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Pak summons US envoy
Iranian ships dock in Syria
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Syria frees iconic blogger Ghazzawi
Activists fear all-out assault on Homs
Mexico prison fight leaves 44 dead
IAEA team in Iran for talks
Myanmar lifts campaign restrictions on complaints
Thai police slaps charges on Iranian
Libyan families move into remains of Gaddafi fortress
US attempts to rope in India to contain China: Report
30 killed in Nigerian violence Hitler had eye on UK mansion for headquarters Ancient temple being renovated in Pakistan
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Pak summons US envoy
Islamabad, February 20 Richard Hoagland, the US Charge d’ Affaires, was called to the Foreign Ministry and a “strong protest was lodged with him with regard to the tabling of a resolution on Balochistan in the US Congress”, said a statement from the Foreign Office. Hoagland was “told in clear terms that the move in the US Congress was contrary to the spirit of friendly relations and violative of the principles of the United Nations Charter, international law and recognized norms of inter-state conduct”, the statement said. “He was asked to convey the serious concern of the Government of Pakistan to the US Administration,” it added. Over the weekend, Pakistan’s top leadership reacted angrily to the resolution moved in the US House of Representatives by Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, with Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani describing the move as an attack on the country’s sovereignty. “We condemn it as it is against our sovereignty,” Gilani said. Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar too took strong exception to the resolution on Balochistan, which has witnessed a spike in violence by nationalist groups that are seeking greater autonomy and a say in the exploitation of the southwestern province’s abundant natural resources, including minerals and gas. Khar said though the resolution was an isolated move by a few individuals, it was against the “very fundamentals of the longstanding Pakistan-US relations”. Pakistan’s National Assembly or lower house of parliament has already adopted a resolution condemning a recent hearing on Balochistan by the US Foreign Affairs Sub-Committee on Oversight and Investigations. Hoagland told state-run PTV yesterday that the US administration fully respects Pakistan’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. He said the US administration did not endorse the resolution on Balochistan. US Congressmen or Senators have the right to introduce any kind of resolutions or bills “but that does not represent the policy of the US Administration”, he said. He said that the Congressman who moved the resolution in the US Congress could get support of only two of the 435 members of the House. — PTI
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Iranian ships dock in Syria
Amman/Beirut, February 20 Despite pursuing a sustained military crackdown on the opposition in cities across the country, President Bashar al-Assad forged ahead with plans to hold a referendum at the end of the week. Activists in the western city of Hama said troops, police and militias had set up dozens of roadblocks, isolating neighbourhoods from each other. “Hama is cut off from the outside world. There are no landlines, no mobile phone network and no internet. House to house arrests take place daily and sometimes repeatedly in the same neighbourhoods,” an opposition statement said. Government troops extended their control on Hama after an offensive last week that concentrated on northern neighbourhoods on the edge of farmland that have provided shelter for Free Syrian Army rebels. The rebel fighters have been attacking militiamen, known as shabbiha, while avoiding open confrontations with armoured forces that had amassed around Hama. Government forces also maintained their siege of pro-opposition neighbourhoods of Homs, south of Hama on the Damascus-Aleppo highway. Opposition activists reported sporadic morning shelling of Baba Amro district. Security forces also mounted a campaign of arrests and raids in two suburbs of Deraa city and loud gunfire was heard, activists said. The reports could not be independently verified. In Damascus, activists unfurled a pre-Assad era national flag over a road bridge at the edge of the capital, YouTube footage showed. The Monday actions followed a weekend which saw one of the biggest demonstrations yet in Damascus as the uprising against Assad’s 11 year-rule neared its first anniversary. Security forces have killed at least 5,000 people, according to human rights groups, in a campaign to crush the revolt while the Assad government says it has lost more than 2,000 soldiers and security agents in what it describes as a struggle against foreign-backed terrorists. — Reuters
Syria frees iconic blogger Ghazzawi
The Syrian authorities have freed blogger Razan Ghazzawi, symbol of an 11-month uprising, and six other female activists arrested last week, a human rights lawyer said today.
The women were released on Saturday, but were ordered to report to police daily in order to continue their questioning, the lawyer, Anwar Bunni, told AFP. They were part of a group of 14 activists people arrested Thursday in a raid on the Syrian Centre for Media and Freedom of Expression, a group headed by rights activist Mazen Darwish. — AFP
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Activists fear all-out assault on Homs
Activists fear an all-out assault today on Homs, with Syria's embattled regime building up troops around the flashpoint city and activating a security alert in Damascus after surprise protests.
