AA Dubai-based Arab satellite news channel launched last week has already become serious competition to the Qatar-based Al Jazeera channel.Al Arabi ya, or The Arabic, went on air on February 20 with hourly news bulletins, documentaries, interviews and news-related talk shows. Now broadcasting 12 hours a day, it will begin around the clock emission March 3.

The new channel has already broadcast interviews with prominent international personalities, including US Secretary of State Colin Powell, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw and Jordan's former crown prince, Hassan. Another one-on-one interview with Jordan's Prime Minister Ali Abul Ragheb was scheduled to be aired on Monday night.

A mixture of classical and modern style, the channel has attracted advertisers that include international car manufacturers and electronic equipment producers, a reflection of its high audience ratings.Al Arabi ya's director, former Jordanian Information Minister Saleh Qallab, wrote in his regular column in Jordan's official Al Rai daily over the weekend that the television station would counter what he called Al Jazeera's provocative style. Al Arabi ya, he said, adopted a calm, professional approach to providing news and discussions and analysis directed at viewer's minds rather than at inciting their political emotions.

Al Jazeera, which describes itself as independent with the slogan of "opinion and the other opinion," attracted millions of Arab viewers around the world shortly after it went on air in 1998 with Qatari funding.

Jordanian media analysts said Al Arabi ya's launch was timely, coming amid a growing possibility of a US war on Iraq that would give the Arab public a source of televised information other than Al Jazeera.