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Pak Ministers oppose military action in Baluchistan
Pak to move World Bank over Baglihar dam
Catholic archbishop abducted in Iraq
Ghost fear torments tsunami survivors
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Racist crime touches new high in Britain
25 NRIs convicted for sham marriages
Muslim women must remove veils during case: court
LTTE chief Prabhakaran alive
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Pak Ministers oppose military action in Baluchistan
Islamabad, January 18 The meeting was held under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz. Sources said an overwhelming majority of the federal ministers opposed launching military action and there was a consensus for providing full protection to gas installations and, side by side, making efforts to find a political solution to the crisis." President Pervez Musharraf presided over another meeting attended by heads of coalition parties and Prime Minister Aziz at the Prime Minister's House after the cabinet meeting to endorse the cabinet's decision on the Baluchistan situation. Ministers of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement opposed any military operation and reiterated the stand taken by the party leader, Altaf Hussain, against any such move, the sources said. The MQM chief, it may be mentioned, has announced that his party will quit the government if military action is launched in Baluchistan. The cabinet decided that the federal government would utilise all resources to protect vital installations in Baluchistan, an official press release said. During a press briefing, Minister for Information Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said at the second meeting presided over by Gen Musharraf, the heads of coalition parties held a 'fruitful' discussion on various options. The government endorsed the efforts initiated by PML president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain for a political solution and decided to beef up security in and around the gasfields by deploying both army and paramilitary personnel. Replying to a question on a statement issued by Nawab Akbar Bugti, the minister angrily said: "I am not a tenant of any Sardar ... Neither I nor the interior minister had declared war ... It (the war) has been declared by elements who fired hundreds of rockets and ... damaged the national economy." He also accused an unspecified 'enemy' who, he said, was trying to destroy the country's industry and harm its economy. When asked if the government action to protect the installations 'at all costs' implied a military action, the minister said: "We will ensure writ of law at all costs." The cabinet meeting was given a detailed briefing by heads of intelligence agencies, including the director-general of the Intelligence Bureau and the director-general of the Military Intelligence. Balochistan Governor Owais Ghani and Chief Minister Jam Yusuf updated the cabinet members on the situation. The cabinet was also briefed by Interior Minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao about the security situation. The cabinet was informed that the lady doctor's alleged rape case had been blown up 'out of proportion' and that the issue needed to be resolved by using 'all means'. The meeting agreed to set up committees at the levels of the provincial and federal government. The sources said that the cabinet had endorsed the policy of setting up cantonments in troubled areas of Balochistan. The information minister said that the government was aware of all aspects, including the possible involvement of Al Qaeda network in the recent incidents in Gilgit and Skardu and the situation in Balochistan. He acknowledged that the meeting also discussed a long-term strategy and said that the federal government was already spending Rs130 billion on development projects in Baluchistan and said that people who were creating a law and order situation were against development. |
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Pak to move World Bank over Baglihar dam
Islamabad, January 18 “Pakistan has made a formal request to the President of the World Bank, who has also been requested to appoint a neutral expert as provided in the Indus Water Treaty, 1960,’’ Foreign Ministry spokesman Masood Khan told a press briefing here this afternoon. Mr Khan said Pakistan’s Ambassador to the USA, General (retd) Jehangir Karamat is meeting the World Bank President today to discuss appointment of the neutral expert. A decision to move the World Bank was taken at yesterday’s high level meeting in Islamabad last morning chaired by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz. “After having failed to resolve the differences at the level of permanent Indus Water Commission and bilaterally over Baglihar hydroelectric dam, being constructed on the river Chenab in violation of the Indus Water Treaty, 1960, Pakistan has decided to invoke provisions of the treaty and approach the World Bank for appointment of a neutral expert,’’ Mr Masood Khan said. The World Bank brokered the bilateral water-sharing treaty and also stood as its guarantor. The treaty gives both countries the third-party option in case of a deadlock over any issue.
— UNI |
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Catholic archbishop abducted in Iraq
Mosul, January 18 Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh said his US-backed interim government was “prepared for the worst” as insurgent attacks killed several persons in the past 48 hours. Archbishop Basile Georges Casmoussa (66), leader of Mosul’s Syrian Catholic community, was seized by gunmen when he was about to enter his car, local priest Father Faraj said. The kidnappers then tossed him into the trunk of their vehicle before speeding away, said the priest, who follows the rival Chaldean rite. The Chaldean patriarch in Baghdad, Emmanuel Delly, said Casmoussa was abducted outside his home as he was returning from a pastoral visit in the diocese of Mosul. “He was abducted and taken off in a car. We don’t know who took him, nor the reason why,” Delly told the missionary news agency Misna. “We gave the news to the Vatican and now we are doing everything possible to trace him and we hope we can save him.” The motive of the abuction was not immediately clear but it came amid mounting sectarian violence in the run-up to this month’s election. BEIJING: Eight Chinese labourers, working in a project to rebuild an Iraqi plant, have been kidnapped by militants in the war-torn country.
Chinese diplomats in Baghdad said the eight construction workers hailing from the southern province of Fujian have been abducted by militants in Iraq, the official Xinhua news agency reported today.
The diplomats said they were making all efforts to rescue the eight hostages, who went missing last week while travelling to Jordan.
