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Sunday,
December 15, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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CEC favoured Pervez: EU
Iran rejects US charge on N-facilities
US jets hit 3 Iraqi air defence sites |
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$ 20 m US aid to Nepal Sikh leader dies in Canada LONDON DIARY Sept 11 toll drops to 2,792
40 children die of
cold Pull of gravity spun moons Crowe to set up nest
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CEC favoured Pervez: EU Islamabad, December 14 “The current Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Justice (retd) Irshad Hasan Khan actively contributed to legitimising Musharraf’s coup as he was heading the Supreme Court that validated the 1999 takeover by the military,” a 99-page report by the European Union Electoral Observers Mission (EUEOM) released recently, said. “In addition, the CEC was responsible for administrating the heavily criticised presidential referendum earlier this year... as a result the ECP’s independence was widely perceived as being compromised,” said the report quoted by The Nation today. The report regretted that the Chief Election Commissioner, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Interior Ministry initially refused to provide security for the EU mission. While referring to the referendum extending Gen Musharraf’s presidential term by another five years, the report observed, “Both the legality and the results of this referendum were controversial.” “Constitutionality aside, following the contested poll there were allegations about tampering with the voters’ lists, public officials being coerced into voting and unconventional polling stations set up in parks, government offices, railway stations, party offices.” The mission pointed out “The Election Commission displayed a number of shortcomings at both national and provincial levels. One of the more worrying developments was the ECP’s failure to curb the authorities’ misuse of state resources in favour of political parties.” “The Election Commission established a central grievance cell, but it was not operational. Instead the Chief Election Commissioner merely issued instructions ordering parties and government officials to adhere to the legal framework and the code of conduct for political parties, something they continued to flout with impunity,” the report concluded.
UNI |
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Pervez’s man Sindh Speaker Karachi, December 14 Syed Muzaffar Hussain Shah, joint candidate of the pro-military Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid-e-Azam) and its regional ally Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), won 90 votes in the Sindh Assembly, comfortably beating his nearest rival. Jam Saifullah Dharejo, backed by Ms Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and a coalition of hardline Islamic parties, secured 73 votes in the 168-seat Assembly. The other five seats will be decided by byelections. The result of weeks of political jockeying means the exiled Ms Bhutto is in opposition in all four of Pakistan’s provincial Assemblies and in the National Assembly, where the PML-QA leads a pro-military bloc that includes the MQM. The Deputy Speaker is expected to be elected later in the day, with the position of provincial Chief Minister settled on Monday. The PPP said it would boycott the contest for Deputy Speaker after accusing its opponents of breaking election rules.
Reuters |
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EU to expand from 15 to 25 Copenhagen, December 14 To the popping of champagne corks, EU leaders agreed yesterday to expand the bloc from 15 to 25 members in May 2004, taking in Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia and Slovakia. “Today we have closed one of the bloodiest and darkest chapters in European history,” Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said.
AFP |
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Iran rejects US charge on N-facilities Dubai, December 14 “We have no nuclear activity or studies outside the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),” Iranian government spokesman Abdollah Ramezanzadeh told the official news agency IRNA in Teheran. CNN on December 12 cited unnamed US officials as claiming that American satellites had spotted two Iranian places, one in the central city of Arak and the other in Natanz in the Isfahan province, which suggested they could be used for making nuclear weapons. Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi stressed that Iran’s nuclear energy activities were for “peaceful objectives” and denounced US claims as being aimed at diverting the world public opinion from the Zionist Israeli regime’s threats, the official said. “Such American propaganda against Iran is not new and is intended to divert the world public opinion from the Zionist regime’s threats to the region at this sensitive juncture,” he said yesterday. “Iran believes it has the right to carry out necessary researches for peaceful use of nuclear energy and no country can deprive it from this natural right,” Asefi added.
PTI |
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US jets hit 3 Iraqi air defence sites Cairo, December 14
The military said it hit targets at Al Kut, 160 km southeast of Baghdad, Qal’at Sukkar, 275 km southeast of the capital, and Al Amarah, 265 km to the east-southeast. Command spokesman Maj Pete Mitchell said coalition aircraft struck the sites after Iraqi warplanes violated the southern no-fly zone. Baghdad: The United Nations weapons inspectors in Baghdad investigated for the second time on Saturday a centre for the prevention of contagious diseases which had been partially locked the day before. AP, DPA |
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$ 20 m US aid to Nepal Kathmandu, December 14 “Our assistance will be in the form of a package including equipment, supplies and training, for the Nepalese security forces to assist the Government of Nepal in its fight against insurgency, said Ms Christina
Rocca, US Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia. The US Government has announced $ 20 million in aid to combat Maoist insurgency.
