PESHAWAR: The displaced persons, who lost their houses and family members during the conflict and military operation in Swat, are skeptical of the repatriation plan announced by the government and demand compensation for their losses.
They are critical of the government plan citing various reasons including the presence of militants in different parts of Kabal and Matta tehsils of Swat.
Some of them claim that they have personal enmity with militants in their respective areas and they cannot go back till complete elimination of militants.
‘Militants had killed three of our female family members on Feb 4 on minor issue of providing drinking water to security forces. Since then we have been living in Charssada as we have now personal enmity with those people,’ said Bukht Munir, hailing from Dagai village of Matta, a stronghold of militants.
He added that they had received information from their areas that militants had still been roaming around.
According to his account of the incident, around 15 to 20 militants had attacked their residence when they were not around and killed his mother and two sisters-in-law (wives of his two brothers). The attackers had also taken away their vehicle and made hostage two of his relatives, who were released after payment of money.
‘So far we have not been given any compensation by the federal or provincial government and we have now been living in miserable conditions,’ he said.
Mohammad Zada, another displaced person, said that they had no place to go back as their houses were destroyed during bombing by jetfighters. Mr Zada lost eight of his family members in the bombing including his wife, four children, a daughter-in-law, a grand daughter and a guest.
‘I am a poor labourer and had gone to Mardan along with my son when the incident took place on May 10 soon after the military operation was launched,’ he said, adding that the remaining members of his family had now been residing at a school in Charssada district.
Three other houses situated near his residence at Shofin village were also destroyed in which five persons were killed. One of the inmates of those houses, Ghulam Mohammad, a distant relative of Mr Zada, said that their area had yet to be cleared of militants as it was situated near Peuchar valley, the headquarters of militants.
‘When the house of Mohammad Zada was hit we rushed to retrieve bodies from the debris and in the meantime jets returned and bombed my house,’ he said. The bodies were mostly dismembered beyond recognition.
Another displaced person, who did not want to be named, said that militants had been lurking around in various areas and their leadership had still been intact. ‘How could we return to our areas when a dreaded commander Ibne Amin and his brother Ibne Aqeel have still been seen there? People are scared of them and scores of other commanders,’ he added.
A social activist from Swat, Ishaq Khan, said that people mostly demanded that the operation should be taken to its logical conclusion, which also included targeting of militant leadership. ‘People want that Maulana Fazlullah and other leaders of the militants should be apprehended and they should be interrogated to know as to who are the masterminds behind them,’ he said.
Despite all the apprehensions, he said, people wanted to go back as they did not want to live life of an IDP.
Last month, NWFP Chief Minister Ameer Haider Hoti had announced that they had approved a package for the citizens affected by sectarianism, army operation and terrorism.
He had announced that Rs300,000 would be given for each killed person, Rs200,000 for each permanently disabled person, Rs300,000 in the case of complete destruction of house to the owner and Rs50,000 for partly destructed house.
However, the mechanism for providing that compensation has yet to be adopted.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Displaced families being transported back to Swat
JALOZAI CAMP: Only a fraction of nearly two million Pakistanis displaced in the onslaught against the Taliban went home on the first day of an organised return Monday, with many fearful about security.
The government laid on buses and trucks to return displaced families on Monday, the first day of large-scale organised returns but only a fraction of the families earmarked for voluntary return actually left the camps.
Azam Khan, a senior official in the government’s emergency response unit said 192 families out of an estimated 2,680 left three camps on Monday.
‘We expect an increase in coming days,’ Khan told reporters at Charsadda, where 22 out of a planned 247 families left for the northwest Swat district.’
Dozens of displaced people blocked a road outside one Charsadda camp vowing not to return until they received ATM bank cards on which they can draw 25,000 rupees of financial aid to rebuild their lives.
Crops were left to rot during the two-month offensive and the local economy has been shattered by a two-year uprising to enforce sharia law in Swat.
‘Some people did not receive their ATM cash cards and they refused to go until they got this card,’ said Khan.
But those who returned to Swat spoke of their joy in returning despite the uncertainty about peace that many expressed back in the camps.
‘Everybody is so happy. They are crying tears of joy,’ Sakhawat Shah, a 25-year-old English student, told AFP by telephone after reaching Landakai.
‘My room was destroyed in the shelling. My computer and books were also damaged but I’m not worried because if I’m alive I can buy more books.’
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari told a gathering of aid organisations working for displaced people the operation to return people to their homes was a ‘huge challenge’, his spokesman Farhatullah Babar said.
‘We resolve not to abandon our brothers and sisters in this hour of trial.
We will take every possible step to help them resume normal life in their
homes,’ Babar quoted the president as saying.
Pakistan launched the offensive in the northwest districts of Buner, Lower Dir and Swat after armed Islamist militants advanced to within 100 kilometres (60 miles) of Islamabad last April in defiance of a peace deal.
Pakistan says more than 1,700 militants were killed but official death tolls are impossible to confirm independently and many suspect that the Taliban simply melted away into the mountains as after past operations.
The government says it has worked hard to restore electricity and running water in main towns since the fighting but analysts warn that much needs to be done to sustain the returnees.
‘They will start living a normal life if the environment is secure and their fundamental needs are addressed. Secure environment means army, police and civil administration,’ said independent analyst Imtiaz Gul.
AFP reporters said they saw just over 200 people leaving Jalozai and the nearby camp of Charsadda but officials swept aside concerns.
‘Twenty-four buses reached Swat. These are full of displaced people,’Bashir Ahmad Bilour, a senior provincial cabinet minister, told reporters.
‘We hope the situation will improve in the coming days and that people will come back with the passage of time,’ he said.
But Shamsher Ali, a 55-year-old shopkeeper, also said he was worried after previous military operations failed to crush the Taliban.
‘The army promised us twice before that they cleared the area but then Taliban came again and again to Swat. Perhaps this time the Taliban will come again to Swat,’ he said.
The government laid on buses and trucks to return displaced families on Monday, the first day of large-scale organised returns but only a fraction of the families earmarked for voluntary return actually left the camps.
Azam Khan, a senior official in the government’s emergency response unit said 192 families out of an estimated 2,680 left three camps on Monday.
‘We expect an increase in coming days,’ Khan told reporters at Charsadda, where 22 out of a planned 247 families left for the northwest Swat district.’
Dozens of displaced people blocked a road outside one Charsadda camp vowing not to return until they received ATM bank cards on which they can draw 25,000 rupees of financial aid to rebuild their lives.
Crops were left to rot during the two-month offensive and the local economy has been shattered by a two-year uprising to enforce sharia law in Swat.
‘Some people did not receive their ATM cash cards and they refused to go until they got this card,’ said Khan.
But those who returned to Swat spoke of their joy in returning despite the uncertainty about peace that many expressed back in the camps.
‘Everybody is so happy. They are crying tears of joy,’ Sakhawat Shah, a 25-year-old English student, told AFP by telephone after reaching Landakai.
‘My room was destroyed in the shelling. My computer and books were also damaged but I’m not worried because if I’m alive I can buy more books.’
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari told a gathering of aid organisations working for displaced people the operation to return people to their homes was a ‘huge challenge’, his spokesman Farhatullah Babar said.
‘We resolve not to abandon our brothers and sisters in this hour of trial.
We will take every possible step to help them resume normal life in their
homes,’ Babar quoted the president as saying.
Pakistan launched the offensive in the northwest districts of Buner, Lower Dir and Swat after armed Islamist militants advanced to within 100 kilometres (60 miles) of Islamabad last April in defiance of a peace deal.
Pakistan says more than 1,700 militants were killed but official death tolls are impossible to confirm independently and many suspect that the Taliban simply melted away into the mountains as after past operations.
The government says it has worked hard to restore electricity and running water in main towns since the fighting but analysts warn that much needs to be done to sustain the returnees.
‘They will start living a normal life if the environment is secure and their fundamental needs are addressed. Secure environment means army, police and civil administration,’ said independent analyst Imtiaz Gul.
AFP reporters said they saw just over 200 people leaving Jalozai and the nearby camp of Charsadda but officials swept aside concerns.
‘Twenty-four buses reached Swat. These are full of displaced people,’Bashir Ahmad Bilour, a senior provincial cabinet minister, told reporters.
‘We hope the situation will improve in the coming days and that people will come back with the passage of time,’ he said.
But Shamsher Ali, a 55-year-old shopkeeper, also said he was worried after previous military operations failed to crush the Taliban.
‘The army promised us twice before that they cleared the area but then Taliban came again and again to Swat. Perhaps this time the Taliban will come again to Swat,’ he said.
Rs 24 b for rehabilitation of Malakand IDPs: Bilour
PESHAWAR : NWFP Senior Minister, Bashir Ahmad Bilour Monday said that government has reserved an amount of Rs. 24 billion for rehabilitation of operation hit Malakand division. Talking to newsmen at Charsadda after seeing off repatriating IDPs to their homeland, Bashir Bilour said the amount of Rs. 24 billion would be provided by the center to provincial government in four installments. Bashir Bilour said after completion of return of IDPs, government would start work on rehabilitation of Malakand division. The Malakand division would be made as a model division in the province, Bilour added. He said in order to ensure lasting peace in the area, government would double the number of Police force. Similarly, he added, Frontier Corps and Frontier Constabulary would be strengthened in the region. Bashir Bilour said the number of tehsils would be increased to seven from the existing two. Similarly, the number of police stations would also be enhanced. The government, he added, would appoint 2500 retired armed personnel to form a special security force in the area. Similarly, 7000 persons would be recruited from communities under the Community Policing Programme for Malakand division. In response to a question about setting up of Army Cantonement in Swat, Bilour said land is being searched for this purpose. He said presence of Army in Malakand division is necessary unless lasting peace is ensured and the region is purged from militants.
Dr. Regina Benjamin is surgeon general choice
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Obama announced Monday his choice for surgeon general -- Dr. Regina Benjamin, a 52-year-old family practice doctor who has spent most of her career tending to the needs of poor patients in a Gulf Coast clinic in Alabama.
"When people couldn't pay, she didn't charge them," Obama said. "When the clinic wasn't making money, she didn't take a salary for herself."
He called Benjamin "a relentless promoter" of programs to fight preventable illness.
Benjamin cited the toll of preventable illness as the reason her family was not with her at the announcement: Her father died with diabetes and high blood pressure; her older brother and only sibling died at age 44 of an HIV-related illness; her mother died of lung cancer after taking up smoking as a girl; her mother's twin brother could not attend because he is at home "struggling for each breath" after a lifetime of smoking.
"I cannot change my family's past, but I can be a voice to improve our nation's health for the future," she said.
Benjamin received a bachelor's degree in 1979 from Xavier University of Louisiana, attended Morehouse School of Medicine from 1980 to 1982, and received a doctor of medicine degree from the University of Alabama at Birmingham in 1984.
She completed her residency in family practice at the Medical Center of Central Georgia in 1987.
Her medical training was paid for by a federal program, the National Health Service Corps, under which medical students promise to work in areas with few doctors in exchange for free tuition, one year of service for every year of paid tuition.
Benjamin founded the Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic in 1990 in the fishing village of Bayou La Batre, Alabama, and has served as its CEO since.
