Plant protests THE BATTLE between the Canadian fertiliser company E Agrium and opponents of the construction of its plant on Ras Al-Barr island in Damietta continues, reports Mohamed El-Sayed. After the company announced a few weeks ago that it would go ahead with the project, hundreds of opponents in Damietta gathered at the Bar Association's branch in the coastal city on Saturday to renew their insistence on relocating the plant away from the governorate. "There are greedy investors who think about nothing but generating profits at the expense of people's health," said Chairman of the Bar Association Sameh Ashour, who also called for the removal of the minister of state for environmental affairs for granting his ministry's approval to the company. "The government failed to execute President Mubarak's instructions that the plant should not be constructed without the consent of the local residents," Ashour added. Hundreds of Damietta locals also organised a sit-in at the doorstep of the Press Syndicate in downtown Cairo in protest at the government's failure to solve the problem. Wearing T-shirts with black skulls painted on them, the protesters raised banners condemning the "killing plant". The protest was dispersed by riot police who cordoned off the syndicate's headquarters. The anti-E Agrium plant campaign was taken to a new level after lawyer and member of the yet unlicensed Wasat Party Essam Sultan filed a lawsuit against the company and the concerned governmental bodies that were reported to have taken $25 million worth of kickbacks from the company to secure necessary approvals. "I have the documents that prove that the company, the Damietta Port Authority, Industrial Development Authority and the Environmental Affairs Agency are all guilty of squandering and embezzling public funds, and I will submit all these documents to the prosecution," Sultan said. In reply to the intensifying campaign, Creg McGlown, executive director of the company, said during a meeting of the Egyptian-Canadian Business Council that, "E Agrium has come to serve the Egyptian economy, not to pollute the environment." Professors in demand AT CAIRO University campus, dozens of professors working for state- owned universities and institutes organised a sit-in on Sunday morning to press for raising their salaries, reports Mona El-Nahhas. The protesters, belonging mainly to the 9 March Movement for the Independence of Universities, called for doubling the basic rates of pay for all members of the teaching staff, increasing governmental support offered to state-owned universities to upgrade the level of university education and scientific research, establishing a supplementary fund for pensions and abolishing Law 82/2000 which regulates conditions of professors over the age of 70. The four demands were included in a statement issued by the organisers of the sit-in. The statement also criticised the regulations set up by the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research for raising professors' incomes. The regulations, currently being discussed by professors during meetings of their faculty councils, have touched off a wave of protests among a majority of professors on the grounds that such regulations will harm the dignity of university professors and tighten the grip of the university administration on members of the teaching staff. By means of such regulations, a system of what has been called "conditional" bonuses will be applied to university professors. In order to get such bonuses, which range from LE1,200 to LE2,000 according to the degree held by the teaching staff member, professors should be assigned by the university administration to perform extra tasks, but which will not be available to everyone. Professors assigned to do such jobs will be asked to work for 28 hours per week, otherwise they will not be paid. Organisers of Sunday's protest announced that their sit-in will be the beginning of a series of measures aimed at dropping the government plan. The right to sight GLAUCOMA is one of the leading causes of irreversible blindness worldwide, Reem Leila reports. Accordingly, Al-Nour Charity Association of the Al-Maghrabi Foundation conducted a workshop on 25 May under the auspices of the World Health Organisation (WHO) to present a recent study showing the dangers of glaucoma, its prevalence and best means of protection. Almost 70 million people suffer from glaucoma worldwide with over 6.7 million people blind in both eyes from the disease. Prevalence in India is estimated as high as 2.6 per cent and in Africa it has been estimated as high as 5.3 per cent. According to ophthalmologist Magdi Helal, who participated in preparing the study, the percentage of the disease in some of Egypt's villages is not promising. In the Menoufiya governorate, for example, more than 38 per cent of its residents are infected with glaucoma, while in Fayoum, victims