E-paper PakistanToday 5yh May, 2012

PAGE | 03 PAGE | 22

Man’s feet, shinsnailed for changing sect

Gilani won’t be allowed to retainoffice, says Nisar

PAGE |05

Islamabad-Peshawar Edition Saturday, 5 May, 2012 Jamadi-ul-Sani 13, 1433Rs 15.00 Vol II No 308 22 Pages

Yes, Bannu jailbreak wasan administrativefailure, admits minister

PESHAWARSHAmim SHAHid

AT least 24 people, includingtwo officers of the BajaurLevies Force, were killed andmore than 40 injured in ahigh-intensity suicide bomb

explosion in Khar, headquarters of BajaurAgency, on Friday.

The Taliban claimed responsibility forthe attack, saying they had wanted to kill thelocal chief and deputy chief of Levies Force,recruited by the government to help defeatthe insurgency in the northwest.

Political Tehsildar Abdul Haseeb said thedead included Levies Force CommandantMajor Javed and Deputy Commandant FazalRabbi. The latter was recently decorated withthe Presidential Award (Tamgha-e-Shujaat) forextraordinary performance in the war on terror.

Officials said a suicide bomber blew upthe explosives attached to his body when avehicle of Bajaur Levies Forces arrived at themain chowk in Khar. The explosion was sosevere that all men boarding the vehicle andseveral civilians were killed on the spot. Thevehicle was also blown into pieces.

Soon after the explosion, high-rankingofficials of the political administration andFrontier Corps rushed to the site and initi-ated the rescue activities. Besides the Levies

vehicle, a number of shops and kiosks werealso destroyed.

According to officials, 24 people werekilled and 46 others were injured. Some ofthose seriously injured were referred to LadyReading Hospital in Peshawar.

Officials feared the death toll could riseowing to the serious condition of several ofthe injured. The political tehsildar confirmedthat it was a suicide attack and the age of thebomber was between 14 and 16.

Following the suicide attack, curfew wasimposed across Bajaur Agency and securityforces embarked on several search opera-tions. The officials claimed having arrestedtwo terrorists later in the afternoon.

The officials said suicide jackets, explo-sive material and sophisticated weapon wererecovered from the possession of the arrestedmen. It was the second terrorist act in BajaurAgency in two days.

Five people, including two tribal eldersand two security personnel, were killed in twosimultaneous bomb explosions atChamarkand area of Bajaur. Friday’s blast wasthe deadliest bombing in the country sinceFebruary 17, when 31 people were killed by asuicide attack on Shias in Kurram Agency.

Ehsanullah Ehsan, spokesman for theTaliban, claimed responsibility, saying any-one involved in “activity” against the Taliban“will be treated with iron hands”.

QUETTAStAFF REPoRt

Chief Justice Iftikhar MohammadChaudhry on Friday gave two weeks’ timeto the Balochistan chief secretary, IG Po-lice and Frontier Corps DIG to recover andproduce the missing persons in the court.

The three-member Supreme Courtbench also comprising Justice Khilji Arifand Justice Tariq Pervez was hearing casesof missing persons and law and order inBalochistan at the Quetta Registry. “Nopolice official has the courage to come upwith the truth and provide the court sub-

stantial evidence leading to the recovery ofthe missing people,” the CJ said.

Deputy Attorney General MalikSikandar apprised the bench that offici-ating in-charges of the ISI and the MIwere ready to appear before the court astheir heads were out of town. Expressingdispleasure, the CJ asked if the IG couldappear before the court, why could notthe others. He said the Balochistan chiefminister was in Islamabad and the bu-reaucracy seemed to be running the gov-ernment. Wali Mohammad told thecourt that his cousin, Safar Khan alongwith Mohammad Karim and Doha Khan,

who were among the seven people gonemissing from Margaat area of Quetta onApril 11, reached home late on Thursdaynight. The chief justice directed the offi-cials of law enforcement agencies to takeeffective measures for the safe recoveryof the remaining four missing persons.

Referring to the case of AbdulWahid, who had been picked up fromDasht area of Mastung, Balochistan Ad-vocate General Amanullah Kunrani toldthe bench that following the court direc-tives, police had made headway

Teenaged bomberkills decorated hero,23 others in Bajaur g Levies Force Deputy Commandant Fazal Rabbi

was recently decorated with tamgha-e-shujaatfor gallantry in the war against terrorism

SC wants missing persons found in two weeksg CJP says no police official has courage to come up with the truthregarding the missing persons

PESHAWAR: A man screams while being treated for wounds from a suicide bombing in Bajaur on Friday. ReuteRs

PDF E-Paper LHR_Layout 1 5/5/2012 3:59 AM

02Saturday, 5 May, 2012

News

today’s

LookQuick

ISlaMaBad

Story on Page 07

newS

Story on Page 06

CaRtoon

Page 13

Pakistan wants to build substantive, long term ties with Sweden: Bokhari Peshawar cleric trebles head money for terry Jones

Robbers loot Rs 5 million

from Multan bankMULTAN: Robbers looted Rs 5 million from the branch of aprivate bank on Friday. According to police, six armed menbarged into the bank located in Gulgasht Colony and took thestaff hostage at gun point. The robbers looted Rs 5 millionand fled in a waiting car bearing registration number FDA-6196. The police have started a search operation for therobbers. onlinE

Indian SC accepts Chishty’s

plea to return homeNEW DELHI: The Indian Supreme Court has accepted anapplication of ailing Pakistani virologist Dr Khalil Chishtyseeking permission to return to Pakistan. The court acceptedthe application and asked the central government to respondby Monday, indicating its seriousness about moving quicklyon the matter. If the government says that it has no objectionand the court rules in favour of the government, then Chishtycould be free to go home. Chishty was recently released fromthe Ajmer Jail, after being sentenced to a life-term inRajasthan in a murder case of 1992, but was set free on April9 this year following a direction from the Indian SupremeCourt. A bench granted him the reprieve, considering his oldage and the fact that he has been in India for the last 20 yearssince a murder case was lodged against him when he came ona visit to Ajmer. The court had agreed to hear Chishty’s pleato allow him to go back to Karachi and asked him to file aseparate application for it but directed him not to leaveAjmer. Chishty’s case was discussed between the authoritiesof the two countries during President Asif Ali Zardari’s visitto India. onlinE

Government school blown

up in ShabqadarSHABQADAR: Unidentified men blew up a governmentprimary school in the wee hours in the remits of ShabqadarPolice Station on Friday. Police said the men planted fourkilogrammes of explosives along the building. The powerfulexplosion destroyed one room and veranda of the school.Immediately after the explosion, police personnel arrived at thespot and cordoned off the entire area. Police started search tonab the perpetrators. Education officer Ahmadullah said some80 students were attending school, the building of which wasrendered useless after the explosion. Ahmadullah said educationto the students would be imparted at an alternate place. nni

Babar’s friend Chishti

takes the heatISLAMABAD: The PPP-government has asked former lawsecretary and close friend of Babar Awan, Pir Masood Chishti,to resign from the membership of Prime Minister’s ReviewCommission. Sources told Online that President Asif AliZardari directed Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani topressurise the member of the PM’S Review Commission tosurrender his membership, following which he finallyresigned. According to the sources, after the resignation ofChishti and that of Farooq Awan - brother of Babar Awan- theentire team of the former law minister had now disappearedfrom the scene and gone into the background. onlinE

KABULnni

Anew strategy for supportingrepatriation, sustainable rein-tegration and assistance tocountries hosting Afghanrefugees was adopted at a two-

day international conference in Geneva.Implementation of the plan, which

would cost an estimated $1.9 billion, woninternational support at the event that con-cluded on Thursday. Officials fromAfghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Switzerlandand the UN attended the meeting.

The plan would initially focus on pro-viding schools and jobs and meeting otherbasic needs for the 5.7 million Afghans whohave returned to their homeland, the UNrefugee agency said in a statement on its

website.High Commissioner for Refugees Anto-

nio Guterres welcomed the global backingfor the initiative and praised the draftingcountries for showing the leadership tocome together and float proposal for thesolutions strategy.

The strategy aims at preserving asylumspace for Afghan refugees in neighbouringcountries over the coming three years andbeyond, and supporting sustainable reinte-gration for the Afghans returning home.

A joint communiqué said the partici-pants “welcomed and supported the Solu-tions Strategy as an integrated frameworkfor multilateral cooperation and coordina-tion.”

Despite the return of more than 5.7 mil-lion Afghans to their homeland since 2002,nearly 2 million are still living in Pakistan

and close to 1 million in Iran. In 2011,about 70,000 Afghan refugees returnedhome.

In Afghanistan, the focus was on sup-porting reintegration, the communiquésaid, adding the participants had recog-nised the need to enhance the developmentand reintegration potential of high-returncommunities.

Afghan Minister of Refugees and Repa-triation Jamaher Anwary said: “We haveidentified 48 sites in the country as prioritysites where we can help the returningrefugees with basic needs, such as healthand employment.” “The ability for refugeesto return in safety and dignity and becomeproductive citizens in their communitiesupon return is also integral to the stabilityand progress of Afghanistan,” Guterres toldthe delegates.

Agreement reached on$1.9b Afghan refugee plan

WASHINGTON SPEciAl coRRESPondEnt

While reiterating that Prime Minis-ter Yousaf Raza Gilani’s convictionwas an internal Pakistani matter, theUnited States has said his case wasbeing addressed in a “legitimate anddemocratic fashion by the Pakistanijudicial system”.

The State Department last weekhad said Gilani remains the primeminister of Pakistan – after his con-viction by the Supreme Court in acontempt of case verdict – and assuch Washington would continue towork with him.

At the daily briefing, DeputySpokesman Mark Toner would notcomment specifically on possibleimplications of the prime minister’srefusal to step down following hisconviction on domestic political en-vironment and fears, raised by ajournalist, that ensuing tussle withopposition parties may bring gov-ernment to a halt, and even imperilthe democratic process.

