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Britain not to ban burqa
Nepali Cong picks party vice-chief as PM candidate
Suicide attacks kill 48 in Iraq
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Hillary in Islamabad
Harvard Professorship for India-born academician
UK to help NRI victims of domestic abuse
Former British soldier recalls Afghan ordeal
One man quest for Osama
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Britain not to ban burqa
London, July 18 Immigration Minister Damian Green told 'The Sunday Telegraph' that the move to ban women from wearing veils would be "rather un-British", despite a recent opinion poll showing widespread public support for such an action.
Claiming it would be "undesirable" for parliament to vote on a burqa ban in Britain similar to that approved in France, he said: “Telling people what they can and can't wear, if they are just walking down the street, is rather un-British thing to do. We're a tolerant and mutually respectful society.” Green said there are times, clearly, when “you have got to be able to identify yourself, and people have got to be able to see your face, but I think it’s very unlikely and it would be undesirable for British parliament to try and pass a law dictating what people wore”. He said a very few women in France actually wear the burqa and that they (French parliament) were doing it for demonstration effects. He said the French political culture was very different, as they were an aggressively secular state who could “ban the burqa, ban crucifixes in schools”, etc. "We have schools run explicitly by religions. I think there's absolutely no read-across to immigration policy from what the French are doing about the burqa." His comments also came after the new head of the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) told the newspaper that the UK was the most welcoming country in Europe for Muslims. — PTI
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Nepali Cong picks party vice-chief as PM candidate
At a time when the political parties and their leaders were undecided over who they should ally with to form a new government, Nepali Congress, the second largest party in the Constituent Assembly, has decided to propose its parliamentary party leader Ram Chandra Poudel as its prime ministerial candidate.
Just three days before to file the nomination for the prime ministerial poll fray the Central Working Committee meeting of Nepal Congress, the country's oldest democratic party, on Saturday unanimously decided to pick party Vice-President Poudel as new prime ministerial candidate. Earlier, Congress leader and former prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba and party general secretary Kul Bahadur Gurung, who were the aspirants for the post, had agreed to propose and second Poudel as party's official candidate, respectively. Immediately after taking the official decision, Nepali Congress top leaders conferred with the Unified Communist Party of Nepal-Maoists Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, alias Prachanda, seeking the latter's support to form a new government under Congress leadership to make the peace and constitution drafting a success. But Maoists, the single largest party in the parliament, Chairman Prachanda, who himself has been aspiring for the coveted post for the last 13 months, has reportedly refused to extend his party's support to the Nepali Congress. Emerging from the meeting, Prachanda, however, said that he held serious discussion with the Nepali Congress leaders on the issues of peace, constitution drafting process and the government formation. Earlier, the Maoists Standing Committee meeting held Saturday morning had decided not to stick to its previous stance that Maoists Supremo Prachanda was the one and only candidate for the prime minister's post. "We decided to keep the option of the prime ministerial candidate open," Maoist spokesperson Dinanath Sharma told the media after the meeting. "Any leader can become PM in Maoist-led government." However, the Maoist leaders have been at loggerheads within the party in picking the right candidate for the PM’s post.
