An official from the President’s Office told Haveeru that the post of International Spokesperson was created Thursday. Ibrahim Hussein Shihab, who had served as the Development Director at the state broadcaster TVM for about two years, had been appointed to the post, the official added. “He would serve at the communications department,” he said. Shihab, who hails from a prominent political family, had worked at the Maldives office at the United Nations as well. He is the son of former Maldives ambassador to Sri Lanka, Hussein Shihab. The communications department was created at the President’s Office late last month. The existing Press and Communications Section, and Public Affairs Section was transferred to the new department. The creation of a new department for handling public relations and appointment of an international spokesperson comes at a time the government is taking extraordinary measures following two assassination attempts on the president. President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom and First Lady Fathimath Ibrahim were travelling to Male from the airport on September 28 when the explosion took place. They had returned home that morning after concluding their visit to Saudi Arabia to perform the annual hajj pilgrimage. The president was unhurt, but the first lady suffered a spinal fracture. Then Vice President Ahmed Adheeb Abdul Ghafoor was arrested on October 24 upon return from an official visit to China and taken to the police detention centre in the island of Dhoonidhoo in Kaafu atoll. He is accused of orchestrating the blast aboard the presidential speedboat now confirmed as the first attempt to kill the president. Charges were filed early this month against Adheeb and Abdulla Ziyath, who serves as the managing director of the Maldives Marketing and Public Relations Corporation (MMPRC). Adheeb was charged with abuse of power while Ziyath was charged with corruption. The Criminal Court began Thursday without prior announcement the trial over the corruption charges against the two. In the first hearing held at the Criminal Court Thursday afternoon, Adheeb, speaking via video conference, sought the right to appoint an attorney. The court granted a month for him to complete his request. Ziyath, also speaking via video conference, denied the charges. At Thursday’s hearing, held without prior announcement, prosecutors asked the court to produce both Adheeb and Ziyath -- remanded at the police detention centre in the nearby island of Dhoonidhoo -- in court for the trial. The judges announced that arrangements would be made for them to appear in court for the next hearing. On Thursday, the court also ordered both Adheeb and Ziyath to be remanded till the end of the trial. The probe into the blast has also unearthed widespread corruption at the highest levels of the government, including the police and MMPRC. MMPRC had siphoned off millions received by leasing islands for resort development, authorities had said. Both the auditor general and the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) are conducting separate investigations into the company. ACC had said its investigation concerning MMPRC is shaping up to be the biggest corruption investigation in its history. The commission had described the probe into MMPRC’s finances as being much wider in scope than previous investigations of a similar scale such as the leasing of Maldives main international airport to an Indian company and the deal with a Malaysian company to install a brand new border control system in the Maldives. Haveeru understands that the funds embezzled by leasing islands for resort development through MMPRC is estimated to sum up to USD40-60 million (MVR616-925 million). The recent decision to declare a month-long state of emergency following the explosion, and previous actions such as the jailing of former president Mohamed Nasheed and other politically motivated trials have made the Maldives the subject of mounting international criticism. On those occasions, the government went so far as to dispatch envoys to neighbouring Sri Lanka to brief diplomats on the political crisis facing the country. The government has faced mounting international pressure to release Nasheed whose incarceration has been ruled as illegal by a UN panel. The former president’s lawyers have stepped up their efforts to impose targeted sanctions against the Maldives and its leadership, following the ruling by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention late September declaring his imprisonment as arbitrary. In the latest setback for the government, European parliament passed a resolution Thursday condemning the human rights abuses of President Yameen, and calling for targeted sanctions to be imposed on his officials and supporters in the business community. The government, however, quickly moved to dismiss the resolution as inappropriate and irresponsible.