Saturday, May 24, 2014
At Least Seven Killed In Bombings In Pakistan,TTP Claims responsibility
At least seven people have been killed in bombings in Pakistan, two of which exploded in Islamabad. The deadliest of the May 24 blasts was in Mohmand tribal region, an area bordering Afghanistan. Six soldiers were reported killed and three wounded when a roadside bomb exploded. Spokesman for Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, Umar Khurasani, called RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal to claim responsibility for the attack in the Mohmand region. Some 20 people in Mohmand have been taken into custody in connection with the attack and a curfew has been imposed in the area. Earlier, an explosion occurred at 2 a.m. (local time) in an upmarket shopping area close to the city center in Islamabad. Police officer Chaudhry Hafiz Hussain said one watchman died after being taken to a hospital. The second blast was described by authorities as a "low intensity" explosion inside a car in a different part of the capital. There has not yet been any claim of responsibility for the blasts in Islamabad. The bombings come after three days of air and ground attacks by Pakistan’s army against militant hideouts in the tribal region of North Waziristan near the Afghan border. The offensive has killed at least 75 people. Pakistan’s military says those killed were militants, including important commanders. But locals have told journalists that civilians were among the dead.
Pakistan: 30 children fall sick in Swat upon receiving measles vaccinations
At least 30 children fell ill in Swat after receiving vaccinations for measles on Saturday, Express News reported. A team of health officials had gone to their school, MR Model School in Mingora, where they were given injections of the vaccines. After which, the children fell ill and were taken to Saidu Sharif Hospital for medical treatment. According to sources at the hospital, the children are out of danger. The reason of the adverse reaction to the vaccinations is not known as yet. On May 21, six children had fallen unconscious after being administered measles vaccines in Kohat district. A team of health officials went to a private school in Jangal Khel to vaccinate children against measles after which the students fell unconscious and were rushed to the Liaqat Memorial Hospital. Two days earlier, at least 23 students of Government Girls Primary School in Dalan union council of Thal, Hangu had fallen unconscious after they were administered anti-measles injections. The commonly known side-effects of measles vaccines range from the common ones which are fever, rash to the very rare ones such as mild seizures and deafness.
Pakistan: BALOCHISTAN MILITANCY DEVASTATES EDUCATION SYSTEM
By Abdul Ghani Kakar Nazeer Ahmed Bangulzai was a typical student in the Awaran area of Balochistan Province, but militant threats have reached the point that they are blocking him from an education. “My father is not letting me to go to school,” the 10th-class student said. “He told me that armed men would kill me if they found me going to school.” This situation has repeated itself throughout the province, blocking thousands of young students from getting an education. And that’s casting a shadow on the future for coming generations. “Our future is moving ahead in darkness; someone should come forward to assist us in this calamitous situation so that we can continue our education without any fear,” Nazeer said. As the situation reaches the crisis point, Balochistan residents are calling for the provincial government to step up efforts to keep the school system functioning. “The role of government is, primarily, in protecting educational institutions,” Mohammad Ali, a schoolteacher in Noshki, told Central Asia Online. “If they [the schools] are destroyed by the militants, the government must ensure that these schools are rebuilt and the process of education continues without any further disruption.” Dropout rates pose a major challenge Militant attacks on schools and on educators have forced roughly 70,000 children to leave school this year, according to officials. The terrorism has included barrages of gunfire at school buses. Roughly 1.3m children throughout the province aren’t going to school, Balochistan Chief Minister Dr. Abdul Malik said. “A high dropout rate and poor access of children to school have emerged as the biggest challenges in the province,” he said. Observers accuse the militancy of being the chief culprit behind Balochistan’s nation-leading illiteracy rate, A.N. Sabir, president of the Government Teachers Association Quetta, told Central Asia Online. “The militants’ biased attitude is shutting the doors of education … and they want to keep the masses in the darkness of ignorance,” Shantul Gurginari, a senior educator and former professor of history in Balochistan, said. “It is a great conspiracy against Balochistan that anti-peace elements want to smash the entire system of education in the province,” Ali said. “These militant groups are trying to keep the Baloch nation backward and illiterate … making their youth easily susceptible to militancy.” Putting children back in school The harsh situation contradicts what the residents want, analysts say. “People want their children to be literate … but in reality there is no one to help them out,” Khuzdar social worker Behram Rind told Central Asia Online. “In conflict areas, seeking an education might cost you your life.” The provincial government says it recognises the need to ensure safe access to schools and a safe learning environment. “We are taking all possible measures to maintain law and order and to restore the educational system in the militancy-hit areas,” Malik said. The government is reviewing education-related policies and has allocated Rs. 61.3 billion (US $62m) to fix the problems, he said. Reforms will include providing security for teachers, students and other stake-holders, Sabir said. “It is the need of the hour to eradicate the menace of extremism and terrorism from education in Balochistan,” he added.
Pakistan: 'Imran intends to become prime minister'
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/
Qaumi Wattan Party (QWP) Chairman Aftab Ahmed Sherpao on Saturday said that Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan wanted to sabotage the process of democratic setup and interested to become the next prime minister. He slammed Imran Khan for leveling allegations of rigging in Punjab and termed general elections 2013 were also rigged in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. During his visit to the district, he offered prayer on the death of party’s district organizer Matwakal Khan’s brother. Strongly criticising on Imran, Sherpao showed concerns over the administration of PTI in the province and said that Imran Khan must focus on the issues in Pakhtunkhwa instead of mourning over the elections held in 2013. He called Imran Khan a politically immature person. He said that the PTI chairman was raising a hue and cry to hide his failure in the Pakhtunkhwa. He urged the federal government to review foreign policy and its relations with neighbouring countries particularly with India.
Religious Rights Overseer Urges to Add Pakistan,Sryia to List of Worst Offenders
According to religious news service, one of the nation’s leading—and official—defenders of religious freedom beseeched the Obama administration to add Pakistan and Syria to the list of nations that most violate religious rights.