“I think we’ve been very clearthat we view this as an internal do-mestic issue but one that is fallingon a clear democratic track, that it’sprogressing within the Pakistani ju-dicial system and that it’s being ad-dressed in a legitimate anddemocratic fashion by the Pakistanijudicial system,” Toner said.

The spokesman disputed thepremise of the question that theState Department was either notbeing informed fully of the politicalsituation in Pakistan or that Wash-ington was being quiet on the issuewhile it always talked of supremacyof the law.

“Well, again, I’m not an experton the Pakistani constitution. All Ican say is that this case has movedforward through the Pakistani judi-cial system in a way that we view asconsistent with Pakistan’s demo-cratic values and in a transparentmanner. And we don’t have any realcomment on what is a domestic po-litical issue,” Toner said, whenpressed further on the issue.

us says Gilani’s casebeing addressed inlegitimate fashion



NewsCoMMentnewer provinces

articles on Page 12-13

All this is rather troubling.

lyariLyari is not in Waziristan.

Arif nizami says:

White lies

foReIGn newS

Story on Page 17

aRtS & enteRtaInMent

Story on Page 14

SPoRtS

Story on Page 18

British Pm’s party suffers heavy losses in mid-term polls ‘coke Studio’ comes back

A year after the raid: No questions answered yet.

Does the Punjab government writ extend to Lahore’s cantonment areas in mattersof wedding activities? Apparently not! There is a grey, rather a khaki area here andit has been noted that wedding celebrations in these areas of Lahore extend waypast the cut-off time.

no evidence against me: Asif

ISLAMABADtAHiR niAz

MINISTER for Law,Justice and Parlia-mentary Affairs Fa-rooq H Naik onFriday told protesting

PML-N legislators that Yousaf Raza Gi-lani was still a member of the parlia-ment, as neither the Supreme Court,NA speaker nor the Chief ElectionCommissioner had given any adverseruling against him, warning them thatif the PML-N’s protest led to the derail-ment of democracy, they would be heldresponsible for it.

However, the opposition membersresponded to the stance of the law min-ister with chants of “no, no, no”.

Speaking on a point of order in theHouse, Naik observed that the PML-Nprotest in the House was in violation ofthe Rules of Procedure and Conduct ofBusiness. “This rowdy stance is againstparliamentary traditions,” he added.

Naik further said the governmentwould move another resolution for thecreation of Hazara Province, but afterevolving a consensus amongst otherpolitical parties.

National Assembly Speaker DrFehmida Mirza also called the PML-Nprotest unfair.

“The opposition has a right toprotest but within the parliamentarynorms… There is a way. Don’t adoptthe manners of a dictator,” she advisedthe PML-N members who continuedprotest for the fourth day.

“Here ends your show, Go GilaniGo,” they shouted in response to thespeaker’s advice.

Torn copies of the questions flewin the air as the opposition membersintensified their protest over the issueof the prime minister’s conviction inthe contempt case. Minister for Fi-nance, Revenue and Planning and De-velopment, Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh,told the House in a written reply thatthe government during the last fouryears borrowed from the State Bank ofPakistan Rs 688.7 billion, Rs 114 bil-lion, Rs 41.9 billion and Rs 16.9 billionin 2007-08, 2008-09, 2009-10 and2010-11, respectively.

‘SC, speaker, CEC never gave

adverse ruling against Gilani’

ISLAMABADAPP

Amidst ruckus by the opposition, the Na-tional Assembly on Friday passed a land-mark bill for the formation of NationalCommission for Human Rights empow-ered to investigate cases of human rightsviolations, check government official’snegligence and create awareness.

Adviser to Prime Minister on HumanRights Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar movedthe bill as passed by the Senate with someamendments that was later passed by theHouse with majority vote.

The commission would be formedonce the president signs this bill into lawas last stage.

The Human Rights Commission isbeing formed in recognition of the consti-

tutional provisions on human rights con-tained in Article 8 to 28 and chapter 2 ofthe constitution and the human rightsagenda of the current government.

Further in pursuance of the UN Gen-eral Assembly Resolution adopted on De-cember 1993 and other relevant UNresolutions of the UN Commission onHuman Rights, the UN member states areunder obligation to establish independentNational Human Rights institutions.

According to the UN, the formation ofthe commission is singular criteria tojudge a state’s commitment towards pro-tection and promotion of human rights.

“Presently, the National HumanRights Commissions are functional inmore than 54 countries of the world,” ac-cording to the bill’s statement of objectsand reasons.

Per the statement, the formation ofthe commission would not only fulfill in-ternational obligations of establishment ofsuch a commission but it shall also serveas driving force for negating the propa-ganda of human rights violations in Pak-istan.

“A national institution shall be vestedwith competence to promote and protecthuman rights. A national institution shallbe given as broad mandate as possible,which shall be clearly set forth in a consti-tutional or legislative text, specifying itscomposition and its sphere of compe-tence,” say UN resolutions.

The commission will be chaired by ajudge of the Supreme Court or qualifiedfor the office and it will comprise onemember each from all provinces, Islam-abad Capital Territory, FATA and Gilgit-

Baltistan, one from minority communitiesand the Human Rights Division secretary.

According to the bill, the commissionwill be empowered to inquire into, takesuo motu or on a petition, intervene in anyproceeding involving allegation of viola-tion of human rights, visit any jail, underintimation to the provincial government.

The commission will also be responsi-ble to review laws, recommend appropri-ate remedial measures, new legislation,the amendment in existing laws and theadoption or amendment of administrativemeasures for their effective implementa-tion.

The House also admitted an annualreport of The Council of Common Inter-ests that was tabled by Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination Mir Hazar KhanBijarani.

ISLAMABADonlinE

The Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) onFriday summoned Ali Musa Gilaniand MNA Hanif Abbasi in theephedrine quota case.

Ali Musa Gilani the son of PrimeMinister Gilani has been summonedon May 12, while Abbasi has beenasked to appear before the ANF onMay 8. This is the second time AliMusa Gilani has been asked to ap-pear before the ANF, as he recordedhis statement on April 26. The ANFhas been directed by the SupremeCourt to conduct a transparent inves-tigation in the ephedrine quota scan-dal case. The ANF in an earlier reportpresented to the apex court allegedthat Ali Musa Gilani was involved inthe illegal allotment of the drug. TheAnti-Narcotics Force (ANF), listingAli Musa Gilani as the main accused

in the ephedrine scandal, submittedadditional documents of its inquiryreport in the Supreme Court. The re-port added eight more names to thelist of accused including Prime Min-ister Yousaf Raza Gilani’s son MusaGilani, PM’s Principal SecretaryKhushnood Akhtar Lashari and Min-istry of Narcotics Control SecretaryZafar Abbas Lak.

Human Rights Commission Bill sails through na

Gilani won’t be

allowed to retain

office: nisarISLAMABAD

AgEnciES

Leader of the Opposition in the NationalAssembly Nisar Ali Khan on Friday sent amessage to the government, saying enoughwas enough and Prime Minister Yousaf RazaGilani would not be allowed to remain inoffice any more.Talking to reporters outside the ParliamentHouse on Friday, Nisar said despite theSupreme Court’s verdict, Gilani and thegovernment were hell bent that he had notbeen disqualified.He said the prime minister came to theHouse at the time of prayers when most ofthe members were not present in the House.He said Gilani would not gather courage toattend the session in the presence of theopposition.Nisar said the resolution presented in theHouse expressing confidence in the primeminister was against rules. He said duringnoisy scenes, no body listened to theresolutions and it was not clear who votedfor and against it. “What was moreinteresting was that at the time of theresolution, Gilani was not present in theHouse,” he said.He said the opposition had no confidence inthe prime minister, adding that it wassurprising that Gilani telephoned thosepeople for their support on the resolutionwho were not present at the time of voting inthe House.The leader of the opposition said he hadwritten a letter to the speaker requesting herto work by remaining within the constitutionand law and not making herselfcontroversial. However, he said the speakerhad started playing her role and that waswhy Gilani was saying that the question ofhis eligibility or ineligibility would bedecided by the speaker.He also criticised the UK and the US forsupporting Gilani, saying the people’ssentiments against them were rising.

aNF summons aliMusa Gilani on 12th

PMl-n has no mass base to

mobilise long march: ShujaatISLAMABAD

nni

Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid President Shujaat Hussain has said Nawaz Sharif has nopower to mobilise long march. Talking to reporters outside the Parliament House onFriday, Shujaat said contempt of court case could also be filed against PML-N chiefNawaz Sharif in the Supreme Court assault incident. He said the PM’s disqualificationissue would be resolved after the detail judgement of the Supreme Court. Whileclarifying COAS Ashfaq Kayani’s statement, Shujaat said the COAS insisted no one couldbe permitted to derail the democratic government from the course of democracy. Hesaid the army wanted continuity of current democratic system in the country, addingthat the COAS emphasised in his statement to run the system according to theconstitution. “The current month is May and March passed away so the Nawaz Shariflost his long march power,” Shujaat said. Responding to a question regarding theresolution moved by the PML-N in parliament for the creation of four new provinces,Shujaat commented that Nawaz might ask to create Raiwind as a new province.

BAJAUR: Security personnel inspect the site

of a suicide bombing here on Friday. staFF Photo



News

KABul: A protester shouts anti-Pakistan slogans during a protest on Friday against the targeted killings of Shias in the neighbouring country. ReuteRs

WASHINGTONREutERS

Al Qaeda’s rela-tionship withIran’s govern-ment has beenfractious at best

and openly antagonistic atworst, according to docu-ments confiscated fromOsama bin Laden’s hideoutin Pakistan and made publicon Thursday.

In the years since theSeptember 11, 2001, attackson New York and Washing-ton, high-ranking al Qaedaleaders, lower level militantsand members of bin Laden’sfamily were held in custodyby Iranian authorities,though U.S. officials say pre-cise conditions of their con-finement are unclear.

