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Sunday,
March 10, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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Sharon’s U-turn on talks with Palestinians
Fire destroys USA’s
biggest gurdwara |
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USA wants Omar for J&K killing
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WINDOW ON PAKISTAN US bombing of town kills 16
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Sharon’s U-turn on talks with Palestinians Jerusalem, March 9 “I thought we could reach a period of respite before a ceasefire,” Sharon yesterday told Israel’s second television channel. “But this is a war situation we are experiencing.” “The negotiations for a ceasefire will take place under fire,” the Premier was quoted as saying by the television, which stressed Sharon was going back on his condition for a week of total calm. However, an adviser to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat dismissed the surprise declaration from Sharon as having “no value” and said the Israelis would have to stop their raids into Palestinian lands. “Sharon must realize that he cannot obtain an end to the violence with a military solution. His declaration on negotiations of a truce “under fire” have no value; he must stop his massacres and aggression against the Palestinian people,” Nabil Abou Roudeina, told newsmen in Gaza city. Sharon had not budged since his election as Israel’s Prime Minister more than a year ago in his insistence on a period of seven days of calm before negotiating with the Palestinians. His apparent turnaround comes ahead of a new visit to the region next week by US peace envoy Anthony Zinni and at the end of the deadliest day of Israeli-Palestinian violence since 1987. Sharon has come under intense U.S. pressure to implement the deal “as quickly as possible” amid the most ferocious fighting since a Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation broke out in September 2000 after peace talks froze. Palestinian officials said his shift amounted to an admission Israel’s security policies had failed. Israeli forces inflicted the bloodiest losses on Palestinians on any single day of the fighting, killing 38 in raids yesterday after an attack on a Jewish settlement in Gaza in which five students were killed. Total Palestinian deaths in the uprising exceeded 1,000 as Israel launched air, land and sea assaults on the West Bank and Gaza as part of Sharon’s declared aim to hit Palestinians hard until they sue for peace. The number of Israeli fatalities stood at nearly 320, according to a tally compiled by Reuters. Palestinian officials have accused the Israeli army of carrying out “massacres” but the Israeli government says it is striking at “terror networks” that have targeted Israelis with suicide bombings and shooting attacks. Washington views the CIA Director George Tenet’s truce plan as a first step before a wider Saudi proposal for Arab-Israeli peace can be pursued. Zinni’s two previous missions have ended in failure. CAIRO: Arab League chief Amr Moussa opened a Foreign Ministers' meeting on Saturday saying Arabs would not stay idle amid fierce Israeli attacks on Palestinians and urged the international community to halt the violence. The ministers have gathered in Cairo for a two-day meeting ahead of a summit in Beirut later this month when Arab leaders are expected to discuss a Saudi plan to try to end 17 months of bloodshed between Palestinians and Israelis. At an emergency meeting late on Friday, the Arab ministers called for urgent US action to stop Israel's "aggression" after some of the bloodiest fighting since the Palestinian uprising against occupation erupted in September 2000. "Israel's negative responses to peace initiatives so far shows the depth of the Israeli policy of aggression and that it has become a permanent strategy, in the face of which we have no choice but to take necessary steps to protect Arab national security," Moussa said in an opening address. Kuwaiti Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Sheikh Mohammad al-Salem al-Sabah, said in his opening statement as chairman of the meeting that the Palestinians were seeking support from the international community. Neither the opening addresses mentioned a Saudi plan to end the conflict by exchanging Arab land occupied in the 1967 war for full normalisation of Arab ties with Israel. "We believe that they (the Saudi proposals) are extremely important in refocusing the attention from the security situation...to the political problem, the problem which is the essential part," Jordan's Foreign Minister Marwan al-Muasher told reporters. In a statement on Friday, Arab ministers called on "the American administration to take urgent measures to stop this aggression which threatens security and stability in the region" and called for support from the international community.
