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Bush admits giving order on eavesdropping
Nepal has not received arms from Pak: Army chief
Pak should lift ban on Indian films: Yash Chopra
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Nawaz to fly to Britain next week
Kanishka: Malik flays
Canadian Govt
Jack Anderson dead
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Bush admits giving order on eavesdropping
President
George W. Bush on Saturday admitted that he had authorised electronic eavesdropping on US citizens after September 11, 2001, and criticised the media for jeopardising national security by revealing his actions. The spying reportedly took place without authorisation from any court.
Acknowledging a report in The New York Times that he had given the National Security Agency (NSA) the licence to eavesdrop on Americans communicating with people overseas, Mr Bush maintained this was “fully consistent” with his “constitutional responsibilities and authorities.” In a radio address, Mr Bush said he allowed the NSA “to intercept the international communications of people with known links to the Al-Qaida and related terrorist organisations.” The NSA is barred from domestic spying. However, it can get warrants issued with the permission of a special court called the
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Court. “In this first war of the 21st century, one of the most critical battlefronts is the home front. And since September 11, 2001, we’ve been on the offensive against the terrorists plotting within our borders,” he said. Mr Bush criticised the press for revealing this programme earlier in the week. “Yesterday the existence of this secret programme was revealed in media reports, after being improperly provided to news organisations. As a result, our enemies have learned information they should not have, and the unauthorised disclosure of this effort damages our national security and puts our citizens at risk,” he said. He defended the programme saying it was crucial to national security and designed “to detect and prevent terrorist attacks.” He said he authorised the programme “more than 30 times” since the September 11 attacks on the USA and signalled he intended to do so “as long as our nation faces a continuing threat from the The President said two of the hijackers who flew an airplane into the Pentagon on September 11 — Nawaf al-Hamzi and Khalid al-Mihdar — communicated while they were in the USA with other members of the Al-Qaida who were overseas. “But we didn’t know they were here, until it was too late,” he added. He said the authorisations to spy on Americans had made it “more likely that killers like these 9/11 hijackers will be identified and located in time, and the activities conducted under this authorisation have helped detect and prevent possible terrorist attacks in the United States and abroad.” On Friday, the revelation of espionage led many US
Senators to block the extension of the USA Patriot Act that gave the Federal Bureau of Investigation greater
surveillance power that civil liberties groups say infringes on people’s rights. The controversial Act, implemented after the September 11 attacks, is set to expire on December 31. Mr Bush criticised members of the US Congress for
blocking the act. Reacting sharply to Mr Bush’s admission of the surveillance programme yesterday, Senator Russell Feingold, Wisconsin Democrat, said: “The President believes that he has the power to override the laws that Congress has passed... He is a
President, not a king.” American Civil Liberties Union director Caroline Fredrickson in Washington pointed out that eavesdropping on conversations of US citizens and others in the USA without a court order and without complying with the procedures of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was both illegal and unconstitutional. Meanwhile, New York Times’ Executive Editor Bill Keller said the newspaper postponed publication of the article for a year at the White House’s request. After considering the legal and civil liberties aspects, the paper ran the story this week, Mr Keller said of Friday. |
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Nepal has not received arms from Pak: Army chief
Kathmandu, December 18 Stating this, Thapa, who returned yesterday from a week-long visit to Pakistan, added that the Pakistan Army had, however, provided training to the Nepalese Army. Training is the main field of cooperation between the two armies, the Nepalese Army chief told reporters. Thapa, who met President Pervez Musharraf and other high-ranking Pakistani Army officials during his visit, noted that Pakistan had previously also provided training to the Royal Nepal Army. He said his talks with the Pakistani officials focussed only on that topic. The Nepalese Army chief said that his talks in Pakistan were not regarding providing weapons to the Nepalese Army. “I feel that the visit has further strengthened bilateral relations,” he said. Thapa also announced that the Army would provide job opportunities to the family members of the 11 innocent civilians killed by a soldier at Nagarkot recently. After his arrival from Pakistan, Thapa went straight to the Army Hospital at Chhauni to visit those injured in the shooting. He assured the injured that action will be taken as per the report of the probe committee.