Like many of her patients, the clinic has suffered its own life-threatening challenges. It was heavily damaged by Hurricane Georges in 1998 and Hurricane Katrina in 2005. It also burned to the ground several years ago. But Benjamin rebuilt it after each setback and has continued to offer medical care to the village's 2,500 residents.
Her commitment to them has meant making house calls during the rebuilding, mortgaging her house and maxing out her credit cards, Obama said.
"Regina Benjamin has refused to give up; her patients have refused to give up," he said.
Many of her family practice patients are immigrants from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos who make up a third of Bayou La Batre's population, and many of them are uninsured.
Benjamin's expertise goes beyond medicine; she earned a master's in business administration in 1991 from Tulane University. But her focus has not been on making money for herself, she said.
"My priority has always been the needs of my patients," she said. "I decided to treat patients regardless of their ability to pay."
Benjamin said she has worked for years to scrape together the resources needed to keep the clinic doors open and found "it has not been an easy road. ... It should not be this hard for doctors and other health care providers to care for their patients."
She praised Obama "for putting health care reform at the top of your domestic agenda," and said she hopes, if confirmed by the Senate, "to be America's doctor, America's family physician."
"As we work toward a solution to this health care crisis, I promise to communicate directly to the American people, to help guide them through whatever changes come with health care reform. I want to make sure that no one falls through the cracks," she said.
A call to the clinic, where Benjamin was working last week, found it in full swing. "We are just packed in with patients right now, and I'm the only one at the front office," said a breathless woman who then hung up.
Benjamin has served as the associate dean for rural health at the University of South Alabama's College of Medicine and as president of the State of Alabama Medical Association, from 2002-2003.
She was the first African-American woman board member of the American Medical Association, and she just served a term as chairwoman of the group's Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs.
The position of surgeon general, whose effectiveness is largely in its use as a bully pulpit, requires Senate confirmation.
"When people couldn't pay, she didn't charge them," Obama said. "When the clinic wasn't making money, she didn't take a salary for herself."
He called Benjamin "a relentless promoter" of programs to fight preventable illness.
Benjamin cited the toll of preventable illness as the reason her family was not with her at the announcement: Her father died with diabetes and high blood pressure; her older brother and only sibling died at age 44 of an HIV-related illness; her mother died of lung cancer after taking up smoking as a girl; her mother's twin brother could not attend because he is at home "struggling for each breath" after a lifetime of smoking.
"I cannot change my family's past, but I can be a voice to improve our nation's health for the future," she said.
Benjamin received a bachelor's degree in 1979 from Xavier University of Louisiana, attended Morehouse School of Medicine from 1980 to 1982, and received a doctor of medicine degree from the University of Alabama at Birmingham in 1984.
She completed her residency in family practice at the Medical Center of Central Georgia in 1987.
Her medical training was paid for by a federal program, the National Health Service Corps, under which medical students promise to work in areas with few doctors in exchange for free tuition, one year of service for every year of paid tuition.
Benjamin founded the Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic in 1990 in the fishing village of Bayou La Batre, Alabama, and has served as its CEO since.
Like many of her patients, the clinic has suffered its own life-threatening challenges. It was heavily damaged by Hurricane Georges in 1998 and Hurricane Katrina in 2005. It also burned to the ground several years ago. But Benjamin rebuilt it after each setback and has continued to offer medical care to the village's 2,500 residents.
Her commitment to them has meant making house calls during the rebuilding, mortgaging her house and maxing out her credit cards, Obama said.
"Regina Benjamin has refused to give up; her patients have refused to give up," he said.
Many of her family practice patients are immigrants from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos who make up a third of Bayou La Batre's population, and many of them are uninsured.
Benjamin's expertise goes beyond medicine; she earned a master's in business administration in 1991 from Tulane University. But her focus has not been on making money for herself, she said.
"My priority has always been the needs of my patients," she said. "I decided to treat patients regardless of their ability to pay."
Benjamin said she has worked for years to scrape together the resources needed to keep the clinic doors open and found "it has not been an easy road. ... It should not be this hard for doctors and other health care providers to care for their patients."
She praised Obama "for putting health care reform at the top of your domestic agenda," and said she hopes, if confirmed by the Senate, "to be America's doctor, America's family physician."
"As we work toward a solution to this health care crisis, I promise to communicate directly to the American people, to help guide them through whatever changes come with health care reform. I want to make sure that no one falls through the cracks," she said.
A call to the clinic, where Benjamin was working last week, found it in full swing. "We are just packed in with patients right now, and I'm the only one at the front office," said a breathless woman who then hung up.
Benjamin has served as the associate dean for rural health at the University of South Alabama's College of Medicine and as president of the State of Alabama Medical Association, from 2002-2003.
She was the first African-American woman board member of the American Medical Association, and she just served a term as chairwoman of the group's Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs.
The position of surgeon general, whose effectiveness is largely in its use as a bully pulpit, requires Senate confirmation.
Sotomayor Pledges 'Fidelity to the Law'
Sonia Sotomayor, the first nominee to the Supreme Court by a Democratic president in 15 years, told the Senate Judiciary Committee today, on the opening day of her confirmation hearing, that her judicial philosophy can be distilled to just a few words: "fidelity to the law."
As a federal trial judge and appellate judge during the past 17 years, Sotomayor said, she has sought to "strengthen both the rule of law and faith in the impartiality of our justice system."
Her statement came at the end of the first day of her confirmation hearing, a day filled with opening statements from each senator on the committee, in which they strived to define Sotomayor. Democrats set about portraying her as a seasoned jurist with a "modest" and restrained approach, while Republicans sought to cast doubt on her impartiality, saying her statements and rulings have been unduly influenced by her own background.
Despite the drama and ceremony that accompany any Supreme Court confirmation hearing, Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) quickly put the proceedings in context in his opening statement: "Unless you have a complete meltdown," he told the nominee, "you are going to get confirmed."
Today was the first time that Sotomayor, 55, who rose from projects of the South Bronx to a member of U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, has spoken publicly since President Obama selected her May 26, the first Latina nominated to serve on the nation's highest court.
Sotomayor, speaking firmly in a voice tinged with her native Bronx, recounted for the senators her now-familiar biography, the child of poor parents who moved from Puerto Rico. "The progression of my life has been uniquely American," she said.
"Over the past three decades, I have seen our judicial system from a number of different perspectives -- as a big-city prosecutor, a corporate litigator, a trial judge and an appellate judge," Sotomayor said.
She said that she decided more than 450 cases as a federal district court, before her elevation to the appellate court -- a position, she said, in which she has decided "a wide range of constitutional, statutory, and other legal questions."
"Throughout my 17 years on the bench, I have witnessed the human consequences of my decisions," she said. "Those decisions have been made not to serve the interests of any one litigant, but always to serve the larger interest of impartial justice. . . . In each case I have heard, I have applied the law to the facts at hand. My personal and professional experience help me listen and understand, with the law always commanding the result in every case."
Senators will not begin their questioning of Sotomayor, which will form the bulk of the hearing, until Tuesday morning.
For now, Republicans tried to make the first Supreme Court hearing of the Obama administration as much a referendum on the president as on the nominee, 55. Republicans also sought to cut into the political mileage Democrats have accrued through Obama's nominating the first Hispanic to the nation's highest court, with some citing Miguel Estrada, a Hispanic lawyer whose appeals-court nomination by President George W. Bush was blocked by Democrats in 2002 and 2003.
Republicans also emphasized a speech Sotomayor gave at the University of California at Berkeley in 2001, widely cited by her detractors in the weeks since her nomination. In it, she said that she hoped that a "wise Latina" judge might make better decisions than a white man. The committee's ranking Republican, Jeff Sessions (Ala.), said that her remarks in that speech were not an anomaly, saying that Sotomayor had said similar things in public "at least five times over the course of a decade."
And Sessions was one of several Republicans who criticized Sotomayor's role in a case, Ricci v. DeStefano, in which the Supreme Court late last month overturned a decision by three 2nd Circuit judges. The high court ruled that white firefighters had been discriminated against when the city of New Haven, Conn., withdrew a promotional test in which minority candidates scored worse than whites.
"I will not vote for, and no senator should vote for, anyone who will not render justice impartially," Sessions said. "Call it empathy, call it prejudice or call it sympathy, but whatever it is, it's not law," he said. "In truth, it's more akin to politics, and politics has no place in the courtroom."
Democrats countered that Sotomayor's years on the federal bench, first as a U.S. district judge before joining the appellate court in 1998, have been characterized by what Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) her home-state senator, called "judicial modesty."
Schumer said: "Judge Sotomayor puts rule of law above everything else. Given her extensive and even-handed record, I'm not sure how any member of this panel can sit here today and seriously suggest that she comes to the bench with a personal agenda."
Schumer noted that she had dissented from her colleagues on the court less frequently than Samuel A. Alito Jr. had during his years as an appellate judge before he was nominated by Bush and became the last justice confirmed to the Supreme Court, 4 1/2 years ago. That record, the senator said, "shows that she is in the mainstream. She's agreed with Republican colleagues 95 percent of the time. She has ruled for the government in 83 percent of immigration cases against the immigration plaintiff. She has ruled for the government in 92 percent of criminal cases. She has denied race claims in 83 percent of the cases and has split evenly on employment cases between employer and employee."
In a similar vein, Schumer and Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) both predicted that she would prove less ideological on the Supreme Court than Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who had said at his own confirmation hearing in 2005 that a judge's role was to be merely an umpire. Durbin said, "It's hard to see home plate from right field," and added that Roberts's action on the court have been a "triumph of ideology over common sense."
Five minutes before the hearing began this morning, Sotomayor wore a broad smile and a royal blue jacket and black skirt as she walked into the packed hearing room of the Hart Senate Office Building, accompanied by the committee's chairman, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.).
In leading off the hearing, Leahy portrayed Sotomayor as a nominee with an uncommonly extensive judicial résumé. "She is the first nominee in well over a century to be nominated to three different federal judgeships by three different presidents," Leahy said.
And he compared Sotomayor to Thurgood Marshall, the court's first African American justice, and Sandra Day O'Connor, its first female member.
Conservatives and some Republicans, Leahy said, have attempted to "twist her words and her record. . . . Ideological pressure groups have attacked her before the president had even made his selection," Leahy said. "They then stepped up their attacks by threatening Republican senators who do not oppose her.
"In truth," he said, "we do not have to speculate about what kind of a justice she will be because we have seen the kind of judge she has been. She is a judge in which all Americans can have confidence."
Democrats are betting that an overly zealous assault on Sotomayor by Republican senators could anger Latinos and accelerate the shift of Hispanic voters away from the party, particularly in the South and West. Conservatives are hoping to use the Sotomayor hearings as a way to motivate their base if they can successfully portray her as an activist judge whose "empathy" for certain groups guides her rulings more than court precedent or the written law.
Before today, Republican senators had given mixed signals on how hard they plan to press Sotomayor, with supporters saying harsh questioning would be politically risky. But pressure from the conservative base mounted this morning. Jay Sekulow, the influential head of the conservative American Center for Law and Justice, issued a statement saying that the Senate "must fulfill its constitutional role in providing advice and consent and that means asking the tough, in-depth questions about Judge Sotomayor's view of the Constitution and her judicial philosophy."
Sessions was careful not to strike too barbed a tone in his opening statement, saying that the hearing would be "respectful" and would consisted of "a thoughtful dialogue and maybe some disagreements."