before a congressional subcommittee Robert P. George, chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, said it makes little sense that the list compiled by the U.S. has hardly changed in a decade. The congressionally chartered commission George heads recently encouraged that the State Department add eight nations to the eight already chosen as “countries of particular concern.” But among the recommended additions, he named Pakistan and Syria particularly for their deteriorating and troublesome record on religious liberty. “Pakistan represents the worst religious freedom environment for a country not designated as a CPC,” said George, whose testament underlined Pakistan for continuing violence against Shia Muslims, Ahmadi Muslims, Christians and Hindus. A renowned intellectual at Princeton University, George, spoke of the “horrible and tragic” sectarian battle in Syria which resulted in killing of thousands and displaced millions. Sunni versus Shia violence is widespread. Extremist religious groups, including al-Qaida affiliates, target Christians and other religious minorities. George said, “Not every three years, not every five years . . . every administration needs to make these designation on a regular and, we believe, annual basis.” He labelled the list as a commanding tool to pressure countries to improve their human rights records. A State Department spokeswoman told that it’s uncertain when the report and a new CPC list will be released. Presently the State Department’s list includes Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Uzbekistan. In addition to Pakistan and Syria, George’s commission wishes it to add Egypt, Iraq, Nigeria, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan and Vietnam. - See more at: http://www.christiansinpakistan.com/religious-rights-overseer-urges-to-add-pakistansryia-to-list-of-worst-offenders/#sthash.6YoZNX7L.dpuf
Murder and ‘blasphemy’: Pakistan’s academy in danger
BY MATTHEW REISZ
Scholars at Risk Network warns of threats to academic freedom after the killing of a lawyer defending a scholar
The recent assassination of the lawyer and human rights activist Rashid Rehman – who claimed that he had received repeated death threats after agreeing to defend Junaid Hafeez, an adjunct lecturer at the Bahauddin Zakariya University, against charges of blasphemy – has raised wider concerns about academic freedom in Pakistan.In response to the killing in Multan on 7 May, the Scholars at Risk Network in New York issued a statement. It notes that “Rehman had taken up the case in 2013 when previous defense counsel withdrew after similar threats” and it then goes on to highlight the concerns raised by the assassination. “In addition to the deprivation of the right to life of the victim and harms to the others injured, their families and associates, an attack on defense counsel deprives defendants of due process and a fair trial,” the network says. “Where the defendant is a scholar detained for nonviolent expressive activity, as in this case, an attack on defense counsel also undermines academic freedom by denying the scholar a full and fair defense and sending a message of intimidation throughout the university community and society.” In the Education under Attack, 2014 report by the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack (of which the Scholars at Risk Network is a member), Pakistan is cited as one of the six most “heavily affected” countries for violence against schools and universities. Hundreds of attacks were documented between 2009 and 2012, and one student and four academics were killed. Clare Robinson, Scholars at Risk’s director of protection services, noted that the network had logged three other attacks on higher education since November: a Shia imam and professor at Hashmat Ali College killed by unidentified gunmen; a professor at the University of Gujrat, said to have been “progressive-minded” as well as a Shia, shot dead with his driver on the way to work; and a first-year student at Khyber Medical College allegedly harassed and assaulted by an academic because she wore a face veil. To put this in a wider context, Ms Robinson added that “SAR has been contacted by over 65 applicants reporting threats in Pakistan”. Mr Rehman was “representing someone who was a lecturer and a student and working in the field of gender studies – all of which raise questions about wider threats to academic freedom in Pakistan”. She said that Scholars at Risk feared that Mr Hafeez “will never get the representation he needs for a fair trial. His other lawyers were threatened and asked to step down, which they did. No one has been held accountable for those threats, nor, to the best of my knowledge, for the threats issued to Mr Rehman. Such threats also need to be taken seriously.” Campaigners argue that Pakistan’s strict laws against blasphemy, which theoretically carry the death penalty, are often used to settle personal scores or deployed by right-wingers keen to silence liberals. “We have seen a handful of recent cases regarding blasphemy,” agreed Ms Robinson, “which risk eroding the rule of law.”
Friday, May 23, 2014
China Voice: Iron fists for the terrorists
China: Xinjiang police identify 5 suspects
Timeline of Violent Attacks in China
A timeline of recent violent incidents linked to tensions in China's far northwestern region of Xinjiang between its native Turkic Muslim Uighur ethnic group and China's majority Han.
Putin on Gazprom-China gas deal: Russia has enough resources for 50 years
In big public push, White House seeks to smooth way for carbon curbs
Last month, Washington's top environment advocate went to the Cleveland Clinic to talk about how President Barack Obama's landmark efforts to crack down on power-plant carbon emissions would ease a range of respiratory illnesses.
Speaking separately to historically black Morehouse College in Atlanta in April, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy also framed proposed new rules in terms of social justice, as poor black communities are disproportionately affected by air pollution.
The meetings, and hundreds more like them over the past year, mark an unprecedented campaign by the White House and the EPA to win broad public and state backing for rules expected to come June 2 to limit for the first time carbon emissions from power plants, which are the biggest source of greenhouse gases.
Both the message and the method reflect a conscious effort to avoid the problems that two years ago nearly sank Obama's health care reform, another contentious policy milestone that will become an indelible part of his legacy, according to officials and sources familiar with the process.
The proposed curbs will form the cornerstone of Obama's climate action plan, a multi-layered blueprint for fighting global warming unveiled a year ago. The plan is critical to fulfilling U.S. commitments to reduce emissions agreed to at an international forum in Copenhagen in 2009.
It is also key to carving out a legacy for Obama's second term, after the administration was frustrated in its efforts to make progress on other goals such as immigration reform and gun control. Taking strong steps to fight climate change could be the biggest achievement of the last two years of his presidency, administration officials say.
Agency officials have met with over 3,300 people and 300 groups, listening to concerns and complaints from teamsters, utility executives, tribal leaders and several governors about the proposal.
For example, she sought in February to reassure state officials in North Dakota that the change won't impede the state's recent surge in energy production. In Orlando last week, the message for small business owners was that environmental stewardship doesn't diminish economic growth.
"This is such an important part of the president's plan, that we just thought it was appropriate to have an extraordinary level of engagement even before the proposed rule stage," Dan Utech, special assistant to the president for energy and climate change, told Reuters in an interview.
By engaging early and often with detractors and supporters alike, with messages tailored to each, the team led by McCarthy and senior White House adviser John Podesta is seeking to spin more effectively than it did with the troubled Affordable Care Act rollout.
They hope to stay a step ahead of critics by getting feedback up front, rather than waiting until provisional new rules are published, as the EPA normally does. They aim to make the need for the new rules tangible to Americans by linking them to public health and safety. The broader goal of tempering climate change is seen as a lower priority for many voters.
Ahead of November elections in which Democrats fear losing control of the Senate, Obama hopes to stave off inevitable accusations that he has launched a war on coal that would force the closure of plants and a loss of American jobs.
"I think the goal for the administration is to preserve the ability to have a conversation and don't have everyone coming out of the back screaming. That will check an important political box," says Heather Zichal, who was Obama's special adviser on energy and climate until last November.
SWEEPING REFORMS
The regulations, drafted under the rarely-used section 111d of the Clean Air Act, will curb the amount of carbon dioxide the country's power plants spew out and give each state a year to devise a tailored plan for how it will meet the new standards.
The White House has been preparing Americans for the sweeping new rules with an increasingly urgent messaging campaign about the seriousness of climate change.
Earlier this month the White House released a report, the National Climate Assessment, that said effects of global warming had "moved firmly into the present" and had touched every corner of the country. It offered a backdrop of climate catastrophe to justify the need for urgent limits on the power sector.
"Climate change is not just about polar bears, although we all love polar bears...It's about all of us," McCarthy said on a visit to Dr. Phillips High School in Orlando, Florida last week, reported by local media.
She explained to students how Florida and other state governments will play a major role in carrying out the rules and had them perform an experiment in which clean white tube socks were barely soiled when placed on tailpipes of cars and busses built after EPA efficiency standards became effective in 2010.
The mood was more combative a month earlier at Bismarck State College in North Dakota, when EPA's Chief Counsel Joe Goffman spoke to industry and state officials, including the state's Republican Governor Jack Dalrymple.
"We cannot jump to a much higher standard for (carbon dioxide) overnight. It simply is not possible, it's not attainable, and we will fight that with every tool that we have available," said Dalrymple said, according to local WDAZ television.
Goffman tried to assure the crowd that the EPA would ensure its rules offered enough "flexibility" for states to achieve their targets.
OPPOSITION LOOMING
The outreach may do little to prevent corporate groups and energy companies from launching legal and lobbying efforts to fight back at rules they fear may heap more costs on to the coal industry and remove 20 percent of the country's coal-fired electricity from the grid, leaving it vulnerable to shortages.
