomat met on Tuesday with Saudi Arabia’s King Salman and his son Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman over the dis- appearance and alleged killing of Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi at the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo smiled and shook hands with both men, who warmly greeted him just hours after a Turkish foren- sics team finished a search inside the Saudi Consulate, looking for evidence of the Washington Post colum- nist’s alleged killing and dismemberment. A high-level Turkish offi- cial told The Associated Press that police found evidence there of Khashoggi’s slaying, without elaborating. The of- ficial spoke on condition of anonymity as the investiga- tion was ongoing. Police plan a second search at the Saudi consul’s home nearby, a Turkish For- eign Ministry official said. Leaked surveillance footage show diplomatic cars trav- eled to the consul’s home shortly after Khashoggi’s disappearance at the con- sulate on Oct. 2. Saudi officials have called Turkish allegations that the kingdom killed Khashoggi “baseless,” but reports in U.S. media on Tuesday suggested the Saudis may acknowledge the writer was killed at the consulate, perhaps as part of a botched interrogation. Saudi Foreign Min- ister Adel al-Jubeir greeted Pompeo when he landed in Riyadh. The former CIA chief did not make any remarks to the media. Soon after, Pompeo ar- rived at a royal palace, where he thanked King Salman “for accepting my visit on behalf of President [Donald] Trump” before the two went into a closed-door meeting. Pompeo then met a smiling Prince Mohammed, the 33-year-old heir ap- parent to the throne of the world’s largest oil exporter. Khashoggi fled Saudi Arabia and took up a self-imposed exile in the United States after the prince’s rise, and had written columns critical of his policies. “We are strong and old al- lies,” the prince told Pompeo. “We face our challenges to- gether – the past, the day of, tomorrow.” Trump, who dispatched Pompeo to speak to the mon- arch over Khashoggi’s disap- pearance, said after talking with King Salman that the slaying could have been car- ried out by “rogue killers.” Trump provided no evi- dence, but that statement appeared to offer the U.S.- allied kingdom a possible path out of a global diplo- matic firestorm. “The king firmly denied any knowledge of it,” Trump told reporters Monday. “It sounded to me like maybe these could have been rogue killers. I mean, who knows? We’re going to try getting to the bottom of it very soon, but his was a flat denial.” Left unsaid was the fact that any decision in the ul- traconservative kingdom rests solely with the ruling Al Saud family. “The effort behind the scenes is focused on avoiding a diplomatic crisis be- tween the two countries and has succeeded in finding a pathway to deescalate ten- sions,” said Ayham Kamel, the head of the Eurasia Group’s Mideast and North Af- rica division. “Riyadh will have to pro- vide some explanation of the journalist’s disappearance, but in a manner that dis- tances the leadership from any claim that a decision was made at senior levels to assassinate the promi- nent journalist.” CNN reported that the Saudis were going to ac- knowledge the killing hap- pened but deny the king or crown prince had ordered it – which does not match what analysts and experts know about the kingdom’s inner workings. The New York Times re- ported that the Saudi royal court would suggest that an official within the kingdom’s intelligence services – a friend of Prince Mohammed – had carried out the killing. According to that reported claim, the crown prince had approved an interrogation or rendition of Khashoggi back to Saudi Arabia, but the in- telligence official was tragi- cally incompetent as he ea- gerly sought to prove himself. Both reports cited anony- mous people said to be fa- miliar with the Saudi plans. Saudi officials have been in and out of the building since Khashoggi’s disappear- ance without being stopped. Under the Vienna Convention, diplomatic posts are techni- cally foreign soil that must be protected and respected by host countries. Turkey has wanted to search the consulate for days. Permission apparently came after a late Sunday night call between King Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Khashoggi has written ex- tensively for the Post about Saudi Arabia, criticizing its war in Yemen, its recent dip- lomatic spat with Canada and its arrest of women’s rights activists after the lifting of a driving ban for women. Those policies are all seen as initiatives of Prince Mohammed, the son of King Salman, who is next in line to the throne. Prince Mohammed has aggressively pitched the kingdom as a destination for foreign investment. But Khashoggi’s disappearance has led several business leaders and media outlets to back out of an upcoming investment conference in Riyadh. