 |
Monday,
February 18, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
|
Laden’s
No 2 in Tehran jail? |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Pak N
capability sans strong R & D base Ultras
‘trained’ at London mosque 28 feared dead in detention centre
Fiji coup: charges not to be downgraded Lioness
adopts antelope Israeli baby in Indian jail
sparks concern
|
||||||||
|
Riyadh detains two for Afghan minister’s murder Kabul, February 17 “The Saudi ambassador was with me this afternoon. He brought news that two of the attackers, killers or culprits, or whatever you call them, have been arrested in Saudi Arabia,” Karzai told reporters. Karzai said he was confident that all three suspects, who fled to Saudi Arabia on a pilgrim flight, would be sent back to Afghanistan. He did not mention what had happened to the third suspect, nor did he say if, or when, Saudi Arabia would send back the two men they had in custody. Two other suspects were being hunted in Afghanistan. Rahman’s murder, which Karzai called an assassination, as well as the first attack on members of the international security force in Kabul on Saturday has raised serious questions about security in the war-shattered country. All of the suspects are believed to be from a powerful faction of the Northern Alliance, a group of forces opposed to the former ruling Taliban, that now makes up the core of the interim government. Mr Karzai said he would do everything necessary to ensure security after last week’s assassination of the Tourism and Civil Aviation Minister and an attack on British security forces. He also dismissed fears that the minister’s murder, allegedly by members of a powerful faction of the Northern Alliance, which makes up the core of the interim administration, could split his government. “The people that committed the crime will be dealt with very, very sternly,” Mr Karzai told a news conference at the presidential palace. “They have committed a murder, let the courts decide on that,” he said. Mr Karzai said five persons were being held in Kabul in connection with Rahman’s killing, which was initially blamed on Muslim Haj pilgrims enraged by delays in flights to Saudi Arabia. Mr Karzai said there would be no going back to the old days of factional violence and chaos. “If I see that Afghanistan is not allowed to live peacefully, I will ask for the changing of the mandate of the ISAF. I will ask for every measure to bring security of the Afghan people.” MAZAR-e-SHARIF:
A warehouse belonging to an aid agency was hit by a rocket during a fresh outbreak of fighting between Commanders of rival factions in the new Afghan interim government, aid officials said on Sunday. An official said an aid worker in the town of Khulm, about 50 km east of the main northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif, had told him that the warehouse was hit on Saturday night in crossfire between troops loyal to the rival commanders. He said about 30 soldiers were wounded in the fighting, the latest flare-up between the mainly ethnic Uzbek Junbish-e-Milli faction, led by warlord and Deputy Defence Minister Abdul Rashid Dostum, and the mainly ethnic Tajik Jamiat-e-Islami faction, which is seen as loyal to Defence Minister Mohammad Fahim.
Reuters |
|
Peacekeepers fired after ‘being shot at’ Kabul, February 17 A 20-year-old man was found shot dead near the scene, the peacekeepers said. The peacekeepers insisted that the British paratroopers involved in the shooting were fired at first. Both parties — the civilians and the
peacekeepers — said the shooting occurred early yesterday, in a hillside slum facing an abandoned grain silo being used as an observation post by the peacekeeping troops. Capt Graham Dunlop, a spokesman for the British-led force, said a six-man British patrol fired shots only after they themselves had been shot at. “The soldiers identified the firing point and they returned fire,” he said. Captain Dunlop said there was more than one gunshot, but did not know how many rounds the soldiers fired. Interim Afghan leader Hamid
Karzai, asked about the incident, said the circumstances were “not clear” but there had been “some sort of incident of firing” in which one or two shots were fired at the peacekeepers’ post. AP |
|
Afghan mine blast kills ISF soldier Canberra, February 17 The soldier, who was not identified but was a member of the International Security Force (ISF) died in southern Afghanistan late last night of wounds received from what was believed to have been an anti-vehicle mine, Defence Minister Robert Hill said.