Some of that resistance is taking a form similar to efforts that nearly derailed Obamacare, with state legislatures and some governors aiming to prevent implementation of the regulation.
The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a group of state lawmakers that promotes limited government and gets funding from companies such as Koch Industries and Peabody Energy, has targeted a dozen state legislatures, including Kentucky and Ohio, to prevent certain states from implementing EPA carbon rules.
"In trying to block federal policy, ALEC has a history - on behalf of its corporate funders - of deliberately establishing legal conflicts to force the issue into federal courts. That is precisely what they did with the ACA," Nick Surgey, research director of Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), a group that monitors ALEC's activities.
ALEC did not respond to several requests for an interview.
Obama's team said it will counter inevitable attacks.
"We're going to be out there aggressively with our positive vision on this, as well as pushing back hard and setting the record straight with respect to some of the attacks that we expect to get from the other side," said Utech.
Afghanistan's hidden gems
Afghanistan has the potential to become one of the most important mining centres in the world.
Emerald citiesOne of the most intriguing examples of this huge unexploited wealth is Afghanistan's emerald industry. There are extraordinarily rich veins of this precious green gemstone running through the Panjshir Valley and the mountains of the Hindu Kush that lie around 150 miles northeast of the capital - stones of a quality to rival the very best available from Colombia and Zambia from where most of the world’s supply currently emanates. But though there is emerald mining in Panjshir, it is on a very small scale and almost tragically inefficient and archaic; a few thousand miners desperate to make a fortune, burrowing into peaks that are 3,000 metres high, with picks, shovels and hand-made explosives. It is slow, back breaking and dangerous work - dozens are killed every year by collapsing tunnels, rockfalls and blasting accidents - and so far it has barely made scratched at the surface. Hamid Nazari, one of the miners who works out of a small tented encampment halfway up the mountainside, explained why they do it: "I work 18 hours a day. I go home once a week. We have to work in very harsh conditions for a pitiful wage. But if we find emeralds, that could change our lives completely. These stones are so valuable that we accept the work. Once we earn some money, we will finally be able to send our children to school in order to educate them. And if we earn lots of money, we can start up a business. For this reason, it's very difficult to give up." The mines, which are unlicensed by the central government in Kabul, are operated under the protection of the Massoud clan, which has long held sway over the area. It’s most famous leader, Ahmad Shah Massooud (or the Lion of Panjshir, as he’s remembered here) achieved fame across Afghanistan for his resistance to the Soviet invasion of the 1980s and then subsequently for taking the fight to the Taliban. Assassinated by al-Qaeda in 2001, Ahmed Shah began developing the precious stones trade to finance his war effort and to buy a few million dollars' worth of arms every year. Since then things have moved on a little; emeralds from Panjshir are now sold for about $150 million a year. But almost all of the stones are smuggled out of the country uncut to Pakistan and India, yielding virtually nothing in terms of tax revenue or extra jobs if they were cut and marketed in Afghanistan before export. International gem industry experts believe that if they were managed properly, the emeralds could be worth five times as much - up to $1bn - and that is before the introduction of new mining methods and technology that could boost production drastically. One of those most keen to see that happen is Raphael Chahboub, a former French soldier. He’s lived in Kabul since 2008. When he first arrived, Raphael was involved in training Afghan security forces, but then he stayed to venture into the emerald trade on behalf of European jewellers and dealers. "The Afghan emerald is renowned as the best in terms of quality…one of the most crystalline, one of the purest," he explained while meeting a Panjshiri trader who had come down to Kabul to show the Frenchman a few samples. But there was a problem - the way the gems were extracted. "It leads to this," he said, holding up a glittering green splinter. "Stones that are completely smashed up." Frustrated by the wasted potential and determined to get his hands on more exceptional stones, Raphael decided to go to Panjshir along with filmmakers Eric De Lavarène and Véronique Mauduy who went with him. After gaining a blessing from the Massoud clan’s representatives in Kabul and dressed in local clothes to keep a low profile, he set off in a car through territory that often sees heavy Taliban activity. "The objective of the trip is to go to the mines, meet the people who work there, forge some links, develop a network... . So you have to travel, to see what's available, and possibly find some truly magnificent samples."
Attack on consulate in Afghanistan: All gunmen killed, Modi talks to Karzai
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Gunmen armed with heavy weapons including rocket propelled grenades on Friday attacked the Indian Consulate in Afghanistan's Herat province during which three attackers were killed, top Indian officials said. However, TV reports further claimed that the fourth gunman has also been killed by the security forces. All the diplomatic staff were safe. Three gunmen were killed, one by ITBP (Indo-Tibetan Border Police) and two by Afghan police, out of four attackers who struck the Consulate which houses two buildings, Indian Ambassador to Afghanistan Amar Sinha said. PM-designate Narendra Modi spoke to Amar Sinha and assured all help. Modi also spoke to Afghan President Hamid Karzai and thanked him for the efforts of Afghan forces in thwarting the attack. In a pre-dawn assault, the gunmen attacked the building which houses the residence of Consulate General, Sinha said, adding that there were nine Indians in the mission apart from local Afghans. One attacker was killed while climbing the wall to enter the premises of the consulate, Sinha said. Meanwhile, a spokesperson in the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi said, "India's Consulate in Herat, Afghanistan attacked. Brave ITBP (Indo-Tibetan Border Police) personnel and Afghan soldiers rebut attackers. All are safe." The spokesperson said that operation is underway. "India-Afghanistan officials (were) in touch on attack on India's Consulate in Herat. Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh (was) monitoring (the) situation," the official said. Afghan police officials earlier said gunmen armed with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades opened fire on the consulate early this morning from a nearby home.'
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack. Afghanistan has experienced a rise in the Taliban attacks as foreign troops plan to withdraw from the war-torn country by the end of the year. In August last year, a failed bombing against the Indian Consulate in Jalalabad city near the border with Pakistan killed nine people, including six children. No Indian officials were hurt. The Indian Embassy in Kabul was attacked twice in 2008 and 2009 that left 75 people dead.
India has invested in some major infrastructure projects in Afghanistan like Salma hydroelectric dam in Herat province and the Afghan parliament building in Kabul. India's development assistance programme for Afghanistan currently stands at USD two billion, making it the leading donor nation among all regional countries.
Pakistan: Black days
Not just for the Jang Group and Geo but for the country as a whole this should be a terrifying situation reflecting how our affairs are actually run by persons who pull invisible strings. Ninety percent of the country is being denied access to the most popular television station without any legal authority. The Pemra ‘meeting’ that supposedly led cable operators to take Geo off the air was a complete farce, with only three members attending and that too not at the Pemra office. Geo’s persecution began the very day Hamid Mir was shot. Apparently airing the views of a man on who he thinks is most likely to target him is not newsworthy and tantamount to treason. The pressure started with cable operators being forced to move the position of Geo on cable networks. Soon Geo wasn’t being shown nor were Jang Group newspapers allowed into cantonments. The defence ministry was browbeaten into sending a complaint against Geo to Pemra. Then the threats and intimidation began. Employees of the group no longer feel safe identifying themselves as such and are being harassed on their way to and from work. The most powerful institution in the country has decided to put all its force, whether legal or extra-legal, behind this assault on a media organisation. Our troops put their lives at risk daily to protect this country and the liberty we enjoy; yet the leadership seems more concerned with fighting a petty vendetta.
