Deputy Speaker Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly Khushdil Khan Advocate Friday said keeping in view the significance of education provincial government has allocated huge funds for the sector.
Stressing on the need for female education, Khushdil Khan said that female enrolment should be increased to eliminate illiteracy and deprivations from society.He stated this while addressing a land demarcation ceremony in Government Girls High School at Sorizai Payan area here.EDO Education Peshawar Gohar Khan, Naib Tehsildar Shakil Barki, Gard, Iqbal Khan, Ex-Nazim Fazal Ilahi, Arbab Najeebullah Khan, Haji Fazal Malik, Haji Janat Gul and elite of the area were present on the occasion.
Khushdil Khan said that female education was the need of the hour and the country’s development was not possible sans female development.
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Pakistan regains control with 95 dead in Karachi
Pakistan announced on Saturday its troops had taken back areas of Karachi occupied by armed groups and arrested more than 100 people after political violence across the vast port city claimed 95 lives.
Four days of unrest has been blamed on political and ethnic tensions, with gunmen firing on two buses in the early hours of Friday, killing 12 people including a six-year-old girl, according to security officials.
"Our paramilitary soldiers have secured the troubled localities and hills where armed terrorists were firing on innocent people, and have restored normal life," interior minister Rehman Malik told reporters.
"We'll treat anyone who disrupts Pakistan's financial capital as a supporter of Taliban and an enemy operating against our war on terror," he said.
Home ministry spokesman Sharafuddin Memon told AFP a 12-year-old boy hit by a stray bullet in Baldia neighbourhood early Saturday was also among the dead.
"More than 100 suspects, many of them with weapons, have been arrested," Memon said, putting the death toll at 95.
Authorities said they had asked residents evacuated as the violence broke out to return home but few had responded.
"I had left my house in Qasba on Tuesday for my workplace, but could only return home now when peace has returned after four days," Abdullah Khan, 33, said.
"I am a construction labourer and support my elderly parents, wife and six children. I am happy to see my family safe but we don't know when the situation will turn difficult again."
Police and hospital officials confirmed the toll and arrests.
"We have taken control of all the affected areas," said Farooq Bilal, a spokesman for the paramilitary Rangers.
A grenade attack in southern Bhimpura neighbourhood killed two men and injured three on Saturday.
"Unknown motorcyclists threw a grenade on some shopkeepers who were trying to open their shops in Bhimpura, killing two and injuring three others," police official Mohammad Rafiq said.
Gunfire could be heard in western neighbourhoods and hospitals were still receiving casualties, witnesses said.
The violence has been blamed on loyalists of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), the dominant local party that represents migrants from India, and the Awami National Party (ANP) of Pashtuns from the northwest.
The latest bout of killings comes days after the MQM walked out of the federal government led by the Pakistan People's Party (PPP), a move which some analysts said made it harder for the government to intervene.
The worst affected areas are impoverished, heavily populated neighbourhoods in western Karachi, dotted with construction sites where armed men of different ethnicities have exchanged gunfire.
Karachi’s mini-civil war
EDITORIAL:Daily Times
For the fourth day running, Karachi remained in the grip of large scale ethnic bloodletting on Thursday. Although at the time of writing these lines the city by and large appeared deserted since markets did not open and transport was off the roads on MQM’s declared day of mourning on Friday, in the troubled areas coinciding with the well known ethnic fault lines that run through the metropolis, the sound of gunfire was almost a constant. The toll of this virtual mini-civil war is rising, with widespread dissatisfaction being voiced by Karachi’s affected citizens that the government and law enforcement agencies are conspicuous by their absence. The gunmen have abandoned individual targeted killings that had been the bane of the city even before the parting of the ways of the MQM and the PPP-led coalition and instead taken to ‘positional’ warfare and indiscriminate killings of innocent citizens on buses and even within their houses. In the absence of any meaningful response by the law enforcement agencies to halt this unfettered massacre, Karachi too is witnessing its own version of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the shape of desperate citizens being forced to abandon their homes and flee to safer areas with the minimum wherewithal to survive. For all intents and purposes, in the areas of intense fighting by means of their menacing presence, and in the rest of the city because of spreading fear, the gunmen rule the roost. It would come as no surprise if within their ranks could be counted land and drug mafias trying to take advantage of the unrest.
MQM’s day of mourning on Friday remained just that, mourning for the city of lights and the dire straits to which it has been condemned. Mercifully, the MQM postponed its planned march, which could have invited more trouble. Nevertheless, as we have said before in this space, the MQM, since leaving the government, has resorted to its time-tested usual terrorist-political tactics. It is difficult to believe that its hand is not detectable in the worst violence to wrack the city for years. That does not mean that there are not other actors who are equally to blame for the descent into open warfare along ethnic lines. The Urdu-speaking and Pashtun people of Karachi are the worst affected communities. The apprehension now is that the concentration of the violence in north-western Karachi may spill over into the rest of the city with a vengeance.
The government claims 235 perpetrators of violence arrested in the last four days. This is the result of a conscious decision not to launch a generalised operation a la the military offensive in 1992, which failed to leave any indelible mark on the circumstances of the city, but instead to gather intelligence and information and then conduct targeted operations against the miscreants. According to Federal Law Minister Maula Bux Chandio, an army action in Karachi would mean the collective failure of the political forces to manage the affairs of the country satisfactorily. He could also have added that it could pose a threat to the continuation of civilian rule once again. While Interior Minister Rehman Malik has once more dashed to Karachi to help out, promising the induction of 1,000 personnel of the Frontier Constabulary to bolster the police and Rangers in the city, the Sindh government has issued shoot on sight orders to quell the violence.
Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani has appealed for calm and peace in Karachi, but his voice sounds more like a plaint than that of an authoritative chief executive, punctuated as the appeal is by the crackle of almost constant gunfire in the streets and alleyways of many areas of the city. In essence, the PPP’s strategy after the 2008 elections to “keep your friends close, and your enemies even closer” seems to have now run its course. It is MQM’s well known and demonstrated track record that it always resorts to the gun when it wants to dictate its own terms to rivals or the power structure. If it is unable to win the day through its habitual tactics of intimidation and at the same time anointing itself as the victim, Karachi is i
For the fourth day running, Karachi remained in the grip of large scale ethnic bloodletting on Thursday. Although at the time of writing these lines the city by and large appeared deserted since markets did not open and transport was off the roads on MQM’s declared day of mourning on Friday, in the troubled areas coinciding with the well known ethnic fault lines that run through the metropolis, the sound of gunfire was almost a constant. The toll of this virtual mini-civil war is rising, with widespread dissatisfaction being voiced by Karachi’s affected citizens that the government and law enforcement agencies are conspicuous by their absence. The gunmen have abandoned individual targeted killings that had been the bane of the city even before the parting of the ways of the MQM and the PPP-led coalition and instead taken to ‘positional’ warfare and indiscriminate killings of innocent citizens on buses and even within their houses. In the absence of any meaningful response by the law enforcement agencies to halt this unfettered massacre, Karachi too is witnessing its own version of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the shape of desperate citizens being forced to abandon their homes and flee to safer areas with the minimum wherewithal to survive. For all intents and purposes, in the areas of intense fighting by means of their menacing presence, and in the rest of the city because of spreading fear, the gunmen rule the roost. It would come as no surprise if within their ranks could be counted land and drug mafias trying to take advantage of the unrest.
MQM’s day of mourning on Friday remained just that, mourning for the city of lights and the dire straits to which it has been condemned. Mercifully, the MQM postponed its planned march, which could have invited more trouble. Nevertheless, as we have said before in this space, the MQM, since leaving the government, has resorted to its time-tested usual terrorist-political tactics. It is difficult to believe that its hand is not detectable in the worst violence to wrack the city for years. That does not mean that there are not other actors who are equally to blame for the descent into open warfare along ethnic lines. The Urdu-speaking and Pashtun people of Karachi are the worst affected communities. The apprehension now is that the concentration of the violence in north-western Karachi may spill over into the rest of the city with a vengeance.
The government claims 235 perpetrators of violence arrested in the last four days. This is the result of a conscious decision not to launch a generalised operation a la the military offensive in 1992, which failed to leave any indelible mark on the circumstances of the city, but instead to gather intelligence and information and then conduct targeted operations against the miscreants. According to Federal Law Minister Maula Bux Chandio, an army action in Karachi would mean the collective failure of the political forces to manage the affairs of the country satisfactorily. He could also have added that it could pose a threat to the continuation of civilian rule once again. While Interior Minister Rehman Malik has once more dashed to Karachi to help out, promising the induction of 1,000 personnel of the Frontier Constabulary to bolster the police and Rangers in the city, the Sindh government has issued shoot on sight orders to quell the violence.
Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani has appealed for calm and peace in Karachi, but his voice sounds more like a plaint than that of an authoritative chief executive, punctuated as the appeal is by the crackle of almost constant gunfire in the streets and alleyways of many areas of the city. In essence, the PPP’s strategy after the 2008 elections to “keep your friends close, and your enemies even closer” seems to have now run its course. It is MQM’s well known and demonstrated track record that it always resorts to the gun when it wants to dictate its own terms to rivals or the power structure. If it is unable to win the day through its habitual tactics of intimidation and at the same time anointing itself as the victim, Karachi is i
Karachi bleeds; 35 more killed
Daily Times
At least 35 more people were killed and scores of others wounded when unidentified gunmen strafed passenger buses and went on shooting sprees in several
neighbourhoods in Karachi on Friday – the forth day of continuing ethnic violence.
In a late night development, law enforcement agencies cordoned off and entered Kati Pahari area in a bid to quell terrorists after intelligence reports revealed that the Taliban were present there.
During the day, despite the deployment of Frontier Constabulary (FC), tension gripped various localities in the city’s west where gunfire reverberated and thousands of people stood stranded, short of food and too frightened to leave their houses. Relatives wept over the bodies of loved ones in morgues and hospitals on Friday. As per reports, four rockets were fired in Saeedabad and Baldia areas while unidentified attackers ridding motorbikes lobbed hand grenades at a building in Bhimpura area. One unidentified man, Hussain, Ghanchi and Maojee were killed when the attackers opened indiscriminate firing.
In Pirabad area, one Saifullah was shot dead while firing claimed the life of one Sakhiur Rehman in Qasba Colony. A passer-by, Ghaniur Rehman, was killed in another similar incident.
In Qasba area, one Akbar was shot dead while firing near Mubarak Mosque killed 19-year-old Usman and wounded Yumna, Rehan, Zaghfaran. A man, Yousuf Jinnah, was killed outside his house. In Orangi Town, Arshad Khan was mowed down while firing near a bakery in Iqbal Market killed one Iqbal and wounded his uncle Qadar. A passer-by, Rafiullah, was killed due to the firing in the limits of Sharah-e-Noor Jahan police. In North Nazimabad, one Arif Ibrahim lost his life because of unbridled firing.
In the limits of Kharadar police, Noor Muhammad got killed. A watchman, namely Abdul Qayyum, was shot dead by unidentified assailants near Bombay Bazaar. Near Miani Market, Fazlur Rehman, 28, was shot dead.
In Saeedabad area, Ayub Masih, Bismillah Khan and an unidentified man were gunned down. Twelve-year-old Shahabad received bullets at his house and later died. In the same area, Ahsan Rashid was killed.
Gunmen opened fire on four vehicles, killing two people, Dost Muhammad and Daniyal, while Lal Muhammad and Noor Ahmed sustained bullet injures.
Abid alias Baba and Ghulam Sarwar were shot dead by unidentified assassins in Model Colony and Bilal Colony, respectively.
In Nazimabad, 7-year-old Salman Siddique was shot dead. A mutilated dead body was recovered from Old Golimar area. In Aligarh Bazaar, unidentified arsonists torched a two-storey building while three shops were also set ablaze. Seven more shops and over a dozen vehicles were set on fire in various localities of the city. In a late night firing incident, Abdul Jabbar and Mir Afridi were killed in Ghousia Colony. A Jamaat-e-Islami activist, Ayub Ali, was ambushed in Lines Area. He died instantly. One passenger was killed and five others were wounded when unidentified men fired indiscriminately at a passenger bus near Hassan Square.
A dead body was recovered near Lea Market. The body is yet to be identified. Two more mutilated bodies were found in Baldia Town.
At least 35 more people were killed and scores of others wounded when unidentified gunmen strafed passenger buses and went on shooting sprees in several
neighbourhoods in Karachi on Friday – the forth day of continuing ethnic violence.
In a late night development, law enforcement agencies cordoned off and entered Kati Pahari area in a bid to quell terrorists after intelligence reports revealed that the Taliban were present there.
During the day, despite the deployment of Frontier Constabulary (FC), tension gripped various localities in the city’s west where gunfire reverberated and thousands of people stood stranded, short of food and too frightened to leave their houses. Relatives wept over the bodies of loved ones in morgues and hospitals on Friday. As per reports, four rockets were fired in Saeedabad and Baldia areas while unidentified attackers ridding motorbikes lobbed hand grenades at a building in Bhimpura area. One unidentified man, Hussain, Ghanchi and Maojee were killed when the attackers opened indiscriminate firing.
In Pirabad area, one Saifullah was shot dead while firing claimed the life of one Sakhiur Rehman in Qasba Colony. A passer-by, Ghaniur Rehman, was killed in another similar incident.
In Qasba area, one Akbar was shot dead while firing near Mubarak Mosque killed 19-year-old Usman and wounded Yumna, Rehan, Zaghfaran. A man, Yousuf Jinnah, was killed outside his house. In Orangi Town, Arshad Khan was mowed down while firing near a bakery in Iqbal Market killed one Iqbal and wounded his uncle Qadar. A passer-by, Rafiullah, was killed due to the firing in the limits of Sharah-e-Noor Jahan police. In North Nazimabad, one Arif Ibrahim lost his life because of unbridled firing.
In the limits of Kharadar police, Noor Muhammad got killed. A watchman, namely Abdul Qayyum, was shot dead by unidentified assailants near Bombay Bazaar. Near Miani Market, Fazlur Rehman, 28, was shot dead.
In Saeedabad area, Ayub Masih, Bismillah Khan and an unidentified man were gunned down. Twelve-year-old Shahabad received bullets at his house and later died. In the same area, Ahsan Rashid was killed.
Gunmen opened fire on four vehicles, killing two people, Dost Muhammad and Daniyal, while Lal Muhammad and Noor Ahmed sustained bullet injures.
Abid alias Baba and Ghulam Sarwar were shot dead by unidentified assassins in Model Colony and Bilal Colony, respectively.
