Damascus, September 27
A powerful car bomb exploded near a security complex in the Syrian capital Damascus today, killing 17 civilians in what the interior minister described as a terrorist attack.

The bombing, on the road to the city’s main airport, was the third major attack in the tightly-controlled country this year.

The state television said the car was rigged with 200 kg of explosives, making it one of the biggest attacks in Damascus since a series of bombings in the early 1980s by Islamist militants.

No group claimed responsibility for the attack, in which a suicide bomber has not been ruled out, but the interior minister’s remarks appeared to indicate that Syrian investigators suspect Muslim militants were involved.

“This is definitely a terrorist attack that occurred in a crowded area. This is a cowardly attack,” interior minister General Bassam Abdel Majeed told the state television.

He said 14 persons were wounded in the attack, although witnesses said the number was much higher.

The blast in southern Damascus occurred at a crowded intersection leading to the Sit Zeinab shrine, popular with Shi’ite pilgrims from Iran, Iraq and Lebanon.

Security forces cordoned off the area but witnesses said the security complex’s main building appeared to have suffered little damage.

Television showed smashed car windshields and shattered windows in nearby residential buildings and a large crater filled with water at the blast site. A footage of a nearby school, which was empty because of the weekend, showed broken glass all over classrooms. The remains of the destroyed car were strewn on the highway, witnesses said.

“Smoke filled nearby buildings ... I rushed to the street and found a burning car, fire and smoke,” one witness told the state television.

Another said: “I was sleeping ... and then the doors came loose and I felt like I was in the street. Glass windows were destroyed and the ceiling’s iron infrastructure was visible. We thought it was an earthquake.”

The ‘Friends of Pakistan’ conference held in New York on Friday to consider Pakistan’s current economic woes did not immediately pledge any precise amount, but decided to form an aid to Pakistan consortium that will hold its first meeting in Abu Dhabi next month. However, no date was announced.

Pakistan indicated it urgently needs 10 to 12 billion dollars to put its faltering economy back on rails. The conference took place at a time of US banking and financial crisis that had its global fallout as well.

The meeting was attended by Italy, France, Japan, China, Australia, Turkey, Canada, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, the last two having played a key role in bringing the group together. President Asif Zardari said he would welcome India to join the consortium if it was willing. He called the US support for democratic Pakistan a blessing and hoped it would continue.

The conference was jointly hosted by Pakistani President Asif Zardari, US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and British foreign secretary David Miliband. Javier Solana represented the European Union.

“It gave a clear message that the world stands by Pakistan and will assist it in rebuilding its economy and fighting the forces of terrorism and extremism,” information minister Sherry Rehman later told reporters.

“There was complete accord on one point: Pakistan is the key to the stability of the region and the world beyond”, Sherry said.

At the suggestion of China, Friends of Pakistan will remain an open-ended group, making it possible for other countries and regional and international entities to join in. Other participants were represented at various levels of seniority.

Rice, in her address, said the Friends of Pakistan should be called the Friends of Democratic Pakistan. She pledged US support for Pakistan to help it gain economic and political stability. She said the security of Pakistan was in the interest of the region and Pakistan deserved support in its fight against terrorism and extremism.

John McCain and Barack Obama sparred briefly over Pakistan in the first presidential debate in Oxford, Mississippi, on Friday night. McCain took Obama to task for threatening Pakistan with military strikes, a suggestion the Democrat promptly took umbrage at.

Obama said as President he would make Pakistan a priority because the Al-Qaida and Taliban still have safe havens in Pakistan. He said President Bush, supported by McCain, had given Pakistan $10 billion over the last seven years and got nothing in return.

McCain shot back, “Now, on this issue of aiding Pakistan, ‘if you’re going to aim a gun at somebody,’ George Schultz, our secretary of State, told me once, “you better be prepared to pull the trigger.” I’m not prepared at this time to cut off aid to Pakistan, so I’m not prepared to threaten it, as Senator Obama apparently wants to do, as he had said that he would announce military strikes into Pakistan.”

McCain said it was essential to get the support of the people of Pakistan rather than launching unilateral and covert strikes into the country. At the very least, he added, “You don’t say that out loud. If you have to do things, you have to do things, and you work with the Pakistani government.”

Obama clarified that what he had actually said was that “if the US has Al-Qaida, bin Laden, top-level lieutenants in our sights, and Pakistan is unable or unwilling to act, then we should take them out.”

Beijing, September 27
Astronaut Zhai Zhigang became the first Chinese man to walk in the space today, clambering out of China’s Shenzhou VII space craft in a technological feat that Beijing wants the world to marvel about.

“I’m feeling quite well. I greet the Chinese people and people of the world,” Zhai said as he climbed out of the craft, his historic achievement carried live on the state television.

Zhai(41), son of a snack-seller chosen for the first “extra-vehicular activity,” unveiled a small Chinese flag, helped by colleague Liu Boming, who also briefly popped his head out of the capsule. Zhai safely returned inside the craft after about 15 minutes. The walk marked the highpoint of the China’s third manned space journey, which has received blanket media coverage.

The risky manoeuvre is a step towards China’s longer-term goal of assembling a space lab and then a larger space station.

The fast-growing Asian power wants to be sure of a say in how space and its potential resources are used.

BRIEFLY

Paul Newman dies at 83
Washington: Legendary film star Paul Newman, whose brilliant blue eyes, good looks and talent made him one of Hollywood’s top actors over six decades, has died, a spokesman said today. He was 83 and had been battling cancer. Newman appeared in some 60 movies, including “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” “The Hustler,” “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” and “The Sting”. He earned nine Oscar nominations for acting and won the best actor honor for 1986’s “The Color of Money”. — Reuters

Device to improve mileage
NEW YORK: Scientists have developed a device that they claim could dramatically improve mileage as much as 20 per cent. A team at Temple University has developed the small device, which consists of an electrically charged tube, that can be attached to the fuel line of a vehicle’s engine near the fuel injector. And, with the use of a power supply from the vehicle’s battery, the device creates an electric field that thins fuel, so that small droplets are injected into the engine. — PTI