Human Trafficking and Islamic Law

This article investigates the Islamic legal framework in relation to human trafficking, which is based on the sources of the Islamic Sharia and the approaches taken by the Islamic Sharia towards human trafficking. It defines the term of human trafficking in the Arabic language and under Islamic laws and focuses on the various practices and forms of human trafficking which are prohibited under both the Islamic Sharia and international human rights law. It also critically analyses the penalties for the crimes of human trafficking under the Islamic Sharia. The chapter then discusses the concept of human dignity under the Islamic Sharia and its influence on the definition of human trafficking from an Islamic perspective. The article demonstrates that Islam has not only supported a set of rights that preserve human dignity, but it has also instituted a series of punishments in civil society to prevent the abuse of these rights. Although there is no explicit text in the major sources of Islamic law prohibiting human trafficking, the chapter concludes that many customs and actions that contribute to trafficking are clearly prohibited. In addition, to strengthen the sense of human dignity, all Islamic principles have sought to grant rights to all, including the vulnerable and the weak. This implies that Islamic Sharia is in an appropriate position to complement and support the international framework for combating human trafficking. Keywords: Density: Human dignity; Human Trafficking; International Law; Islamic Sharia; Forced Marriage; Mut’ah Marriage DOI: 10.7176/JLPG/131-02 Publication date: April 30th 202

Responses of UN Human Rights Bodies to Human Trafficking and Modern-Day Slavery in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

This article discusses  international conventions related to human rights and human trafficking signed by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabian (KSA). In addition, the article examines KSA’s response to human trafficking and presents clear arguments concerning Saudi Arabia’s compliance to regional and international standards. The submitted reports by KSA and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO) are analyzed by the relevant committees and various human rights bodies. The article further discusses the gap between the reports provided by the Saudi state and the real situation and its victims.  The articles concludes that despite efforts made by the KSA to combat human trafficking, KSA remains non-compliant to international conventions related to human trafficking. Keywords: Kafala System; Human Trafficking; International Law; Islamic Sharia; Migrant Domestic Workers DOI: 10.7176/JLPG/131-05 Publication date: April 30th 202

Understanding Islamic Sharia and the KSA Legal System

The promotion of the rule of law in the Middle East, particularly in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (the KSA), is becoming increasingly important due to globalization. The country operates within a conventional Islamic legal framework, a non-constitutional monarchy. However, the pace of reform and change in the KSA is slow. Understanding the essence and significance of law within the legal framework is crucial for advancing a rule of law system in the KSA and other Muslim and Middle Eastern nations. This study examines the legal framework of the KSA, which is based on monarchy, tribal organization, and traditional Islamic Sharīʿa. The study also investigates the feasibility of implementing change in a country like the KSA, where its legal system may be too entrenched in certain ideologies and traditions, hindering its ability to adopt necessary reforms for a rule of law system. The keywords: the KSA legal system; Islamic Sharīʿa; Primary sources; Secondary sources; statutory law. DOI: 10.7176/JLPG/138-07 Publication date: December 31st 202

Role of Educational Services in Promoting Inclusive Higher Education for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students

A way to safeguard university students’ educational rights is through inclusive higher education. It allows deaf and hard of hearing students (DHH) to effectively access and gain from their education. To facilitate academic success, inclusive programs must provide DHH students with diverse educational services that ensure proper access to information in lectures. This chapter discusses the role of educational services in the inclusive higher education of DHH students. These services are an integral part for the academic success of these students in higher education. The following are some of the educational services for DHH students that will be covered in the chapter: modified classroom delivery, presence of coordinators, and note-taking services, as well as the teaching experience as important elements that will influence the development of inclusive higher education for DHH students. The aim of this chapter is to describe the role of educational services for DHH students in promoting inclusive higher education through an analysis of previous research, as well as an overview of the key issues regarding these services. It also compares the roles of these services in various universities around the world. This chapter also considers the challenges of providing and using these services as a component of a comprehensive strategy for the academic integration of DHH students