On occasion, Iranian au-thorities promised to re-lease, and may have actuallyreleased, al Qaeda figuresand family members. But atother times, the documents

suggest, Iran and al Qaedawere engaged in what couldalmost be characterized astit-for-tat hostage taking.

“The documents suggestthat the relationship be-tween al-Qaeda and Iranwas antagonistic, dominatedby indirect negotiations overthe release of jihadis andtheir families detained inIran,” said LieutenantColonel Liam Collins, direc-tor of the Combating Terror-ism Center at the U.S.Military Academy at WestPoint and a co-author of ananalysis of the confiscateddocuments published by thecenter on Thursday.

Some US critics of Iranhave suggested that Iran’srelationship with al Qaedawas less hostile, or even co-operative at times.

Some American conser-vatives claimed that Iranwas complicit in the Septem-ber 11 attacks, and that, af-terward Iran had provided acomfortable safe haven and

base of operations for alQaeda personnel fleeing U.S.military operations inAfghanistan.

Iran’s Shi’ite Muslimrulers deny cooperating withal Qaeda, which has its rootsin the Wahhabi sect of SunniIslam dominant in the Ara-bian Peninsula. In their pub-lic statements, Iranianofficials call al Qaeda a ter-rorist group, and Iranian se-curity forces periodicallyreport the arrest of al Qaedamembers. According to theWest Point study, al Qaedaconsidered Iran as an alter-native base for its activitiesafter the U.S. attacked itsAfghanistan safe havens inlate 2001. The study notedthat a senior deputy to binLaden, Saif al-Adl, suggestedin public writings that alQaeda had established con-tact with supporters in Iranaffiliated with Afghan war-lord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar,though not with the Iraniangovernment.

At the time that he wroteabout this, Adl himself wasbelieved to be under deten-tion by Iranian authorities,as were the families of otheral Qaeda militants who hadfled Afghanistan.RELEASING PRISON-ERS: Documents seized bythe Navy SEAL team thatkilled bin Laden a year agoprovide more recent insightsinto Iran-al Qaeda dealings.In a letter to bin Ladendated June 2009, one of hislieutenants reported that theIranians had released “agroup of brothers in severalbatches last month,” andwere planning more re-leases, including possiblybin Laden family members,“within a week.”

According to the analy-sis by West Point’s experts,the Iranians likely were notdoing this out of sympathyfor al Qaeda. Rather, theanalysis suggests, the letterto bin Laden indicates thatTehran freed some al Qaeda

detainees in response tothreats from al Qaeda andthe November 2008 kidnap-ping of an Iranian diplomatstationed at Iran’s consulatein Peshawar, Pakistan. Thediplomat was released inMarch 2010.

However, the release ofbin Laden relatives men-tioned in the letter to the alQaeda leader did not fullymaterialize on schedule. In-stead, one of bin Laden’ssons who had been held inIran, Saad, reportedly waskilled later in 2009.

This led his father, in adocuments seized from hishideout, to advise an associ-ate that he wanted a letterfrom Saad to be included inal Qaeda’s archives “in viewof the important informa-tion it reveals about thetruth of the Iranian regime.”

The West Point reportnotes that the Iranians con-tinued to hold one of binLaden’s daughters and herhusband even after the

diplomat was set free.“It is not fair to separate

women from their hus-bands; it is therefore neces-sary that they release herand her husband” along withthe husband’s second wife,bin Laden wrote in a lengthyletter to an aide in May 2010which was posted on theWest Point website.

The West Point analysisof bin Laden’s correspon-dence says that while it isclear that the al Qaeda-Iranrelationship was antagonis-tic, the rationale behindIran’s detention of al Qaedamilitants for years “withoutdue process” is unclear.

The study says one rea-son the Iranians may haveheld al Qaeda personnel forso long was to deter the mil-itant group from attackingIran. Another reason, the re-port suggests, might be thatIran was holding al Qaedadetainees as bargainingchips for future dealingswith Washington.

KARACHIonlinE

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Fridayasked Banned People’s AmanCommittee chief Uzair Balochto join the party.

PML-N leader Ghous AliShah told reporters thatBaloch had given a positivereply. He further said the partywould contact all Sindh na-tionalist parties for the move-ment against the government.“Protests will be staged againstthe government from May 6-13th,” Shah added. Earlier onFriday, Uzair said if BilawalBhutto Zardari and PresidentZardari contested the upcom-ing election from Lyari, hewould contest the election

against them. “The people ofLyari would not support them(PPP leaders) in comingtimes,” Uzair said. He said hedid not trust the police and

would not surrender himself tothem, adding that he wouldonly be willing to surrender toPakistan Army in front ofRangers DG.

Documents show tense al Qaeda-Iran relationship

“Whether it was 1977 or1999, whenever one-pointagenda was presented andpoliticians avoided dia-logue, the system was de-railed and khakis took over.We need to learn from thepast mistakes as we sharecollective responsibility,” heasserted.

He also warned the gov-ernment that the US-Afghan pact had revealedthat the US forces wanted tostay until 2024 despite theirwithdrawal staring from2014, adding that regionalinstability would continueto challenge Pakistani secu-rity.

“Moreover, the Penta-gon has planned to form anew intelligence agency for

monitoring Iran and China.We must understand thatthis would also includemonitoring of Pakistan. Wemust adopt corrective meas-ures,” he added.

He asked the govern-ment not to attend theChicago Summit until theUS offered unconditionalapology over the Salala at-tack.

Maulana Abdul GhafoorHaideri of the JUI-F calledfor adopting a balanced ap-proach by political leadersand said that taking ex-treme steps might jeopar-dise the democratic system.

He urged the govern-ment to respect the apexcourt verdicts and advisedthe PML-N leadership totake into account the sensi-tive situation that may lead

the country towards desta-bilization.

Mudassir Sehr of the PPPsaid President Asif Ali Zardarihad withdrawn his powers tosecure the democratic sys-tem. She said challenging theprime minister would desta-bilize the country.

She also expressed griefover the Gayari incident andurged for formation of theparliamentary committee tovisit the affected familiesand compensate them fi-nancially.

Muzaffar Hussain Shahof the PML-F said thebiggest achievement of thePPP-led coalition govern-ment in the past four yearswas abolishment of the con-current list and provincialautonomy given to thesmaller provinces.

opp, treasury PML-N asks uzair Balochto join party

Court verdict does

not disqualify me,

says Gilani

ISLAMABADnni

Prime Minister Yousaf RazaGilani has said that the verdictof the Supreme Court againsthim in the contempt case didnot disqualify him from office,as he did not commit anycriminal offence.The Supreme Court foundGilani guilty of contempt ofcourt and convicted him afterhe refused to accept thecourt’s order to reopen graftcases against President, AsifAli Zardari.“The charges against me arenot of criminal nature. In acivil charge, there cannot bedisqualification,” he toldforeign journalists at thePrime Minister’s House.

SC gives two

in the case and if allowed,officials would give an in-camera briefing as confidentialinformation about the casecould not be made public. Hesaid the “information obtainedduring the investigation wouldlead us to recover 10 morepeople missing from differentareas. Justice Khilji remarkedthat it was an open court andhaving in-camera briefingsmight give a wrong impressionto the public. However, he saidif that helped recovery of otherpeople, the SC bench would gofor that option as well. TheBalochistan home secretarybriefed the court about themeasures taken by police tocurb incidents of targetedkilling, sectarian violence,kidnapping for ransom andother heinous crimes in theprovince. “The law and orderhas improved due to a newsecurity plan adopted by thelaw enforcement agencies,” headded. The chief justiceexpressed concern over therecent spate of targeted killingof clerics and killing scholars ofreligious seminaries, saying itwould further fan hatred andcause more killings. “Effectivemeasures should be put inplace to give an end to thesectarian violence,” he said.The advocate general told thecourt that an amount of Rs 3million on account of salariesof Dr Akbar Marri, who wentmissing five years ago, hadbeen released to his family.The court recorded statementsof another 45 family membersof the missing people.

CONTINUED fROM PagE 1

CONTINUED fROM PagE 22

PMl-n ‘postpones’

anti-PM campaign

LAHOREonlinE

The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Fridayannounced that it waspostponing its scheduled anti-Gilani campaign but a privateTV channel later reported thatthe party had reconsidered itsdecision and would go aheadwith its protest plan. Accordingto some TV reports, the PML-Nhas decided to wait for thedetailed judgment of theSupreme Court of Pakistanagainst the prime minister inthe contempt case. A protestrally scheduled on May 9 hasbeen postponed as part of theparty’s decision. According tothe reports, the Nawaz-Leaguewould devise a new course ofaction following the apex courtdetailed judgment.



News

ISLAMABADStAFF REPoRt

Political parties on Friday urged thegovernment and the Election Commis-sion of Pakistan to speed up theprocess of electoral reforms in Pakistanwell before the upcoming elections.

The demand was made at a publicforum organised by PILDAT on thestate of electoral reforms in Pakistan inwhich representatives of all major po-litical parties like Pakistan People’sParty, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz,PML-Quaid, Muttahida Qaumi Move-ment and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insafparticipated among other people.

A large number of participants, es-pecially the parliamentarians, weredeeply concerned about the quality ofelectoral rolls which many of themfound to contain serious flaws whenthese were displayed for inviting publiccomments from March 1 to 21. The par-ticipants hoped that the flaws detectedat the preliminary stage would be rec-tified before the final electoral rolls arereleased on 27th May.

It was demanded that the ElectionCommission should release the statis-tics relating to the number of objectionsreceived during the display period andthe number of voters who approachedthe ECP via SMS or at the Display Cen-tres for information about their votesduring the display period. A concernwas expressed about the lack of trans-parency on this count despite the factthat the display period concluded morethan a month ago. A similar trans-parency was also demanded about thenumber of voters reached and the mod-ifications made as a result of the door-to-door verification by the ECP earlier.

