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AMMAN — The ICT Association of Jordan (int@j) on Monday said local universities need to train IT students on cyber security skills, as a Cisco Systems report indicated that hackers worldwide are cashing in on the shortage of skilled cyber security staff.

"Universities in Jordan do not even provide IT students with an option to study subjects related to cyber security," int@j CEO Abed Shamlawi told The Jordan Times.

"IT students in Jordan graduate with a general knowledge of IT and lack skills to combat cyber crime," Shamlawi said.

"There is a huge shortage at present in the number of professionals with the skills needed to maintain cyber security. This problem is not only limited to Jordan; the situation is the same in the Gulf and the rest of the world," Shamlawi added.

Currently, at least one million more skilled security employees are required globally to enable organisations and countries to fend off cyber criminals, according to the Cisco 2014 Annual Security Report, posted on the multinational corporation's website this week.

The report said overall vulnerabilities and security threats have reached their highest levels since 2000, and that a serious skills shortage is not making matters better.

The sophistication of the technology and tactics used by online criminals — and their non-stop attempts to breach networks and steal data — have "outpaced the ability of IT and security professionals to address these threats", Cisco said.

"Jordan is part of the world and we are also subject to cyber attacks. The risk of falling victim to cyber crimes is growing, as such attacks target not only individuals but also organisations," Shamlawi said.

"It will be easier for IT students to find jobs if they have skills in cyber security as this specialty is needed everywhere in the world," he added.

In its report, Cisco said "unprecedented growth" is expected this year for advanced malicious attacks.

About 99 per cent of all mobile malware in 2013 targeted devices running the Android operating system, according to Cisco.

Trojans — malicious programmes which perform actions that are not authorised by the user, such as data deletion — constituted 69 per cent of malware in 2013, while adware made up 20 per cent. Adware is software that automatically displays or downloads advertising material such as banners or pop-ups when a user is online and usually downloads suspicious programmes to gather information.

Cyber threats

- Threat alerts grew 14% in 2013 compared to 2012

- 99% of all mobile malware in 2013 targeted Android devices

- Android users also have the highest encounter rate (71%) with all forms of web-delivered malware

- Trojans constituted 69% of malware in 2013 and adware 20%

- Malicious exploits are gaining access to web hosting servers, name servers, and data centres

- Buffer errors are a leading threat

- Spam continues its downward trend, although the proportion of maliciously intended spam remains constant

Source: Cisco 2014 Annual Security Report

AMMAN — Jordan is engaged in “positive discussions” over a proposal to host a US training programme for Iraqi troops, a senior official said Sunday.

His comments come as Iraqi forces are locked in battles with anti-government militants who have gained ground in Anbar province, west of Baghdad, amid a spike in violence across the country (see separate story).

“Discussions over the proposed plan are positive,” said Minister of State for Media Affairs and Communications Mohammad Momani, who is also government spokesperson.

He said no official request has been made yet and so no final decision has been taken.

Al Rai daily quoted Momani as saying that Jordan welcomes positively the US request to train Iraqi forces on its territory.

“This project is part of permanent cooperation between Jordan, Iraq and the United States to fight against terrorism in the region.”

Meanwhile, an official source familiar with the discussions told The Jordan Times that the government is inclined to agree to the plan.

On Friday, a US defence official told AFP that Washington was waiting for an agreement with Jordan or another country to go ahead with the training programme.

AMMAN — A leading lawmaker said Sunday that his bloc has prepared a plan to revive the education system, featuring a suggestion not to hire teachers before they obtain a teaching licence.

According to MP Mustafa Hamarneh (Madaba, 1st District) the suggested plan, if adopted by the government, is likely to trigger a transformation process that will take the quality of education to the next level.

Hamarneh leads the Mubadara initiative, a House-based alliance seeking to convert into a shadow government with a clear platform to address key national issues.

Recently, the bloc reached a landmark deal with the government, under which plans are being finalised to grant the children and husbands of Jordanian women married to non-Jordanians full civil rights.

The teaching licence suggestion is part of a full-fledged draft plan that is yet to receive endorsement by Mubadara members before it is presented to the government next week. Hamarneh told The Jordan Times over the phone that it addresses all aspects of the education process.

The bloc will urge the government to restructure the administration of the educational sector and allocate more funds to send postgraduate students to renowned educational institutions abroad to obtain higher degrees and return to serve their country. The plan speaks about a target of 2,500 students, according to Hamarneh.

The lawmaker, a prominent university professor and researcher, said that the proposed plan also addresses loopholes in basic education, citing recent remarks by Education Minister Mohammad Thneibat, who said that more than 100,000 students in grades 1-3 are illiterate.

Mubadara will push to limit the General Secondary Certificate Examination (Tawjihi) to the two streams: academic and vocational, which was the old version of the national test. At present, the Tawjihi is divided into five independent streams including scientific and literary as academic streams in addition to IT and Sharia, or Islamic law, and agriculture.