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, left, walks with Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir, after arriving Tuesday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. – PHOTO: AP Hurricane Michael knocked a billboard into this Waffle House restaurant in Panama City, Florida, pictured here on Sunday. - PHOTO: AP8 WORLD&REGIONAL LONDON (AP) – Facebook says that anyone who takes out a British political ad on the social media platform will now be forced to reveal their identity, in a bid to in- crease transparency and curb misinformation. The company said Tuesday that it will require any British political ad- vertisement to carry a dis- claimer explaining who paid for it. Other data on the ad buyers, such as the budget and number of people reached, will be archived for seven years in a publicly ac- cessible database. Facebook users can also flag for review any unla- beled ad. If it’s deemed po- litical, the company will take it down and add it to the database. The company is already applying a similar system in the United States, which is holding midterm elec- tions this year, and Brazil, which held a general vote this month. British lawmakers have called for greater oversight of social media companies and election campaigns to protect democracy in the digital age. A House of Commons report this year said de- mocracy is facing a crisis because data analysis and social media allow cam- paigns to target voters with messages of hate without their consent. “While the vast majority of ads on Facebook are run by legitimate organizations, we know that there are bad actors that try to misuse our platform,” Facebook said in a statement. “By having people verify who they are, we believe it will help prevent abuse.” Facebook said it’s up against “smart and well- funded adversaries who change their tactics as we spot abuse,” but it believes that increased transparency is good for democracy and the electoral process. WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 • CAYMAN COMPASS China says camps for Muslims lead them to ‘modern’ life Check-in with facial recognition now possible in Shanghai SHANGHAI (AP) – It’s now possible to check in auto- matically at Shanghai’s Hon- gqiao airport using facial rec- ognition technology, part of an ambitious rollout of fa- cial recognition systems in China that has raised privacy concerns as Beijing pushes to become a global leader in the field. Shanghai Hongqiao In- ternational Airport unveiled self-service kiosks for flight and baggage check-in, secu- rity clearance and boarding powered by facial recogni- tion technology, according to the Civil Aviation Administra- tion of China. Similar efforts are under way at airports in Beijing and Nanyang city, in central Chi- na’s Henan province. Many airports in China already use facial recognition to help speed security checks, but Shanghai’s system, which debuted Monday, is being billed as the first to be fully automated. “It is the first time in China to achieve self-ser- vice for the whole check-in process,” said Zhang Zheng, general manager of the ground services department for Spring Airlines, the first airline to adopt the system at Hongqiao airport. Cur- rently, only Chinese iden- tity card holders can use the technology. Spring Airlines said Tuesday that passengers had embraced automated check-in, with 87 percent of 5,017 people who took Spring flights on Monday using the self-service ki- osks, which can cut down check-in times to less than a minute and a half. Across greater China, fa- cial recognition is finding its way into daily life. Mainland police have used facial rec- ognition systems to identify people of interest in crowds and nab jaywalkers, and are working to develop an in- tegrated national system of surveillance camera data. Chinese media are filled with reports of ever-ex- panding applications: A KFC outlet in Hangzhou, near Shanghai, where it’s possible to pay using facial recogni- tion technology; a school that uses facial recognition cam- eras to monitor students’ re- actions in class; and hun- dreds of ATMs in Macau equipped with facial recog- nition devices to curb money laundering. But increased convenience may come at a cost in a country with few rules on how the government can use biometric data. “Authorities are using biometric and artificial in- telligence to record and track people for social con- trol purposes,” said Maya Wang, senior China re- searcher for Human Rights Watch. “We are concerned about the increasing inte- gration and use of facial recognition technologies throughout the country be- cause it provides more and more data points for the au- thorities to track people.” BEIJING (AP) – China on Tuesday characterized its mass internment of Mus- lims as a push to bring into the “modern, civilized” world a destitute people who are easily led astray – a depiction that analysts said bore trou- bling colonial overtones. The report is the ruling Communist Party’s latest ef- fort to defend its extraju- dicial detention of Central Asian Muslim minorities against mounting criticism. China’s resistance to Western pressure over the camps highlights its growing confidence under President Xi Jinping, who has offered Beijing’s authori- tarian system as a model for other countries. A U.N. panel and a human rights group have estimated that around 1 million Ui- ghurs, Kazakhs and other minorities have been arbi- trarily detained in intern- ment camps in China’s far west Xinjiang region. The report by the offi- cial Xinhua News Agency in- dicated that key to the par- ty’s vision in Xinjiang is the assimilation of the indig- enous Central Asian ethnic minorities into Han Chi- nese society – and in turn, a “modern” lifestyle. Xinjiang Gov. Shohrat Zakir said the authorities were providing people with lessons on Mandarin, Chi- nese history and laws. Such training would steer them away from