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.), who leads the GOP's campaign arm, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, cited three speeches Sotomayor has given in recent years in which, he said, she advocated in favor of judges changing the law, even a "radical change," and advanced the idea of foreign courts as basis for domestic rulings.
"We thank you for your candor in these speeches," Cornyn told the nominee. "Not every judicial nominee is so open about their judicial philosophy. Yet many Americans wonder what these various statements mean -- and what you're trying to get at with these remarks. And many more wonder whether you are the kind of judge who will uphold the written Constitution -- or the kind of judge who will veer us even further off course -- and towards new rights invented by judges rather than ratified by the people."
Republicans repeatedly jabbed at Obama. At one point, Graham recalled the president's role in Supreme Court confirmations of the recent past, when he was in the Senate. "When he was here," Graham said of the president, "he set in motion a standard, I thought, that was more about seeking the presidency than being fair to the nominee.
"When he said, 'The critical ingredient is supplied by what is in the judge's heart,' translated, that means, "I'm not going to vote against my base, because I'm running for president.' " Graham said.
The hearing had barely begun before it was interrupted by a brief protest. As Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) was giving her opening remarks, an abortion protester in the back of the room punctuated the somber quiet by screaming out, "Senator, what about the unborn?" A few seconds later, just before he was promptly hauled out of the room by a security guard, he referred to "unborn Latinos."
According to Sgt. Kimberly Schneider of the U.S. Capitol Police, 48-year-old Robert M. James was charged with disruption of Congress. James, of Centreville, said later that he was trying to remind GOP senators "of their principles," adding, "This is one of these rare moments when attention is focused in a singular way." Standing outside the Hart building alongside noted antiabortion opponent Randall Terry, James said, "the unborn have no one to speak for them. This is our opportunity -- that someone who can speak for them will stand up and defend them."
Almost two hours later, another abortion protester interrupted the opening statement of Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.). Andrew R. Beacham, 27, of Indiana, was also charged with disruption of Congress. And in the afternoon, two others tried to disrupt the proceedings as they were leaving the hearing room.
Leahy sharply rebuked the gallery after each outburst, saying at one point, "Judge Sotomayor deserves respect, to be heard. These Senators deserve the respect of being heard."
Sotomayor's handlers said there would be "watch parties" in more than 30 states, with supporters gathering to hear from the woman they hope will replace retiring Justice David H. Souter. In Washington, the Hispanic Bar Association planned to gather at a law office to watch Sotomayor's opening statement.
Yesterday, sources predicted that a surprise could come late today, if several Republican senators announce their support for Sotomayor's nomination. That would effectively seal her appointment to the court and make the only question how many votes she will receive.
Among those who some court watchers say could make an early announcement are Sen. Mel Martinez of Florida, the only Latino Republican in the chamber, and Sens. Richard G. Lugar of Indiana and Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe of Maine.
Meanwhile, both political parties have released a list of witnesses who will appear before the Judiciary Committee later in the week. The Republican witnesses will include a former president of the National Rifle Association, a firefighter from New Haven, Conn., and an antiabortion activist, reinforcing the themes that GOP senators hope to cement as the hearings close by the end of the week. Charmaine Yoest, president of Americans United for Life, wrote recently in the Washington Times that "Justice Sotomayor's lack of reflection combined with her record of abortion activism shows that, with her on the court, the unborn would be at greater risk than ever before."
The Democratic list includes David Cone, a former Major League Baseball pitcher who watched as Sotomayor helped resolve baseball's strike; Michael R. Bloomberg (I), the mayor of New York; and Michael J. Garcia, a former U.S. attorney appointed by President George W. Bush.
Obama called Sotomayor yesterday after he returned from a three-nation overseas trip, the White House announced. Press secretary Robert Gibbs said in a statement that Obama "complimented the Judge for making courtesy calls to 89 Senators in which she discussed her adherence to the rule of law throughout her 17 years on the federal bench" and "expressed his confidence that Judge Sotomayor would be confirmed to serve as a Justice on the Supreme Court for many years to come."
Sotomayor is expected to meet for a short time with senators in a closed-door luncheon, most likely on Thursday. The meeting is standard procedure for Supreme Court nominees.
But otherwise, the judge will be before the cameras the entire time.
Blast kills 15 in Mian Channu
MULTAN :An explosion at the home of a local cleric in Punjab killed 15 people on Monday, trapping casualties under the rubble of dozens of flattened homes, officials said.
It was not immediately clear why the explosives detonated on the outskirts of Mian Channu, about 90 kilometres (55 miles) east of Multan city.
"The blast took place inside the house of a local cleric. Children used to come to his house for religious education," local district police chief Kamran Khan told reporters.
"Rescue teams have recovered 15 dead bodies. Dozens are injured. The blast was apparently due to some type of explosives inside the house," Khan added.
A doctor at the local hospital confirmed the death toll.
"We received 15 dead bodies. Thirty-five people are injured," Doctor Naeem Sadiq told AFP by telephone.
Khan said 20 to 25 homes collapsed in the explosion.
A senior local administration official, Qazi Ashfaq Ahmad, told the private Geo television station that several homes collapsed.
"It was a huge blast. We do not know how it happened but it was a severe one," witness Mohammad Baber told AFP.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Pakistan Swat valley roads reopen
BBC: The Pakistani military is preparing to reopen roads into the conflict-hit Swat valley and neighbouring regions.
The move is intended to encourage people displaced by earlier fighting against the Taliban to return home.
About two million have already returned to the area, but damage to the region's infrastructure means returnees will rely on aid for months to come.
The UN has stressed that the return, which will begin with people living in temporary camps, must be voluntary.
Once people have been moved from the camps, the army will begin returning people who have been living in schools and other places since they fled the fighting between Taliban militants and government forces.
The return is being overseen by the substantial military presence established in the Swat, Malakand and Buner regions after Taliban militants were dislodged.
Damaged infrastructure
General Nadeem Ahmad, who is coordinating the operation, said every family leaving the camps would receive cash support from the government.
Gen Ahmad had a similar role following the 2005 earthquake in Kashmir.
A computerised identity card system, which was developed then through the banks, is being used again to help registered users access state aid.
However, much of the infrastructure in the Swat region was severely damaged in the months of fighting.
Power and water supplies have been shattered and the reconstruction is expected to take many months.
A resident of the town of Sultanwas, in Buner province, told the Associated Press that if the government failed to provide for people's needs, "no one will stand against militant extremism in the future".
"In this war we lost and gave everything, saw our village destroyed," said Muhamed Shereen.
"So now the people of Sultanwas look to the government and the whole country and world to come forward and help us."
The BBC's Syed Shoaib Hasan, who recently visited Swat's main town, Mingora, said the town was largely intact, with markets and residential areas still standing.
But the security situation remains uncertain and supplies are critically low, he says.
Signals from a failing state
Daily times.com
BOOK REVIEW: Signals from a failing state —by Khaled Ahmed
Pakistan Aik Nakaam Riyasat? By Mujahid Husain;
Politicians signing brilliantly democratic but unfamiliar charters confuse Pakistan by swearing that they will be friends and not destabilise each other in the old pavlovian reflex of toppling that the country is used to. In fact if you don’t topple, there is something seriously wrong with you
Mujahid Husain as a journalist is a man of the field but lately his columns in daily Aajkal have caught the attention of the reader who wants something new in Urdu journalism. He knows the facts that back his perceptions and is easy with the language so that the message gets across, and he keeps himself out of his message, which is quite unusual in Pakistan where the column has been reduced to anecdotal egotism that readers must accept as analysis.
He is alerted by yaksaniyat (uniformity) of thinking in a state where discord is the most threatening aspect of its failing health, a kind of brainwash absorbed from the centres of power within the state that patronise you only if you mouth their shibboleths. Hatred of America, hatred of India, and a kind of blind faith in the muslimhood of the Taliban is what this uniformity relies on for growth. The scene that these elements of identical thinking present becomes murkier when they start wrestling each other for power.
He thinks the fall of Peshawar to the domination of the terrorists is clearly indicated by the free run the Taliban have on the NATO trucks that pass through Peshawar to Torkham border in the Khyber Agency. The frequency with which these trucks are blown up and looted by the Taliban tells us how Peshawar has been ‘taken’; and if Peshawar is taken then one can imagine that a takeover of Islamabad would be the next easy step. Those who think that in case there is another Indo-Pak war the Taliban will stand with the Pakistan Army may be favouring a Taliban takeover of Islamabad as well.
One could actually link the looting of the NATO trucks to the way Islamabad has been reacting to the build-up of US and NATO forces in Afghanistan. In fact Islamabad is partly convinced that NATO presence in Afghanistan is against the interests of Pakistan and therefore the trucks for which Islamabad receives a hefty fee from the US are being targeted and looted freely by the Taliban. And when Islamabad realised that one billion dollars on account of the trucks were still outstanding from the US it must have realised that the stuck ‘truck money’ could be the American message for the free run on trucks that was allowed in Peshawar. The Americans lost nothing; we lost Peshawar.
Fifteen leaders of PMLQ have money in banks in France, Belgium Germany and Holland and they fear no disclosures because the accounts are held jointly with the local Pakistanis. Because the author lives in Belgium he has inside information about others too. But these ‘partners’ talk all the time; and information is therefore available. A former minister has a grand house in Brussels in the name of a Polish lady who makes him welcome and comfortable whenever he goes visiting to be home away from home. Big men in Pakistan imperiously survey Spain, Portugal, Italy and Holland for parking their excess money in the shape of properties. The local expat Pakistanis offer services of caretaking, and all is well after that.
A former federal minister of Musharraf lived in Germany for six months because he had bought four houses in Bonn and had to get them decorated properly in his presence. NAB, who got after the Bhuttos in a big way, was unaware of this ‘lota’ minister who had suddenly become rich after deserting his original party. The PMLN too is no sacred cow. Two of its office holders have vast properties worth 80 million euros in Belzano in Italy (p.236). Close relatives of a former ISI officer have a large property in Luxembourg and have ‘joint accounts in a well known local bank’. He visits now and then to look after the accounts of a relative of his who was also a minister for some time.
Politicians signing brilliantly democratic but unfamiliar charters confuse Pakistan by swearing that they will be friends and not destabilise each other in the old pavlovian reflex of toppling that the country is used to. In fact if you don’t topple, there is something seriously wrong with you. The book informs on page 254 that a meeting took place in which a plan to topple the Zardari-Gilani government was actually set on foot. The campaign of defamation to instrumentalise this was to be based on the amount of money Musharraf ‘returned’ to the Bhuttos after the NRO was put through by him.
It is said that the total assets returned to Zardari after the NRO were worth Rs 98 billion which was confiscated — courtesy Sardar Farooq Leghari as president — together with other assets it was thought had been acquired through corruption and fraud. The idea was to spread lethal rumours about the PPP leadership and bring them to a point where the 2008 government would have to leave. The obstacle was General Ashfaq Kayani who insisted on having a normal working relationship with the president and prime minister and was in no mood to go into the toppling mode.
Mujahid Husain keeps asking questions like why are Pakistanis so intent on taking revenge in all spheres of life, from foreign policy to family life; why are they determined to annihilate the opponent in political contest; why are the powerful intent on not using the law but punishing their perceived opponents with their own hands; why are Pakistanis using religion to vent their aggression till religion itself starts looking an evil inspiration to the world outside?
