The government has decided not to file a review petition against the Supreme Court’s decision on the constitutional petition of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry.

The decision was taken at a top-level meeting chaired by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and attended by federal ministers, senior leaders of the Pakistan Muslim League (PML) and law advisers. The meeting discussed the political and legal implications of the verdict and devised strategy to counter possible moves by lawyers and political parties to take advantage of the judgment.

“It was decided not to file a review petition,” a federal minister said, demanding not to be named. He said the participants of the meeting were of the view that the presidential reference was not properly handled from day one, even though it “had substance”. Local government minister Abdul Razzaq Thaeem was the only participant to propose filing a review petition.

“Let’s not create more problems. Try to build bridges,” Malik Abdul Qayyum a former judge, who had represented the federation in the CJP case, told the meeting. “The government should avoid further confrontation,” he added.

Aziz said the government respected the Supreme Court and had accepted its judgment. It was neither a defeat nor victory for anybody, he said.

To demands that the government should initiate an accountability process and take action against those who messed up the entire exercise from preparing the reference and subsequent mishandling, the meeting decided that it would be launched after the detailed judgment is announced.

Islamabad, July 22
Pakistan’s reinstated Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar M. Chaudhry will make a triumphant return to office tomorrow after four tumultuous months during which he acquired an iconic status for protesting against his suspension by President Pervez Musharraf.

Careful not to demonstrate his emotions in public after the full Bench quashed his suspension as well as Musharraf’s reference against him two days ago, Chaudhry took charge from Acting Chief Justice Rana Bhagwandas minutes after the verdict and began his "new tenure" by bringing back the court registrar who was sent packing during his absence.

Chaudhry would triumphantly drive to court tomorrow, not in a vehicle driven by his defence lawyer, Aietzaz Ahesan but in his official convoy which was taken away the minutes after his suspension on March 9.

As he would drive down, thousands of lawyers across the country, who launched a massive movement to restore him, would observe a thanksgiving day nationwide to greet him.

While the government mulled its options after "accepting" the judgement to restore him, the civil society and the opposition parties chalked out their options to neutralise Musharraf's plans to get re-elected as President in uniform for yet another five-year term.

Many expect that Chaudhry's return at the helm with a charged and invigorated judiciary which appeared to keen to wash its image of playing second fiddle to the military, would in the short run open a Pandora's box of petitions. — PTI

Islamabad, July 22
Twenty pro-Taliban militants were killed and five Pakistani troops injured during separate gun battles in the North Waziristan tribal agency, where the army is engaged in containing spiralling attacks on security forces in an apparent retaliation for the Lal Masjid crackdown.

After militants launched attacks on army posts and tried to blow up an army convoy, the military pressed helicopter gunships to bombard their hideouts in the area, for the first time in recent months.

Defence spokesman Major Gen Waheed Arshad told media here the helicopters were attacking the militant positions after a gunfight broke out between troops and militants in Mirnashah, the headquarters of North Waziristan, following an attempt by ultras to blow up an army convoy with improvised explosives.

He said seven militants were killed and five armymen injured in the fighting that ensued as troops engaged the militants from different sides.

Arshad said 13 militants were killed and seven captured last night when they tried to attack “three to four” check posts manned by paramilitary forces.

“Security forces, who were ready for these attacks, retaliated, in which 13 militants were killed and seven have been arrested with their arms and ammunition,” he said.

This is perhaps the first major success by the beleaguered Pakistani troops which began moving into the tribal area amid a spate of suicide bomb attacks since the July 11 military raid on the Lal Masjid here. — PTI

London, July 22
Helicopter and boat crews rescued hundreds trapped after storms lashed Britain, flooding towns and villages on Friday.

Motorists slept overnight in cars on rain-lashed highways, while others were attempting to find vehicles abandoned on major roads after the downpours caused long delays.

The Association of British Insurers estimated damage from the floods could run into hundreds of millions of pounds.

Meteorologists said many areas of Britain had more than a month’s worth of rain in a few hours on Friday and predicted more downpours over the weekend.

“We have acted quickly in what is an emergency,” Prime Minister Gordon Brown said in a televised statement. “When you have a situation where a month’s rain is coming down and a month’s water is being created in an hour or two, then people have to act very quickly.”

Weather forecaster MeteoGroup UK, said Pershore, a town around 200 km northwest of London, was worst hit, drenched by 145.4 mm of rain in 25 hours, between Thursday and Friday. Usual levels are 50-60 mm in a month, the centre stated.

Royal Air Force (RAF) helicopters rescued more the 100 people from rooftops of flooded villages, and around 2,000 people spent Friday night in emergency shelters in Gloucestershire.

“I’ve never seen torrential rain like this, the weather has been freakish across the whole of the country,” said Parmjit Dhanda, a lawmaker who represents the city of Gloucester in parliament. — AP

Melbourne, July 22
Foreign doctors could avoid Australia because of the way the case of Mohameed Haneef, an Indian physician charged over the failed UK terror plot, has been handled, according to the Australian Medical Association (AMA).

Australians must separate the allegations against Haneef from his profession, AMA president Rosanna Capolingua said.

“There seems to be a thought that doctors from overseas won’t want to come to Australia looking at the Haneef issue because they don’t want to be a part of this,” Capolingua was quoted in ‘The Australian’ newspaper today as saying.

“We have to remember that this is not about doctors. This is about a particular situation around an individual who happens to be a doctor,” she said, adding, “It would be very sad to see doctors dissuaded from coming here, because this is not about doctors.”

Australia’s medical sector would struggle without the input of foreign doctors, Capolingua said. “Of our total medical workforce, 30 to 40 per cent are international medical graduates and in some cases they have been in Australia for 10, 20, 30 years.

“Three thousand to 4,000 doctors are here on visas, so they are temporary residents and many are working in rural and regional areas,” she said, adding, “They are no different to any other doctor as far as patient care is concerned and we are very dependent on them.” — PTI

The son of Bangladesh’s detained former PM Sheikh Hasina Wazed says his mother’s attorneys are being threatened by military personnel in Dhaka and that she is worried she will not get justice.

Hasina was arrested by the military-backed government on July 16. She is being held on the charge of extorting money from a businessman before clearing his project when she was PM. She also faces two cases of extortion and a murder case.

Sajeeb Wazed, a consultant based in the Washington area, said his mother was being confined in a sub-jail. “But,” he added, “she is in good spirits.”

He said his mother's attorneys had told him that all judges, including those in the Supreme Court, “are now either handpicked or threatened and intimidated into issuing pre-determined rulings.”

A source close to Hasina said from Dhaka that the government had decided to try her under the Emergency Power Rules, 2007, thereby depriving her of the due process of law.

Hasina’s counsel Abdul Matin Khasru told reporters in Dhaka on Friday that the former leader “has expressed her apprehension that she may not get justice ...”. Wazed suspects the government acted against his mother because she had recently “exposed the attempts by the military intelligence wing, Directorate-General Forces Intelligence to break up the two major political parties and create a new party of handpicked leaders with dubious track records and public allegations of corruption against them.” 

They voted him on to the next level during Friday’s episode, broadcast live on Abu Dhabi TV and Prince of Poets channel.

Hussain (31) was born in Hyderabad and has been living in Saudi Arabia since he was three. — PTI