Current Affairs

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Pakistan violates ceasefire again

JAMMU: Violating the ceasefire again, Pakistani troops fired with small arms at two forward areas in Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir, drawing retaliation from Indian forces.

"There was small arms firing by Pakistan army on Indian forward posts in two sub-sectors along the line of control (LoC) in Poonch district from Monday night," defence spokesman SN Acharya said on Tuesday.

A Pakistani judicial commission's visit to India to cross-examine witnesses of the Mumbai terror attacks has been delayed because of the 10-day Ganesh Chaturthi festival, a defence lawyer said on Tuesday. "The Indian government informed us that the visit (planned for) tomorrow cannot take place due to Ganesh Chaturthi as the courts (in Mumbai) are closed," lawyer Riaz Akram Cheema said.

KABUL: A bus that took a detour to avoid one roadside bomb instead hit another in the central province of Ghazni, killing seven people, including three children, an Afghan official said.

Assadullah Ensafi said the explosion occurred in the province’s Muqur district on Tuesday morning.

He said 17 people were injured in the explosion.

WASHINGTON : A broad majority of Americans, exhausted by nearly a dozen years of war and fearful of tripping into another one, are opposed to a military strike on Syria, even though most say they think Syrian forces used chemical weapons against civilians, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

Those findings illustrate the depth of the challenge facing President Obama as he tries to win support for a limited strike from a deeply reluctant Congress and an American public that has become steadily more skeptical of foreign engagement.

TEHRAN: A collision between two buses in Iran killed 44 people and injured 39 others, the ISNA news agency reported on Tuesday, in the country's most serious road accident in years.

The accident took place late on Monday along the highway between Qom and Tehran.

SYDNEY: Australian rugby great David Campese has apologised for a Twitter outburst in which he said Muslim cricketer Fawad Ahmed should “go home” if he refused to wear a beer logo on his shirt.

Cricket Australia agreed to the Pakistan-born leg-spinner's request not to wear the sponsorship logo of beer brand VB on his team outfit because of religious reasons.

New Delhi: A fast-track court here on Tuesday pronounced all the remaining four accused guilty in the 2012 December 16 Delhi gang-rape case. Of the total six accused, the prime conspirator – Ram Singh – had earlier this year killed himself in jail, while a minor accused was recently sentenced to three years in a special home by the Juvenile Justice Board. The 23-year-old trainee physiotherapist was lured by five men and a teenager onto a bus on December 16 last year, where they raped and tortured her with a metal bar.

ISLAMABAD: In a major development that has gone almost unnoticed, police arrested a relative of senior Kashmiri leader Aasiya Andarabi from Indian-held part of the Valley on terrorism-related charges over the weekend.

But Ms Andarabi’s another relative is reported to have escaped a raid carried out by the federal capital police on Saturday on a house in Khayaban-i-Kashmir on the outskirts of the city.

A herd of 15 elephants on Monday damaged the 150-year-old ‘Gibraltar House’ built by a judge of the Calcutta High Court at Kanhari Hills in Hazaribagh town.

The elephants damaged the “Gibraltar House”, built by late S.C. Mallick, a judge of the Calcutta High Court, but none was hurt in the raids by the elephants, said Ajit Kumar, the Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) Hazaribagh East (Forest) Division.

Lashkar-e-Taiba's chief coordinator Manzoor arrested in Kashmir

In yet another breakthrough by the security agencies, a top Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) commander was arrested from Baramulla district of Kashmir.A top Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) commander was arrested today by security forces from Baramulla district of Kashmir.

Manzoor alias Shams Bhai, the 'chief coordinator' of the militant outfit was arrested during a joint operation by Army and police from Pattan area of Baramulla, an army official said.

A query issued by Reserve Bank of India to major temple boards in Kerala asking them to provide details of their gold stocks has evoked ire of Hindu outfits in the state.

While confirming that they have received such a letter from the RBI, top officials of some of the major temples said they were not taking any hasty decision on the matter without consulting the government and authorities concerned.

LONDON: U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said in London on Monday that Syria could prevent a military attack if President Bashar al-Assad handed over all his chemical weapons to the international community within the next week.

Egypt's interior minister survives bomb attack

CAIRO: Egypt's interior minister survived an assassination attempt on Thursday when a bomb blew up as his convoy drove through Cairo's Nasr City district, state media and security officials said.

