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Pak woman urges
insurgents to release son
Hussain elected
Pak PM
SC rebuffs Bush on detainees’ rights Militants free 3
Turkish hostages
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9 die in Iraq
24 die in UN copter crash Murdered
teenager’s parents to visit Punjab India for task
force on communication Priest of Indian
origin faces sexual abuse charges 6 Indians held in
Nepal for carrying arms Yemeni rebel
leader killed
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Pak woman urges insurgents to release son
Islamabad, June 29 Amjad Hafeez from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir is a driver based in Kuwait, who was ferrying food supplies when he was kidnapped in an attack on an American base north of Baghdad on Sunday. “Hafeez is the sole bread-earner and belongs to a poor family,” Syeda Jan, Hafeez’s mother, said at a press conference here. She said Hafeez went to the Gulf to work, not to fight. He is innocent and has nothing to do with the internal political situation of Iraq, she added. Hafeez was shown on a video broadcast on Sunday along with gun-toting militants who said they would behead him within 72 hours unless local detainees were released from Iraqi prisons. In the video, Hafeez appealed to President Pervez Musharraf to close down the Pakistani embassy in Iraq and repatriate all Pakistanis from the country. Pakistan said yesterday it would not bow to the demands of militants. It said it has sent people from its mission in Baghdad to try to negotiate the release of its national with the Iraqi authorities and religious leaders. Pakistan has no troops in Iraq, but the authorities are considering American and British requests to send them, only if they are part of a multinational force to protect the UN staff.
— PTI |
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Hussain elected
Pak PM Islamabad, June 29 Shujaat, (58) defeated his lone opposition rival Mukhdhum Amin Fahim by a margin of 114 votes in the election held in the 342-member National Assembly. Musharraf-loyalist Shujaat, a two-time former minister, got 190 votes against 76 votes of Fahim, a leader of the 14-party Alliance for Restoration of Democracy who belongs to former premier Benazir Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Speaker of the House, Amir Hussain, said. Shujaat will be sworn-in by Musharraf tomorrow, outgoing Prime Minister Jamali, also from the PML-Q, said. Islamic alliance Muttahida Majlis-e Amal (MMA), which has 68 seats in the House, stayed away from voting.
— PTI |
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SC rebuffs Bush on detainees’ rights
Washington, June 29 The Apex Court said the executive branch does not have the authority to deprive accused members of Al-Qaida or the Taliban of their liberty without giving them a day in court. The court also said the President may order a U.S citizen detained as an “enemy combatant”, but rejected Administration’s expansive interpretation of that authority. It ruled that such detainees were entitled to contest government’s case. In another ruling, the court determined that each of the 595 alleged members of Al-Qaida and the Taliban being held at the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has the right to ask a U.S. judge to set him free.
— PTI |
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Militants free 3 Turkish hostages
Baghdad, June 29 The Arab satellite station broadcast a videotape showing the three hostages kneeling in front of the three members of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s Tawhid and Jihad movement, as one of the militants read a statement. “For the sake of you, our brothers, and Muslims of Turkey ... we will release these hostages and send them safely home,” the statement said. Supporters of Al-Zarqawi, a suspected Al-Qaida terrorist, said on Saturday that they would behead the Turkish hostages within 72 hours unless the Turkish companies stopped doing business with the American forces in Iraq. They also called for huge demonstrations in Turkey against the war and the U.S. President, Mr George W. Bush, who is attending a NATO summit in Turkey. The following day, Turkey’s Defence Minister Vecdi Gonul reportedly said Turkey would not give in to terrorists’ threats. Turkish media reports have identified the three as Mustafa Bal, Mehmet Bakir and Abdulselam Bakir, all Turkish Kurds from Turkey’s Kurdish-dominated southeast.
— AP |
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9 die in Iraq
Baghdad, June 29 “Three Marines were killed and two wounded when a Marine convoy was attacked with a roadside bomb in east Baghdad at 2:00 am (0330 IST) on June 29,” a US military statement said. Interior Ministry spokesman Colonel Adnan Abdul Rahman said the bomb hit a US military convoy near the Canal Hotel on the east side of Baghdad. Abdul Rahman also said two Iraqi insurgents were killed in a three-hour gunfight after attacking a police station in Baghdad’s northern Adhamiya district. In the town of Mahmudiyah, 30 km south of the capital, one policeman was killed and another injured in an attack on police headquarters. In Karbala, assailants attacked the house of the chief of police with small-arms fire, wounding one policeman, according to a multinational force statement. A senior police officer in the northern oil city of Kirkuk was targeted by a bomb attack which killed his driver and wounded two of his guards, according to the city’s police chief. In Mosul two Kurdish peshmerga fighters were killed and two others injured by unknown attackers as they drove through the eastern Karama neighbourhood, a police officer said.
— AFP |
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US Marines kill 3 militants Kabul, June 29 The clash occurred on Saturday near Deh Rawood, the capital of the central province of Uruzgan, 400 km southwest of Kabul, American spokesman Major Rick Peat said. None of the Marines or any allied troops were wounded, he said in an e-mail yesterday. “The Marines did engage anti-coalition militants in the vicinity of Deh Rawood yesterday, killing three of them,” Peat said. “The Marines immediately searched them and found wire, detonators, and radio devices.” The US military deployed 2,000 extra Marines to Uruzgan, the home province of Taliban supreme leader Mullah Omar, in the spring in an attempt to keep the militants on the defensive in the run-up to September elections. The Marines, who have set up a base in Deh Rawood, led fighting in neighbouring Zabul province that the military says has killed more than 80 insurgents since May 25.
