SC allows Gilani to take his car inside courts premises
Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani was allowed to take his car inside Supreme Court premises when he arrives for hearing in contempt case today.
In an earlier development the apex court had barred Gilani from taking his car inside court’s premises.
Pakistan People’s Party’s secretary information Qmar Zaman Kaira moved an application in the court that security risks have increased due to hearing of missing persons case by the Supreme Court.
Interior Minister also wrote a letter to registrar of the Supreme Court, asking him to grant permission to prime minister to bring his car inside the Supreme Court building.
Tesla announces Model X SUV for 2014
Tesla Motors Inc showed off a prototype of its Model X, a battery-powered SUV that represents the company s bet that consumers will buy a range of electric vehicles spun from a common platform.
The Model X, which features what the company calls “falcon-wing” doors and faster acceleration than a Porsche 911 — it goes from 0 to 60 miles per hour in 4.4 seconds — will start production late 2013 and begin delivery in 2014.
Tesla begins taking reservations at noon on Friday for the characteristically sleek vehicle resembling a taller version of its Model S sedan, but with a folding door hinged on the roof.
CEO Elon Musk touted his latest electric vehicle as cramming in more space than a typical sport utility vehicle. It seats seven, with ample storage.
“Minivans and SUV have been trying for years to overcome these problem,” the entrepreneur told a rowdy crowd. Musk didn t lose his cool even when the front trunk — or “frunk” — stubbornly refused to open in the middle of his demonstration.
Tesla — which has never made a profit — hopes to create a buzz with Thursday night s event, which featured a smattering of lesser-known celebrities, a buffet spread and an open bar, with hundreds of guests milling across a hangar-sized space at the company s California design engineering offices.
The well-heeled guests were offered a chance to be first in line for the Model X, sales of which will follow a reservations-and-delivery template much like the preceding sedan.
While flashy car debuts are a staple of the auto industry, nine-year-old Tesla tracks and reports the number of reservations for upcoming models as a benchmark for investors.
The company went public in June 2010. Its private backers range from venture-capital firms Draper Fisher Jurvetson and VantagePoint Capital Partners to Silicon Valley heavyweights such as Sergey Brin and Larry Page, founders of Google Inc. It also won a $465 million loan guarantee in 2009 from the U.S. Department of Energy.
Its shares were trading on Nasdaq on Thursday at $32.58, well above their June 2010 IPO price of $17.
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The Model X is important for the company because it is the second model to be based on a platform purpose-built by Tesla for electric drive vehicles. The first was the Model S, a sedan scheduled to go on sale in the middle of this year.
Musk has bet that development costs for the Model S and the Model X can be recouped as more models are introduced on the same platform. Two more Tesla models are in the works, the company has said.
Tesla has said between 10,000 and 15,000 of the Model X vehicles will roll off its Fremont, California assembly lines in 2014, priced close to the $60,000-plus Model S.
The Model X — whose falcon-wing doors recall a design made famous by the DeLorean sports car in 1985 s “Back to the Future” — will compete with Toyota Motor Corp s electric RAV4, a crossover SUV that will sport Tesla s electric-drive technology.
Musk did not detail pricing or specifications for the Model X, which will have dual-motor all-wheel drive — a motor in front, and another in the rear, which he says vastly improves grip, handling and turn radius.
For now, Tesla is scrambling to meet a July deadline for delivering the first Model S cars. Musk hopes to have delivered 20,000 of the cars by 2013, yielding a gross margin of 20 percent or more.
The Model S, which goes for a base $57,000, is Tesla s entree into the mass consumer luxury market, going downscale from the $100,000-plus Roadsters that it made its name on.
While the base version of the Model S will sell for $57,000, few cars are expected to be sold for that little. The average price for a car sold in the U.S. market in 2011 was around $30,000.
Tesla autos have captured the public imagination and helped spur Detroit to work on its own electric vehicles. General Motors Co in 2010 started selling its plug-in hybrid Chevrolet Volt.
California governor Jerry Brown was on hand on Thursday to join Musk in touting the Model X. The wealthiest U.S. state approved aggressive new rules in January to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by requiring automakers to put many more electric and hybrid vehicles on the roads by 2025.
US group rejects accusations of interference in Egypt
Accused of interference in Egypt s affairs, US pro-democracy groups whose staff are to be tried in Cairo reject charges they are working secretly for the US government, which largely finances them.
Barrie Freeman, director of the North Africa region for the National Democratic Institute (NDI), one of the US groups whose offices were raided in December, denied the NDI has a hidden agenda.
“We trained thousands of candidates, hundreds of them were from the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafist party,” Freeman told AFP, referring to Islamist groups that won a decisive majority in recent parliamentary elections.