The reported buildup comes as the top US military officer, General Martin Dempsey, warned any intervention in Syria would be "very difficult" and that it was "premature" to arm the unrest-swept country's opposition movement. Activists and Syrian state media reported that at least 14 people were killed yesterday, adding to the more than 6,000 people who have died in the Syrian government's 11-month crackdown on dissent. "Infantry troops arrived yesterday (Sunday) in Homs," Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told AFP on the phone today. A Homs-based activist voiced fears of an imminent attack on Baba Amr. —
AFP
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Mexico prison fight leaves 44 dead Monterrey, February 20 Several inmates attacked others, Domene said, and the riot then spread. Forty-four people died before authorities regained control of the prison a couple of hours later, he said. Families of the prisoners gathered outside the prison yesterday morning, pushing at the fences and shouting at police to demand word of the victims. Deadly fights happen periodically in Mexican prisons as gangs and drug cartels stage jail breaks and battle for control of penitentiaries, often with the involvement of officials. Some 31 prisoners died in January in a prison riot in the Gulf coast city of Altamira in Tamaulipas state, which borders Texas. Another fight in a prison in the Tamaulipas border city of Matamoros in October killed 20 inmates and injured 12. In July, a riot at a prison in the border city of Juarez killed 17 inmates. Mexican authorities detained the director and four guards over that clash. Surveillance video showed two inmates opening doors to let armed prisoners into a room where the slain victims were reportedly holding a party. Twenty-three people were killed in a prison riot in Durango city in 2010, and a 2009 riot in Gomez Palacio, another city in the northern Mexican state of Durango, killed 19 people. —
AP
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Tehran, February 20 The trip is the second in less than a month by the International Atomic Energy Agency team, reflecting growing concerns over alleged weapons experiments something Iran has so far both denied and refused to discuss. Herman Nackaerts, a senior UN nuclear official, said in Vienna before the team departed on Sunday that he hoped for progress in the talks but his careful choice of words suggested little expectation the meeting will be successful. The West suspects Iran’s nuclear programme is geared toward making weapons, a charge Iran denies, insisting it’s for peaceful purposes only, such as power generation. Iran’s state radio said the inspectors hope to meet Iranian nuclear scientists and visit the Parchin military complexThe report said the IAEA had requested to visit Parchin, an Iranian military base and conventional weapons development facility outside of Tehran. The site has also been suspected of housing a secret underground facility used for Iran’s nuclear program, a claim denied by Iranian authorities. IAEA inspectors visited the site in 2005, but only one of four areas of potential interest within the grounds. —
AP
Tehran threatens to cut oil to more EU nations Tehran will cut oil exports to more EU nations if they remain “hostile,” the deputy oil minister who heads Iran’s state oil company said today, a day after sales were halted to France and Britain. Exports to Spain, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Germany and the Netherlands would be stopped, Ahmad Qalebani said, quoted by Mehr news agency. “Certainly if the hostile actions of some European countries continue, the export of oil to these countries will be cut,” said Qalebani, who runs the National Iranian Oil Company. He added: “In the current market situation, the price per barrel (of oil) will probably reach $150.” Qalebani also said any country wanting Iranian oil would be required to sign “longterm contracts”. European companies, he said, would be held to “two- to five-year contracts with no preconditions.” Iran exports about 20 per cent of its crude-some 600,000 barrels per day (bpd) -- to the European Union, most of which goes to Italy, Spain and Greece. Today, the oil ministry announced it had halted exports to France and Britain. That was in apparent retaliation for an EU-wide ban on Iranian oil that is to come fully into effect July 1 as part of Western sanctions against Tehran’s nuclear programme. —
AFP
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Myanmar lifts campaign restrictions on complaints
Yangon, February 20 The state Union Election Commission’s decision to lift all restrictions was unusual. Bureaucratic wheels grind slowly even where there are no political hurdles in the country where an elected, nominally civilian government took office almost a year ago after a half-century of military rule. NLD spokesman Nyan Win had said the party was facing difficulty in getting permission to use public venues for its meetings ahead of the April 1 polls. “What we want is fair play but the restrictions have increased lately. It is very difficult to say that the upcoming by-elections could be free and fair,” Nyan Win told reporters. Later today, however, he said the state Union Election Commission had informed the party that “all restrictions are lifted for the organisational activities.” “There is now a flicker of hope,” Nyan Win commented. Suu Kyi is running for one of the 48 parliamentary seats being contested in April. Her party overwhelmingly won a 1990 general election but the military refused to allow it to take power. — AP
