Japan regulator urges monitoring of Fukushima sea
Tokyo, August 29
Japan’s nuclear regulator today said it is largely unknown what impact radioactive water leaking from the country’s wrecked nuclear plant is having on the Pacific Ocean and the situation must be monitored more closely.

PM pledges greater role

British Sikhs continue fight against meat plant near gurdwara
London, August 29
British Sikhs are convening an inter-faith debate as part of their protests against a proposed meat processing plant near a prominent gurdwara in the city of Bradford.

Swat, Pak’s former Taliban haven, hosts golf tournament after 20 yrs
Islamabad, August 29
After a break of about 20 years, a golf tournament started today in the former Taliban stronghold of Swat in northwestern Pakistan.

Cairo, August 29
The US and UK today appeared to have backed down from an immediate punitive military strike against Syria, even as embattled President Bashar al-Assad vowed that his country would emerge "victorious" in any confrontation with America and its allies.

A strike by Western forces had appeared imminent, but the US allies were increasingly reluctant to act before hearing the results of a UN probe into the alleged poisonous gas attacks in the war-torn country on August 21.

President Barack Obama has said he had not yet decided whether to attack Syria in response to alleged use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime, but a strike still appeared likely as the US stopped seeking a UN mandate. “We have not yet made a decision, but the international norm against the use of chemical weapons needs to be kept in place. Hardly anybody disputes that chemical weapons were used on a large scale in Syria against civilian populations," Obama said in an interview.

British Prime Minister David Cameron backed down and agreed to delay a military attack on Syria following a growing revolt over the UK’s rushed response to the crisis.

The Prime Minister has now said he would wait for a report by UN weapons inspectors before seeking the approval of MPs for "direct British involvement" in the Syrian intervention.

Downing Street said the decision to wait for the UN was based on the "deep concerns" the country still harbours over the Iraq War.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon today pleaded for more time for diplomacy and to allow UN investigators to complete their probe on suspected chemical weapons attacks.

He said the investigators would leave Syria by Saturday morning. “Diplomacy should be given a chance...peace (should) be given a chance,” Ban said in Vienna.

“The use of chemical weapons by anyone, for any reason, under any circumstances, is a crime against humanity and that must be held accountable for,” he said.

Meanwhile, President Assad remained defiant amid heightened tensions, saying "Since the start of the crisis, as you know, we have waited for our true enemy to reveal itself."

"I know that your morale is good and that you are ready to face any attack and to save the homeland," Al-Akhbar newspaper quoted Assad as telling Syrian officials. "It's a historic confrontation from which we will emerge victorious," the paper quoted him as saying.

Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi yesterday had accused Western countries of "inventing" excuses to take military action against his country.

“Western countries, starting with the United States, are inventing fake scenarios and fictitious alibis to intervene militarily in Syria,” he was quoted as saying by state television. Halqi said his country would become a "graveyard of the invaders" if there were a military intervention.

Russia and Iran, key allies of Syria, again reiterated their warning against any Western intervention in the civil war. They said that such a strike could set off a wider regional conflict. — PTI

Islamabad, August 29
The 33-year jail term given to Shakeel Afridi, the Pakistani doctor who helped the CIA track Osama Bin Laden, was today overturned by an official who ordered a fresh trial.

Frontier Crimes Regulation Commissioner Sahibzada Mohammad Anees ruled that a judge in the tribal belt had exceeded his authority when he handed down the sentence last year and ordered a fresh trial.

Anees also handed over Afridi’s case to the political agent of the Khyber Agency. He said Afridi could be released only on the orders of the political agent.

“The assistant political agent...did not have the authority to award 33 years’ imprisonment to Dr Shakeel Afridi,” Anees said in his order.

“The assistant political agent played the role of a magistrate for which he was not authorised," it said.

Afridi, in his forties, was sentenced to 33 years in jail on May 24, 2012 on a charge of aiding the banned Lashkar-e-Islam militant group. The verdict was issued by the assistant political agent, who has judicial powers.

He was also accused of conducting a fake vaccination campaign on behalf of the CIA in Abbottabad as part of efforts to trace bin Laden.

The Al-Qaida chief was killed in a unilateral US military raid in the garrison town in May 2011, sending bilateral relations into a tailspin and embarrassing Pakistan’s powerful military.