In a related development, the Education Committee of the Lower House held a meeting Sunday, during which it directed harsh criticism towards the education leadership demanding to put the last five education ministers on trial for their alleged failure to address the deteriorating education situation.

Head of the committee MP Mohammed Qatasheh (Tafileh, 1st District) said if the same approach continues, “then the educational system will collapse and this government will ruin the most valuable asset in the country”.

He held the successive government accountable for the “shocking” outcomes of the basic education, saying “100,000 students in the basic levels are illiterate, of whom almost 70,000 are in the southern region”.

AMMAN — The UN Security Council, which Jordan presides over this month, will hold an open discussion session on Monday in New York on the situation in the Middle East.

Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh will chair the session, which will tackle the latest developments in the region, particularly regarding the Palestinian issue and the Syrian crisis.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and several foreign ministers of UN member states will participate in the session, according to the Jordan News Agency, Petra.

“We support the US efforts to create a political framework for the negotiations and we hope that US Secretary of State John Kerry’s efforts will succeed in achieving the goal of creating an independent, sovereign and viable Palestinian state,” Minister of State for Media Affairs and Communications Mohammad Momani said, commenting on the peace process.

“This is a high and strategic national interest,” Momani, who is also the government spokesperson, told The Jordan Times in a phone interview.

“We appreciate the continuous communication between Jordan and the US administration on the progress of negotiations and we are in close contact with the Palestinians and in touch with the Israelis,” the minister said.

In reply to a question on Jordan’s participation in the Geneva II conference on Syria, Momani confirmed that the Kingdom will attend the meeting, which is slated for Wednesday.

“We are participating in the Geneva conference. Jordan will present its views regarding the Syrian crisis to the members of the Security Council, [in an attempt] to increase the Security Council’s and the international community’s level of engagement with the crisis,” he noted.

Jordan will urge all Security Council members to heed “the need for a credible, viable and political process that will end the bloodshed and restore stability and security in Syria and for the Syrian people”, said the minister.

“Jordan is in a perfect position to bring to the Security Council an objective and insightful assessment of the Syrian crisis,” noted Momani, reiterating that the Kingdom is already suffering because of the influx of Syrian refugees and the burdens posed by the presence of over 600,000 of them in the country.

Jordan will call on the international community to shoulder its responsibility towards the refugees, as it is playing its humanitarian role on behalf of the international community, he said, emphasising the heavy burdens on the Kingdom’s infrastructure and services, let alone the security challenges on the border with Syria.

Last week, India called for a peaceful end to the Syrian crisis.

“We have been extremely worried. The parties involved should avoid violence,” India’s External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid told reporters in New Delhi last Wednesday in reply to a question on the plight of Syrian refugees and the need to assist them and host countries.

“I will take part in the Geneva conference on Syria and I hope that India can make a push towards a solution. India will contribute to arriving at an appropriate solution,” the minister told journalists from West Asia and North Africa.

Khurshid added that, India, a member of the Non-Aligned Movement, is pledging $2 million in assistance to mitigate the effect of the Syrian crisis this year.

“We have constantly played a role for the benefit of rebuilding capacity in Syria. We are willing to assist. We do not accept telling societies how to conduct themselves. India has its own way,” the minister elaborated.

“We have our own way of giving comfort and we will continue to do that. Our position is consistent for any part of the world, especially through dramatic changes,” Khurshid noted.

“As friends, we have always advised towards infusion, reconciliation, healing of any wounds that happen because of any changes,” he added. 

AMMAN — Microsoft Jordan will soon start receiving entries for its Imagine Cup 2014 Jordan competition, with winners scheduled to be announced late in April, according to Ayman Afaneh, Microsoft Jordan’s developer and platform evangelist lead.

The software giant will provide a month-long training course for university students as of February 1 to help them come up with different technology solutions and applications in their projects using Microsoft’s latest platforms in three main categories: world citizenship, games and innovation, Afaneh told The Jordan Times on Sunday.

“The objective of the competition is to encourage Jordanians aged above 16 years to come up with creative, innovative apps that serve the community, as well as support young talents,” Afaneh said.

“The competition is in line with Jordan’s efforts to trigger innovation among young Jordanians… especially since the country is home to a pool of talents,” he added.

“Imagine Cup is very important to Microsoft Jordan especially since education is one of the main pillars of the company’s national plan.”

The first round of finalists will be announced on March 15, with four selected in each of the competition’s three categories, according to Afaneh.

The final round will be on April 19 when all applicants will be judged, while the winner will be announced in an official ceremony on April 29.

The top three winners then will participate in an event in Qatar in May, where they will compete with other winners of similar Imagine Cup competitions in the Arab world, Afaneh noted.