— PTI |
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Pak should lift ban on Indian films: Yash Chopra
Dubai, December 18 Talking to The Gulf Today on the last day of the Dubai International Film Festival (DIFF) 2005, he said the screening of Indian films would benefit the Pakistan Government, film distributors as well as film-makers from both countries. ''It is a known fact that each and every Pakistani loves to watch Indian films. Since they are not allowed to be screened in theatres, they opt for the pirated version of DVDs and VCDs of Indian films,'' he said. Chopra pointed out that various studies had revealed that the government and the film fraternity across the border were losing millions of rupees every year due to the ban on Indian film screenings in theatres. This, the veteran filmmaker said, had created a market for the pirated DVDs and VCDs of Bollywood blockbusters. ''If the government removes the ban, it will fetch them millions of rupees and also benefit film distributors in Pakistan along with Indian film-makers,'' he noted. He said the apprehension that the import of Indian films would mar the prospects of Pakistani cinema, was baseless. ''It is wrong. In fact, they will improve if they face competition. The opening up will provide them with the much-needed exposure,'' he opined. Chopra said, ''If Indian films can do brisk business in the USA, UK and West Asia, why can't Pakistani films achieve the same status ?'' ''Dubai is a place where East meets West, Arabs get closer to non-Arabs and films from Bollywood, Hollywood and Arab World are equally popular. These factors would certainly help the festival attain that stature soon," he said. He suggested that more mainstream Indian films should be screened during the festival, which would involve the local residents as well. — UNI
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Nawaz to fly to Britain next week
Islamabad, December 18 The PML-N Information Secretary said that he could confirm that Saudi protocol authorities had handed over some 20 passports with British visas to Mr Sharif, his family members and servants. He said Mr Sharif was expected to fly to Britain on December 24 or 25. Meanwhile, a source in the party told Dawn that Mr Sharif wanted to pay a farewell call on King Abdullah and other members of the Saudi royal family to thank them for extending hospitality to him during his stay in Saudi Arabia. The meeting is expected to take place in a couple of days. For the past three weeks Mr Sharif had been waiting to get the UK visa as he had wanted to visit London where his son Hasan was undergoing medical treatment. The source said that initially Mr Sharif had no plan to take part in political activities, and would focus solely on the treatment of his ailing son. But, he said, Mr Sharif would definitely meet politicians visiting London to enquire about his son’s health. He said that many local leaders of the party were also planning to visit London following Mr Sharif’s arrival in
the city. |
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Kanishka: Malik flays
Canadian Govt
Vancouver, December 18 In a related development, Malik has also initiated a lawsuit in British Columbia Supreme Court in an attempt to reclaim his position as a director on the Khalsa Credit Union. “It’s unfair, but there is nothing I can do... I have no money to fight them,” Malik told a Canadian daily in an interview. The BC Government has sent letters to the Vancouver-based millionaire businessman Malik and
co-defendant in the Kanishka trial, Kamloops millworker Ajaib Singh Bagri, as a first step in recovering the loan. It has demanded that the two repay the $16-million the government spent on defence lawyers during the high-profile Air-India trial. Malik confirmed yesterday that he had received a letter from the government asking him to repay the cost of his trial. “They told me they want the money. What can I say? It’s not fair. Who knows what will happen now,” he told the Globe and Mail newspaper. Malik and Bagri were acquitted four-and-a-half years after they were charged with murder in the deaths of 331 people in two bomb explosions off the Irish Coast and Narita airport in Japan on June 23, 1985.
— PTI |
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Washington, December 18 He was 83. Anderson died yesterday at his home in Bethesda, Maryland, of complications from Parkinson’s disease, said one of his daughters, Laurie Anderson-Bruch. Anderson won a 1972 Pulitzer Prize for reporting that the Nixon administration secretly tilted towards Pakistan in its war with India. He also published the secret transcripts of the Watergate grand jury. Anderson gave up his syndicated Washington Merry-Go-Round column at age 81 in July, 2004, after Parkinson’s disease left him too ill to continue. He had been hired by the column’s founder, Drew Pearson, in 1947. — AP
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