Netanyahu calls for meeting with Abbas to resume peace talks
JERUSALEM-- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Sunday called for a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as soon as possible in order to resume Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
"Let's make peace -- both diplomatic peace and economic peace," Netanyahu was quoted by local daily The Jerusalem Post as saying at the start of a cabinet meeting in Beersheba in southern Israel, which was held there to show solidarity with the Negev capital.
"There is no reason for which we can't meet, Abbas and me, anywhere in Israel, and since we are in Beersheba, I say, let's meet here," said the Israeli prime minister.
Netanyahu said "The Palestinian people living next to us have abasic right to live with peace, security and prosperity," adding "In recent weeks, we have made great efforts to ease their lives. We've removed many roadblocks, we've decided to increase the operating hours of the Allenby Bridge for more goods, and I decided to advance a series of projects with the Palestinians to promote peace."
"But all these efforts can only bring us to a certain point, and the results will be multiplied by the dozen if there is cooperation from the other side," asserted the Israeli prime minister.
In addition to Palestinian leaders, Netanyahu also reached out to Arab countries, saying that "Let's meet, let's cooperate... We have the ability to bring many players on board."
In June, Netanyahu delivered his foreign policy speech, during which he called on the Palestinians to resume peace talks without preconditions.
However, the Palestinian side has repeatedly said peace talks with Israel can not resume until Netanyahu halts settlement activities and accepts the two-state solution.
President Obama Exclusive interview on sky TV.
The US president sat down with Sky's political editor Adam Boulton during his whistle-stop tour of Ghana. See the whole exchange.
Syria FM: Pullout from Golan for peace
THE JERUSALEM POST
Syria is sticking to its demand that Israel withdrawal from all of the Golan Heights in return for peace.Speaking Sunday during a a news conference with his visiting French counterpart Berbard Kouchner, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem that Damascus would not restart peace talks unless Israel showed willingness to discuss a full withdrawal.Moallem's demand came a week after he responded to President Shimon Peres saying Syria could not expect to receive the Golan Heights from Israel on a silver platter, by remarking that his country actually wanted the territory back on a "gold platter.""Let's face it - it's our land and our right to have it back is the most normal thing in the world, he said, after meeting with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Syrian President Bashar Assad, according to AFP.Assad said at the meeting that there is no "real partner" in Israel to make peace, stressing that a halt to settlements is essential for restarting peace talks.A day earlier, Peres had asked Steinmeier to made it clear that Assad must understand he could not expect to receive the Golan on a silver platter while he continued to strengthen Hizbullah and maintain contact with Iran.
Dick Cheney kept Congress in dark over CIA counterterrorism action
guardian.co.uk
The former US vice president Dick Cheney directed the CIA not to inform Congress about a counterterrorism programme that the CIA director, Leon Panetta, ended last month, according to revelations by US intelligence officials.
The programme, the nature of which is not known, was set up eight years ago after the 9/11 attacks, reported the New York Times, citing a former intelligence official and another government official familiar with Panetta's briefing to the House and Senate intelligence committees on 24 June.
Upon learning of the programme a day earlier from within the CIA, Panetta terminated it and called an emergency meeting with the committees the following day. He told them the programme had existed but had now been cancelled.
Cheney played a central role in overseeing the Bush administration's surveillance programme. Last week, an inspectors' general report noted that Cheney's chief of staff, David Addington, personally decided who in Bush's inner circle could know about the secret initiative.
Revelations about Cheney's role in making decisions for the CIA on whether or not to notify Congress came as a surprise to some on the committees, said another government official who, like the other sources, spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss the issue in public.
The nature of the counterterrorism plan remains a mystery. The former intelligence official said it was not related to the CIA's rendition, interrogation and detention programme. Nor was it part of a wider classified electronic surveillance programme.
The official characterised it as an embryonic intelligence-gathering effort, that was only sporadically active. He said it was set up to yield information that would be used to conduct a secret mission or missions in another country, but it never matured to that point.
The two sources said Congress had not been briefed about other CIA activities.
The revelation about Cheney comes as the House of Representatives prepares to debate a bill that would require the White House to expand the number of members who are told about covert operations. The White House has threatened a veto over concerns that wider congressional notifications could compromise the secrecy of the operations.
The former US vice president Dick Cheney directed the CIA not to inform Congress about a counterterrorism programme that the CIA director, Leon Panetta, ended last month, according to revelations by US intelligence officials.
The programme, the nature of which is not known, was set up eight years ago after the 9/11 attacks, reported the New York Times, citing a former intelligence official and another government official familiar with Panetta's briefing to the House and Senate intelligence committees on 24 June.
Upon learning of the programme a day earlier from within the CIA, Panetta terminated it and called an emergency meeting with the committees the following day. He told them the programme had existed but had now been cancelled.
Cheney played a central role in overseeing the Bush administration's surveillance programme. Last week, an inspectors' general report noted that Cheney's chief of staff, David Addington, personally decided who in Bush's inner circle could know about the secret initiative.
Revelations about Cheney's role in making decisions for the CIA on whether or not to notify Congress came as a surprise to some on the committees, said another government official who, like the other sources, spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss the issue in public.
The nature of the counterterrorism plan remains a mystery. The former intelligence official said it was not related to the CIA's rendition, interrogation and detention programme. Nor was it part of a wider classified electronic surveillance programme.
The official characterised it as an embryonic intelligence-gathering effort, that was only sporadically active. He said it was set up to yield information that would be used to conduct a secret mission or missions in another country, but it never matured to that point.
The two sources said Congress had not been briefed about other CIA activities.
The revelation about Cheney comes as the House of Representatives prepares to debate a bill that would require the White House to expand the number of members who are told about covert operations. The White House has threatened a veto over concerns that wider congressional notifications could compromise the secrecy of the operations.
PESHAWAR PARALYZE BY SUICIDE BOMBINGS
Peshawar, Pakistan -- The markets of this chaotic city are usually cacophonous places, alive with the din of motorcycle rickshaws and legions of Pakistanis sizing up the pyramids of mangoes in one stall, office furniture in the next.
But on a recent dusky evening at Sadar market, shopkeepers sipped tea and looked out into an empty street. No one, they fretted, wants to risk being there the next time a suicide bomber strikes.
"Almost every shop here is empty," said Nisar Ahmed, 35, manager of a small clothing store in the bazaar. "No customers come. There are days when we just close early and go to sleep. We can't sustain this."
Pakistan's bid to subdue the Taliban has unleashed a wave of retaliatory suicide bombings in several major cities, from Islamabad, the capital, to the country's cultural center, Lahore.
No city, however, has been hit as hard as Peshawar, a metropolis of nearly 3 million just outside the Taliban-infested northwestern tribal areas. In recent weeks, suicide bombings have targeted crowded bazaars, police checkpoints, a movie theater and a heavily guarded luxury hotel frequented by Western diplomats and other foreigners.
Zahid Ullah Shinwari, the owner of a plastic sheeting factory and a PVC pipe plant not far from Peshawar, said he had been trying in vain for weeks to sell his businesses and move his family to safer ground.
"Who will invest in an area where everyone is fleeing?" said Shinwari, seated in a posh Peshawar office decorated with white laminate furniture and a large painting of a moose behind his desk. "But when you fear for your life, you can't think about business. There's only one thing on my mind right now, and that's how to save myself, how to sell my assets and find a safer place to live."
An early-evening drive shows just how rattled this city is. Restaurants once teeming with Peshawar's middle class are largely empty. There's not a soul in sight at Funland, a large family park with a Ferris wheel, bumper cars and other amusement rides that's a favorite with families.
"Cultural life has come to a standstill," said Behroz Khan, Peshawar bureau chief for the Geo TV network. "People don't go to restaurants anymore. They don't go to neighborhood festivals. People just stay indoors now."
The bombing last month of the Pearl Continental Hotel, which killed 11 people, appeared to be a last straw for many here. The hotel was seen as an oasis of security. Diplomats and dignitaries stayed there, and businesspeople often dined in its restaurant or used its health club.
The bombing, businesspeople said, appeared to confirm their worst suspicion -- that no place in Peshawar is safe.
"That was a nail in the coffin," said Mohammed Ishaq, vice president of Peshawar's chamber of commerce and owner of an adhesive tape plant in the city. "That made people really scared. We used to go there and feel so secure."
Since the government's offensive in the Swat Valley began in April, 25 companies have moved out of Peshawar, Ishaq said. Some went to Lahore, others to Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Those that chose to stay have run into another problem: Workers aren't showing up for night shifts out of fear something could happen to them on their way to work.
"Factories in Peshawar don't have evening shifts anymore," Ishaq said.
At Sadar market, business owners say they can't hold on much longer. Ahmed's clothing store, Melody Garments, used to take in an average of $560 in sales daily. Now, he said, his store pulls in about $10 a day.
Next door, the sales at Tariq Javed's See and Select carpet shop have dropped by 75%.
"From morning to evening, there are no customers," Javed said angrily, as one of his workers sleepily leaned against a stack of rugs. "All the shop owners here sit idle all day. If this continues, we'll lose our business in a month."
But on a recent dusky evening at Sadar market, shopkeepers sipped tea and looked out into an empty street. No one, they fretted, wants to risk being there the next time a suicide bomber strikes.
"Almost every shop here is empty," said Nisar Ahmed, 35, manager of a small clothing store in the bazaar. "No customers come. There are days when we just close early and go to sleep. We can't sustain this."
Pakistan's bid to subdue the Taliban has unleashed a wave of retaliatory suicide bombings in several major cities, from Islamabad, the capital, to the country's cultural center, Lahore.
No city, however, has been hit as hard as Peshawar, a metropolis of nearly 3 million just outside the Taliban-infested northwestern tribal areas. In recent weeks, suicide bombings have targeted crowded bazaars, police checkpoints, a movie theater and a heavily guarded luxury hotel frequented by Western diplomats and other foreigners.
Zahid Ullah Shinwari, the owner of a plastic sheeting factory and a PVC pipe plant not far from Peshawar, said he had been trying in vain for weeks to sell his businesses and move his family to safer ground.
"Who will invest in an area where everyone is fleeing?" said Shinwari, seated in a posh Peshawar office decorated with white laminate furniture and a large painting of a moose behind his desk. "But when you fear for your life, you can't think about business. There's only one thing on my mind right now, and that's how to save myself, how to sell my assets and find a safer place to live."
An early-evening drive shows just how rattled this city is. Restaurants once teeming with Peshawar's middle class are largely empty. There's not a soul in sight at Funland, a large family park with a Ferris wheel, bumper cars and other amusement rides that's a favorite with families.
"Cultural life has come to a standstill," said Behroz Khan, Peshawar bureau chief for the Geo TV network. "People don't go to restaurants anymore. They don't go to neighborhood festivals. People just stay indoors now."
The bombing last month of the Pearl Continental Hotel, which killed 11 people, appeared to be a last straw for many here. The hotel was seen as an oasis of security. Diplomats and dignitaries stayed there, and businesspeople often dined in its restaurant or used its health club.
The bombing, businesspeople said, appeared to confirm their worst suspicion -- that no place in Peshawar is safe.
"That was a nail in the coffin," said Mohammed Ishaq, vice president of Peshawar's chamber of commerce and owner of an adhesive tape plant in the city. "That made people really scared. We used to go there and feel so secure."
