Cold weather grips most parts of country

 

The cold wave persists in most parts of the country with lowest temperature as -1C was even recorded in Mithi area of Sindh while temperature also fell below zero Celsius degrees in Balochistan including Quetta.

 

The temperature recorded in different cities was: Parachinar-14C, Kalat-8C, Quetta-7C, Zhob -5C, Murree- 4C and -1C in Toba Tek Singh and Sahiwal.

 

The cold weather also persists in Punjab, Khyber-Pakhtunkhawa and Northern areas while farmers have been informed that rain is not expected in most cultivation areas within next 3 days.
 

Eid Milad arrangements finalised

 

Faithfuls have decorated public and private buildings, roads, bazaars and markets across the country tastefully with colourful lights, buntings and flags to celebrate Eid Milad-un-Nabi (PBUH) which falls on Sunday.

 

Foolproof security measures have been made on the routes of Milad processions which will be taken out in different cities to mark the day.
 

Rain, snowfall likely in upper areas, Balochistan

 

According to Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD), a new spell of western winds causing rains in entering the upper areas of the country due to which rain is expected in north eastern Balochistan including, Quetta, Zhob, Kalat divisions and in upper Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa including Peshawar, Malakand and Hazara divisions while intermittent rain and snowfall is expected in some areas of Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan.

 

However, weather will remain cold and dry in most parts of the country.

 

Minimum temperature recorded in different cities was: Kalam -15C, Parachinar -11C, Astore -10C, Skardu -9C, Gopas and Hunza -7C, Gilgt -5C, Dir -4C and Muree -1C.
 

Cold, dry weather predicted for next 24 hours

 

According to Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD), mostly cold and dry weather will prevail in most parts of the country during next few days.

 

However, light rain and snowfall is expected in the hilly areas of the country.

 

Minimum temperature recorded in different cities of the country was: Kalam -15C, Astore -9C, Hunza -8C, Kalat -6C, Quetta -6C, Murree -3C, Islamabad 0C, Gilgit 1C, Muzaffarabad 2C, Lahore, Faisalabad and Peshawar 3C, Multan 5C and Karachi 10 degree centigrade.
 

China retail sales hit $74 billion during holidays

 

China said retail sales surged 16.2 percent year on year to 470 billion yuan ($74 billion) during the week-long Lunar New Year holiday, as consumers splashed out on food, wine and clothes.

 

Hundreds of millions of people journey across the country during the holiday to celebrate with their families and consumer spending typically soars during the period.

 

The commerce ministry said sales of clothes, jewellery and food rose 18.7 percent, 16.4 percent and 16.2 percent respectively, according to a statement posted on its website Saturday, the last day of the holiday.

 

The number of passenger trips on trains, planes, boats and buses was expected to reach 3.2 billion during the peak travel period from January 8 to February 16, up 9.1 percent from last year.

 

Authorities warned snow and rain in parts of southern and southwestern China could disrupt road and rail links as millions of people returned to work in the major cities, the Global Times reported.

WAPDA employees continue protests in Sialkot, Jhang

TrendPK.com

SIALKOT: Protests staged in several cities against Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA), TrendPK reported on Wednesday.

The protesters condemned illegal appointments and possible privatization of the institute in Sialkot, Jhang and other cities and areas.

They chanted slogans against the institute. The protesters locked their office and boycotted routine work.

In Jhang, the WAPDA employees protested on fifth consecutive day demanding their rights.

The protesters warned of serious consequence if their demands not accepted. TrendPK

Police calm London, but riots flare across UK

LONDON: Thousands of extra police officers on the streets kept a nervous London quiet Wednesday after three nights of rioting, but looting flared in Manchester and Birmingham, where a murder probe was opened when three men were killed after being hit by a car.

An eerie calm prevailed in the capital, where hundreds of shops were shuttered or boarded up as a precaution, but unrest spread across England on a fourth night of violence by brazen crowds of young people.

Scenes of ransacked stores, torched cars and blackened buildings have frightened and outraged Britons just a year before their country is to host next summer’s Olympic Games, bringing demands for a tougher response from law enforcement. Police across the country have made almost 1,200 arrests since the violence broke out over the weekend.

In London, where armored vehicles and convoys of police vans patrolled the streets, authorities said there were 16,000 officers on duty — almost triple the number present Monday night.

The show of force seems to have worked. There were no reports of major trouble in London, although there were scores of arrests. Almost 800 people have been arrested in London since trouble began Saturday.

“What happened in London last night was, when community leaders and the police came together, there were significant arrests,” said police deputy assistant chief constable Stephen Kavanagh. “We used buses to make sure some looters were taken away before they got into doing anything, but it was that joint action that made the difference.”