Journalists around the country have been protesting what is an illegal act against a channel in any way they can. Punjab Assembly proceedings have been boycotted, statements issued and protests staged. But there is every indication the forces we see unleashed will continue to do what they can. Some media organisations, perhaps sensing an opportunity to supplant the most popular news station in the country, have offered themselves up to act as a conduit for the moves against the Jang Group. Given the precarious situation in which journalists in the country find themselves, airing false accusations against those in the media is essentially putting a bounty on their heads. The civilian government, already embroiled in tussles with the military over issues like the Pervez Musharraf trial, has been circumspect but is understood by some to be quietly supportive. It now may be time for Nawaz Sharif to take a stand. He could begin by firing members of Pemra who appear to be taking marching orders from non-professional sources and are illegally trying to shut Geo down. A stirring defence of media freedom may also be in order. In a democracy, for a channel to be strangulated in this manner – through cable operators who are themselves of course vulnerable to coercive power – is a very serious matter. It removes the right to access information enshrined in our constitution and snatches away from people their basic right to choose. All the gains from the battle against Musharraf’s repression in 2007 could be lost if Geo is cast aside and allowed to drown. This fight is about more than one news channel. The right of the media to operate freely is at stake.
Pakistan: Nawaz’s 14 foreign tours cost nation Rs 259m
http://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/A sum of Rs259 million was spent on Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s 14 foreign visits undertaken in the last 12 months, a private news channel reported. Sources in the Foreign Office said that a staggering amount of Rs259 million spent on foreign tours in just a year is kind of a record itself. On an average each tour cost the national exchequer around Rs20 million. Official documents revealed that PM’s most expensive tour was to the United Nations last year during which Rs87 million were spent while the cheapest tour costing Rs1.2 million was to the neighboring Afghanistan. As per other details available two visits each to China, UK and Turkey cost the nation Rs41.9 million, Rs50.4 million and Rs9.6 million respectively while single tour to Iran, Thailand, Sri Lanka and Netherlands put burden of Rs4.8 million, Rs9.7 million, Rs10.2 million and Rs10.46 million respectively.
Pakistan: New polio case from FR Bannu takes countrywide total to 67
A new case of polio emerged from (FR) Bannu on Friday bringing the total number of countrywide affected children to 67, Express News reported.
The seven-year-old victim hadn’t been immunised against the disease. Of all the cases reported from the Federally Administered Tribal Areas this year, none of the children were administered the oral polio vaccine.
Pakistan is one of the three countries where polio is still endemic.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) recently slapped Pakistan with an embarrassing penalty, forcing would-be travellers from the country to obtain proof of inoculation against the disease.
The lawmakers – reacting to the global fallout of this domestic threat – had also passed a resolution calling for the implementation of polio immunisation programme (EPI).
Pakistan: Wattoo criticizes Nawaz's new BMW
Punjab PPP President Mian Manzoor Ahmed Wattoo said purchase of two new bullet proof BMW vehicles for the VVIP is a clear justification of government’s insincerity with the public. He pointed out that the purchase of the vehicles was at public expense. In a country where 54 percent people are leading their lives below the poverty line and about 30 percent are acutely food insecure, such expenditures are out of question, he added. He mentioned that the despicable aspect of this purchase was that the cabinet pool had sufficient number of bullet proof vehicles for the VVIP duties.
Pakistan: The CII is at it again
Members of Pakistan's Council of Islamic Ideology r ignorant,illiterate mullahs,will be better to dissolve this council of ignorant mullahs.The lengths to which Pakistan will go to tolerate the likes of the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) are mindboggling indeed. After the initial verdict passed by the CII in late March this year on how setting the minimum age for marriage is un-Islamic and how men need not take the permission of their existing wife to remarry, as stated in the Family Law Ordinance of 1961, the advisory body is back to endorse these two positions in fresh statements, reiterating that it has not forgotten about these matters. Maulana Mohammad Khan Sherani, chairing the latest meeting of the CII has once again stated that Islam does not prohibit child marriages and that polygamy does not require the permission of one’s first wife. He has asked for a repeal of the country’s marriage laws, bringing into the spotlight once again just how ridiculous the CII’s obsession has become with issues of little worth in today’s world. The CII has always worked in an advisory capacity and does not have any legislative powers — thank the Lord for small mercies. However, by repeating these issues time and again, it seems the CII is hell bent on amassing more power for itself. That is why it is so very important to disband this body, which has now become a council deliberating on matters that hold little relevance in this day and age. We are a country mired in terrorism, sectarian warfare and, now, a polio emergency. Instead of talking about such fundamental issues, the CII has found it indispensible to talk about marrying off young children and making life easier for those men who choose to indulge in more than one marriage at a time. Child marriages have been proved as being detrimental to female reproductive health as well as being one of the main reasons behind extreme psychological harm. What are the maulana and his band of merry brothers trying to do? Send us back to the Stone Age? The world has come so far now in moving beyond these issues that to hear of our religious advisory council speak of them only serves to remind us that this antediluvian body must be done away with. We have too much intolerance and ideology-based hate in our society already. We hardly need to add to the plethora of religion-based ‘edicts’. The government must not allow the CII to carry on with its campaign against the country’s laws, laws that protect the family structure and keep us from becoming a laughing stock the world over.
Pakistan: A surprise entry of Sikhs inside parliament
Sikh community demands protection in all over Pakistan *Minority representatives record protest against alleged desecration of their holy book in Sindh
Dozens of people belonging to Sikh community entered the Parliament House premises in protest against what they called desecration of their holy book in Sindh.
Leaders of the Sikh community stated that multiple incidents of desecration of their holy book have taken place in Sindh over the past few weeks but the federal or the provincial governments were not taking any notice to arrest the culprits.
The protestors, carrying placards and banners and chanting slogans against the incident, made a surprise entry into the Parliament House premises, leaving police guessing about why and from where the protestors barged in.
Crossing all barricades, the protestors first entered the Parliament House parking and later the building premises, prompting police to fire tear-gas shells, but to no avail. The Sikh community men got hold of a small stage set up for the parliamentarian to talk to media persons.
Few of them spoke from the rostrum and hurriedly narrated the incident. They vowed not to evacuate the Parliament House premises unless higher authorities come to hear them and fulfill their demands. Representatives of the Sikh community also called for the protection in Sindh and other town of Pakistan.
Pakistan: PPP not in favour of restrictions on freedom of expression
http://mediacellppp.wordpress.com/
Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Syed Khurshid Shah has said that the Pakistan People’s Party is not in favour of any restriction on freedom of expression. Speaking to media after meeting senior Geo News anchor Hamid Mir, the PPP stalwart said that all the institutions should work within their limits. He said that media infighting was harmful for the democracy and journalism. Shah visited Hamid Mir’s residence to inquire about his health.
Pakistan's Irrelevant CII
IT would be regrettable under any circumstances but in the case of Pakistan, a deeply religious society, it is especially so: behind many of the most serious fissures and conflicts threatening the country lies either religion or contested versions of it. From the violence visited on members of minority beliefs to the scourge of sectarianism that relentlessly draws more and more lives into its gaping maw, to the outlawed TTP whose fight with the state is bound up inextricably with the militant group’s own version of Sharia, matters of faith have led Pakistan into dangerous waters. Areas as basic and as essential to a society’s health as the vaccination of children against polio and the need for girls’ education have become contested issues. The mere allegation of blasphemy has become enough to provoke a lynch mob; even providing legal assistance in such a case has proved a death sentence. No target has been considered too sacred: mosques, churches, shrines and other places of worship, funeral and mourning processions, emergency wards and school assemblies. Never has it been clearer that if the country is ever to lead itself into the light, urgent efforts need to be made to counter the hate spread in the name of religion.
