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THE TRIBUNE SPECIALS
50 YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE

TERCENTENARY CELEBRATIONS
W O R L D

Balance of power must for peace,
says Pervez

Islamabad, April 27
President General Pervez Musharraf said here on Tuesday that balance of power was the best guarantee for peace and Pakistan would maintain its minimum defensive deterrence both in the conventional and non-conventional areas. The President who was speaking at the 58th Formation Commanders’ Conference at the General Headquarters, praised the advanced weaponry developed by various arms of the forces.


Rahul Gandhi accepts the highest award for foreigners on behalf of Jawaharlal Nehru from South African President Thabo Mbeki

Rahul Gandhi (left) accepts the highest award for foreigners on behalf of Jawaharlal Nehru from South African President Thabo Mbeki (centre) and Chancellor of National Orders Rev Frank Chikanea (right) at Union Building in Pretoria, South Africa, on Tuesday. — AP/PTI photo

WB to appoint expert for Indo-Pak treaty
Washington, April 27
The World Bank has announced that it is ready to appoint a neutral expert to resolve the Baglihar issue between India and Pakistan.

50 dead in Lanka train accident
Colombo, April 27
More than 50 bus passengers were feared dead and at least 40 injured after a train rammed into the overcrowded vehicle at a level crossing in Sri Lanka today, officials said. None of the passengers and crew on the crowded morning train were hurt, a railway official said, but it was one of the island’s worst accidents in years.





A Yongtai nun and a Shaolin monk perform a new show
A Yongtai nun and a Shaolin monk perform a new show, "Lotus&Sword", in Barcelona, Spain, on Tuesday. The Chinese troupe is in Barcelona to take part in a spectacular show that has made them famous across the globe. — Reuters

EARLIER STORIES

 
The world’s biggest airliner, Airbus A380, a 555-passenger superjumbo twin-deck aircraft, takes off on its maiden flight World’s biggest airplane takes off
Toulouse, France, April 27

The world’s biggest airplane, the Airbus double-decker A380, soared effortlessly into the sky today on one of the most eagerly awaited maiden flights since the supersonic Concorde took off in 1969.
The world’s biggest airliner, Airbus A380, a 555-passenger superjumbo twin-deck aircraft, takes off on its maiden flight at the Toulouse-Blagnac airport in southwestern France on Wednesday.
— Reuters photo

Patients sue company
Want access to experimental drug
Two Parkinson’s disease patients on Tuesday sued Amgen Incorporation to force the biotechnology giant to provide an experimental and potentially dangerous drug that the patients and their families view as their only hope.

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Balance of power must for peace, says Pervez
Ihtasham ul Haque
By arrangement with The Dawn

Islamabad, April 27
President General Pervez Musharraf said here on Tuesday that balance of power was the best guarantee for peace and Pakistan would maintain its minimum defensive deterrence both in the conventional and non-conventional areas. The President who was speaking at the 58th Formation Commanders’ Conference at the General Headquarters (GHQ), praised the advanced weaponry developed by various arms of the forces.

About 150 generals attending the conference reviewed the threat and response parameters for the country’s defence, especially against the backdrop of India’s Cold Start Doctrine.

The new Indian war doctrine was unveiled by India’s army chief, Gen N.C. Vij, on March 4, 2004, while inaugurating a two-day seminar on ‘Army 2020: shape and size and structure and general doctrine for emerging challenges’.

According to a press release of the Inter Services Public Relations, the conference was briefed on the threat spectrum including the ‘Cold Start Doctrine’ propagated last year by India, newly raised South Western Command, Rapid Reaction Force, Special Forces Command, Indian force goals and the status of their development plans.

The participants discussed various implications of the threat and response parameters.

The conference also reviewed the army’s employment on UN peacekeeping missions and noted with pride that now Pakistan was the largest contributor to the UN peacekeeping missions with around 9,500 troops employed in various parts of the world, mostly in African countries.

Towards the end of the two-day session, the participants witnessed a display of indigenously developed defence equipment and vehicles.

While some of the equipment were value-added version of the combat equipment already in service in the army, the others were to act as force multiplier.

The conference note with utmost satisfaction that the indigenous defence industry was progressing well and had earned international recognition.

Besides it was ensuring greater self-reliance and contribution to the national economy.

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WB to appoint expert for Indo-Pak treaty
T.V. Parasuram

Washington, April 27
The World Bank (WB) has announced that it is ready to appoint a neutral expert to resolve the Baglihar issue between India and Pakistan.

The bank, which is a signatory to the 1960 Indus Water Treaty between the two countries, was approached by Pakistan for arbitration in the issue of the construction of the Baglihar hydro-power project by India in Jammu and Kashmir after the failure of talks with New Delhi early this year.

The bank had now begun the process of consultation required by the treaty for the appointment of the neutral expert, it said. — PTI

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50 dead in Lanka train accident

Colombo, April 27
More than 50 bus passengers were feared dead and at least 40 injured after a train rammed into the overcrowded vehicle at a level crossing in Sri Lanka today, officials said.