AP |
|
Laden’s No 2
in Tehran jail? Tehran, February 17 The Farsi-language Hayat-e-Nou reported Ayman al-Zawahri was in Tehran’s Evin Prison, where well-known political prisoners often are held. It did not disclose its sources or provide any other information. Hayat-e-Nou is run by Hadi Khamenei, an influential legislator and brother of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It is among Iran’s most reliable newspapers. Experts on Bin Laden’s movements had assumed Al-Zawahri, a doctor and Bin Laden’s potential successor as head of the terrorist network Al-Qaida, would be with him in hiding. The report of the detention amid signs Tehran is trying to defuse tensions with the USA, which has accused it of trying to destabilise neighbouring Afghanistan by harbouring Al-Qaida militants.
AP |
|
Laden tape found Kabul, February 17 The tape was discovered in the village of Kulangar in Logar province, officials from the Ministry of Information and Culture said.
AP |
|
Pak N capability sans strong R & D base CAUGHT in a cleft stick over the fate of Daniel Pearl, Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has sought yet another diversion towards India. This time it is clumsy nuclear duplicity, evidenced in what he told an audience in Washington during his American safari: “Some information, some news even, of may be a possibility of a nuclear test (by India) — it is most untimely, and may I also say, provocative.” When his discerning audience asked for clarification, Musharraf’s answer was even more dubious: “I can’t give conclusive evidence, but I thought if at all there was a possibility it should be checked.” No wonder the games Musharraf was playing failed to click. The Americans were not amused: the General was let off because he was on a state visit. Why is Musharraf playing nuclear games, one too often, with the Americans in view? Only recently he proposed to the American journal Newsweek that Pakistan was prepared for a nuclear-free South Asia, if India joined Pakistan in accepting such a plan. Musharraf knew that India had already rejected such a move even before the 1998 nuclear tests. Obviously, the Pakistan ruler hoped to obtain American appreciation on the sensitive nuclear issue, and possibly some relief from Washington’s pressures to curb and control Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, lest they fall into wrong hands. There is no such concern in Washington about safe upkeep of India’s nuclear deterrent. A long-time Pakistani posture has been the danger of a nuclear catastrophe on the subcontinent — an India-Pakistan nuclear flashpoint over Kashmir. This stance is meant to play on American sensitive and push Washington into the role of mediation over Kashmir. Lately, however, there has been a change in Pakistan’s usual theme of a nuclear flashpoint in the wake of India’s stern warning of its determination to end cross-border terrorism. The stand-off between Indian and Pakistani armed forces, face to face on the border, has put Pakistan’s nuclear brinkmanship to a severe test. Pakistan’s nuclear brinkmanship has in fact begun to totter. This is so because several facets of Pakistan’s nuclear prowess are deceptive and are in the process of being exposed. The first facet is that the nuclear race with India has badly bruised Pakistan’s weak financial edifice, driving it to near-bankruptcy. Even before the September 11 events, General Musharraf had to negotiate an aid package with the Aid Pakistan club — the Western powers and Japan — for Pakistan’s very survival, on humiliating terms. one of the secret conditions of this aid package placed strident curbs on nuclear weapon making by Pakistan, cutting down these operations to the minimum. Kahuta was affected resulting in its chief, Dr Qadir Khan, quitting in disgust. It is clear that Islamabad is in no condition to build up and maintain sizeable nuclear stockpiles, not to speak of entering into nuclear competition with India. The Indian nuclear weapon capability has bypassed financially ruinous uranium enrichment and rests on the plutonium route — the cheapest weapon programme anywhere in the world. India does not need to go in for further tests to give more strength to its nuclear deterrent. Islamabad is therefore in no position to maintain its earlier nuclear bravado and has toned down its warnings of a nuclear flashpoint on Kashmir. General Musharraf now seeks other avenues for a nuclear disclosure with India, which explains his recent forays. The proposal for a nuclear-free South Asia is evidently the safest from Pakistan’s point of view, for it will eliminate the Indian nuclear weapon potential and ensure Indo-Pak nuclear parity. It will also please Washington, for then there would be no need for either country to join the CTBT. It is also in this context that one can understand how and why the Pakistan President chipped in with the claim in Washington on a ‘possible’ Indian test even though it turned out to be a faux pas for which he might now be lamenting. In the changed scenario, it is now possible for India to offer new terms to Pakistan for a nuclear rapport that eliminates a nuclear accident on the sub-continent. But that can be at a moment of India’s choosing, and as part of a larger Indo-Pak understanding.
