Washington, March 29
Opposing the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal, former US President Jimmy Carter has said it has sent "uncertain" signals to countries like Iran and North Korea and will open a pandora's box of nuclear proliferation.

"This change in policies has sent uncertain signals to other countries, including North Korea and Iran, and may encourage technologically capable nations to choose the nuclear option. The proposed nuclear deal with India is just one more step in opening a pandora's box of nuclear proliferation," he said in an article in The Washington Post.

He said there were no detectable efforts being made to seek confirmed reductions of almost 30,000 nuclear weapons worldwide, of which the USA possesses about 12,000, Russia 16,000, China 400, France 350, Israel 200, Britain 185, India and Pakistan 40 each.

"A global holocaust is just as possible now, through mistakes or misjudgements, as it was during the depths of the Cold War," he said.

Mr Carter said there was some fanfare in announcing that India plans to import eight nuclear reactors by 2012, and that US companies might win two of those reactor contracts, but stressed that it was a minuscule benefit compared with the potential costs.

"India may be a special case, but reasonable restraints are necessary. The five original nuclear powers have all stopped producing fissile material for weapons, and India should make the same pledge to cap its stockpile of nuclear bomb ingredients," he said.

The Democrat said the proposal for India would allow enough fissile material for as many as 50 weapons a year, "far exceeding what is believed to be its current capacity." "So far India has only rudimentary technology for uranium enrichment or plutonium reprocessing, and Congress should preclude the sale of such technology to India," he said.

"There is no doubt that condoning avoidance of the NPT encourages the spread of nuclear weaponry. Japan, Brazil, Indonesia, South Africa, Argentina and many other technologically advanced nations have chosen to abide by the NPT to gain access to foreign nuclear technology. Why should they adhere to self-restraint if India rejects the same terms?, he added. — PTI 

Washington, March 29
The USA has not adequately protected itself against the nightmare scenario of a nuclear attack by terrorists, the head of the panel that investigated the September 11, 2001, attacks said yesterday

Former New Jersey Gov. Tom Kean told a Senate panel that neither the Bush administration nor Congress had done all it could to protect American lives and the U S economy: ‘‘The size of the problem still totally dwarfs the policy response.’’

Another expert, Stephen Flynn of the Council on Foreign Relations, outlined numerous security gaps in global trade and shipping. Flynn, a retired Coast Guard commander, said the country was living on ‘‘ borrowed time’’ for avoiding a so-called dirty bomb that could contaminate a financial district or residential neighborhood and wreak havoc on the economy.

They were among the witnesses before the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations one day after the release of a government report that said that four years after the attacks on New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, federal undercover investigators were able to enter the USA with enough radioactive material for two dirty bombs.

Radiation monitors did detect the radioactive materials in investigators’ cars crossing the U S -Mexican and U S -Canadian borders in December 2005, but border patrol officials did not realise the shipping documents and permits were forged, the Government Accountability Office said in the report. — Reuters

Paris, March 29
Minute moons just a hundred metres or so across orbit Saturn within its rings, astronomers reported today, suggesting that the finding would shed light on how the planet's majestic ring system came into being.

The prevailing theory is that the rings, so dazzlingly reflected by the distant Sun, comprise the remnants of an icy moon that long ago was smashed open by an asteroid or a comet.

But a collision of this kind normally gives rise to debris in a wide range of sizes, from big lumps a kilometre wide to pebbles a few centimetres across.

Photographs and radar sensing by scout probes, though, have hitherto shown Saturn's ring particles to be remarkably small, between a few centimetres to a few metres across.

The only big exceptions were a pair of kilometre- wide moons called Pan and Daphnis that lurk within the ring system.

There seemed to be nothing in the intermediate size.

Astronomers led by Matthew Tiscareno of Cornell University, New York, believe they have found some of the missing medium-sized rocks.

Their evidence comes from data sent back by the orbiting US spacecraft Cassini, which show gaps, shaped rather like a propeller blade or an elongated teardrop, in some of the rings.

Tiscareno's team deduct that the gaps are caused by "embedded moonlets" -- rocks about 100 metres across that were too small to be seen in the Cassini pictures but which must have briefly scattered the particles as they orbited, rather like a ship forms a bow wave and trails a wake that then closes behind it. —AFP 

Karachi, March 29
Chairman of the moderate Hurriyat Conference Mirwaiz Umar Farooq has called for the inclusion of China in the ongoing composite dialogue between India and Pakistan on Kashmir.

‘‘The APHC is preparing a roadmap of 2020 for the resolution of the Kashmir issue in which we will also recommend the inclusion of China as a party,’’ the Mirwaiz said at the final round of the series of discussions on Kashmir at the World Social Forum (WSF) being held at the KMC Sports Complex, here yesterday.

At the workshop on Kashmir the moderate Hurriyat. chief told the WSF that besides India, Pakistan and Kashmiri leadership, China should also be considered as a party in resolving the Kashmir issue.

The inclusion of China, he said, was necessary because ‘‘it occupies a large part of the Jammu and Kashmir and the forces of globalisation could not be ignored in this issue’’.

He said the Kashmiri leadership was not satisfied with the dialogue process between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.

Stating that the Hurriyat Conference was preparing a roadmap according to which recommendations would be made in light of the ground realities to resolve the Kashmir issue, the Mirwaiz said, ‘‘If our roadmap is implemented it would resolve all disputes by 2020.’’

Mr Tariq Hameed Qarra of the Peoples' Democratic Party Jammu and Kashmir said his party was a part of the Congress-led coalition in India and both the people in uniform and without uniform were equally responsible upholding human rights in Kashmir. — UNI

Washington, March 29
The Senate Judiciary Committee of the USA has voted to significantly increase the number of H-1B visas for highly skilled foreign workers as part of a controversial immigration bill that faces a tough fight in the Congress before it becomes law.

This measure to double the number of temporary visas to H-1B skilled-workers to 115,000 — with an option of raising the cap 20 per cent more each year, was buried in the Senate’s giant 300-page Immigration Bill, that got approved 12-6 yesterday.

The bill, once adopted by the Senate and the Congress, would open the country’s doors to highly skilled immigrants for science, mathematics, technology and engineering jobs from India, China and other nations.

The H1-B visa provisions were incorporated into the immigration legislation at the insistence of Silicon Valley tech companies and enjoys significant bipartisan support amid concerns that the USA might lose its edge in technology. — UNI

Johannesburg, March 29
Twelve persons were killed after a fire broke out in an illegally occupied building in downtown Johannesburg today, local media said.

“The cause of death of all 12 appears to be traumatic asphyxia,’’ spokesman Malcolm Midgley was quoted as saying. — Reuters