Afridi is currently being held at the central prison in Peshawar. Welcoming today’s order, Afridi's cousin Qamar Nadeem Afridi said it was a "great development". He said the "true facts" would come out now. — PTI

Kabul, August 29
Taliban insurgents staged an evening mountain pass ambush on an Afghan police convoy patrolling a key highway, killing 15 officers and wounding 10 in the Farah province of west Afghanistan, a provincial official said today, the latest in a string of escalating insurgent attacks around the country.

The ambush late yesterday came on the same day as the Taliban launched their most complex attack this year, a failed effort to overrun a NATO base in the eastern Ghazni province that killed one US soldier and wounded 10 Polish soldiers and dozens of Afghans.

In the mountain pass attack, insurgents fled unharmed after they attacked about 40 officers in the convoy driving on the main trade route through the province, Farah provincial spokesman Abdul Rahman Zhawandai said today.And in another strike nearby, rockets killed six truck drivers and destroyed dozens of trucks that carry fuel for coalition forces. — AP

Tokyo, August 29
Japan’s nuclear regulator today said it is largely unknown what impact radioactive water leaking from the country’s wrecked nuclear plant is having on the Pacific Ocean and the situation must be monitored more closely.

Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) chairman Shunichi Tanaka said the current monitoring of the ongoing leaks at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant was insufficient and he urged a more comprehensive effort to monitor contamination in the ocean near the plant.

Also today, executives of the Japanese fisheries association criticised the plant operator over the unstoppable leaks, saying the situation could doom the fishing industry of Japan.

The plant operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co., must constantly cool the reactors with water, and is struggling to contain the waste. TEPCO recently acknowledged the chronic leaking of radiation-tainted underground water into the Pacific, plus a 300-ton (300,000-litre 80,000-gallon) seepage from one of more than 1,000 storage tanks. The leak was the firth and worst from a tank since the crisis began.

The tank leak prompted the nuclear authority to upgrade its rating yesterday to a level-III "serious incident," from a level I on the International Atomic Energy Agency radiological event scale.

“We cannot fully stop contaminated water leaks right away,” Tanaka said. — AP

London, August 29
British Sikhs are convening an inter-faith debate as part of their protests against a proposed meat processing plant near a prominent gurdwara in the city of Bradford.

Councillors recently permitted food firm Pakeezah to convert a car workshop near Guru Gobind Singh Gurdwara into a wholesale meat plant as an expansion of its existing business in the northern England city.

However, Sikhs opposed the plans over fears that the smell of meat would waft into the gurdwara.

Senior community leaders have now invited leaders of other faiths to a specially convened meeting to discuss the issue on Friday.

According to the Bradford Telegraph, the Board of Representatives of Bradford Gurdwaras has sent invitations to the meeting to prominent faith leaders and organisations, including the Bishop of Bradford and the Bradford Council for Mosques.

The Sikhs want to debate the planning permission on the ground that it could set a precedent for other such plants near religious buildings.

"The board supports Guru Gobind Singh Gurdwara to seek further legal advice against the decision and we urge the owners of Pakeezah to withdraw their application in recognition that their proposal is most disrespectful to the gurdwara and thereby hurtful to Sikhs everywhere," said Nirmal Singh, chairman of the board.

Pakeezah director Tariq Haq, who won approval to convert the disused car repair workshop on the Percival Street into a modern meat plant earlier this month, said work had started on the extension.

“They are not going to see what’s happening and it’s not going to affect the temple in any way, shape or form,” he said. — PTI

Islamabad, August 29
After a break of about 20 years, a golf tournament started today in the former Taliban stronghold of Swat in northwestern Pakistan.

The tourney is being played at the Sedar Golf Club in Kabal, which was the headquarters of the Pakistani Taliban till they were expelled from the picturesque valley after a bloody military operation in 2009.

The three-day Swat Open golf contest has been jointly organised by the civil administration and army, which has been permanently stationed in the area to forestall any comeback by the rebels.

A total of 54 professionals, 27 senior professionals and 45 amateurs are participating in the contest, one of the biggest sporting events held in Swat since the ouster of the Taliban.

Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Golf Association secretary Shahdat Imtiaz said it was first gold event since 1992, when an uprising by radical cleric Sufi Mohammed to implement Shariah or Islamic law ended almost all recreational activities. "We want to give a message to the people through the tournament that Swat is peaceful now and anyone can come to stay or see places without any fear," he said.

The Kabal gold ground was set up by Miangul Auranzeb, the former ruler of the princely state of Swat, in 1964. It is one of the biggest golf parks spread over 122 acres.

It was the favourite ground of former military ruler Zia-ul-Haq, who ruled Pakistan with an iron hand in the 1980s and played a key rule in spreading extremist and jihadi ideology in the region.

Swat, referred to as the Switzerland of Pakistan, was run as a semi-independent state till it amalgamation with the rest of the country in 1969. — PTI

Washington, August 29
CIA contractor Edward Snowden, who leaked some of America's most closely guarded secrets, travelled to India before 2011, but did not report the trip during his background-check process.

"The background checkers failed to verify Snowden's account of a past security violation and his work for the CIA, they didn't thoroughly probe an apparent trip to India that he had failed to report," the Wall Street Journal reported, quoting a review after leaks of classified documents by him.

During the 2011 routine background check the National Security Agency contractor needed to keep his security clearance, the checkers didn't get significant information from anyone who knew him beyond his mother and girlfriend.

"The background interviewers learnt from a work supervisor that Snowden had travelled to India, which Snowden hadn't reported during the background-check process, but the final background report failed to clarify the purpose of the trip," the Journal reported.

India was among over a dozen nations approached by 30-year-old Snowden for asylum while he was stranded at the Moscow airport. New Delhi had turned down his request.

The review report said several aspects of the background check "did not meet the requirements" of a 1997 document that outlined federal standards for background checks.

The most recent background check of Snowden was "so inadequate that too few people were interviewed and potential concerns weren't pursued," the Journal said.

National Counterintelligence Executive Frank Montoya Jr, who led the review, said the 2011 background check by a private contractor "did not present a comprehensive picture of Snowden," the Journal said.

After the background check renewed Snowden's high-level security clearance, he had access, through his job at Booz Allen Hamilton, to top secret documents about US surveillance programs, the paper said.

Snowden has argued he was acting out of conscience because he wanted to shine a light on a surveillance apparatus which he believes is out of control. He is wanted on felony charges by the United States, but Russia has refused to extradite him. — PTI

Washington, August 29
The Obama administration announced new steps today on gun control, curbing the import of military surplus weapons and proposing to close a loophole that lets felons and others circumvent background checks by registering guns to corporations.

The administration has failed to find support in the Congress for its gun control proposals this year. The issue became a top one for President Barack Obama after a gunman killed 20 young children and six adults at a Connecticut school in December.

Obama has added two more executive actions to a list of 23 steps the White House determined Obama could take on his own to reduce gun violence.

Vice President Joe Biden unveiled the new actions today at the White House.

One new policy will end a government practice that lets military weapons, sold or donated by the US to allies, be reimported into the US by private entities, where some may end up on the streets.

The White House said the US has approved 250,000 of those guns to be reimported since 2005. Under the new policy, only museums and a few other entities like the government will be eligible to reimport military-grade firearms.

The Obama administration is also proposing a federal rule to stop those who would be ineligible to pass a background check from getting around the law by registering a gun to a corporation or trust.

The new rule would require people associated with those entities, like beneficiaries and trustees, to undergo the same type of fingerprint-based background checks as individuals if they want to register guns. — AP

Washington, August 29
A man who allegedly threatened first Hindu Congresswoman in the US, Tulsi Gabbard, was arrested in Mexico, which turned him over to the US authorities today.

Aniruddha Sherbow, 42, was arrested yesterdayin Tijuana by the Baja California State Police pursuant to an arrest warrant issued in the Court for the District of Columbia, the FBI's field office here said.

Sherbow was turned over to FBI agents at San Diego in California late Wednesday and is scheduled to have his initial court appearance in San Diego today, prior to his return to Washington to face the outstanding charge of transmission of threats in interstate commerce.

“The alleged threats occurred on August 1 and August 3, 2013, and were deemed credible,” the FBI said .

According to media reports from Hawaii, from where Gabbard is a Congresswoman, Sherbow in 2011 was ordered by a local court to stay away from her. — PTI