AFP, Reuters |
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Fire destroys USA’s biggest gurdwara New York, March 9 The 37-year-old Richmond Hill gurdwara in the Queens suburb of New York was destroyed in the early morning blaze yesterday, with the authorities saying that it does not appear to be a case of arson or hate crime but the result of a gas leak. “It feels like taking your heart out. It (gurdwara) just has been reduced to a shell,” Harpreet Singh Toor, Sikh Cultural Society Chairman in Richmond Hill, said. Most injured suffered smoke inhalation and taken to hospital, a source said. The gurdwara did not immediately identify the injured. More than 150 fire fighters worked for more than three hours to bring leaping flames under control but the basement, where the fire was suspected to have originated, was still burning several hours later. The gurdwara was a two-storey structure with a basement. Neighbours, many of them Sikhs, watched in horror as the fire consumed roof of the gurdwara, windows exploded and a library containing more than 15,000 books was destroyed. But, six holy books were saved before the fire spread. President of the Indian National Overseas Congress, Surinder Singh Malhotra, who is also a leading Sikh leader, hoped investigations would reveal that it was an accidental fire. “Otherwise things would become very difficult.” The authorities are investigating the cause of fire which might have started by gas leak in the kitchen in basement. A report said some people smelled gas prior to fire. The Sikh community, Malhotra said, is determined to rebuild the gurdwara and it would be up in a short time. The gurdwara had an education wing, a kitchen and living quarters for 50 persons which were used mainly by visiting preachers from India. Despite the tragic loss, Sikh community gathered in the rear of the burnt out building for prayers yesterday and an adjoining two-storey building that the society owns would be used for worship till the time the gurdwara is rebuilt. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who visited the site, said Fire Chief Joseph Callen had told him that there was no reason to believe that there was anything suspicious. Callen said they were checking underground main gas pipe as several people had reported smell of gas coming from the kitchen in the basement. Devotees from New York and adjoining states of New Jersey, Connecticut and Pennsylvania had been visiting the gurdwara. About 800 devotees visit it every day and some 3000 on weekends. On festive occasions, the number rises to as much as 10,000.
PTI |
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USA wants Omar for J&K killing Islamabad, March 9 The News, local daily, quoting a Pakistani official said the USA had demanded Omar Saeed Sheikh’s extradition in the kidnap and murder case of the American tourist, registered in Srinagar, and “not in the Pearl kidnap and murder case.” Britain-born Sheikh Omar has confessed to masterminding the kidnapping of Wall Street Journal reporter. He has been in police custody since last month. The paper said the government would hold Sheikh’s trial in the Pearl case in Pakistan if it was able to find sufficient evidence to get him convicted by Pakistani courts. Otherwise he would be extradited to the USA. Sheikh’s lawyers have stated in a Karachi court that he remained in Indian jails for four years and was charged in the tourist kidnap and murder case but no trial was held. The Americans are working now to try him in the case, but he cannot be tried for it in the USA because no one can be subjected to double jeopardy under American law, his lawyers say. There are, however, clear indications that Pakistan would extradite the accused to the USA and that it is waiting for an appropriate time to do so, said the
paper. Sindh Advocate-General Raja Qureshi has said handing over Sheikh to the USA would not contravene Pakistani law. The government’s view is that an old extradition treaty existing prior to Pakistan’s independence and adopted by it after its creation was still relevant if someone was to be extradited to the USA. “Therefore, the argument relating to the absence of such a treaty between Pakistan and the USA does not hold in the official view,” the paper said.
IANS |
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Morgan to seek poll extension Harare, March 9 Tsvangirai, who is fighting a bitter contest with veteran President Robert Mugabe, made the call during a tour of the polling stations in Harare and the neighbouring town of Chitungwiza where voters turned out in thousands on the first day. "We are trying to see if we can get an extension to the voting days. There is no way we can finish this within two days," the Movement for Democratic Change leader told reporters outside a polling station where 1,000 persons were queuing. Tsvangirai said there were only 167 polling stations in Harare compared with 249 in parliamentary elections two years ago despite an increase in the population. "So the intention is very clear, but we hope people will be patient." The MDC said in a statement the voting process was extremely slow, with only 60 votes being processed each hour. It said at this rate many people in the urban areas, seen as opposition strongholds, would not be able to vote. There were no official figures on the voter turnout by midday on Saturday. But reports from around the southern African country said hundreds of thousands of people were stuck in queues. Two days of voting are due to end at 7 p.m. (1700 GMT) tomorrow. Zimbabwe state radio said Mugabe had told reporters after casting his vote at a school in Highfields, a Harare suburb, that he was confident of victory, but would accept any result. Mugabe attacked Western countries which he said had already decided that the elections would not be free and fair unless Tsvangirai won.