In Nazimabad, 7-year-old Salman Siddique was shot dead. A mutilated dead body was recovered from Old Golimar area. In Aligarh Bazaar, unidentified arsonists torched a two-storey building while three shops were also set ablaze. Seven more shops and over a dozen vehicles were set on fire in various localities of the city. In a late night firing incident, Abdul Jabbar and Mir Afridi were killed in Ghousia Colony. A Jamaat-e-Islami activist, Ayub Ali, was ambushed in Lines Area. He died instantly. One passenger was killed and five others were wounded when unidentified men fired indiscriminately at a passenger bus near Hassan Square.
A dead body was recovered near Lea Market. The body is yet to be identified. Two more mutilated bodies were found in Baldia Town.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Pakistan hardly to see any change in gov't soon
Despite the political mercury shooting up in Pakistan after the country's biggest opposition party, Pakistan Muslim league-Nawaz (PML-N), launched a campaign to unite other opposition parties against the current government, the country will hardly see any big political move or change in the government soon, analysts said.
The political circles got active when PML-N chief and two-time former prime minister Nawaz Sharif announced on June 30 to unite all opposition parties on a "minimum agenda" to overthrow the current government of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) led by President Asif Ali Zardari.
Sharif took this decision soon after his two-decade rival party Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), or United National Movement, quit the coalition government over some differences with the President Zardari.
Some key leaders of the PML-N were assigned tasks to make contacts with all opposition parties to oust the Zardari-led regime.
Two PML-N leaders, Ishaq Dar and party president Shahbaz Sharif, met MQM central leader Farooq Sattar in Dubai and London respectively and discussed political situation including the options to form the grand opposition alliance.
As a result of these political connections, MQM and PML-N on Wednesday agreed to work together as a joint opposition in both upper and lower houses, and in provincial assemblies to solve the key national issues.
The political circles got active when PML-N chief and two-time former prime minister Nawaz Sharif announced on June 30 to unite all opposition parties on a "minimum agenda" to overthrow the current government of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) led by President Asif Ali Zardari.
Sharif took this decision soon after his two-decade rival party Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), or United National Movement, quit the coalition government over some differences with the President Zardari.
Some key leaders of the PML-N were assigned tasks to make contacts with all opposition parties to oust the Zardari-led regime.
Two PML-N leaders, Ishaq Dar and party president Shahbaz Sharif, met MQM central leader Farooq Sattar in Dubai and London respectively and discussed political situation including the options to form the grand opposition alliance.
As a result of these political connections, MQM and PML-N on Wednesday agreed to work together as a joint opposition in both upper and lower houses, and in provincial assemblies to solve the key national issues.
Afghan civilians killed in NATO strike
A NATO air strike has killed at least 14 civilians, including eight children, in the eastern Afghan province of Khost, local police say.
But Nato said four Taliban members had been killed in the strike and that it was investigating reports of civilian casualties.
The deadly air raid came a day after two children were reportedly killed in a separate air strike in southwest Ghazni province.
The killing of civilians by foreign troops is a major source of friction between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his Western backers, and has soured the feelings of many ordinary Afghans towards foreign forces.
Earlier this year, two NATO helicopters gunned down nine Afghan boys as they collected firewood in a volatile province in northeastern Afghanistan.
The incident prompted a sharp rebuke from Karzai and a rare apology by David Petraeus, the commander of US and NATO forces. US President Barack Obama also expressed "deep regret" over the killings.
As violence has spread across the country, casualties have risen, and the United Nations said May was the deadliest month for civilians since they began keeping records four years earlier.
A lasting solution for Balochistan
By Malik Siraj Akbar | DAWN.COM
The Balochistan solution has to be a political one rather than a ‘white-wash’ of replacing the military with a paramilitary force.
While the Chief of Army Staff General Parvez Ashfaq Kayani’s announcement to replace PA soldiers with the paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) in Balochistan’s gas-rich town of Sui indicates a significant policy change on part of the military, it would be unwise to say that this is without precedent.
In the last eight years, the federal government has taken such steps to appease the Baloch but despite their goodwill, they did not translate into practical changes on the ground.
For instance, in 2004, then caretaker Prime Minister Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain made the first comprehensive effort to address Balochistan’s issues peacefully and constituted two parliamentary committees.
The committee headed by Senator Wasim Sajjad was tasked with compiling Balochistan’s concerns on constitutional issues such as provincial autonomy and decided on how much control the province should exercise on its natural resources. The second committee headed by Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed was responsible for addressing the Baloch’s reservations on military cantonment and mega projects such as the Gwadar Port. Unfortunately, the recommendations of the parliamentary committees were never implemented.
The Pakistan Peoples Party made a similar comprehensive move in November 2009 with the unveiling of the Aghaz-e-Haqooq-e-Balochistan Package in a joint session of the parliament. Two years on, no progress has been made in calming the Baloch sentiments of deprivation. The reasons are obvious by analysing the semantics only.
Firstly, there is a grand communication gap between the Baloch, the army and the federal government. All the parties involved in the conflict do not properly understand terms used from each other’s lexicons. The ambiguity of terminology has added to the issue at hand. For example, the army and the Baloch differently interpret the term “military operation”.
From Pakistan Army’s point of view, a “military operation” takes places when tanks and helicopters as well as weaponry are employed to accomplish a goal.
On the other hand, the Baloch equate extra-judicial killings, disappearances, and even the checking at check-posts with “operation”. So every time the army chief or the federal Interior Minister Rehman Malik decline any “ongoing operations” in Balochistan, the Baloch instantly cite the killing or “disappearance” of some young political workers and activists. The knee-jerk reaction by the Baloch to every government statement is: “So many Baloch were killed and many are missing, how can they deny that there is a military operation?”
In a similar vein, there is a difference in the interpretation of the term “development”. For the government, development projects means the work at Chamalong Coal mines or the establishment of cadet colleges and cantonments. On the other hand, the Baloch are sceptical of these measures and consider it a “usurpation” of Baloch resources under the umbrella of “development.”
The skepticism is not limited to semantics either. The Baloch see the army’s decision to recruit youth from Balochistan to stem the protest against “disappearances.”
The political establishment would be well advised to not rely on rhetoric and realise that a change in Balochistan can only come with a holistic approach, which means a lasting and sensible political solution.
General Kayani’s fresh announcement about pulling out the army in Sui is either because of his ignorance about the Baloch point of view or a deliberate attempt to block the way for a political settlement to the conflict. In fact, to them, the term “poj” (similar to Fauj in Urdu) includes both the army and the federal paramilitary force, the FC.
Today, the Baloch have more complaints against the FC than the army itself or the federal government. People see the FC, whose composition includes barely 10 per cent of local Baloch, as a troublemaker rather than a solution to the ragging conflict. Balochistan Chief Minister Nawab Mohammad Aslam Raisani blames the FC for allegedly running a “parallel government” within the province. Ministers in his cabinet accuse the FC of sabotaging every attempt to politically reconcile with the enraged Baloch leaders. The nationalists accuse it of whisking away political activists during broad daylight from public places like universities and markets. In one such incident, hundreds of people saw the FC personnel whisking away three Baloch nationalist leaders from Turbat district two years ago. Within a couple of days, all three leaders were killed and their bodies were thrown in an abandoned area.
Thus, when General Kayani says he is going to deploy FC in Sui, it means he, in the Baloch interpretation, approves of FC’s extra-constitutional actions such as the killing of political workers, arrests and enforced disappearances.
That said, General Kayani should realise that FC is no longer the only issue in Balochistan. As the head of the country’s armed forces, he can take some of the following proposed measures as confidence building measures (CBMs), among several others, to prevent Balochistan from falling apart. First, military and paramilitary presence has to be reduced in the province. FC-controlled check posts should be removed from the heart of the district headquarters as well as the alleged underground torture cells be disbanded.
Second, only the Supreme Court should have authority to decide the fate of the missing persons. Intelligence agencies must cooperate with the Supreme Court of Pakistan and an independent investigation be conducted by the concerned parties.
Moreover, the two newly formed groups, the Baloch Musla Defai Tanzeem and Sipa-e-Shudha-e-Balochistan, which have publicly accepted responsibility for the killing of around 120 missing Baloch persons, should be exposed and brought to justice. Allegations by the Baloch of these having links with the country’s security establishment should be investigated.
It must be underscored that the army at the federal level and the Frontier Corps (FC) at the provincial level should demonstrate respect and have faith in the policies of the elected governments. They should be offered an unconditional assurance of a non-interference policy for a peaceful and political settlement of the Balochistan imbroglio.
The Balochistan solution has to be a political one rather than a ‘white-wash’ of replacing the military with a paramilitary force.
While the Chief of Army Staff General Parvez Ashfaq Kayani’s announcement to replace PA soldiers with the paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) in Balochistan’s gas-rich town of Sui indicates a significant policy change on part of the military, it would be unwise to say that this is without precedent.
In the last eight years, the federal government has taken such steps to appease the Baloch but despite their goodwill, they did not translate into practical changes on the ground.
For instance, in 2004, then caretaker Prime Minister Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain made the first comprehensive effort to address Balochistan’s issues peacefully and constituted two parliamentary committees.
The committee headed by Senator Wasim Sajjad was tasked with compiling Balochistan’s concerns on constitutional issues such as provincial autonomy and decided on how much control the province should exercise on its natural resources. The second committee headed by Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed was responsible for addressing the Baloch’s reservations on military cantonment and mega projects such as the Gwadar Port. Unfortunately, the recommendations of the parliamentary committees were never implemented.
The Pakistan Peoples Party made a similar comprehensive move in November 2009 with the unveiling of the Aghaz-e-Haqooq-e-Balochistan Package in a joint session of the parliament. Two years on, no progress has been made in calming the Baloch sentiments of deprivation. The reasons are obvious by analysing the semantics only.
Firstly, there is a grand communication gap between the Baloch, the army and the federal government. All the parties involved in the conflict do not properly understand terms used from each other’s lexicons. The ambiguity of terminology has added to the issue at hand. For example, the army and the Baloch differently interpret the term “military operation”.
From Pakistan Army’s point of view, a “military operation” takes places when tanks and helicopters as well as weaponry are employed to accomplish a goal.
On the other hand, the Baloch equate extra-judicial killings, disappearances, and even the checking at check-posts with “operation”. So every time the army chief or the federal Interior Minister Rehman Malik decline any “ongoing operations” in Balochistan, the Baloch instantly cite the killing or “disappearance” of some young political workers and activists. The knee-jerk reaction by the Baloch to every government statement is: “So many Baloch were killed and many are missing, how can they deny that there is a military operation?”
In a similar vein, there is a difference in the interpretation of the term “development”. For the government, development projects means the work at Chamalong Coal mines or the establishment of cadet colleges and cantonments. On the other hand, the Baloch are sceptical of these measures and consider it a “usurpation” of Baloch resources under the umbrella of “development.”
The skepticism is not limited to semantics either. The Baloch see the army’s decision to recruit youth from Balochistan to stem the protest against “disappearances.”
The political establishment would be well advised to not rely on rhetoric and realise that a change in Balochistan can only come with a holistic approach, which means a lasting and sensible political solution.
General Kayani’s fresh announcement about pulling out the army in Sui is either because of his ignorance about the Baloch point of view or a deliberate attempt to block the way for a political settlement to the conflict. In fact, to them, the term “poj” (similar to Fauj in Urdu) includes both the army and the federal paramilitary force, the FC.
Today, the Baloch have more complaints against the FC than the army itself or the federal government. People see the FC, whose composition includes barely 10 per cent of local Baloch, as a troublemaker rather than a solution to the ragging conflict. Balochistan Chief Minister Nawab Mohammad Aslam Raisani blames the FC for allegedly running a “parallel government” within the province. Ministers in his cabinet accuse the FC of sabotaging every attempt to politically reconcile with the enraged Baloch leaders. The nationalists accuse it of whisking away political activists during broad daylight from public places like universities and markets. In one such incident, hundreds of people saw the FC personnel whisking away three Baloch nationalist leaders from Turbat district two years ago. Within a couple of days, all three leaders were killed and their bodies were thrown in an abandoned area.
Thus, when General Kayani says he is going to deploy FC in Sui, it means he, in the Baloch interpretation, approves of FC’s extra-constitutional actions such as the killing of political workers, arrests and enforced disappearances.
That said, General Kayani should realise that FC is no longer the only issue in Balochistan. As the head of the country’s armed forces, he can take some of the following proposed measures as confidence building measures (CBMs), among several others, to prevent Balochistan from falling apart. First, military and paramilitary presence has to be reduced in the province. FC-controlled check posts should be removed from the heart of the district headquarters as well as the alleged underground torture cells be disbanded.
Second, only the Supreme Court should have authority to decide the fate of the missing persons. Intelligence agencies must cooperate with the Supreme Court of Pakistan and an independent investigation be conducted by the concerned parties.
Moreover, the two newly formed groups, the Baloch Musla Defai Tanzeem and Sipa-e-Shudha-e-Balochistan, which have publicly accepted responsibility for the killing of around 120 missing Baloch persons, should be exposed and brought to justice. Allegations by the Baloch of these having links with the country’s security establishment should be investigated.
It must be underscored that the army at the federal level and the Frontier Corps (FC) at the provincial level should demonstrate respect and have faith in the policies of the elected governments. They should be offered an unconditional assurance of a non-interference policy for a peaceful and political settlement of the Balochistan imbroglio.
Jolie, Parker Hollywood's highest paid actresses
Much of Parker's hefty earnings comes from reruns of the hit television show "Sex and the City", which she starred in and produced, and earnings from the second movie which generated $290 million at the global box office.
"People may be surprised to see Sarah Jessica Parker up there but they may not realize that in addition to acting, she earns big from her perfumes and endorsement deals," said writer Dorothy Pomerantz of Forbes.com. "Also she's coming off of 'Sex and the City 2' which turned a healthy profit."
Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon were not far behind in the rankings with each actress bringing home $28 million.
Aniston's film "Just Go With It" is her fourth highest earning film in the U.S.
The top 10 earning actress made a total of $218 million between May 2010 and May 2011, according to Forbes.com, which compiled the list by talking to producers, lawyers, agents and Hollywood insiders to estimate what each actress earned.
Last year's top earner, Sandra Bullock, took a 12-month break from making movies and dropped to No.9 with earning of $15 million. (Reuters)
'Al Khalifa, free prisoners then talk'
All political prisoners must be released for a national dialogue to occur between the Western-backed Bahraini regime and the opposition, an analyst says.
“If you want a dialogue, you need to start from the basis that all political prisoners need to be freed,” Raza Kazim, from the Islamic Human Rights Commission in London, said in an interview with Press TV.