The Council of Islamic Ideology is meant to advise on matters of religion. The natural expectation would be that these would be the issues — of life and death — that would be exercising the minds of the forum’s members. Yet, sweeping aside all these and more, the CII in its wisdom gave on Wednesday its opinion on an issue it clearly considers much more pressing: that underage marriage is permissible for young girls, and that most of the clauses of the Muslim Marriage Law, 1961, are un-Islamic.
Leave aside for the moment the awful repercussions this has for children’s rights, women’s rights and indeed for the basic norms of civilisation in a country where child marriages and forced unions have proved to be an indelible stain. Leave aside the signals such a pronouncement gives of being determined to drag the country towards obscurantism. Consider, instead, how it reflects on the relevance of the CII itself, which exposes itself — yet again — as a hopelessly out-of-touch forum, either unaware or uncaring of the horrifying realities that the people of this country face. Given that this is apparently the best it can do, is it not better to save the government’s resources and divert them to other, more fruitful avenues? Why is there even the need for such a council when an elected parliament is in place, which is in itself perfectly capable of deciding what the law should be? In March, the Sindh Assembly passed a resolution demanding the dissolution of the CII. It was not off the mark.
Pakistan: North Waziristan attacks
HIDEOUTS attacked, militants killed, damage inflicted — at least that is the official military version of events in North Waziristan Agency. As with any conflict zone, independent reporting is difficult and immediately ascertaining the facts nearly impossible. But a disturbing pattern is emerging in the latest phase of the struggle to try and tamp down militancy in Fata. When retaliation for attacks against the security forces occurs, the claims of success are not just unverifiable in the immediate aftermath, they are not verified even later. As with earlier retaliations, the military seems to be focusing on the overlap between foreign militants and hardline local militants. But while the number of dead militants is always announced with a degree of satisfaction, there is never any visual or factual evidence of the claims made. If this time it was the East Turkestan Independence Movement that reportedly bore the brunt of the attacks, previously it was alleged to be Uzbek militants. But neither then, nor this time is there any evidence to back up the claims. Often, there are not even names. Meanwhile, the human ‘collateral damage’ does come into view quickly enough with civilian casualties appearing in local clinics or before the cameras.
More problematically, what do these retaliations achieve? As has happened over the past couple of days in North Waziristan, even when the military conducts search-and-clear operations, an opportunity is given beforehand for the local population to leave. Surely, most of the militants melt away in the crowd or through other routes. Thereafter, the army tends to blow up homes and buildings associated with militants — leaving physical scars when the population does return. And what of the militants themselves, the bulk of whom leave for other areas? That simply means another retaliation somewhere else is effectively already on the table. If the military’s latest ad hocism in Fata is partly because of the government’s insistence on dialogue being the preferred path, what is happening on the talks front? Surely, this dual policy of allowing the military to retaliate when directly attacked while the civilians try to pursue dialogue with the outlawed TTP is good for neither the military option nor the dialogue one. But can the army and civilians arrive at a more coherent policy?
Pakistan:Bombing in North Waziristan: 4 suspected militants killed
http://tribune.com.pk/Gunship helicopter and jet planes bombed hideouts of suspected militants in North Waziristan on Friday, killing four and injuring three others, Express News reported. The strikes targeted hideouts in Miranshah, Machis Camp and Mir Ali Bazaar areas of the tribal agency. “Security forces fired mortar shells from Miranshah fort on the adjacent areas of Machis camp, Kharwani and Sukhail Wazir Friday morning, followed by pounding suspected militant hideouts with gunship helicopters,” an intelligence official based in Miranshah told AFP. The official said four suspected militants were killed and later security forces carried out a door to door search, arresting five others. In the latest offensive, which started on May 21, at least 74 suspected militants have been killed in the air strikes and ground fighting in North Waziristan. A curfew has been imposed in these areas for the past three days. On Wednesday, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) issued a statement saying, over the past few weeks, a “large number of civilians and security personnel have embraced shahadat due to various terrorist acts, including IED blasts and suicide attacks in Fata, K-P and Karachi.” The ISPR stated that intelligence reports and other investigations confirmed links of these terrorist acts with the terrorists targeted.
The EFF Blasts Twitter For Censoring Itself In Russia And Pakistan
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) today upbraided Twitter for censoring itself in Russia and Pakistan, stating that the company has stepped “down from the free speech party.”
The EFF’s argument is simple: Twitter’s decision to censor content on a country-by-country basis was the “least terrible option” available to it, provided that it only did so when the company was “compelled” by a court order in a country where the company has “significant assets or employees.”
In the case of Russia and Pakistan, where local censorship is now instituted by the company, Twitter does not have sufficient local presence to make presented court orders meaningful in the eyes of the EFF.
This makes the censorship in Russia (of a Ukrainian political account) and Pakistan (where takedown requests have ranged from porn to blasphemy) unreasonable according to the EFF, because Twitter’s lack of a local presence precludes it from the behest of the requests.
The EFF is blunt in its assessment of the company’s actions. Regarding the case of censorship in Russia: “If Twitter won’t stand up for political speech in a country where independent media is increasingly under attack, what will it stand for?” And Pakistan: “As disappointing as it is to see Twitter cave in response to pressure from the Russian government, it is even more alarming to see Twitter comply with Pakistani requests based on what ["Pakistani advocacy group"] Bolo Bhi describes ‘little in the way of due process.’”
For Twitter, a service that has done much good around the world by helping to unite protestors and allowing for rapid dissemination of information including dissent, to crack down on its regular users at the non-binding behest of repressive governments is disappointing.
There is a bitter irony of Russia censoring a Ukrainian political account, given that recent Ukrainian protests that drew Russian ire and later incursion used Twitter to organize.
TechCrunch has reached out to Twitter for comment on the presented criticisms.