Since the government's offensive in the Swat Valley began in April, 25 companies have moved out of Peshawar, Ishaq said. Some went to Lahore, others to Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Those that chose to stay have run into another problem: Workers aren't showing up for night shifts out of fear something could happen to them on their way to work.
"Factories in Peshawar don't have evening shifts anymore," Ishaq said.
At Sadar market, business owners say they can't hold on much longer. Ahmed's clothing store, Melody Garments, used to take in an average of $560 in sales daily. Now, he said, his store pulls in about $10 a day.
Next door, the sales at Tariq Javed's See and Select carpet shop have dropped by 75%.
"From morning to evening, there are no customers," Javed said angrily, as one of his workers sleepily leaned against a stack of rugs. "All the shop owners here sit idle all day. If this continues, we'll lose our business in a month."
Three soldiers, 14 Taliban killed in NW Pakistan
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Three Pakistan soldiers and 14 Taliban fighters were killed as Islamabad pushed its massive assault against the insurgents in the northwest, officials said Sunday.
Eight Taliban were killed when Pakistani jet fighters pounded the militants' hideouts in South Waziristan tribal district, bordering Afghanistan, two security officials said.
The attacks came as Pakistan prepared to draw a line under the northwest operation.
The destroyed hideouts belonged to the members of Taliban warlord Baitullah Mehsud against whom the military has vowed to open a second front, the officials said.
Separately Pakistani artillery pounded two Taliban hideouts in Lower Dir district's Kashmor village Sunday, killing five rebels and injuring five others, district coordination officer Ghulam Mohammad told AFP.
The two hideouts were targeted and destroyed on intelligence received by Pakistan, the official said.
A daily military statement rounding up developments over the past 24 hours said a militant was killed and another arrested during a search operation in Swat valley where troops destroyed five caves where militants were hiding.
At least 15 other militants were arrested in different parts of Swat and seven soldiers were wounded, it said.
One soldier died in an exchange of fire with militants in South Waziristan, while two others were killed in a bomb blast in a mosque in the northwestern town of Dera Ismail Khan, it said.
The death tolls provided could not be verified independently as the areas are under military operation.
The Pakistani army launched a massive offensive in late April in the three northwestern districts of Buner, Lower Dir and Swat to flush out Taliban militants.
The military said last week the operation was almost over and on Thursday Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani announced that preparations were being made to send home from Monday nearly two million people who fled their homes in the Swat valley.
Paramilitary troops raided militant hideouts in Khyber tribal district's Shinkoh village and after a gunfight that left two soldiers injured, arrested 11 of the rebels, paramilitary Colonel Mujahid told AFP.
"Among those who had been arrested, five are from South and North Waziristan tribal districts, four (are) Afghan nationals and two locals," said Mujahid, who goes by one name.
The troops also seized hundreds of bullet rounds, rocket launchers, wireless equipment and documents, he said.
Two explosive-filled vehicles meant to be used in suicide attacks were also destroyed.
The Khyber tribal district lies between Peshawar, the capital of North West Frontier Province, and landlocked Afghanistan and is a key strategic route for vital civil and military supplies to the war-torn country.
Eight Taliban were killed when Pakistani jet fighters pounded the militants' hideouts in South Waziristan tribal district, bordering Afghanistan, two security officials said.
The attacks came as Pakistan prepared to draw a line under the northwest operation.
The destroyed hideouts belonged to the members of Taliban warlord Baitullah Mehsud against whom the military has vowed to open a second front, the officials said.
Separately Pakistani artillery pounded two Taliban hideouts in Lower Dir district's Kashmor village Sunday, killing five rebels and injuring five others, district coordination officer Ghulam Mohammad told AFP.
The two hideouts were targeted and destroyed on intelligence received by Pakistan, the official said.
A daily military statement rounding up developments over the past 24 hours said a militant was killed and another arrested during a search operation in Swat valley where troops destroyed five caves where militants were hiding.
At least 15 other militants were arrested in different parts of Swat and seven soldiers were wounded, it said.
One soldier died in an exchange of fire with militants in South Waziristan, while two others were killed in a bomb blast in a mosque in the northwestern town of Dera Ismail Khan, it said.
The death tolls provided could not be verified independently as the areas are under military operation.
The Pakistani army launched a massive offensive in late April in the three northwestern districts of Buner, Lower Dir and Swat to flush out Taliban militants.
The military said last week the operation was almost over and on Thursday Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani announced that preparations were being made to send home from Monday nearly two million people who fled their homes in the Swat valley.
Paramilitary troops raided militant hideouts in Khyber tribal district's Shinkoh village and after a gunfight that left two soldiers injured, arrested 11 of the rebels, paramilitary Colonel Mujahid told AFP.
"Among those who had been arrested, five are from South and North Waziristan tribal districts, four (are) Afghan nationals and two locals," said Mujahid, who goes by one name.
The troops also seized hundreds of bullet rounds, rocket launchers, wireless equipment and documents, he said.
Two explosive-filled vehicles meant to be used in suicide attacks were also destroyed.
The Khyber tribal district lies between Peshawar, the capital of North West Frontier Province, and landlocked Afghanistan and is a key strategic route for vital civil and military supplies to the war-torn country.
Obama Returns Home From European, African Trip
US President Barack Obama addresses members of Ghanaian Parliament at the International Conference Center in Accra, 11 Jul 2009
U.S. President Barack Obama has returned home from a weeklong trip to Moscow, a G-8 summit, and a stop in Ghana.
Mr. Obama and his family arrived back in the United States shortly after midnight.
On Saturday, the president challenged Africans to take more responsibility for wiping out poverty, war and corruption on the continent.
In a speech to Ghana's parliament, he said good governance is missing from too many places in Africa. He said Africa does not need strongmen, it needs strong institutions.
The emotional high point of the president's visit was a tour of a former slave center from which thousands of Africans once were shipped off to America.
Before leaving Ghana late Saturday, Mr. Obama said he would never forget the image of his daughters, the descendants of Africans and African-Americans, walking through the center's doors of no return, but then walking back out.
Mr. Obama's visit to Ghana was his first trip to sub-Saharan Africa since becoming the first African-American president.
He said it was particularly important for his daughters to see the slave center at Cape Coast Castle and witness how history can take cruel turns.
Mr. Obama said the tour reminded him of a visit to a German World War Two concentration camp. He said both experiences remind him of man's capacity for evil.
The president said several times on his trip to Ghana that Africa is not a world apart, but is a fundamental part of an interconnected world.
He said he chose to visit Ghana because of its "functioning democracy" and its president, John Atta Mills, who Mr. Obama said is "serious about reducing corruption."
More Russian military forces arrive in China for joint anti-terror exercise
TAONAN, Jilin,Xinhua-- A 92-member advance unit of Russia's air force and two Il-76 air lifters arrived Sunday noon at a base in Qiqihar in northeast China's Heilongjiang Province to prepare for a joint exercise with the People's Liberation Army (PLA).
The advance unit includes personnel responsible for commanding aviation, communications, weather service and mechanics.
Prior to their arrival, 161 soldiers, 41 commanding and armored vehicles arrived Saturday afternoon by train at the PLA's Taonan tactic training base in northeast China's Jilin Province.
All Russian troops to participate in the drill will arrive at the drill venue by July 14, according to the Defense Ministry.
China and Russia, both members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), will jointly conduct the five-day anti-terrorism military drill code-named "Peace Mission-2009" beginning July 22.
About 1,300 personnel from both armies and air forces will participate in the exercise. Russia will also send an airborne assault unit, according to the Defense Ministry.
Most of the PLA's 1,300 troops in the exercise have been deployed, the ministry said.
More Russian military forces arrive in China for joint anti-terror exercise
TAONAN, Jilin,Xinhua-- A 92-member advance unit of Russia's air force and two Il-76 air lifters arrived Sunday noon at a base in Qiqihar in northeast China's Heilongjiang Province to prepare for a joint exercise with the People's Liberation Army (PLA).
The advance unit includes personnel responsible for commanding aviation, communications, weather service and mechanics.
Prior to their arrival, 161 soldiers, 41 commanding and armored vehicles arrived Saturday afternoon by train at the PLA's Taonan tactic training base in northeast China's Jilin Province.
All Russian troops to participate in the drill will arrive at the drill venue by July 14, according to the Defense Ministry.
China and Russia, both members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), will jointly conduct the five-day anti-terrorism military drill code-named "Peace Mission-2009" beginning July 22.
About 1,300 personnel from both armies and air forces will participate in the exercise. Russia will also send an airborne assault unit, according to the Defense Ministry.
Most of the PLA's 1,300 troops in the exercise have been deployed, the ministry said.
The advance unit includes personnel responsible for commanding aviation, communications, weather service and mechanics.
Prior to their arrival, 161 soldiers, 41 commanding and armored vehicles arrived Saturday afternoon by train at the PLA's Taonan tactic training base in northeast China's Jilin Province.
All Russian troops to participate in the drill will arrive at the drill venue by July 14, according to the Defense Ministry.
China and Russia, both members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), will jointly conduct the five-day anti-terrorism military drill code-named "Peace Mission-2009" beginning July 22.
About 1,300 personnel from both armies and air forces will participate in the exercise. Russia will also send an airborne assault unit, according to the Defense Ministry.
Most of the PLA's 1,300 troops in the exercise have been deployed, the ministry said.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
US president sets Afghan target
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The increasingly deadly conflict in Afghanistan is a "serious fight" but one essential for the future stability of the country, the US president says.
Insisting that US and allied troops have pushed back the Taliban, Barack Obama said the immediate target was to steer Afghanistan through elections.
The country is due to hold a presidential vote in August.
Mr Obama spoke to Sky News as concern grew in the UK at the rising British death toll in Afghanistan.
UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown was also forced on Saturday to justify British involvement in Afghanistan.
Mr Brown said the UK's military deployment there was aimed at preventing terrorism in the UK.
Fifteen British troops have died in the past 10 days, pushing the country's number of deaths in Afghanistan past the number killed in action in Iraq.
'Extraordinary role'
Speaking during a day-long visit to Africa, Mr Obama also told Sky News that the battle in Afghanistan was a vital element in the battle against terrorism.
He said the continued involvement of British troops in the conflict was necessary, right and was a vital contribution to UK national security.
Speaking during a day-long visit to Africa, Mr Obama also told Sky News that the battle in Afghanistan was a vital element in the battle against terrorism.
He said the continued involvement of British troops in the conflict was necessary, right and was a vital contribution to UK national security.
Barack Obama has boosted troop levels and is hoping for tangible results
"This is not an American mission," Mr Obama said.
"The mission in Afghanistan is one that the Europeans have as much if not more of a stake in than we do.
"The likelihood of a terrorist attack in London is at least as high, if not higher, than it is in the United States."
He praised the efforts of all troops currently fighting the Taleban in gruelling summer heat, singling out British forces for praise when asked if their role was still important.
"Great Britain has played an extraordinary role in this coalition, understanding that we can not allow either Afghanistan or Pakistan to be a safe haven for al-Qaeda, those who with impunity blow up train stations in London or buildings in New York.
"We knew that this summer was going to be tough fighting. They [the Taliban] have, I think, been pushed back but we still have a long way to go. We've got to get through elections." Speaking to Sky News, Mr Obama said although forces were currently engaged in heavy fighting, new strategies for building bridges with Afghan society would be considered once the country had held its presidential election.