The top two winners in Qatar’s event will be sent to the US to take part in Imagine Cup 2014 Worldwide, scheduled for July.

MAFRAQ — HRH Princess Basma on Sunday officially inaugurated the Social Support Centre, a hexagonal stadium and a children’s park in Mafraq Governorate.

Established by Save the Children and the Jordanian Hashemite Fund for Human Development (JOHUD), the centre helps school dropouts rejoin formal and non-formal education, linking them with vocational training, and providing counselling to them and children found at risk of child labour.

According to the law, the minimum age for regular work is 16, and 18 for hazardous work, which the Labour Ministry defined in 1997 as dangerous, tiring or harmful to the health of juveniles.

The JD118,000 stadium and park, established at the Princess Basma Centre for Development in Mafraq, was supported by Mercy Corps and funded by UNCHR and the British embassy as part of a project that aims at developing local communities.

Implemented in Irbid and Mafraq governorates, the project helps local residents and Syrian refugees overcome transformations that took place as a result of the Syrian crisis, according to the organisations involved.

It also trains individuals to identify the needs of their respective areas and manage projects that lead to social change.

Princess Basma checked on the centre’s classrooms and was briefed on the extra-curricular activities it provides.

The facility is part of a US-funded $3.9 million project, dubbed “Promising Future”, implemented by Save the Children to eliminate child labour in Jordan through education and improve the living conditions of families with working children.

JOHUD also works with Save the Children to provide social support services in Marka and Zarqa, which have high rates of child labour.

The princess also listened to the testimony of five students, including one Syrian, on the programmes and services they receive at the centre and its branch in Amman.

Commending the efforts of all stakeholders, Princess Basma underlined the importance of the newly established facilities in light of the difficult social, economic and political circumstances the local community is facing in Mafraq, some 80km northeast of Amman.

She cited the “fruitful” cooperation between JOHUD and official institutions, such as the ministries of labour and education and the Vocational Training Corporation, to combat child labour.

Saba Mbaslat, director of Save the Children programmes in Jordan, said the phenomenon is on the rise in the Kingdom, citing child labour as one the consequences of the Syrian crisis and calling for more efforts to combat it.

“We should reject seeing a child working to support the family… investing in our children and protecting them should always be a priority,” she added.

According to the UNCHR, a total of 107,300 Syrian refugees registered in Jordan are children between the ages of one and four. Some 117,000 are under eleven.

AMMAN — Pioneer Jordanian artist Yasser Dwaik is celebrating his 50-year career with a retrospective exhibition in Amman showcasing works from all periods of his multifaceted production.

With organisers stressing Dwaik’s role in laying the foundation for the blossoming of art in Jordan, the artist said he was constantly searching for the next inspiration, noting that, following Dutch artist Rembrandt’s beliefs: “All my works are a personal photo of me.”

“I still recall my suffering in search of art tools and materials in the middle of the libraries of Jerusalem as a child. Even there, it was extremely difficult to get art books and materials,” Dwaik told The Jordan Times in a recent interview.

“One day, when I was about 13, I even sent a letter to a shop in Egypt asking how to use charcoals. I had to learn how to do everything by myself. It was very hard but I was highly motivated.”

Starting with painting, and having grown confident with the use of colours, Dwaik started drawing Jerusalem’s alleys, arches, minarets, bells, people and markets which influenced his first paintings and photography and his handling of water and oil colours.

The shock of the Israeli occupation of what was left of the Palestinian land in 1967 caused a transition in the way he handled art forms, Dwaik noted, adding that from that moment, the topics he presented were mostly a challenge to the sad circumstances in his surroundings.

The state of Israel was established on Palestinian land after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, and later expanded illegally in the wake of the 1967 Middle East war, occupying the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and annexing East Jerusalem as part of its capital, a move never recognised at an international level.

Following this event, Dwaik, like many other Palestinians, left Jerusalem and found sanctuary in Jordan.

“I used to make references in my work, in my paintings especially, to the landscape and the place I lived in,” he said.

“I painted ruins in many backgrounds, but they were always stylised and in combination with circles, representing the sun or the moon — signs of hope. There were often trees before those ruins with light gleefully coming through their leaves.”

After travelling to Europe and completing his studies in Baghdad, Dwaik became acquainted with graphics and printing that made his work more abstract, with geometric shapes gradually taking over the former figurative style.

“My experience with graphics and its multiple techniques and methods had a great impact in achieving an expressive vision of spiritual symbols reflecting my feelings and senses towards the course of the world’s events,” Dwaik said.

“The aim of the exhibition ‘50 years in Art’ is to point out all the different sides of a life’s work,” Mohammad Jaloos, curator at the Cairo Amman Bank art gallery, the exhibition’s venue, told The Jordan Times.

The artist’s eclectic approach to art has made his work span from graphics to paintings and etching, leading him to work with all kinds of materials, he said.

