M A I N   N E W S

US tells Pak to get a grip on ISI

Colombo, August 3
In a virtual indictment of ISI’s involvement in the bombing of Indian embassy in Kabul, the US today asked Pakistan to get its intelligence network to work towards tackling terrorism that is affecting its neighbourhood.

“Pakistan needs to get everybody lined up in the same direction if they are really going to tackle the terrorist problem,” US assistant secretary of state Richard Boucher, who is here as an observer at the SAARC Summit, told reporters.

His statement came after US officials vindicated Indian claim of Pakistan’s ISI’s role in the suicide bombing on the Indian Embassy in Kabul last month.

Boucher, who met Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on the sidelines of the SAARC Summit, welcomed his assurance to India to probe the Kabul attack.

“Our view is that it is important to have a good intelligence service in Pakistan, but it is also important for that intelligence service to work single-mindedly with other institutions to tackle the terrorist issue that affects so many people in Pakistan and its neighbourhood,” he said.

“No society is able to fight terrorism if it is divided.

It takes all the institutions administrative, executive (and) intelligence to fight this menace,” Boucher said.

The top Bush administration official said the Pakistani leadership was faced with “big challenges” in its endeavour to put its house in order.

Boucher said the US was working very closely with Afghanistan, and cooperating with Pakistan and with India in their fight against the terrorism in all its manifestation.

The US official said cooperation among the nations of the region was the only way to solve these problems.

Boucher said he had a meeting with Gilani in Washington earlier this week and the discussions yesterday were a follow up to the deliberations they had in the US.

Recent US media reports had said that US intelligence agencies had concluded that ISI had helped plan last month’s suicide car bomb attack on the Indian mission in Kabul that killed nearly 60 persons.

On Bangladesh, he said the US would like to see elections being held as per schedule announced by the caretaker government. On Sri Lanka, Boucher said the government should investigate human rights abuses in full and ensure pro-government paramilitaries disarm and stop recruiting children.

“We are concerned about reports on intimidation against media, abduction, illegal detentions,” Boucher said. — PTI

‘Lankan guards fail to show up for Indian leaders’

Colombo, August 3
Sri Lankan security officers tasked with protecting Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and national security adviser M.K. Narayanan failed to turn up for their job, sending officials on both sides in a tizzy, the Press here claimed today.

After Manmohan Singh concluded his meeting with President Mahinda Rajapakse at the Presidential Secretariat here yesterday and returned to his vehicle, it was discovered that the Sri Lankan personal security officer assigned to accompany him was missing, The Sunday Leader reported.

Quoting informed sources, it said an Indian security officer, who was in a back-up vehicle, then got into the Prime Minister’s car as Manmohan Singh had to rush for his next appointment.

Sri Lankan SSP Kapila Jayasekera, who had failed to turn up on time, rushed to the scene and on observing that the Prime Minister’s convoy was moving, started running behind it and tapping on the window of the vehicle to stop it, causing panic among the security detail, the report said.

Rajapakse questioned the SSP after the incident and told him to be more alert in the future, it said quoting the sources.

Another newspaper The Sunday Times reported that Rajapakse ordered a complete inquiry into the incident. It reported another security lapse when national security adviser Narayanan had to return to his hotel room from the SAARC conference hall yesterday in a hotel taxi. — PTI

Indian accusations shocking: Gilani
Tribune News Service

Colombo, August 3
Pakistan Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani says India must stop the 'blame game'while describing as "shocking" New Delhi's accusations that Islamabad was to blame for the July 7 suicide bombing at the Indian mission in Kabul.

Gilani told Sri Lanka's 'Sunday Leader' in an interview that Pakistan condemned the attack on the mission that killed 50 people, including four Indians, immediately after the incident.

"First of all, it may be recalled that we have condemned this incident in the strongest terms," he said. "Against this background, the Indian statement is not only surprising, but shocking too.''

The Pakistani leader said there were bombing incidents in Pakistan subsequently, but Islamabad had not pointed finger at anyone as ''we believe in carrying out investigations before laying responsibility.''

He said it was important that the blame game was avoided as both countries had an institutionalised counter-terrorism mechanism that was working satisfactorily.

Gilani's comments were published today, a day after he promised Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that he would hold an 'independent investigation' into New Delhi's accusations that the Pakistan's ISI was involved in the Kabul bombing.