IHC becomes operational today

Islamabad High Court (IHC) would become functional on Monday (today), however, the hearing would not be resumed because so far judges have not been appointed.

In April, the government has ordered revival of the IHC in the light of the 18th Constitutional Amendment. The high court will start functioning after appointment of judges. Law Minister Babar Awan said that the chief justice and judges of the IHC would be appointed from all units of the federation. Three judges for the IHC including the Chief Justice have been nominated, however the parliamentary committee would likely to notify more judges. The SC last year declared the Islamabad High Court as illegal, saying it had been established under the Provisional Constitutional Order imposed by former president Gen (retd) Pervez Musharraf of Nov 3, 2007. In its July 31 judgment, the apex court had struck down the order of establishment of the IHC and reverted the judicial system to the status of Nov 2, 2007. All the judges who were part of the judiciary on Nov 2, 2007, had been ordered to return to original courts. All judges who were not part of the judiciary had been ordered to cease acting as judges. The IHC employees had been ordered back to their original positions or to the federal surplus pool. The Supreme Court, under Justice Hameed Dogar, had decided in favour of the establishment of IHC. But its creation was delayed because of a stay order issued by the Lahore High Court after its establishment was challenged. The IHC was to start functioning in Feb 2008.

SC reserves verdict on PCO judges case

The Supreme Court on Friday reserved its ruling in contempt of court case involving PCO judges.

Dr. Abdul Basit, counsel of Justice Shabbar Raza Rizvi and Justice Hasnat, again objected to the formation of the bench hearing his client’s petition. Dr. Basit said that Justice Sair Ali, Justice Shahid Siddiqi and Justice Tariq Parvez should not sit on this bench.He argued that an attempt was made to evacuate Dr. Shahid Siddiqis house and this order was related to the bench, which comprised of Justice Hasnat and Justice Shabar Raza Rizvi. Justice Shahid Siddiqi denied that the High Court had ordered to vacate the house, adding that the court had barred the administration from any such action.
The PCO judges were facing contempt charges for taking oath under the Provisional Constitution Order (PCO) in defiance of a restraining order issued by a seven-judge Supreme Court bench on November 3, 2007, moments after the proclamation of emergency by former president Pervez Musharraf.

Spot-fixing scandal: ICC keeps ban on Amir and Butt

International Cricket Council on Sunday rejected appeals by Salman Butt and Muhammad Amir against a life ban for alleged involvement in spot-fixing scandal.
Earlier, the appeals of Salman Butt and Mohammad Amir against the provisional suspensions imposed on them by the ICC for alleged involvement in the spot-fixing controversy were heard in Dubai on Saturday. The hearings, chaired by Michael Beloff, the chairman of the ICC’s code of conduct commission, will continue tomorrow when a verdict is expected.
The proceedings were long and neither the players nor the ICC addressed the media. Fast bowler Mohammad Asif had also been provisionally suspended but he withdrew his appeal earlier this month.
The three players, prior to the suspensions, were charged with various offences under Article 2 of the ICC’s anti-corruption code. The suspensions came after the News of the World tabloid claimed to have exposed a scam in which deliberate, planned no-balls would be bowled by Amir and Asif during the Lord’s Test against England, with the involvement of Butt, who was then captain. The hearings will only concern themselves with the matter of the provisional suspensions and whether or not the ICC followed the correct procedures in taking that action. The matter of the players’ innocence or guilt and the actual charges against them will not be heard. Thus, even if the suspensions are lifted and the players allowed to return to cricket, a full hearing into the case will still take place later to determine their innocence or guilt in the matter. Butt is represented in Dubai by his lawyer Aftab Gul, a former Test cricketer, and Khalid Ranjha, a former law minister. Butt has spoken to the press, saying he is determined to prove his innocence and questioning the reliability of the sting conducted by News of the World. Amir, who has not made a statement throughout this time, said on departure that he hoped he could return to the side. He will be represented by Shahid Karim, the lawyer who defended Asif in a doping case in October 2006.

