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NRI held in £80m scam in UK
Thousands mourn ex-Philippine Prez Aquino
UK PM Brown wants to write on Gandhi
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Let Parliament decide Mush’s fate: Pak PM
24 killed in Karachi building collapse
Pakistani paramilitary troops look in the rubble to find bodies at the site where a five-storey building collapsed, in Karachi on Sunday. — AP/PTI
Plane carrying 16 goes missing
Report: Myanmar close to testing N-bomb
Swine Flu
Sufi faces treason charge
Summer retreat for Swat girls
Five NATO soldiers killed in Afghanistan
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NRI held in £80m scam in UK
London, August 2 The mastermind of the scheme,, Chelsea-based Indian entrepreneur Nandan Pruthi, and his business partners Kenneth Peacock and John Anderson were arrested after a series of raids conducted by the London police in the city, the Observer newspaper reported today. The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has frozen assets of Pruthi. Sports cars, jewellery and £250,000 in cash are among the assets the police and FSA have managed to recover from Pruthi and his colleagues, though their value is less than £2 million. There has been some speculation that money may have been salted away in Dubai, the Cayman islands or Thailand. Behind the facade of token investments, Pruthi and his partners are believed to have recycled millions of pounds from new investors on to existing ones in order to maintain the illusion of a successful investment strategy generating huge returns. Much of the cash is thought to have been churned through accounts with the HSBC. Monthly payback rates of between 8 per cent and 13 per cent were said to be available to those making “loan” investments with the trio. Marketing material for Pruthi’s Business Consultancy International suggested money was invested as venture capital in small or struggling businesses. The police believe vast majority of cash was churned among Pruthi’s victims in the manner of a classic ‘Ponzi scheme’ - named after US fraudster Charles Ponzi. Former England cricketer Darren Gough, ‘Rising Damp’ actress Francis de la Tour and singer Jerome Flynn are among the victims of the scam. A 1960s pop singer, as yet unnamed, is also among the victims while cricketer Kevin Pietersen has confirmed that he was approached by the suspected fraudsters but he decided not to hand over any of his money. Pruthi has filed a defence claiming he has instructed his bank to make payments to investors but they have been blocked by the freezing order. The police, however, believe his protestations are unsustainable. The money simply is not there. — PTI
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Thousands mourn ex-Philippine Prez Aquino
Manila, August 2 Aquino, who died at the age of 76 yesterday after a long battle with colon cancer, led millions of Filipinos in protests against dictator Ferdinand Marcos in a popular revolt in 1986, before taking over as President. World figures led by US President Barack Obama paid tribute to Aquino as “an inspiration”, while President Gloria Arroyo declared 10 days of mourning for the woman she described as a “national treasure”. She will be laid to rest beside her husband, Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino, who was assassinated in 1983 after he flew back to the Philippines from exile in Boston to seek an audience with Marcos. Today, thousands queued up to see the former President lying in state at a Catholic school in Manila, many of them wearing yellow clothing or yellow ribbons, the symbol of the “People’s Power” movement that swept her to power. —
AFP
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UK PM Brown wants to write on Gandhi
London, August 2 “I want to write something about the contribution of Gandhi to our civilisation. I think he was one of the great leaders of the 20th century. He didn’t seek power, sought to win by changing people’s hearts and minds, and he managed to do so,” Brown said in an interview to ‘Garavi Gujarat’, a leading Gujarati-English bilingual weekly, published today. Noting that Gandhi is an inspirational figure for him and for so many people around the world, Brown said: “I have read a lot about how he developed his non-violent faith and how he practised his civil disobedience and how he won support because people could see his moral integrity.” The British Prime Minister also spoke about his strong links with India, which he plans to visit again soon. Brown said India was going to have a bigger role in world affairs in the future and Britain was working with it on development of its new educational institutions. “We want to work closely with India on issues like climate change, financial services, industry, pharmaceuticals and information technology,” he said, noting that New Delhi has “a highly respected role in the G-20” as well. The British Prime Minister said his strong links with India went back to his childhood days, when he received constant updates from a close relative living in Delhi. “I have got a great affinity for India. One of my family’s closest relations spent a few years as a professor of engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi. I visited it a few months ago and it is a great institution. “So I have always had great knowledge about what’s happening in India and I continue to retain that contact I had, including a close personal relationship with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who is one of the people I admire greatly,” Brown said. — PTI
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Let Parliament decide Mush’s fate: Pak PM
Islamabad, August 2 “It (Supreme Court) has given its verdict...I have been saying from day one that Parliament is the forum which has to take these decisions. Let the Parliament decide (the fate of Musharraf),” he said. Gilani said he did not hold a personal opinion in the matter. “My party (the ruling PPP) will have an opinion and the party will never support a dictator,” he said in an interview to a TV news channel when he was asked if Musharraf would be brought to trial. On Friday, the apex court declared the emergency imposed by Musharraf in November 2007 as unconstitutional and illegal. The ruling has made it possible for the former military ruler to be tried for treason for violating the Constitution. However, such a trial can only be initiated by the government. Gilani said he appreciated the apex court’s decision declaring the emergency and Musharraf’s subsequent actions as null and void. A parliamentary committee has been constituted by the Speaker of the National Assembly to recommend constitutional reforms, which will be placed before Parliament. Asked about the possibility of scrapping of 17th amendment of the Constitution which gives the President sweeping powers to dissolve Parliament and dismiss the Premier, Gilani said the PPP and main opposition PML-N do not have the required two-thirds majority in Parliament to undo the measure. “Other parities will have to be taken along for this purpose,” he said. In reply to another question, Gilani said there were no differences between him and President Asif Ali Zardari. “This is just a perception limited to newspapers. We have a normal relationship and there is no misunderstanding,” he said. — PTI
