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Arms deal with India worries Nepal Maoists
UK police starts special service for Sikhs
New Delhi involved in Baloch unrest: Malik
ISI fomenting chaos in Kashmir: Mullen |
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Mush to defend emergency
US wants Mehsud killed, says Holbrooke
Jha’s oath taken in Hindi unconstitutional, says Nepal SC
India signs pact to rebuild north Sri Lanka
17 killed in Iran plane mishap
World bids Cronkite farewell
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Arms deal with India worries Nepal Maoists
As the Government of India appears all set to lift four years old arm embargo imposed on the Nepal Army, the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) (UCPN-M) is jittery about the whole exercise and says this is directed against them.
UCPN-M Foreign Affairs Chief C P Gajurel said this would derail the peace process and the government would be solely responsible for that. “We will peacefully protest against it, mobilise public opinion at home and tell the international community that this is not acceptable,” he told The Tribune on Friday. Two days ago, Maoist chairman Prachanda had spoken to Prime Minister Mahdav Kumar Nepal on the telephone and expressed his resentment against the government move saying that it would affect the ongoing peace process. He asserted that this was clearly in violation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed between the then Prime Minister and Maoist chief Prachanda, who had led the decade-long armed insurgency resulting in the death of more than 13,000 persons. Defence Minister Bidhya Bhandari, who is in Delhi on an official visit is believed to have succeeded in convincing the Indian establishment that it should resume supply of both lethal and non-lethal arms that was suspended following the king’s takeover in February 2005. Only three weeks ago, Indian foreign secretary Shivshankar Menon was in Kathmandu and is believed to have assured the new coalition government in Nepal that India would be open to resuming the arms supply if there was a formal request from the government of Nepal. Moreover, India’s latest decision comes in the wake of heightened attack of the Indian Maoists against the security agencies, state and private properties as well as individuals in the past few months. There are “credible concerns” from the Indian official side asking the Nepal to keep a watch on possible link between the Maoists of the two sides. Nepali Maoists have criticised the Government of India’s latest decision declaring the Maoists there as terrorist as something totally futile and meaningless. Gajurel also said, “It’s a matter of principle and we believe that arms deal with any country, including China, when the peace process is on, should be deemed as violation of the peace process.” China had dispatched huge contingents of arms for the Nepal army during the royal regime once India, UK, and some other countries had suspended it.
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UK police starts special service for Sikhs
London, July 24 Under the new scheme the ‘specialist’ knowledge of the Punjabi culture will be used to handle cases like forced marriage and ‘honour’ crime. The police said, “The new service, pioneered by the Metropolitan Police Sikh Association (MPSA), could be extended to other minority groups like Muslims in future.” Chairman of the MPSA Palbinder Singh, said, “It’s about understanding and appreciating difference. I don’t believe a white officer is ever going to be fully conversant with a Sikh for example.” “We have got evidence in the most serious type of crimes where Punjabi culture itself is the issue, that they haven’t been properly investigated.” Jagdeesh Singh, whose 27-year-old sister Surjit Athwal was murdered in a so-called honour killing, supported the scheme. In 2007, Athwal’s husband and mother-in-law were convicted of her murder, almost 10 years after she went missing from home. Met officers said crimes in the community had gone unsolved and even unreported because of lack of understanding of the culture by officers from a “white” background. A senior officer from the Met’s Criminal Justice Policy Unit, Joanna Young, said, “I think it’s a great start and what we need to do is evaluate it... Does it make a difference? Can we sustain it?” A website has also been set up to report crimes online. Officers hope that this will give a voice to women who may be in danger of honour-based violence, or who are restricted from making an unsupervised phone call or leaving their home. However, Metropolitan Police Federation chairman Peter Smyth said, “We’re stretched thin enough already. Are Sikh officers going to have their rotas changed so there’s always one on duty? It’s political correctness gone mad. We are talking about the creation of a separate force within a force.”
— PTI
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New Delhi involved in Baloch unrest: Malik
Interior Minister Rehman Malik has alleged that Indian agents are manning terrorist training camps in Afghanistan that are imparting training to Baloch youth for creating disturbances in the province. Speaking in the Senate on Friday, the minister said he had met President Hamid Karzai in Kabul last week and provided him with proofs regarding training camps in Afghanistan, where Baloch insurgents were being trained. The Interior Minister said President Karzai had assured him of action to close down these camps, which Malik claimed were being run by the Indian intelligence agencies. Rehman informed the House that President Karzai also agreed to put in place three biometric check-posts on the Pak-Afghan border by the first week of August. He told the house that Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani had also raised the issue of Indian involvement in Balochistan with his counterpart Manmohan Singh in Egypt. The demand for separation by Baloch separatists cannot be accepted, Malik said.
