Briefly

SAUDI ARABIA

Swedish firms overpay Arabs, report says

STOCKHOLM — Many Swedish companies operating in Saudi Arabia violate workers’ rights by enforcing repressive local laws instead of standing up for their employees, according to SwedWatch, an alliance of nongovernmental human-rights, fair-trade and environmental groups.

Truck maker Volvo, Swiss-Swedish engineering group ABB and packaging firm Tetra Pak have shared the benefits of Saudi Arabia’s booming economy, but sometimes follow local rules that violate the rights of their workers, SwedWatch said.

“ABB and Tetra Pak pay Saudi workers more than foreign workers, even when they perform the same tasks,” the group said in its 61-page report. At Saudi Crawford Doors Factory Ltd., a Saudi can earn more than three times as much as a foreign counterpart. Especially shocking, said the group, is that “all Swedish-Saudi companies keep the migrant workers’ passports” — which is prohibited by a United Nations’ migrant-rights convention.

TURKEY

Kurds resume war, seek concessions

DIYARBAKIR — Back on the offensive after a five-year pause, Kurdish rebels are seeking to extract further concessions from Turkey, testing Ankara’s ability to maintain stability and keep on track its bid for membership in the European Union.

About 100 rebels and soldiers have been killed in the southeast since April, when clashes intensified. The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) called off its unilateral cease-fire in June 2004, saying that Turkey’s reforms to expand Kurdish freedoms were inadequate. The unrest raised fears that chaos might again engulf the region and shatter Ankara’s democratization efforts.

The PKK’s advocacy of a democratic Turkey respectful to Kurdish ethnic identity has evolved into a demand for Kurdish autonomy within a federal system, amnesty for the rebels guaranteeing their participation in political life and freedom for their imprisoned leader, Abdullah Ocalan.

KUWAIT

Ailing rulers raise oil-policy concerns

KUWAIT CITY — This Arab kingdom has a long-ailing emir and a crown prince who is even more ill, putting pressure on the Persian Gulf oil state’s ruling family to clarify who is next in line to rule.

Many Kuwaitis and foreign diplomats expect Prime Minister Sheik Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, the emir’s half-brother who has effectively run the emirate for four years, to be chosen, and some say he should replace the crown prince now.

Weekly notes …

Mauritania has jailed scores of political opponents, accusing them of being Islamic terrorists, and said an attack from across the border in Algeria by a group linked to al Qaeda proves the seriousness of the threat. Fifteen Mauritanian soldiers were killed in the June 4 raid on a remote military outpost by the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, based in neighboring Algeria. The political opposition says the claim is more politics than reality. … Twelve Pakistani children sold to work as camel jockeys in the United Arab Emirates have been reunited with their parents after returning home last month, officials said this week. The parents have been forced to pay bonds of 100,000 rupees ($1,660) to ensure that the children are not sold again, a child-welfare official said. Ten other children, who also flew home June 21, are still waiting for their parents to claim them, the Child Protection Bureau reports.