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24 killed in Karachi building collapse
Karachi, August 2 The building located at Lea Market area, which was weakened by heavy monsoon rains, caved in Friday night, a local official said, adding that the rescue operation was still on. The rescue teams dug out 12 bodies and rescued three people from the debris who were shifted to Karachi Civil Hospital, ‘The Nation’ reported. The 18-year-old construction had a godown in the basement and five families were residing on its second floor. The 12 deceased, including nine women, belonged to different families, the report said. Rescue operation was hindered initially as lane where the building was located is narrow. An adjacent building was also evacuated after cracks appeared in it. — PTI
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Plane carrying 16 goes missing
Jakarta, August 2 “We’re still trying to locate it,” he said. Pegunungan Bintang district transport head Dumaroni suggested that weather may have been a factor, adding that everyone on board the plane was Indonesian. “To get to Oksibil, the plane has to pass mountains and the weather is always changing... it can just turn cloudy anytime,” he said. Dumaroni said the plane went missing at 10:28 local time. “It left Sentani airport (in Jayapura) at 10:15 am and was supposed to arrive at Oksibil at 11:05 am but lost contact at 10:28 am. Until now, it hasn’t arrived in Oksibil,” he said. Search operations had been delayed due to bad weather, Jayapura airport spokesman Suharno said. — AFP
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Report: Myanmar close to testing N-bomb
Melbourne, August 2 The key far-eastern nation is building a secret nuclear reactor and plutonium extraction facilities with North Korea’s help, Sydney Morning Herald has reported citing two key junta defectors. The Myanmarese military has sited the reactor in mountain caves inter-linked by deep tunnels at Naung Laing in Northern part of the country, apparently to camouflage it from detection by satellites. The secret complex, the paper said, runs parallel to a civilian reactor being built at another site by Russia that both the Moscow and Yangon authorities say will be put under international safeguards. The revelations by the Australian Daily come as US Naval Warships recently shadowed a North Korean commercial vessel bound for Myanmar, suspecting it to be carrying contraband nuclear and missile components. However, the ship was not intercepted. China and other Asian nations had helped persuade Myanmar to turn back the North Korean freighter, the Nam Kam 1. A month back Japanese police arrested a North Korean and two of its own nationals allegedly trying to export illegally to Myanmar magnetic measuring device that could be used to develop missiles. The Hearld identified the two defectors as an officer with a Myanmar army’s secret nuclear battalion and the other a former executive and leading regime business partner, Htoo Trading, who handled nuclear contracts with Russia and North Korea. It said the defectors were extensively interviewed separately over the past two years by Australian strategic experts and a Thai-based Australian journalist. The defectors testimony brings into sharp focus, hints and sightings emerging recently of North Korean delegations visiting Myanmar, the paper said. Washington, the report said, is increasingly concerned that Myanmar is the main nuclear proliferation threat from North Korea, after Israel destroyed in September 2007 a reactor that North Koreans were apparently building in Syria. — PTI
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Swine Flu
Kuala Lumpur, August 2 The report carried by The Strait Times on its website however did not give any further details about the patient. The woman had no underlying medical conditions other than being obese. The woman, who had been reportedly suffering from flu-like symptoms for the last four days, was admitted to Changi General Hospital' emergency department on July 25 after becoming unconscious. — PTI
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Islamabad, August 2 Sufi, father-in-law of Maulana Fazlullah, leader of the Taliban in Swat and head of a banned Islamist militant group, was arrested on July 26 on the outskirts of Peshawar. He has been charged on the basis of a speech he delivered on April 19, declaring that he did not believe in democracy, the constitution of Pakistan or its judicial and parliamentary system, the Nation reported. — PTI
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Summer retreat for Swat girls
Islamabad, August 2 Shiza Shahid, a student at Stanford University and the brain behind the retreat, wants to “prevent the death of female education” in Swat, where scores of girls’ schools have been bombed and burnt by the
Taliban. Shajar-e-Ilm will host 20 girls aged between 12 and 18, all of whom are students of Ziauddin’s schools in Swat valley, and have distinguished themselves in some way or the other. The group will include the writer of the BBC’s acclaimed ‘Diary of a Pakistani School Girl’. Using a pseudonym, the girl had penned her experiences while the Taliban banned girls’ education and bombed schools, gaining a worldwide audience. —
PTI
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Five NATO soldiers killed in Afghanistan
Kabul, August 2 The three US troops were part of a patrol in eastern Afghanistan that was struck by a homemade bomb and then ambushed with gunfire, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force
(ISAF) said in a statement. “The patrol responded to the attack but three service members died in the engagement,” it said in a statement. The ISAF, made up of around 64,000 troops from 40 nations, does not release the nationalities of its casualties but the US military in Kabul said the three were from its ranks. Two other ISAF troops were killed when two bomb blasts struck their patrol in the south yesterday, the alliance announced separately. They were not US nationals, the US military said, without being able to identify them. The soldiers were killed the same day one French and three US soldiers in separate attacks already announced by
ISAF. —
AFP
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Thousands of mourners paid their final respects to former Philippine President Corazon Aquino today, lining up to file past her coffin in silent tribute to the “People’s Power” democracy leader.
Karachi, August 2