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ISI fomenting chaos in Kashmir: Mullen
Washington, July 24 “I believe that in the long run the ISI has to change its strategic thrust which has been to foment chaotic activity, you know, in its border countries. And I think in the long run ...and that has been a Pakistan view to its own survival and its own security. And I think in the long run that’s got to change,” the US chairman of the joint chiefs of staff Admiral Michael Mullen told the Al Jazeera news channel in an extensive interview. Admiral Mullen, the senior most military officer in the US, has served as chairman of the joint chiefs of staff under both George Bush and Barack Obama, helming two wars. Asked to elaborate on his comments, Mullen said: “What I mean is that they have clearly focused on support of ... historically of militant organisations both east and west. I mean that’s been a focus of theirs in Kashmir historically as well as in FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas). And I think ... that fundamentally has to change.” “And there are discussions which have been ongoing in respect to that and the leadership recognises that, and there is a big challenge dealing with that, based on what their history is and what they need to do for the future,” he asserted. Asked to comment on “the close — and some people say too close — relationship between the ISI and the Taliban”, Mullen replied: “Well, one of the things I have learned in my frequent visits to Pakistan over the last year — I’ve been there almost a dozen times — is that it is another extraordinarily complex relationship. And it’s one that I’ve spoken very publicly about.” He also admitted: “And yet the ISI has also served ...some very positive intelligence needs both in the country and certainly between our two countries. So, I think it’s something we keep discussing, keep looking at. In the long run, it’s about the security for Pakistan and better security in the region for both those countries.” Mullen replied in the affirmative when asked if he believed the Al-Qaida leadership, including Osama bin Laden, is in Pakistan. He added that the terror network of Al-Qaida was “at the top of the list” of his priorities.
— IANS
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Mush to defend emergency
Former President Gen Pervez Musharraf (retd) has constituted a panel of lawyers to represent him in the Supreme Court in response to a notice by the court to defend his actions of imposition of emergency and massive purge of superior judiciary on November 3, 2007. A 14-member bench of the court led by his nemesis, whom he sacked and detained on November 3, Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, has directed Musharraf to appear either personally or through a counsel on July 29. The notice has caused a euphoric response within the country amid strong voices for Musharraf's trial on charges of treason, subversion of constitution, imposition of emergency and dismissal of 60 judges of superior courts. And to add to the woes of former military ruler currently living in London, a determined group of Pakistanis and human rights activists led by a member of the House of Lords has launched an initiative for Musharraf's trial in London on war crimes and other offences on the pattern of former Chilean dictator Pinochet.
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US wants Mehsud killed, says Holbrooke
Islamabad, July 24 Holbrooke asked Pakistani security forces to go after Mehsud and his key aide Maulana Fazlullah because they pose a serious threat to this country. The Special US Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan said Mehsud, the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan chief, was “one of the most dangerous and odious people in the region” and acknowledged the US had “paid insufficient attention to him until recently”.
— PTI
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Jha’s oath taken in Hindi unconstitutional, says Nepal SC
Just a year after Vice-President of the Himalayan nation Parmananda Jha took oath of office and secrecy in Hindi language instead of Nepali, the Supreme Court on Friday asked him to take the oath of office and secrecy again, pronouncing his previous move as unconstitutional.
A bench comprising Chief Justice Min Bahadur Rayamajhi and Balram KC ruled that oath-taking in Hindi language could not be taken as constitutional and that if Jha wants to continue at his office, he needs to take oath in Nepali. On July 22, 2008, Vice-president Jha had taken the oath of office and secrecy from President Dr Ram Baran Yadav where he had translated the copy in Hindi instead of constitutionally recognised Nepali language. Jha who hails from the southern plain (Terai region that is largely dominated by the Indian origin population) had fallen into controversy for taking oath in Hindi. In fact, Jha’s mother tongue in Maithali. Immediately after his move, people from different castes and regions had unleashed nationwide protest against Jha. Subsequently, an advocate Bal Krishna Neupane had filed a petition in the apex court requesting the later to nullify it.
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India signs pact to rebuild north Sri Lanka
Colombo, July 24 The pact would cover construction of buildings and utilities under the massive rehabilitation and reconstruction programme in the north, a statement by the Construction and Engineering Services Ministry of Sri Lanka said today.
— PTI
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17 killed in Iran plane mishap Tehran, July 24 “There was an accident and a fire involving a passenger plane from Tehran to Mashhad that has left 17 people dead and 19 injured,” the official IRNA news agency reported, quoting the deputy governor of Khorasan province Ghahreman Rashid. Rashid identified the plane as a Russian-designed Ilyushin and said it carried 153 passengers. A senior transport official said, “Instead of landing at the beginning of the tarmac, the plane landed in the middle of the runway.” — AFP
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World bids Cronkite farewell
New York, July 24 CBS said the service took place at Saint Bartholomew’s Church in Manhattan ahead of Cronkite’s burial in the southern state of Missouri.
— AFP
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