Security sources said at least 10 people had been injured, but the minister, who lives in Nasr City, just outside the city centre, was not hurt.

Bomb wounds 11 outside girls' school in Bannu

Bannu: A bomb wounded 11 people, mostly children, when it exploded outside a girls' school in Bannu on Thursday, a doctor said.

The bomb went off at the end of the school day as pupils walked into a street lined with fabric shops in the northwestern town of Bannu, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

Doctor Omar Zeb told news agency AFP that 11 people had been brought to the local hospital – seven primary schoolgirls and four other people who had been in the street.

ISLAMABAD: The National Command Authority session, chaired by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, took place at the Prime Minister House on Thursday, DawnNews reported.

The meeting, which took place after media disclosure that the United States had intensified its surveillance of Pakistan’s nuclear programs based on documents from whistleblower Edward Snowden, was aimed at examining Pakistan’s nuclear assets.

Guwahati: A Border Security Force (BSF) constable allegedly killed two officers and injured another before shooting himself at a remote border post in Assam's Dhubri district. The constable, Jawan Prabhakar Mishra, died on his way to the hospital.

Constable Mishra allegedly shot the officers from his service weapon around 10:30 am and, later shot himself at Hathi Char border post, a senior BSF official said.

World leaders from the G20 group of nations are set to meet in Russia amid sharp differences over military action against Syria’s government.

Ahead of the talks, Russia’s Vladimir Putin warned that action without UN approval would be “an aggression”.

WASHINGTON: The White House meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and US President Barack Obama will be held as per schedule on September 27, despite the latter being busy due to ongoing Syrian crisis.

While no formal bilateral Obama-Singh meeting has been planned on the sidelines of the G-20 Summit in St Petersburg, Russia, the two leaders are expected to interact on its margins this week, officials said here.

ISLAMABAD: A Pakistani legal aid group Wednesday said dozens of Pakistani prisoners held by the US at an Afghan prison were at risk of falling into indefinite detention due to stalled negotiations between the US and Pakistan over their repatriation.

The Justice Project Pakistan represents Pakistani prisoners held in Afghanistan and their families.

KARACHI: Three suspected militants were killed on Thursday during an exchange of fire with personnel from the Crime Investigation Department (CID) in Karachi’s Mauripur area, DawnNews reported.

According to SSP CID Chaudhry Aslam, police launched a search operation in the Mauripur graveyard upon receiving a tip-off on the suspects’ whereabouts, following which the suspected men opened fire.

The Order of St. Andrew the Apostle Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate released a statement criticizing the possible reconversion of the Hagia Sophia Museum in Istanbul into a mosque.

The statement said that there was a possibility of the “church-turned-mosque-turned-museum” in Istanbul being reconverted into a mosque, as two previous cases of Hagia Sophia churches that were recently in Iznik and Trabzon.

Israeli forces surround al-Aqsa mosque

There are confirmed reports that Israeli forces have surrounded the al-Aqsa mosque in occupied Jerusalem after it was reportedly stormed by Jewish groups.

Witnesses inside the mosque told Al Jazeera on Wednesday that Israeli forces had detained several Palestinian Muslim worshippers inside and were firing tear gas.

US court issues summons to Sonia Gandhi in 1984 anti-Sikh riots case

A federal court in New York has issued summons to Congress president Sonia Gandhi for "shielding and protecting" the leaders of her party who were allegedly involved in the anti-Sikh riots in India in 1984.

The summons was issued by the US Eastern District Court of New York after a rights group Sikhs For Justice (SFJ) and two victims of the riots filed a complaint before it.

KARACHI: Prime Minister Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif was presiding over the meeting of the federal cabinet over the law and order situation in Karachi at the Governor's house on Wednesday.

During the special meeting Sharif said that recruitments had been made in Sindh Police on political basis adding that it was easy for persons involved in criminal activities to get themselves released after obtaining bail.

WASHINGTON: Al Qaeda's leaders have set up cells of engineers to try to shoot down, disable or hijack US drones, The Washington Post reported late Tuesday citing top-secret US intelligence documents.

The Al Qaeda leadership is “hoping to exploit the technological vulnerabilities of a weapons system that has inflicted huge losses against the terrorist network,” the Post said online.