Reuters |
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WINDOW ON PAKISTAN When General Pervez Musharraf captured power after staging a coup in October, 1999, he was quite generous in his dealings with the Press initially. This led to the general belief that the Press in Pakistan was functioning without the expected fetters. Even elected Heads of Government like Mr Nawaz Sharif and Ms Benazir Bhutto did not allow as much freedom as was available in the changed circumstances. Thus General Musharraf appeared to be a messiah for the media! The situation continued only till it suited the General. There was a hidden motive behind his generosity. Newspapers were initially carrying news stories and articles exposing the misdeeds of the previous government. This benefited the military regime from two angles. One, what it wanted to put before the public to justify the bloodless coup was being highlighted in the newspaper columns. Two, being non-interfering with the media gave the Musharraf regime respectability within the country and abroad. But this was a false impression. The General appeared in his true colours after the failed Indo-Pak Agra summit. A reporter of the Nawa-e-Waqt group was the first sufferer for gathering courage to ask inconvenient questions at General Musharraf's first Press conference in Islamabad after the Agra fiasco. Since then a number of journalists have been victimised by the military regime in pursuit of its policy of having a controlled Press. What has happened in the case of the Editor of The News, Shaheen Sehbai, could be easily expected when he showed enterprise in organising incisive reports relating to the kidnapping of American journalist Daniel Pearl. Being a senior journalist, he must have known that the ISI, the intelligence outfit through which the regime tries to control the newspapers, would not let him and his reporters concerned live in peace. Yet he decided to publish the report based on the confessions of terrorist Omar Sheikh shows that there are journalists in Pakistan prepared to suffer for performing their professional duty independently. The report revealing Sheikh's involvement in the attack on India's Parliament complex appeared on February 17 and led to Sehbai and three reporters of The News----Kamran Khan in Karachi, Rauf Klasra in Islamabad and Amir Mateen in Washington----losing their jobs.The sensational piece was undigestible for the regime from two other angles. It linked the Pearl kidnapping with the highjacking of an Indian Airlines plane in December, 1999, and the terrorist attack at Kolkata's American Information Center. The report mentioned Sheikh having confessed that the kidnapping was planned and executed by Mansur Husnain, a leader of the Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorist outfit to which he belonged. Sheikh also admitted that he was an associate of Aftab Ansari, the main suspect in the Kolkata incident. In the process of publishing the report Sehbai ran into trouble with his management too because the government stopped the release of its advertisements to the Jang group, the owners of The News, with immediate effect. The regime put a specific condition that there would be no release of government advertisements till Sehbai was shown the door. Hence his exit from The News. Fearing threat to his life, he has left Pakistan to live in the USA. However, this is a small price to pay. Some time ago a senior journalist associated with the popular Newsline magazine, Ghulam Husnain, was tortured for doing an indepth story on the Daniel Pearl case. But these are not the only incidents exposing the regime's policy to force the Press to toe the official line. On March 1 Dawn carried a long write-up based on a list released by the International Press Institute showing a number of editors and newsmen having been victimised at the behest of the military regime with many publications compelled to close their shop. The most notable is the case of the Peshawar-based Frontier Post. On January 29 the police sealed the offices of the respected daily following a raid and arrested five of its employees. The offices of The Post's sister publication in Urdu, Maidan, were also sealed. Their crime: publication of a letter considered blasphemous by the government of General Musharraf. The increasing number of incidents of victimisation of journalists and newspapers has sent a depressing message throughout Pakistan. Can the coming elections be free and fair when the Press has no right to tell the truth? |
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US bombing of town kills 16 Islamabad, March 9 Quoting sources in the border town of Wana, the Pakistan-based news service said the residents had gathered to pray for the return of a man who was taken into US custody two months ago. The report said the planes attacked the town Thursday in Barmal district of Paktika province, near the Pakistani border. Among the 16 dead were six members of one family, the agency said, adding that most of the bodies were mutilated. AIP said the residents were praying for the return of Meer Shahazad Khan, a local businessman.
AFP |
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Annan: Iraq’s stand significant United Nations, March 9 “I don’t want to run ahead of ourselves and declare success. We are at early stage yet, so we should not claim success or failure yet. We are at a very, very early stage,” he told reporters yesterday after briefing the Security Council on his talks with Iraqi delegation on Thursday.
PTI |
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