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Seven held for Istanbul
blasts, says paper |
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Michael Jackson surrenders, gets bail
Two held for racial attack |
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Maoists bury farmer alive
Hari Kunzru rejects
‘racist’ paper’s award Musharraf fears return of sanctions Palestinian militants agree on Cairo talks Protests against ethnic cleansing
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Rebels attack Baghdad hotels Baghdad, November 21 Two other rocket launchers mounted on donkey carts were found within hours, one 30 metres from the Italian Embassy and another near the Academy of Fine Arts, both in the Waziriya neighbourhood north of downtown. Iraqi police and US troops were seen securing those weapons, which apparently had not been fired, and US soldiers were seen searching donkey carts in the nearby streets. One man was carried away bleeding from the Palestine Hotel, where many foreign journalists and US workers are staying. No other casualties were reported at the Palestine or the Sheraton Hotel across the street. “This is the work of terrorists,’’ said Loay Yunis Khalil, manager of the Palestine Hotel. Elsewhere, a US soldier from the 82nd Airborne Division was killed and two others were injured near the city of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, on Thursday when a roadside bomb exploded next to their convoy, the military said on Friday. The Baghdad attacks occurred at the height of “Operation Iron Hammer,” the US military counter-offensive against rebels in and around the capital. The US Commander in the capital, Brig-Gen. Martin Dempsey, said yesterday that the 12-day crackdown had contributed to a 70 per cent decrease in rebel activity. —AP |
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Seven held for Istanbul blasts, says paper Istanbul, November 21 A statement purporting to come from a unit of Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaida network said it carried out yesterday’s strikes on the British consulate and the London-based banking giant HSBC, five days after two similar strikes on synagogues here. “Some persons have been arrested but it’s too early to give any information about them,’’ Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul told a news conference. Turkish daily Hurriyet said seven persons had been arrested over the second pair of blasts which, it said, were carried out by Turkish suicide bombers. British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, who visited both bomb sites after arriving here late yesterday, said the UK stood side by side with its NATO ally. A NATO statement in Brussels also voiced its support. DUBAI: An Islamist website on Friday carried a statement claiming responsibility on behalf of a unit of Osama bin Laden’s Al- Qaida network for the truck bombings. The statement, purporting to come from the Abu Hafz al-Masri Brigades, which earlier claimed responsibility for bombing two synagogues in Turkey on Saturday, was headed “Operation Islamic Iron Hammer’’ — a mocking allusion to a US military clampdown on guerrillas in Iraq. —
Reuters |
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Michael Jackson surrenders, gets bail Washington, November 21 He was later released on bail after posting a $ 3 million bond. A private Jet carrying Jackson landed at Santa Barbara airport shortly before noon yesterday and the 45-year-old pop icon was immediately taken into custody by sheriffs. Jackson, his hands cuffed behind his back, entered the Santa Barbara County main jail, accompanied by defence attorney Mark
Geragos, who earlier said he had arranged the surrender. The pop star was booked under multiple counts of lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14, an offence punishable by three to eight years in jail. Jackson’s spokesman Stuart Backerman termed the allegation the most vicious imaginable. “The big lie against Michael Jackson is anchored in the most vicious allegation imaginable, one that resonates across every culture: the spectacle of harming a child... But this spectacle is rooted in a lie.” —
PTI |
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Two held for racial attack New York, November 21 The Pakistan-born brothers were identified as Javad, 17, and Junaid, 16. They requested that their last name be not used as they feared recrimination. According to a criminal complaint filed by the District Attorney’s office in Queens, one of New York city’s five boroughs, the two youths — Alex Batista and Ivan Pracido — had reportedly yelled “I am going to get you Taliban’’ at the two victims before punching them and running off. The incident occurred shortly after 2100 hours, local time, at the mosque, the police said. The District Attorney’s office said the defendants, 16 and 18 respectively, were arrested as one of the victims identified the alleged attackers, who were charged with third-degree assault and second-degree harassment. Under normal circumstances, the duo could face a one-year sentence, but under bias crime law enacted more than two years ago, they are likely to face up to four years in prison. —
UNI |
