 |
|
|
Prince Charles to marry Camilla Parker
Bush seeks $ 400 m to reward allies
Pak, Lanka call for early SAARC summit
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Undersea upheaval caused by tsunami
Pallone moves Bill backing India
Attacks continue despite truce
|
|
Prince Charles to marry Camilla Parker
London, February 10 Camilla, would not be called Queen once Charles becomes King but would be known as the Princess Consort. After her marriage she will also carry the title of Duchess of Cornwall, The Clarence House, official residence of Prince Charles said. It said the ceremony would take place at Windsor Castle on Friday, April 8 in “a largely private occasion for family and friends” — without the pomp and circumstance of Charles’s wedding to Diana in 1981. “Mrs Parker Bowles and I are absolutely delighted. It will be a very special day for us and our families’,” Prince Charles said in a statement. Charles and Diana divorced in 1996, and Diana had blamed Parker for ruining the marriage, famously revealing in an interview that “there were three people” in their marriage. In a statement, Queen Elizabeth II said: “The Duke of Edinburgh (Prince Philip) and I are very happy that the Prince of Wales and Mrs Parker Bowles are to marry. We have given them our warmest good wishes for their future together.” The marriage will end years of speculation on their relationship which has spanned decades. The question of whether Prince Charles, 56, could marry his 57-year-old divorced companion has been contentious within the Anglican church. He would become head of the church on becoming King. But the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, in a statement today endorsed Prince Charles’s plans to marry Bowles. “These arrangements have my strong support and are consistent with Church of England guidelines concerning remarriage which the Prince of Wales fully accepts as a committed Anglican and as prospective Supreme Governor of the Church of England,” he said in a statement. “I am pleased that Prince Charles and Mrs Camilla Parker Bowles have decided to take this important step,” he added. Alastair Bruce, a royal commentator, today said that there were no constitutional impediments for the couple to marry, although it might provoke some soul-searching in the Church of England. In a snap poll on Sky News television, 70 per cent of respondents said they did not approve of the wedding, and 30 per cent were in favour. Prince Charles and Camilla first met at a Windsor polo match in 1970 and kept contact with each other since, as Charles’s marriage to Diana — which produced two sons, Prince William, 22, and Prince Harry, 20 — collapsed.
— PTI |
|
Bush seeks $ 400 m to reward allies
Washington, February 10 White House spokesman Scott McClellan said yesterday money for the so-called solidarity initiative would be included in an 81 billion dollars supplemental budget request to fund U.S. military operations this year. “This assistance will support nations that have deployed troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as other partners,” he said. He said the money would “assist nations such as Poland, which have taken political and economic risks in order to act on their convictions, to develop and sustain the capabilities needed to do so.” President Bush met Polish President Aleksander Kwashiewski at the White House yesterday and said he was seeking 100 million dollars “to help Poland modernise and fulfill its mission.” Democratic critics have derided past payments to Iraq war allies. When President Bush slated billions of dollars for Iraq coalition allies in 2003, Democratic Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia called President Bush’s so-called coalition of the willing “C-O-W for short.”
— Reuters |
|
Pak, Lanka call for early SAARC summit
Islamabad, February 10 Talking to reporters after their formal talks at the PM House here, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and President Chandrika Kumaratunga agreed on the need to make more efforts to hold the summit as soon as possible. ‘‘Certainly, we are in favour of an early holding of the summit and we will do our best to help its reconvening as soon as possible,’’ the Sri Lankan President said. Prime Minister Aziz said that Pakistan was endeavouring to convene the summit at the earliest to give further momentum to the process of SAARC for regional cooperation. ‘‘Pakistan wants the SAARC process to move forward and further strengthened,’’ he added. The two leaders held a one-to-one meeting before they were joined by their respective sides. Officials told APP that the two leaders expressed their disappointment at the postponement of the Dhaka summit. Prime Minister Aziz emphasised that it was important that the process of SAARC should not be stalled as a result of postponement of the summit. President Kumaratunga assured Prime Minister Aziz of her country's full support in this respect. The Prime Minister described talks with the Sri Lankan President as productive that covered all areas of bilateral interest. Pakistan and Sri Lanka also signed four accords and two MoUs, including a free-trade agreement (FTA) that would open a new chapter of economic cooperation between the two countries. The Prime Minister described the signing of FTA as historic and said it would be a ‘‘turning point’’ in the economic ties between the two South Asian states. He said the two sides had agreed to hold a meeting of the joint economic forum in Colombo in April and Pakistan had also proposed to hold a single-country exhibition in the Sri Lankan capital at the same time that would give further momentum to the FTA process. |
|
Undersea upheaval caused by tsunami
The first underwater images of the seabed off Indonesia where an earthquake struck on Boxing Day show the colossal scale of the geological forces that sent a devastating tsunami across the Indian Ocean.
Three-dimensional pictures taken by a sonar on the Royal Navy vessel HMS Scott reveal a ruptured sea floor of submarine canyons and mountains created by the movement of one tectonic plate beneath another at the rate of 2.4 inches a year. It was the sudden release of pressure built up over decades of tectonic movement that triggered the earthquake, which some geologists have re-evaluated as three times more powerful than previously thought. Images released by the Navy show how the flat Indian tectonic plate is slipping under or ‘‘subducted’’ beneath the crumpled Burma plate which is being pushed up in the process. Steve Malcolm, commanding officer of HMS Scott, said the seabed at the earthquake epicentre looked like a ‘‘rumpled carpet’’ when viewed on the sonar screen. Data from the sonar is being analysed by the marine geologists Lisa McNeill and Tim Henstock, of the Southampton Oceanography Centre. It is the first time the sea floor has been studied so intensely after such a large earthquake. Dr Henstock said: ‘‘There are features which we would think are something like the Grand Canyon would look. You can see huge piles of mud maybe a few hundred metres thick; there's a lot of evidence of activity at the subduction zone.’’ The scientists estimate some of the ridges are up to 5,000 feet high. Some of the ridges have collapsed to produce huge landslides of mud and rock several miles long. Seismologists have calculated that the epicentre of the earthquake was some 25 miles below the sea floor. They initially registered it as 9.0 on the Richter scale. But, seismologists from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, have recalculated the earthquake as 9.3, which would make it three times larger — because the scale is logarithmic — and the second-largest recorded earthquake. Seth Stein, who reanalysed the seismograms, said: ‘‘The rupture zone was much larger than previously thought. The initial calculations that it was a 9.0 earthquake did not take into account what we call slow slip, where the fault, delineated by aftershocks, shifted more slowly.’’ By arrangement with |
|
Pallone moves Bill backing India
Washington, February 10 Mr Frank Pallone, founder of the Congressional Caucus on India, introduced a ‘Sense of Congress’ legislation which would put the US House of Representatives officially on record in support of India’s bid. “Sense of Congress” resolutions have no binding effect on the Administration but indicate the strong feelings of Congress on issues of importance. Observing that New Delhi was a growing economic power, Mr Pallone said: “Any reform of the Security Council must lead to permanent membership for India. It is in our national interest and, indeed, our responsibility to ensure that this happens.”
— PTI |
|
Attacks continue despite truce
Gaza, February 10 The army said 17 mortar bombs early in the morning in some Jewish settlements and army posts in southern Gaza as well as Israeli towns near the border. Militant groups had said they would not abide by the ceasefire, declared by Israeli Prime Minister and Palestinian President at a summit in Egypt.
— Reuters |
| HOME PAGE | |
Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir |
Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs |
Nation | Opinions | | Business | Sports | World | Mailbag | Chandigarh | Ludhiana | Delhi | | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