IPA |
|
Ultras ‘trained’ at London mosque London, February 17 The disclosures that hardline Islamists practised with Kalashnikov AK47s at the Finsbury Park mosque in north London underline the pivotal role that the UK has played in the recruitment of volunteers to fight alongside Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaida group all over the world. It will also intensify pressure on the government to crack down on Islamic militants using the UK as a base. The UK intelligence service, MI5, recruited worshippers at Finsbury Park who opposed the hardline stance taken by controversial Muslim cleric Abu Hamza, who often leads prayers there, and asked them to help monitor the activities of extremists. Early last year, the agents told their handlers that several groups had been taught to strip and reassemble Kalashnikovs in the mosque’s basement. Hamza, the most influential and radical of the prayer leaders at the mosque, said yesterday that as far as he knew, no “harmful” activities had ever taken place there. Hamza, who is wanted for alleged terrorist offences in the Yemen, said the mosque may have been the victim of a smear campaign by foreign agents. Last month, The Observer revealed that a video showing the execution of Algerian conscripts by hardline militants had been circulated at the mosque. Hamza denied it had been used for recruiting purposes. However, MI5 has been told by its agents that scores of young men were sent from the mosque for training at camps in Afghanistan. Senior officers with two Middle Eastern intelligence agencies based in Peshawar, which was until recently a major base for militant volunteers fighting alongside the Taliban and their Al-Qaida allies, said interviews with Mujahideen arrested by Pakistani authorities over the past 18 months had revealed that many had received instruction in basic battlefield first aid from a doctor who ran lessons at the mosque. Hamza yesterday denied the allegations, saying that the mosque lacked funds.
The Observer |
|
28 feared dead in detention centre London, February 17 Group 4, the security company which runs the complex at Yarl’s Wood in Bedfordshire, near London, says it cannot say which detainees had escaped or died because its records were destroyed during the fire. The police has held 15 persons who were recaptured after an unknown number of people escaped into the countryside as fire swept through the centre. Meanwhile, the UK Home Office was challenged to justify its decision not to instal fire sprinklers at the 900-bed site which housed families and single men and women. On Thursday night there were 383 persons at Yarl’s Wood, was built last year. Today about 250 remained at the centre after women and children were moved to other detention centres. A spokeswoman for the Bedfordshire police said: “We are hoping they will all be traced and found safe, but there is a possibility they may not have escaped and obviously we cannot rule out that they could have died.” The police last night was waiting for clearance from fire chiefs to enter the premises. It is thought was unlikely that a full search of the site will begin until tomorrow. The fire, which destroyed an entire wing of the centre on Thursday night, is set to force a complete rethink on the detention of asylum-seekers awaiting deportation, who will now be kept in high-security prison accommodation with strict limits on the time they are allowed to associate with other detainees. The Home Offices last night said if investigations proved there had been a serious security breach at Yarl’s Wood, then it would be forced to house detainees in prison accommodation. Prison campaigners last night said a new influx of asylum-seekers would put an unsustainable pressure on the prison system, whose population hit a record 69,195 last week. “The dilemma is that if it was a riot and was planned, the only response we can have is to increase security,” said a spokeswoman for Home Secretary David Blunkett. Liberal Democrat Home Affairs spokesman Simon Hughes said: “The failure to install sprinklers seems inexcusable. A full explanation is needed from the Home Office, which we will expect when Parliament comes back in a week’s time.” Three inquiries, by the Immigration Service, Bedfordshire Police and Group 4, have been launched into the incident, which was estimated to have caused $ 54 million of damage. The events that led to the fire began at just before 8pm on Thursday in the reception area of the mixed wing of the centre. According to Group 4, an argument developed over a 55-year-old Eastern European woman who wasrefusing hospital treatment and had to be restrained. The dispute drew in the other 60 or so detainees in the room who began to attack windows, break doors and attack officers. A fire started in the reception room and spread to nearby offices. The fire service was tackling the fire in the reception room buildings when the main blaze began in a residential wing and quickly spread. Rioting continued throughout the night. Order was finally restored by police at dawn. The Observer, London |
|
Missile
strike on West Bank town
Nablus (West Bank), February 17 Witnesses said warplanes and helicopter gunships carried out the attacks, which the Israeli army said targeted a Palestinian Authority building, a police compound and the office used by Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat during visits to the city. The missile attacks took place just hours after a Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up in a crowded shopping centre in a West Bank settlement on Saturday night, killing two Israeli teenagers and injuring 20 other persons. JERUSALEM: Thousands of Israeli pacifists demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Sunday at a rally aimed at putting pressure on right-wing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to end the occupation of the Palestinian
territories. Demonstrators, mostly militants from left-wing parties and the Israeli pacifist group Peace Now, assembled in the city’s Rabin Square, named after assassinated Prime Minister Yitzak Rabin and marched to the Tel Aviv museum, chanting slogans calling for an end to the bloodshed.