Spot-fixing scandal: ICC keeps ban on Amir and Butt

International Cricket Council on Sunday rejected appeals by Salman Butt and Muhammad Amir against a life ban for alleged involvement in spot-fixing scandal.
Earlier, the appeals of Salman Butt and Mohammad Amir against the provisional suspensions imposed on them by the ICC for alleged involvement in the spot-fixing controversy were heard in Dubai on Saturday. The hearings, chaired by Michael Beloff, the chairman of the ICC’s code of conduct commission, will continue tomorrow when a verdict is expected.
The proceedings were long and neither the players nor the ICC addressed the media. Fast bowler Mohammad Asif had also been provisionally suspended but he withdrew his appeal earlier this month.
The three players, prior to the suspensions, were charged with various offences under Article 2 of the ICC’s anti-corruption code. The suspensions came after the News of the World tabloid claimed to have exposed a scam in which deliberate, planned no-balls would be bowled by Amir and Asif during the Lord’s Test against England, with the involvement of Butt, who was then captain. The hearings will only concern themselves with the matter of the provisional suspensions and whether or not the ICC followed the correct procedures in taking that action. The matter of the players’ innocence or guilt and the actual charges against them will not be heard. Thus, even if the suspensions are lifted and the players allowed to return to cricket, a full hearing into the case will still take place later to determine their innocence or guilt in the matter. Butt is represented in Dubai by his lawyer Aftab Gul, a former Test cricketer, and Khalid Ranjha, a former law minister. Butt has spoken to the press, saying he is determined to prove his innocence and questioning the reliability of the sting conducted by News of the World. Amir, who has not made a statement throughout this time, said on departure that he hoped he could return to the side. He will be represented by Shahid Karim, the lawyer who defended Asif in a doping case in October 2006.

ICC uphold spot-fixing suspensions on Pakistani duo

DUBAI: Pakistani cricketers Salman Butt and Mohammad Amir had their provisional suspensions over allegations of spot-fixing upheld by the International Cricket Council (ICC) on Sunday.

“I have decided to dismiss the application… all three players accordingly are still for the time being unable to participate in cricketing activities ” Michael Beloff, the head of the ICC’s code of conduct commission told reporters in Dubai on Sunday after a two-day hearing.

The innocence or guilt of the players, who have denied any wrongdoing, will be judged at an independent tribunal, the date of which has yet to be set. AGENCIES

Path to Haiti polls clouded as cholera spreads

PORTAUPRINCE: The death toll from Haiti’s spreading cholera epidemic topped 300 on Wednesday as fears over violence and fair voting clouded the path to elections next month which are seen as key to stability in the Western Hemisphere’s poorest nation.

Electoral officials still say the presidential and legislative polls will go ahead as scheduled on November 28, despite the cholera outbreak which has killed more than 300 people and sickened more than 4,700 since last week, triggering a major multinational treatment and prevention operation.

“On November 28, at 6 a.m., the polls will open,” Pierre-Louis Opont, director general of Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council, told Reuters. But one presidential candidate has said that if the epidemic of the deadly diarrhea disease reaches national proportions, the polls should be postponed.

The World Health Organization

Asif confident of playing in WC 2011 despite suspension

KARACHI: Controversial fast bowler Muhammad Asif is confident of playing in the 2011 World Cup despite the pending allegations of spot-fixing and the International Cricket Council’s suspension.

Asif on Tuesday said he was confident that he would get cleared of all allegations and suspensions by the time the World Cup was played in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

“I optimistically see myself playing in the World Cup despite all the recent problems. That is why I am training regularly and keeping myself very fit,” said Asif, who also got married in late September.

Asif surprised the cricket world last week by withdrawing his appeal against the provisional suspension by the ICC which had already scheduled a hearing in Doha later this month.

But he maintained he wanted to not only challenge the suspension but also the spot fixing allegations against

U.S. envoy urges probe into Kyrgyz killings

BISHKEK: The United States called on Friday for an international investigation into ethnic violence in Kyrgyzstan, as its leader said the death toll could be 10 times higher than the official tally of 190.