“We don t favor any party over another. We don t fund parties directly. We don t fund revolutions. We trained poll watchers, we sent international election observers,” she said.
“The program components included bringing people who had been through transition in their countries at high level.
“We brought in a former general from Indonesia, we brought politicians from Chile and Poland to share their experiences,” Freeman said.
Since December, ties between the United States and Egypt s interim military rulers have become strained, and Washington has raised the possibility it could withhold military aid worth $1.3 billion a year.
“It s really puzzling,” says Charles Dunne, the Middle East and North Africa director at Freedom House, another US-funded group raided in November.
“There is a campaign to try to shut down or control completely the civil society in Egypt,” Dunne told AFP.
“We re involved in civic education,” he said.
Egyptian authorities disagree, accusing the groups of undermining the military-run government during a fragile transition following last year s ouster of longtime ruler Hosni Mubarak, once a close US ally.
Egyptian Judge Sameh Abu Zeid said in Cairo that the NGOs are operating “without license,” and that their work “constitutes pure political activity and has nothing to do with civil society work.”
But the US State Department said Thursday that it has not yet seen any document outlining the charges against the groups.
If convicted, the members of these organizations could be sentenced to five years in prison, according to another judge, Ashraf Ashmawi.
Activists opposed to Egyptian military rule see the accusations as an attempt to silence them under the banner of fighting “plots” from abroad.
The US-funded groups reject the charge they are secretly working for the US government.
“It s unfair,” said Eric Trager, a specialist at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
“If it s a foreign funding issue, these groups shouldn t be targeted exclusively, it should be the Salafist party, the Muslim Brotherhood. Egypt is a poor country. Everyone receives money from abroad,” Trager said.
The NDI said it is financed up to 81 percent by the State Department and the US Agency for International Development. Its board of directors is chaired by Madeleine Albright, who was president Bill Clinton s secretary of state.
The NDI, which was present in Ukraine during the 2004 “Orange Revolution” and works on five continents, is not “affiliated” with the US government, said Kathy Gest, who is in charge of public relations.
John McCain, an influential senator and 2008 Republican presidential candidate, is the chairman of the board of directors of the International Republican Institute, also targeted by Egyptian authorities.
On its website the IRI says it is financed through subsidies from US government agencies.
For its part, Freedom House has a budget of $25 million for 2012, with $21 millions coming from the US government, according to communications manager Mary McGuire.
But for Thomas Carothers, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the question of financing is secondary.
“The same activities have been carried out in Belarus for at least 12 years and haven t produced very much,” Carothers told AFP.
“This idea that there is some kind of sinister technology that very quietly, the US or certain European actors go into countries and prepare them for revolution, is colorful and sounds like a good spy movie.”
Pakistan, Afghanistan set for historic one-dayer
Pakistan and Afghanistan play a historic first-ever one-day international between the two countries here on Friday with both captains vowing to make the game a memorable one.
“It is a very important game for both countries and we will try to make the occasion memorable with some quality cricket,” Pakistan captain Misbah-ul Haq said.
“It is important for countries like Afghanistan to play a top team which will help them improve and we are going to play with our full strength team as they have some good players.”
Friday s match in Sharjah Stadium — which holds the world record of staging the most one-day internationals with 201 — is fitting because most of the Afghan players learnt the game in Pakistan while staying as refugees after the Soviet invasion of their country in 1979.
Afghanistan captain Nawroz Mangal thanked Pakistan for giving them chances.
“We thank Pakistan for allowing us to play this one-day and also giving us opportunity to play in their domestic competitions which raised our confidence,” said Mangal, who led Afghanistan to one-day status.
“It is a history making match against a top team like Pakistan and we will try our best to put up a good fight in a contest which is a big challenge for us,” said the 27-year-old Mangal, an off-spin bowler.
Mangal said his team had prepared well for Pakistan s spinners Saeed Ajmal and Abdul Rehman who were behind the 3-0 destruction of England in their three-Test series: Ajmal finished with 24 wickets while Rehman took 19.
“We have prepped well for Pakistan s spin duo and I am confident my batsmen will do their best,” said Mangal, adding that paceman Hamid Hassan, who has 24 wickets in 14 one-day internationals, will miss the match through knee injury.
They still have Mohammad Nabi, an off-spinner who took five wickets while playing for an ICC Combined XI against England last month and wicket-keeper batsman Mohammad Shahzad who scored 51 and 74 in the same match.
Pakistan will be further boosted by the return of all-rounder Shahid Afridi who will add variety to team s spin attack.
Mangal hoped a sell-out crowd of 15,000 largely Afghan and Pakistan expats, enjoying the weekly holiday here, will show their support.
“We want the public to share this historic moment with both the teams,” said Mangal.
