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Cartoon protests flare up in Pak
Iran resumes uranium enrichment
Pashtun convention calls for elimination of Durand Line
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Pak committed to gas pipeline: Musharraf
Saddam on hunger strike
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Cartoon protests flare up in Pak Lahore, February 14 At least two persons were killed and nearly 50 injured when police fired to control the rampaging crowd that targeted McDonald’s, Pizza Hut and KFC outlets here, besides government buildings, banks and a five-star hotel. They also torched two cinema halls. In Islamabad, the protesters, mostly students, stormed the high-security diplomatic enclave, damaging cars, including one belonging to the Indian High Commission. Some stones were also thrown at the Indian mission but sources said it was not the target of the protesters and there was no damage to the building. Several cars bearing diplomatic number plates parked outside a nearby hotel, including one belonging to the Indian High Commission, were damaged by angry demonstrators, sources said. The front and rear windscreens of the Indian diplomatic car were smashed by the protesters but nobody was hurt, they said. They also smashed windows and hoardings outside a branch of the Standard Chartered Bank before police dispersed them using tear gas shells and water cannon. Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao said the shots were fired by a guard of the Metropolitan bank here and two people died. “It is a serious development. We are grieved over the loss of precious life,” he told the local Geo TV. The protesters, mostly belonging to Islamist parties, also targeted several hotels, including the five-star Holiday Inn, and the office of Norwegian cell phone company, Telenor in Lahore. Witnesses said police fired tear gas shells to disperse a crowd that tried to storm the Punjab provincial assembly building. In Islamabad, the protesters also ripped down portraits of President Pervez Musharraf and visiting Bangladeshi Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, besides demonstrating outside parliament. They burned effigies of US President George W Bush and Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen. Some 200 Pakistani legislators also held a five-minute silent protest outside the diplomatic enclave. Reports of protests also came from northwestern city of Peshawar where around 1,500 people held separate rallies and burnt tyres. — PTI
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Iran resumes uranium enrichment
Tribune News Service The development may be a cause for concern for the international community, but for the Manmohan Singh government it should bring a sense of relief as such sabre rattling by Iran would make it more difficult for pro-Iran individuals, political parties or nations to continue to support Tehran. Iran has also postponed its March 16 talks with Russia for discussing the Russian formula that aims at enriching Iranian uranium on Russian soil and shipping back the enriched uranium to Iran. The Iranians are reported to have sought the postponement — the Iran-Russia talks are now slated to be held on February 20 — for certain technical reasons. Tehran had first rejected the proposal outrightly but later agreed to discuss it. As of now, the Russian formula is the only workable proposal on the table that has the potential of averting a showdown between Iran and the international community. A UK newspaper has reported that the Pentagon is already making plans to attack Iranian nuclear facilities if negotiations were to fail. Iran’s latest provocation comes barely three weeks before the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors meets on March 6 to consider a full report of the agency on Iran’s nuclear programme and the pivotal role played by the Pakistani nuclear mart run by Dr A.Q. Khan. The UPA government has come under fire from its allies like the Left parties and the Samajwadi Party, which are supporting the government from outside, and other parties like the Telugu Desam for its vote against Iran at the IAEA. The Left parties are so incensed that they said “no” to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s invitation for dinner, which he hosted tonight for UPA partners. There was no official reaction on the Iran developments from the Ministry of External Affairs till the time of writing of this report. Despite the February 4 vote at Vienna when the IAEA reported the Iranian nuclear file to the United Nations Security Council, Tehran has decided to suspend certain aspects of its cooperation with the IAEA and steam ahead with enrichment. An AP report from Tehran quoted Deputy Secretary of the Supreme National Council Javad Vaeidi as telling reporters today that enrichment of uranium resumed last week at Iran’s main enrichment plant in Natanz. Asked if Iran had resumed large-scale enrichment, as required for producing fuel for nuclear reactors, Mr Vaeidi replied: “No.” |
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Pashtun convention calls for elimination of Durand Line
Peshawar, February 14
Speaking on the occasion after securing a unanimous show of hands for a resolution to remove the Durand Line, Asfayandar Wali Khan, the chief of the ANP, said that it was imperative to do away with the imaginary line. He said that this line had artificially separated the Pashtu speaking people for over a century and now the time had come to eliminate it.
Giving the example of East and West Germany, he said that if the collapse of the Berlin Wall in the early 1990s has led to the creation of a unified Germany, he saw no reason why a separate state for Pakhtuns could not be created by wiping out the Durand Line. ‘‘It’s a line whose time has ended’’, announced Asfayandar Wali Khan, who is the grandson of Khan Abdul Gafar Khan, the Frontier Gandhi. Extending an argument to support his claim, Asfayandar Wali Khan further went on to say that if Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf could open the Line of Control at different points to re-establish broken ties between Kashmiris separated from their kith and kin for several decades, he said the same procedure could be applied in the case of the Durand Line, created by the British.
— ANI |
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Pak committed to gas pipeline: Musharraf
Islamabad, February 14 Reacting to reported US reservations over the project, General Musharraf said, “Pakistan wants gas. Iran wants to sell it. What is the problem? We need the gas. If anybody is against it, they should provide us financial assistance.” The Pakistan President made these remarks while talking to a 14-member delegation of American and Asian journalists from Jefferson Fellowship Programme of East West Centre, Hawaii, yesterday, the Associated Press of Pakistan reported. General Musharraf said one of his top priorities was expanding economic ties with the USA. “We are looking for more trade and not aid, because trade means job creation, more investment, more taxes, reductions in poverty and increases in exports,” he said. Referring to the Iran nuclear stand-off, General Musharraf said, though Pakistan was opposed to a US attack on Iran, in the eventuality of an attack, Pakistan has little power to stop it.
— UNI |
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Ex-Nepal Premier Deuba set free
Kathmandu, February 14 The two leaders had been jailed by the order of the Royal Corruption Control Commission (RCCC) for their involvement in the alleged irregularities in the ADB-funded Melamchi Drinking Water project. They were set free at midnight following the Supreme Court’s decision to scrap the six-member RCCC and annul all its rulings terming them as “unconstitutional,” according to officials. Deuba and Singh were freed hours after the Supreme Court verdict annulled the anti-graft commission constituted by King Gyanendra to grill politicians and bureaucrats last February when he sacked Deuba’s government and assumed absolute power by suspending democratic rights and press freedom.
— PTI |
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Saddam on hunger strike
Baghdad, February 14 “We have been on a hunger strike for three days,” Saddam declared as the trial resumed for its 12th hearing since its opened in October. “Long live the great Arab nation” and “long live the mujahideen,” he shouted. The start of the hearing was again marked by heated exchanges between defendants and presiding judge Rauf Abdel Rahman, who has taken a tough line since taking over the trial after his predecessor resigned in January.
— AFP |
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