Pasban-e-Aza leader killed in Karachi

Staff Report

KARACHI: The leader of Pasban-e-Aza Nayyar Zaidi has been killed on Monday in firing in Mahmoodabad, Karachi.

Nayyar Zaidi was killed in an incident of target killing near Chanesar Halt. He was going to participate in a meeting organized on the deteriorating situation of peace in the city when the killers, on motorbikes, opened fire at him. He was in a car with his nephew when a bullet hit his head. Zaidi died on the spot.

After the post mortem at Jinnah Post-graduate Medical Center, his body was brought to Iram Mosque (Mahmoodabad No. 4).

The funeral of Nayyar Zaidi will be held after Maghrib (sunset) prayers. Shops in the area were closed after the incident occurred. Trend Pk

Zardari responsible for sorry-state of affairs, says Nawaz

PML-N Leader Mian Nawaz Sharif has said that the President is responsible for the sorry-state of affairs of the country. Nawaz Sharif also held the President responsible for breaking all pledges and promises.
Addressing PML-N party workers in London, Mian Nawaz Sharif said that the government backed out from all its promises. He further said that if the deteriorating situation of the country is left unaddressed then everyone would be responsible for it. We do not want a Pakistan where there is no reverence for the judiciary and the Supreme Court, he added. He also said that worst rigging was held in the elections of 2008 against PML-N.
Mian Nawaz Sharif also said that the country is in deep crisis at the moment. He opined that positive minded people have rendered great sacrifices for the country.
PML-N Leader also blamed the government for always being on the begging side, disgracing the state’s image. He said that justice should be done in Akbar Bugtis assassination case in order to ensure peace in Baluchistan.

China defends Pakistan nuclear cooperation as ”peaceful”

BEIJING: China on Thursday defended its nuclear cooperation with Pakistan as peaceful after the United States announced it had sought clarification from Beijing on the sale of two reactors to Islamabad.

“China and Pakistan have maintained cooperation in recent years in the civilian use of nuclear energy,” foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters when asked about the US reaction to the deal.

“This cooperation is in line with our respective international obligations and totally for peaceful purposes, and has International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards and supervision.”

The state-run China National Nuclear Corporation has agreed to finance two civilian nuclear reactors in Pakistan”s Punjab province.

The deal comes after China in 2004 entered the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), a group of nuclear energy states that forbids exports to nations lacking strict International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards.

On Tuesday, US State Department spokesman Philip Crowley told reporters the United States had asked China to clarify details of the deal, which he said must be approved by the NSG.

Third daughter of rickshaw driver dies

LAHORE: Third daughter of a rickshaw driver who swallowed poisonous pills along with his wife and three daughters passed away today in a local hospital.

Muhammad Akbar, a rickshaw driver, father of three minor girls, led his family to commit suicide by giving poisonous pills to them, but his wife and one child survived leaving three others dead on Wednesday. His wife Muzamil Bibi and daughter Beenish were admitted to hospital.

MS Jinnah Hospital Dr Muhammad Akram told media Thursday that Beenish was put into ventilator because of her deteriorating situation but she was expired today. However, her mother is still under treatment.

Top US senator presses Clinton on Iran sanctions

WASHINGTON: A day after calling Iran a “festering sore,” the top US senator on Friday urged Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to work with lawmakers to ensure speedy approval of new sanctions against Tehran.

Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid also pressed Clinton to patch up strained ties with Israel and help promote direct negotiations between the crucial Middle East ally and the Palestinians.

“I am writing to ask you to work with Congress to quickly complete action on the Iran sanctions legislation and to encourage you to support direct negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians,” he wrote.

The US Senate and House of Representatives have launched discussions to meld their rival versions of legislation to target Iran”s gasoline imports in order to force the Islamic republic to freeze its suspect nuclear program.

President Barack Obama”s administration has expressed reservations about imposing new US sanctions before trying for a new round of UN sanctions, and over alienating countries that have helped Washington curb Iran”s atomic drive.

“While I support the administration”s decision to pursue sanctions at the United Nations, I think congressional action can further our mutual goal to halt Iran”s nuclear weapons activities,” said Reid.

“I look forward to working with you to ensure there are no impediments to swiftly completing this legislation,” he told Clinton.

Reid, who represents Nevada, also pressed the top US diplomat to defuse tensions with Israel, urging her to “clearly and unequivocally” restate Washington”s support for its ally and “unbreakable bond” with the Jewish state.