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Former rights activist set to become Germany’s Prez Berlin, February 20 Chancellor Angela Merkel last night nominated Gauck as the joint candidate of her centre-right coalition and the two main opposition parties for the largely ceremonial post. Gauck had lost the presidential race as the opposition candidate against Wulff 20 months ago. A joint nomination by the main political parties will ensure that Gauck, who has no political affiliations, will get a resounding victory when the Federal Assembly, the electoral college comprised of members of the federal parliament and state legislatures, elects the 11th president on March 18. Presenting Germany’s future president to the media together with the leaders of the main political parties, Chancellor Merkel spoke of Gauck as a genuine democrat”, who could give important impulse to globalisation, solving the euro zone debt crisis and for more democracy. —
PTI
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Thai police slaps charges on Iranian Bangkok, February 20 Mohammad Hazaei, who was arrested at Suvarnabhumi International Airport last Tuesday while trying to flee to Malaysia, was questioned at the Metropolitan Police Bureau. Deputy Metropolitan Police Chief Pansiri Prapawat, who is heading the investigation, formally notified him of the joint charges, with the other three suspects. The charges include assembling explosive devices, possessing explosive devices without a permit, and causing an explosion injuring other persons and property. Deputy National Police Chief Jarumporn Suramanee said the DNA test showed links between Hazaei and evidence such as clothes, hats and shoes collected from the rented house where the first explosion took place. — PTI
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Libyan families move into remains of Gaddafi fortress
Tripoli, February 20 Their move, largely for economic reasons they say, highlights the collision between two parts of Libyan society. On one side are the pro-Gaddafi elite who benefited from his largesse, and on the other are ordinary people who, while not poor by regional standards, only saw a small share of Libya’s huge energy wealth. Rebels forced Gaddafi to abandon his Tripoli stronghold, a huge complex of houses, offices and storage buildings which was targeted by NATO warplanes several times during the war. They burned, looted and defaced what for years was a forbidding symbol of the autocratic leader’s power. Days after the walls of the Bab al-Aziziya compound came tumbling down in late August, school chemistry teacher Majid moved his wife and seven children into one of its villas believed to be once occupied by one of Gaddafi’s officers. “Before, when I would drive past Bab al-Aziziya, I wouldn’t even dare to look at it, we were afraid to even talk in the car,” the 50-year-old said as he walked around his new large four-bedroom house with its separate guest quarters. “We never imagined we would even enter this place; now I am living here.” Majid said he found the house in disarray when he arrived and has since been working to restore it. He has repainted walls but a corridor is still charred. As a pot of stew steams on a cooker in the kitchen, his family sit next door watching television in a living room. Outside, a toilet lies in the grass, nearby, pieces of a broken wooden cupboard lie scattered. “It is much better than where I lived before,” he said. Others are not as comfortable. Behind Majid’s villa, 24-year-old Saja Mohammed al-Sahali and her husband Haithem live in a room that once passed for an office. Teapots, plastic cups and plates on a tray and suitcases of clothes, lie scattered on a carpet. Plastic flowers and plants stand in vases around the room. “There is nowhere else for us to stay. We can’t keep on paying rent, that’s why we came here. We don’t have anybody,” al-Sahali said, fighting back tears. “To be honest, it’s not healthy, there is no power, no water, it’s cold. There is nothing. But what can we do?” While the residents may not have deeds to their property, Haithem presents a document signed by a nearby neighbourhood military council that gives them permission to stay. It does not mention Bab al-Aziziya specifically, but cites Haithem’s needs for accommodation. The families have inhabited the last standing buildings of the sprawling complex. In front of them, piles of rubble have yet to be moved. Children ride bikes and run around fallen basketball hoops and empty ammunition boxes. The black, green and red flags of the now ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) dot the landscape. — Reuters
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US attempts to rope in India to contain China: Report Beijing, February 20 But America's attempts to rope in India to build new Asia-Pacific strategic structure to contain China is complicating bilateral ties between the two Asian neighbours, the write up said. "The development of the China-India relations is being tested by the US' strategic adjustment in the Asia-Pacific Region, which will have a complicated and in-depth influence on the future of China-India relations," it said referring to US' attempts to build alliances especially in Beijing's neighbourhood. The article also referred to multinational military co-operation, including US-Australia-India cooperation and US Japan-India cooperation. "One of the main topics of the dialogue is on how to deal with China's growing global military and political status. — PTI