None of the passengers and crew on the crowded morning train were hurt, a railway official said, but it was one of the island’s worst accidents in years.

“The train hit the centre of the bus and dragged it for about 500 metres on the track before it could be halted,” Mr Asoka Ratnaweera, Deputy Inspector-General of Police in the island’s North Western Province, told Reuters.

“The bus had started to burn under the impact of the collision and we have got the fire brigade at the scene right now,” he said.

Mr Ratnaweera said rescue workers had removed 33 bodies so far and details of more victims were not yet available. A police spokeswoman said earlier that at least 60 were feared dead when the train hit the packed bus carrying many people to work.

The crash took place around 8.30 am (0230 GMT) at a level crossing in Polgahawela town, about 60 km (40 miles) northeast of the capital, she said. — Reuters

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World’s biggest airplane takes off

Toulouse, France, April 27
The world’s biggest airplane, the Airbus double-decker A380, soared effortlessly into the sky today on one of the most eagerly awaited maiden flights since the supersonic Concorde took off in 1969.

The A380, which is designed to carry 555 passengers but has room for more than 800, lumbered down the runway before gathering speed and taking off from Airbus headquarters near Toulouse in southern France.

Thousands of enthusiasts cheered outside the perimeter fence as the plane, carrying just a six-man test crew and equipment for a test flight expected to last two to fours hours, pulled away over open countryside towards the Atlantic Ocean.

The A380 is a key weapon in the battle by Airbus in which European aerospace group EADS has an 80 per cent stake to keep its edge over US plane maker Boeing Co. Boeing is banking on customers wanting to buy smaller long-range airliners.

“We told you the A380 would fly on this day at 10:30 and it flew right on time,’’ Airbus chief executive Noel Forgeard said.

Airbus said the A380 had made aviation history and set out plans for up to 2,500 hours of test flights to pave the way for the A380 to enter service in the second half of 2006.

Jacques Rosay, one of the test pilots, said: “The speed on takeoff was exactly as we had expected. The weather is wonderful. Everything is absolutely perfect and we are very happy.’’

It has taken more than a decade and some 12 billion euros ($15.68 billion) to develop the A380. It has been subsidised by European governments and has yet to prove it can make a profit.

The A380 ended the four-decade reign of Boeing’s 747 jumbo as the biggest airliner to have flown. It looks like a 747 with the upper deck stretched all the way to the tail.

French President Jacques Chirac has hailed the project as “an immense European success’’ and described the new plane as a “cruise ship of the skies’’. The French Cabinet, meeting at the time, burst into applause when Mr Chirac announced the takeoff.

The A380 is 15 metres wider, four metres taller, two metres longer and 118 tonnes heavier than the 747 jumbo, which helped change the airline business.

The length of eight London buses, it has enough room on its wings to park 70 cars.

The plane has a list price of $285 million. Airbus says it needs to sell 250 of the A380 planes to break even although some analysts put the figure as high as 700. — Reuters

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Patients sue company
Want access to experimental drug
Denise Gellene

Two Parkinson’s disease patients on Tuesday sued Amgen Incorporation to force the biotechnology giant to provide an experimental and potentially dangerous drug that the patients and their families view as their only hope.

Medical ethicists said the case was unusual because it pitted desperately ill patients and their physicians against a drug company. In that sense, it differs from the early struggles of AIDS patients for access to unapproved medications.

“In those cases, drug companies and doctors agreed the drugs weren’t ready,” said Jonathan Moreno, a medical ethicist at the University of Virginia.

The suit, filed in federal court in New York, demands that Amgen offer the Parkinson’s medicine to patients who had once received it in a clinical trial that ended last year.

The patients said they went to court after months of begging Amgen for the drug, which they considered a godsend. Robert Suthers, 70, said the drug quelled his tremors and restored his energy; now he lacks the strength and coordination to bathe himself.

“It was tremendous,” he said, recalling his treatment with GDNF. “I could walk two miles like it was nothing.”

The patients’ pleas stand in poignant contrast to the accusations leveled at manufacturers in the recent debate over drug safety. The withdrawals of painkillers Vioxx and Bextra came amid assertions that companies failed to protect patients from rare but harmful side effects.

The Parkinson’s patients want to assume the risks of taking the Amgen drug, but the company won’t allow them to do so.

“The shoe is on the wrong foot,” said Arthur Caplan, a medical ethicist at the University of Pennsylvania.

Amgen declined to comment on the lawsuit.

Amgen broke its contract with patients when it pulled the drug, the suit charges. Patients allowed physicians to “drill holes in their brains and insert catheters’’ in return for the right to receive “GDNF indefinitely.”

The case could redefine the obligations of drug companies to participants in clinical trials, Moreno said. If experts believed that an experimental drug had a benefit, a company might have an obligation to continue testing it.

— By arrangement with the LA Times-Washington Post

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