Roza Otunbayeva”s interim administration and the United Nations say the bloodshed in clashes between ethnic Kyrgyz and Uzbeks, which has driven hundreds of thousands to flee their burnt-out homes, began with planned and orchestrated attacks.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Robert Blake described the situation as a humanitarian crisis and urged the interim government of the Central Asian state, which hosts U.S. and Russian military bases, to act immediately to stop the killing.

Blake was visiting refugee camps in neighbouring Uzbekistan as Otunbayeva travelled to the strife-torn south and pledged to rebuild the region to allow refugees to leave squalid camps and return home.

The government, which assumed power after the president was overthrown in April, has struggled to restore order following clashes between Uzbeks and Kyrgyz around the ancient Silk Road city of Osh — the worst violence in Kyrgyzstan in two decades.

Around 400,000 refugees, mainly women and children, are crammed into huts and makeshift camps on either side of the Kyrgyz-Uzbek border on the sun-scorched plains of the Ferghana valley, many running out of food and water.

“We urge the provisional government of Kyrgyzstan to take immediate steps to stop the violence,” Blake told reporters on the Uzbek side of the border. “A Kyrgyz investigation should be complemented by an international investigation.”

Otunbayeva landed in Osh, its streets lined with charred buildings, in a military helicopter to meet local leaders.

Iran urges West to accept nuclear fuel swap deal

TEHRAN: Iran called on Western powers on Saturday to accept a nuclear fuel swap deal brokered by Turkey and Brazil as a “dignified” way out of an intensified atomic standoff, the state news agency reported.

“The best dignified way out of Iran”s nuclear issue for Western countries is to accept the fuel swap,” the head of Iran”s Atomic Energy Organisation, Ali Akbar Salehi, told the agency.

Ethnic clashes rage in Kyrgyzstan, 51 dead

OSH: Police and soldiers struggled Saturday to stop ethnic clashes in this Central Asian country that have killed more than 50 people, as gangs of armed young Kyrgyz men marched on Uzbek neighborhoods and fires raged throughout the city.

The official death toll has climbed to at least 51, while about 700 people have been wounded, the Health Ministry said. The real figures may be higher because doctors and human rights workers said ethnic Uzbeks were afraid to seek hospital treatment.

Thousands of ethnic Uzbeks were fleeing toward the nearby border with Uzbekistan.

The violence that broke out Friday in Osh, the country”s second-largest city, is the worst since former President Kurmanbek Bakiyev was toppled in a bloody uprising in April and fled the country.

It poses a decisive test of the provisional government”s ability to control the country, where the U.S. and Russia both have military air bases. The government needs stability to hold a June 27 vote on a new constitution and go ahead with elections for a new parliament in October.

The government declared a state of emergency in and around Osh and dispatched armored vehicles, troops and helicopters to pacify the situation. Fighting quieted down overnight but resumed with new strength Saturday. Much of central Osh was on fire, while homes in Uzbek neighborhood also burned.

“Young men in white masks are marauding and stealing from the remaining stores, offices and houses, and then setting them on fire,” said Bakyt Omorkulov, a member of the Coalition for Democracy and Civil Society, a non-governmental organization.

The interim government acknowledged that it was struggling to establish control.

“The situation in Osh remains very, very difficult,” Azimbek Beknazarov, an acting prime minister, told journalists in Bishkek, the capital. “We are doing everything we can, but there is no improvement yet.”

Police and residents said groups of young Kyrgyz men were streaming into Osh by road from other parts of the country and marching toward Uzbek neighborhoods. They were armed with metal bars and some had automatic weapons.

Omorkulov said ethnic Uzbeks in the Cheryomushki and Besh-Kuprik neighborhoods called to say their houses were on fire and they were terrified. “They called us and were sobbing into the phone, but what can we do?” Omorkulov said.

From the Osh airport, where hundreds of arriving passengers were stranded, fire from heavy machine guns and automatic weapons was heard as troops tried to gain control of roads into the city.

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