The ruling regime in Bahrain has called for a fresh round of talks with the opposition after months of brutal crackdown on protesters, demanding an end to Al Khalifa dynasty, which has ruled the country for over 40 years.
Kazim believes the United States, a major influence on the government, is also persisting to push for the talks between the two sides.
However, he mocked the gesture stating that the US could have “exerted pressure” before the advancement of the popular uprising, which has now led to the regime willing to engage in dialogue.
In March, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates deployed military forces to Bahrain to help the regime crush nationwide protests that had broke out in mid-February.
US's reason behind sending intervening forces into Bahrain was to prevent the overthrow of the Bahraini regime, which would cost the US interest dearly, he added.
“If you want a dialogue, you need to start from the basis that all political prisoners need to be freed,” Raza Kazim, from the Islamic Human Rights Commission in London, said in an interview with Press TV.
The ruling regime in Bahrain has called for a fresh round of talks with the opposition after months of brutal crackdown on protesters, demanding an end to Al Khalifa dynasty, which has ruled the country for over 40 years.
Kazim believes the United States, a major influence on the government, is also persisting to push for the talks between the two sides.
However, he mocked the gesture stating that the US could have “exerted pressure” before the advancement of the popular uprising, which has now led to the regime willing to engage in dialogue.
In March, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates deployed military forces to Bahrain to help the regime crush nationwide protests that had broke out in mid-February.
US's reason behind sending intervening forces into Bahrain was to prevent the overthrow of the Bahraini regime, which would cost the US interest dearly, he added.
HRW blasts US over Bahrain crackdown
Human Rights Watch (HRW) has lashed out at the US and its allies for ignoring violent oppression against peaceful anti-regime protesters in Bahrain.
"Bahrain has brutally punished those protesting peacefully for greater freedom and accountability while the US and other allies looked the other way," HRW's deputy Middle East director Joe Stork said.
The rights group, in a statement on Wednesday, also criticized the Bahrain government for carrying out a "campaign of violent oppression" against its citizens.
Anti-government protesters took to the streets of Bahrain on February 14, but the country's Saudi-backed forces crushed the demonstrations in a bloody crackdown in March.
"The Bahrain government, since March 2011, has been carrying out a punitive and vindictive campaign of violent repression against its own citizens," the statement said.
Bahrain Center for Human Rights, a non-governmental organization, said there are currently over 1,000 political detainees, including medical staff, inside the country.
HRW called on Bahrain "to end unlawful and incommunicado detention, to free protesters unless legitimate criminal charges can be brought against them, and to allow monitoring by independent human rights organizations."
It also said it has been prevented from working in Bahrain since April.
Memories of Taliban still haunt Pakistanis in Swat
Daily Times
It is more than two years since the Taliban roamed Pakistan’s Swat Valley with impunity and threatened to kill him, but Muhammad Karim is still scared when he remembers how they paralysed life.
“The bad days are over... they (the Taliban) are in the past now and I don’t think they will ever come back,” he said as he prepared to close up his music and video shop and rejoin his family for the evening.
It was his merchandise of popular songs and films that saw the Taliban effectively shut down his shop two and a half years ago, after the picturesque mountain valley first started to slip out of government control in July 2007. Radical cleric Maulana Fazlullah led hundreds of Taliban in sowing terror in an area once loved by holidaymakers for its balmy summers and snowy winters.
His supporters beheaded opponents, burning schools and fighting to implant a harsh brand of Islamic law.
But in April 2009, Pakistan launched a major offensive to reclaim Swat from the Taliban, along with the neighbouring districts of Buner and Lower Dir.
Heavy fighting displaced an estimated two million people, but the military declared the region back under control in summer 2009 and tentative efforts began to kick start development and revive the economy. Two years later, the army still has a heavy presence in Mingora, the main town of Swat, and commanders confirm they are preparing to create a military-run cantonment area in a bid to protect long-term stability.
“They (the Taliban) ruined my business,” Karim said. He grew so frightened of their threats for running an “un-Islamic” shop that, after watching helplessly as his sales fell by 70 percent, he closed down for several months.
“Let me tell you very frankly, I got scared after they warned me of serious consequences.”
Standing behind big wooden shelves displaying CDs and DVDs of popular Urdu, Pashto and Indian songs and movies, Karim said it had been difficult to survive. “We’re in safe hands now but one thing I’m at a loss to understand is where did the Taliban come from and where did they disappear to so quickly?”
Nowadays shops, small restaurants and cafes are open in Mingora until late at night, with little outward sign of fear.
It may look like any normal Pakistani city, with people going about their routine business and markets crowded, but heavily armed police and soldiers are still deployed in large numbers, searching vehicles and even pedestrians. “This is one big problem that we’re facing. An over presence of military and civilian police on all roads and areas has been causing lots of problems for people,” a local grocer, Zahid Iqbal, said. He wants things to be more relaxed and for the army to hand over power to a civilian administration since Mingora and other areas of Swat are now peaceful.
“Gone are the days when we used to receive threats and collect dead bodies from different areas of the city,” he said. But Major General Javed Iqbal, commander of Swat, said it would take time before the situation fully returns to normal – a mantra that army leaders have been repeating for almost two years.
“As soon as the government and the general headquarters (of the army) determine that the job is done, the army will go out of Swat and hand over administrative control to civilians,” Iqbal said. He told reporters on the sidelines of a seminar on de-radicalisation in Swat that the area was experiencing a “victory of peace. A military solution was the temporary phase of a permanent solution.” The army has endorsed or organised a series of public events in Swat this year to revive tourist interest, such as a skiing competition in March and a public festival in June to showcase what is on offer.
But the rumble of violence is never far away in northwest Pakistan. On June 1 and June 3, hundreds of terrorists besieged an area in Upper Dir on the Afghan border, around 70 kilometres northeast of Swat, sparking prolonged fighting that killed at least 34 people.
Sporadic outbreaks of violence in Swat have led to fears that the Taliban who held it are regrouping elsewhere in the northwest. “Larger efforts are needed to sustain whatever we have achieved in Swat,” said Lieutenant General Asif Yasin Malik, supervising all military operations in the northwest. afp
It is more than two years since the Taliban roamed Pakistan’s Swat Valley with impunity and threatened to kill him, but Muhammad Karim is still scared when he remembers how they paralysed life.
“The bad days are over... they (the Taliban) are in the past now and I don’t think they will ever come back,” he said as he prepared to close up his music and video shop and rejoin his family for the evening.
It was his merchandise of popular songs and films that saw the Taliban effectively shut down his shop two and a half years ago, after the picturesque mountain valley first started to slip out of government control in July 2007. Radical cleric Maulana Fazlullah led hundreds of Taliban in sowing terror in an area once loved by holidaymakers for its balmy summers and snowy winters.
His supporters beheaded opponents, burning schools and fighting to implant a harsh brand of Islamic law.
But in April 2009, Pakistan launched a major offensive to reclaim Swat from the Taliban, along with the neighbouring districts of Buner and Lower Dir.
Heavy fighting displaced an estimated two million people, but the military declared the region back under control in summer 2009 and tentative efforts began to kick start development and revive the economy. Two years later, the army still has a heavy presence in Mingora, the main town of Swat, and commanders confirm they are preparing to create a military-run cantonment area in a bid to protect long-term stability.
“They (the Taliban) ruined my business,” Karim said. He grew so frightened of their threats for running an “un-Islamic” shop that, after watching helplessly as his sales fell by 70 percent, he closed down for several months.
“Let me tell you very frankly, I got scared after they warned me of serious consequences.”
Standing behind big wooden shelves displaying CDs and DVDs of popular Urdu, Pashto and Indian songs and movies, Karim said it had been difficult to survive. “We’re in safe hands now but one thing I’m at a loss to understand is where did the Taliban come from and where did they disappear to so quickly?”
Nowadays shops, small restaurants and cafes are open in Mingora until late at night, with little outward sign of fear.
It may look like any normal Pakistani city, with people going about their routine business and markets crowded, but heavily armed police and soldiers are still deployed in large numbers, searching vehicles and even pedestrians. “This is one big problem that we’re facing. An over presence of military and civilian police on all roads and areas has been causing lots of problems for people,” a local grocer, Zahid Iqbal, said. He wants things to be more relaxed and for the army to hand over power to a civilian administration since Mingora and other areas of Swat are now peaceful.
“Gone are the days when we used to receive threats and collect dead bodies from different areas of the city,” he said. But Major General Javed Iqbal, commander of Swat, said it would take time before the situation fully returns to normal – a mantra that army leaders have been repeating for almost two years.
“As soon as the government and the general headquarters (of the army) determine that the job is done, the army will go out of Swat and hand over administrative control to civilians,” Iqbal said. He told reporters on the sidelines of a seminar on de-radicalisation in Swat that the area was experiencing a “victory of peace. A military solution was the temporary phase of a permanent solution.” The army has endorsed or organised a series of public events in Swat this year to revive tourist interest, such as a skiing competition in March and a public festival in June to showcase what is on offer.
But the rumble of violence is never far away in northwest Pakistan. On June 1 and June 3, hundreds of terrorists besieged an area in Upper Dir on the Afghan border, around 70 kilometres northeast of Swat, sparking prolonged fighting that killed at least 34 people.
Sporadic outbreaks of violence in Swat have led to fears that the Taliban who held it are regrouping elsewhere in the northwest. “Larger efforts are needed to sustain whatever we have achieved in Swat,” said Lieutenant General Asif Yasin Malik, supervising all military operations in the northwest. afp
Saudi Women Taken Into Custody For Driving
Five Saudi women have been taken into custody because they defied the men-only driving rule.
In the campaign to overthrow this law in the ultraconservative Arab kingdom, these arrests mark the first ramifications to the activists. It started about two weeks ago and has brought out dozens of women drivers.
According to Saudi-based rights activist Eman al-Nafjan, police took one woman into custody while driving in Jiddah on the Red Sea coast, and another four women accused of driving were later detained in the city. Unfortunately, there’s been no new information about these women.
“This is the first big pushback from authorities, it seems,” al-Nafjan said. “We aren’t sure what it means at this point and whether this is the start of a harder line by the government against the campaign.”
The Saudi Women for Driving, as the group is called, is out to lift the restrictions, where women can only appear in public when escorted by a male relative. It’s interesting to note that Saudi Arabia has no written law that bans women from driving. What’s keeping them off the road are fatwas (religious edicts) that are put into place by senior clerics that follow a strict brand of Islam called Wahabism.
In the campaign to overthrow this law in the ultraconservative Arab kingdom, these arrests mark the first ramifications to the activists. It started about two weeks ago and has brought out dozens of women drivers.
According to Saudi-based rights activist Eman al-Nafjan, police took one woman into custody while driving in Jiddah on the Red Sea coast, and another four women accused of driving were later detained in the city. Unfortunately, there’s been no new information about these women.
“This is the first big pushback from authorities, it seems,” al-Nafjan said. “We aren’t sure what it means at this point and whether this is the start of a harder line by the government against the campaign.”
The Saudi Women for Driving, as the group is called, is out to lift the restrictions, where women can only appear in public when escorted by a male relative. It’s interesting to note that Saudi Arabia has no written law that bans women from driving. What’s keeping them off the road are fatwas (religious edicts) that are put into place by senior clerics that follow a strict brand of Islam called Wahabism.
8,000 incidents of violence against women
The year 2010 saw 8,000 incidents of violence against women in the country indicating a decrease of 6.85 per cent compared to the preceding year.
This was stated by the Aurat Foundation Resident Director Shabina Ayaz while releasing the annual report on the violence against women at a press conference here on Tuesday.
Accompanied by Deputy Resident Director Shireen Javed, she said the report was compiled under the Policy and Data Monitoring on Violence against Women Project from January-December 2010.
Unveiling the report titled ìViolence against Women in Pakistan; A qualitative review of statistics 2010,î she said incidents of violence gathered by the Aurat Foundation during this period were based on the cases reported in newspapers as mostly no first information reports (FIRs) were registered in a large number of incidents that reflected the citizen’s lack of confidence in the police.
Shabina Ayaz said violence against women may take the form of beating, torture, rape, burning, confinement, honour killings, acid-throwing crimes and women trafficking which were condemnable in any civilised society.
She said the total number of reported cases of violence against women in Pakistan were 8000 from January 1 to December 31, 2010. These were lower than the 8,548 cases reported in 2009.
“Out of the 8,000 incidents, 5,492 cases of violence were reported from Punjab, 1,652 from Sindh, 650 from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 79 from Balochistan and 127 from Islamabad. The figure in Islamabad is alarming given the smaller population and high security maintained in the capital,” she pointed out.
Of the nature of the violence, she said 2,236 women were abducted, 1,436 were murdered, 557 were killed in the name of honour, 928 were raped, 633 committed suicide, 32 women were attacked with acid and 38 were victims of stove burning.
This was stated by the Aurat Foundation Resident Director Shabina Ayaz while releasing the annual report on the violence against women at a press conference here on Tuesday.
Accompanied by Deputy Resident Director Shireen Javed, she said the report was compiled under the Policy and Data Monitoring on Violence against Women Project from January-December 2010.
Unveiling the report titled ìViolence against Women in Pakistan; A qualitative review of statistics 2010,î she said incidents of violence gathered by the Aurat Foundation during this period were based on the cases reported in newspapers as mostly no first information reports (FIRs) were registered in a large number of incidents that reflected the citizen’s lack of confidence in the police.
Shabina Ayaz said violence against women may take the form of beating, torture, rape, burning, confinement, honour killings, acid-throwing crimes and women trafficking which were condemnable in any civilised society.
She said the total number of reported cases of violence against women in Pakistan were 8000 from January 1 to December 31, 2010. These were lower than the 8,548 cases reported in 2009.
“Out of the 8,000 incidents, 5,492 cases of violence were reported from Punjab, 1,652 from Sindh, 650 from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 79 from Balochistan and 127 from Islamabad. The figure in Islamabad is alarming given the smaller population and high security maintained in the capital,” she pointed out.
Of the nature of the violence, she said 2,236 women were abducted, 1,436 were murdered, 557 were killed in the name of honour, 928 were raped, 633 committed suicide, 32 women were attacked with acid and 38 were victims of stove burning.
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Another Pakistani woman is killed, yet officials remain silent
Daily Times
By Daud Khattak
No one noticed last month when Shazia, 19, was stoned, burnt with acid, and then shot dead for an unknown sin in Mardan, the second largest town in northern Pakistan after Peshawar.
