Karachi, November 30
At least 18 persons were killed and over 80 injured in ethnic clashes between two groups in this southern Pakistani port city, prompting authorities to arm the security forces with “shoot-to-kill” orders to quell the violence.

The violence erupted after members of one group resorted to indiscriminate firing in several parts of Karachi last night. Sporadic incidents of firing were reported throughout last evening.

The rioters also torched 17 vehicles, the police said adding cops and paramilitary troops were patrolling the city to prevent further violence. At least four women were among the injured, they said.

Zulfiqar Mirza, the home minister of Sindh province, said he had issued orders to security forces to shoot anyone opening fire.

Witnesses said the violence started in the Banaras area when some armed men organised a protest and blocked Bacha Khan Chowk. The protest turned violent when two groups exchanged fire.

Subsequently, unidentified armed men started firing in other parts of the city, killing people in at least seven places. They also threatened shopkeepers to close their businesses.

Karachi's police chief Waseem Ahmed said orders had been issued to arrest and deal with anti-social elements with an iron hand.

No leniency would be shown to them, he said. The police has arrested over 20 suspects and seized arms from them. — PTI

Dhaka, November 30
A group of Islamist bigots has damaged a landmark sculpture in Bangladesh calling it “un-Islamic”, a month after another right-wing group vandalised an under-construction monument in the country, the police said today.

At least 100 activists of the Ulama Anjuman-e-Al-Baiyanat, a group which had
so far concentrated its activities only on issuing edicts on Islamic rituals and
practices, tried to destroy the ‘Balaka’ - a herd of six storks looking up in the
sky - in the crossing near the national flag carrier Bangladesh Biman’s sales office
in Motijheel district.

“Equipped with shovels, hammers and iron rods, they suddenly began to destroy the sculpture at about 9.45 pm last night at the commercial area, prompting immediate police intervention,” a police officer said.

Witnesses said some bigots climbed up the monument, standing 41-feet tall, to tie the sculptures with ropes to pull them down and later clashed with the police as they tried to stop them wielding batons leaving at least 20 persons injured.

The police said they arrested 10 persons from the scene and some of them were being treated at Dhaka Medical College Hospital with injuries.

The incident came a month after the authorities were apparently forced to remove five sculptures, which were being erected in front of Dhaka’s Zia International Airport after a right-wing Islamist group called the ‘Khatme Nabuat Andolon’ threatened to wage a massive campaign against the “un-Islamic act”. — PTI

Bangkok, November 30
A grenade blast wounded more than 50 anti-government protesters in Bangkok today, fuelling fears of clashes ahead of a big rally in the Thai capital planned by government supporters.

The blast occurred around midnight at Government House, the prime minister’s office occupied by the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) since August in a bid to topple the government.

PAD supporters are dug in at the capital’s two main airports, stranding thousands of tourists, grounding exports and threatening to further slash economic growth.

Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat has declared a state of emergency at the airports and given the authority to the police to remove the protesters.

But PAD supporters attacked the police on Saturday night, forcing them further away from the main Suvarnabhumi international airport.

A Reuters reporter said that no policeman was visible around the airport today.

The sit-ins at Suvarnabhumi and the city’s domestic hub Don Muang are the latest escalation in the PAD’s “final battle” to unseat a prime minister it accuses of being a front for former leader Thaksin Shinawatra.

Thaksin, who is Somchai’s brother-in-law, was ousted in a military coup in 2006 and lives in exile. — Reuters

Thimphu, November 30
Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness (GNH) has found a new admirer in Brazil, which says it plans to adopt the unique development index as it will offer the most complete set of indicators for the South American country’s true progress.

“The GNH seeds are planted in Brazil. Now we have to water it with care,” said psychologist and educator Susan Andrews, the founder of the Future Vision Ecological Park that will coordinate the GNH in Brazil.

“There is a tremendous yearning in people’s hearts for an integrated solution to problems and the GNH shows a systematic approach to all of them. People want to work together towards that,” Andrews, who attended the 4th international GNH conference here past week, said.

According to her, Brazil today was becoming one of the superpowers in the world with vast resources of water, energy, food and forests, but had reached a threshold where they had to choose a path to follow. — PTI

Paris, November 30
As World AIDS Day is marked tomorrow, the fight against the disease remains stymied by the lack of adequate treatment in poor countries and setbacks in finding an effective vaccine, experts say.

