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Advani fails to find ancestral house
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Advani strikes balance between peace, Parivar Malik stays away from meeting
with Aziz
Pak wants to inspect Kishenganga project
Peace process moving at ‘good speed’: Musharraf
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India, Pak move towards energy agreement
Islamabad, June 5 “Common interest of India, Pakistan lies in accessing low cost energy and affordable fuel from neighbourhood stretching the countries of Iran, Turkmenistan, Qatar and spreading to the Caspian Sea. Both countries have agreed to hold discussion on the Iran-India gas pipeline via Pakistan and other pipelines,” said Indian Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar. Addressing a press conference after meeting his counterpart Mr Amanulah Khan Jadoon, Minister of Petroleum and Natural Resources, Pakistan, Mr Aiyar said: “We have discussed the modalities of the bilateral talks between India and Pakistan, scheduled to continue tomorrow as well. On the Indian side, GAIL CMD Prashanto Banerjee made a presentation on the proposed project including issues relating to the investment, transmission and security aspects.” Pakistan officials will made a presentation tomorrow and later Mr Aiyar will meet Commerce Minister of Pakistan and call on Pakistan Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz. He is also expected to meet Pakistan President Musharraf before leaving for Tehran via Baku. Meanwhile, Pakistan has invited Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh to visit Islamabad as a follow-up of the Indian minister’s visit to Pakistan and Iran. “Pakistan has signalled its readiness to recognize India’s interests in the participation of Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline. On its part India has also shown readiness to study the feasibility of accessing gas from Turkmenistan via Afghanistan and Pakistan to India,” said Mr Aiyar. Earlier, Mr Aiyar along with media team from India reached Pakistan yesterday via Wagah border and visited his natal home in Lahore. Referring to the US opposition to the project, Mr Aiyar said, “We have informed Pakistan about the security concerns raised by the US. But we are also hopeful that the US will also recognise India’s energy needs. We have already held six rounds of ministerial talks besides nine rounds of official talks with Iran.” Asked about any feasibility report undertaken by India on the proposed Iran-India gas pipeline, Mr Aiyar said: “A study has been undertaken by BILT, but both India and Pakistan will still have to study the details of the project including final pricing of gas at India’s doorstep.” Earlier, talking to Indian mediapersons, Mr Ahmad Waqar, Petroleum Secretary, Pakistan said, “In view of the 7-8 per cent high growth rate of GDP, India and Pakistan both require gas to meet their demand. We need gas anyway to meet our requirements of 50 per cent gas equivalent to 51 million tonne oil.” India is welcome to join all the “pipelines as the investment required would be in billions of dollars in each project.” It is understood that though agreeing with the proposed pipeline, Islamabad has also moved on the table “ Turkmenistan-Pakistan gas pipeline via Afghanistan that can be extended to New Delhi to meet its energy requirements” besides working on the Iran gas pipeline. The indications are that in view of the US concerns, Pakistan is showing more interest in convincing India to a partner in the Turkmenistan and/or Qatar gas pipeline project while asking New Delhi to independently push Iran project though it will consider the transit issue. |
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Advani fails to find ancestral house
Karachi, June 5 As Mr Advani reached Plot No JM-133, in what was then Aimil Colony, under a heavy police escort and was surrounded by local residents, he looked around for his ancestral double-storey six-bedroom ‘Lal Cottage’, which his father Kishanchand Dharamdas Advani had named after him. Though Mr Advani was lucky enough to see the old house during his last visit to Karachi in 1978, what he saw today was a multi-storey apartment in its place. The only remnants of the Haveli spread over 1,350 square yards that Mr Advani’s father sold to an Arab, Abdul Jaleel Bin Mohammed for Rs 80,000 after Partition were the sale deed preserved by present owner Iqbal Hussein Jeevani, a Gujarati and two iron gates that now adorn the entry to the residence of Mohammed Mamsa, who had received the BJP President during an earlier visit. Mr Advani, who along with his family went inside the new house, proudly showed the sale deed to his daughter Pratibha, who said the date of the sale coincided with her birthday on September 6. “It is a very emotional moment,” she said. “Now that we (Indians and Pakistanis) are getting to be friends, the fact that a prominent person like Mr Advani stayed here seems very nice,” said Jeevani inviting Mr Advani’s son Jayant to be his guest during their next visit to Karachi. Mr Advani also asked the Indian officials to arrange for a photocopy of the sale deed. The Leader of Opposition also sat on the bed, which once belonged to him, and saw a cupboard, which was sold by his father. However, Mr Advani’s wife Kamala was not as lucky as she could not locate the house near the Regal building in the city’s Sadar area, which she had left with her parents in 1947. “Now there is an electronic market in the area and the entire landscape has changed. Even the gurdwara, which was there, does not exist,” she said. However, Mrs Kamala said she was not disappointed as Mr Advani’s house was also hers. Equally unlucky were Advani’s Private Secretary Deepak Chopra’s wife, who was also looking for her house and so was his Political Secretary Sudheendra Kulkarni, who was searching for his mother-in-law’s erstwhile residence.