Originally from a village in the Swat Valley, Shazia was taken away by her ex-husband from her mother to the mountains, tortured, and eventually killed. Her mother, Noor Jehan, a widow with no male relatives, has lodged complaints at three different police stations about her daughter’s fate, but her wailing has so far fallen on deaf ears. Law-enforcement personnel keep telling her that “investigations are under way.”
Days before Shazia’s heinous murder, another woman was stripped and paraded around Haripur, a city near the now-infamous suburb of Abbottabad, the last dwelling of al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden. The woman, in her 50s, was punished because her son was found guilty of having illicit relations with the wife of another man.
This was local jirga’s sentence to ‘restore’ man’s honour – although it dishonoured an innocent woman. These two women are not exceptions. A Thomson Reuters Foundation expert poll lists Pakistan as the third most dangerous country for women in the world, just behind its war-ravaged neighbour, Afghanistan, and the Congo.
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) says, “Around 3,000 women were raped and another 791 murdered for honour in 2010 alone.” This is apart from thousands of unreported cases when women are bartered, exchanged to settle family disputes, harassed in their workplaces, forced into marriage in childhood, or married off to men double and triple of their ages.
I still remember the daylight murder of a budding female singer, Ayman Odhas, in the city of Peshawar in 2009 by her own brothers for appearing on television, a move that defied the family norms. Although Odhas was an adult, living with her husband who had no objection to her singing on television and the stage, her brothers felt the act dishonoured them.
One morning they knocked on her door, before shooting her repeatedly when she stepped out to meet her visitors. This shows the collective mentality of a society where women, instead of being thought of as equals, are dealt as a commodity owned by men - father, brother, or husband – from birth to death.
These owners reserve every right to treat her as a commodity in terms of settling honour or blood disputes, monetary matters, marriage, or any other situation that may arise. Domestic violence is often ignored as a petty dispute and has become part of the culture where many people are living in a joint-family system. Interestingly enough, no Pakistani political or religious party has paid any attention to the woman paraded in Haripur or the murder of Shazia in Mardan.
They were vocal, however, about the detention of Dr Aafia Siddiqi, who was sentenced last year in the United States to 86 years in prison after being found guilty of attempting to kill her US interrogators in Afghanistan.
With the exception of a few statements from HRCP or the Aurat Foundation, a women’s advocacy organisation, no feathers are ruffled in Pakistani government circles at the federal or provincial levels, where the secular Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) of late Benazir Bhutto and Awami National Party (ANP) are ruling the roost, respectively.
Perhaps killing, forced marriage, or the dishonouring of a woman is not that important for a government in a country where scores are killed and maimed in bomb explosions in the name of religion.
It is a sad irony that these so-called religious warriors struggle throughout their life to attain several beautiful women in the afterlife.
By Daud Khattak
No one noticed last month when Shazia, 19, was stoned, burnt with acid, and then shot dead for an unknown sin in Mardan, the second largest town in northern Pakistan after Peshawar.
Originally from a village in the Swat Valley, Shazia was taken away by her ex-husband from her mother to the mountains, tortured, and eventually killed. Her mother, Noor Jehan, a widow with no male relatives, has lodged complaints at three different police stations about her daughter’s fate, but her wailing has so far fallen on deaf ears. Law-enforcement personnel keep telling her that “investigations are under way.”
Days before Shazia’s heinous murder, another woman was stripped and paraded around Haripur, a city near the now-infamous suburb of Abbottabad, the last dwelling of al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden. The woman, in her 50s, was punished because her son was found guilty of having illicit relations with the wife of another man.
This was local jirga’s sentence to ‘restore’ man’s honour – although it dishonoured an innocent woman. These two women are not exceptions. A Thomson Reuters Foundation expert poll lists Pakistan as the third most dangerous country for women in the world, just behind its war-ravaged neighbour, Afghanistan, and the Congo.
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) says, “Around 3,000 women were raped and another 791 murdered for honour in 2010 alone.” This is apart from thousands of unreported cases when women are bartered, exchanged to settle family disputes, harassed in their workplaces, forced into marriage in childhood, or married off to men double and triple of their ages.
I still remember the daylight murder of a budding female singer, Ayman Odhas, in the city of Peshawar in 2009 by her own brothers for appearing on television, a move that defied the family norms. Although Odhas was an adult, living with her husband who had no objection to her singing on television and the stage, her brothers felt the act dishonoured them.
One morning they knocked on her door, before shooting her repeatedly when she stepped out to meet her visitors. This shows the collective mentality of a society where women, instead of being thought of as equals, are dealt as a commodity owned by men - father, brother, or husband – from birth to death.
These owners reserve every right to treat her as a commodity in terms of settling honour or blood disputes, monetary matters, marriage, or any other situation that may arise. Domestic violence is often ignored as a petty dispute and has become part of the culture where many people are living in a joint-family system. Interestingly enough, no Pakistani political or religious party has paid any attention to the woman paraded in Haripur or the murder of Shazia in Mardan.
They were vocal, however, about the detention of Dr Aafia Siddiqi, who was sentenced last year in the United States to 86 years in prison after being found guilty of attempting to kill her US interrogators in Afghanistan.
With the exception of a few statements from HRCP or the Aurat Foundation, a women’s advocacy organisation, no feathers are ruffled in Pakistani government circles at the federal or provincial levels, where the secular Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) of late Benazir Bhutto and Awami National Party (ANP) are ruling the roost, respectively.
Perhaps killing, forced marriage, or the dishonouring of a woman is not that important for a government in a country where scores are killed and maimed in bomb explosions in the name of religion.
It is a sad irony that these so-called religious warriors struggle throughout their life to attain several beautiful women in the afterlife.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Chavez, back in Venezuela, says he will win 'battle for life'
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez returned unexpectedly Monday to his nation's capital, where he vowed to win the "battle for life" after undergoing emergency surgery in Cuba.
Five killed in FC convoy attack in Ketch
A Frontrier Corps (FC) convoy was attacked in Gormazai area of District Kaich by a remote-controlled roadside bomb, killing five security personnel and injuring four others, Geo News reported Tuesday.
According to sources, Gormazai is located approximately 800 kilometers from Quetta where the FC convoy was attacked. After the convoy was ambushed with a road-side bomb, firing was also reported, however the FC spokesman in Quetta did not confirm the reports.
Pakistan’s Spies Tied to Slaying of a Journalist
Obama administration officials believe that Pakistan’s powerful spy agency ordered the killing of a Pakistani journalist who had written scathing reports about the infiltration of militants in the country’s military, according to American officials.
New classified intelligence obtained before the May 29 disappearance of the journalist, Saleem Shahzad, 40, from the capital, Islamabad, and after the discovery of his mortally wounded body, showed that senior officials of the spy agency, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, directed the attack on him in an effort to silence criticism, two senior administration officials said.
The intelligence, which several administration officials said they believed was reliable and conclusive, showed that the actions of the ISI, as it is known, were “barbaric and unacceptable,” one of the officials said. They would not disclose further details about the intelligence.
But the disclosure of the information in itself could further aggravate the badly fractured relationship between the United States and Pakistan, which worsened significantly with the American commando raid two months ago that killed Osama bin Laden in a Pakistan safehouse and deeply embarrassed the Pakistani government, military and intelligence hierarchy. Obama administration officials will deliberate in the coming days how to present the information about Mr. Shahzad to the Pakistani government, an administration official said.
The disclosure of the intelligence was made in answer to questions about the possibility of its existence, and was reluctantly confirmed by the two officials. “There is a lot of high-level concern about the murder; no one is too busy not to look at this,” said one.
A third senior American official said there was enough other intelligence and indicators immediately after Mr. Shahzad’s death for the Americans to conclude that the ISI had ordered him killed.
“Every indication is that this was a deliberate, targeted killing that was most likely meant to send shock waves through Pakistan’s journalist community and civil society,” said the official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the delicate nature of the information.
A spokesman for the Pakistan intelligence agency said in Islamabad on Monday night that “I am not commenting on this.” George Little, a spokesman for the Central Intelligence Agency, declined to comment.
In a statement the day after Mr. Shahzad’s waterlogged body was retrieved from a canal 60 miles from Islamabad, the ISI publicly denied accusations in the Pakistani news media that it had been responsible, calling them “totally unfounded.”
The ISI said the journalist’s death was “unfortunate and tragic,” and should not be “used to target and malign the country’s security agency.”
The killing of Mr. Shahzad, a contributor to the Web site Asia Times Online, aroused an immediate furor in the freewheeling news media in Pakistan.
Mr. Shahzad was the 37th journalist killed in Pakistan since the 9/11 attacks, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Pakistan’s civilian government, under pressure from the media, established a commission headed by a Supreme Court justice to investigate Mr. Shahzad’s death. The findings are scheduled to be released early next month.
Mr. Shahzad suffered 17 lacerated wounds delivered by a blunt instrument, a ruptured liver and two broken ribs, said Dr. Mohammed Farrukh Kamal, one of the three physicians who conducted the post-mortem.
The anger over Mr. Shahzad’s death followed unprecedented questioning in the media about the professionalism of the army and the ISI, a military-controlled spy agency, in the aftermath of the Bin Laden raid.
Since that initial volley of questioning, the ISI has mounted a steady counter-campaign. Senior ISI officials have called and visited journalists, warning them to douse their criticisms and rally around the theme of a united country, according to three journalists who declined to be named for fear of reprisals.
Mr. Shahzad, who wrote articles over the last several years that illuminated the relationship between the militants and the military, was abducted from the capital three days after publication of his article that said Al Qaeda was responsible for an audacious 16-hour commando attack on Pakistan’s main naval base in Karachi on May 22.
The attack was a reprisal for the navy’s arresting up to 10 naval personnel who had belonged to a Qaeda cell, Mr. Shahzad said.
The article, published by Asia Times Online, detailed how the attackers were guided by maps and logistical information provided from personnel inside the base.
Particularly embarrassing for the military, Mr. Shahzad described negotiations before the raid between the navy and a Qaeda representative, Abdul Samad Mansoor. The navy refused to release the detainees, Mr. Shahzad wrote. The Pakistani military maintains that it does not negotiate with militants.
Mr. Shahzad prided himself on staying out of the mainstream press, preferring, he wrote in a preface to his recently published book, “Inside Al Qaeda and the Taliban,” to challenge the “conventional wisdom.”
He had submitted articles to Asia Times Online, which claims 150,000 readers, since 2001, when he was a reporter in Karachi uncovering corruption in the public utility, the editor of the Web site, Tony Allison, said.
He broke into the limelight two years ago with an interview with Ilyas Kashmiri, a highly trained Pakistani militant allied to Al Qaeda. Mr. Kashmiri is believed to have been killed in a drone attack in early June.
According to associates, Mr. Shahzad cultivated contacts inside the military and the intelligence agency and members of militant groups, some from his student days in Jamaat Islami, a religious political party.
Some of his stories were threaded with embellishments. Soon after the Bin Laden raid, Mr. Shahzad wrote that Gen. David H. Petraeus visited the chief of the Pakistani Army, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, and informed him, an account the White House strongly disputes. Pakistani journalists questioned the authenticity of some of Mr. Shahzad’s reporting: whether those doubts arose from professional jealousy or were well founded was never clear.
But the ISI had been interested in Mr. Shahzad for some time. In an e-mail written to Ali Dayan Hasan, the head of Human Rights Watch in Pakistan, which Mr. Shahzad instructed Mr. Hasan to release if something happened to him, Mr. Shahzad gave details of an Oct. 17 meeting at ISI headquarters, where two senior officials in the press section wanted to discuss an article he had written about the release of an interrogated Afghan Taliban commander, Abdul Ghani Baradar.
At the end, Mr. Shahzad said, he had been given what Mr. Hasan said he understood to be a veiled death threat from the head of the press section, Rear Adm. Adnan Nazir. “We have recently arrested a terrorist and recovered a lot of data, diaries and other material during the interrogation,” Mr. Shahzad quoted Admiral Nazir saying. “The terrorist had a list with him. If I find your name in the list, I will certainly let you know.”
In its statement after the death of Mr. Shahzad, the ISI said the agency notifies “institutions and individuals alike of any threat warning received about them.” There were no “veiled or unveiled threats” in the e-mail, the ISI said.
Hameed Haroon, the publisher of Dawn, an English-language newspaper and the head of the newspaper publishers’ association in Pakistan, said that the journalist had confided to him that “he had received death threats from various officers of the ISI on at least three occasions in the past five years.”
It was possible that Mr. Shahzad had become too cavalier, said Ayesha Siddiqa, a Pakistani columnist and author.
“The rules of the game are not completely well defined,” she said. “Sometimes friendly elements cross an imaginary threshold and it is felt they must be taught a lesson.”
The efforts by the ISI to constrain the Pakistani news media have, to a degree, worked in recent days. The virulent criticism after Mr. Shahzad’s death has tempered a bit.
A Pakistani reporter, Waqar Kiani, who works for the British newspaper The Guardian, was beaten in the capital after Mr. Shahzad’s death with wooden batons and a rubber whip, by men who said: “You want to be a hero. We’ll make you a hero,” the newspaper reported. Mr. Kiani had just published an account of his abduction two years earlier at the hands of intelligence agents.
Pakistanis thriving in Afghan market
http://surgar.net
With the Americans and their subsidiary companies – construction, supplies, telecom etc. – now running the show, Afghanistan has emerged as another labour market for the Pakistanis.
Security in Afghanistan is precarious and even Kabul wears the look of a war zone. The Afghan officials waste no opportunity to show their dislike, even hatred, for anything Pakistani. Yet underneath the political tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan, the market appears to define and rule the relationship between Pakistani labour and their employers in Afghanistan. There are, according to unofficial estimates, over 70,000 Pakistanis working in different sectors – hotels, telecom and banking – and some are even running printing presses.
According to the Pakistanis working in and around Kabul, two factors – dollarisation of the Afghan economy and prevalence of English language – have opened the Afghan market to labour from Pakistan.
The Americans, one way or the other, are pumping over $100 billion into Afghanistan. “Even if three to four per cent of this money trickles down to a common man, it is more than enough to lift his economy,” says Haris Ali, country head of Aircom International in Afghanistan. Artificially pegged to dollar, the Afghani has improved to 45 Afghanis to a dollar; meaning that an Afghani is almost worth two Pakistani rupees. This exchange rate, though artificial as per economists’ claims, has become major attraction for the Pakistani labour, he concludes.
All major contracts, civil or military, go to the American companies, which, in turn, sub-let them to local or regional contractors. These contractors then need people who can write, speak and understand English and interact with American managers. That is where the Pakistanis as also the Afghan refugees who have been educated in Pakistan enter the picture.