WH ”deeply concerned” about US hikers held in Iran

WASHINGTON: The United States is “deeply concerned” about three American hikers held in Iran since July, the White House said Friday amid reports they were in poor health and considering a hunger strike.

“The United States remains deeply concerned by the case of three American hikers, Shane Bauer, Josh Fattal and Sarah Shourd, who have been detained in Iran without charge or access to legal representation since July 2009,” President Barack Obama”s spokesman Robert Gibbs said in a statement.

Gibbs also said the White House was “deeply alarmed” to learn from the hikers” families of their deteriorating state of physical and emotional health, and said their conditions were “additional reasons for the government of Iran to release them immediately.”

Top UK General Says Afghanistan Army In Morale Crisis

The head of the army has warned that British troops are facing a crisis of deteriorating morale on the home front that risks undermining the war in Afghanistan.
In a confidential draft memo prepared for ministers, General Sir David Richards, chief of the general staff (CGS), said that recent cuts to the defence budget are having a “cumulative and corrosive effect on our soldiers and their families”.
Cuts to housing, shortages of training equipment and even the cancellation of sports events between soldiers’ tours of duty were making them and their families feel “undervalued”, the army chief wrote.
The leaked memo will be seized on by the Tories as opening a new front in the tussle between army chiefs and ministers over the politically sensitive issue of defence cuts.
It echoes the row last year when Richards’s predecessor, General Sir Richard Dannatt, stepped down after speaking out about equipment shortages as well as poor pay and conditions. It later emerged that government figures had tried to smear him over his expenses.
A senior military commander emphasised yesterday that it was not Richards’s intention to criticise ministers: “He’s not whingeing. He’s simply trying to flag up what he believes is a vital issue that needs their urgent attention.”
In the memo to the defence board, which comprises ministers and service chiefs, Richards shifts the focus of criticism from the war effort in Afghanistan to the treatment of troops on their return home.
While there had been “significant progress” on the front line, Richards said, the treatment of soldiers when they returned for 24 months between tours is so poor that it is threatening to undermine the war effort.
Marked “restricted”, the memo reports a summary of an internal “poll” of 5,000 soldiers and their families at units in Britain, Germany and Cyprus over the past four months.
The survey was discussed at the executive committee of the army board this month. Its results appear to be so alarming that Richards decided to alert ministers to its key findings. “My greatest concern … is the deteriorating experience of soldiers and their families … between tours which, the [survey] team reports, is disaffecting attitudes, damaging morale and risks undermining our ability to sustain the campaign . . .” he wrote.
“We need our soldiers to be ready, mentally and physically, to endure repeated tours in Afghanistan, in a harsh environment, with the real prospect of significant casualties each time. “To maintain the necessary morale and cohesion, they must see tangible signs between tours that they and their families are valued.”

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Top UK General Says Afghanistan Army In Morale Crisis was first posted on March 1, 2010 at 12:54 am.

Contempt Of Court Petition Filed In SC Against Musharraf

ISLAMABAD: A former presidential candidate in 2007 has filed a petition in Supreme Court of Pakistan to try former president under Article 6 of the Constitution.

Dr Anwar-ul-Haq, a medical practitioner in Islamabad, filed a petition in the court Wednesday saying Musharraf breached the Constitution and violated Supreme Court’s order by imposing emergency rule on Nov. 3, 2007.

He pleaded the court to try former military ruler under Article 6 and Contempt of Court Act, suggesting that he could be brought in to the country if needed for the purpose by InterPol.

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Contempt Of Court Petition Filed In SC Against Musharraf was first posted on September 2, 2009 at 12:29 pm.
©2009 “Pakistan News“.

I Asked Nothing For Myself From SA: Musharraf

RIYADH: Former President General (r) Pervez Musharraf has claimed that he asked nothing for himself but discussed the issues pertaining to the development of Pakistan in his meeting with Saudi King, reports ARY NEWS.

“The former president discussed the ways to improve political and economical situation of Pakistan in his meeting with Shah Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz held Tuesday,” Chaudhry Shahhaz Hussain – former federal minister and a close ally of Musharraf, told the newsmen.

It was decided in the meeting that all the steps would be taken keeping the Pakistan’s interests in view, he added.

After the meeting, the former president was quoted as saying that he would apprise the nation of the deteriorating economical situation of the country once he arrived in London.