Afghan civilians often bear the brunt of the conflict with the Taliban
Afghanistan needed its own army, its own police and the ability to control its own security, Mr Obama said - a strategy currently being implemented in Iraq, where security is being handed over to Iraqi forces.
"All of us are going to have to do an evaluation after the Afghan election to see what more we can do," the president said.
"It may not be on the military side, it might be on the development side providing Afghan farmers alternatives to poppy crops, making sure that we are effectively training a judiciary system and a rule of law in Afghanistan that people trust."
"We've got a core mission that we have to accomplish."
Brown's secret plan to cut Afghanistan force by 1,500
independent.co.uk
In Britain, Ministers are secretly planning to cut the number of British troops in Afghanistan, at a time when defence chiefs are appealing for thousands more reinforcements to meet the deadly threat from the resurgent Taliban.
Hours after the death toll of UK forces in Afghanistan rose above the number killed in Iraq, The Independent on Sunday established that Gordon Brown wants to bring up to 1,500 service personnel home from the war-torn country after its elections next month, seemingly on grounds of cost.
Astonished former military chiefs condemned the "disastrous" move, which emerged at the end of one of the bloodiest weeks in the recent history of the British military.
General Sir Hugh Beach, a former deputy commander of British land forces, said: "They ought to be sending the extra 2,000 men the generals have asked for because it's quite obvious that if we're going to get anywhere with this campaign it's troops on the ground that are going to cut the mustard. To reduce numbers now seems to be crazy... and [makes] nonsense of everything the Army has tried to do so far."
Colonel Bob Stewart, who commanded UK forces in Bosnia, said: "The Army apparently asked for 2,500 men and was given 750. The real resource in Afghanistan is manpower, and they ain't got it."
The deepening crisis in Afghanistan has dominated the political agenda in recent days, as the number of British military killed in the conflict rose to 184 – five more than the total lost by UK forces in Iraq. Ferocious fighting during Operation Panther's Claw, the offensive aimed at clearing the Taliban from central Helmand Province, has claimed the lives of 15 British soldiers in 10 days. Eight died in 24 hours at the end of last week.
Senior ministers, including Mr Brown, the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, and the Secretary of State for Defence, Bob Ainsworth, have striven to justify the mission amid growing doubts over the reasons for remaining in Afghanistan and over the Government's ability to give UK forces the tools they need to do the job.
The Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, last week fractured the cross-party consensus over the eight-year Afghan campaign by questioning the Government's commitment to the forces, and challenging the Prime Minister to show that the sacrifices of troops "have not been in vain".
Amid growing frustration over the death toll, Tory leader, David Cameron, yesterday said it was a "scandal" that British forces lacked vital equipment, including helicopters.
Mr Miliband reinforced the Government's commitment to the conflict, claiming it was essential to prevent Afghanistan from again becoming an "incubator for terrorism" that serves as a launching pad for attacks on the West.
"This is about the future of Britain because we know that the badlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan – that border area – have been used to launch terrible attacks, not just on the United States, but on Britain as well," he said.
"We know that until we can ensure there is a modicum of stability and security provided by Afghan forces for their own people, we are not going to be able to be secure in our own country."
In a letter to senior MPs yesterday Mr Brown stoutly defended his Afghan policy, saying the global terror threat that sparked the invasion in 2001 remained a danger. Mr Brown also told the liaison committee, in advance of his appearance before them this week: "We will, of course, continue to review force levels, based on the advice of our commanders and discussions with allies."
The Chancellor, Alistair Darling, also emphasised Britain's commitment to provide whatever equipment British troops might need, and pointed to the extra troops sent in preparation for the elections, but said the figures were being constantly reviewed.
But a senior MoD source yesterday said the Prime Minister wanted up to 1,500 personnel – troops and support staff – pulled out of Afghanistan once the election campaign is concluded. The decision conflicts with demands for an Obama-style surge to defeat the Taliban threat, and comes only weeks after Mr Brown rejected a request from defence chiefs for 2,000 more troops.
An MoD spokesman confirmed yesterday that hundreds of troops would be returning after the election – although he said any withdrawal would involve 700 troops sent in "temporarily" in April to help maintain security ahead of the elections. He added: "This is an international mission to which the UK is the second largest troop contributor. UK forces are doing a large part of the heavy lifting in Afghanistan, having provided the vast majority of international forces in the most difficult province in the country for the past three years.
"While we will continue to keep the position under review, there is no plan to reduce troop numbers by 1,500 from their current levels."
But critics said the rising death toll demanded an increase in troop numbers beyond the current 9,000 – not a reduction – and warned that, failing a change of plan under political pressure following last week's deaths, the military was falling victim to government cuts.
The shadow Defence Secretary, Liam Fox, said: "Commanders have been telling us that they need more boots on the ground. To be reducing the numbers seems to fly in the face of military need. It would be a disaster if Labour were to make decisions on deployment based on political interest and not the safety and welfare of our armed forces."
Colonel Clive Fairweather, a former SAS commander, said there were also rumours about cuts in infantry battalions in the years ahead. He added: "This surge is for 20 August, but it's no good just to have it for then. You've got to have it permanently, you've got to be able to hold the ground and at the moment the Afghan army is not big enough to hold the ground. If there were 2,000 more troops there now the casualties would probably be lighter.
"I think it would be a terrible mistake to take troops away in October, both from an operational point of view and a morale point of view – it's disastrous when in fact there should be 2,000 more actually there now. Frankly, any talk of bringing troops back would leave a very bitter taste in the mouth all round."
The US President, Barack Obama, last night said that coalition partners would consider increasing their contribution to Afghanistan after the election on 20 August. He also signalled that the move would not necessarily mean more troops.
He added: "My heart goes out to the families of those [fallen] British soldiers. Great Britain has played an extraordinary role in this coalition, understanding that we cannot allow either Afghanistan or Pakistan to be a safe haven for al-Qa'ida."
Unveiled Rebiya Kadeer: a Uighur Dalai Lama or female osama bin laden
By Li Hongmei
People's Daily Online
Rebiya Kadeer, presiding over the 'World Uighur Congress' and the 'Uighur American Association,' denied the accusation of masterminding the July 5th Urumqi bloody riots. But what she did, in her so-called exile since 2005, has manifested as clear as daylight that she is an ironclad separatist colluding with terrorists and Islamic extremists and an instigator unceasingly fanning unrest among her followers within and outside of China.
The 58-year-old Kadeer is likened to the Dalai Lama, and the comparison grew more apt when she strived for Nobel Peace Prize, following in the footsteps of the Dalai Lama, who has been revered by Kadeer as the spiritual tutor. Like the Dalai Lama, Ms. Kadeer is also fully cognizant of the importance of P.R. endeavors in a bid to rally the international support. For all these years, she has devoted herself to globe-trotting and lobbying around for the 'rights and interests of the Uighurs.' And in the process, like the Dalai Lama, she is also clad in the religious garment in an attempt to convince others she is just decrying the 'stricture' carried out by the Chinese central government upon the Uighurs and their religion, but whatever she is pushing for, she insisted, is strictly confined to 'peaceful demonstration.'
Most ridiculously, the so-called 'peaceful demonstration' was staged on the Urumqi streets in the form of the most inhumane atrocities too horrible to look at. However, the Kadeer group abroad quickly washed clean themselves pleading ignorance of the beating, smashing, looting and burning incidents which have so far claimed 156 innocent civilian lives, and even recalibrated their gun muzzle toward the Chinese government chiding it for using the same template of accusations as it did in the Mar.14th Lhasa riots. Perhaps, it is none other than Rebiya Kadeer herself who knows fully well why it is so-- simply because she did as much, or more than, as the Dalai Lama and his clique to sow resentment among the ethnic Uighur people and instigate their discontent and hatred toward the government and other ethnic groups, while disregarding the fact that China's Xinjiang Autonomous Region enjoys a time-honored history as a civilized settlement with different ethnic groups living in a compact community and harmony.
Mud is mud, as the old saying goes. When Kadeer made a sensational phone call to her followers in Xinjiang on the very bloody day instructing them to mobilize the local outlaws to launch 'something more courageous and even bigger,' and when she drew upon the Internet in the days gone by to wide spread her separatist ideas and encourage sacrifice of the Uighurs for the 'Independence of East Turkistan,' the true color of a separatist has been thoroughly unveiled. And when, on July 5th and in the apparently preempted and premeditated plot which quickly spiraled into a tragic riot, a baby boy was witnessed smashed to death by a stray brick in his mother's arms, innocent passers-by were mutilated by choppers and swards wielded by the outlaws, and a lot more people were put out of business as their premises and lifework were destroyed within the horrifying three hours, the ferocious terrorist nature of Rebiya Kadeer group has been completely unmasked.
Rebiya Kadeer, in the pursuit of her dream of Nobel Prize, used to hire a shooter keeping a detailed record of her 'colorful personal experiences' and 'epic-like heroic legends.' The so-called autobiography was later published with the title 'Dragon Fighter', and with the foreword written by her much admired tutor, the Dalai Lama. The book has also been labeled by some anti-China political observers abroad as a living force in a fierce defiance of the Chinese government and its policies governing autonomous regions and ethnic minority groups, and Kadeer herself a fearless fighter for human rights and independence of China's Xinjiang Autonomous Region, 1/3 of China's territory. Unfortunately, Ms. Kadeer's deeds always betray the 'lofty goal' she is seeking after for dear life.
Before 1999, she was among the galaxy of the 'happy few' who benefited from China's achievements by adopting the reform and opening up policy, and was listed within the then top 10 richest persons in the country, and ranked No.1 in Xinjiang with a hoard of individual wealth worth over 100 million yuan. Rebiya, a mother of 11 children from two marriages, rose to fame rapidly as a shrewd businesswoman, and later was elected a member of the 8th National Committee of Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and meanwhile she was also put in charge of the Chamber of Commerce in Xinjiang. But in 1999, she ended up her glorious days in prison with the charges of tax evasion and criminal acts endangering state secrets. Nevertheless, she did not see through her seven-year term and was released in 2005 for the consideration of her health. The same year, Rebiya applied for a chance to go to the U.S. and join her second husband, a veteran separatist, and gained approval from the government on the conditions that she would never involve in any plot fanning independence of Xinjiang, and subversive activity against the Chinese government, as Rebiya herself pledged repeatedly before her departure.
Obviously, she went back on her word. Since the notorious 'East Turkistan Islamic Movement' was blacklisted as a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the international community after the 9/11 terrorist attack, Rebiya changed her identity with no time to spare and into new forms of 'World Uighur Congress' and 'Uighur American Association,' but what remains unchanged under the bewildering disguise of the assorted names is the core essence of terrorism and violence, and the 'desperate fulfillment' of all her ambitions at the cost of civilians' life and property.
Nobel Prize will lose its luster if it were meted out to the hands stained with innocent blood. No government would have the tolerance when seeing its people are living in the dread of killing and looting. Physical damage could be measured in terms of money, but the trauma will linger on like a ghost. Rebiya, as well as those with the mentality marked by antipathy and gloom, might intend to dislocate the Chinese society and split China, but will be hoisted by their own petard.