“All the Afghans, who went to Iran during war, were put in secluded camps and Persian was their medium of instruction,” says a Pakistan diplomat in Afghanistan. In Pakistan, however, they lived in cities and were, by and large, integrated into the society and the education system.
This has turned out to be another advantage for Pakistanis. Even the mid-level Afghan managers feel much more comfortable with the Pakistani managerial staff and labour because of their own recent history and language affinity. Almost all of them also know Urdu language and can easily communicate with the Pakistani community. In fact, they became bridge between the American companies and the Afghan government, which hired local Afghans for all mid-level jobs and they in turn brought in the Pakistanis, the diplomat explains.
Afghanistan, even Kabul, is still not a family station. All the foreigners keep their families out because of security reasons. This situation also helps Pakistanis. “It takes only four hours to enter Pakistan by road from here,” says Shah Saleem – a hotel manager in Kabul, who hails from Hunza. Since it is a war zone salaries are higher. A worker gets salary either in dollars or Afghanis; both currencies are far better placed than the Pakistani rupee.
“I was employed at a Lahore hotel at a monthly salary of Rs17,000. Here, I am getting 35,000 Afghanis, which come to about
70,000 Pak rupees. All my boarding and lodging is covered,” Saleem said.
The hotel industry is booming because of a steady stream of foreigners who visit Afghanistan for different reasons. The NGO sector has become very vibrant for the last few years and their meetings – local, regional and international – generate a lot of business here.
The Pakistani labour gets one week off after three weeks of work, says Shahbaz Khan – who manages a printing press in one of busiest Kabul market. So, a man works for 21 days and earns more than double of what he gets in Pakistan after toiling for a month. The working hours are not long; by 7pm, everyone pulls the shutters down due to the Taliban scare and gets home
before dark.
Labour from Pakistan is a win-win proposition both for the Afghan employers and Pakistani workers. Pakistan workers get more money and the Afghans get cheap labour as compared to others. A mid-level American costs much more than a Pakistani. Then, they have to be supplied special food and taken to India or Dubai if they fall ill. In case of Pakistanis, food and health cover is not a problem: they eat the same food and dash back to Pakistan in case of an illness. And before long they are back, having either been treated at their own expense and at lower costs even if the company is paying, Shahbaz Khan said.
The telecom sector has turned out to be the most vibrant sector in Afghanistan, covering even the actual war zone and all those areas that fall under the Taliban control. Pakistanis’ presence in the sector is most dominating and visible too. “Call rates are much higher as compared to Pakistan as the companies also include war zone charges and insurance for the equipment,” says Abdul Hayee, from Azad Kashmir, working in Afghanistan for a cellular company.
The companies do not suffer as much losses on their equipment as they charge from the consumers. Since the Taliban are also beneficiaries of the system, they hardly ever are indiscreet enough to damage the company towers, etc. All the income coming in shape of war charges is companies’ profit. The telecom sector is certainly making huge profits, and Pakistanis being expert in the sector are also beneficiaries.
All these factors put together have made the Afghan economy attractive for labour, and the Pakistanis, given the proximity and historical ties, seem to be capitalising on it. Since most of them have also learnt Pashto and can hardly be distinguished from other Afghans, it only works to their added advantage in a market, which is open and thriving, even if on borrowed money and time.
With the Americans and their subsidiary companies – construction, supplies, telecom etc. – now running the show, Afghanistan has emerged as another labour market for the Pakistanis.
Security in Afghanistan is precarious and even Kabul wears the look of a war zone. The Afghan officials waste no opportunity to show their dislike, even hatred, for anything Pakistani. Yet underneath the political tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan, the market appears to define and rule the relationship between Pakistani labour and their employers in Afghanistan. There are, according to unofficial estimates, over 70,000 Pakistanis working in different sectors – hotels, telecom and banking – and some are even running printing presses.
According to the Pakistanis working in and around Kabul, two factors – dollarisation of the Afghan economy and prevalence of English language – have opened the Afghan market to labour from Pakistan.
The Americans, one way or the other, are pumping over $100 billion into Afghanistan. “Even if three to four per cent of this money trickles down to a common man, it is more than enough to lift his economy,” says Haris Ali, country head of Aircom International in Afghanistan. Artificially pegged to dollar, the Afghani has improved to 45 Afghanis to a dollar; meaning that an Afghani is almost worth two Pakistani rupees. This exchange rate, though artificial as per economists’ claims, has become major attraction for the Pakistani labour, he concludes.
All major contracts, civil or military, go to the American companies, which, in turn, sub-let them to local or regional contractors. These contractors then need people who can write, speak and understand English and interact with American managers. That is where the Pakistanis as also the Afghan refugees who have been educated in Pakistan enter the picture.
“All the Afghans, who went to Iran during war, were put in secluded camps and Persian was their medium of instruction,” says a Pakistan diplomat in Afghanistan. In Pakistan, however, they lived in cities and were, by and large, integrated into the society and the education system.
This has turned out to be another advantage for Pakistanis. Even the mid-level Afghan managers feel much more comfortable with the Pakistani managerial staff and labour because of their own recent history and language affinity. Almost all of them also know Urdu language and can easily communicate with the Pakistani community. In fact, they became bridge between the American companies and the Afghan government, which hired local Afghans for all mid-level jobs and they in turn brought in the Pakistanis, the diplomat explains.
Afghanistan, even Kabul, is still not a family station. All the foreigners keep their families out because of security reasons. This situation also helps Pakistanis. “It takes only four hours to enter Pakistan by road from here,” says Shah Saleem – a hotel manager in Kabul, who hails from Hunza. Since it is a war zone salaries are higher. A worker gets salary either in dollars or Afghanis; both currencies are far better placed than the Pakistani rupee.
“I was employed at a Lahore hotel at a monthly salary of Rs17,000. Here, I am getting 35,000 Afghanis, which come to about
70,000 Pak rupees. All my boarding and lodging is covered,” Saleem said.
The hotel industry is booming because of a steady stream of foreigners who visit Afghanistan for different reasons. The NGO sector has become very vibrant for the last few years and their meetings – local, regional and international – generate a lot of business here.
The Pakistani labour gets one week off after three weeks of work, says Shahbaz Khan – who manages a printing press in one of busiest Kabul market. So, a man works for 21 days and earns more than double of what he gets in Pakistan after toiling for a month. The working hours are not long; by 7pm, everyone pulls the shutters down due to the Taliban scare and gets home
before dark.
Labour from Pakistan is a win-win proposition both for the Afghan employers and Pakistani workers. Pakistan workers get more money and the Afghans get cheap labour as compared to others. A mid-level American costs much more than a Pakistani. Then, they have to be supplied special food and taken to India or Dubai if they fall ill. In case of Pakistanis, food and health cover is not a problem: they eat the same food and dash back to Pakistan in case of an illness. And before long they are back, having either been treated at their own expense and at lower costs even if the company is paying, Shahbaz Khan said.
The telecom sector has turned out to be the most vibrant sector in Afghanistan, covering even the actual war zone and all those areas that fall under the Taliban control. Pakistanis’ presence in the sector is most dominating and visible too. “Call rates are much higher as compared to Pakistan as the companies also include war zone charges and insurance for the equipment,” says Abdul Hayee, from Azad Kashmir, working in Afghanistan for a cellular company.
The companies do not suffer as much losses on their equipment as they charge from the consumers. Since the Taliban are also beneficiaries of the system, they hardly ever are indiscreet enough to damage the company towers, etc. All the income coming in shape of war charges is companies’ profit. The telecom sector is certainly making huge profits, and Pakistanis being expert in the sector are also beneficiaries.
All these factors put together have made the Afghan economy attractive for labour, and the Pakistanis, given the proximity and historical ties, seem to be capitalising on it. Since most of them have also learnt Pashto and can hardly be distinguished from other Afghans, it only works to their added advantage in a market, which is open and thriving, even if on borrowed money and time.
Pakistan launches military offensive in tribal region
The Pakistani military has launched a fresh offensive against militants in its tribal region, the country's top military spokesman said Monday.
The offensive is targeting militants in Kurram, one of seven districts in Pakistan's tribal region bordering Afghanistan, Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said. He gave no further details.
Pakistani security forces have conducted operations in Kurram as far back as 2009, but this appears to be the largest.
A Pakistani military official said air force fighter jets were "softening" targets on the ground to open the way for ground troops. The official asked not to be named because he is not authorized to speak to the media on the record.
Thousands of troops are taking part in the operation, according to two officials who did not want to be named because they are not authorized to speak to the media.
The offensive coincides with several others taking place in Pakistan's tribal region and is likely to please U.S. officials who are pressing Pakistan to do more in the fight against militancy.
The military has launched more than 10 offensives against violent extremists in northwest Pakistan in recent years, but for the United States, what matters most is North Waziristan, which U.S. officials call an epicenter of terrorism and a haven for the Haqqani network and other al Qaeda-linked militants killing American troops across the border in Afghanistan.
Washington has pressured Pakistan to launch a major offensive in North Waziristan, but the Pakistani military has refused. Some U.S. officials fear that the army here has held off because Pakistan's spy agencies have links with militant groups in North Waziristan.
Kurram is just north of North Waziristan and is believed to be a destination for many militants escaping other offensives in the region.
‘ZA Bhutto ruling on hearts, minds of millions of people’
Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) will observe black day on July 5 (today) as 34 years ago the then Chief of Army Staff General Zia-ul-Haq on July 5, 1977 imposed Martial Law by overthrowing the elected government of the PPP.
The dictator suspended the constitution, dissolved the National Assembly, the Senate and provincial assemblies and arrested the then elected prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.
The dictator later hanged the premier.
PPP will hold several programmes all over the province to commemorate the black day. Regarding the day, Members of Provincial Assembly (MPAs) Sindh belonging to PPP said that even after a passage of 34 years the ideology of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had been alive in the hearts of poor people and it would remain so for centuries to come.
These and similar views were expressed by MPAs Saleem Khursheed Khokhar, Shama Arif Mithani, Farheen Moughal, Nadeem Ahmad Bhutto and others, when a survey was conducted by the Daily Times here on Monday.
Saleem Khursheed Khokhar said that it was first time when a man, who belonged to elite class came to common people informing them that they were true source of power in a democracy. According to Khokhar, Bhutto informed the common people that ‘you are the ultimate pillar of the strength,’ adding Bhutto empowered people of Pakistan and he also gave freedom of expression to them.
Khokhar further said, a dictator over-turned an elected government of the people of Pakistan and later hanged the leader. Bhutto had a revolutionary personality and he never compromised on his vision and the rights of the poor people, Khokhar added.
MPA Shama Arif Mithani said that the dictator had hoped to crush Bhuttoism by hanging Bhutto but that was his mistake. The day of July 5 was not only a black-day for Pakistan and Pakistanis but it was also a sad day for Muslims and all those people, who were living in third world, she added.
Mithani further said that the people of Pakistan from July 5, 1977 to this day had been observing this day as a black day for reminding those elements in society, which wanted to get the government by back-door or wanted to win elections through the help of anti-people forces.
MPA Farheen Moughal said that there was a time, when people were given two to three year of jail time for shouting the slogan ‘Jeay Bhutto.’ But the people fought against the martial law and several people had given their lives for the democracy but they eventually won, she added.
MPA Nadeem Ahmad Bhutto said that it was a wish of every dictator to eradicate PPP and the ideology of Bhutto but they were living in fools’ heaven. Those forces were unaware that every common person in Pakistan was fighting against the dictators and anti-people and anti-democratic forces.
The MPA said no one dictator had ever been remembered in the history for good deeds rather they had been recalled as dictator and enemy of people, adding, it was truth of the history that the ideology of Bhutto was alive and it would live in the hearts of poor people for centuries.
Sindh Chief Minister’s Special Assistant Ismail Dahri said the PPP protected the sovereignty of the country and the entire nation, protected the rights of the provinces, and gave a unanimously approved Constitution of 1973.
Dahri said it was the vision of Bhutto and Shaheed Benazir Bhutto (BB) to keep the nation united. He said that Shaheed Bhutto gave a unanimous Constitution, which was approved by all political parties and that was the first reconciliation policy of Bhutto.
Dahri claimed that BB re-launched the reconciliation policy and President Asif Ali Zardari had been continuing the same tradition.
The dictator suspended the constitution, dissolved the National Assembly, the Senate and provincial assemblies and arrested the then elected prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.
The dictator later hanged the premier.
PPP will hold several programmes all over the province to commemorate the black day. Regarding the day, Members of Provincial Assembly (MPAs) Sindh belonging to PPP said that even after a passage of 34 years the ideology of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had been alive in the hearts of poor people and it would remain so for centuries to come.
These and similar views were expressed by MPAs Saleem Khursheed Khokhar, Shama Arif Mithani, Farheen Moughal, Nadeem Ahmad Bhutto and others, when a survey was conducted by the Daily Times here on Monday.
Saleem Khursheed Khokhar said that it was first time when a man, who belonged to elite class came to common people informing them that they were true source of power in a democracy. According to Khokhar, Bhutto informed the common people that ‘you are the ultimate pillar of the strength,’ adding Bhutto empowered people of Pakistan and he also gave freedom of expression to them.
Khokhar further said, a dictator over-turned an elected government of the people of Pakistan and later hanged the leader. Bhutto had a revolutionary personality and he never compromised on his vision and the rights of the poor people, Khokhar added.
MPA Shama Arif Mithani said that the dictator had hoped to crush Bhuttoism by hanging Bhutto but that was his mistake. The day of July 5 was not only a black-day for Pakistan and Pakistanis but it was also a sad day for Muslims and all those people, who were living in third world, she added.
Mithani further said that the people of Pakistan from July 5, 1977 to this day had been observing this day as a black day for reminding those elements in society, which wanted to get the government by back-door or wanted to win elections through the help of anti-people forces.
MPA Farheen Moughal said that there was a time, when people were given two to three year of jail time for shouting the slogan ‘Jeay Bhutto.’ But the people fought against the martial law and several people had given their lives for the democracy but they eventually won, she added.
MPA Nadeem Ahmad Bhutto said that it was a wish of every dictator to eradicate PPP and the ideology of Bhutto but they were living in fools’ heaven. Those forces were unaware that every common person in Pakistan was fighting against the dictators and anti-people and anti-democratic forces.
The MPA said no one dictator had ever been remembered in the history for good deeds rather they had been recalled as dictator and enemy of people, adding, it was truth of the history that the ideology of Bhutto was alive and it would live in the hearts of poor people for centuries.
Sindh Chief Minister’s Special Assistant Ismail Dahri said the PPP protected the sovereignty of the country and the entire nation, protected the rights of the provinces, and gave a unanimously approved Constitution of 1973.
