W O R L D

Delhi, Dhaka ink strip maps to mark border
Dhaka, August 20
Bangladesh and India today inked strip maps to demarcate over 4,000-kilometre international border between the two neighbours in a bid to settle the long-standing frontier-related discord ahead of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to the country next month.

Egypt, Israel ties hit a new low
Cairo, August 20
The relations between Egypt and Israel plunged to a new low with Cairo announcing recall of its envoy from Tel Aviv to protest the killing of its five soldiers in a shootout between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants in Sinai.

Egyptian demonstrators burn an Israeli flag during a protest outside the Israeli embassy in Cairo on Saturday. — AFP

Delhi, Dhaka ink strip maps to mark border

Boundary Issue n A strip map is an unscaled drawing of a route to include critical points along the border, roadside features and town facilities on a simple flip-over style map. n Bangladesh shares borders with five Indian states. The longest 2,262-km border is with West Bengal n The strip map was required to ensure international recognition to the 1947 boundary lines with Bangladesh as the drawings in the map would mark the frontier lines across the border and significant features along that line.

Dhaka, August 20
Bangladesh and India today inked strip maps to demarcate over 4,000-kilometre international border between the two neighbours in a bid to settle the long-standing frontier-related discord ahead of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to the country next month.

“This signing of the strip maps containing the Bangladesh-India International border boundary line coordination point will end an outstanding issue which (has) remained unresolved for the past 65 years,” said Land Minister Rezaul Karim Hira at a function here to mark the launch of the signing process.

A strip map is an unscaled drawing of a route to include critical points along the border, roadside features and town facilities on a simple flip-over style map. The map usually incorporates distances.

Rajeet Mitter, the Indian High Commissioner here, and Tariq Ahmad Karim, his Bangladesh counterpart in New Delhi, were designated to sign jointly some 11,000 maps, expected to be completed ahead of Indian Prime Minister's September 6-7 Dhaka visit.

“The two envoys are ambassadors plenipotentiary or officials having authority to resolve dispute and that is why they are entrusted with the task of signing the maps,” a Home Ministry official said.

Officials said the two envoys have already signed some of 1,149 maps.

The two neigbours formally acknowledged their 1947 boundary lines by signing the strip maps today to demarcate a 4,156-km, mostly porous international border between them to resolve an outstanding issue pending since 1947.

A Home Ministry official, familiar with the process, said the strip map was required to ensure international recognition to the 1947 boundary lines as the drawings in the map would mark the frontier lines across the border and significant features along that line.

Home Minister Shahara Khatun, who was also present on the occasson, said Bangladesh shares borders with five Indian states. The longest 2,262-km border is with West Bengal (Paschim Banga) followed by 874 km with Tripura, 436 km with Meghalaya, 320 km with Mizoram and 264 km with Assam.

Last month, the two neighbours inked a key agreement aimed at enhancing quality of border management and ensuring cross-frontier security through measures like joint vigils to deal with human trafficking and smuggling of drugs and weapons.

Bangladesh and India have also concluded a crucial joint survey in 162 'enclaves' on both sides of their porous borders so as to prepare the ground for a deal on the historical dispute during the Indian premier's visit.

The enclaves, or areas land-locked by territories belonging to the other side, has been an unresolved border issue between the two countries since the Partition of the subcontinent. — PTI

Egypt, Israel ties hit a new low
Cairo recalls envoy from Tel Aviv over border killings, demands official apology

Cairo, August 20
The relations between Egypt and Israel plunged to a new low with Cairo announcing recall of its envoy from Tel Aviv to protest the killing of its five soldiers in a shootout between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants in Sinai.

The step escalated tensions between the two neighbours and threatened the 1979 peace treaty.

Egypt’s interim government accused Israel of violating the treaty and said its envoy in Tel Aviv would be withdrawn until Israel apologises for the incident. “Egypt has decided to withdraw its ambassador to Israel until there is an official apology,” state television said.

A statement issued after a rare meeting of the ministerial group of the crises-management committee said that Egypt has asked Israel to officially apologise for the attack.

“Egypt will never give up the rights of its sons.” The meeting was attended by Deputy Prime Minister Ali el-Selmi and the ministers of international cooperation and planning, justice, interior, information, foreign affairs, information and health along with the head of the Egyptian intelligence service and Armed Forces commanders.

The meeting discussed clashes in Sinai that left an Egyptian army officer and four soldiers dead and several others injured. They were deployed at the border area inside the Egyptian territories, said Egyptian Information Minister Osama Heikal.

They were killed and wounded in the shoot-out between the Israeli forces and the armed groups inside the Israeli territories, he added. The meeting also entrusted the foreign minister to summon the Israeli envoy in Cairo. Egypt is calling for an official probe into the incidents.

