http://archive.gulfnews.com/articles/07/12/15/10174965.html
12/15/2007 01:18 AM | By Scott Shuey, Chief Business Reporter Dubai: It could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship. A Moroccan delegation, comprising government officials and industry leaders, visited Dubai last week looking for ways to build trade relations. Jamal Benhamou, director and CEO of the Federation of Information Technologies, Telecommunications and Offshoring (Apebi), said that while the country may not yet be known for ICT, it plans to use the recent infrastructure upgrades and its position as a trade hub to change. Benhamou said his organisation's objective is to support innovation and development in Morocco's IT sector and increase the number of companies doing business there. "To be successful, we had to build up step by step, so we built up our original position in North Africa," he said. Then the country had to make sure that an environment existed where international investors could benefit. Now that the country has that, he says, he's trying to spread the word in Dubai. More than 42,000 people are currently employed in Morocco's ICT sector in 1,500 firms, Apebi claims. The Moroccan ICT sector grew 9.6 per cent to $638.69 million between 2001 and 2006, and the government expects the sector to reach $9 billion by 2012. It isn't just foreign direct investment (FDI) that Morocco is looking for. Moroccan companies are also eyeing the Gulf region. "There are so many countries that you can reach so easily from Dubai," said Chemsedine Ould Sidi-Baba, executive manager of Cadtech, a Moroccan company looking to expand into fleet management and tracking services. "Instead of going to other countries, you open an office in Dubai and from there you can reach the entire regional market." Jyoti Lalchandani, the regional managing director for IDC, which provides analysis for the ICT industry, said there are a number of reasons that make Morocco competitive in the wider regional market, where it competes with countries such as Egypt. "Morocco definitely understands that it competes with Egypt in terms of some of the localisation and customisation work, or 'Arabisation' as we call it," he said. But the country offers a more mature market, and aims to make it easier for companies to set up shop there, he said.
The country, known more for tourism and Casablanca than technology, is actively looking to expand its image as an information and communication technology (ICT) hub.
By Nick Britten
A witness in the Madeleine McCann case has broken her silence to protest the innocence of the missing four-year-old's parents and recount the haunting night she disappeared. Bridget O'Donnell and her partner, Jeremy Wilkins, befriended Kate and Gerry McCann during their week-long holiday in Portugal and have now given the most insightful account yet of their agony after the "catastrophic" disappearance of the little girl.
Miss O'Donnell, who worked as a producer on BBC's Crimewatch programme, said that she has "always believed that Gerry and Kate McCann are innocent". Speaking about the night Madeleine went missing, Miss O'Donnell said: "Our baby would not sleep and at about 8.30pm, Jes (Mr Wilkins) took him out for a walk in the buggy to settle him. "Gerry was on his way back from checking on his children and the two men stopped to have a chat. "They talked about daughters, fathers, families. Gerry was relaxed and friendly. advertisement "They discussed the babysitting dilemmas at the resort and Gerry said that he and Kate would have stayed in too, if they had not been on holiday in a group. "Jes returned to our apartment just before 9.30pm. We ate, drank wine, watched a DVD and then went to bed. "On the ground floor, a completely catastrophic event was taking place. On the fourth floor of the next block, we were completely oblivious." Confirmation of the conversation between Mr Wilkins and Mr McCann is crucial because police believe at that time Madeleine was already dead and Mr McCann was hiding her body. It also corroborates the timeline of events given to the police by the McCanns and their friends. Miss O'Donnell described how the tragic event led to an immediate, physical transformation in the McCanns after the loss of their daughter. She said during the holiday they got to know them and their group, who they called "the Doctors". "One man was the joker," she said. "He had a loud Glaswegian accent. He was Gerry McCann. He played tennis with Jes. Gerry was outgoing, a wisecracker, but considerate and kind." She added: "Kate was calm, still, quietly beautiful; Gerry was confident, proud, silly, strong." She next saw the McCanns two days after Madeleine's disappearance. She said: "The physical transformation of these two human beings was sickening. "Kate's back and shoulders, her hands, her mouth had reshaped themselves in to the angular manifestation of a silent scream. Gerry was upright, his lips now drawn into a thin, impenetrable line." She revealed that she had debated with the McCanns the childcare arrangements at the Ocean Club resort and recalled admiring them "for not being paranoid parents" by leaving their children alone as they ate at a tapas restaurant every night. She added that privately she was glad she had not been given the McCanns' apartment because, being on a corner by the road "people could see in" and "they were exposed". She said the first she knew about Madeleine's disappearance was when one of the McCanns' friends began banging on their apartment door at 1am. "Jes got up to answer. I stayed listening in the dark. I knew it was bad; it could only be bad. I heard male mumbling, then Jes's voice. "You're joking?" he said. It wasn't the words, it was the tone that made me flinch. "He came back in to the room. 'Gerry's daughter's been abducted,' he said. "I jumped up and went to check our children. They were there. We sat down. "We got up again. Weirdly, I did the washing-up. We wondered what to do. "Jes had asked if they needed help searching and was told there was nothing he could do; she had been missing for three hours. "Jes felt he should go anyway, but I wanted him to stay with us. I was a coward, afraid to be alone with the children - and afraid to be alone with my thoughts." The following morning, she said, there was no news. "People were crying in the restaurant. Mark Warner had handed out letters informing them what had happened in the night, and we all wondered what to do. "Mid-sentence, we would drift in to the middle distance. Tears would brim up and recede." Miss O'Donnell said that while the parents were out looking for Madeleine, she saw no police until one turned up with a "slightly sweaty" translator, who turned out to be Robert Murat, the only other official suspect in the case. She said police failed to ask Mr Wilkins for a statement and when the officer pointed to a picture of Madeleine and asked if it was her daughter, "my heart sank for the McCanns". |
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McCanns: Madeleine home within days - detective agency (Roundup)
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UK News
McCanns: Madeleine home within days - detective agency (Roundup)
By Rich Bowden, M&C Staff Writer
Dec 14, 2007, 13:38 GMT
(M&C) - The head of the Barcelona-based detective agency hired by the McCanns to find their missing daughter says he believes he is just days away from finding her.
Francisco Marco, head of Metodo 3, says he is confident Madeleine McCann, who vanished from the family's holiday apartment in the Portuguese resort of Praia da Luz on May 3, will be reunited with her parents by Christmas.
"It's the highest pressure case I've ever had to deal with because of the press and because of my own family, Mr Marco said to Spanish newspaper Metro.
He added: "When I get home at night, my children ask me, 'Have you found Madeleine yet daddy?'"
He went on to say the agency knows who kidnapped the four-year-old.
"We have proof of her movements after her kidnap and we know she was alive the day after her disappearance. We are not certain she left Portugal," he said.
"I talk of certainties because we know which group may have her or could have kidnapped her to then sell her on to others."
The detective added: "We know who kidnapped her. We believe she is in an area not very far from the Iberian peninsula and north Africa. And we have a fairly certain idea who she is with."
"I cannot say who she is with because we are putting together conclusive proof we can present to the authorities so they can proceed with their arrests."
He added: "God willing, I hope that she will be back with her parents before Christmas."
McCanns family spokesman Clarence Mitchell said the parents were "pleased" at the positive attitude shown by the detective agency and said Metodo 3 "retains our full confidence".
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