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| Friday,
August 3, 2001, Chandigarh, India   
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London
exporter ‘helped Pak’s
300 feared
dead in China |
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Bush wins
test on missile defence World
population to reach nine billion, say experts Australia
continues to charm Bollywood Indian
poet gets Russian award
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London exporter ‘helped Pak’s N-weapon drive’ London, August 2 Abu Siddique of Corringway, Ealing, West London, who is charged with customs violations, sent several items, including a 12-tonne furnace, a five-tonne overhead gantry and a high specification measuring machine between July 1995 and June 1998 destined for the Pakistani nuclear industry, the Southwark Crown Court was told yesterday. The consignments were sent without valid licences and evading export restrictions, prosecutor Mukul Chawla said. He said the goods were destined for Dr A.Q. Khan, who was a friend of Siddique’s father but was best known as “the architect of Pakistan’s nuclear programme.” “It is the Crown’s case that these were destined for the Pakistani nuclear industry. They were destined to that industry to the knowledge of Siddique and knowing that was the end use of these particular goods he nevertheless lied about the use of these goods and the end user of these goods, or did not tell when told that he needed to apply for an export licence,” Mr Chawla said. But a batch of high strength aluminium bars was stopped by customs officers at a dock and an investigation was launched which resulted in him yesterday denying seven counts of breaching customs export regulations, the court was told. Pakistan conducted its first nuclear tests in May 1998. Mr Chawla said each of the goods exported could be used for both military and civilian purposes. These were subject to strict British and European legislation aimed at stopping the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and Siddique was aware of this, he said. It was his responsibility to check where the goods were going, and who would be using them and he should have become suspicious because they were destined to Pakistan which was gearing up its nuclear efforts at the time and was also on a government list of high countries, Mr Chawla pointed out. Siddique, 38, was arrested after a shipment of high strength aluminium bars was stopped by British customs officers, sparking an investigation into his activities. The defendant, who maintains he is innocent, has been charged with seven counts of breaching customs regulations.
PTI |
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Pak killings: Musharraf takes tough stand Islamabad, August 2 General Musharraf told Interior Minister Moinuddin Haider during a Cabinet meeting yesterday to act tough to check the sectarian attacks and submit a report on the law and order situation in the country by the next Cabinet meeting. “We owe it to the families of the victims. My government shall not be deterred by such acts and we shall chase them till the last of the terrorists is apprehended,” an official statement quoting him said. The government will not let terrorists spread terror, he said and assured that every possible step would be taken to
bust the gangs of terrorists, whether from abroad or from within. He directed the Interior Minister to pursue the de-weaponisation programme with renewed vigour and asked the provinces to take concerted and coordinated action in seizing all unauthorised weapons. General Musharraf also asked senior security officials to inject efficiency and commitment in the ranks of the law-enforcing agencies and said the government had already allocated special funds in this year’s budget for re-equipping the police. Six top officials, including a chief executive of the government-owned Pakistan State Oil, a senior defence official, a former Minister of State for Foreign Affairs and senior activist of militant outfit
Jaish-e-Mohammad, were killed during the past one week.
PTI |
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Pak Lt-Gen sacked Islamabad, August 2 Lt-Gen Khawaja Ziauddin was dismissed for “offences prejudicial and detrimental to good order and military discipline,” the terse one-sentence statement said. Ziauddin was named army chief in October, 1999, by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to replace Pervez Musharraf. The military revolted against his appointment and seized power, arresting Ziauddin and Sharif. The army revolted because Lieutenant-General Ziauddin was a junior General and Musharraf was en route home from Sri Lanka when his replacement was announced. AP |
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300 feared dead in China Beijing, August 2 While authorities yesterday confirmed a reported water leak in a tin mine in Nandan county, they refused to say how many persons were trapped inside, the official China Daily reported. “We have sent an investigating team to the site but so far I have not heard of any reported deaths,” the paper quoted an official with the Region’s Work Safety Department as saying. The official only identified himself as
Zhou. “As to how many victims are inside the mine, we are waiting for the final report from the work team, and only after the water inside the mine is pumped out can we count,” Mr Zhou said. However, locals said as many as 300 miners could still be trapped in the mine. The county authorities could not be reached for comment. Two days ago, the Sichuan-based Tianfu Morning News had reported that over 200 miners and technicians were trapped in the Nandan mine, about 400 km from Nanning, the capital of the autonomous region. However, department said, “The media’s report was not true and we need more time to investigate”.