War-ravaged Afghanistan gained a notable foot up on the world cricket stage by finishing fifth in the 2011 World Cup qualifiers which earned them the right to play one-day internationals.
They also won the right to play the third edition of World Twenty20, held in the Caribbean in 2010, by winning the qualifying tournament and then finished with a silver medal in the Asian Games in China in November that same year.
Afghanistan, one of the 59 associate members of the International Cricket Council (ICC), are also the title holders of the Inter-Continental Cup meant for the Associate nations.
The ICC, which contributes approximately 700,000 dollars a year to help Afghanistan s development in cricket, has shown great delight in their progress, terming it as “a success story in cricket”.
Sakhi Sarwar tragedy: charges against 6 accused framed
ATC Judge Chaudhry Imtiaz Ahmad conducted hearing of the case in the Central Jail in DG Khan and framed charges under the sections related to murder, attempt to murder, terrorism and possession of explosive material against accused Behram Khan alias Sofi Baba, Umar Fidai, Saleem Jan, Bashir Ahmad, Farooq and Asghar in two different cases.
Accused are said to be involved in suicide attack on the eve of Sakhi Sarwar’ Urs on April 3, 2011 in which about 54 pilgrims were killed while more than 100 injured.
It is worth mentioning that the court already has declared three accused as proclaimed offenders.
Cavendish wins 5th stage of Tour of Qatar
Tom Boonen closed in on the overall victory by protecting his lead on the penultimate day.
Cavendish secured his second stage win in three days by taking a mass sprint at the end of a 160-kilometer ride from a camel race track in the east of the country to Al Khor in the north. The Team Sky rider arrived in Doha with a bout of flu but still beat Liquigas-Cannondale duo Daniel Oss and Peter Sagan to the finish line.
Boonen retained a 31-second lead over Tyler Farrar going into Friday s final stage. Spanish rider Juan Antonio Flecha is third, while Cavendish moved up to seventh.–AP
$3.3m aid for frogs, others
The threatened species on the list would benefit from a $3.3 million (2.4 million euro) aid award, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said Thursday.
The conservation fund Save Our Species (SOS), set up by the IUCN, the World Bank and others, has announced it is to allocate the cash to more than 20 projects.
SOS is involved in the protection of the Cross River Gorilla and Black Rhino in Africa and the Snow Leopard in Pakistan.
Asia s Spoon-billed Sandpiper and Madagascar s Golden Mantella Frog are also on its list.
The body is meanwhile working to re-introduce the Philippine Cockatoo to its native land.
“By implementing on the ground conservation action, the projects (that) SOS select help protect entire habitats which both people and wildlife depend on,” said SOS director Jean-Christophe Vie.
The body was established in 2010 by IUCN, the World Bank and the GEF (Global Environment Facility) with more than $10 million funding to help protect threatened species.–AFP
Worchestershire contract Ajmal for 2nd stint
Ajmal got boost following his clutch of wickets for Pakistan in their Test series whitewash of England.
Ajmal will join the Midlands county as their second overseas player for the domestic Twenty20 competition, along with Australia batsman Phil Hughes who will be at New Road for the whole of the 2012 English county season.
The in-form Ajmal took 24 wickets in Pakistan s 3-0 rout of England in the United Arab Emirates, including a Test-best seven for 55 in the series opener.
He spent the second half of last term with Worcestershire and helped them avoid relegation from the First Division of the County Championship.
Ajmal also collected up 16 Twenty20 wickets for the county at an average of just over 11 apiece.
“Saeed showed last summer when playing for us what a quality bowler he is,” said Worcestershire director of cricket Steve Rhodes.
“His recent performances against England only serve to back this up,” the former England wicket-keeper added.
“We are delighted that he has agreed to return to New Road for a second time.”
The 34-year-old Ajmal, in a Worcestershire statement, said: “I really enjoyed my time at New Road in 2011 and look forward to returning this summer to help inspire the club to Twenty20 success.”–AFP
MQM to hold woman rally on 19th
While addressing female party workers at the MQM Headquarters Nine Zero, the party chief said that women have been playing a revolutionary role in hard times.
Now they would maintain a new record and unique history with their gathering at Jinnah Garden on February 19.
Altaf said that women would prove with their sincerity and enthusiasm that they are above all ethnic, lingual and religious discrepancies.
Collapsed factorys owners granted bail
All the three accused Zahir Iqbal, Zubair and Zafer Iqbal, owner of the collapsed factory on Multan Road, were taken to the court of Additional Session Judge Chaudhry Nazir Ahmad.
The counsel for the accused said that his clients would like to record their statements to the investigation authorities.
The court heard preliminary arguments and accepted their pre-arrest bail till February 15. The court ordered that the accused would not be arrested till due date.