A number of participants also un-derlined the need to introduce reformsto effectively enforce the election ex-penses limits prescribed in the law.There was a general consensus that thetransportation of voters to the pollingstations on the polling day constituteda major chunk of the election expensesand therefore the number of pollingstations should be substantially in-creased to facilitate easy access to thepolling stations without motor vehicles.

Some participants suggested that thenumber of polling stations may even bedoubled or tripled, if necessary.

The forum expressed concern at thelack of clarity about the procedure ofadding fresh names to the electoralrolls after the final electoral rolls arereleased on 27th May. The participantswere unanimous in demanding that is-suance of CNIC should automaticallylead to the registration as a voter. Itwas suggested that the applicationforms for CNIC may be modified to col-lect applicant’s preference for the placeof voting. The Forum also noted withconcern that the Prime Minister did notinitiate the process of appointing a newChief Election Commissioner despitethe fact that it was well known that theformer CEC was to retire on 23rdMarch 2012. The Forum participantswere also concerned that the ElectionCommission was currently workingwithout a Secretary and an AdditionalSecretary during the crucial electionyear. Conducting the Citizens’ Forum,Dr. Ijaz Shafi Gillani suggested that allpolitical parties should build consensus

on electoral reforms and pass the nec-essary legislation at an early date.

Briefing the participants on the stateof Electoral Reforms in Pakistan, Mr.Ahmed Bilal Mehboob, Executive Direc-tor-PILDAT said that the Election Com-mission of Pakistan (ECP) has achievedan overall progress of 53 % on its 5-yearStrategic Plan for electoral reforms as ofMarch 31, 2012. In the previous quarterthis progress was assessed by PILDAT tobe 48 % as of 31 December 2011. The ECPhad prepared and unveiled a Five-YearStrategic Plan 2010-2014 on May 25,2010. Under the Plan, a total of 127 ob-jectives are listed under 15 StrategicGoals with a deadline for achieving eachobjective. 4 objectives do not have a spe-cific deadline as these relate to recurrentactivities; 77 objectives were scheduled tobe achieved by March 31, 2012. The re-maining 46 objectives are scheduled to beachieved after March 31, 2012 - some aslate as December 2014. PILDAT carriesout a detailed monitoring of the progresson the implementation of the strategicplan and issues quarterly citizens’ reportsto inform the public. Iqbal Qadari, Chair-

person NA Sub Committee on ElectoralReforms said that all politicians wishedthat the electoral rolls must be in a goodshape but, unfortunately, Election lawshave difficulties and election process inour country has complexities which hadretarded the process of reforms. He sug-gested that greater powers should begiven to the Election Commission of Pak-istan. He disclosed that It was being pro-posed by his sub-committee that onUnion Council level number of births anddeath should be registered and ECPshould be provided a continuous updateon it so the Electoral Rolls can be updatedregularly. He said that it was under con-sideration that Symbol allotment to thepolitical parties should be given on thebasis of a certain criteria and parties thathave not secured at least two seats inprovincial or national Assemblies shouldnot be allotted an election symbol. Headded that the Parliamentary Committeewas considering that the election ex-penses should be controlled by disallow-ing posters, banners and hoardings. He,however, added that wall chalking wasrecommended to be allowed.

Parties urge eCP to complete electoral reforms before elections

PESHAWARStAFF REPoRt

RE A F F I R M I N G the gov-ernment’s stance of tak-ing stern action againstthose found involved inthe Bannu jailbreak inci-

dent, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Informa-tion Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussainon Friday confessed that the incidentwas a failure of secret agencies andadministration.

“We not only confess our failurebut are determined to take actionagainst all those found guilty in such ashameful act,” Iftikhar responded to apoint of order raised by Opposition

Leader Akram Khan Durrani in theHouse on Friday.

Former chief minister Akram KhanDurrani, through a point of order, ex-pressed grave concern over the escapeof more than 380 prisoners fromBannu jail. He called it a complete fail-ure of the government and asked forstern action against District Coordina-tion Officer Zahir Shah.

Beside Akram Khan Durrani, PML-N MPA from Lakki Marwat Naseer Mo-hammad Khan also expressed concernover the incident and diverted theHouse’s attention towards frequentraids being conducted by personnel ofarmed forces in Lakki Marwat. He saidpersonnel of armed forces were raiding

innocent people’s houses and urged thegovernment to take notice.

Iftikhar said, “The attack on Bannuail and escape of more than 380 pris-oners is not only a conspiracy but itwasted all contributions and achieve-ments of the government in the war onterror,” On such grounds, he made itclear that the “government is not onlyfirm on its decision of stern actionagainst the responsible elements butalso determined to expose all those in-volved in the conspiracy before themasses, parliamentarian as well”. Theprovincial minister said an inquiry intothe attack on Bannu Jail was in its finalstages and in the coming few days, thefindings would be made public.

Yes, Bannu jailbreak was anadministrative failure, admits minister

naB starts

probe into

UnaICo

ponzy schemeISLAMABAD

StAFF REPoRt

The National Accountability Bureau(NAB) Rawalpindi has initiated aninquiry against UNAICO PakistanPvt Ltd on a report by the StateBank of Pakistan (SBP) regardingthe alleged suspicious transactions(STR) in the accounts of thecompany. Initial verification of relevantrecord has revealed that thecompany, registered with the SECP,was allegedly involved in the illegalbusiness of MLM (multi-levelmarketing) by enticing the generalpublic for investments.The company was running a ponzyscheme. Earlier, the SECP had issued apublic warning through thenational dailies requesting thegeneral public to refrain frominvesting in UNAICO or involvingin any transaction with the same.The warning had clearly notifiedthe general public that thecompany’s business was illegal andnot authorised by the SECP. NABRawalpindi has started a full-fledged inquiry and in the initialphase has frozen all bank accountsof the company and its director,Atif Kamran.There are three bank accounts inthe name of the company andrelevant banks have been advisednot to entertain any transaction inthe said accounts till furtherorders. The NAB has placedKamran’s name on the ECL. NABRawalpindi is in the process ofcontacting all members/investorsof the company to approach.The NAB Rawalpindi has to verifytheir claims and record theirstatements for legal action againstM/s UNICO Pakistan Limited RPPsCase. NAB is in the process ofreconciliation based on theavailable materialcollected/recorded duringexamination of the accused personsalleged in the case and hoped tofinalise its inquiry within a week.During the process, NAB may callthe accused persons already heardfor further grilling if need be. Thebureau has received commitmentsfrom various RPPs to return thedefrauded amount in the days tocome.

KARAcHi: Policemen put blocks of ice in an armored personnel carrier to keep the occupants of the vehicle cool as the temperature soared in the provincial capital on Friday. oNLiNe


06 Saturday, 5 May, 2012

NewsPolice excesses

rising in SwatSWAT

HARoon SiRAJ

Police are increasingly becomingimposing in Swat valley, as theytortured a lawyer at Khwaza Khela onThursday and protests over theincident had hardly ended whenanother case of police torture came tothe forefront on Friday. Police onFriday tortured a staff member of theSaidu Sharif Board on Friday. A rowover parking led the police to attackthe BISE Swat office and molest itsstaff on duty. Moreover, the policeeven did not hesitate to destroy thequestion papers in the Board SecrecySection that were intended for theongoing Intermediate examinations.The police, however, gave a differentversion of the incident. According tothe police, they intervened afterreceiving reports of their fellow policebeing held illegally inside the boardbuilding. On the other hand, the boardstaff said that after an exchange of hotwords between the police and themover car parking, the SHO ofRahimabad broke into the buildingand tortured them. The police alsosealed the building. However, aftersuccessful negotiations between theDSP Headquarters and the Boardchairman, both parties reconciledamicably. As a result, no FIR waslodged. The aggravated staff of theboard, however, was not happy withthe reconciliation and hooted andprotested against the chairman. SwatPrivate School ManagementAssociation President ZiauddinYousafzai condemned the excesses onthe part of the police and said this wasinjustice because police torturedteaching staff. He said the policeaction was indeed shameful. The SwatBar Association also announced two-day strike as a condemnation of theviolence over a fellow lawyer atKhwazakhela police station the otherday.

five die in

Bhalwal road

accident BHALWAL

onlinE

Five died in a road accident near BheraInterchange on Islamabad-LahoreMotorway, M-2, due to over speedingand alleged negligence of the driver.According to details, a car got out ofcontrol of the drowsy driver andoverturned when it reached a bridgenear Bhera Interchange.A severely injured woman, Maiyah Bibi,was taken to the hospital and is in aserious condition, while other fiveincluding Suleman, Saifullah, Suhail,Sidra Bibi and Salma Bibi died on thespot. The deceased belonged to thesame family.Motorway Police and Bhera Policerushed towards the spot immediatelyafter the accident and transferred thecorpses to the hospital.

SWAt: Education officials look at the ransacking carried out by police official at the Swat Board office on Friday. oNLiNe

ISLAMABADonlinE

Ameeting was held under theChairmanship of Prime Min-ister Yousaf Raza Gilani re-garding the forthcomingvisit of the Prime Minister to

United Kingdom from 8-13 May 2012.The meeting was attended by Mrs.

Hina Rabbani Khar, Minister for ForeignAffairs, Begum Shahnaz Wazir Ali, Spe-cial Assistant to the Prime Minister,Saleem H. Mandviwala, Chairman BOIand the Secretaries of the concernedMinistries.

The Prime Minister will attend stateopening of Parliament by Queen Eliza-beth on May 9, 2012. Later on, he willparticipate in the reception in the hon-our of Parliamentarians at the House ofCommons.

During the visit, the Prime Ministerwill participate in the First Round of An-nual Review of Pak-UK Enhanced Strate-gic Dialogue. The Enhanced StrategicDialogue encompasses five areas of tradeand business relations; financial and de-velopment cooperation; education andhealth; defence, security and cultural co-operation.

Prime Minister Gilani and the BritishPrime Minister Cameron will review theprogress being made in the above areasas a follow-up of their commitment inApril 2011 to enter into a deeper andbroader dialogue between the two coun-tries aimed at strengthening friendshipand promoting mutual prosperity andsecurity.

Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Kharapprised the Prime Minister of theprogress made in the five priority areasunder the Enhanced Strategic Dialogueand outlined proposals to provide mo-mentum to enhanced cooperation be-tween Pakistan and the U.K.

The Prime Minister said that Pakistanand the U.K. enjoy excellent relations andhis visit will further boost cooperation be-tween the two countries. The Prime Min-ister further said that Pakistan offerstremendous trade and investment oppor-tunities and hoped that the British Com-panies would take advantage of theseopportunities. The Prime Minister ex-pressed his satisfaction at the work beingundertaken by the two countries onshared national security challenges in-cluding the area of counter-terrorism.The Prime Minister said that the En-hanced Strategic Dialogue would inten-

sify cooperation on shared interests in-cluding trade, economic growth and de-velopment, cultural cooperation, securityand education. The Leader of British op-position, Edmund Milliband, will also callon the Prime Minister.

The Prime Minister will go to the

Buckingham Palace and meet the Dukeof York. Besides, the British Foreign Sec-retary, Secretary for Trade and Invest-ment, Secretary DFID will meet him anddiscuss areas of bilateral interest. InBirmingham, the Prime Minister will ad-dress the Pakistani Community.

PM Gilani chairs review

meeting on Britain visit

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, who is facing severecriticism from opposition parties and their members in the parliament after hisconviction in contempt of court case, will lead a 70-member delegation on a five-day visit to the United Kingdom. The visit, which was decided during the visit ofBritish Prime Minister David Cameron, will begin on May 8. According toreports, Gilani has no scheduled meeting with any significant British personalityexcept a meeting with the British counterpart for an hour during the five dayvisit, which would cost Pakistan millions of rupees. For most of the time, theprime minister would be delivering speeches at private gathering of Pakistanicommunities, including a Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) public meeting inBirmingham. Sources said the British government will bear the expenses of onlysix members of the delegation of the 70 and the rest would be borne by thegovernment of Pakistan. According to sources, the delegation includes some whowould just be enjoying the trip. On the other hand, voices have come out of theBritish Parliament questioning the visit of a convicted prime minister. Gilani isalso likely to face tough questions by the British and international media. inP

National exchequer to bear burden

of PM’s 64 uninvited companions

PESHAWARStAFF REPoRt

Maulana Yousaf Qureshi, khateeb of historical Mo-habat Khan Mosque in Peshawar, has trebled thereward for killing US Pastor Terry Jones, saying, “Iwill give a prize of Rs 4.5 million to those who killthis person.”

Qureshi announced the increase the rewardwhile addressing a demonstration in Peshawar onFriday afternoon. The protest rally was arranged tocondemn the US priest who desecrated the Holy

Quran recently.Three days ago, Qureshi had announced a re-

ward of Rs 1.5 million for killing Terry Jones.During the protest rally, a number of individu-

als, mostly traders from Peshawar, also announcedprizes and rewards for the killer of Jones.

Before leading the rally of a few dozen protest-ers, Qureshi slammed the immoral and inhumaneact of Jones in his Friday sermon.

He urged US authorities and Christian scholarsfrom all over the world to fulfill their responsibili-ties in this respect.

Peshawar cleric trebles headmoney for terry Jones


Saturday, 5 May, 2012

RAWALPINDIonlinE

THE open manholes onRailway Carriage Factoryroad are posing lifethreats while the con-cerned authorities are

playing role of silent spectators.Talking to Online, transporters andbike riders complained that severalmain holes are open on Railway Car-riage Factory road, Graveyard BridgeGanjmandi and Dhoke Hassu.

The transporters said that severalbikes had fallen into the open man-holes. The transporters said that chil-dren could fall into the manholes, so theauthorities concerned should coverthem as soon as possible. EDO COMMUNITy DEvELOP-MENT PROBES CORRUPTION:

The community development executivedistrict officer (EDO) has launched in-vestigations against the company re-sponsible for depriving 1,000 childrenof milk allocated for each child five daysa week

Punjab CM Muhammad ShahbazSharif had directed to provide a packcontaining a quarter of one kilo of milkfor the disabled children in special edu-cation centres of Rawalpindi, but the di-rection has not been implemented forthe last three months.

According to details, funds for milkwere issued in February this year andtenders for the contract offered subse-quently, but the supply of milk has beencut off since the first day of Februarydue to bad governance and un-favourable policies of the government.30 CDA EMPLOyEES TO PER-fORM HAJJ : As many as 30 employ-

ees of the Capital Development Author-ity (CDA) will perform Hajj this year.

The Capital Development Authority(CDA) will bear the expenses. The com-puter balloting was carried out amongstmore than 12,000 employees here at theCDA Headquarters on Friday. The Hajjballoting ceremony was also attendedby CDA Chairman Engineer FarkhandIqbal, all board members of CDA,Chaudhry Muhammad Yasin, generalsecretary, CDA Mazdoor Union (CBA)and office bearers of the CDA Employ-ees Union.

Engineer Farkhand Iqbal, Chair-man CDA pressed the computer key forinitiating Hajj balloting. He congratu-lated the employees declared successfulin the draw and requested those se-lected for the Hajj to pray for the pros-perity and development of Pakistan aswell as the CDA.

The names of the employees are:Malik Muhammad Tariq, MuhammadShafiq, Muhammad Afzal, JavedAkhtar, Muhammad Shakeel, IrshadHussain Shah, Hassan Akhtar,Muhammad Amir, MuhammadQasim, Muhammad Khursheed,Khalid Hameed, Asim Jillani,Muhammad Shafi, Aurangzeb, Mum-taz, Gul Khitab, Irshad Mehmood,Muhammad Hussain, MuhammadSarwar, Muhammad Asif, Azhar Iqbal,Mazhar Hussain, Sajid Mehmood,Akhtar Abbas, Rafiq Ahmad, TajMuhammad, Akhtar Gul, MuhammadSaleem, Nisar Ali, Muhammad Imranand Rabia Haider.

It is pertinent to mention herethat for the first a female employee ofthe CDA, Rabia Haider, would alsoproceed for Hajj in the history of thecivic agency.

iSlAmABAd: Jamaat-ud-dawa activists chant slogans against the uS during a protest to condemn the burning of the holy Quran. staFF Photo

ISLAMABADAPP

Senate Chairman Syed Nayyar Hus-sain Bokhari on Friday said trade notaid is ultimate key to economicprogress of any country and Pakistanseeks this from friends to provide itan opportunity as it will be appropri-ate route to assist economy to takeoff.

“Pakistan offers attractive invest-ment opportunities in energy, infra-structure, communications andagriculture sectors. We would wel-come more investment from Swedenin these fields,” he said this in ameeting with Swedish Ambassador,Lars – Hjalmar Wide here at Parlia-ment House.

He said Pakistan wants to buildbroad based, substantive and long-term relations with Sweden as we at-tach great importance to our friendlyrelations.

The chairman said exchange of

parliamentary and business delega-tions can provide opportunity forbetter understanding and open newvistas of cooperation and added thatit is essential to have regular contactsat all levels and in all areas focusingparticularly on people to people con-tacts.

He told the Ambassador thatPakistan looks forward to increasingbilateral trade volume with great ac-cess to its products in EU markets.

“Our high quality rice, mangoes,citrus fruit and textile goods can gen-erate demand in Swedish and EUmarkets. Close contacts between theChambers of Commerce and busi-ness community of both sides cangenerate momentum for enhance-ment of bilateral trade,” he added.

Pakistan’s economy is facingpressure because of losses due to ter-rorism and natural calamities andtrade preferences and GSP status forEU markets can provide us substan-tial assistance and will boost our

economy.He deliberated upon the frontline

role of Pakistan in war on terrorismand told that Pakistan has incurredheavy losses which have affected usbadly. Perception of Pakistan needsto be changed and our friends canplay beneficial role in discardingwrong perceptions.

“Our tourism industry has alsobeen affected badly which needs re-vival,” he said.

Swedish Ambassador agreedwith the Chairman regarding theneed to enhance cooperation in vari-ous sectors and frequent exchange ofdelegations at every level. He told theChairman that Sweden can assistPakistan in energy sector like usageof wind, solar and solid waste as en-vironmentally friendly sources of en-ergy to address energy deficiency inPakistan.

“Our partnership must grow ineducation, technological and culturalfields as well,” he added.

Basra greets nationover resolution fornew province

ISLAMABADAPP

Senior PPP leader Shaukat Basra on Fri-day congratulated the nation on passingresolution for establishing a new provinceto help resolve the problems of the peopleof South Punjab. He said that credit goes to the President,the Prime Minister and coalition partnerswho made struggle for new province. He said that Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP)government after coming into power ismaking all out efforts to bring progressand prosperity in all fields of life.Talking to Pakistan Television channel,he said that there is need to utilize the fi-nancial resources in the Punjab provincein a proper manner. Deputy Parliamentary leader of PakistanPeoples Party in the Punjab Assemblysaid that spending huge amount on theconstruction of bridges, roads, flyovers,laptops and other projects launched byChief Minister would not address the realissues of the people of the area.

adB to assist Cda’s Rapid transit System


The Asian Development Bank (ADB) willprovide assistance for carrying out the feasi-bility study for running the CDA Rapid Tran-sit System (BRTS) for the capital city. Thestudy will be completed in September 2012,however, work on the project already initi-ated by the Capital Development Authority(CDA) will continue expeditiously. Provisionof the decent public transport facility is thepriority of the authority and the service willsoon be launched after completing necessarymodalities for this purpose.CDA Chairman Engineer Farkhand Iqbalstated this while presiding over a meeting by adelegation of BRTS Projects here on Thursday.The chairman said that CDA had already allo-cated a vast area for establishing a modernisedterminal in Islamabad equipped with busstand, shopping mall and allied facilities. Hesaid in the first instance, the service will belaunched for Bhara Kau, Golra Sharif, Pak Sec-retariat, Faizabad and other areas of the fed-eral capital to facilitate the general public. Hesaid public transport facility was one of thebasic requirements of the city which had beenneglected during the successive regimes. Hesaid the PMO director, traffic engineering di-rector and project director of the programmewould come up with their recommendationsafter detailed deliberations and would submit adetailed report to the CDA board at the earli-est. The meeting was attended by Member En-vironment Mian Waheed-ud-Din, MemberEngineering Ibrar Hussain Shah, Member Es-tate Khalid Mahmud Mirza, Member FinanceJaved Jehangir and Member AdministrationShaukat Ali Mohmand.