A video tape aired by the pan-Arab al-Jazeera TV channel today showed the eight hostages holding Chinese passports standing in a row, flanked by masked militants who read a
statement, demanding the Chinese government clarify its stance on Iraq.
The kidnapping incident took place ahead of a visit to China by Deputy President Rowsch Nuri Shaways of the Iraqi Interim Government from January 20.
— PTI, AFP
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Ghost fear torments tsunami survivors
Phuket, January 18 In the wake of last month’s tsunami, stories about people seeing, hearing or even being possessed by ghosts are echoing along Asian coastlines, where thousands were swept away. In Banda Aceh, the devastated capital of Indonesia’s hardest-hit Aceh province, residents living on the banks of the Kruengdhoi said they heard cries of “help’’ every evening from under the water for two weeks after December 26 disaster. Soldiers have recovered dozens of bodies from the debris-clogged waterway. Adek, 22, a university student, said he was going to pray at a mosque on the river’s banks when he saw two spirits. One was the apparent owner of a home who went in, but faded into a shadow. When Adek went to follow, the door was locked and no one was in sight.
— AP |
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Racist crime touches new high in Britain
RACIST crime in England and Wales reached record levels last year. Figures published by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) today show that prosecutions of racially aggravated offences have increased by 2,500 since the race hate laws were introduced in 1999. In the last two years these prosecutions have jumped by more than 20 per cent.
The report confirms fears raised by Muslim and Asian leaders that there is a link between the war on terror and a rise in racist incidents. Last year the Director of Public Prosecutions warned that a growth in race-hate crime and a sharp rise in the number of young Asian men being stopped by the police threatened to alienate Britain's Muslim communities. This picture is supported by prosecutions of religiously aggravated crime which has more than doubled in the last year with Muslims identified as the victims in a half of all cases. Of the 49 cases one involved a passenger in a minicab who subjected the Muslim driver to a torrent of racially and religiously abusive language. After pleading guilty to religiously aggravated common assault he received four months imprisonment. Ken Macdonald told the Independent last year that the typical race-hate element of a crime involved white youths calling Asians "Mullahs, Bin Ladens or
Taliban". The CPS said there was also evidence of inter-racial religious hatred crime. A 12-year-old Sikh boy was attacked by a 14-year-old Muslim boy who threw a lighted aerosol at him, setting his hair and turban alight. He was convicted last year of religiously aggravated actual bodily harm and sentenced to a three-month action plan order and made to pay the victim (pounds sterling)200 compensation and (pounds sterling)100 costs. Between April 2003 and the end of March 2004, the CPS dealt with 4,728 racially aggravated cases and prosecuted 3616 of them. The figures also suggest that other cases are not being prosecuted because of difficulties getting witnesses to give evidence in court. Ken Macdonald QC, Director of Public Prosecutions, said: "I am reassured that the conviction rate for racially aggravated offences remains high but there is still work to be done. In this report witness difficulties accounted for 26 per cent of dropped charges. We have high hopes that the witness care units, which are being rolled out to all 42 criminal justice areas in England and Wales, will provide more dedicated care to witnesses to help them attend court for all types of case." By arrangement with
The Dawn |
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25 NRIs convicted for sham marriages
London, January 18 Ringleaders Salim Mullan (50) from Leicester and Ibrahim Umarji (66) from East Ham, London, were jailed for four years each after they admitted helping illegal immigrants enter the country through the sham marriages. Twentythree others received jail terms of up to three years for their part in the racket. One woman was given a suspended sentence. Mullan’s wife, Jahara, was jailed for one year after pleading guilty to money laundering. She had nearly £ 80,000 in two bank accounts, the Leicester Crown Court was told. The court heard that the ceremonies were set up in an attempt to beat the UK immigration system. One of the bogus brides connected with the case married as many as six men over a period of five years. Delivering the sentence yesterday, Judge Simon Hammond said: “Clearly this was a well-planned and sophisticated operation involving recruitment of stooges in this country.”
— PTI |
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Muslim women must remove veils during case: court
Wellington, January 18 The Auckland District Court said Fouzya Salim and Feraiba Razamjoo, witnesses in an insurance fraud case, must show their faces to the judge, lawyers and female court staff, but would be screened from full public view. The women, both Afghans who moved to New Zealand as refugees, have refused to remove their burqas in court while giving evidence for the prosecution, saying it would violate their Islamic customs to show their faces in public. Defence lawyers have insisted on seeing their faces when they testify, saying “we need to see the body language” of witnesses.
— AP |
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LTTE chief Prabhakaran alive
Colombo, January 18 The LTTE’s peace secretariat website last night released a number of photographs of the rebel chief addressing a group of Tamil intellectuals and tsunami disaster management planners yesterday in Kilinochchi. The speculation of the rebel chief being killed in the tsunami disaster, was triggered off when the state-run Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC) quoted Chief of Defence Staff and Navy Commander Vice-Admiral Daya Sandagiri as saying that Prabhakaran and his intelligence wing head Pottu Amman had gone missing after the killer wave devastated Mullaitivu, where the LTTE have many of their military bases. This had resulted the local newspapers, publishing a number of speculative reports about Prabhakaran and his family becoming tsunami victims around Mullaitivu, where over 3,000 persons were killed.
— UNI |
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