The Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) has recommended a law that would radically amend current divorce regulations.

According to one recommendation, verbal divorce will not be valid unless a form is duly filled and registered.

According to the conservative view on divorce it becomes effective if the husband orally thrice proclaims to the wife that he is divorcing her.

The wife will have the right to divorce her spouse. It will be mandatory for husband to divorce his wife within 90 days if she submits a written demand for divorce.

In case of failure to do that, the nikah (marriage) will stand annulled after the 90-day term lapses, except if the wife withdraws her demand.

The council’s suggestions immediately evoked a strong rejection by the religious orthodoxy that accused it for playing into the hands of the PPP-led ruling coalition that was attempting to impose secularism in the country.

The CII is a constitutional panel designed to scrutinize all laws to ensure these do not contravene the injunctions of the Holy Quran and Sunnah.

The recommendations are subject to approval by the parliament. It met here on Saturday under its chairman Dr MuhammadKhalid Masud.

If the husband gave his wife assets and property and demanded them back at the time of divorce, the wife would have to return the assets except for dowry and maintenance or else approach a court of law for the resolution of the conflict.

The council also proposed a 'Talaqnama' form on the pattern of the nikah form and suggested that all divrorces be registered properly like in the case of nikah.

The CII recommended that a single Hijri calendar should be devised. Regarding women performing Haj without a mehram (close male relative), the council said t no law prevented women from travelling inland and abroad. It observed Saudi laws were beyond its jurisdiction.

The CII approved guiding principles for shariah enforcement to be tabled before
religious scholars.

The CII chairman said at the meeting that after his meeting with President Asif Ali Zardari a few days ago, Zardari had constituted a committee with the minister of parliamentary affairs as its head, to review reports and recommendations of council.

Senator Sajid Mir, chief of Ahle Hadith Party denounced the CII recommendations terming them as deviation from the Islamic teachings.

Adviser to Prime Minister on interior affairs Rehman Malik on Friday blamed banned Tehrik-e-Taliban being behind the kidnapping of Iranian diplomat from Peshawar.

“No one has claimed the responsibility of kidnapping, however, the evidences collected so far indicates the involvement of the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban,” he told the media at a briefing in the Interior Ministry.

Unidentified gunmen kidnapped a senior Iranian diplomat after killing his bodyguard from Hayatabad Phase-IV on Thursday, a day after a US official was shot dead along with his driver in the nearby University Town locality.

The abducted 57-year-old diplomat, Heshmatollah Attarzadeh, had been serving as commercial attache at the Iranian Consulate in Peshawar for the past three years.

Malik said the search operation was being conducted in Peshawar and expressed hope that soon the abducted Iranian diplomat would be recovered.

He said, he would soon meet the NWFP Chief Minister and discuss regarding the security of foreigners.

Islamabad November 16
A meeting of the home ministers of the South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation countries, scheduled to be held here from November 24 to 27, has been postponed on the request of a member country.

According to a press release issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the meeting will be rescheduled in the first quarter of 2009 on dates convenient to all members.

A foreign office official said the meeting had been deferred due to electoral activities in Bangladesh but declined to comment on reports that members countries are wary of visiting Pakistan because of security concerns.

Washington, November 16
The US has struck a tacit agreement with Pakistan on a "don't-ask-don't-tell" policy that allows unmanned aircraft to attack suspected terrorist targets in the country's restive western regions, a US daily said in a report that could be damning for the ruling PPP.

Senior officials in both countries described the deal worked out in September
as one in which Washington refused to publicly acknowledge the attacks by
predator aircraft while Islamabad continued to complain noisily about the politically
sensitive strikes.

In recent months, the US drones have fired missiles at Pakistani soil at an average rate of once every four or five days. At least three senior Al-Qaida figures were killed in predator strikes last month.

The arrangement coincided with a suspension of ground assaults into Pakistan by helicopter-borne US commandos, the Washington Post reported.

Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari said recently that he was aware of no ground attacks since one on September 3 that his government vigorously protested.

A senior Pakistani official, one of several who discussed the sensitive military and intelligence relationship only on the condition of anonymity, said the US-Pakistani understanding over air strikes was "the smart middle way for the moment." — PTI

New York, November 16
The alleged person, who fatally shot an Indian-American chief executive officer of a semiconductor company in California and two senior colleagues, has been arrested.

According to the police, Jing Hua Wu, suspected to be the person behind the triple murder, was arrested by Santa Clara County police yesterday.

Mountain View, also situated in California, is reported to be the hometown of Wu, who is aged 47.

The suspect possessed no weapon and offered no resistance at the time of arrest, Santa Clara police chief Steve Lodge said.