UNI |
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Sikh leader dies in Canada Dr Preetam Singh, who had the honour of becoming the first Sikh Queen’s Council in England died in Montreal, Canada, on December 10 after a few months of bouts with heart illness. In him, the Sikh Panth lost one of the intellectuals and a Sikh activist who served the Panth for almost a century. Dr Preetam Singh was born on October 1, 1914, and remained a veteran Sikh activist and an intellectual support throughout his life. He was the first Sikh to be appointed as the Queen’s Council (QC) in England. Throughout his active life in England he remained a leader of the Sikhs and pioneered many activities for the community. After retirement he moved to Montreal where he continued to serve the Sikh community in many ways, including accepting responsibilities of being elected president of a gurdwara and the editor of the gurdwara magazine. Dr Preetam Singh worked on problems pertaining to Sikh historical places in Pakistan. He was an active member of the Sri Nanakana Sahib Foundation. Through the efforts of this organisation he fought many legal battles for Sikh hijackers in Pakistan and helped draft various documentations regarding management of Sikh historical places in Pakistan. He also rendered help in the formation of the Pakistan Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee. Memorial services were held today in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, according to Dr Harbans Lal. |
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LONDON DIARY London, December 14 And never more often than with air travel. Nirpal Singh Shergill, a businessman and journalist who travels frequently between India and Britain, found this on a recent flight of Austrian Airlines from New Delhi to London via Vienna. He was first allotted seat no. 12C on his connecting flight from Vienna to London. That was changed then to 15C. But at the lounge his name was announced and he was asked to walk up to the airline office. The seat was changed again to 26C right at the back of the aircraft, and next to the service centre for flight crew. The seats next to him were kept vacant. Shergill says the motive behind the moves and the placement was obvious. He says it is particularly unfortunate that Air-India has an arrangement with Austrian Airlines. Shergill’s experience is not unique. Time and again Sikhs or Indians with beards are seated next to flight crew centres on aircraft, and seats next to them are kept vacant. They are asked too many unnecessary questions by immigration officials and also by ground crew checking in passengers. Nobody quarrels with the need for security, but these moves do not even promote security. *** The visit of Mr Joginder Singh Vedanti, Jathedar of Sri Akal Takht, to Britain to meet leading members of the Sikh community and lay a foundation stone for a gurdwara in Hounslow turned out to be a unique event. For the first time, a Jathedar from the Akal Takht was invited to the Foreign Office. The meeting was a mark of the significance Britain attached to moderate political views at the seat of Sikh religious authority. The Jathedar met Foreign Secretary Jack Straw and Mike O’Brien, minister in the Foreign Office. Mike O’Brien said after the meeting: “The Foreign Secretary and I were pleased to welcome the Jathedar of Sri Akal Takht on his visit to Britain. There are around 500,000 Sikhs in Britain, and they and the rest of the British-Indian community make a major contribution to Britain’s economy and culture and are an established part of our multi-racial multi-faith society.” This is the Jathedar’s second visit to Britain, and the first to be recognised by the government. He later attended the “Panjabis in Britain, All Party Parliamentary Group” annual conference held at the Houses of Parliament on November 26. *** Manpreet Singh is among the most celebrated chefs among Indian restaurants in London. Which means that diners at the Chor Bizarre restaurant in Mayfair pay a lot of money even by Mayfair standards to dine there. But he is now being celebrated for other reasons. It began at a cookery lesson he did for socialites at the fancy restaurant. He was humming to himself as he cooked, and then on demand began to sing out loud. He hasn’t stopped since then. The restaurant began innovative lessons. And so rich socialites now invite him to their parties, and invite him to sing for them while he shows them how to put some amazing dishes together. Manpreet? Forget it. He is known now as Singh the Singing Chef.
IANS |
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Sept 11 toll drops to 2,792 New York, December 14 Police Inspector Jeremiah Quinlan, who heads the massive missing persons effort, said yesterday that investigators had spoken to the three persons. The discovery reduces the city’s official count of persons killed or reported missing in the terrorist attack to 2,792. Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the city medical examiner, identified the three as Jeffrey Montgomery of St Joseph, Missouri; William Yemele of Gaithersburg, Maryland; and Olivia Khemrat of Jersey City, New Jersey.
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40 children die of cold Kabul, December 14 “At least 40 children have died from December 4... in three camps of Afghan refugees in Spin Boldak,” Mohammad the Iqbal, an official at Edhi Welfare Centre in the Pakistani border town of Chaman, said.
AFP |
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Pull of gravity spun moons Pasadena, December 14 Since observations from the spacecraft Galileo first revealed in 1993 a binary asteroid system — the primeval, icy space rock Ida orbited by its satellite Dactyl — in the main asteroid belt between the planets Mars and Jupiter, astronomers have observed more than a 12 pairs of such frozen relics of the solar system’s beginnings. Scientists long have thought such twin worlds — exemplified by Earth and its moon — resulted from the collision of large heavenly bodies. However, such crashes rarely occur in the deep freeze of the outermost region of the solar system, where asteroid pairs were revealed for the first time last year. There, in the area known as the Kuiper belt, which stretches from just past the frigid, cyclone-whipped planet Neptune to beyond the farthest reaches of the tiny misfit Pluto’s highly elliptical orbit, some other forces must have been at work. Intrigued by the mystery, a team of space watchers from the California Institute of Technology set out to solve the puzzle. “Previous attempts to explain Kuiper belt binaries relied upon physical collisions,” lead study author Re’em Sari told UPI. “However, collisions are very rare in the Kuiper belt. Moreover, when a binary is formed by a collision, it tends to be close, i.e., the separation between the two component bodies is only a few times larger than the bodies’ diameters,” he explained. “By contrast, the separation in Kuiper belt binaries is hundreds or even thousands of diameters. Thus, it is implausible that Kuiper belt binaries were formed through collisions.”
UPI |
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Crowe to set up nest Sydney, December 14 Crowe’s Australian publicist Wendy Day said the 38-year-old actor would marry Danielle Spencer, the Australian Associated Press reported. No date was announced. The announcement follows tabloid reports that Crowe, who formerly dated Hollywood actress Meg Ryan, recently bought Spencer a US $ 1,00,000 diamond ring and asked her to marry him. Crowe, 38, met Spencer, an accomplished musician, after his first attempt to break into the music industry in New Zealand during the late 1980s. While filming Australian director Peter Weir’s film "Master and Commander" in Mexico over the past several months, Crowe had publicly complained of the time he and Spencer had spent apart. The New Zealand-born, Australian-raised actor, who last year splashed out nearly Aus $ 10 million on media heir Lachlan Murdoch’s exclusive Sydney waterfront home, had recently been spending time unwinding on his ranch on Australia’s east coast.
AP |
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