Tanlock based loop with improved performance

This thesis is focused on the design, analysis, simulation and implementation of new improved architectures of the Time Delay Digital Tanlock Loop (TDTL) based digital phase-locked loop (DPLL). The proposed architectures overcome some fundamental limitations exhibited by the original TDTL. These limitations include the presence of nonlinearity in the phase detector (PD), the non-zero phase error of the first-order loop, the restricted locking range, particularly of the second-order loop, the limited acquisition speed and the noise performance. Two approaches were adopted in this work to alleviate these limitations: the first involved modifying the original TDTL through the incorporation of auxiliary circuit blocks that enhance its performance, whilst the second involved designing new tanlock-based architectures. The proposed architectures, which resulted from the above approaches, were tested under various input signal conditions and their performance was compared with the original TDTL. The proposed architectures demonstrated an improvement of up to fourfold in terms of the acquisition times, twofold in noise performance and a marked enhancement in the linearity and in the locking range. The effectiveness of the proposed tanlock-based architectures was also assessed and demonstrated by using them in various applications, which included FM demodulation, FM threshold extension, FM demodulation with improved THD (total harmonic distortion), and Doppler effect improvement. The results from these applications showed that the performance of the new architectures outperformed the original TDTL. Real-time performance of these architectures was evaluated through implementation of some of them on an FPGA (field-programmable gate array) based system. Practical results from the prototype FPGA based implementations confirmed the simulation results obtained from MATLAB/Simulink

Impact of pharmacist intervention in patient counseling at point of hospital discharge in a specialized cardiac center in Saudi Arabia

Purpose: To determine the interventions associated with the pharmacist’s patient counseling and review of discharge prescriptions of patients from a specialized cardiac center in Saudi Arabia.Methods: This was a prospective interventional study conducted at Prince Sultan Cardiac Center (PSCC) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia for a duration of 12 months. The pharmacist responsible for providing patient counseling reviewed the patient records, collected patient demographics and clinical data, as well as medical and medication history, diagnosis and discharge (treatment) plan.Results: The study included 2008 patients who met the inclusion criteria. The counseling pharmacist identified and provided interventions to 358 (18 %) patients for 508 (3.4 %) items. About half of counseling pharmacist interventions concerned involved the addition of a drug to treatment regimen followed by drug discontinuation (28.1 %). The most common reason for adding the drug during patient counseling was the omission of medications (35 %). Angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors/angiotensin receptor blockers (ACEI/ARBs), antidiabetics and antihyperlipidemics were the classes of drugs often associated with counseling pharmacist interventions. The cost-saving interventions identified were 200 (39.4 %). Out of these, drug discontinuation (n = 143) was the most frequent suggestion provided by the intervening pharmacist, followed by a dose reduction resulting in cost savings of 66.5 % (US $6,590.10) and 8.9$ 882.32), respectively.Conclusion: The results indicate that discharge medication discrepancies decrease as a result of pharmacist-facilitated patient counseling at the point of hospital discharge.Keywords: Discharged patients, Cardiac, Counseling, Pharmacist-intervention, Coronary artery diseas

The First Kuwait National Satellite Project - KuwaitSat-1

Nanosatellites present many opportunities and enable many nations and organizations to participate in the space field. The affordability of these satellites offers a short-term strategy for developing space systems capability. The first Kuwaiti satellite project known as KuwaitSat-1 started back in 2019 and it was initiated by Kuwait University and funded by Kuwait Foundation for the advancement of Sciences (KFAS). Kuwaitsat-1 is a 2U nanosatellite with an imager payload in the visible light (RGB) and it was Launched on January 3rd, 2023, by Space-x, falcon 9, Transporter 6. The main objective of Kuwait Sat-1 project is to provide the students with the knowledge of the different pre-launch sessions of designing, assembling, integrating, and testing the nanosatellites. The post-launch training sessions include communicating with the satellite, data acquisition and processing the images for different applications. Since the start of the project, many educational seminars rooted in foundational space knowledge were given and then followed by more technical training in nanosatellite subsystems and deployment. Kuwait University has developed the supporting infrastructure to encourage and foster a new generation of students who have the understanding and vision to recognize the potential applications for small satellite systems. This paper describes the overall process, with the results achieved, and the current status of the KuwaitSat-1 project and possibilities for future space-related ventures

