The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

31 killed in Pak violence
Two journalists fall prey to target killings in Karachi
Afzal Khan in Islamabad

At least 31 persons, including members of the minority Shia community, have been killed in various incidents of target killings in Pakistan's commercial city of Karachi and Balochistan's capital Quetta.

As many as 10 persons died today, including two journalists, in Karachi while 21 others lost their lives yesterday, including three from the Shia Hazara community who were shot dead in Quetta, local media reported.

A father and son were gunned down by unidentified men in Orangi Town area of Karachi, while the body of another person was found beneath the Banaras Bridge in the city, the police said.

One more person was gunned down in Metroville area while another body with bullet marks was found from Sarrafa Bazaar at Mithadar in Karachi, Geo News reported.

Earlier in a firing incident in Liaquatabad, two persons, including son of a slain Intelligence Bureau officer, were killed. Another person died in violence elsewhere in Karachi today.

Sindh police chief Fayyaz Legahri said the sectarian strife has witnessed an increase in the city in recent times.

Firing and and other violent incidents in the city yesterday claimed 20 lives, including that of a police officer and some madrassa students.

The killings come at a time when an International Defence Exhibition is being held at the Expo Centre in the city, where Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is also present with a high- level delegation as part of his week-long Pakistan tour.

Most of the killings yesterday were carried out by motorcycle-borne gunmen, notwithstanding the Sindh provincial government's ban on pillion riding.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik said at the National Assembly, lower house of Parliament, yesterday that a total of 1,363 people had lost their lives in Karachi at the hands of target killers during the past five years.

He said 104 people were killed in year 2008, 160 in 2009, 373 in 2010, 478 in 2011 and 248 so far in 2012.

However, independent organisations, including the Human Rights commission of Pakistan, put the figure of those killed this year at a much higher level. In the first 10 days of November itself around 100 people have been killed in the city, they said.

(With inputs from PTI)

FBI probe into ‘suspicious emails’ did CIA chief in

Washington, November 11
The FBI investigation that led to the discovery of CIA Director David Petraeus' affair with author Paula Broadwell was sparked by "suspicious emails" from her to another woman and Petraeus was not the target of the probe, US law enforcement and security officials told Reuters on Saturday.

Ex-CIA chief Gen David Petraeus with his biographer Paula Broadwell in Afghanistan in this file photo. — AFP

But the CIA director's name unexpectedly turned up in the course of the investigation, two officials and two other sources briefed on the matter said.

The FBI was looking into "an issue with two women and they stumbled across the affair with Petraeus," a US government security source said.

The FBI probe was triggered when Broadwell sent threatening emails to an unidentified woman close to the CIA director, a security official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. It was unclear what the relationship of the woman who received the emails was to Petraeus.

The woman went to the FBI complaining of cyber harassment and the law enforcement agency traced the threats to Broadwell, the security official said. The FBI then uncovered explicit emails between Petraeus and Broadwell, The Washington Post reported.

Attempts by Reuters and other news media to reach Broadwell, an Army reserve officer and author of a biography of Petraeus, have not been successful.

Many questions in the case remain unanswered publicly, including the identity of the second woman; the precise nature of the emails that launched the FBI investigation; and whether US security was compromised in any way. — Reuters

Leisure, backroom politics await retiring Chinese leaders

Beijing, November 11
With a new set of Chinese leaders set to be unveiled on November 14 at the once-in-a-decade leadership Congress of the ruling CPC, it is not yet clear what the current high-profile leaders will do after retirement.

Keeping up with Party discipline after the death of its founder - Mao Zedong - Chinese Communist Party (CPC) leaders at top level have been retiring after a 10-year stint at the helm. The party, earlier, abolished life-long tenures.

While many top leaders earlier, after the transition, faded into oblivion enjoying the rich post-retirement privileges, others like for instance ex-President Jiang Zemin remained key players and kept on influencing the course of the party wielding influence over their proteges.

While some refrain from interfering politics and seek more time to pursue personal interests, others continue to dabble in behind the scene politics.

Some travel around the country to relax, write books and learn the arts, according to a report by Southern Weekend, a weekly newspaper Guangzhou, Capital of South China's Guangdong province.

Jiang, 86, never a man to shy away from publicity remained an exception and even played significant role in the selection of a new set of leaders to succeed President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao.

Even after retirement as President, he remained Chairman of the powerful Military Commission for two years, while his successor Hu remained Vice-Chairman.