Dahri said it was the vision of Bhutto and Shaheed Benazir Bhutto (BB) to keep the nation united. He said that Shaheed Bhutto gave a unanimous Constitution, which was approved by all political parties and that was the first reconciliation policy of Bhutto.
Dahri claimed that BB re-launched the reconciliation policy and President Asif Ali Zardari had been continuing the same tradition.
July 5 is a Black Day in the history of country
Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said that July 5, will always be remembered as a Black Day in the history of the country. It was on this day that a dictator overthrew a democratically elected government of Shaheed Zulifqar Ali Bhutto and plunged the country into darkness of martial law for eleven-long years, he said in his message marking the day.
He said today all the political forces should pledge to work for strengthening democracy and promote a culture of dialogue, instead of sabotaging he democratic order.
He further said that the democratic forces should demonstrate political sagacity, wisdom of thought and maturity of action for further strengthening the country, which was attained by rendering supreme sacrifices.
Prime Minister saidhad the people’s will been respected and their government allowed to serve them, Pakistan must have become politically and economically a great power both in the region as well as beyond.
He said the multiple challenges facing the country today owe themselves to lack of continuity of the democratic system.
Prime Minister Gilani said democracy and representative rule is the only way forward to secure country’s interests.
He said no nation can aspire to have any role at the regional and global level unless its institutions are strong, which is, otherwise, a function of strong democracy.
Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said the day also reminds us of the heroic struggle waged by the workers of Pakistan People’s Party against the dictatorial regime and for restoration of people’s inalienable right to determine their future through their elected representatives.
On July 5, let us pledge to work even harder for strengthening democracy in the country, he added.
He said today all the political forces should pledge to work for strengthening democracy and promote a culture of dialogue, instead of sabotaging he democratic order.
He further said that the democratic forces should demonstrate political sagacity, wisdom of thought and maturity of action for further strengthening the country, which was attained by rendering supreme sacrifices.
Prime Minister saidhad the people’s will been respected and their government allowed to serve them, Pakistan must have become politically and economically a great power both in the region as well as beyond.
He said the multiple challenges facing the country today owe themselves to lack of continuity of the democratic system.
Prime Minister Gilani said democracy and representative rule is the only way forward to secure country’s interests.
He said no nation can aspire to have any role at the regional and global level unless its institutions are strong, which is, otherwise, a function of strong democracy.
Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said the day also reminds us of the heroic struggle waged by the workers of Pakistan People’s Party against the dictatorial regime and for restoration of people’s inalienable right to determine their future through their elected representatives.
On July 5, let us pledge to work even harder for strengthening democracy in the country, he added.
Monday, July 4, 2011
PML-N leaders political terrorists
Chairperson Benazir Income Support Program (BISP) Farzana Raja Sunday said Sharif brothers should seek apology from Kashmiri people on putting ‘for sale’ label on them and called the N-League leaders ‘political terrorists’.
At a news conference, Raja described Nawaz Sharif, the PML-N Chief, as ‘an enemy’ of the people.
She said Rs65 billion had been allocated for BISP but added that the amount was insufficient and the Prime Minister had promised to increase it.
“Benazir Income Support Program is purely a public welfare initiative and it is not a political one,” she maintained.
Farzana Raja clarified that no funds had secretly been distributed for Kashmir elections and that forms were given away to the people many months prior to the polls.
At a news conference, Raja described Nawaz Sharif, the PML-N Chief, as ‘an enemy’ of the people.
She said Rs65 billion had been allocated for BISP but added that the amount was insufficient and the Prime Minister had promised to increase it.
“Benazir Income Support Program is purely a public welfare initiative and it is not a political one,” she maintained.
Farzana Raja clarified that no funds had secretly been distributed for Kashmir elections and that forms were given away to the people many months prior to the polls.
Fireworks, parades mark July 4th celebrations
msnbc.msn.com
Obama to host White House barbecue celebrating nation's 235th birthday
People across the U.S. are marking the 4th of July with parades, fireworks, barbecues — and competitive eating.
Thousands of revelers camped out near the Washington Monument to catch a glimpse of the fireworks.
Wet weather around the country put a damper on celebrations on Sunday from St. Louis, where a concert and fireworks display was cancelled, to Washington D.C., where Capitol Police evacuated where spectators on the National Mall who were watching rehearsals for Monday's "Capitol Fourth" show.A statement on the White House's website said Michelle Obama had sent a message to its email list, "wishing them a Happy Independence Day and encouraging all Americans to honor our brave men and women in uniform by volunteering to give back to the military families who sacrifice so much to keep us safe."
"We know that when our troops are called to serve, their families serve right along with them. For military kids, that means stepping up to help with the housework and putting on a brave face through all those missed holidays, bedtimes and ballet recitals," she said. "For military spouses, it means pulling double-duty, doing the work of both parents, often while juggling a full-time job or trying to get an education."
Story: Petraeus hails US troops in Afghanistan as patriots
"Our troops give so much to this country and they ask us for just one thing in return: to take care of their families while they’re gone. So we’ve put out a call to action. We’re urging all Americans to ask themselves one question: What can I do to give back to these families that have given so much?" the First Lady added.
She urged people to go to JoiningForces.gov and learn more about can be done to help military families.
Clarion call for freedom'
House Speaker John Boehner said these were "anxious days for people who cherish freedom."
"Every day, I meet Americans concerned about whether their kids and grandkids will enjoy the same blessings and opportunities they've been given," he said.
But he added that there was "no force more unstoppable than a free people who seize an opportunity to do something big and have the vigilance to see it through. That's we how keep the Spirit of '76 alive and well."
"America is much more than a point on a map, and Independence Day is no ordinary birthday. It is an annual clarion call for freedom," Boehner said. "We raise the flag and light up the skies to remind the world that the revolution continues. What those brave patriots helped create we must — and we will — help preserve."In New York City, more than 40,000 fireworks will be ignited on floating barges.
The gigantic Macy's fireworks show boasts it's the largest in the country. This year, Beyonce and Brad Paisley were slated to perform.
Coney Island will host the annual Nathan's July Fourth hot dog eating contest.
Champion Joey Chestnut, who put away a record 68 hot dogs in 2009, is looking to win his fifth title.
Obama to host White House barbecue celebrating nation's 235th birthday
People across the U.S. are marking the 4th of July with parades, fireworks, barbecues — and competitive eating.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
President Barack Obama planned to host a barbecue at the White House to celebrate the nation's 235th Independence Day.Thousands of revelers camped out near the Washington Monument to catch a glimpse of the fireworks.
Wet weather around the country put a damper on celebrations on Sunday from St. Louis, where a concert and fireworks display was cancelled, to Washington D.C., where Capitol Police evacuated where spectators on the National Mall who were watching rehearsals for Monday's "Capitol Fourth" show.A statement on the White House's website said Michelle Obama had sent a message to its email list, "wishing them a Happy Independence Day and encouraging all Americans to honor our brave men and women in uniform by volunteering to give back to the military families who sacrifice so much to keep us safe."
"We know that when our troops are called to serve, their families serve right along with them. For military kids, that means stepping up to help with the housework and putting on a brave face through all those missed holidays, bedtimes and ballet recitals," she said. "For military spouses, it means pulling double-duty, doing the work of both parents, often while juggling a full-time job or trying to get an education."
Story: Petraeus hails US troops in Afghanistan as patriots
"Our troops give so much to this country and they ask us for just one thing in return: to take care of their families while they’re gone. So we’ve put out a call to action. We’re urging all Americans to ask themselves one question: What can I do to give back to these families that have given so much?" the First Lady added.
She urged people to go to JoiningForces.gov and learn more about can be done to help military families.
Clarion call for freedom'
House Speaker John Boehner said these were "anxious days for people who cherish freedom."
"Every day, I meet Americans concerned about whether their kids and grandkids will enjoy the same blessings and opportunities they've been given," he said.
But he added that there was "no force more unstoppable than a free people who seize an opportunity to do something big and have the vigilance to see it through. That's we how keep the Spirit of '76 alive and well."
"America is much more than a point on a map, and Independence Day is no ordinary birthday. It is an annual clarion call for freedom," Boehner said. "We raise the flag and light up the skies to remind the world that the revolution continues. What those brave patriots helped create we must — and we will — help preserve."In New York City, more than 40,000 fireworks will be ignited on floating barges.
The gigantic Macy's fireworks show boasts it's the largest in the country. This year, Beyonce and Brad Paisley were slated to perform.
Coney Island will host the annual Nathan's July Fourth hot dog eating contest.
Champion Joey Chestnut, who put away a record 68 hot dogs in 2009, is looking to win his fifth title.
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Nawaz Sharif gave party positions to opportunists: Saranjam
Senior Pakistan Muslim League leader from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Saranjam Khan has blamed the PML-N Quaid Mian Nawaz Sharif for awarding important offices of the party to opportunists, hardliners and those having soft corner for extremists.
Talking to a private TV channel here on Sunday, Saranjam Khan said that reason behind his resignation from party’s basic membership was the discriminatory attitude of the leadership towards senior office bearers and activists.
It is worth mentioning that Saranjam Khan remained associated with Muslim League for almost half a century and served as Central Secretary General and Provincial Chief.
He announced to resign from the basic membership of the party last week.
Mr. Khan said that he was not satisfied with the Nawaz Sharif’s decision to prefer new faces over his recommendations from Mardan district therefore he in protest against the decision resigned.
However, he said that he could rejoin the party if his nominees were appointed for party posts in Mardan. Saranjam Khan blamed that Nawaz Sharif was misguided by Sardar Mehtab Abbasi and Iqbal Zafar Jhagra.
The PML leader said that he had stood by Nawaz Sharif during critical times when his close associates were seeking patchup with the rulers to save their skin. He regretted that now the party Quaid, misled by party leaders was giving no importance to his recommendations.
Mr Khan said that he would unveil his future plans on Monday July 04. Meanwhile PML-Q President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, Salim Saifullah and Amir Muqam have reportedly contacted the disgruntled PML leader to persuade him to join their ranks.
Talking to a private TV channel here on Sunday, Saranjam Khan said that reason behind his resignation from party’s basic membership was the discriminatory attitude of the leadership towards senior office bearers and activists.
It is worth mentioning that Saranjam Khan remained associated with Muslim League for almost half a century and served as Central Secretary General and Provincial Chief.
He announced to resign from the basic membership of the party last week.
Mr. Khan said that he was not satisfied with the Nawaz Sharif’s decision to prefer new faces over his recommendations from Mardan district therefore he in protest against the decision resigned.
However, he said that he could rejoin the party if his nominees were appointed for party posts in Mardan. Saranjam Khan blamed that Nawaz Sharif was misguided by Sardar Mehtab Abbasi and Iqbal Zafar Jhagra.
The PML leader said that he had stood by Nawaz Sharif during critical times when his close associates were seeking patchup with the rulers to save their skin. He regretted that now the party Quaid, misled by party leaders was giving no importance to his recommendations.
Mr Khan said that he would unveil his future plans on Monday July 04. Meanwhile PML-Q President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, Salim Saifullah and Amir Muqam have reportedly contacted the disgruntled PML leader to persuade him to join their ranks.
Pakistani Military Still Cultivates Militant Groups
The Pakistani military continues to nurture a broad range of militant groups as part of a three-decade strategy of using proxies against its neighbors and American forces in Afghanistan, but now some of the fighters it trained are questioning that strategy, a prominent former militant commander says.
The former commander said that he was supported by the Pakistani military for 15 years as a fighter, leader and trainer of insurgents until he quit a few years ago. Well known in militant circles but accustomed to a covert existence, he gave an interview to The New York Times on the condition that his name, location and other personal details not be revealed.
Militant groups, like Lashkar-e-Taiba, Harakat-ul-Mujahedeen and Hizbul Mujahedeen, are run by religious leaders, with the Pakistani military providing training, strategic planning and protection. That system was still functioning, he said.
The former commander’s account belies years of assurances by Pakistan to American officials since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that it has ceased supporting militant groups in its territory. The United States has given Pakistan more than $20 billion in aid over the past decade for its help with counterterrorism operations. Still, the former commander said, Pakistan’s military and intelligence establishment has not abandoned its policy of supporting the militant groups as tools in Pakistan’s dispute with India over the border territory of Kashmir and in Afghanistan to drive out American and NATO forces.
“There are two bodies running these affairs: mullahs and retired generals,” he said. He named a number of former military officials involved in the program, including former chiefs of the intelligence service and other former generals. “These people have a very big role still,” he said.
Maj. Gen. Zaheer ul-Islam Abbasi, a former intelligence officer who was convicted of attempting a coup against the government of Benazir Bhutto in 1995 and who is now dead, was one of the most active supporters of the militant groups in the years after Sept. 11, the former commander said.
He said he saw General Abbasi several times: once at a meeting of Taliban and Pakistani militant leaders in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Province as they planned how to confront the American military in Afghanistan; and twice in Mir Ali, which became the center for foreign militants in Pakistan’s tribal areas, including members of Al Qaeda.
There were about 60 people at the Taliban meeting in late 2001, soon after the Taliban government fell, the former commander said. Pakistani militant leaders were present, as were the Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, and Muhammad Haqqani, a member of the Haqqani network.
Several retired officials of Pakistan’s premier spy agency, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, were also there, he said, including a man known as Colonel Imam but who was actually Brig. Sultan Amir, a well-known trainer and mentor of militants, and General Abbasi. The militant groups divided Afghanistan into separate areas of operations and discussed how to “trip up America,” he said.
The Pakistani military still supports the Afghan Taliban in their fight to force out American and NATO forces from Afghanistan, he said, adding that he thought they would be successful.
The ISI also still supports other Pakistani militant groups, even some of those that have turned against the government, because the military still wants to keep them as tools for use against its archrival, India, he said. The military used a strategy of divide and rule, encouraging splits in the militant groups to weaken and control them, he said.
Although the military has lost control of many of the firebrand fighters, and has little influence over the foreign fighters in the tribal areas who belong to Al Qaeda — some of whom openly oppose the Pakistani government — it was reluctant to move against them, he said. Pakistan could easily kill the notoriously vicious militant leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Hakimullah Mehsud, but chose not to, he said. “If someone gave me 20,000 rupees, I would do it,” he said, citing a price of about $235.
“The government is not interested in eliminating them permanently,” he said. “The Pakistani military establishment has become habituated to using proxies.” He added that there were many sympathizers in the military who still supported the use of militants.
Pakistan has 12,000 to 14,000 fully trained Kashmiri fighters, scattered throughout various camps in Pakistan, and is holding them in reserve to use if needed in a war against India, he said.