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30 killed in Nigerian violence Abuja, February 20 The market in Maiduguri city came under attack this afternoon and at least eight militants were also killed in the ensuing gunbattle with security forces. Militants of Boko Haram launched a revenge attack on the market where one of their members was killed by an irate mob seven days ago, locals told PTI. The militants threw several explosives into the market and some other parts of the city and launched gunfire, killing and wounding indiscriminately before the military intervened. Hospital workers said the number of dead people could be up to 30. While a resident said that at least 15 persons were killed in the ensuing gun battle with the military, the Joint Task Force (JTF) said it had killed only eight members of the sect. "We saw about three pick up vans loaded with people in front of Ibrahim Taiwo Police Station, opposite the Baga Market this afternoon shortly after the gun battle with members of the sect, but we cannot tell whether they were corpses or those wounded," a source at the market said. The spokesman of the JTF, Lt Col Hassan Mohammed said the military killed eight members of the sect during a gun battle at the Baga Market. — PTI
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Hitler had eye on UK mansion for headquarters London, February 20 According to them, Hitler had, in fact, chalked out the "top secret" plan to use Apley Hall, near Norton, in the heart of Shropshire countryside in the Midlands as the headquarters of his operation during the Second World War. The house was then owned by one Major AW Foster, a decorated hero of both the Boer War and First World War, who had lost a leg in battle. The historians believe the Nazi tyrant was interested in the area, seven miles from the tourist town of Bridgnorth, as it was geographically in the middle of England and had a handy airbase nearby, the 'Daily Mail' reported. Their conclusion came from a bundle of 1940s papers, recovered from a bunker in Belgium at the end of World War II, containing maps highlighting strategic sites for attack by the Germans, including railway stations, power plants and bridges in Bridgnorth and other towns in the Midlands. "As far-fetched as it may sound, the papers, which were marked 'top secret', earmarked a place in the middle of nowhere where Hitler hoped to set up camp during his planned invasion. "It was widely believed that Hitler's invasion was timed for 1940 but that he scrapped the idea after the Royal Air Force fended off the Luftwaffe over Kent. The fact that some of these documents date from 1941, a year after the Battle of Britain, clearly shows that Hitler never abandoned the plan. "To go to so much trouble in researching Bridgnorth and the surrounding area indicated that the Nazis saw the town as of key importance for something," Richard Westwood-Brookes, one of the historians, said. — PTI
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Ancient temple being renovated in Pakistan
Islamabad, February 20 The 1,500-year-old Shri Panchmukhi Hanuman Mandir, located at Soldier Bazaar in Karachi, is getting a facelift after its management battled land grabbers to regain partial control of its property. Though the renovation efforts suffered a setback some years ago, its management is adamant that the work will be completed despite encroachments on the temple's plot, intimidation and threats by land grabbers and a lack of funds, a media report said today. "The temple was supposed to be renovated within two years. But a shortage of funds and the cases we have been fighting for the ownership of our land have slowed down the process. Yet we won't give up," said Shri Ram Nath Maharaj, the temple's caretaker. The temple holds special significance for Hindus as it is the only shrine in the world which has a "natural statue" of Hanuman that is not man-made, Maharaj said. The eight-foot blue and white statue was discovered at the site of the temple long ago. The room in which the statue is kept will not be touched during the renovation. A free 'langar khana' or kitchen and a praying area are currently being built. To preserve the look of the temple, its original yellow stones are being used to rebuild the arched walls. "We believe in preserving our temple. We had to renovate because it was in ruins, with parts of the roof caving in," Maharaj said. — PTI
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A fight among inmates led to a prison riot in northern Mexico that left 44 persons dead, according to a security official.
Nuevo Leon state public security spokesman Jorge Domene Zambrano said yesterday the riot broke out at about 2 am (local time) in a high-security section of a prison in the city of Apodaca outside of the northern industrial city of Monterrey.
It used to be the impenetrable fortress of Muammar Gaddafi’s regime. Only workers or members of the toppled Libyan leader’s inner circle could see inside.
Now, six months after Tripoli fell to Western-backed rebels, dozens of families have moved into the few buildings still standing in the charred remains of Gaddafi’s Bab
al-Aziziya compound, setting up homes amid the rubble.
