News in Brief

Border project back: Saudi Arabia is resuming a project abandoned in 2004 to build a three-metre (10-foot) fence the length of its border with Yemen, a Saudi newspaper confirmed on Friday.

Reports that the project was back on had already drawn condemnation from human rights activists who accused Saudi Arabia of dealing a new blow to its impoverished neighbour after deporting thousands of Yemeni workers under new labour regulations in recent weeks.

The fence along the 1,800-kms (1,125-mile) border will consist of a network of sandbags and piping, fitted with electronic detection systems, Arab News reported. “Tightening security along the border with its southern neighbour has become more urgent for the kingdom after the Yemeni revolution in 2012 and the subsequent turmoil,” the paper said. (AFP) Gaza border reopens: Israel reopened a goods crossing into the Gaza Strip on Friday, officials said, after closing it several days earlier in response to rocket fire from the besieged Palestinian enclave.

“Kerem Shalom crossing was reopened this morning,” said Guy Inbar, spokesman for the Israeli defence ministry unit responsible for all civilian affairs in the Palestinian territories.

The crossing “doesn’t normally function on Friday but we opened it especially to allow the transport of goods blocked since its closure on Monday,” he added. . (AFP)

Turkey canal plans: Turkey will forge ahead with plans for a 45-kms (30 mile) ship canal linking the Black Sea to the Sea of Marmara to try to ease congestion in the Bosphorus Strait, one of the world’s busiest waterways, the government said on Friday.

The “Kanal Istanbul” plans are a pet project of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who announced them ahead of a general election in 2011 in what many Turks dismissed as a prestigious but unrealistic vision. The canal would turn the European side of Istanbul into part of a large island, running parallel and to the north-west of the Bosphorus. (RTRS)