People's Daily Online
Rebiya Kadeer, presiding over the 'World Uighur Congress' and the 'Uighur American Association,' denied the accusation of masterminding the July 5th Urumqi bloody riots. But what she did, in her so-called exile since 2005, has manifested as clear as daylight that she is an ironclad separatist colluding with terrorists and Islamic extremists and an instigator unceasingly fanning unrest among her followers within and outside of China.
The 58-year-old Kadeer is likened to the Dalai Lama, and the comparison grew more apt when she strived for Nobel Peace Prize, following in the footsteps of the Dalai Lama, who has been revered by Kadeer as the spiritual tutor. Like the Dalai Lama, Ms. Kadeer is also fully cognizant of the importance of P.R. endeavors in a bid to rally the international support. For all these years, she has devoted herself to globe-trotting and lobbying around for the 'rights and interests of the Uighurs.' And in the process, like the Dalai Lama, she is also clad in the religious garment in an attempt to convince others she is just decrying the 'stricture' carried out by the Chinese central government upon the Uighurs and their religion, but whatever she is pushing for, she insisted, is strictly confined to 'peaceful demonstration.'
Most ridiculously, the so-called 'peaceful demonstration' was staged on the Urumqi streets in the form of the most inhumane atrocities too horrible to look at. However, the Kadeer group abroad quickly washed clean themselves pleading ignorance of the beating, smashing, looting and burning incidents which have so far claimed 156 innocent civilian lives, and even recalibrated their gun muzzle toward the Chinese government chiding it for using the same template of accusations as it did in the Mar.14th Lhasa riots. Perhaps, it is none other than Rebiya Kadeer herself who knows fully well why it is so-- simply because she did as much, or more than, as the Dalai Lama and his clique to sow resentment among the ethnic Uighur people and instigate their discontent and hatred toward the government and other ethnic groups, while disregarding the fact that China's Xinjiang Autonomous Region enjoys a time-honored history as a civilized settlement with different ethnic groups living in a compact community and harmony.
Mud is mud, as the old saying goes. When Kadeer made a sensational phone call to her followers in Xinjiang on the very bloody day instructing them to mobilize the local outlaws to launch 'something more courageous and even bigger,' and when she drew upon the Internet in the days gone by to wide spread her separatist ideas and encourage sacrifice of the Uighurs for the 'Independence of East Turkistan,' the true color of a separatist has been thoroughly unveiled. And when, on July 5th and in the apparently preempted and premeditated plot which quickly spiraled into a tragic riot, a baby boy was witnessed smashed to death by a stray brick in his mother's arms, innocent passers-by were mutilated by choppers and swards wielded by the outlaws, and a lot more people were put out of business as their premises and lifework were destroyed within the horrifying three hours, the ferocious terrorist nature of Rebiya Kadeer group has been completely unmasked.
Rebiya Kadeer, in the pursuit of her dream of Nobel Prize, used to hire a shooter keeping a detailed record of her 'colorful personal experiences' and 'epic-like heroic legends.' The so-called autobiography was later published with the title 'Dragon Fighter', and with the foreword written by her much admired tutor, the Dalai Lama. The book has also been labeled by some anti-China political observers abroad as a living force in a fierce defiance of the Chinese government and its policies governing autonomous regions and ethnic minority groups, and Kadeer herself a fearless fighter for human rights and independence of China's Xinjiang Autonomous Region, 1/3 of China's territory. Unfortunately, Ms. Kadeer's deeds always betray the 'lofty goal' she is seeking after for dear life.
Before 1999, she was among the galaxy of the 'happy few' who benefited from China's achievements by adopting the reform and opening up policy, and was listed within the then top 10 richest persons in the country, and ranked No.1 in Xinjiang with a hoard of individual wealth worth over 100 million yuan. Rebiya, a mother of 11 children from two marriages, rose to fame rapidly as a shrewd businesswoman, and later was elected a member of the 8th National Committee of Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and meanwhile she was also put in charge of the Chamber of Commerce in Xinjiang. But in 1999, she ended up her glorious days in prison with the charges of tax evasion and criminal acts endangering state secrets. Nevertheless, she did not see through her seven-year term and was released in 2005 for the consideration of her health. The same year, Rebiya applied for a chance to go to the U.S. and join her second husband, a veteran separatist, and gained approval from the government on the conditions that she would never involve in any plot fanning independence of Xinjiang, and subversive activity against the Chinese government, as Rebiya herself pledged repeatedly before her departure.
Obviously, she went back on her word. Since the notorious 'East Turkistan Islamic Movement' was blacklisted as a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the international community after the 9/11 terrorist attack, Rebiya changed her identity with no time to spare and into new forms of 'World Uighur Congress' and 'Uighur American Association,' but what remains unchanged under the bewildering disguise of the assorted names is the core essence of terrorism and violence, and the 'desperate fulfillment' of all her ambitions at the cost of civilians' life and property.
Nobel Prize will lose its luster if it were meted out to the hands stained with innocent blood. No government would have the tolerance when seeing its people are living in the dread of killing and looting. Physical damage could be measured in terms of money, but the trauma will linger on like a ghost. Rebiya, as well as those with the mentality marked by antipathy and gloom, might intend to dislocate the Chinese society and split China, but will be hoisted by their own petard.
Xinjiang people donate money, blood for riot victims
URUMQI, -- The Xinjiang branch of China Charity Federation said Saturday it had received 2.03 million yuan (297,218 U.S. dollars) in donation from all walks of life for victims in the Urumqi riot.
The single largest donation is 200,000 yuan from the Xinjiang company of China Pacific Life Insurance Co., Ltd., said the federation.
Wu Jie, an employee of the insurance company, said she would like to do something for the dead and injured people. "We need to comfort the families of the dead and help the people who need medical treatment."
Maolaxifu Rishat, a businessman of the Tartar ethnic group who was the first to propose a comfort fund for riot victims, donated 5,200 yuan on behalf of 14 donators from 14 different ethnic groups.
"We pray for national unity in Xinjiang, so that we can have a peaceful and harmonious environment," he said.
Urumqi Public Transport Group, which suffered 37.6 million yuan as hundreds of its buses were torched or smashed, received 3.38 million yuan in donation from enterprises in the city. Five bus drivers of the group were killed by mobs and 57 others injured.
The riot in Xinjiang on July 5, the worst in six decades, caused a severe shortage of blood at local hospitals where more than 1,000 injured people were rushed in.
Shortly after the shortage was reported, many citizens rolled up their sleeves to donate blood.
On Friday, Urumqi's blood center announced the shortage had been eased, but donors continued to pour in.
A total of 1,315 people from 13 ethnic groups had come to the blood collection stations to donate 400,000 milliliters of blood as of 10 p.m. Friday. More than 1,000 other people have made appointments with blood collection centers to donate blood in the coming days.
Senior leader calls to build "steel wall" in Xinjiang for stability
HOTAN, Xinjiang, (Xinhua) -- Government and Communist Party departments at all levels in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region should rely on the people of all ethnic groups to build a "steel wall" for the region's stability to safeguard the interests of the people, senior Chinese leader Zhou Yongkang said here Saturday.Zhou, a Standing Committee member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, made the remarks on the third day of his visit to Xinjiang. He is the first member of the Political Bureau Standing Committee to visit the region after the July 5 riot in Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang, which caused at least 184 deaths and injured over 1,000 others.During his visit to Hotan and Kashgar, both in the southern part of Xinjiang, Zhou said the current situation in the region was "heading in a good direction."But he warned that hostile forces from home and abroad would not give up easily. "They are attempting to stage more sabotage," he said. Zhou urged government and Party departments, troops on duty in the region and public security authorities to stay on high alert, nip all hidden dangers in the bud and focus on ethnic unity education, to foil all sabotage attempts by the hostile forces. When talking with Uygur farmers during his visit, Zhou said the CPC Central Committee and the State Council have always attached great importance to the development of southern Xinjiang. He promised that more efforts would be made to improve the living standards of people in southern Xinjiang and infrastructure in the region.
Rebiya Kadeer behind Xinjiang riot: Chinese gov't
BEIJING, (Xinhua) -- The separatist World Uyghur Congress led by Rebiya Kadeer was behind the deadly July 5 Xinjiang riot, in which at least 156 people died and more than 1000 were injured, sources with the government said.
Evidence showed the riot was organized. It was instigated and masterminded by the World Uyghur Congress led by Kadeer, the sources said.
The Congress used the June 26 factory brawl between Uygur and Han ethnic workers in Guangdong Province, in which two Uygurs died, to create chaos.
On July 1, the Congress held a special meeting, plotting to instigate unrest by sending messages via the Internet, telephones and mobile phones.
On July 4, some people inside the country began to send out a flood of online posts encouraging people to go to the Renmin Square in Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, to protest on July 5 to support separatists abroad.
At 1:06 a.m. July 5, police in Urumqi were tipped off that some people were putting out illegal information calling for an illegal gathering at Renmin Square at 7 p.m. July 5.
According to recordings of calls, at 11 a.m. July 5, Kadeer said, as she called her younger brother in Urumqi, "A lot of things have happened, and we all know something might happen in Urumqi tomorrow night."
On July 6, Kadeer held an emergency meeting with some senior members of the Congress to make plans to further stir up both domestic and overseas demonstrations and to call for intervention from foreign governments and human rights institutions.
Evidence showed the riot was organized. It was instigated and masterminded by the World Uyghur Congress led by Kadeer, the sources said.
The Congress used the June 26 factory brawl between Uygur and Han ethnic workers in Guangdong Province, in which two Uygurs died, to create chaos.
On July 1, the Congress held a special meeting, plotting to instigate unrest by sending messages via the Internet, telephones and mobile phones.
On July 4, some people inside the country began to send out a flood of online posts encouraging people to go to the Renmin Square in Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, to protest on July 5 to support separatists abroad.
At 1:06 a.m. July 5, police in Urumqi were tipped off that some people were putting out illegal information calling for an illegal gathering at Renmin Square at 7 p.m. July 5.
According to recordings of calls, at 11 a.m. July 5, Kadeer said, as she called her younger brother in Urumqi, "A lot of things have happened, and we all know something might happen in Urumqi tomorrow night."
On July 6, Kadeer held an emergency meeting with some senior members of the Congress to make plans to further stir up both domestic and overseas demonstrations and to call for intervention from foreign governments and human rights institutions.
Obama in Ghana: War a 'millstone around Africa's neck'
CNN.COM: President Obama reached out to Africa in a speech in Ghana on Saturday, praising the continent's achievements but condemning persistent wars, calling them the "millstone around Africa's neck.""Despite the progress that has been made -- and there has been considerable progress in parts of Africa -- we also know that much of that promise has yet to be fulfilled," Obama said in a speech to the parliament of Ghana, a West African nation seen as a model of democracy and growth for the rest of the continent.
Obama's visit,the third by a sitting American president, highlighted the stability, political strides and painstaking economic progress that Ghana made in being the first sub-Saharan nation to gain independence, in 1957.
This is in sharp contrast to conditions in other continent hot spots cited by Obama -- Zimbabwe, where the society is in economic and political turmoil; Sudan, where fighting rages in the Darfur region, and Somalia, site of civil warfare. Congo and Liberia have also been in the throes of war.
"Here in Ghana, you show us a face of Africa that is too often overlooked by a world that sees only tragedy or the need for charity," Obama said.