To be sure, there have been plenty of advances over the past two decades. While 33 million people have the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes AIDS, more are enjoying healthier, longer lives thanks to powerful new medications.

Organisers of World AIDS Day, built around the themes of leadership, self-responsibility and activism, are calling on governments to follow through on promises of universal treatment, prevention, care and support.

“We have effective treatments. We have no other choice than to offer them to all those who need them,” said Jean-Francois Delfraissy, head of the French National Research Agency on AIDS and viral hepatitis (ANRS).

But affordable and effective treatment remains a rarity in Africa, home to the majority of HIV-positive people, making prospects of universal access to medication remote in the near future.

In poorer countries, the choice may eventually be between treating millions of HIV-positive patients, or offering more expensive treatment to some 5,00,000 people who are resistant to mainstream therapies, Delfraissy said.

In wealthy nations like France, where 5,200 new HIV-positive cases were registered past year, thousands of others remain unaware that they are infected. — AFP

BRIEFLY

Israel to release 250 Palestinian prisoners
Jerusalem: The Israeli cabinet gave its approval today to the release of 250 Palestinian prisoners as a goodwill gesture to Western-backed Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas. Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert during talks on November 17 with Abbas undertook to free the prisoners. The talks in Jerusalem were the two men’s first meeting in two months. The names of those to be freed will now be drawn up by a special committee according to criteria which rule out the release of prisoners “with Jewish blood on their hands”. — AFP

No driving licence to nurses, tailors
DUBAI: Nurses, bakers and tailors are among the 100 categories who cannot apply for a driving licence in the UAE. The other professions who will be denied the right to drive a vehicle include cooks, carpenters, housemaids, watchmen, cafeteria waiters, unskilled labourers and gardeners as well as expatriates in those jobs, which do not require a university degree. A Sharjah police official told Gulf News that the move is meant to reduce the huge number of vehicles by limiting the number of professionals allowed obtaining driving licences. — UNI

Bruni to be AIDS ambassador
London: Moved by the tragic death of her brother from AIDS, the glamorous French first lady, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, is ready to don a new avatar as an ambassador in the global fight against the deadly disease. She is expected to be appointed an “ambassador” for the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria, a Geneva-based organisation backed by the United Nations, tomorrow on World Aids Day. The supermodel-turned-singer had for long been trying to decide what cause to embrace as first lady, and the choice of AIDS appears to have been influenced by a her brother’s death. — PTI

Steep school fee hike
DUBAI: Indian expatriates in Kuwait have protested to the President of India over the unilateral hike in school fees in the country by up to 25 per cent. All Indian schools in Kuwait have announced the steep hike, though the Kuwaiti authorities gave a nod to increase it only by 5 per cent, the NRIs said in a memorandum to the President of India. About 10,000 signatures, along with the memorandum, will be sent to President Pratibha Patil to seek her intervention in the matter, as parents and Indian organisations called for the Indian government to take over the management of the Indian Community School, the Arab Times reported. — UNI

150 whales dead
SYDNEY: At least 150 whales have died in a mass stranding off Tasmania’s west coast, Australian authorities said on Sunday, despite the efforts of rescuers who managed to shepherd a small number back to the ocean. The state government said the number of long-finned pilot whales that had perished had climbed to 150 after a body count on Sunday, almost double the earlier estimate of 80. The stranded whales were discovered on Saturday and members of the local community and government officials worked to rescue them, but the whales had been badly injured by the rocks. — Reuters

Wine auction nets $4 million
HONG KONG: Global auction house Christie’s sold HK$31.54 million (US$4.07 million) of fine wine at a Hong Kong auction, capitalising on the growth of Asian demand for top vintages. Sales at the auction on Saturday, which was buoyed by a rare collection of vintages sourced from Chateau Latour’s reserve cellars, topped a pre-sale estimate of $3.2 million, with 94 per cent of lots sold. Asian buyers bid strongly and paid well above the market premiums for the vintages from Chateau Latour, which had been bought by Christie’s owner, French businessman Francois Pinault, in 1993. — Reuters