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Behind Xinjiang attack, glimpse into China’s growing terror problem
http://www.thehindu.com/Xinjiang, a mineral-rich desert "autonomous region", has seen a history of ethnic tensions between the native Uighur Muslims and majority Han Chinese migrants. Thursday’s bomb blast targeting a market in China’s western Muslim-majority Xinjiang region, which left at least 31 people killed and 94 injured, was only the latest of a series of daring and brazen attacks by Islamist groups that are, according to analysts in Beijing, demonstrating increasing willingness and capabilities to carry out high-profile attacks in major cities. Thursday’s incident follows three attacks on railway stations since March 2014, which left more than 30 people killed and several hundred injured. On March 1, at least 29 people were killed when a group of apparently trained assailants, armed with long knives, attacked passengers in Kunming railway station, in southwestern Yunnan Province. The Kunming attack was blamed by authorities on Uighur extremist groups, who are campaigning for independence in Muslim-majority Xinjiang. Xinjiang, a mineral-rich desert “autonomous region” that borders Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and Central Asia has seen a history of ethnic tensions between the native Uighur Muslims and majority Han Chinese migrants since it came into the People’s Republic of China’s fold six decades ago. Intermittent ethnic riots have broken out every few years. In 2009, at least 197 people were killed and more than a thousand injured as Uighur and Han clashed in Urumqi. While China has long blamed Uighur separatist groups for fomenting unrest, many Uighurs have pointed to rising disparities and restrictions on religion as fuelling anger and ethnic distrust. What has dramatically changed in recent months, according to Pan Zhiping, a terrorism expert at the government-run Xinjiang Academy of Social Sciences in Urumqi, is that some Uighur extremist groups have decided to take their fight outside of Xinjiang, targeting Chinese cities. In October 2013, three Uighurs drove a explosive-laden vehicle into a crowd of tourists in the heart of Beijing — right on Tiananmen Square — killing two tourists. The Kunming attack, according to Mr. Pan, also showed an altogether new level of organisation: eight attackers appeared well trained, he said, and by carrying out an attack in far-away Yunnan province demonstrated increased capabilities. The timing of the spurt in attacks, and what has suddenly emboldened and enabled groups, is unclear. Chinese officials have blamed Uighur groups operating overseas for leading the attacks. Some officials believe leaders of the banned East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) are hiding out in Pakistan, near the Afghan border. On Thursday, visiting Pakistan President Mamnoon Hussain, in Shanghai for a regional security summit, in strong terms pledged support to China and “combat the terrorists”, describing the ETIM as “a common enemy of Pakistan and China”.
US Panel Urges Stronger Stand Against Religious Freedom Violators
http://www.voanews.com/A bipartisan U.S. government panel on Thursday urged the State Department to double the number of countries named as severe violators of religious freedom. The chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, Robert George, testified before a House subcommittee on Foreign Affairs. He said it had been eight years since the State Department added, or removed, a country from its list of so-called Countries of Particular Concern on religious liberty, or CPCs. “We’re concerned that the designations that have been made in the past simply become, in the words of our vice chairman Katrina Lantos Swett, the great human rights champion, 'part of the wallpaper' that nobody pays attention to,” he said. There are now eight states designated as CPCs in the State Department’s annual International Religious Freedom Report, including Sudan and Saudi Arabia. George said recent events warrant the addition of another eight, including Pakistan and Syria. Critics say naming and shaming violators can complicate diplomacy aimed at improving conditions for religious liberty. George disagreed. He said, “The designation process and the possibility of punitive actions can breathe new life into diplomatic efforts, that should both precede and follow the designation, and stimulate political will in foreign capitals.” George also told lawmakers he is concerned because the State Department’s post of ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom has been vacant since October. The Commission on International Religious Freedom includes members of the three main Abrahamic faiths. But it has been criticized for being more concerned with persecution against Christians than people of other religions. A day before the hearing, the commission condemned a bill in the Turkish parliament to turn the Hagia Sophia Museum in Istanbul - which has been both a Christian and Muslim place of worship - back into a mosque
US condemns declaration of Thai army coup d’état
THE IRISH TIMESThailand’s army chief, general Prayuth Chan-ocha, seized control of the government in a coup today, two days after declaring martial law, saying the military had to restore order and push through reforms after six months of turmoil. The military declared a 10pm until 5am curfew, suspended the constitution and detained some politicians. It later summoned former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra and 22 others, including relatives and ministers in her ousted government. Rival protest camps were ordered to disperse and media censored. There were no reports of violence. US secretary of state John Kerry said there was no justification for a coup, which would have “negative implications” for ties. The United States was reviewing its military and other assistance, “consistent with US law”. Thailand is locked in a protracted power struggle between supporters of ousted former premier Thaksin Shinawatra and opponents backed by the royalist establishment that has polarised the country and battered its economy. “In order for the situation to return to normal quickly and for society to love and be at peace again ... and to reform the political, economic and social structure, the military needs to take control of power,” Mr Prayuth said in a televised address. The general made his broadcast after a meeting to which he had summoned the rival factions, with the aim of finding a compromise to defuse anti-government protests. But no progress was made and Mr Prayuth wound up the gathering by announcing he was seizing power, according to a participant. The Thai armed forces have a long history of intervening in politics - there have been 18 previous successful or attempted coups since Thailand became a constitutional monarchy in 1932, most recently when Mr Thaksin was deposed in 2006. Hundreds of soldiers surrounded the meeting at Bangkok’s Army Club shortly before the coup announcement and troops took away Suthep Thaugsuban, leader of the anti-government protests. Some political party leaders were also detained, witnesses said. Mr Prayuth, who has for months been trying to keep the army out of the political confrontation, assumed the powers of the prime minister. Shots fired Soldiers fired shots into the air to disperse thousands of pro-government “red shirt” activists gathered in Bangkok’s western outskirts. The military detained one of the leading activists, a spokesman for the group said, and the protesters later left peacefully, many of them in vehicles provided by the military. The army also ordered television and radio stations to halt programmes and broadcast its material, and banned gatherings of more than five people. It said it would block websites that spread false information or incited unrest. The army had declared martial law on Tuesday, saying it was necessary to prevent violence. Twenty-eight people have been killed and 700 injured since the anti-government protests erupted late last year.
Video: US Navy turns seawater into fuel
The US Navy is turning seawater into fuel. Scientists at the US Naval Research Lab have been able to extract CO2 and hydrogen from the ocean and repackage it in a form of fuel that could one day power the Navy's fleet.
Russia, China veto U.N. bid to refer Syria to International Criminal Court
A United Nations Security Council resolution referring the Syrian War to the International Criminal Court fails to pass after veto votes by Russia and China.
Global Geopolitics and the Russia-China “Gas Deal of The Century”
By Ulson Gunnar
Russian energy giant Gazprom’s 30 year, 400 billion dollar gas deal with China is set to impact global geopolitics in many profound ways. To understand the future impact of the deal, it is important first to understand the geopolitical conditions that face both Russia and China today that helped seal it.
The Russian Imperative
For Russia, diversifying its markets away from the European Union is of vital importance. Persistent economic decline is effecting demand, while special interests within the EU have become increasing belligerent toward Russia as the supranational conglomerate seeks to expand into Russia’s traditional spheres of influence. The EU and NATO’s insistence on continued eastward expansion, “integrating” nations along Russia’ peripheries, is now clearly aimed at the encirclement of Russia proper. The current crisis in Ukraine, and the brief conflict of 2008 on the Russian-Georgian border are both direct results of this expansion. US and EU sanctions aimed at Russia, and Russia’s response by leveraging the EU’s dependence on its natural gas have reminded both of this vulnerable interdependencies.
For Russia, it will be difficult to find another market in which to sell the 160 billion cubic meters of natural gas it exported to Europe last year. The new deal with China is expected to begin at 38 billion cubic meters of gas per year, or about a quarter of what it exports to Europe. Additional pipelines are in the works, and the amount of gas routed to China can surely be expanded to meet future demand.
While the new deal will not be a substitute for European markets, the ability for Russia to shut off 40 billion cubic meters of gas to the EU may become a persuasive bargaining chip, one US shale gas will be unable to compensate for well into the foreseeable future, if ever.
The new deal will take effect in 2018, so may not immediately compensate for US-EU sanctions leveled against Russia in the latest Ukraine row. However, many of these sanctions have had either disappointing effects, or have all together failed to bite. Sanctions aimed at Russia’s aerospace industry for instance, fell flat, both because Russia is indispensable to the United States (its astronauts entirely depend on Russian launch systems) and Western alternatives are years from implementation. By the time these sanctions do begin to bite, Russian gas will be flowing into China, and Chinese capital will be flowing into Russia’s economy.