Speculation is rife that Hu, 69, is going to do the same remaining Chairman of the Commission which will give him the control over 2.3 million strong powerful People's Liberation Army (PLA).

The new President to be, Xi Jinping, 59, a princeling and former Secretary of Shanghai Party unit, the home turf of Jiang was regarded as his protege, while Li Keqiang, 57, is regarded as the follower of Hu.

After his retirement Jiang returned to Shanghai, where he served as a mayor in 1985 and toured the country.

He had visited the Bailin Temple, a Zen Buddhist temple in Hebei province that has a history of more than 1,700 years and vowed to visit at least one religious venue every year. He is also well known for his appreciation of Western opera.

On June 6, 2010, he watched La Traviata in the capital with Beijing party chief Liu Qi and former vice-premier Li Lanqing, dismissing rumours that he was suffering from ill health. Li, now 80, sought an ordinary life after quitting politics in 2002.

A report in March by a Guangxi government news portal said Li tried to bargain over the price of his groceries for Lunar New Year, and applied for a job in a small restaurant, but the owner had identified him.

Like Jiang, the former vice-premier spends most of his time on the arts. He learnt signet engraving at 71, and gave a sample of his work to South Korean President Lee Myung-bak.

Li also spent eight years compiling a book that introduces the history of European music and the lives of 50 European classical musicians, according to the write up.

Former premier Li Peng, 84, who stepped down in 2003, has written several books detailing his thoughts on various topics.

He thrust himself into the public eye last month, though, by donating 3 million yuan proceeds from his books, to a scholarship for poor university students in Yanan, Shaanxi.

Li's successor, Zhu Rongji, who once said he was one of the busiest people in China when he was in office, has firmly avoided meeting officials after stepping down in 2003. "I have a rich post-retirement life," he said. — PTI

Change of guard

* Keeping up with Party discipline after the death of its founder, Mao Zedong, Chinese Communist Party leaders at top level have been retiring after a 10-year stint at the helm

* While many top leaders earlier, after the transition, faded into oblivion, others like for instance ex-President Jiang Zemin remained in the limelight

* While some refrain from interfering politics and seek more time to pursue personal interests, others continue to dabble in behind the scene politics

Entwistle quits as BBC top executive

London, November 11
Barely eight weeks into the job, George Entwistle has stepped down as BBC’s top executive after one of the broadcaster’s flagship current affairs programmes wrongly implicated a former Conservative politician in a paedophile scandal involving children’s care homes in Wales.

Bowing to widespread criticism, 50-year-old Entwistle resigned as the Director-General of the BBC, saying that the “wholly exceptional” events of last week had convinced him to do the “honourable thing” and stand down.

The news was announced by Entwistle and BBC Trust Chairman Lord Patten in a statement outside Broadcasting House, the BBC’s new billion-dollar headquarters in central London. Entwistle had admitted BBC’s Newsnight programme’s report, which led to Thatcher-era Tory Lord Alistair McAlpine being wrongly implicated, should not have been aired.

“When appointed to the role, with 23 years’ experience as a producer and leader at the BBC, I was confident the trustees had chosen the best candidate for the post, and the right person to tackle the challenges and opportunities ahead,” Entwistle said. “However the wholly exceptional events of the past few weeks have led me to conclude that the BBC should appoint a new leader.”

Lord Patten said the new acting Director-General would be Tim Davie, adding that Entwistle’s resignation was “one of the saddest evenings of my public life”.

Entwistle stepped down in the wake of criticism over a Newsnight report that had focused on allegations of abuses by a senior Conservative politician in the 1970s and 1980s at children’s homes in north Wales. Entwistle’s resignation follows a day of heavy criticism which saw the BBC Director General being mauled on the Radio 4’s Today programme by John Humphreys, who probed the recently appointed Editor-in-Chief as to why he had not taken more of an interest into the programme’s output, particularly in the wake of the scandal involving Jimmy Savile. — PTI

The row

* The BBC Director-General was under fire over a Newsnight report that had focused on allegations of abuses by a senior Conservative politician in the 1970s and 1980s at children’s homes in North Wales

* Entwistle had admitted that BBC’s Newsnight report, which led to Thatcher-era Tory Lord Alistair McAlpine being wrongly implicated, should not have been aired

Gandhi’s kin elected to Kansas assembly

Washington, November 11
A great-grandson of Mahatma Gandhi has been elected to a State Assembly in the United Stated during the general elections held on November 6.