No details of the interrogation, following the arrest were made available. But the charges the police filed against the suspect were killing of officials of SiPort, the semiconductor company.

The police identified the victim as Sid Agrawal (56), CEO of SiPort. The other two slain victims were Marilyn Lewis (67), head of the company’s human resources department and Brian Pugh (47), vice president for operations of the company.

It was not clear whether the suspect acted the way he did after he was laid off from his job earlier on Friday. Following the current financial meltdown, many employees in Silicon Valley lost their jobs.

Agrawal had more than 25 years’ experience in the computer industry. He helped set up high-tech companies such as Adobe, Intel and Bell Labs.

He had a degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. Agrawal earned his Master’s degree from Southern Illinois University and another Master’s from the University of Chicago.

This was the second incident concerning Indian-Americans. Last month, unemployed IIT graduate Karthik Rajaram shot his wife, three sons and his mother-in-law before killing himself.

Many technology and banking companies, in view of the ailing US economy have launched job layoffs and cutting costs.

Sun Microsystems said it would lay off nearly a fifth of work force. Citigroup, too, announced a series of job cuts. — UNI

Kabul, November 16
A bomb blast and clashes have killed an international soldier in the NATO-led force in Afghanistan and 10 militants, including some allegedly linked to Al-Qaida, the military said on Sunday.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force did not release the nationality of the trooper, who was killed when a bomb struck a patrol on yesterday. The 40-nation force did not say where the blast had occurred.

The new death means 261 international troops have lost their lives this year in the effort to help the government fight an insurgency led by the Taliban, according to the icasualties.org website.

Five militants were killed in an operation on Saturday aimed at Al-Qaida in the eastern province of Paktia on the border with Pakistan, the separate US Forces Afghanistan said.

The troops also detained a "significant Al-Qaida-associated militant known to finance militant operations and to assist Taliban leaders with the movement and training of Arab and foreign fighters into Afghanistan," it said.

In all, eight alleged militants were arrested in the province's Zurmat areas. A similar operation in the adjacent border province of Khost was targeted at the radical Haqqani network which had links with Al-Qaida. About 10 suspected militants were detained, the statement said. — AFP

Seoul, November 16
Armed gunmen have hijacked a cargo ship carrying 23 crew off the coast of Somalia, latest attack near the lawless African country, a South Korean official said today.

The 20,000-ton-class ship, owned by a Japanese shipping company and registered in Panama, was seized by gunmen in the past evening in waters, 155 km east of Somalia’s Aden port, a South Korean foreign ministry official said, on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak on the record.

The condition and safety of the crew were not immediately known. The official said he had no information on whether the gunmen were asking for ransom for the sailors’ release. The official said the 23 abducted sailors include South Koreans and Filipinos.

Somalia, which has had no functioning government since 1991, is the world’s top
piracy hotspot.

It is located along the Gulf of Aden, which connects the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean and is one of the world’s busiest waterways with some 20,000 ships passing through it each year.

Somali pirates are trained fighters, often dressed in military fatigues, using speed boats equipped with satellite phones and the GPS equipment.

They are typically armed with automatic weapons, anti-tank rockets launchers and various types of grenades.

In October, 22 sailors - eight South Koreans and 14 citizens of Myanmar, were released following a month of captivity after their South Korean shipping company paid a ransom to Somali pirates.

South Korea has said it is considering dispatching navy vessels to join several other countries’ warships in patrolling the waters off Somalia. — AP

BRIEFLY

3 dead in subway tunnel collapse
BEIJING: At least three people were killed and 17 more were trapped when a half-built subway tunnel in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou collapsed, leaving a huge crater that also engulfed 11 vehicles, state media said on Sunday. Workers building the new metro system scrambled to escape the slow cave-in on Saturday, which left a pile of jumbled steel poles jutting out of a gaping giant crater and forced the evacuation of nearby homes. — Reuters

Reunion of Indian Jews
JERUSALEM: Some 200 members of a north-eastern Indian community would be reuniting with their families in Israel soon where a red carpet welcome awaits them. The members of Bnei Menashe community, which lives in Indian states of Manipur and Mizoram and claim to be one of the lost tribes of Judaism, will be immigrating to Israel after the government here has approved their request. The members are drawn from fifteen extended families some of whose kins have immigrated to Israel in the past. — PTI

Indian labourers in SA
DURBAN: Indian-origin people of South Africa on Sunday paid tributes to their ancestors on the 148th anniversary of the arrival of indentured sugar cane labourers from the country in Durban on this day in the year 1860. Prayer services were organised at temples, churches and mosques to mark the day. November 16 is one of the most important dates in the calendar of people of Indian origin because on this day the first ship, S S Truro, landed with more than 350 indentured labourers from Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Andhra Pradesh. — PTI