PTI |
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Bush wins test on missile defence Washington, August 2 On a party-line 31-28 vote yesterday, the House Armed Services Committee rejected a Democratic plan to cut nearly $ 1 billion from a proposed $ 8.1 billion in spending on missile defence. “This is a strategy for failure,” Rep. Duncan Hunter, a California Republican, said of the Democratic effort to redirect $ 985 million in national missile defence spending to purchases of new helicopters, transport aircraft and other accounts. The amendment by South Carolina Democratic Rep. John Spratt was offered on a $ 343 billion fiscal 2002 defence spending authorisation Bill. The panel approved the final spending measure 58-1 after a 13-hour debate on a variety of issues. The committee also rejected the Bush administration’s plan to cut the B-1 bomber fleet and imposed tough new conditions on ending bombing exercises at the Navy’s Vieques training range in Puerto Rico. After a lengthy debate, the committee decided to take no position on a base-closings plan, one day before the Pentagon sends Congress its proposal to save costs by closing excess military bases. On missile defence, Pentagon officials have tried to rally Congressional support for Bush’s plans, which it says will eventually require a restructuring or abandonment of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with the former Soviet Union. The Spratt proposal would have cut $ 584 million of the $ 786 million included in the Bill for construction of a new missile test bed in Alaska that critics said was simply a first step toward limited deployment by 2004 and could lead to a possible ABM treaty violation.
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World population to reach nine billion, say experts London, August 2 Demographers at a think-tank in Austria calculate that by the turn of the century the number of people on the planet will have dropped down to 8.4 billion people. They also predict the population will be older, with up to 40 per cent aged over 60 by 2100. “We see the end of world population growth on the horizon. But the level of population size and the speed of increase will depend on policy and development in the different regions,’’ Wolfgang Lutz said in a telephone interview yesterday. But Lutz, a demographer at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Laxenburg, said the predictions reported in the science journal ‘Nature’ should not mean the end of population concerns because populations would still be increasing in some of the world’s poorest areas. “Some of the most vulnerable regions, such as sub-Saharan Africa or South Asia, will still see very significant population growth,’’ he added. In most European countries people over 60 make up 20 per cent of the population. Lutz and his team predict that by the middle of the century it will rise to 35 per cent and reach 45 per cent by 2100. They believe China’s percentage of elderly will triple from 10 per cent today to 30 per cent by 2050. In Japan the elderly will comprise half the population by the turn of the century. The scientists said life expectancy would continue to rise, except in part of Africa where the HIV/AIDS epidemic had taken a very heavy toll. Lutz and his colleagues based their predictions on many different simulations of future world populations and data from a recent US National Academy of Science report.
Reuters |
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Australia continues to charm Bollywood Sydney, August 2 “Indian people want to see fresh and untouched locations. We have exhausted landscapes of Switzerland. It is not crowded here and there is no public nuisance during shooting. The artistes can perform in a relaxed atmosphere, not found in most places of the world these days,” producer and director of the film Mehul Kumar said from the Gold Coast. “Besides, Australia offers competitive rates. While it may cost almost the same to shoot in Canada or New Zealand, it is certainly less expensive than shooting in the US or the UK,” he says. This time around, it is not just the song and dance sequence, but some important scenes will also be shot in Brisbane and Gold Coast during the 12-day shoot, Mehul says. “This is the first film I am shooting in Australia. I am seeking unexposed locales rather than the Harbour Bridge and Opera House in Sydney as in the recent years many Bollywood films have been shot there,” he says. The storyline is based on a couple brought up in Australia and they go to India to get married. “Both Fardeen and Amrita fit into the role perfectly. They are very Indian and have a foreign diction. They are also good friends and as the film is a love story demanding romantic scenes, there is the much needed fine tuning between the two,” Mehul adds. Former MTV VJ Amrita is making her tinsel debut in this film. For Fardeen, he has ‘Jungle’ and ‘Pyar Tune Kya Kiya’ experience behind him.
PTI |
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Indian poet gets
Russian award Moscow, August 2 Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov, who attended the ceremony, read out the decree issued by President Vladimir Putin decorating Madhu with the prestigious award for his “great contribution to the promotion of Russian- Indian cultural ties.” Madhu had worked for many years as one of the editors of the Hindi magazine “Soviet Nari,” published from Moscow.
IANS |
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