A few hundred Egyptians kept up a protest at the Israeli embassy in Cairo that began on Friday night, when they burned Israeli flags and tore down metal barriers. Banging on the barriers, they demanded the expulsion of the Israeli envoy.

The cabinet ordered the foreign minister to summon the Israeli ambassador and demand an official apology from Israeli leaders for statements accusing Egyptian military rulers of losing their grip on the Sinai peninsula.

The Egyptian cabinet held an emergency meeting to discuss events at the Israeli border. After the meeting the minister of information, Osama Heikal, gave a press conference to report on the decisions of the cabinet.

There is also a request for a joint official investigation to find the reasons of the incident, identify the people responsible and legal producers that will safeguard the rights of the Egyptian victims and injured. — PTI

Hamas ends ceasefire with Israel

Jerusalem, August 20
Amid spiralling violence that claimed 22 lives in two days, Palestinian Gaza Strip ruler Hamas today announced an end to the informal ceasefire with Israel. Hamas’ military wing, Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, announced that it is no longer committed to the Gaza region ceasefire with Israel.

“There is no longer a lull vis-à-vis Israel, in the face of the ongoing massacre that it commits against the Palestinian people without any justification,” the armed faction’s spokesman said in a statement.

Hamas also urged all Gaza factions to “respond to Israel’s crimes.” Israeli warplanes killed three Palestinians in an airstrike in central Gaza City yesterday, medics said, raising the death toll to 14 in the coastal enclave since a deadly attack in southern Israel on Thursday left eight Israelis dead. — PTI

Gunmen ambush police van in Karachi; 4 cops shot dead

Karachi, August 20
Four elite police commandos were killed and around 35 others injured when their van was ambushed by unidentified gunmen in a troubled area of this Pakistani port city which has witnessed 70 deaths during violence in the past couple of days.

The police personnel were ambushed late last night in Chakra Goth area of Korangi, but two of the gunmen were captured after being wounded in the ensuing shootout. “The policemen were in plain clothes when they were ambushed and retaliated immediately,” city police chief Saud Mirza said.

The gunmen after attacking the van disembarked the policemen and shot dead four of them before the other commandos retaliated. “Around 35 policemen, who were wounded in the ambush, have been shifted to Jinnah hospital the condition of six is critical,” Mirza said. The injured included a DSP from Quaidabad.

The incident took place on a day when despite President Asif Zardari chairing a high level meeting in Islamabad to discuss the law and order situation in Karachi, the violence escalated with the death toll reaching 27.

Besides the killings, there were reports of 18 people missing and gunmen opening fire on public transport in some areas.

Seven vehicles were also torched in different parts of Karachi as the death toll for two days of violence has reached around 70. — PTI

Rebels push closer to Tripoli
Fighting spills over to Tunisia

Tunis/Zawiyah, August 20
Rebels battled for towns on either side of the besieged Libyan capital Tripoli today, and fighting spilled across the border into Tunisia, where Libyan infiltrators clashed with Tunisian troops.

Tunisian security sources said their forces had intercepted Libyan men in vehicles with weapons and fought them through the night in the desert. They reported several casualties. The six-month-old war in Libya came close to the frontier this week after rebels suddenly seized the coastal city of Zawiyah just 50 km west of Tripoli, surrounding the capital and severing its supply routes. Gaddafi's forces west of Zawiyah and near the Tunisian border have been effectively encircled and cut off from their own supply lines. Tunisia has beefed up its army presence in the border area.

Residents of Tunisian town of Douz told Reuters that helicopters were swooping overhead and troops had been summoned from nearby towns to subdue the infiltrators, who rode in vehicles without number plates. The Tunisian security sources did not say whether the armed men were rebels or supporters of Gaddafi. — Reuters

Aung San Suu Kyi ‘encouraged’ by talks with Prez

Aung San Suu Kyi and President Thein Sein in Naypyitaw. — AP/PTI

Naypyidaw, August 20
Myanmar’s democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi today said she was “encouraged” by her first meeting with the country’s new nominally civilian President.

In her first comments on yesterday’s discussions with President Thein Sein, a former general, the Nobel laureate indicated that the one hour meeting in the capital Naypyidaw had gone well. “I am glad to see him and I am encouraged,” she told reporters.

The talks, a rare encounter between Suu Kyi and one of the members of the junta who kept her locked up for much of the past two decades, are the latest example of contacts between the government and its most renowned critic.

It was the democracy icon’s first visit to the capital Naypyidaw, at the invitation of the regime, which came to power in March after a widely condemned election marred by the absence of Suu Kyi and her party.

A Myanmar official, who asked not to be named, said the meeting was “quite good and quite open” without giving details of the nature of discussions, which were held behind closed doors. — AFP