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Maoists bury farmer alive Kathmandu, November 21 The newspaper, citing a report received from the remote village of Kalika, about 460 km northwest of Kathmandu, said the farmer was a victim of the Maoist atrocity because his brother was a police officer. The victim, identified as 27-year-old Kal Bahadur Budha, was abducted by Maoists and taken to the neighbouring Seri village where he was buried alive in a ditch he was forced to dig. The newspaper quoted several Seri villagers as saying the armed rebels first forced him to dig the ditch and then told him to lie in it. “When he resisted to lie down in the ditch he was forced to dig, the Maoists chopped off his legs and buried him alive despite pleas for mercy,” said the villagers, who were forced to watch the gruesome act. Locals said Budha was killed because his elder brother is in the police. The Maoists, according to the newspaper, had been pressuring him to force his brother to quit his police job. Budha’s wife and parents had already left Kalika after the rebels had started to threaten them. Villagers said that Budha was an ordinary farmer and had no links with any political parties. Meanwhile, the Nepali language daily Rajdhani reported today that armed Maoist rebels were extorting “donations” from tourists visiting Dorpatan in Dolpa district, about 310 km west of the capital. The district was the scene of a major Maoist attack two years ago when dozen of policemen were killed. According to the newspaper, there hasn’t been “hardly any government presence there since the Maoist attack”. The newspaper said a group of 14 Danish tourists who reached the district after the Maoists unilaterally broke the ceasefire in late August were forced to pay $ 50 each to the Maoists. A second group of 11 German tourists who visited the district were forced to pay $ 75 each. The extortion came despite claims by top Maoist leaders that tourists were in no way targeted in their anti-establishment campaign. —
DPA |
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Hari Kunzru rejects ‘racist’ paper’s award London, November 21 Instead, his agent read his explosive statement, which said Kunzru rejected the award because of what he called the paper’s consistent “hostility towards black and Asian British people”. He claimed The Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday, which sponsored the prize, “pursue an editorial policy of vilifying and demonising refugees and asylum-seekers.” “As the child of an immigrant, I am only too aware of the poisonous effect of The Mail’s editorial line. The atmosphere of prejudice it fosters translates into violence and I have no wish to profit from it”, the statement said, according to today’s The Guardian. The 33-year-old author, who was at a family wedding in New Delhi, discovered he had made the shortlist only last week. He was not even aware that his publishers had entered him for the prize. While thanking the judges, Kunzru explained in his statement: “‘The Impressionist’ is a novel about the absurdity of a world in which race is the main determinant of a person’s identity. —
PTI |
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Musharraf fears return of sanctions Islamabad, November 21 Expressing serious concern over the activities of the religious extremist and sectarian groups, Musharraf told a meeting of editors of Pakistani media here last night that “this is one area which will drown us. It is senseless.” Highlighting the gravity of the situation prevailing at the borders of Afghanistan where Taliban and Al-Qaida are reportedly regrouping, he acknowledged that the international community has questioned his government’s commitment Cautioning that any “miscalculation” on the part of Pakistan could land it in trouble and bring back the era of sanctions, he said the USA and allied forces could resort to aerial bombing of tribal areas bordering Afghanistan, “If we do not control the tribal areas and they (US) start bombing your tribal areas, what will we do. Let us not be under any delusion,” he was Musharraf also said his own credibility was at stake. “People (US) have started suspecting I am not with them”. —
PTI |
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Palestinian militants agree on Cairo talks Gaza, November 21 Obtaining a truce is crucial to reviving a US-backed road map to peace which envisages the establishment of a Palestinian state by 2005, but has stalled over an upsurge of Israeli-Palestinian violence. Sources from Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Yasser Arafat’s Fatah faction said representatives from three main militant groups that have spearhead attacks against Israel in a three-year-old Palestinian uprising would attend the Cairo talks on December 2. “The groups have expressed good intentions and their desire to reach a ceasefire agreement,” Egypt’s Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher told reporters in Cairo Yesterday. —
Reuters |
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Protests against ethnic cleansing Dhaka, November 21 Leaders of the Chittagong unit of the AL alleged that the motive behind the carnage was not mere dacoity but that it was carried out as part of the BNP-led four party alliance’s “blue print to force the minority communities out of Bangladesh,” the ‘Daily Star’ reported today. The AL has demanded a judicial probe into the incident and has announced a four-day protest beginning tomorrow in the hill district, the report said. Students of Dhaka University brought out a protest demonstration even as people in the capital and elsewhere in the country formed human chains to denounce the incident. —
PTI |
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