Yet Pakistan has been losing the fight for Kashmir, and most Kashmiris now want independence and not to be part of Pakistan or India, he said. Since Sept. 11, Pakistan has redirected much of its attention away from Kashmir to Afghanistan, and many Kashmiri fighters are not interested in that fight and have taken up India’s offer of an amnesty to go home.
Others, like the former commander, have gotten out because of their disillusionment over the way they were being used to fight Osama bin Laden’s war, or used for the aims of a few top generals who had allied Pakistan with the United States to gain access to its military and financial aid. “There are a lot of people who do not think they are doing the right thing,” he said of the military.
“This is extremely wrong to sacrifice 16,000 people for a single person,” he said, referring to Bin Laden. “A person should sacrifice himself for 16,000 people.” He said he was using the figure of 16,000 just as an example.
“The Taliban lost a whole government for one person,” he said, again referring to Bin Laden. “And Pakistan went to war just for a few generals and now for President Zardari,” he said, referring to Asif Ali Zardari. “A real war is for a country.”
Many of the thousands of trained Pakistani fighters turned against the military because it treated them so carelessly, he said. “Pakistan used them and then, like a paper tissue, threw them away,” he said. “Look at me, I am a very well-trained fighter and I have no other option in life, except to fight and take revenge.”
Indeed, he was first trained for a year by the Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba at a camp in Kunar Province, in Afghanistan, in the early 1990s. The war against Soviet troops in Afghanistan was over, and Pakistan turned to training fighters for an insurgency in the Indian-controlled part of Kashmir.
He became skilled at firing Russian-made rocket-propelled grenades, and he was sent to fight, and train others, in Kashmir, Bosnia, Chechnya and Afghanistan. Over the years he worked with different militant groups, and he estimated that he personally trained up to 4,000 fighters.
The entire enterprise was supported by the Pakistani military and executed by Pakistani militant groups, he said. He was paid by a wing of the ISI, which is an integral part of the army.
Fighters were paid about $50 a month, he said, and commanders about $500.
But now, he said, Pakistan and the United States would be much better able to counter terrorism if they could redirect the legions of militants toward the correct path of Islam to rebuild and educate communities, he said.
“Pakistan, and especially America, needs to understand the true spirit of Islam, and they need to project the true spirit of Islam,” he said. “That would be a good strategy to stop them.”
U.S. turns to other routes to supply Afghan war as relations with Pakistan fray
The U.S. military is rapidly expanding its aerial and Central Asian supply routes to the war in
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Afghanistan, fearing that Pakistan could cut off the main means of providing American and NATO forces with fuel, food and equipment.
Although Pakistan has not explicitly threatened to sever the supply lines, Pentagon officials said they are concerned the routes could be endangered by the deterioration of U.S.-Pakistan relations, partly fed by ill will from the cross-border raid that killed Osama bin Laden.
Memories are fresh of Pakistan’s temporary closure of a major crossing into Afghanistan in September, resulting in a logjam of hundreds of supply trucks and fuel tankers, dozens of which were destroyed in attacks by insurgents.
While reducing the shipment of cargo through Pakistan would address a strategic weakness that U.S. military officials have long considered an Achilles’ heel, shifting supply lines elsewhere would substantially increase the cost of the war and make the United States more dependent on authoritarian countries in Central Asia.
A senior U.S. defense official said the military wants to keep using Pakistan, which offers the most direct and the cheapest routes to Afghanistan. But the Pentagon also wants the ability to bypass the country if necessary.
With landlocked Afghanistan lacking seaports, and hostile Iran blocking access from the west, Pentagon logisticians have limited alternatives.
“It’s either Central Asia or Pakistan — those are the two choices. We’d like to have both,” the defense official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid alienating Pakistan. “We’d like to have a balance between them, and not be dependent on either one, but always have the possibility of switching.”
U.S. military officials said they have emergency backup plans in case the Pakistan routes became unavailable.
“We will be on time, all the time,” said Vice Adm. Mark D. Harnitchek, deputy commander of the U.S. Transportation Command, which oversees the movement of supplies and equipment.
In such an event, however, the military would have to deliver the bulk of its cargo by air, a method that might not be sustainable; it costs up to 10 times as much as shipping via Pakistan.
“We’d have to be a little bit more mindful of what we put in the pipe,” Harnitchek said.
The Defense Department is already boosting the amount of cargo it sends to Afghanistan by air. To save on costs, the military is shipping as many of those supplies as possible to seaports in the Persian Gulf before loading them on planes bound for the war zone.
As recently as 2009, the U.S. military moved 90 percent of its surface cargo through Pakistan, arriving by ship at the port in Karachi and then snaking through mountain passes, deserts and remote tribal areas before crossing the border into Afghanistan. The Pakistan supply lines are served entirely by contractors instead of U.S. military convoys and are vulnerable to bandits, insurgents and natural disasters.
Today, almost 40 percent of surface cargo arrives in Afghanistan from the north, along a patchwork of Central Asian rail and road routes that the Pentagon calls the Northern Distribution Network. Military planners said they are pushing to raise the northern network’s share to as much as 75 percent by the end of this year.
Obama administration officials said they are negotiating expanded agreements with Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and other countries that would allow for the delivery of additional supplies to the Afghan war zone. Washington also wants permission to withdraw vehicles and other equipment from Afghanistan as the U.S. military prepares to pull out one-third of its forces by September 2012.
By shifting the burden to Central Asia, however, the U.S. military has become increasingly reliant on authoritarian countries, prompting criticism from human rights groups that the Obama administration is cozying up to dictators.
For instance, more than one-third of the northern-route cargo passes through tiny Azerbaijan, a country saddled by “pervasive corruption,” according to the State Department’s annual human rights report. U.S. defense officials also say the northern supply lines would not be possible without the cooperation of Russia. One new route runs through Siberia.
The biggest potential choke point, however, lies in Uzbekistan, a former Soviet republic that borders northern Afghanistan. It previously had kicked the U.S. military out of the country after Washington complained about the killing of hundreds of protesters in 2005.
But as the United States has deepened its involvement in Afghanistan, relations with Uzbekistan have warmed up again. Today, more than 80 percent of supplies shipped along the Northern Distribution Network pass through the country.
Expanded supply lines
The northern routes were developed in the waning days of the George W. Bush administration. Since then, the U.S. government has expanded the network into a spiderweb of supply lines.
Some start at Baltic seaports and run through Russia and Central Asia by rail. Another key line picks up traffic on the Black Sea and funnels it through the Caucasus region. One winding truck route begins at a U.S. Army depot at Germersheim, Germany, and ends, an average of 60 days later, at Bagram air base in Afghanistan. As with the Pakistan routes, the deliveries are all made by contractors.
“If you look at what we’ve done there in the last two years, we look at it more or less as a logistics miracle,” said Alan F. Estevez, the Pentagon’s principal deputy assistant secretary for logistics.
There are two big limitations, however, on what the Pentagon can ship through Central Asia. First, supplies are generally restricted to food, water and construction material; ammunition, weapons and other “lethal” cargo are prohibited.
Also, the routes are strictly one-way. Nothing can be shipped back out of the war zone.
U.S. officials said they are trying to negotiate deals with several countries to remove those restrictions. That will be crucial as the United States withdraws 33,000 troops from Afghanistan over the next 15 months, military leaders said.
Perhaps the most vital section in the northern network is a rail line that crosses south through Uzbekistan and over the Amu Darya river to reach Hairaton, Afghanistan. About five out of every six cargo containers travel this route.
“In reality, Uzbekistan is really at the center of all these routes,” said Alexander Cooley, a Barnard College professor and an expert on U.S. military relations in Central Asia. “They’re certainly in the catbird seat. And they know it.”
The final leg of the Uzbek rail line, from the city of Karshi to the Afghan border, underscores how the U.S. military has been forced to rely on rickety routes to sustain its troops.
In November 2009, U.S. embassy officials in Tashkent, the Uzbek capital, were warned by a confidential source that the tracks were brittle and at risk of fracturing if trains carried more than half their usual loads. On top of that, the Soviet-era locomotives carrying U.S. cargo were not designed to cross steep mountains; engineers had to apply the brakes almost constantly as they moved downhill.
“By the time the trains have descended from the mountains, the wheels are glowing red hot,” the embassy reported in a diplomatic cable. The source, an engineer, said he was “appalled by how long it takes to transport anything by rail in Uzbekistan” and that he refused to take the train for fear of a crash.
The cable, titled “Uzbek Rail: Red Hot Wheels to Afghanistan” and obtained by the anti-secrecy Web site WikiLeaks, concluded that “a train wreck is possible in the literal sense.”
U.S. military officials said they knew of no accidents or safety problems on the 200-mile rail segment. In February, Uzbekistan announced it had obtained a $218 million loan from Japan to upgrade the line to the Afghan border.
Human rights concerns
Uzbekistan has been assailed by human rights groups for repression under President Islam Karimov, who has ruled the country since the breakup of the Soviet Union. Freedom House, a Washington-based advocacy group, ranks it as one of the nine worst countries in the world for civil liberties and political rights.
From 2001 to 2005, the U.S. military relied on an Uzbek air base as a hub for combat and supply missions to Afghanistan. U.S. forces were evicted from the base after Washington pressured Karimov to allow an international probe into the deaths of hundreds of anti-government protesters in the province of Andijan.
Since 2008, however, Washington has steadily worked to repair relations. A stream of U.S. military leaders and diplomats has visited Tashkent, including Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in December and Denis McDonough, the deputy national security adviser, in late May. Uzbekistan, in turn, has reopened its railroads, highways and airspace for U.S. cargo.
Thomas M. Sanderson, an analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that the Obama administration has continued to raise human rights concerns with Uzbekistan but that the Afghan supply routes usually take precedence.
“There is no doubt about it. We are there for one primary reason, and that is to enable our operations in Afghanistan,” said Sanderson, who has studied the Northern Distribution Network.
State Department officials said they do not hesitate to press Uzbekistan to improve its human rights record. When Clinton visited Tashkent, they noted, she made a point of meeting activists and calling for the release of jailed journalists.
“We’ve made a real effort to try to engage Uzbekistan on human rights and in trafficking persons, and in some cases there’s been some progress,” said Robert O. Blake, assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia. “This is something that’s in their own interest to do, to allow greater freedom of religion and greater freedom of expression.”
Diplomatic cables, however, show Uzbek officials have not hesitated to demand U.S. restraint on human rights in exchange for cooperation on the supply routes.
In March 2009, shortly after the State Department gave an award to an Uzbek human rights activist, Foreign Minister Vladimir Norov made an “implicit threat” to suspend deliveries to Afghanistan, according to a cable signed by Richard B. Norland, the U.S. ambassador in Tashkent at the time.
An angry Karimov also complained to Norland personally.
“Put yourself in my place,” Karimov told the ambassador, according to the cable. “Would you trust me if I had done this?”
In that cable and others to Washington, Norland counseled the Obama administration to check its public criticism of Karimov to maintain the viability of the supply lines. In advance of a visit to Tashkent by a senior State Department official, Norland advised using “private, but frank diplomacy” to cajole Uzbekistan rather than “more openly coercive measures.”
“Uzbek pride often gets the better of rationality and officials here will think nothing of cutting off their nose to spite their face,” Norland added in a July 2009 cable.
http://www.washingtonpost.com
Afghanistan, fearing that Pakistan could cut off the main means of providing American and NATO forces with fuel, food and equipment.
Although Pakistan has not explicitly threatened to sever the supply lines, Pentagon officials said they are concerned the routes could be endangered by the deterioration of U.S.-Pakistan relations, partly fed by ill will from the cross-border raid that killed Osama bin Laden.
Memories are fresh of Pakistan’s temporary closure of a major crossing into Afghanistan in September, resulting in a logjam of hundreds of supply trucks and fuel tankers, dozens of which were destroyed in attacks by insurgents.
While reducing the shipment of cargo through Pakistan would address a strategic weakness that U.S. military officials have long considered an Achilles’ heel, shifting supply lines elsewhere would substantially increase the cost of the war and make the United States more dependent on authoritarian countries in Central Asia.
A senior U.S. defense official said the military wants to keep using Pakistan, which offers the most direct and the cheapest routes to Afghanistan. But the Pentagon also wants the ability to bypass the country if necessary.
With landlocked Afghanistan lacking seaports, and hostile Iran blocking access from the west, Pentagon logisticians have limited alternatives.
“It’s either Central Asia or Pakistan — those are the two choices. We’d like to have both,” the defense official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid alienating Pakistan. “We’d like to have a balance between them, and not be dependent on either one, but always have the possibility of switching.”
U.S. military officials said they have emergency backup plans in case the Pakistan routes became unavailable.
“We will be on time, all the time,” said Vice Adm. Mark D. Harnitchek, deputy commander of the U.S. Transportation Command, which oversees the movement of supplies and equipment.
In such an event, however, the military would have to deliver the bulk of its cargo by air, a method that might not be sustainable; it costs up to 10 times as much as shipping via Pakistan.
“We’d have to be a little bit more mindful of what we put in the pipe,” Harnitchek said.
The Defense Department is already boosting the amount of cargo it sends to Afghanistan by air. To save on costs, the military is shipping as many of those supplies as possible to seaports in the Persian Gulf before loading them on planes bound for the war zone.
As recently as 2009, the U.S. military moved 90 percent of its surface cargo through Pakistan, arriving by ship at the port in Karachi and then snaking through mountain passes, deserts and remote tribal areas before crossing the border into Afghanistan. The Pakistan supply lines are served entirely by contractors instead of U.S. military convoys and are vulnerable to bandits, insurgents and natural disasters.
Today, almost 40 percent of surface cargo arrives in Afghanistan from the north, along a patchwork of Central Asian rail and road routes that the Pentagon calls the Northern Distribution Network. Military planners said they are pushing to raise the northern network’s share to as much as 75 percent by the end of this year.
Obama administration officials said they are negotiating expanded agreements with Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and other countries that would allow for the delivery of additional supplies to the Afghan war zone. Washington also wants permission to withdraw vehicles and other equipment from Afghanistan as the U.S. military prepares to pull out one-third of its forces by September 2012.
By shifting the burden to Central Asia, however, the U.S. military has become increasingly reliant on authoritarian countries, prompting criticism from human rights groups that the Obama administration is cozying up to dictators.
For instance, more than one-third of the northern-route cargo passes through tiny Azerbaijan, a country saddled by “pervasive corruption,” according to the State Department’s annual human rights report. U.S. defense officials also say the northern supply lines would not be possible without the cooperation of Russia. One new route runs through Siberia.
The biggest potential choke point, however, lies in Uzbekistan, a former Soviet republic that borders northern Afghanistan. It previously had kicked the U.S. military out of the country after Washington complained about the killing of hundreds of protesters in 2005.