— AP |
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24 die in UN copter crash
Victims aboard the Russian-made Mi-8 also included the Russian crew, U.N. mission spokeswoman Sharon McPherson said. There was no immediate word on the cause of the crash. Russia’s ITAR-Tass news agency said the crash scene was in flames after the accident. The helicopter had taken off from Freetown, Sierra Leone’s capital, with 21 passengers and three crew members, said Daniel Adekera, another U.N. spokesman. Passengers included peacekeepers and other U.N. personnel and aid workers and other civilians, Adekera said. It was bound for the western city of Kailahun, he said. Ground crew lost radio contact with the aircraft and sent a search mission seven minutes later, Adekera said.
— AP |
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Murdered teenager’s parents to visit Punjab
London, June 29 Trevor and Hillary Foster will go to Punjab, where the murder suspect, Maninder Singh Kohli, had fled to from Southampton two days after Hannah’s body was found in March 2003. Hannah, a 17-year-old student who wanted to become a doctor, was abducted 500 yards from her home in Southampton. Two days later her body was found in Allington Lane, West End, Southampton. A post-mortem examination found that she had been raped and strangled. One of the largest murder inquiries ever undertaken by the Hampshire police was launched with more than 100 detectives at the height of the inquiry. However, despite a $ 70,000 reward and more than a year of manhunt, Kohli still remains at large. The couple will leave for India on July 10 and return on July 21. They are expected to attend a number of press conferences there to urge the public to come out with any information about Kohli before he harms somebody else’s daughter again. At a press conference yesterday Mr Foster said: “We are travelling to India to ensure everyone shares and understands our goal of bringing Hannah’s killer to justice, whatever the obstacles.” A spokesperson for the Hampshire Constabulary said: “Mr and Mrs Foster hope to raise awareness of the ongoing hunt for the man wanted in connection with Hannah’s death. They will also speak of a new telephone line being set up and run completely independently of the Hampshire Constabulary and the Punjab police to encourage people to call in with information as to Kohli’s whereabouts.” Kohli, a married sandwich delivery driver, stayed with his family in Punjab after fleeing from the UK. The family was then unaware of the police hunt. Kohli later left home and has not been traced by detectives since. In May this year, an anonymous letter sent to the Southampton Daily Echo from New Delhi said Kohli had an accomplice who helped him to flee from the UK last year. The letter, which was handed over to the police, named the accomplice and said the person had links to a terrorist organisation, although the police say they have looked into this claim and rejected it.
— UNI |
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India for task force on communication Islamabad, June 29 “A continuous dialogue and exchange of information on technologies, growth as well as projects will greatly help. I urge setting up of a task force to continuously monitor the development in the communications sector,” Union Communications and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran said at the SAARC Communication Ministers’ Conference here. This task force, he suggested, could be set up under the SAARC Secretariat and perform such functions as members would assign it. Mr Maran said the task force could develop performance indicators in the telecom sector, which would serve as a guideline to the policy makers in the region. He stressed on providing Internet and broadband facilities, digitalising inter-country links in a time-bound manner, strong cooperation in R&D in telecom and exchanging human resources to impart training on technologies.
— PTI |
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Priest of Indian origin faces sexual abuse charges Washington, June 29 Rev Simon Palathingal (62) has been in jail awaiting a hearing since his arrest outside his church rectory in South Amboy, New Jersey, on June 3, The ‘Times-Picayune of New Orleans reports. Advocates for sexual abuse victims distributed leaflets outside Roman Catholic Parishes in two states where Palathingal worked. Last week, a New Jersey judge revoked bail for Palathingal, who is accused of sexually assaulting a nine-year old Milwaukee boy in 1990 and 1991, because of concerns about an investigation in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and rumours that the priest’s family in India might be able to post $1.25 million bail before he could be extradited to
Wisconsin. — PTI |
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6 Indians held in Nepal for carrying arms
Kathmandu, June 29 The arrested Indians include two security personnel, Raj Bahadur Singh and Chhatrapal Singh, three others identified as Brajesh Singh, Dhirendra Singh and KK Gupta apart from the driver of the vehicle, Superintendent of Police Dipak Ranjit said. A gun and some pistols were recovered from the six, the SP said, adding that one of the arrested, Brajesh Singh, said he was the brother of Uttar Pradesh minister Suren Singh. They had entered Nepal from Sunauli and were arrested at the Thankot check post in Kathmandu. The police said it was investigating the incident and the Indian Embassy had been informed about the arrests.
— UNI |
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Yemeni rebel leader killed Sanna, June 29 The weekly, September 26, said on its web site that Zaid bin Ali al-Houthi was the deputy commander of ‘’The Believing Youth’’, whose leader Hussein al-Houthi and supporters have clashed with the police in a mountainous region in northern Yemen since last week. At least 51 supporters of Shi’ite cleric Hussein al-Houthi have been killed by the government troops besieging them in Saada province since June 20. More than 50 have been arrested.
— Reuters |
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Baghdad, June 29
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Freetown, (Sierra Leone), June 29