Amid speculation that Russia may hike military assistance to Syria should the Unites States strike, Russian leader Vladimir Putin warned the West against taking action, in comments published on Wednesday.

In an interview with The Associated Press and Russia’s state Channel 1 television, Putin said that Moscow has provided some components of the S-300 air defense missile system to Syria but has frozen further shipments.

Leaders of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said Tuesday they reached an agreement on a draft resolution to use military force in Syria, setting a 60-day deadline, with one 30-day extension possible for the intervention -- while also barring the involvement of ground forces in the conflict.

KABUL: Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai has issued a legislative decree that gives minority Hindus and Sikhs a seat in the country's next parliamentarian election.

A statement Wednesday from the presidency said the seat would be in the parliament's lower house.

The addition would make the parliament now have 250 seats.

Turkey's ambassador is due to return to Egypt on Wednesday after he was recalled last month over the bloody crackdown on supporters of the country's ousted Islamist president, a foreign ministry diplomat said.

"The ambassador is due to return to Cairo later today," the diplomat told AFP on condition of anonymity.

However, the Turkish official stressed that Ankara's move to return its envoy should not be interpreted as a restoration of diplomatic ties.

WASHINGTON: Pakistani military officials plotted to kill prominent human rights activist Asma Jahangir while she was on a visit to India, according to new US intelligence disclosures arising from the Snowden affair.

The plan was evidently aborted after she learned of it and went public. But it is just one incident in a pattern of extrajudicial killings orchestrated by Pakistani military and intelligence leaders, according to classified documents given by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden to the Washington Post, which reported some episodes and extracts to protect perceived US interests vis-a-vis Pakistan.

KABUL: Afghan security forces have arrested eight policemen for accidentally killing six children when firing a rocket into a river to catch fish, officials said Wednesday.

The incident took place last Friday in the Doshi district of the northern province of Baghlan when policemen on the bank of a river fired a rocket-propelled grenade into the water.

Tehran : Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani-Fazli said on Wednesday that expanding of bilateral relations with neighboring countries is one of the priorities of Irans foreign policy.Speaking to IRNA after a meeting with the visiting Afghan Minister of Refugees and Repatriation Jamaher Anwari on September 3, Rahmani-Fazli said the two excahnged views on various issues including Afghan refugees residing in Iran and bilateral cooperation.

A spate of car bombs in mostly-Shia neighbourhoods of the Iraqi capital has killed at least 67 people and wounded almost 80, security and medical officials said.

The bombings struck across Baghdad and left dozens of others wounded on Tuesday, in the latest in a trend of increased attacks in the evening as Iraqis visit cafes and other public areas.

No one has claimed responsibility for the attacks.

WASHINGTON: The US military chief told a congressional committee on Tuesday that US strikes on Syria would degrade the Syrian government’s overall military capabilities, besides causing other collateral consequences.

“Yes,” said Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen Martin E. Dempsey when asked if US military strikes would have other “collateral consequences for the Syrian government, including the degradation of its overall military capabilities”.

Arab states urge action against Assad regime

The Arab Foreign Ministers have held the Syrian government responsible for all the chemical attacks on the suburbs of Damascus, while calling for referring the perpetrators to international trials, Xinhua reported.

In the Arab League (AL) resolution, the Foreign Ministers strongly condemned and denounced the “heinous crime” committed by using the chemical weapons banned internationally against unarmed civilians, in defiance of the international norms.

EL-ARISH: Egyptian helicopter gunships fired rockets early Tuesday at militants in the northern Sinai Peninsula, causing ''dozens'' of casualties, a security official said.

He said the two aircraft surprised militant gatherings in three houses in two locations, al-Muqataa and Touma, south of the town of Sheikh Zuweyid near the border with the Gaza Strip.

Islamabad/Lahore: The hearing in the Mumbai attack case was on Tuesday adjourned till tomorrow after the prosecution said the Law Ministry is yet to issue gazette notification about departure of Judicial Commission to India on 7 September.

Damascus: Amid escalating violence in Syria, it has been reported that two ballistic missiles have been fired towards Deir ez-Zor, the 6th largest city in Syria and the largest in the eastern part of Syria, on Tuesday. According to reports, two ballistic objects were fired from the eastern Mediterranean Sea at around 10.16 am (Moscow time).