The Chinese ImperativeFor China, its immense population has likewise immense energy requirements. As the world’s largest oil importer, its sources in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) require a long and vulnerable logistical line known to many geopolitical analysts and policy planners as China’s String of Pearls. The United States, in a bid to reassert itself in the Pacific and maintain both regional and global hegemony, has committed to years of disrupting China’s oil lifeline and in theory, strangle China’s growth. The US has sown chaos across MENA and attempted to carve off the entire Pakistani province of Baluchistan. This is an attempt to disrupt China’s plans to establish a port in Gwadar to receive Middle Eastern oil, and a pipeline across Pakistani territory into China to deliver it to Chinese markets. Similar meddling is taking place in Myanmar to disrupt a Chinese port and planned pipeline in Rakhine state. While coal accounts for most of China’s energy production, with oil coming in second, China is planning to replace these and other hydrocarbon sources with natural gas in the near future. When Russian gas begins flowing into China, not only will it allow for the expansion of markets where it is currently being used, but will enable China to begin reducing its dependency on oil via its long, vulnerable logistical lines from MENA, and coal it is now beginning to import in greater quantities from Australia.
The Net ImpactBeginning in 2018, Russia will have an alternative market in China for its natural gas that will grow steadily and perhaps even eclipse its current markets in Europe. This will allow Russia to better counter attempts by the EU and NATO to expand into its traditional spheres of influence, and prevent the geopolitical encirclement of its territory by the West. With Russia’s pipelines in the east running through relatively stable regions of its territory directly into China, vulnerabilities such as US-backed terrorism (as is present in Russia’s Caucasus region) and US-EU destabilization in countries through which Russian gas must move through in the west, will be nonexistent, providing a stable and reliable source of economic growth for decades to come. China likewise will benefit from the proximity within which Russian gas will be delivered. US-backed separatists in China’s western provinces, and attempts to destabilize nations in which China’s logistical infrastructure must be located to ensure the steady flow of oil to its markets will have no effect on this new and expanding source of energy. The net impact is the circumvention of decades of geopolitical maneuvering, alliances, and conflicts the US, UK, and EU have bled themselves dry in terms of resources and political legitimacy arraying against Russia and China. Through a direct energy partnership that will pave the way for future expansion, both Russia and China are hedging risks they face due to a dependency on both direct dealings with the West, and in regions the West is able to project military, economic, and political influence upon. In the short-term, the significance of the deal will be primarily political, rendering US-EU sanctions leveled against Russia that will take years to bite, virtually moot and thus meaningless amid the current crisis in Ukraine. EU member states will begin entering Russia’s impending leverage into their calculus when considering how much support politically and materially to lend Washington, London, and Brussels in their support of pro-Western Kiev. For China, the deal will confound America’s current “pivot to Asia” strategy of encircling and containing China, as Beijing opens up energy corridors immune to Washington’s meddling. Finally, Russia and China’s constructive energy partnership, concluded without territorial, economic, or legal integration, will lend further credibility toward a future multipolar global order, while simultaneously exposing the shortcomings, even follies, of the West’s unipolar system of pursuing hegemony through costly and ultimately unsustainable global integration.
China's Gas Deal with Russia Could Benefit Rest of Asia
By SIMON HALL
Vast Siberia Fields Expected to Produce Enough Cheap Fuel for Other Countries, Put Pressure on Other Development ProjectsRussia's $400 billion gas deal with China may pave the way for cheaper energy for the rest of Asia and put in question the viability of future gas developments around the world. By committing to the 30-year accord, Beijing will help finance the development of two vast gas fields in Eastern Siberia. While much of that output will go to China, there will still be plenty of relatively cheap gas left over that Russia plans to pipe to the Pacific coast near Vladivostok and ship as liquefied natural gas to elsewhere in Asia. That will put downward pressure on energy prices in the region and avoid Russia becoming too reliant on China. Russia made a similar maneuver several years back when it built a crude-oil pipeline to the Pacific with a spur pipeline into China.
While good news for buyers, lower prices are a potential threat for developers of other multibillion-dollar gas projects being planned that also target Asian markets, which need to decide soon if this new supply could lose them customers and impact their profits.The significance so far of the deal is mostly political given the boost it provides to Russian President Vladimir Putin as his relations with the West sour. It remains to be seen what the deal will do to prices, but that will be crucial in determining the impact on other suppliers, many of whom are already experiencing cost overruns. The agreement "will have profound impacts on multiple fronts including political relationships among China, Russia, Europe and the U.S., domestic gas market in China, and [the] LNG market in Asia," said analysts at Bernstein Research in Hong Kong. Higher-cost LNG projects "will be less likely to be developed." Developing sites capable of producing gas can costs tens of billions of dollars and take years to bring online, leaving their backers vulnerable to sudden changes in the market, like the recent China-Russia deal or the unlocking of shale gas reserves in North America. Some in Australia have already been hit by big cost overruns, including projects backed by Chevron Corp. CVX -0.25% , ConocoPhillips, COP +0.06% Total SA FP.FR -0.15% and BG Group PLC. Others like those planned offshore Mozambique by Anadarko Petroleum Corp. APC +1.04% and Italy's Eni ENI.MI 0.00% SpA are awaiting a final go-ahead. While the Russia deal and development of China's own shale reserves and offshore gas deposits may put some projects at risk, producers say things aren't that bad. Peter Coleman, chief executive of Woodside Petroleum Ltd., Australia's biggest exporter of natural gas by volume, said Thursday that despite the Russia agreement, China will still need a lot of gas from various supply sources. "China's growth is coming off such a small base at the moment," he said. "It's got a lot of headroom in it." The Russian gas isn't expected to reach China for at least four years, and by the end of the decade will amount to around 10% of China's supply. Others say China will also still need to have a variety of energy importers given the sometimes tense relations between countries that can lead to trade disruptions. Another potential major source of gas to China and Asia is Canada, where more than a dozen LNG export projects are planned. State-owned Chinese companies are heavily invested in some of the larger ones, including the Kitimat venture and one spearheaded by Malaysia's Petronas. "I don't think there's a country in the world that today wants to depend on Russia as their sole supplier of natural gas," said Christy Clark, premier of Canada's gas-rich British Columbia province. "Providing the assurance that we are not going to play politics with energy—I think that's worth a lot to our potential partners out there, I think especially China." Just how much China will pay Russia isn't clear, but Barclays BARC.LN +0.74% analysts say it could be around $350 per million standard cubic meters, making it slightly cheaper for Chinese consumers than imported gas from the existing Turkmenistan-China Central Asia pipeline, but more significantly, around 40% below the cost of LNG brought in by sea. Asia's LNG spot price is currently around $13.7 per million metric British thermal units, compared with a U.S. Henry Hub price of $4.5 per mmBtu and $7.7 per mmBtu in the U.K.
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303749904579577603779204922?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702303749904579577603779204922.html
China: Unity vital for fighting violent terrorism
A serious violent terrorist attack happened in a morning market in Urumqi, the capital city of western China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, on Thursday. Two cars without license plates ploughed into busy crowds and then tossed explosives, killing 31 and injuring 94. The malicious incident has solicited a new round of shocks to public opinion.
