Islamabad, July 11
The Pakistan army has admitted that it is in contact with Afghan Taliban leaders, including Mullah Mohammad Omar, and can bring them to the negotiating table with the US if its concerns with India are addressed.

Pakistan’s chief military spokesman Maj Gen Athar Abbas has been quoted by CNN in an interview as saying that the military is still in contact with Taliban commanders like Mullah Omar, Jalalladin Haqqani, Mullah Nazir and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar of the Hizb-e-Islami.

Within hours of CNN airing the report yesterday, the Inter-Services Public Relations issued a denial, saying the remarks attributed to Abbas were “totally baseless, fabricated and unfounded as well as out of context”.

“No intelligence organisation in the world shuts its last door on any other organisation. So therefore, the contacts are there. The communication remains,” CNN quoted Abbas as saying in the interview.

Abbas said in return for any role as a broker between the US and the Taliban, Pakistan wanted concessions from Washington over Islamabad’s concerns with India, the channel reported.

It claimed that senior US officials had told the channel that President Barack Obama’s administration was “willing both to talk to top Taliban leaders and to raise some of Pakistan’s concerns with India”.

Asked if the US could talk to the militant groups in Afghanistan, Abbas said, “There are reconcilable elements...in these Taliban groups...and one has to identify those”.

He said there was no harm in opening negotiations with them.

In reply to another question on whether Pakistan could provide assistance to a US mission for dialogue, he replied: “I think, yes, that can be worked out, that’s possible”.

“The ISI was in the forefront of the whole struggle against the Soviets. Now, by maintaining the contacts with the organisations like (Mullah Omar’s Taliban and Hekmatyar) doesn’t mean that that state policy is (to be) providing them physical support or the funding or training,” Abbas said.

“What we see as a concern is an over-involvement of Indians in Afghanistan that becomes a concern - particularly if one is watching the security calculus in that,” he said.

“The fear is, tomorrow what happens if these Americans move out and they are replaced by Indians as military trainers? That becomes a serious concern. So these kind of apprehensions are there, and they are talked about and they are consulted,” Abbas said.

He said Pakistan had been informing the US-led coalition countries about its own concerns. “They have to have a line because if [it] goes beyond them, beyond the line then of course the situation would take an ugly turn,” he warned. After the 9/11 attacks, Pakistani policy to support the militant groups did a “U-turn”, he said. “And the state began its offensive, followed by the army, and latter the ISI.” —PTI 

London, July 11
The leaked toxicology report of Michael Jackson claims that the pop star had lethal levels of potent painkillers and drugs in his body at the time of his death, triggering suspicion that it may be a case of homicide. Jackson was on a diet of deadly cocktail potent enough to have killed a normal person instantly but his body had developed a tolerance due to the longtime use of huge doses, the British newspaper Sun claimed quoting the findings of his preliminary toxicology reports.

Apart from high levels of Demerol, a strong painkiller and heroin substitute Methadone, Jackson’s blood tests found high doses of antianxiety drug Xanax, according to the leaked toxicology report submitted to the Los Angeles county coroner’s office, the paper said.

Lower levels of powerful anaesthetic drug Propofol was also present in Jackson’s body. The medicine is used for surgical operations but according to Jackson’s close aides, the pop star who suffered from insomnia, used the medicine as a sleeping pill.

Another medicine, Dilaudid, which is normally used to numb post-surgery pain, was also found in Jackson’s body.

Jackson died after collapsing on June 25 just weeks before making his comeback in London and reports have linked his sudden death to the long abuse of prescription drugs.

Coroner’s office is yet to release the toxicology report, which will determine the cause of death. But the daily claiming to have access to the report said besides Demerol and Methadone, 50-year old Jackson had taken four more painkillers and anaesthetics plus anti-anxiety pills. — PTI

“It is unfortunate that the government is trying to exclude students from any meaningful discussion. We support multiculturalism, but we do not support politicians trying to divert attention and debate away from the victims, unsafe streets, rising crime rate and failure of the judicial system,” FISA president Amit Menghani said. — PTI

Dubai, July 11
A cargo vessel with 15 Indian crew members was hijacked off the port city of Bosasso in Somalia, a media report said today.

“A sea-hijacking of an Indian cargo vessel with around 15 Indian crew (took place) around lunchtime (Friday) just 14 nautical miles off the port city of Bosasso in the semi-autonomous north-eastern region of Somalia,” Australia.to website reported.

The vessel was captured after it had unloaded goods from the UAE at the Somali harbour from where it was sailing off. Initial reports indicate of business deal gone sour.

The vessel is said to operate regularly between Saudi Arabia and the African coast and “had brought sugar in a deal brokered by Dahabshil (hawala money transfer operator)”, the report said. — IANS