The Syrian government will attack US interests in the Middle East in the event of a military strike on the country, Syria's Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad said.

"Any act of aggression towards Syria is aggression towards the Arab world and the region," Mekdad told Lebanon's al-Manar TV channel.

The Afghan national police have killed 12 militants and arrested 33 others during a number of clean-up operations, the country's interior ministry said Tuesday.

"Afghan national police, supported by the army, intelligence agency and the NATO-led coalition forces, carried out several clean-up operations in Helmand, Ghor, Paktiya, Logar, Wardak, Uruzgan, Kandahar, Kunduz, Baghlan and Nangarhar provinces over the past 24 hours," the ministry said in a statement, reports Xinhua.

Indian Mujahideen (IM) founding member Yasin Bhatkal, who was recently arrested near India-Nepal border along with a close aide, has revealed that Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi is the IM's prime target, an Indian Today report said. Bhatkal told the intelligence officers that IM's international funds flow will in increase manyfold if the IM manages to reach the leader.

ISLAMABAD: Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan, T.C.A. Raghavan, met with Adviser to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Foreign Affairs and National Security, Sartaj Aziz, at the Foreign Office on Tuesday, DawnNews reported.

The two reportedly discussed the details of a meeting that is likely to take place between Prime Minister Sharif and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly this month.

All papers related to coal block allocation that are not traceable will be located and given to CBI within time stipulated by the Supreme Court, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday.

If the government is unable to locate the papers, a report will be filed with the CBI for proper probe, Dr. Singh added.

Eleven ammunition technicians of the Royal Bhutan Army (RBA) were killed yesterday in Haa, after the unserviceable ammunition they were trying to dispose of exploded around 10am.

Another five, in critical condition, were airlifted to Thimphu referral hospital yesterday afternoon, while another five, including a storekeeper and a driver, are recovering at the IMTRAT hospital in Haa.

Islamabad:Cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan's party is set to restore "violent jihadist content" removed from school textbooks in Pakistan's militancy-racked Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, according to a media report today.

After the secular-leaning Awami National Party (ANP) came to power in the province in 2008, education officials removed Quranic verses preaching jihad or holy war and illustrations depicting weapons or violence.

KUALA LUMPUR : Malaysia's government said on Monday it would cut fuel subsidies for the first time in nearly two years to save RM3.3 billion (S$1.3 billion) annually as part of crucial budget reforms.

Prime Minister Najib Razak said the reductions are needed to trim the budget deficit and strengthen economic fundamentals to boost investor confidence.

FRANCE: French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said there would be no vote during Wednesday's parliamentary debate on the Syria crisis, adding that there was no doubt that Damascus was behind a deadly chemical attack.

Steps will be taken for communal harmony in J&K: Farooq

National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah, whose party heads the government in Jammu and Kashmir, on Monday assured Rajya Sabha that all steps would be taken to maintain communal harmony in the state as BJP expressed concern over Kishtwar communal violence there.

Self-styled godman Asaram Bapu who has been charged for sexually assaulting a minor was produced in the Jodhpur district court and was sent to 14 days in judicial custody. He has earlier gone through a potency test and has been questioned by the police in connection with this case.

ISLAMABAD: India has handed over to the Pakistan high commission in New Delhi a list of 386 Pakistanis detained in Indian jails.

However, according to the record of Pakistani prisoners maintained by the Pakistan foreign ministry as well as well as by the high commission in New Delhi, NGOs, and relatives of prisoners, there are 485 Pakistanis in Indian jails, the Associated Press of Pakistan (APP) on Monday quoted an official of the foreign ministry as telling the senate standing committee on narcotics control and interior.

Any military retaliation by Syrian against Turkey following an invasion of the Arab republic would be madness and suicide because it would be conducted against a NATO country, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s chief political adviser, Yalçin Akdogan, has said.

MUZAFFARABAD: The Indian Army has once again carried out unprovoked shelling in the Nakyal Sector area in Kotli leaving numerous children stranded inside a local school, Express News reported on Monday.

The district administration is currently making efforts to take the children back to their parents.

On August 27, at least five people, including two women and a girl, were injured by heavy shelling and unprovoked firing at Nakyal Sector.

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