Outside the capital, some looting erupted, but not on the scale of the violence that hit several areas of London on Monday.

In the northwestern city of Manchester, hundreds of youths rampaged through the city center, hurling bottles and stones at police and vandalizing stores. A women’s clothing store on the city’s main shopping street was set ablaze, along with a disused library in nearby Salford.

Manchester assistant chief constable Garry Shewan said it was simple lawlessness.

“We want to make it absolutely clear — they have nothing to protest against,” he said. “There is nothing in a sense of injustice and there has been no spark that has led to this.”

Britain’s soccer authorities were talking with police to see whether this weekend’s season-opening matches of the Premier League could still go ahead in London. A Wednesday match between England and the Netherlands at London’s Wembley stadium was canceled to free up police officers for riot duty.

Britain’s riots began Saturday when an initially peaceful protest over a police shooting in London’s Tottenham neighborhood turned violent. That clash has morphed into a general lawlessness in London and several other cities that police have struggled to halt.

While the rioters have run off with goods every teen wants — new sneakers, bikes, electronics and leather goods — they also have torched stores apparently just for the fun of seeing something burn. They were left virtually unchallenged in several neighborhoods, and when police did arrive they often were able to flee quickly and regroup.

With police struggling, some residents stood guard to protect their neighborhoods. Outside a Sikh temple in Southall, west London, residents vowed to defend their place of worship if mobs of young rioters appeared. Another group marched through Enfield, in north London, aiming to deter looters.

One far-right group said about 1,000 of its members were taking to the streets to deter rioters.

“We’re going to stop the riots — police obviously can’t handle it,” Stephen Lennon, leader of the far-right English Defense League, told The Associated Press. He warned that he couldn’t guarantee there wouldn’t be violent clashes with rioting youths.

Anders Behring Breivik, who has confessed to the bombing and massacre that killed 77 people in Norway last month, has cited the EDL as an inspiration.

In the central England city of Nottingham, police said rioters hurled firebombs though the window of a police station, and set fire to a school and a vehicle but there were no reports of injuries. Some 90 people were arrested.

Some 250 people were arrested after two days of violence in Birmingham — where police launched a murder investigation after the deaths of three men hit by a car — some residents said the men had been patrolling their neighborhood to keep it safe from looters.

Police said a man had been arrested on suspicion of murder in the case.

In the northern city of Liverpool, about 200 youths hurled missiles at police and firefighters in a second night of unrest, and 44 arrests were reported.

There also were minor clashes in the central and western England locations of Leicester, Wolverhampton, West Bromwich, Bristol, and Gloucester — where police and firefighters tackled a blaze and disturbance in the city’s Brunswick district.

In London, hundreds of stores, offices, pubs and restaurants had closed early Tuesday amid fears of fresh rioting. Normally busy streets were eerily quiet and the smell of plywood filled the air as business owners rushed to secure their shops before nightfall.

In east London’s Bethnal Green district, convenience store owner Adnan Butt, 28, said the situation was still tense.

“People are all at home — they’re scared,” he said.

Prime Minister David Cameron’s government rejected calls by some lawmakers and citizens for strong-arm riot measures that British police generally avoid, such as tear gas and water cannons.

“The public wanted to see tough action. They wanted to see it sooner and there is a degree of frustration,” said Andrew Silke, head of the criminology department at the University of East London.

Cameron recalled Parliament from its summer recess for an emergency debate on the riots Thursday.

Other politicians visited riot sites Tuesday — but for many residents it was too little, too late. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg was booed by crowds who shouted “Go home!” in Birmingham, while London Mayor Boris Johnson was heckled on a shattered shopping street in Clapham, south London.

Johnson said the riots would not stop London from “welcoming the world to our city” for the 2012 Olympics.

So far 770 people have been arrested in London and 167 charged — including an 11-year-old boy — and the capital’s prison cells were overflowing. Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service said it had teams of lawyers working 24 hours a day to help police decide whether to charge suspects.

A total of 111 officers and 14 members of the public have been hurt.

The violence was triggered by the fatal police shooting of Mark Duggan, a 29-year-old father of four who was gunned down in Tottenham on Thursday under disputed circumstances.

Police said Duggan was shot dead when officers from Operation Trident — the unit that investigates gun crime in the black community — stopped a cab he was riding in. A Saturday protest demanding justice degenerated into a riot, which spread to neighboring parts of London on Sunday and by Monday had spread across the capital.