extremism and onto the path toward a “modern life” in which they would feel “confident about the future,” he said. “It’s become a general trend for them to expect and pursue a modern, civilized life,” Zakir said, referring to the trainees. He said the mea- sures are part of a broader policy to build a “founda- tion for completely solving the deeply rooted problems” in the region. China has long viewed the country’s ethnic minori- ties as backward, said James Leibold an expert on Chinese ethnic polices at Melbourne’s La Trobe University. Leibold described Bei- jing’s perspective on minori- ties as: “They’re superstitious, they’re deviant, they’re po- tentially dangerous. The role of the party-state is to bring them into the light of civiliza- tion, to transform them.” Despite growing alarm from the U.S. and the United Nations, China has main- tained that Xinjiang’s vast dragnet of police surveillance is necessary for countering latent extremism and pre- serving stability. The Turkic-speaking Ui- ghurs have long resented re- strictions placed on their re- ligious practices. They say they experience widespread discrimination in jobs and access to passports. In the Xinhua report, Zakir said authorities pro- vide free vocational training in skills geared toward man- ufacturing, food and ser- vice industries. Zakir said “trainees” are paid a basic in- come during the training, in which free food and accom- modations are provided. The report appeared aimed at disputing accounts provided by former detainees, who have said they were held in political indoctrina- tion camps where they were forced to denounce Islam and profess loyalty to the party. Ethnic Uighurs and Ka- zakhs have told The Associ- ated Press that ostensibly in- nocuous acts such as praying regularly, viewing a foreign website or taking phone calls from relatives abroad could land one in a camp. Zakir said the training centers were for people “who are influenced by terrorism and extremism, and those suspected of minor crim- inal offenses” who could be exempted from crim- inal punishment. Zakir did not say whether such individuals were ever formally charged with any crime or provided a chance to defend themselves against the allegations. The re- port also did not say if at- tendance was mandatory, though former detainees have said they were forcibly held in centers policed by armed guards. Maya Wang, senior China researcher at Human Rights Watch, said the system de- prived detainees of basic legal protections such as ac- cess to lawyers. The authorities’ attempts to justify the camps “illus- trate what the ‘rule of law’ in China means – that the party bends it to its will and uses it as a weapon against perceived political enemies,” Wang said in an email. Zakir did not say how many people were in such courses, but said some would be able to complete their courses this year. Zakir seemed to try to counter reports of poor living conditions within the camps, saying that “trainees” were immersed in athletic and cul- tural activities. The centers’ cafeterias provide “nutri- tious, free diets,” and dormi- tories are fully equipped with TVs, air conditioning and showers, he said. Omir Bekali, a Xinjiang- born Kazakh citizen, said he was kept in a cell with 40 people inside a heavily guarded facility. Bekali said he was kept in a locked room with eight other internees. They shared beds and a wretched toilet. Baths were rare. Before meals, they were told to chant “Thank the party! Thank the mother- land!” During daily manda- tory classes, they were told that their people were back- ward before being “liberated” by the party in the 1950s. The idea that one’s beliefs can be transformed through indoctrination dates back to the Mao Zedong era, when self-criticisms and public humiliation were routinely employed to stir up ideo- logical fervor. The program’s philoso- phies can be traced even fur- ther back to the late imperial era, when Xinjiang’s “natives” were seen as requiring edu- cation in the Confucian way, according to Michael Clarke, a Xinjiang expert at Austra- lian National University. Amnesty International called the Xinhua report an in- sult to detainees and the fam- ilies of people who have gone missing in the crackdown. “No amount of spin can hide the fact that the Chi- nese authorities are under- taking a campaign of system- atic repression,” the human rights group said. Shohrat Zakir, chairman of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, speaks at the National People’s Congress in Beijing, China, Sunday. - PHOTO: AP A sign marks an entrance to Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California. - PHOTO: AP Facebook requires UK political ad buyers to reveal identity9 ENTERTAINMENT CAYMAN COMPASS • WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 17, 2018 Shohrat Zakir, chairman of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, speaks at the National People’s Congress in Beijing, China, Sunday. - PHOTO: AP A sign marks an entrance to Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California. - PHOTO: AP www.rbcroyalbank.com/caribbean ® / ™ Trademarks of Royal Bank of Canada. Used under licence. IMPORTANT NOTICE RBC Royal Bank (Cayman) Limited wishes to advise its clients that due to a recent change in the United States Federal Reserve interest rate, the CI$ and US$ prime interest rate will increase from 5% p.a. to 5.25% p.a. effective