IHC CJ constitutes 9 benches to hearover 300 cases

ISLAMABADAPP

Islamabad High Court (IHC) Chief JusticeIqbal Hameed-ur-Rehman has constitutedsix single and three division benches to hearmore than 300 cases during the next week,starting from Monday. Six single benches include Chief JusticeIqbal Hameed-ur-Rehman, Justice RiazAhmed Khan, Justice Muhammad AnwarKhan Kasi, Justice Noorul Haq N Qureshi,Justice Shaukat Aziz Sidqui and JusticeMuhammad Azim Khan Afridi.First divisionbenches comprise of Chief Justice IqbalHameedur Rehman and Justice Noorul HaqN Qureshi, second bench include JusticeRiaz Ahmed Khan and Justice MuhammadAzim Khan Afridi while the third bench in-clude Justice Muhammad Anwar Khan Kasiand Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui.

HeC to formulate fee refund policy


Following the court order, the Higher Edu-cation Commission (HEC) is going to for-mulate a fee refund policy for all publicsector universities. This was decided at theCommission’s 26th meeting wherein theissue was raised by HEC Chairman DrJavaid R Laghari, said a press release onFriday. The Islamabad High Court had de-clared the non-refund policy of all educa-tional institutions illegal and directed theHEC to formulate a policy to safeguard thestudents’ interests. So the Higher EducationCommission has begun work on a mecha-nism to protect students from unnecessarydifficulties. The HEC will also work on for-mulating a consolidating uniform admis-sion test for students so that they do nothave to appear for multiple entrance tests.

Pakistan wants to build substantive,long term ties with Sweden: Bokhari

Citizens protest open manholes



Islamabad

low

High

SUnday Monday tUeSday34°C I 19°C 36°C I 20°C 37°C I 21°C

PRayeR tIMInGSfajr Sunrise Zuhr asr Maghrib Isha

03:41 05:14 12:05 15:47 18:54 20:28

CIty dIReCtoRy

PolICe eMeRGenCy 15

aMBUlanCe 115

ReSCUe 1122

HIlal-e-aHMeR 9250488

edHI foUndatIon 2827844

BoMB dISPoSal 9270698

fIRe BRIGade CentRe 16

CIVIl defenCe 9262830

eMeRGenCy HelP

HoSPItalS

Blood BanK

PIMS Blood BanK 9261272

Poly ClInIC Blood BanK 9209123

CoMPlaInt

waPda 111-000-118

SUI GaS 1199

RaIlwayS

CIty StatIon (enqUIRy) 117

ReSeRVatIon 9273614

RaIlway PolICe 1333

aIRPoRt

flIGHt enqUIRy 114

PIa ReSeRVatIon 111-786-786

ColleGeS / UnIVeRSItIeS

InteRnatIonal ISlaMIC UnIVeRSIty 9260765

BaHRIa UnIVeRSIty 9260002

nUMl 9257677

qUaId-e-aZaM UnIVeRSIty 90642098

aRId aGRICUltURe UnIVeRSIty 9290151

fJwU 9273235

RIPHa InteRnatIonal UnIVeRSIty 111510510

nCa RawalPIndI 5770423

PUnJaB law ColleGe 4421347

MaHRoof Int 2222920

PIMS 9261170

Poly ClInIC 9218300

Cda 9221334

SHIfa InteRnatIonal 4603666

alI 4444435

dIStRICt HqS 5556311-14

UltRaSonIC ClInIC 2824862

Holy faMIly 9290319

MY PAST LOVE

"My Past love" by Mohan das & ZahraMalkani opens at Khaas Gallery. do joinus for this experimental two person showthat continues till 5 May 2012 and meetthe artists in person. Please spread theword and bring your friends!

DrUMMING CIrCLE

date and tIMe: 05:00 PM, weeKly eVentVenUe: tHe CentRe foR aRtS & CUltURe

our drumming circle is a (free!) ongoingevent and is held every friday from 5pmto 6pmwe are having a great time, and want toshare the good time with you! ourdrumming circle has children ...

SUnny InteRValS

weatHeR UPdateS

33°C

date: aPR 24 - May 05 at 5:00PM

VenUe: KHaaS aRt GalleRy (fRee)

20°C

WOMEN: HOLDING UP HALF THE SKY

this group exhibition showcasing thework of Iqbal Hussain, ahsen asif, amnaIlyas, Isma Hussain, amra Khan, amnatariq, faten anjum Suleman, anmal fatimaUppal, Sehar Hashmi and annem Zaidiwill run from april 20 - May 10, 2012.

date: aPR 20 - May 10 at 6 to 8 PM

VenUe: SeRena Hotel, ISlaMaBad.

ISLAMABADonlinE

CNG suspension hasbecome a nightmarefor the citizen of twincities as they face im-mense difficulties to

reach their destinations duringload shedding days.

Citizens, as well as, publictransporters have spent millionsof rupees to get their vehicles toCNG and they are facing immenseproblems due to prolonged clo-sures of CNG stations which havenow become a regular feature.

After increase, in the petro-leum prices citizens convertedtheir vehicles to CNG, as it was thecheap fuel as compared to Petrol.These citizens are facing problemsdue to prolonged closure of CNGstations.

CNG suspension is not onlycreating problems for the com-muters but also affecting the busi-ness of the transporters in thetwin cities, as they cannot get CNGto ply their vehicles on roads.

CNG suspension has become aregular feature which is disturbing

the life of people of twin cities asthey have not any other option leftbut to again convert their vehiclesto petrol and diesel which wouldcost million of rupees. This prac-tice is difficult for vehicle ownersbut it would also cause billion ofrupees loss to the economy of thecountry.

Citizens have expressed theirconcerns in this regard saying thatit is not possible for every citizen toconvert vehicle to petrol or diesel.

Khubaib an employee of a pri-vate firm told Online that trans-port system in federal capital ispathetic that one prefers to pur-chase his own vehicles rather totravel in public transport. He saidthat now due to inefficiency of thepresent government CNG criseshas been worsened and people areagain facing difficulties. He de-manded the government to devisemechanism regarding supply ofCNG to stations and provide pos-sible relief to the masses.

Rizwana a teacher by profes-sion told this scribe that she trav-els daily from Bani chowk to G/10and uses public transport but dueto CNG suspension she faces diffi-

culties. During load shedding dayspublic transport remains lesswhile cab owners take extracharges on pretext of runningtheir vehicles on petrol.

She demanded from the au-thorities to take notice of the situ-ation and to take immediate stepsto solve this issue.PLEASURE EATING MAyfUEL OBESITy: When pleasuremotivates eating, rather thanhunger, it activates chemicalsignals which can cause overeatingand fuel obesity, says a new study.

"`Hedonic hunger` refers tothe desire to eat for pleasure, andto enjoy the taste, rather than torestore the body`s energy needs,"said Palmiero Monteleone, Uni-versity of Naples SUN, Italy, wholed the study.

"For example, desiring and eat-ing a piece of cake even after a sa-tiating meal is consumption drivenby pleasure and not by energy dep-rivation," said Monteleone, theJournal of Clinical Endocrinology& Metabolism reported.

"The physiological process un-derlying hedonic eating is not fullyunderstood, but it is likely that en-

dogenous substances (hormone orneurotransmitter produced natu-rally in the body), regulating re-ward mechanisms like thehormone ghrelin and chemicalcompounds such as 2-arachi-donoylglycerol (2-AG) are in-volved," said Monteleone.

Researchers assessed satiatedhealthy adults, aged 21 years, feed-ing them each their personal foodand later, a less-palatable food ofequal caloric and nutrient value,said a university statement.

They periodically measured 2-AG and ghrelin levels. The plasmalevels (concentration in blood) ofghrelin and 2-AG increased duringhedonic eating, with the favouritefoods, but not with non-hedoniceating.

This increase suggests an acti-vation of the chemical reward sys-tem, which overrides the body`ssignal that enough has been eatento restore energy.

"Hedonic hunger may power-fully stimulate overeating in anenvironment where highly palat-able foods are omnipresent, andcontribute to the surge in obesity,"concluded Monteleone.

CNG suspension nightmarefor citizens of twin cities

iSlAmABAd: dancers perform during a cultural show arranged by Pakistan national council of the Arts for the visiting scouts delegation from india. staFF Photo



Islamabad


College of Physicians and Sur-geons Pakistan (CPSP) Presi-dent Prof Zafarullah Chaudhryhas commended Shifa Interna-tional Hospital (SIH) for start-ing living donor livertransplant programme for thefirst time in Pakistan.

He congratulated SIHPresident and Chief ExecutiveOfficer Dr Manzoor H Qaziand liver transplant team forperforming first ever livingdonor pediatric liver trans-plant of a 12-year-old child atShifa on April 30, 2012, fol-lowed by another liver trans-plant of a 47-year-old personon May 1, 2012.

He said now people of Pak-istan would not have to goabroad for liver transplant asShifa had introduced first

class liver transplant pro-gramme in Pakistan. He wasaddressing to the participantsof a ceremony arranged at SIHin collaboration with CPSP inconnection with Golden Ju-bilee Celebrations of CPSP.

Three workshops on thetopics of “management of vas-cular malformations of thehead and neck – multidiscipli-nary case”, “handling commonemergencies” and “hepatobil-iary and gastroenterology”were conducted on this occa-sion. Associate Director Post-graduate Medical Education(PGME) SIH Dr. DarakshanJabeen coordinated the work-shops. Postgraduate residents,doctors and medical studentsof Rawalpindi and Islamabadattended the workshops.