— PTI |
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Advani strikes balance between peace, Parivar Karachi, June 5 Under attack from the Sangh Parivar outfits over his remarks here on issues ranging from Babri demolition to the Partition, Mr Advani sought to strike a balance, saying that hardening of positions in certain sections of society in India and Pakistan were rooted in history. “This is the reason why even well-intentioned moves for peace and normalisation are often viewed with suspicion and met with disapproval on both sides,” Mr Advani said and appealed to those involved in the Indo-Pak peace process to “give due weightage to these critical viewpoints.” “Nothing can be achieved by either dismissing or disparaging these critical viewpoints,” he said, addressing a function organised by the Karachi Council on Foreign Relations, Economic Affairs and Law. Maintaining that those who viewed the peace process with suspicion in both countries were “not insubstantial” in number, he said, “in our endeavour to establish lasting peace in India and Pakistan, it is axiomatic that we should strive to carry with us all sections of society and public opinion in two countries.” — PTI
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Advani defends statement on Jinnah Karachi, June 5 Addressing the Karachi Council on Foreign Relations, Economic Affairs and Law here on the eve of the completion of his week-long visit to Pakistan, he clarified that it was appropriate for him to read out the relevant portion from Mr Jinnah’s speech after the Pakistan Government invited him to lay the foundation stone for a project to restore Katas Raj temples in Chakwal district four days ago. “What had been stated in his speech was equality of all citizens in the eyes of the state and freedom of faith for all citizens,” he noted, adding, “we in India call it a secular or a non-theocratic state.” The BJP President asserted that there was no place for bigotry, hatred, intolerance and discrimination in the name of religion in a secular state. “And there can certainly be no place, much less state protection, for religious extremism and terrorism in such a state,” he said. — UNI
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Malik stays away from meeting with Aziz Islamabad, June 5 Neither Malik nor the Pakistan side was willing to give any reason for the JKLF leader’s absence at the talks. As for the talks between Aziz and separatist leaders, they followed the familiar line — Kashmiris should be involved in the talks between India and Pakistan aimed at finding a solution to the Kashmir issue. After the meeting, addressing a press conference with Hurriyat Conference Chairman Mirwai Umer Farooq, the Prime Minister said any talks aimed at resolving the Kashmir problem should involve three stakeholders — Kashmiris, Pakistan and India. Asked about Pakistan’s stand now on UN resolutions on Kashmir, Aziz said it still stood by them but if a solution emerges hypothetically out of the talks involving the three parties, it would take the peace process towards the resolution of the Kashmir issue. Farooq said the Pakistan Government had assured them that it would continue to make efforts for their participation in the dialogue between India and Pakistan to resolve the Kashmir problem. — PTI
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Pak wants to inspect Kishenganga project
Islamabad, June 5 “We have asked India to allow site inspection (of Kishenganga project) and hopefully it will do so,” Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, here on Saturday, said, adding that a team of experts would be visiting India shortly. He was talking to reporters at the Prime Minister’s House after presiding over a meeting on the Kishenganga and Baglihar projects. The meeting was attended by top officials of the foreign office, law and water and power ministries and Pakistan Indus Commissioner and others. The meeting decided to send a team comprising the Attorney-General of Pakistan, Water and Power Secretary and other experts to Paris to attend a meeting convened on June 9-10 by neutral expert appointed by the World Bank to address differences between the two countries on the Baglihar hydro-power project. Mr Aziz said Pakistan Indus Commissioner Syed Jamaat Ali Shah briefed the meeting about his discussions with the Indian authorities early this week on the Kishenganga project. He said Pakistan desired that the disputes should be resolved in accordance with the provisions of the treaty and it would accept the decision of the neutral expert. |
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Peace process moving at ‘good speed’: Musharraf
Dubai, June 5 Musharraf, who arrived on a two-day visit to the UAE yesterday, said the conducive environment of goodwill, witnessed now, had never been there before. “We have had the joint statement, which was not there earlier when we went to discuss peace with India...so things are moving in the right direction,” he was quoted as saying by the local media here. “The peace process is moving ahead at a fairly good speed, but it will take time to remove the hatred of 50 years, when both countries went to war three times, besides tens of skirmishes,” he said.
— PTI |
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