Magnetically assisted control of stem cells applied in 2D, 3D and in situ models of cell migration

The success of cell therapy approaches is greatly dependent on the ability to precisely deliver and monitor transplanted stem cell grafts at treated sites. Iron oxide particles, traditionally used in vivo for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), have been shown to also represent a safe and efficient in vitro labelling agent for mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs). Here, stem cells were labelled with magnetic particles, and their resulting response to magnetic forces was studied using 2D and 3D models. Labelled cells exhibited magnetic responsiveness, which promoted localised retention and patterned cell seeding when exposed to magnet arrangements in vitro. Directed migration was observed in 2D culture when adherent cells were exposed to a magnetic field, and also when cells were seeded into a 3D gel. Finally, a model of cell injection into the rodent leg was used to test the enhanced localised retention of labelled stem cells when applying magnetic forces, using whole body imaging to confirm the potential use of magnetic particles in strategies seeking to better control cell distribution for in vivo cell delivery

Dystrophin deficiency affects human astrocyte properties andresponse to damage

In addition to progressive muscular degeneration due to dystrophin mutations, 1/3 of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) patients present cognitive deficits. However, there is currently an incomplete understanding about the function of the multiple dystrophin isoforms in human brains. Here, we tested the hypothesis that dystrophin deficiency affects glial function in DMD and could therefore contribute to neural impairment. We investigated human dystrophin isoform expression with development and differentiation and response to damage in human astrocytes from control and induced pluripotent stem cells from DMD patients. In control cells, short dystrophin isoforms were up-regulated with development and their expression levels changed differently upon neuronal and astrocytic differentiation, as well as in 2-dimensional versus 3-dimensional astrocyte cultures. All DMD-astrocytes tested displayed altered morphology, proliferative activity and AQP4 expression. Furthermore, they did not show any morphological change in response to inflammatory stimuli and their number was significantly lower as compared to stimulated healthy astrocytes. Finally, DMD-astrocytes appeared to be more sensitive than controls to oxidative damage as shown by their increased cell death. Behavioral and metabolic defects in DMD-astrocytes were consistent with gene pathway dysregulation shared by lines with different mutations as demonstrated by bulk RNA-seq analysis. Together, our DMD model provides evidence for altered astrocyte function in DMD suggesting that defective astrocyte responses may contribute to neural impairment and might provide additional potential therapeutic targets

Minocycline synergizes with corticosteroids in reducing colitis severity in mice via the modulation of pro-inflammatory molecules

Background: A few studies have highlighted the anti-inflammatory properties of minocycline in reducing colitis severity in mice, but its molecular mechanism is not fully understood. The aim of this study was to determine the anti-inflammatory properties of minocycline and the expression/activity profiles of molecules involved in pro-inflammatory signaling cascades, cytokines, and molecules involved in the apoptotic machinery. The synergistic effect between minocycline and corticosteroids was also evaluated.Methods: The effects of various treatment approaches were determined in mice using the dextran sulfate sodium (DSS) colitis model at gross and microscopic levels. The expression/activity profiles of various pro- or anti-inflammatory molecules were determined using Western blotting and polymerase chain reaction (PCR).Results: Minocycline treatment significantly reduced colitis severity using prophylactic and treatment approaches and produced a synergistic effect with budesonide and methylprednisolone in reducing the active state of colitis. This was mediated in part through reduced colonic expression/activity of pro-inflammatory molecules, cytokines, proteins involved in the apoptotic machinery, and increased expression of the anti-inflammatory cytokine IL-10.Conclusion: Minocycline synergizes with corticosteroids to reduce colitis severity, which could reduce their dose-dependent side effects and treatment cost. The reduction in colitis severity was achieved by modulating the expression/activity profiles of various pro- and anti-inflammatory signaling molecules, cytokines, and molecules involved in the apoptotic machinery