The meeting for which Musharraf flew in to Saudi Arabia from London Monday on a special plane owned by Saudi King continued for more than three hours. Few Saudi cabinet ministers were also present in the meeting’ first hour, while later, Musharraf and King Abdullah held a one-on-one meeting lasted for more two hours.

The former president also called on Saudi Intelligence chief Prince Mukaran on Tuesday besides addressing members of Pakistani community in Jeddah, the channel reports.

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I Asked Nothing For Myself From SA: Musharraf was first posted on September 2, 2009 at 12:39 pm.
©2009 “Pakistan News“.

Hight Alert In Iraq After Series Bombing In Baghdad

BAGHDAD: Iraqi forces were on high alert Thursday after twin truck bombs killed 95 people and wounded almost 600 in Baghdad’s bloodiest day in 18 months.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki late Wednesday vowed to overhaul the country’s security while Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, whose ministry compound was among the buildings targeted, said there had been “serious security breaches”.

The explosions came just minutes apart outside government ministries while a car bombing and spate of mortar attacks added to the carnage in the capital, which has been under Iraqi security control since US troops withdrew from towns and cities in the conflict-torn country at the end of June.

Maliki met with his security and intelligence officials Wednesday during which a number of “important decisions and fast measures” were agreed upon to sustain security and stability in Baghdad, his office said in a statement.

Baghdad military command announced the arrest of 10 officers from the army and police who were responsible for security in the two districts hit by the attacks. No details were given.

The international community, led by the UN security council, condemned the blasts, which came on the sixth anniversary of a bombing on the UN compound in Baghdad that killed special envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello and 21 others.

The White House described the attacks as “senseless violence” but the Pentagon noted that they would not affect the US military’s plans to withdraw from Iraq by the end of 2011.

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen condemned the twin bombings as “cowardly and pointless attacks,” vowing to help fight the scourge of terrorism.

An Iraqi interior ministry official said 563 people were wounded in the truck bombs, one of which targeted the foreign ministry just outside the heavily fortified Green Zone and the other the nearby finance ministry, across the Tigris river.

“This was a calculated, deliberate attack on the restoration of normal life,” Zebari told reporters. “My assessment is it’s an attack on the normalisation of life in Baghdad.”

He acknowledged that there had been “some serious, serious security breaches,” and said that while he couldn’t say who was behind the attack, its timing was “archetypal of Al-Qaeda.”

In an earlier statement, Maliki said the bombings were “a desperate attempt to derail the political process and affect the parliamentary elections,” planned to take place in January 2010.

Analysts said that the attacks shattered attempts by Maliki to portray himself as a guardian of security ahead of the January elections.

“Maliki is clearly the man who wanted to be the symbol of increasing security and security capabilities, and that is clearly not the case,” International Crisis Group analyst Loulouwa al-Rachid said.

“If this trend (of violence) continues, yes, definitely it’s going to weaken Maliki. Practically, it will endanger the whole process. How can you run elections if security is an issue?”

Iraqis pointed the finger at their security forces, which in turn blamed members of executed former dictator Saddam Hussein’s regime.

“The government promised us security would return, but where is the security?” asked Hamid, 46, who lives a few hundred metres (yards) from the foreign ministry compound.

Major General Qassim Atta, the spokesman for the Iraqi Army’s Baghdad operations, blamed an alliance of Baathists loyal to Saddam and religious extremists for the attacks.

He added that security forces had arrested two senior Al-Qaeda leaders in western Baghdad, and that a truck carrying one tonne of explosives had been intercepted near a hospital in the centre of the capital.

A car bomb meanwhile hit a market in western Baghdad, while two mortar bombs landed in the Green Zone — an area of foreign embassies and government offices — and one exploded outside, a security official said.

It was the bloodiest day in Iraq since February 1, 2008, when bombs at Baghdad pet markets killed 98 people.

Recent attacks in the capital have appeared to target various ethnic groups in what is seen as a bid to reignite the sectarian violence which engulfed Iraq in 2006 and 2007.

Despite a reduction in violence across Iraq in the past year, attacks on security forces and civilians remain common in Baghdad, the restive northern city of Mosul and in the ethnically divided oil city of Kirkuk.

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Hight Alert In Iraq After Series Bombing In Baghdad was first posted on August 20, 2009 at 11:40 am.

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