comprise more than 44 per cent of its inhabitants over the age of 40, when the disease's possible occurrence is high. "WHO's allowed percentage of infection among any community is 18 per cent at the most," Helal said. The WHO has rated Egypt among the countries worst infected with the disease. As such, Egypt will receive annual financial and technical support from the WHO. Ophthalmologist Ayman Salah pointed out that early glaucoma detection and treatment are currently the only known methods to prevent blindness and poor vision resulting from glaucoma. When patients identified as having glaucoma by screening are compared to patients selected by Al-Nour in a clinical setting, the screened patients tended to have less severe glaucomatous upon the initial diagnosis, "thereby supporting glaucoma screening as a powerful method to reduce blindness," explained Salah. Treatment for glaucoma can cost up to $1,100 per year, partly depending on the treatment regimen and frequency of medication changes. Cornea concerns ON THE RECENT scare caused by imported cornea reportedly infected with Hepatitis C Virus (HCV), Reem Leila writes that the Ministry of Health and Population has firmly denied a report published in one of Egypt's daily newspapers on the import of corneas from eastern Asia infected with HCV, stressing that the news was totally devoid of truth. A press release issued by the ministry acknowledged it was possible that a very small number of corneas could have been illegally smuggled into Egypt, stressing the fact that the Ministry of Health has full control over corneas coming from abroad. Each cornea coming into Egypt, according to the press release, is subject to strict procedures. They must be accompanied with documents proving their source as well as all the data concerning the patients taken from them. Waiting lists for cornea transplant operations have been curtailed significantly in the past two years. Samia Sabri, manager of Egypt's National Eye Bank, argues there are only two eye banks in Egypt but that the Ministry of Health is planning to increase the number of banks to five in the near future. Sabri, who denied allegations regarding importing corneas infected with HCV, said Egypt imports nearly 1,000 corneas every year. "Everything concerning people's health in Egypt is subject to the Health Ministry's supervision," Sabri said. Importing all medical equipment and organs are totally subject to the supervision of the Ministry of Health and Population. According to Abdel-Rahman Shahin, the official spokesman of the minister of health and population, the Medical Insurance Authority (MIA) conducted 560 cornea transplants during the past 18 months. All cases survived the operation and are enjoying good eyesight. "Every year nearly 1,000 cornea patients undergo the transplant operation either in the MIA or at Al-Qasr Al-Aini Hospital. They were all successful," confirmed Shahin. Currently there are only 600 cornea cases on the waiting list, according to Shahin, which will be conducted in only one year. Corneal transplants are the only form of therapy for many cornea disorders, which can lead to blindness. Secrets of the deep THE BASALT sarcophagus of Mankawre, the pharaoh for whom the third pyramid at Giza was built, began a maritime journey to England shortly after it was discovered, writes Nevine El-Aref. Then the curse of the pharaohs' struck: Beatrice, the ship that was carrying the sarcophagus, sank in the Mediterranean, off the Spanish shore, in 1838. Despite several attempts to raise the sunken treasure the sarcophagus has remained on the seabed for 170 years. This year, in collaboration with the Spanish government, an Egyptian- Spanish archaeological team, headed by secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) Zahi Hawass, plans to finally raise Menkawre's sarcophagus. Hawass told Al-Ahram Weekly that maps and newspaper reports published at the time of the sinking of Beatrice helped enormously in pinpointing the wreck which is submerged in the waters off the Spanish city of Cartegana. He also added that Robert Ballard, the co-discoverer of the sunken Titanic, will help in raising the sarcophagus. But after the salvage operation who will own the sarcophagus? Will it go to Egypt or to Spain? Under international law the sarcophagus could well be claimed by the Spanish authorities since it was found in Spanish territorial waters. Yasser Mourad, Egypt's ambassador to Spain, thinks this unlikely. The sarcophagus, he says, will be returned to Egypt. Two years ago Spain found itself in a similar situation to Egypt when the United States salvaged Spanish artifacts from a wreck discovered in US waters. They are now exhibited in Madrid. Mourad has confirmed that the salvage operation is expected to be completed by end of the year and that Egypt's Minister of Culture Farouk Hosni will be present, alongside his Spanish counterpart.