"The people of Ghana have worked hard to put democracy on a firmer footing, with peaceful transfers of power even in the wake of closely contested elections. And with improved governance and an emerging civil society, Ghana's economy has shown impressive rates of growth.
After his speech, Obama toured Cape Coast Castle, the notorious fort used in the transatlantic slave trade.After viewing the castle, a visibly moved Obama, who was accompanied by his wife and two daughters, said that the site held special significance for him.
"As Americans, as African-Americans obviously, there's a special sense that on the one hand this place was a place of profound sadness, on the other hand," he said, "it is here where the journey of much of the African-American experience began," he said.
Earlier in the day, Obama in his speech to the country's lawmakers said the kind of nation-building exemplified by Ghana doesn't have the "drama of the 20th century's liberation struggles," but he believes "it will ultimately be more significant."
"We must first recognize a fundamental truth that you have given life to in Ghana: Development depends upon good governance. That is the ingredient which has been missing in far too many places, for far too long," he said. "That is the change that can unlock Africa's potential. And that is a responsibility that can only be met by Africans."
Obama pointed to Kenya -- where his father was born -- as an example of unmet potential.
"Countries like Kenya, which had a per-capita economy larger than South Korea's when I was born, have been badly outpaced. Disease and conflict have ravaged parts of the African continent. In many places, the hope of my father's generation gave way to cynicism, even despair," he said.
"History shows that countries thrive when they invest in their people and infrastructure, when they promote multiple export industries, develop a skilled workforce, and create space for small and medium-sized businesses that create jobs."
Obama said the United States has committed $63 billion to a global, comprehensive health strategy.
"Building on the strong efforts of President [George W.] Bush, we will carry forward the fight against HIV/AIDS. We will pursue the goal of ending deaths from malaria and tuberculosis, and we will work to eradicate polio.
"We will fight neglected tropical disease. And we won't confront illnesses in isolation -- we will invest in public health systems that promote wellness, and focus on the health of mothers and children," Obama said.
The visit by the first African-American president in the United States sparked a frenzy in the country as street vendors sold miniature U.S. flags, and massive billboards with pictures of a smiling Obama and "akwaaba, " the local word for welcome, were set up in the capital city.
"People in Ghana are printing clothes for this occasion," said Adrian Landry, general manager of a beach hotel in Accra.
"The fact that his father is African and he picked us makes us special," he said. "He is endorsing our strong democracy in Ghana. This is historic."
Bill Clinton was the first U.S. president to visit Ghana in 1998 as part of a six-nation Africa tour. Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, stopped there as part of a four-nation Africa tour during his last year of office.
Obama, who recently attended the G-8 summit in Italy, will not visit any other country in the continent during the trip.
Obama's visit,the third by a sitting American president, highlighted the stability, political strides and painstaking economic progress that Ghana made in being the first sub-Saharan nation to gain independence, in 1957.
This is in sharp contrast to conditions in other continent hot spots cited by Obama -- Zimbabwe, where the society is in economic and political turmoil; Sudan, where fighting rages in the Darfur region, and Somalia, site of civil warfare. Congo and Liberia have also been in the throes of war.
"Here in Ghana, you show us a face of Africa that is too often overlooked by a world that sees only tragedy or the need for charity," Obama said.
"The people of Ghana have worked hard to put democracy on a firmer footing, with peaceful transfers of power even in the wake of closely contested elections. And with improved governance and an emerging civil society, Ghana's economy has shown impressive rates of growth.
After his speech, Obama toured Cape Coast Castle, the notorious fort used in the transatlantic slave trade.After viewing the castle, a visibly moved Obama, who was accompanied by his wife and two daughters, said that the site held special significance for him.
"As Americans, as African-Americans obviously, there's a special sense that on the one hand this place was a place of profound sadness, on the other hand," he said, "it is here where the journey of much of the African-American experience began," he said.
Earlier in the day, Obama in his speech to the country's lawmakers said the kind of nation-building exemplified by Ghana doesn't have the "drama of the 20th century's liberation struggles," but he believes "it will ultimately be more significant."
"We must first recognize a fundamental truth that you have given life to in Ghana: Development depends upon good governance. That is the ingredient which has been missing in far too many places, for far too long," he said. "That is the change that can unlock Africa's potential. And that is a responsibility that can only be met by Africans."
Obama pointed to Kenya -- where his father was born -- as an example of unmet potential.
"Countries like Kenya, which had a per-capita economy larger than South Korea's when I was born, have been badly outpaced. Disease and conflict have ravaged parts of the African continent. In many places, the hope of my father's generation gave way to cynicism, even despair," he said.
"History shows that countries thrive when they invest in their people and infrastructure, when they promote multiple export industries, develop a skilled workforce, and create space for small and medium-sized businesses that create jobs."
Obama said the United States has committed $63 billion to a global, comprehensive health strategy.
"Building on the strong efforts of President [George W.] Bush, we will carry forward the fight against HIV/AIDS. We will pursue the goal of ending deaths from malaria and tuberculosis, and we will work to eradicate polio.
"We will fight neglected tropical disease. And we won't confront illnesses in isolation -- we will invest in public health systems that promote wellness, and focus on the health of mothers and children," Obama said.
The visit by the first African-American president in the United States sparked a frenzy in the country as street vendors sold miniature U.S. flags, and massive billboards with pictures of a smiling Obama and "akwaaba, " the local word for welcome, were set up in the capital city.
"People in Ghana are printing clothes for this occasion," said Adrian Landry, general manager of a beach hotel in Accra.
"The fact that his father is African and he picked us makes us special," he said. "He is endorsing our strong democracy in Ghana. This is historic."
Bill Clinton was the first U.S. president to visit Ghana in 1998 as part of a six-nation Africa tour. Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, stopped there as part of a four-nation Africa tour during his last year of office.
Obama, who recently attended the G-8 summit in Italy, will not visit any other country in the continent during the trip.
Another Insurgency Gains in Pakistan
New York Times
TURBAT, Pakistan — Three local political leaders were seized from a small legal office here in April, handcuffed, blindfolded and hustled into a waiting pickup truck in front of their lawyer and neighboring shopkeepers. Their bodies, riddled with bullets and badly decomposed in the scorching heat, were found in a date palm grove five days later.
Local residents are convinced that the killings were the work of the Pakistani intelligence agencies, and the deaths have provided a new spark for revolt across Baluchistan, a vast and restless province in Pakistan’s southwest where the government faces yet another insurgency.
Although not on the same scale as the Taliban insurgency in the northwest, the conflict in Baluchistan is steadily gaining ground. Politicians and analysts warn that it presents a distracting second front for the authorities, drawing off resources, like helicopters, that the United States provided Pakistan to fight the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Baluch nationalists and some Pakistani politicians say the Baluch conflict holds the potential to break the country apart — Baluchistan makes up a third of Pakistan’s territory — unless the government urgently deals with years of pent up grievances and stays the hand of the military and security services.
Hundreds, possibly thousands, of Baluch were rounded up in a harsh regime of secret detentions and torture under President Pervez Musharraf, who left office last year. Human rights groups and Baluch activists say those abuses have continued under President Asif Ali Zardari, despite promises to heal tensions.
“It’s pretty volatile,” said Nawab Zulfiqar Ali Magsi, the governor of Baluchistan. “When you try to forcibly pacify people, you will get a reaction.”
The discovery of the men’s bodies on April 8 set off days of rioting and weeks of strikes, demonstrations and civil resistance. In schools and colleges, students pulled down the Pakistani flag and put up the pale blue, red and green Baluch nationalist flag.
Schoolchildren still refuse to sing the national anthem at assemblies, instead breaking into a nationalist Baluch song championing the armed struggle for independence, teachers and parents said.
For the first time, women, traditionally secluded in Baluch society, have joined street protests against the continuing detentions of nationalist figures. Graffiti daubed on walls around this town call for independence and guerrilla war, which persists in large parts of the province.
The nationalist opposition stems from what it sees as the forcible annexation of Baluchistan by Pakistan 62 years ago at Pakistan’s creation. But much of the popular resentment stems from years of economic and political marginalization, something President Zardari promised to remedy but has done little to actually address.
In interviews, people in and around Turbat said the Pakistani military and intelligence agencies were still doggedly pursuing nationalist sympathizers.
A case in point, they say, is that of the three political figures who were killed: Gul Muhammad, Lala Munir and Sher Muhammad, all prominent in the nationalist movement.
Government officials say the men were being prosecuted for activities against the state but deny any involvement in their deaths. People are not convinced and say that while the men supported independence, they were not involved in the armed struggle.
Mir Kachkol Ali, the men’s lawyer, who witnessed their abduction, said the killings represented a deepening of the campaign by the Pakistani military to crush the Baluch nationalist movement. “Their tactics are not only to torture and detain, but to eliminate,” he said.
The insurgents, who say they are led by the Baluchistan Liberation Army, have escalated their tactics, too. A prominent example was the kidnapping in February of an American citizen, John Solecki, the head of the United Nations refugee organization in the provincial capital, Quetta.
The abduction was carried out by a breakaway group of young radicals who wanted to draw international attention to their cause and to exchange their captive for Baluch being held by the security services.
Mr. Solecki was released in April after the intervention of Baluch leaders, including Gul Muhammad. Baluch leaders speculate that the intelligence agencies may have killed Mr. Muhammad and his colleagues to provoke the kidnappers into murdering the American, which would have branded the Baluch nationalists as terrorists.
Instead, “the killing of these three has centralized the national movement of Baluchistan,” Mr. Ali, the lawyer, said.
He and others said they had no doubt that the intelligence services were responsible.
The three men were in his office on April 3 when a half-dozen armed men seized them, he said.
“They were persons of the agencies,” Mr. Ali said. “They were in plain clothes, but from their hairstyles, their language, we know them.” Mr. Ali has lodged a case with the police against the intelligence agencies for the abduction and murder of the three.
Nisar Ahmed, a shopkeeper and friend of the political leaders, said he saw them pushed into a pickup truck. He also said that the armed men appeared to be intelligence agents and that they were escorted by a second vehicle with 10 more armed men, also in plain clothes, who looked to be from the Frontier Corps paramilitary force.
While the insurgency remains strong in other parts of Baluchistan, the military has largely crushed the resistance around Turbat since March 2007, yet armed men are still in the hills and continue to be rounded up, residents here said.
Yousuf Muhammad, the brother of Gul Muhammad, one of the slain political leaders, said that in February he was hung by his hands from the ceiling for 48 hours in a Pakistani military camp.
“They came to arrest Gul Muhammad but they found me,” he said. Another brother, Obeidullah, said Gul Muhammad had received threats from people in the intelligence agencies warning him to stop his work. The latest came 10 days before his death, he said.
A group of students in the nearby town of Tump said they were rounded up and held in various army camps without charge for seven months in 2007. Some said they were suspended by their hands or their feet until they passed out, were beaten and were held in solitary confinement. Each showed a blackened mark where a toenail had been pulled out.
The arrests and disappearances have hardened attitudes, townspeople said, particularly among the young.
Even the governor, who is the president’s representative in the province, expressed exasperation at the Zardari government’s inaction in addressing the needs of the population. Many Baluch are increasingly cynical about the government’s ability to change things.
Sayed Hassan Shah, the minister for industry and commerce in Baluchistan, said his party was now demanding provincial autonomy.
“This is our last option,” he said. “If we fail, then maybe we have to think of liberation or separation.”
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