But as the United States has deepened its involvement in Afghanistan, relations with Uzbekistan have warmed up again. Today, more than 80 percent of supplies shipped along the Northern Distribution Network pass through the country.
Expanded supply lines
The northern routes were developed in the waning days of the George W. Bush administration. Since then, the U.S. government has expanded the network into a spiderweb of supply lines.
Some start at Baltic seaports and run through Russia and Central Asia by rail. Another key line picks up traffic on the Black Sea and funnels it through the Caucasus region. One winding truck route begins at a U.S. Army depot at Germersheim, Germany, and ends, an average of 60 days later, at Bagram air base in Afghanistan. As with the Pakistan routes, the deliveries are all made by contractors.
“If you look at what we’ve done there in the last two years, we look at it more or less as a logistics miracle,” said Alan F. Estevez, the Pentagon’s principal deputy assistant secretary for logistics.
There are two big limitations, however, on what the Pentagon can ship through Central Asia. First, supplies are generally restricted to food, water and construction material; ammunition, weapons and other “lethal” cargo are prohibited.
Also, the routes are strictly one-way. Nothing can be shipped back out of the war zone.
U.S. officials said they are trying to negotiate deals with several countries to remove those restrictions. That will be crucial as the United States withdraws 33,000 troops from Afghanistan over the next 15 months, military leaders said.
Perhaps the most vital section in the northern network is a rail line that crosses south through Uzbekistan and over the Amu Darya river to reach Hairaton, Afghanistan. About five out of every six cargo containers travel this route.
“In reality, Uzbekistan is really at the center of all these routes,” said Alexander Cooley, a Barnard College professor and an expert on U.S. military relations in Central Asia. “They’re certainly in the catbird seat. And they know it.”
The final leg of the Uzbek rail line, from the city of Karshi to the Afghan border, underscores how the U.S. military has been forced to rely on rickety routes to sustain its troops.
In November 2009, U.S. embassy officials in Tashkent, the Uzbek capital, were warned by a confidential source that the tracks were brittle and at risk of fracturing if trains carried more than half their usual loads. On top of that, the Soviet-era locomotives carrying U.S. cargo were not designed to cross steep mountains; engineers had to apply the brakes almost constantly as they moved downhill.
“By the time the trains have descended from the mountains, the wheels are glowing red hot,” the embassy reported in a diplomatic cable. The source, an engineer, said he was “appalled by how long it takes to transport anything by rail in Uzbekistan” and that he refused to take the train for fear of a crash.
The cable, titled “Uzbek Rail: Red Hot Wheels to Afghanistan” and obtained by the anti-secrecy Web site WikiLeaks, concluded that “a train wreck is possible in the literal sense.”
U.S. military officials said they knew of no accidents or safety problems on the 200-mile rail segment. In February, Uzbekistan announced it had obtained a $218 million loan from Japan to upgrade the line to the Afghan border.
Human rights concerns
Uzbekistan has been assailed by human rights groups for repression under President Islam Karimov, who has ruled the country since the breakup of the Soviet Union. Freedom House, a Washington-based advocacy group, ranks it as one of the nine worst countries in the world for civil liberties and political rights.
From 2001 to 2005, the U.S. military relied on an Uzbek air base as a hub for combat and supply missions to Afghanistan. U.S. forces were evicted from the base after Washington pressured Karimov to allow an international probe into the deaths of hundreds of anti-government protesters in the province of Andijan.
Since 2008, however, Washington has steadily worked to repair relations. A stream of U.S. military leaders and diplomats has visited Tashkent, including Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in December and Denis McDonough, the deputy national security adviser, in late May. Uzbekistan, in turn, has reopened its railroads, highways and airspace for U.S. cargo.
Thomas M. Sanderson, an analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that the Obama administration has continued to raise human rights concerns with Uzbekistan but that the Afghan supply routes usually take precedence.
“There is no doubt about it. We are there for one primary reason, and that is to enable our operations in Afghanistan,” said Sanderson, who has studied the Northern Distribution Network.
State Department officials said they do not hesitate to press Uzbekistan to improve its human rights record. When Clinton visited Tashkent, they noted, she made a point of meeting activists and calling for the release of jailed journalists.
“We’ve made a real effort to try to engage Uzbekistan on human rights and in trafficking persons, and in some cases there’s been some progress,” said Robert O. Blake, assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia. “This is something that’s in their own interest to do, to allow greater freedom of religion and greater freedom of expression.”
Diplomatic cables, however, show Uzbek officials have not hesitated to demand U.S. restraint on human rights in exchange for cooperation on the supply routes.
In March 2009, shortly after the State Department gave an award to an Uzbek human rights activist, Foreign Minister Vladimir Norov made an “implicit threat” to suspend deliveries to Afghanistan, according to a cable signed by Richard B. Norland, the U.S. ambassador in Tashkent at the time.
An angry Karimov also complained to Norland personally.
“Put yourself in my place,” Karimov told the ambassador, according to the cable. “Would you trust me if I had done this?”
In that cable and others to Washington, Norland counseled the Obama administration to check its public criticism of Karimov to maintain the viability of the supply lines. In advance of a visit to Tashkent by a senior State Department official, Norland advised using “private, but frank diplomacy” to cajole Uzbekistan rather than “more openly coercive measures.”
“Uzbek pride often gets the better of rationality and officials here will think nothing of cutting off their nose to spite their face,” Norland added in a July 2009 cable.
Kashmiris not to accept dictation from Raiwind
President Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain Saturday said that when Kashmiris never accepted dictation from India how they could accept dictation from Raiwind.
“Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif stayed in Azad Kashmiri for 5 days and wherever they addressed rallies, their candidates lost election,” he said while talking to the Newsmen here Saturday after holding a meeting along with Senior Minister Chaudhry Parvaiz Elahi with AJK Prime Minister Sardar Attique Ahmed Khan.
During the meeting post-election political situation in the AJK was discussed.
Talking to newsmen after the meeting, Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain said it was the right of Kashmiris to elect their representatives without any outside interference. “The intervention of Raiwind in the politics in Kashmir should be ended and elections in AJK should be held without any outside interference,” he said. Chaudhry Shujaat said the personal politics would cause damages to the Kashmir cause. He said Nawaz Sharif’s interference in the politics of Kashmir for his personal agenda has negated Quaid-e-Azam view on Kashmir.
Senior Federal Minister Parvaiz Elahi said Kashmir is ours and will remain with Pakistan and it is time that all political parties should leave their political difference to stand united on one point agenda on Kashmir.
“Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif stayed in Azad Kashmiri for 5 days and wherever they addressed rallies, their candidates lost election,” he said while talking to the Newsmen here Saturday after holding a meeting along with Senior Minister Chaudhry Parvaiz Elahi with AJK Prime Minister Sardar Attique Ahmed Khan.
During the meeting post-election political situation in the AJK was discussed.
Talking to newsmen after the meeting, Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain said it was the right of Kashmiris to elect their representatives without any outside interference. “The intervention of Raiwind in the politics in Kashmir should be ended and elections in AJK should be held without any outside interference,” he said. Chaudhry Shujaat said the personal politics would cause damages to the Kashmir cause. He said Nawaz Sharif’s interference in the politics of Kashmir for his personal agenda has negated Quaid-e-Azam view on Kashmir.
Senior Federal Minister Parvaiz Elahi said Kashmir is ours and will remain with Pakistan and it is time that all political parties should leave their political difference to stand united on one point agenda on Kashmir.
Cameron should not lecture China on human rights
on human rights as he attempts to win over the emerging power in a bid to get Britain's economy back on track, says Hamish McRae in an op-ed piece in The Independent on June 29, 2011.
Britain's economic relationships with China are hugely important both as an inward investor and as an exporter, notes McRae, associate editor of The Independent. But he also points out that there are may be other relationships that are just as important. "There are more students from China in Britain than in any other country, more even than the United States. We have the historic link with China through Hong Kong, which became a model for the Chinese mainland free trade and enterprise zones, which in turn triggered the country's astounding economic take-off."
Additionally, all experience of Chinese economic relations reflects that politics is not allowed to intervene in economics, McRae opines. The Chinese will pursue what they believe is their self-interest. "So it is not really a question of our damaging trade relations with them; it is more a question of our still not quite grasping the scale of what is happening in China – or how unimportant our views are to the Chinese."
As China's economic growth is becoming more generally appreciated, two things are worthy of attention, says the piece. One has been "the gradual, relentless overhauling of the West by China, passing France, Britain, Germany and last year, Japan in economic size". The other has been "the way the recession has speeded up the shift". China kept growing, its banks did not need rescuing and its living standards kept on rising. And now as the West stumbles out of recession, China's debts are lower than those of any G7 economy.
Actually, Western views on human rights might be inconsistent, according to McRae. Colonel Gaddafi was once feted by, among other countries, Britain, and now is reviled. And they are also seen as patronizing in their relationship with Africa, with African leaders telling Chinese investors that they find it much easier to deal with them, the Chinese, than with the coordinators of Western aid programs.
The relative economic failure has diminished the political influence of the West, believes McRae. "It does not matter what we say or think, not so much because we might lose trade opportunities if we speak our mind, but because we are not respected any more. The West's judgment on how to run economies has been proved wrong, so why should anyone listen to our judgment on how to run societies?"
Shelling, militant raids dog thaw with Afghanistan
Days ahead of the start of a drawdown of US troops from Afghanistan, Islamabad and Kabul are locked in fresh acrimony and tension over cross-border raids by militants into Pakistan and firing of mortar rounds.
The friction is threatening to undermine the recent improvement in relations between the two countries achieved after years of hostility, something that was being billed as this year’s only positive story on the foreign relations front other than revival of peace talks with India, which too have lately run into problems.
President Hamid Karzai’s spokesman Waheed Omar, talking to Dawn from Kabul, accused the Pakistan government of not responding to his country’s concerns about incidents of shelling of Afghan border areas.
He said the matter had been raised by President Karzai with President Asif Zardari, Army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir over the past few days, but “there has been no response on Pakistan’s part”.
Pakistan army had earlier this week said that the mortar rounds could have “accidentally crossed the border” and denied that the shelling was intentional.
However, the issue got complicated with the Afghan National Army (ANA) firing rounds into Pakistani territory.
The Karzai administration has come under increased pressure from the eastern Afghan provinces and several public protests have been held against the mortar firing incidents in Kabul, Jalalabad and other cities.
Omar said the shelling from Pakistan “has caused a lot of public anger”.
He said the Afghan government was seeking to convey the message to Islamabad through diplomatic channels and did not want to “destroy the trust”.
A journalist from Kabul seconded the spokesman’s view about the pressure, but said the Afghan president was likely to show a lot of restraint because of his compulsions.
Pakistani military commanders say the root of the problem lies in Afghanistan where militants have sanctuaries in areas bordering Pakistan from where they “launch attacks on our posts”.
There have been five major raids by militants based in eastern Afghanistan. The militants, many of whom had fled operations in Bajaur, Mohmand and Swat, are occupying an area between River Kunar and the border because of a void created by withdrawal of Isaf forces from the area.
“They attack the Pakistani areas to regain the territory lost because of army operations,” a military official said. Pakistan has protested over militant attacks with the Afghan government, Isaf and ANA.
Military officials say when Pakistani forces retaliate against the militant attacks some rounds possibly land in Afghan territory.
“We have told Isaf and the ANA about the presence of Swati Taliban and militants led by Faqir Mohammad (Bajaur) and Abdul Wali (Mohmand),” a military official said, adding no action was being taken against their sanctuaries.
Another official said there was no doubt that they had tacit support of regional leaders and some elements within the Afghan government.
“There could be no other explanation for groups of 200-300 militants moving in Kunar to launch attacks on Pakistani posts. They have a continuous supply line of arms and finances in addition to logistical support.”
He expressed fear that a ‘game’ was being played at the behest of some regional stakeholders who were averse to Pakistan-Afghan rapprochement.
During a recent operation against militants, the army seized a large quantity of Indian, American, Russian and Chinese weapons and ammunition.
The friction is threatening to undermine the recent improvement in relations between the two countries achieved after years of hostility, something that was being billed as this year’s only positive story on the foreign relations front other than revival of peace talks with India, which too have lately run into problems.
President Hamid Karzai’s spokesman Waheed Omar, talking to Dawn from Kabul, accused the Pakistan government of not responding to his country’s concerns about incidents of shelling of Afghan border areas.
He said the matter had been raised by President Karzai with President Asif Zardari, Army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir over the past few days, but “there has been no response on Pakistan’s part”.
Pakistan army had earlier this week said that the mortar rounds could have “accidentally crossed the border” and denied that the shelling was intentional.
However, the issue got complicated with the Afghan National Army (ANA) firing rounds into Pakistani territory.
The Karzai administration has come under increased pressure from the eastern Afghan provinces and several public protests have been held against the mortar firing incidents in Kabul, Jalalabad and other cities.
Omar said the shelling from Pakistan “has caused a lot of public anger”.
He said the Afghan government was seeking to convey the message to Islamabad through diplomatic channels and did not want to “destroy the trust”.
A journalist from Kabul seconded the spokesman’s view about the pressure, but said the Afghan president was likely to show a lot of restraint because of his compulsions.
Pakistani military commanders say the root of the problem lies in Afghanistan where militants have sanctuaries in areas bordering Pakistan from where they “launch attacks on our posts”.
There have been five major raids by militants based in eastern Afghanistan. The militants, many of whom had fled operations in Bajaur, Mohmand and Swat, are occupying an area between River Kunar and the border because of a void created by withdrawal of Isaf forces from the area.
“They attack the Pakistani areas to regain the territory lost because of army operations,” a military official said. Pakistan has protested over militant attacks with the Afghan government, Isaf and ANA.
Military officials say when Pakistani forces retaliate against the militant attacks some rounds possibly land in Afghan territory.
“We have told Isaf and the ANA about the presence of Swati Taliban and militants led by Faqir Mohammad (Bajaur) and Abdul Wali (Mohmand),” a military official said, adding no action was being taken against their sanctuaries.
Another official said there was no doubt that they had tacit support of regional leaders and some elements within the Afghan government.
“There could be no other explanation for groups of 200-300 militants moving in Kunar to launch attacks on Pakistani posts. They have a continuous supply line of arms and finances in addition to logistical support.”
He expressed fear that a ‘game’ was being played at the behest of some regional stakeholders who were averse to Pakistan-Afghan rapprochement.
During a recent operation against militants, the army seized a large quantity of Indian, American, Russian and Chinese weapons and ammunition.
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