Vice President CPSP ProfMuhammad Shoaib Shafi, DrManzoor H Qazi and other of-

ficials of Shifa and CPSP werealso present on the occasion.

President CPSP acknowl-edged the contribution ofShifa in medical research anddevelopment in Pakistan be-sides providing medical careof an international standardto the patients. “Shifa is in-deed a national asset,” Prof.Chaudhry stated. He was ear-lier informed about Shifa’smedical services, Liver Trans-plant Program and Postgradu-ate Medical Education(PGME) program. Dr Man-zoor H Qazi acknowledgedand thanked CPSP for its co-operation and support forShifa’s PGME program. LaterDr Qazi presented souvenirsto Prof Zafarullah Chaudhry,Prof Shoaib Shafi and othersenior officials of the Collegeof Physicians and SurgeonsPakistan.

6,835 involved in illegal human trafficking nabbedin four years

ISLAMABADAPP

Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) hasnabbed 6,835 persons involved in illegalhuman trafficking in the country duringthe last four years. Giving year-wise de-tails about the arrests, an official sourceon Friday said in 2008, 1642 smugglersor traffickers were arrested, 1775 in2008, 1779 in 2010 and 1639 were ap-prehended during 2011. In addition, theAgency also nabbed 1,842 ProclaimedOffenders (POs) during the period with376 arrests in 2008, 441 in 2009, 522 in2010 and 503 POs in 2011. The officialsaid 507 Court Absconders (COs) werealso arrested during the last four yearswith year wise details of 77 in 2008, 54in 2009, 200 in 2010 and 176 in 2011.The official said thanks to steps taken byMinistry of Interior and introducing dif-ferent methods that Pakistan got up-graded from Tier-II Watch List toTier-II in Trafficking in Persons Report(TIP Report) published by US State De-partment and maintained the same sta-tus during 2011 whereby 188 countriesaround the global were categorized. Thisreport has direct impact on US and UNfinancial aid. He said the Agency wasgiving priority to control the illegalhuman trafficking in the country and inthis regard it had successfully launchedIntegrated Border Management System(IBMS) at Islamabad and Peshawar air-ports. The other measures were installa-tion of Edison System at major airportsthrough Australian High Commission,creation of Immigration IntelligenceUnit (IIU) in collaboration with UK, cre-ation of Transnational Crime Unit(TCU) with collaboration of Australia.

Hike in groceryprices rejected

RAWALPINDIonlinE

Traders’ unions and general stores asso-ciations have rejected price list issuedby the district management, demandingdecrease in prices of grocery items inthe open market. These unions have demanded the man-agement reschedule the meetings ofprice control committees and fix newrates of grocery or supply the groceryitems to merchants at their doorsteps. They said the management is not con-trolling wholesale retailers as they areselling grocery according to their ownprice lists. They added that in theopen market the rates of differentgrocery items are comparatively high.

iSlAmABAd: contractual employees of Federal Planning and development division protest in favour of their demands outside the national Press club. staFF Photo

Hilarious declamation contest held at nUMl


Participants with their heart touchingverses, dramatic rise and fall of pitch,literary dictions, scholastic themes,metaphoric vocabulary, meticulouslypracticed pronunciation, pithy andcrispy delivery of their speechesearned showers of commendationsand accolades from their universityfellows and teachers at interdepart-mental declamation contest. This interdepartmental declamationcontest was arranged by the NationalUniversity of Modern Languages(NUML) Debating Society on Fridayat main campus. NUML Debating Society ChairmanArshad Mehmood said the purpose ofsuch events at regular intervals wasto introduce and develop the art ofpublic speaking, promote confidenceand sense of responsibility amongststudents.A total of 19 participants from de-partments of Arabic, English, eco-nomics, education, engineering,information technology, governanceand organizational sciences, interna-tional relations, management sci-ences and mass communicationparticipated in English and Urdudeclamation contest and presentedtheir views with masterly acumen. Itis worth mentioning that said stu-dents were not professional speakersor debaters and some of them haveeven never been on the rostrum. Therules of the contest require that thespeech should carry a strong themeregarding present day social, cultural,economical and geo-political aspectsof life. The speech must be com-pletely memorised, no notes allowed,and must be between three to fourminutes in length. Muhammad Shahbir from Arabic De-partment won the first position, Au-rooj Qaiser from English (FunctionalCourses) Department secured the sec-ond position while Muhammad Ikhlasfrom IR Department secured thirdposition. First and second consola-tion prizes went to Muhammad UmerFarooq of Governance Departmentand Sarmad Bashir of Mass Commu-nication Department respectively inthe English declamation contest. ArifQureshi of English Graduate StudiesDepartment was declared first, SajifAbbas from Urdu Department stoodsecond while Sajis Ali Niazai of Ara-bic Department won the third posi-tion in Urdu Declamation Contest.

ISLAMABADAPP

MINISTER for Ports andShipping Babar KhanGhuri on Fridaystressed the need forearly completion of M-

8 Gwadar-Ratodero Motorway to give amuch needed boost to country’s econ-omy. “Around 66% work on Motorway-8Ratodero has been completed and if theNational Highway Authority (NHA) com-pletes the remaining work it will give atremendous increase to trade activities atthe Gwadar port,” he said in reply to aquestion asked by Senator Talha Mah-mood during the question hour session ofthe Senate. The Minister said in order toenable Gwadar to compete with its re-gional peers, early completion of Motor-way-8 Ratodero was extremely necessary.To another question he said that differentorganizations under the ministry, includ-ing KPT, PQA, PNSC, GPA etc. were giv-ing profit and as a whole paid Rs. 6 billionrupees to the government in tax. Mean-

while, Minister for Information Technol-ogy and Telecommunications Raja Per-vaiz Ashraf informed the Upper Housethat a case of misappropriation corrup-tion amounting to Rs. 12,645 million wasreported by Audit and Inspection Reportin Pakistan Computer Bureau (PCB).

Replying to a question asked by Sen-ator Talaha Mehmood, he the Audit wasconducted by Directorate of General ofFederal Audit, Islamabad in the year2009-10. He said the four officials of thePCB were allegedly found involved in thecorruption and after registration of FIRthe case was referred to the FIA for inves-tigation. However, this matter is sub ju-dice as the alleged officials had gone tothe Islamabad High Court to clarify theirposition. To another query, he said that 15computers, two wireless access sets andsome other accessories provided underthe PSDP project went missing fromSheikh Zayed Medical Complex, Lahore.He said the theft incurred a loss of around0.5 million rupees adding, “This case wasalso referred to FIA.”THANvI’S DEATH ANNIvERSARy

OBSERvED: One of the foremost hu-morist in Urdu literature, Shaukat Thanviremembered on his death anniversary onFriday. Shaukat Thanvi’s family belongedto Thana Bhaun, a small town in Muzaf-farnagar district but he was born inBindraban, district, UP, on February 2,1904, private news channel reported.

Shaukat Thanvi was an essayist,columnist, novelist, short story writer,broadcaster, playwright, sketch-writerand poet but, in essence, he was a hu-morist and in almost all his writings anunmistakable streak of humour can al-ways be traced. His article “SwadeshiRail” established him as the foremostUrdu humourist. After partition, he mi-grated to Pakistan. In 1957, Thanvi joinedJang, Karachi, and wrote a humour col-umn called Vaghaira vaghaira. WhenJang launched its Rawalpindi edition in1959 Shaukat was posted there. He re-ceived Tamgha-i-Imtiaz in March 1963.He was ill and his health deterioratedthere. He died on May 4, 1963 and wasburied in Miani Sahib Graveyard.

Ghauri urges early completion of M-8 Motorway

CPSP president lauds Shifa Hospital’sliver transplant programme



Islamabad

iSlAmABAd: Pml-Q Secretary general Senator mushahid Hussain addresses a ceremony on the distribution of sewing machines among the non-muslim women

at the party office. staFF Photo

PM can perform duties till deseated by ECP: RamzanISLAMABAD

APP

FORMER Judge High Court andSenior Advocate Supreme Court ofPakistan Ramzan Chaudhry saidon Friday that Supreme Court

bench has not stopped the prime ministerfrom performing his duties, and till the com-pletion of the constitutional obligations, hewould remain chief executive of the country.

Ramzan Chaudhry said Constitution isthe supreme law of the country and it hasclearly given procedure of the disqualifica-tion of an MNA and till the completion of theprocedure he cannot be declared as disqual-ified. Ramzan said that neither the SupremeCourt, nor the Constitution stops the PrimeMinister from performing his duties tillcompletion of the constitutional procedure.

He said that as provisions of the Consti-

tution, the Speaker will prepare a referenceagainst the convicted MNA and then give adecision if he or she stands disqualified ornot. If the Speaker thinks that he is not dis-qualified,the matter will end there, otherwisethe matter will be sent to the Election Com-mission which will decide his fate within 90days. To a question he said that confronta-tion among state institutions was not in theinterest of the democracy and efforts shouldbe made to avert such a situation.USE Of MOBILE PHONE WHILEDRIvING DANGEROUS: Almost half ofyoung drivers have admitted to using asmartphone to listen to music, read emailsand check maps while driving, according toa research from RAC.

In its report on motoring 2011, the or-ganisation said that although it is illegal touse a phone while driving, 48 percent ofdrivers aged 18-24 had admitted to using

smartphone distractions, with 24 percentusing an iPod to listen to music, 23 percentreading emails and 22 percent checkingGoogle maps, BBC reported.

A further 15 percent said they talked tofriends on mobile phone. Almost one in 10admitted they had played games on theirsmartphone while driving, and more than afifth (21 percent) had texted behind thewheel. The RAC said that while car distrac-tions were a problem among drivers of allages, with 12% of motorists admitting theyreceive or make non-hands-free calls whiledriving, the issue is particularly acute amongthe young a quarter of drivers consider mo-bile phone usage a bigger issue than drinkdriving. Adrian Tink, RAC motoring strate-gist, said: “Drivers using handheld mobilephones is still an all-too common sight, andone that appears to be getting worse.