The massive knife attack at Kunming railway station early March and the suicide bomb attack at Urumqi South train station make this incident all the more prominent. Chinese people are increasingly aware of and concerned about terrorist attacks.
Violent terrorism haunting Xinjiang has become more ferocious and obstinate than we expected and it is becoming a chronic challenge to our social governance. The causes of the terrorist attacks are perhaps so complicated and profound as to go beyond our traditional view.
We lack experience in cracking down on violent terrorism in today's highly open era. However, unity and action constitute the basic experience we need.
Unity means, first and foremost, we should accept the fact that we are living in an unfortunate stage mired by violent terrorism in China. Therefore, we need to add "anti-terrorist" elements to our life by making some adjustments. Though policy errors in the course of history partly contributed to the current plight, we must impede complaints and criticism from shaping public opinions on Xinjiang.
Catalysts for violent terrorism in China have spread, so we need to keep sober-minded. No matter how we adjust relevant policies and how many measures we take, we cannot ensure they will take immediate effects. If we are too impatient, we may flounder, doubt everything and finally lose confidence, thus leading to escalated chaos in ideology as well as social governance.
Amid the smooth decades of reform and opening up, most of the crises we have undergone were temporary and hence the spasmodic protracted conundrum of violent terrorism is quite strange to us.
Looking around the world, extremism notably separatism has resulted in countless tragedies such as state disintegration, civil war and mass genocide. Effective policies for intractable ethnic issues are difficult to find in Western countries as well.
Beset by violent terrorism in Xinjiang, we should clearly see it's an overall challenge to public security instead of "ethnic conflict" in a universal sense. Terrorists are a common enemy of all the Chinese people including Xinjiang residents.
It has been proved that governing Xinjiang is not an easy task and we should advance with the times and find major contradictions at present. We should give full play to the strong aspiration of the Uyghur people for sustained peace and a better life. They should play a major role in fighting violent terrorists who are just a handful of separatists.
China: President Xi vows severe punishment for terrorists
Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged to severely punish terrorists and spare no efforts in maintaining stability in response to Thursday morning's fatal explosions in Urumqi.
Police will step up patrols and security control over possible terrorist targets and prevent ripple effects, said Xi in a statement.
Xi asked local authorities to solve the case fast, put the injured under proper care and offer condolences to families of the victims.
The Chinese government will continue to work hard in fighting terrorism and try its best to safeguard social stability, he said.
The explosions,which hit an open air market in Urumqi, capital of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, have left 31 dead and more than 90 injured.
A working group led by Minister of Public Security Guo Shengkun has left for Xinjiang to supervise the investigation and handle the aftermath.
So far all injured people have been sent to hospitals and police are pushing through the investigation, authorities said.
‘Arab Spring opened a Pandora's box of extreme Islamism’
The military rebellion that took place in Libya recently, planned and led by former general, Khalifa Hiftar, involved an assault on the nation’s parliament in Tripoli and on an Islamist organisation in Benghazi.
Hiftar, who defected to the US in the 1980s before returning to Libya to participate in the NATO-driven assault on the former Libyan leader and his government, has pledged to fight Islamist militants in Libya, who currently exert a major influence over the country’s fragile government.
Hiftar’s emergence at the head of a coalition of ex-Libyan army personnel and sympathetic tribal forces, in a country reduced to chaos after NATO’s military campaign led to Gaddafi’s downfall in 2011, is further evidence of a gathering backlash against Islamism and religious extremism throughout the Arab world. This wave of Islamist violence and terror has turned out to be the major beneficiary of the wave of uprisings which swept through the region starting in late 2010 and which came to be known as the Arab Spring.
Sadly, what began as a spontaneous mass movement of people no longer willing to exist within the stifling constraints imposed on their lives and aspirations by autocracy, having done so for decades, turned in on itself when its political and popular tide ran out in Libya and the West intervened to co-opt it as a proxy to advance its own geopolitical and regional agenda.
The consequent chaos and destabilization wrought in Libya, and later Syria, created a political vacuum that was filled by the forces of reaction, otherwise known as Sunni fundamentalism. The proliferation of this malignant ideology on the back of the Arab Spring has been a disastrous development for the region, plunging it into an abyss of sectarian and communal conflict in Iraq, Libya, and Syria, while growing in Africa and attracting more and more young Muslim men into its ranks across the world.
Many witnessing its growing influence over the past few years had considered its spread as further confirmation of the death of Arab nationalism as a counter hegemonic political force in the region; its high tide in the 1950s and 1960s responsible for spurring its economic and social development. A variety of factors resulted in the decline of Arab nationalism through succeeding decades, however, not least of which was the West’s success in blunting its potency, either via the use of proxies, such as Israel, or directly via the projection of military and economic power.
Dark chapters
To get an idea of what the Arab world would look like under the iron heel of Islamism, you only have to consider the tragedy to befall Afghanistan. In the sixties and seventies, Afghanistan benefited from the influence of Soviet-style planned economic development. The state control of economic development was a key factor in the success of the modernising governments that peppered the Arab world in the same period, involving the use of the region’s vast oil wealth to invest heavily in infrastructure, education, and industry. In Afghanistan secularism, women’s rights, education, freedom of religion, and modernity had created an urban society to compare with any when it came to modernity.
But, then, in response to a campaign waged by the Afghan government to extend the modernising reforms to the countryside, a campaign that involved an attempt to break the power of local Mullahs and clerics, a resistance movement began. Soon it attracted the support of the West, seizing the opportunity to undermine a Soviet ally, and soon became a cause celebre for Islamists throughout the world, descending on the country to wreak havoc.
The fate of Afghanistan after a bitter conflict lasting years is one that we are by now familiar with. What is important for us to understand today is that it is the same fate that awaits those nations across the Middle East which currently find themselves the subject of similar campaigns of Islamist terror – specifically Libya, Syria, and Iraq.
But, increasingly, the backlash created provides the region with hope of a resurgence of something approaching the Arab nationalism that once acted as a lynchpin and unifying political force, capable of bringing Sunnis, Shiites, Christians and every Arab minority under the same umbrella.
While the Syrian people and government remain locked in a brutal struggle with an invasion of Sunni fundamentalists intent on turning the country into a graveyard, in Egypt the Muslim Brotherhood’s rise on the back of the country’s first democratic elections since the toppling of the Mubarak dictatorship led straight to their demise. Millions of Egyptians poured back out onto the streets in late June-early July 2013, fearful of the direction which former president, Mohamed Morsi, and the Brotherhood were taking the country in. Events in Syria and Libya were clearly a prime factor in the determination and size of these protests, revealing the abiding suspicion of the Muslim Brotherhood’s intentions in a society with strong secular and liberal traditions.
Step forward the Egyptian armed forces, led by their commander-in-chief, Abdul Fattah el-Sisi.
Sisi’s intervention and forced removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, followed by the army’s ruthless suppression of the Muslim Brotherhood in conjunction with the mass arrest of its leadership and supporters in the aftermath, has been popularly supported in Egypt. Likewise, Bashar al-Assad and the Syrian Arab Army still enjoy popular support in Syria after three years of merciless violence has decimated large swathes of that country.
Increasingly, and in some cases at huge cost, Sunni fundamentalism and extremism is being resisted across the Arab world. Speed the day when it is reduced to nothing more than a dark chapter in the region’s history.
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