As one of the founders of the Jordanian Plastic Artist Association in the late 1970s, the main representative institution of the fine arts in the Kingdom, Dwaik has also dedicated a large part of his career to supporting art education in the Kingdom, Jaloos added.

“Back then, we were a small group of artists working together and supporting each other. Today, I am happy that more and more students are joining my classes at the University of Jordan and have a perfect knowledge of art and come up with their own original ideas,” Dwaik said.

Looking at his latest work hanging on the gallery’s walls characterised by abstract patchworks of different materials and covered with enamel, the 73-year-old artist said his production has always been, and will always be, in constant evolution.

“I am an artist; therefore, I need to constantly think in different ways, looking at things from a different perspective and employing new techniques. I always look for new styles, subjects, materials and keep changing them all the time. My work changes every time as my feelings do.”

NEW DELHI — Several Jordanian officials are due in India in the near future to discuss bilateral relations, with defence cooperation as the main issue, according to a senior Indian official.

Salman Khurshid, Indian minister for external affairs, said his country has distinguished relations with Jordan, adding that several meetings are planned to develop these ties further.

“With Jordan we have a two-way investment, and we have a very good relationship with the Royal family,” Khurshid said at a meeting last week with journalists from West Asia and North Africa (WANA).

The minister said a delegation representing the Royal Jordanian National Defence College will visit India soon to discuss cooperation in the field of defence and to be familiarised with Indian defence schools.

In addition, Khurshid noted that his country is preparing to receive Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh, but “we are working on the dates for his visit.”

“We [are also] considering cooperation in the fields of information technology and financial services,” the official said in reply to a question by The Jordan Times.

The Indian foreign minister said WANA countries are important to his nation, which is closely watching changes in the region.

“You come from a region that is important to us, and your people should decide for themselves, and whatever you decide will be acknowledged by us,” Khurshid told journalists representing Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Sudan, Egypt, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Yemen.

The minister noted that there are 7 million Indians working in WANA countries, and this channels more than $70 billion to the Indian economy.

He added that almost 60 per cent of “our oil supplies come from your region. We heavily depend on your countries. You are good friends and good partners.”

Khurshid said the trade volume between India and the countries of the region stands at $180 billion.

Meanwhile, E.M. Sudarsana Natchiappan, minister of state for commerce and industry, noted that more than 10,000 Indians currently work in the Kingdom’s textile and health sectors, as more than 20 factories in Jordan are run by Indians.

Indian investments in the Kingdom, he said, are estimated at $60 million.

“The exchange of visits between our countries will further strengthen economic cooperation,” Natchiappan said, adding: “We are happy to have further talks to help in this aspect.”

AMMAN — The All Jordan Youth Commission is working on establishing offices in badia areas and camps in order to reach as many young people as possible.

The aim behind the commission’s upcoming step is to communicate with young Jordanians in the governorates and remote areas, giving them the opportunity to take part in voluntary activities and discover their inner talents, the commission’s director, Sami Al Maitah said.

“Young people in the capital already have so many chances, we want to provide as many programmes as possible for Jordanians in the governorates, because there is a lack of opportunities there,” he told The Jordan Times in a recent interview.

Established in September 2006, the impetus for the commission came during an annual conference held for young people to meet with His Majesty King Abdullah to discuss several issues, according to Maitah.

“The commission is affiliated with the King Abdullah II Fund for Development,” he said, noting that the commission’s activities cover all the country’s regions.

“The commission is successful because it does not impose ideas on young people; it receives their ideas and projects and implements them,” Maitah said, adding that the commission is open for all youths in the Kingdom.

Its activities cover economic and political empowerment, in addition to voluntary and social work.

“For example, the commission implemented around 250 activities, with the participation of 75,458 young Jordanians during the parliamentary and municipal elections between 2007 and 2013,” Maitah said.

The commission holds voluntary activities during national occasions instead of organising concerts, he said.

“We want to hold events that benefit society and youths in general.”

Moreover, the commission took advantage of last December’s blizzard by signing an agreement with the Civil Defence Department (CDD) to train young people on how to deal with severe weather conditions.

“During the snowstorm, the commission’s volunteers helped CDD personnel open roads that were blocked due to accumulated snow, so we thought we should train young people in the governorates to enable them to face such conditions in the future,” he added.

Despite what has been achieved so far, Maitah stressed that young Jordanians cannot assume their rightful role as the builders of the country’s future as long as officials disregard their potential.

“Young people’s role is really significant and most of the challenges society faces are related to their issues,” he noted.

Maitah added that the commission established a unit to address women’s issues and organise several activities targeting women in Jordan.

The commission is currently working on organising a national conference with the aim of discussing young people’s outlook towards reform and the Elections Law, he added.

“We also want to hold activities to link young Jordanians who reside outside the Kingdom with their compatriots in the country,” Maitah said.