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Suicide attacks kill 48 in Iraq
Baghdad, July 18 The bombings were the deadliest in a series of attacks across Iraq today that were aimed at the Sons of Iraq, Sunni groups also known as Awakening Councils that work with government forces to fight al-Qaida in Iraq. The attacks highlighted the stiff challenges the country faces as the US scales back its forces in Iraq, leaving their Iraqi counterparts in charge of security. The first attack this morning, the worst against Iraq's security forces in months, killed at least 45 people and wounded more than 40. It occurred at a checkpoint near a military base where the Awakening Council members had lined up to collect their paychecks in the mostly Sunni district of Radwaniya southwest of Baghdad. "There were more than 150 people sitting on the ground when the explosion took place. I ran, thinking that I was a dead man," said Uday Khamis, 24, who was sitting outside the Mahmoudiyah hospital where many of the wounded were taken. His left hand was bandaged and his clothes were stained with blood. "There were more dead than wounded," he added. At least a dozen men, dressed in military-style uniforms were seen laying in pools of blood in front of a blast wall in footage taken by the Associated Press Television shortly after the blast. There were conflicting reports as to how many of the dead were Iraqi soldiers and whether any of the civilian accountants handing out money were among them. — AP
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Hillary in Islamabad
Islamabad, July 18 “There are still additional steps that we are asking and expecting the Pakistanis to take,’ she told the corporation. Clinton noted that Washington and Islamabad had “increased our cooperation, deepened our relationship, when it comes to fighting terrorism. But there is no doubt in anyone's mind that should an attack against the US be traced to be Pakistani it would have a very devastating impact on our relationship.” She confirmed that Washington planned to formally designate Pakistan's Haqqani network as a foreign terrorist organisation. — AFP
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Harvard Professorship for India-born academician
Boston, July 18 Gopinath, 38, has been a member of the Harvard faculty since 2005 and was named associate professor in 2009. Her focus area is business cycles in emerging markets and price-fluctuations across international borders. "Professor Gopinath's research on emerging markets has proven extremely important to our understanding of their business cycles and her studies of price stickiness have been highly influential among macroeconomists," Dean of social science in Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences Stephen Kosslyn said. Gopinath's research has examined price stickiness at the US border. A University of Delhi alumnus, Kolkata-born Gopinath has a Ph.D in economics from Princeton University.
— PTI
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UK to help NRI victims of domestic abuse
London, July 18 Such victims of abuse, who have no access to public funds because of their immigration status, will continue to get help, Home Secretary Theresa May said. The pilot scheme, which has so far helped more than 250 women, including Indians, will continue until March 2011. The scheme provides support to victims in the UK on a spouse or partner visa who have been forced to leave their home because of domestic violence. Before the pilot scheme began in November last year, women in this situation were not eligible for state benefits or housing, as leaving the family home invalidates their visa. Speaking at a Women's Aid conference, May said stopping violence against women would be a "priority for government”.
— PTI
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Former British soldier recalls Afghan ordeal
London, July 18 Bill Shaw, the former Army major in an interview to the Mail today said the worst part of his time in Afghan detention had been in a US-run prison, where his head was shaved, his legs were shackled and he was kept in a cell where the lights never went off. "Can you imagine? There I was, a 51-year-old educated man, being held down by Afghan prison-guards and having my head forcibly shaved. At that point I felt I'd lost everything," he was quoted as saying by the paper. Shaw who received death threats after his military background appeared in the press said, "There was a $10,000 bounty on my head causing him to be put into solitary confinement. It was a threat from al Qaida because of my military background". — PTI
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Islamabad, July 18 Gary Brooks Faulkner, 51, who was detained in northern Pakistan while trying to sneak into Afghanistan's Nooristan province, claimed during his interrogation that he was on a one-man quest to find and decapitate bin Laden in revenge for the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Faulkner, who has been dubbed "Rambo" and the "American Ninja", was arrested with night-vision goggles, a pistol, dagger and 40-inch sword that may have been intended for use on Osama. According to The Daily Times, the American Rambo had told one of his Pakistani interrogators that he was not alone in his mission, but many others were also trying to catch the dreaded terror warlord. "So there are others like you? Working freelance, trying to catch Bin Laden?" Faulkner was asked. — ANI
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A majority of Britons, around 67 pc, want to see the burqa banned in the country. Earlier in the week, members of parliament in France voted to outlaw the full Islamic veil in public. A poll by YouGov showed that two-thirds of the British public would like to see their government follow suit, the Daily Express reported. Over 2,000 Britons were asked whether the burqa should be banned in Britain. Some 67 pc said yes, while that figure rose to 80 per cent among people aged 55 or over. — IANS