Duggan’s death resonated because it stirred memories of the 1980s, when many black Londoners felt they were disproportionately stopped and searched by police. Their frustration erupted in violent riots in 1985.

But the rioters who have taken to the streets since Sunday have been extremely diverse — those in central England appeared to be mostly white and working class. AGENCIES

Three Pakistanis killed by car in Birmingham riots

LONDON: Three Pakistani men died Wednesday after being hit by a car during riots in Birmingham, officials said, as witnesses said they died while trying to protect their community from looters.

The deceased include two brothers Shehzad Hussain and Haroon Hussain and another youth Mussavir Ali.

Police said they had arrested a man and launched a murder inquiry after the incident which happened at around 1:00 am (0000 GMT) as Britain’s second largest city suffered from another night of riots.

Paramedics said they found around 80 people at the scene after the men were hit by the car. Two of the men were pronounced dead on the spot and the third died later in hospital.

Witnesses and family members said the victims were Pakistani men and were part of a group protecting the area from looting after local people had left a local mosque.

“People came out of prayers and they were protecting the area. My friends were targeted — they were standing on the side of the road and the car just came and ran them over,” witness Kabir Khan Isakhel said.

Another witness said the incident happened after a car was set ablaze in a nearby street and youths gathered, prompting local people to defend a local shopping area.

“They lost their lives for other people, doing the job of the police,” Mohammed Shakiel said outside the hospital where the men were taken, prompting around 200 people to gather in support.

“They were protecting the community as a whole.”

Several cars drove past the group as it was guarding the stores and the occupants shouted abuse before one vehicle returned and mounted the pavement at “tremendous speed” and hit the men, throwing them into the air, Shakiel said.

Tariq Jahan, the father of Haroon Jahan, one of the men who died, told the BBC: “I’ve got no words to describe what, why he was taken and why this has happened.”

“He was a very good lad, starting at the beginning of his life. He had his whole life ahead of him. It makes no sense why people are behaving like this and taking the lives of three innocent people.”

Police said a 32-year-old man was being held on suspicion of murder. It said the victims were aged 20, 30 and 31.

“West Midlands Police have launched a murder enquiry, arrested one man in connection with the incident and recovered a vehicle nearby which will be examined by forensics experts,” a police statement said.

Britain has been hit by four nights of violent rioting. London was quieter on Tuesday night but the unrest spread to other cities including Manchester and Birmingham. AGENCIES/ TrendPK

European spring: Rioters rule England for fourth straight night

There were isolated incidents of disorder Tuesday in the city of Wolverhampton and town of West Bromwich, both near Birmingham, England’s second biggest city, police said.

The rioting erupted on Saturday in London and has been worst in the capital but it has also spread to other parts of the country.

“In Wolverhampton, some stores have been broken into. In West Bromwich, there is currently some disorder and two cars have been set on fire,” said a statement from West Midlands Police.

“Police officers are at both scenes dealing with the incidents.” A police spokeswoman refused to say how many people were involved in the disturbances.

West Midlands Police have already arrested more than 130 people after rioting late Monday in Birmingham, which saw shops smashed up and looted in the city centre and a police station set on fire.

Prime Minister David Cameron on Tuesday recalled parliament and ordered thousands of extra police onto the streets after three nights of rioting left parts of London and other cities in flames.

There were no immediate reports of fresh unrest in London.

A total of over 500 people have been arrested by Scotland Yard on charges of rioting and hundreds have reportedly been charged.

British PM David Cameron inspects damage in south of capital

LONDON: British Prime Minister David Cameron visited the site of a building that was destroyed by fire in a third night of rioting in the UK capital.

The House of Reeves in Croydon, south London, was a local landmark furniture store run by the Reeves family for decades.

It was torched overnight during the wave of violence and looting that has raged across London since Saturday.

Cameron met police at the site who explained what had happened.

Cameron described the scenes of burning buildings and smashed windows in London and several other British cities as “sickening,” but refrained from more extreme measures such as calling in the military to help beleaguered police restore order.

Instead the Prime Minister, who cut short his holiday to fly in to the capital, recalled Parliament from its summer recess Tuesday and nearly tripled the number of police on the streets.

Violence in London first broke out late on Saturday in the low-income, multiethnic northern district of Tottenham, where protesters demonstrated against the fatal police shooting of Mark Duggan, a 29-year-old father of four who was gunned down in disputed circumstances Thursday.

Duggan’s death stirred old animosities and racial tensions similar to those that prompted massive UK race riots in the 1980s, despite efforts by London police to build better relations with the city’s ethnic communities.

Some 525 arrests have been made in London alone and dozens were arrested in other cities. AGENCIES

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