November 8, 2018. Prince Harry and Meghan start Aussie tour MRS. AMERICA PAGEANT CEO ACCUSED OF RACIAL BIAS NEW YORK (AP) – Four con- testants in this year’s Mrs. America pageant on Monday called for the pageant’s CEO to apologize over accusations he used racial slurs and ste- reotypes in a conversation at a contest-related event. The four women, three African-American and one white, spoke at a news con- ference in Manhattan with lawyer Gloria Allred, accusing David Marmel of using ra- cially biased language in Las Vegas in August. Allred said that while her clients do not intend to file a lawsuit, but they do want Marmel to apologize and im- plement an action plan in- cluding sensitivity training. “They have decided that it would be wrong to stay si- lent about this matter,” Allred said. “They feel it is their duty to share what they al- lege was their experience, be- cause they do not want next year’s contestants to be sub- jected to what they consider to be racially offensive and demeaning comments which have hurt them and caused them so much pain.” The women said at a pre- competition party, Marmel sat down with a group of four African American con- testants, including the three who spoke Monday. The white contestant was also in the room but behind Marmel, they said. They said he began talking about what he had done for black people, in- cluding developing a pro- gram recognizing African- American achievements. But they said he also made neg- ative comments about NFL players who knelt during the national anthem, as well as statements saying black women need to stop having so many babies with multiple fathers and that those men were drug dealers and in jail. They said he talked about his time as a baseball player in the 1960s and going to the South where there were signs prohibiting Jews and blacks from entering. In re- counting that, he used the N- word, they said. SYDNEY (AP) – A beaming Duke and Duchess of Sussex thrilled thousands of fans outside the Sydney Opera House on Tuesday during their first meeting with the general public since the former Meghan Markle’s newly announced pregnancy. Prince Harry and Meghan spent longer than the 20 minutes allocated in their schedule to speak to and shake hands with as many well-wishers as possible. Meghan, wearing a beige trench coat over a sleeveless cream dress by Australian designer Karen Gee, accepted cards and flowers from an enthusiastic crowd. The two are on a 16- day tour of Australia, Fiji, Tonga and New Zealand that their Kensington Palace staff said would not be al- tered despite confirmation that the American former ac- tress is pregnant. Among those taken by surprise by the announce- ment were their Sydney hosts, Governor-General Sir Peter Cosgrove and Lady Lynne Cosgrove. The gov- ernor-general, who repre- sents Queen Elizabeth II, Australia’s head of state and Harry’s grandmother, sent staff to hastily buy a toy kan- garoo with a joey in its pouch and a tiny pair of Australian sheep skin boots for their pregnant guest. “Here’s your first gift for the nursery,” the gov- ernor-general told the couple during a welcome ceremony at his official residence, Ad- miralty House. “Thank you, that’s so sweet,” Meghan said as she received the toy. The pregnancy has made front-page news across Australia. Outside the Opera House on Tuesday, Harry lingered longest with war widow Daphne Dunne, 98, whom he hugged as they chatted. It was the third time that they had met since Harry’s eye caught sight of a Victoria Cross medal on her chest during a Sydney visit in 2015. She explained that her first husband Albert Chowne had been given the highest award in the British honors system after he died in Papua New Guinea in 1945. This time, Meghan joined Harry in greeting Dunne, who admires the prince’s work with veterans. “Oh my goodness, is this Daphne?” Meghan asked. Dunne later said Meghan told her “she had heard all about me; she’s so beautiful.” “I wished them well with the baby on the way and said this is what Harry has been waiting for so long,” Dunne added. Before Megan donned her coat, her tight-fitting dress barely revealed a bump as they were welcomed at the first event of the day at the Sydney Harbor-side mansion where the two are staying. The main focus of that engagement was to meet In- victus Games representatives from the 18 countries com- peting in the event that starts Saturday. The sporting event, founded by Harry in 2014, gives sick and injured mili- tary personnel and veterans the opportunity to compete in sports such as wheel- chair basketball. Several of the represen- tatives congratulated the couple on their baby news. Meghan replied: “Thank you so much. We are very excited.” The couple later traveled by boat to Taronga Park Zoo where they opened a research center and met two 10-month old koalas that had been named after them. They watched an indige- nous dance company rehearse inside the Opera House be- fore meeting the public. Harry, 34, and Meghan, 37 – along with Prince Wil- liam and his wife, Kate, the duchess of Cambridge – have stepped to the fore in the last year as the 92-year-old queen slightly reduces her public schedule. Britain’s Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, play with koalas during a visit to Taronga Zoo in Sydney, Australia, Tuesday, at the beginning of a 16-day tour of Australia and the South Pacific. – PHOTO: APNext >