Reuters, AFP |
|
Fiji coup: charges not to be downgraded
Suva (Fiji), February 17 The police set up roadblocks on main roads into the capital city and security was tightened ahead of the opening of the trial of coup leader George Speight and 12 other defendants tomorrow. Sources close to the prosecution team said today that no plea bargains had been struck despite widespread speculation that lesser charges would be substituted for treason charges for all, except Speight. The trial follows their armed takeover of Parliament amid riots, arson and looting in central Suva 21 months ago. The ethnic Indian-led government of Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry was ousted by the indigenous Fijian coup in May, 2000. The government prosecution statement to the court said the coup accomplices “unlawfully conspire(d) to overthrow the government of the Republic of the Fiji Islands ... and for that purpose ... did use unlawful force and other unlawful means.” The indictment lists what it calls 13 “overt acts” by the coup conspirators, including the armed takeover of the country’s Parliament and taking the Prime Minister, his Cabinet and other lawmakers hostage.
AP |
|
Lioness
adopts antelope Nairobi, February 17 Game wardens at Samburu National Park say the lioness spent yesterday lying down with the delicate oryx calf in the shade of an acacia tree, grooming it and warding off predators. “The lioness and her calf are doing well,” said park warden Mark Lenya-kopir. When the lioness adopted her first calf last month, animal behaviourists said she had probably mistaken it for a lion cub. But on Friday she showed full awareness of the calf’s species, allowing its real mother to feed it before chasing her away. The lioness nursed her first baby antelope for two weeks, nudging it gently across the savannah — before a hungry lion with more traditional tastes ate it as she slept. On waking, the lioness attacked the lion, but was driven off. Since adopting her second calf on Thursday, the lioness has not eaten. Lions can go a month without food, but unless she continues to allow the oryx calf to feed from its mother, it is unlikely to last more than a few days.
The Observer, London |
|
Israeli
baby in Indian jail sparks concern
Jerusalem, February 17 The week-old baby’s plight in prison has been highlighted in the media and foreign ministry officials in a guarded response said they had full faith in the Indian judicial system. Ravit Shriki, 22, was arrested last year along with another Israeli woman for possession of drugs and was subsequently sentenced to 10 years in prison. Shriki and her parents have appealed to Israeli President Moshe Katsav, who has expressed concern over the case, and Peres to secure her release on humanitarian grounds.
PTI |
HARARE’S NO TO SWEDISH SCRIBES GIULIANI GETS GERMAN MEDIA PRIZE
ACCUSED PRIESTS REMOVED JUDGE APOLOGISES FOR SURFING SEX SITES |
||||||
 |
| Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir | Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs | Nation | Editorial | | Business | Sport | World | Mailbag | In Spotlight | Chandigarh Tribune | Ludhiana Tribune 50 years of Independence | Tercentenary Celebrations | | 122 Years of Trust | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