Shanti Gandhi, 72, contesting as a Republican Party candidate, defeated his Democratic rival Theodore “Ted” Ensley by nine percentage point for the Kansas’s 52nd Assembly District.

He is son of late Saraswati Gandhi, wife of Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson the late Kanti Lal.

Shanti Gandhi, a cardiovascular and thoracic surgeon retired in 2010 from Stormont-Vail Hospital at Topeka City in the Kansas State, received 6,413 votes against Ensley’s 5,357 in the elections held Tuesday for the State’s, according to the results declared by the Kansas Secretary of State.

He arrived in the US in 1967 as a medical graduate from University of Bombay. — PTI

Shanti Gandhi

* Is the son of Saraswati Gandhi, wife of Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson Kanti Lal

* Defeated his Democratic rival Theodore “Ted” Ensley by nine percentage point for the Kansas’s 52nd Assembly District

NASA spacecraft may land like helicopters

Washington, November 11
US space agency NASA has tested a new rotor landing system in an attempt to enable its future space capsules to land like helicopters.

The idea behind the new landing system, tested in the 550 foot fall Vehicle Assembly Building at the space agency's Kennedy Space Center, is to replace parachutes with spinning blades to enable soft and controlled landings on land instead of the ocean.

The rotor re-entry and landing system is designed for capsule-inspired spacecraft like the Orion Multipurpose Crew Vehicle that should fly before the end of the decade. The landing system's process is called auto-rotation and has never been tried on a spacecraft. — PTI

Two stabbed outside California gurdwara

Washington, November 11
Two men have been stabbed outside a gurdwara in California and over a dozen pepper-sprayed in violent clashes that broke out between two groups over a power struggle to control the shrine.

An eyewitness said violence erupted outside the Tierra Buena gurdwara in Yuba City yesterday when the meeting of its board of directors ended and some of the directors were leaving the parking lot.

Clashes erupted outside the gurdwara apparently due to a power struggle between two groups on having the control over the religious place.

Two men were stabbed in the incident while over a dozen were pepper-sprayed.

No arrest has been made so far, as the incident is currently being investigated, the Sutter County Sheriff’s Department said.

Details of the incident were not available as the matter was under investigation.

The board members leaving the parking lot were apparently confronted by a group of men and attacked with shovels, broom handles and sticks, as two groups of over 30 people clashed with each other.

Later both sides claimed that they were attacked by the other group. — PTI

26/11 perpetrators trained in Karachi: Pak officials to court

Islamabad, November 11
Pakistani officials have informed an anti-terrorism court in Rawalpindi the details of training received at Lashkar-e-Taiba camps by the perpetrators of the Mumbai terror attacks.

Judge Chaudhry Habibur Rehman yesterday recorded the statements of five inspectors of crime investigation department who are prosecution witnesses, the Dawn reported today.

They informed him about the training received by the accused, including Zaki ur Rehman Lakhvi, alleged mastermind, at LeT camps in Karachi, Mansehra, Thatta and Muzaffarabad.

Lakhvi, a resident of Okara district, is an expert in using improvised explosive devices. He also served as LeT commander in Pakistani Kashmir, the court heard.

The inspectors informed the court that some of the accused also trained at sea near Karachi's Gadap town, according to the newspaper.

The Federal Investigation Agency's special prosecutor Chaudhry Zulfiqar Ali told the court that the witnesses recorded their statements without any pressure.

Counsel for Lakhvi, Khwaja Mohammad Haris, asked the witnesses whether they had witnessed the accused getting training at the LeT camps.

They admitted that they had never visited the LeT places or witnessed the suspects getting training and had relied upon the reports of informers.

Lakhvi's counsel said the witnesses had no direct knowledge of the involvement of his client in the attacks and had never shared their intelligence with the police.

“If they knew that Lakhvi or other suspects were involved in suspicious activities then why they did not put their names in the Fourth Schedule to limit their movement.

“The prosecution has fabricated a false story against the suspects and the statements of the five witnesses are part of that story,” he alleged.

As many as 166 persons died in the terrorist attack in Mumbai in November 2008. — IANS

Lakhvi ‘trained’ at Muzaffarabad
Witnesses informed the judge about the training received by the accused, including Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi alleged mastermind, at LeT camps in Karachi, Mansehra, Thatta and Muzaffarabad