“The popularity of smartphones and

apps, especially among younger drivers whohave grown up with the technology, riskscreating a new generation of dri vers whobelieve using a phone behind the wheel isacceptable. This has to change.” He added:“At 70mph your car travels around thelength of six double decker buses every twoseconds if someone told you to close youreyes at that speed for that length of timeyou’d think they were crazy yet people aredoing virtually the same thing by takingtheir eyes off the road to look at phones.”

Tink said 82 percent of drivers agreedthat using a phone behind the wheel is dan-gerous, though a minority (14 percent) saidthey feel “confident and safe” doing so.CHATTAN CONDEMNS PML-N MP’SROWDINESS IN NA: Pakistan PeoplesParty Member National Assembly from Ba-jaur Agency Syed Akhundzada Chattan onFriday strongly condemned the attitude of

Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz parliamen-tarians for not joining the Fateha offered forthe martyrs of Bajaur Agency in the House.

Talking to media-persons outside Par-liament House he said more than 20 inno-cent people lost their lives in Bajaur blast onFriday morning. But the PML-N membersrefused to join Fateha and continued chant-ing slogans in the House during the `Dua’.

He said this is shameful as the victimsof Bajaur Agency were only Pakistanis anddid not belong to Pakistan Peoples Party. InBajaur Agency a protest demonstrationwould be held to protest the apathy of PML-N parliamentarians. Responding to a ques-tion he said, he always condemned droneattacks and recalled that he had even joinedthe sit in of Pakistan Tehrik e Insaf in Pe-shawar against the drone attacks. He urgedTaliban to surrender as innocents are beingkilled in bomb blasts.

Black pepper helps keep fat under check

ISLAMABADonlinE

Researchers have offered a long-soughtexplanation for the beneficial fat-fight-ing effects of black pepper.The research pinpoints piperine — thepungent-tasting substance that givesblack pepper its characteristic taste,concluding that piperine also can blockthe formation of new fat cells.Soo-Jong Um, Ji-Cheon Jeong and col-leagues describe previous studies indi-cating that piperine reduces fat levels inthe bloodstream and has other benefi-cial health effects.Black pepper and the black pepperplant, they noted, have been used forcenturies in traditional Eastern medi-cine to treat gastrointestinal distress,pain, inflammation and other disorders.Despite that long medicinal history, sci-entists know little about how piperineworks on the innermost molecular level.The scientists set out to get that infor-mation about piperine’s anti-fat effects.Their laboratory studies and computermodels found that piperine interfereswith the activity of genes that controlthe formation of new fat cells.In doing so, piperine may also set off ametabolic chain reaction that helps keepfat in check in other ways.The group suggests that the finding maylead to wider use of piperine or black-pepper extracts in fighting obesity andrelated diseases. The study has beenpublished in ACS’ Journal of Agricul-tural and Food Chemistry.

appointment of adhocjudges opposed

ISLAMABADAPP

Former Supreme Court Bar AssociationPresident Qazi Anwar said that adho-cism was the negation of independentjudiciary as Pakistan Bar Council hadpassed resolutions repeatedly againstadhocism.He said that the bar council has beenstressing that there should be no adho-cism and only permanent judges shouldbe appointed.Qazi Anwar further said that threejudges will not be the part of bench forhearing appeal in the contempt of courtcase due to certain reasons.He explained seven Judges have alreadyheard the contempt of court caseagainst the Prime Minister Syed YousufRaza Gilani and they cannot become thepart of the bench for hearing the ap-peal.Qazi Anwar maintained that the totalstrength of judges in the Supreme Courtshould be seventeen and there is also avacant position of permanent judge inthe apex court.He clarified that there remain only sixjudges who may become the part of thebench for hearing the appeal. Qazi fur-ther said that the Article 177 of the Con-stitution defines the method ofappointing a permanent judge.

23 uCs cleaned undergrand cleanliness drive

RAWALPINDIAPP

Municipal Services DepartmentRawalpindi has cleaned 23 Union Coun-cils (UCs) of Rawalpindi city and re-moved so far 8,000 tonnes of garbageduring the grand cleanliness campaign.

Under the special cleanliness cam-paign, so far 23 (UCs) have been clearedwhile overall 16 k m sewerage lines havealso been cleaned. Four thousandstonnes debris of demolished buildingswere also lifted from five plots, three ofPotohar Town and two of Rawal Town.Executive District Officer (EDO) Munic-ipal Services Imtiaz Ahmed Malik andDistrict Officer (DO) Solid Waste Man-agement Dr Mazhar Azeem visited dif-ferent areas of the city and inspected thecleanliness work being done by the san-itary workers. They urged the citizens es-pecially traders to cooperate with thesanitary workers and play their role inthis connection so that the city could bemade neat and clean. Under a decision,the owners of nearly 12 open plots will beissued notices. EDO and DO expressinghis satisfaction over performance of thedepartment concerned said thatRawalpindi city will be made a pollutionand dust free city. EDO said that thecleanliness campaign for 46 (UCs) ofRawalpindi city and eight union councilsof Potohar Town was underway. THALASSAEMIA CONfERENCETO BE HELD TODAy: A two-day 8th

National Thalasaemia Conference will beheld on Saturday at Al-Mizan Campus,274 Peshawar Road Rawalpindi whileDr. Samar Mubarak Mand will be thechief guest at the inaugural session of theconference. The conference is being or-ganised by Islamic International MedicalCollege, an institute of Riphah Interna-tional University, in collaboration withThalasaemia Federation of Pakistan. Theconference is part of the national thalas-saemia week being observed by the Pak-istan Thalasaemia Federation from May2 to May 8 to create public awarenessabout the disease. SHAHIDUDDIN APPOINTED DGCADD: Shahiduddin Khan,Director(BS-19), Directorate of Workers Educa-tion is appointed to hold current chargeof the post of Director General (BS-20).

It will be in addition to his own du-ties with effect from 1.5.2012 for a periodof three months or till the availability ofregular incumbent of the post which everis earlier, according to a notification is-sued here by Secretary, Capital Admin-istration and Development Division .JOGGING INCREASES LIfE Ex-PECTANCy: Regularly jogging in-creases life expectancy for men by sixyears and women by five years, cardiol-ogists have found. As little as an hour aweek is enough to deliver the surprisinghealth benefit, According to the medics,who studied the longevity of around2,000 Danish joggers with that of thosewho exercised less, The Telegraph

newspaper reported. What is more, theyfound that gentle jogging appeared tobe better in terms of adding years toone’s life, than cranking up the pace.Male joggers who spent between 60minutes and two-and-a-half hours aweek, split into two or three runs, tread-ing the pavements at a “slow or average”pace lived on average 6.2 years longerthan non-exercisers, found the teamworking on the Copenhagen City HeartStudy. Female joggers derived slightlyless benefit, but still an impressive 5.6extra years. The results of the researchare being presented at a meeting of theEuropean Society of Cardiology, beingheld in Dublin this weekend. PeterSchnohr, chief cardiologist on the heartstudy project, said: “We can say withcertainty that regular jogging increaseslongevity. “The good news is that youdon’t actually need to do that muchtoreap the benefits.” The study, started in1976, has followed the cardiovascularhealth of around 20,000 people aged 20to 93. The jogging sub-study looked at1,116 male joggers and 762 female jog-gers and compared their lifespan tonon-joggers in the main study popula-tion. Joggers were asked to assesswhether they ran at a slow, average, orfast pace. Dr Schnohr, who is based atBispebjerg University Hospital inCopenhagen, said there was a U-shapedrelationship between the amount andintensity of jogging and a person’s riskof dying over a particular period.

‘Special funds tobe released forrural areas’ uplift’ISLAMABAD: The government, on thedirection of Prime Minister Yousuf RazaGilani would allocate special funds toremove the deprivation of the ruralareas and upgrade them in accordancewith the urban areas of the capital. These areas have been neglected duringthe successive regimes. The rural areasof Islamabad would be provided withbasic facilities like clean drinking water,electricity and gas at the earliest tobring them at par with the urban areasto improve the level of living.Prime Minister’s Task Force on Islam-abad Chairman Faisal Sakhi Butt, dur-ing his visit to the rural areas, includingShams Colony, Golra Morre and JhangSaiyedan, said the residents of the areaswould be provided clean drinking water,graveyard facility and an NOC for rail-way line. He said in order to resolvethese issues on priority the task forcewould take up the matter with the quar-ters concerned like the Capital Develop-ment Authority (CDA) and otherorganisations for prompt action. The notables of these areas, includingMalik Javed, Shahzad Khan, GhulamMustafa, Malik Abid of Suleman Town,Asad Shah, Syed Wajahat Hussain Shah,Asad Abbas, Ishtiaq Shah, ShahidAbbas, Samar Shah, Khawar Shah andothers, were present on this occasion.He said that those elected from this con-stituency in the past had totally ignoredthe people after the election. He said thathe would first solve problems of the peo-ple as the development of the area, nottheir votes, was his priority. StAFF REPoRt


Editor’s mail 11Saturday, 5 May, 2012

Send your letters to: Letters to Editor, Pakistan Today, 4-Shaarey Fatima Jinnah, Lahore, Pakistan. Fax: +92-42-36298302. E-mail: [email protected]. Letters should be addressed to Pakistan Today exclusively.

on oBl’s lettersMost of the Osama bin Laden letters

which were released, May 03, by WestPoint Combating Terrorism Centre in theUS, give a quite different perspectiveabout the writer himself.

Osama bin Laden appears to be quitefrustrated, disillusioned and disheart-ened with the blows Al-Qaeda was re-ceiving in the battlefield. He appears tobe quite de-linked with the world politicswhen he bases his views on simplistic as-sumptions.

One would just laugh on the proposalto his comrades to target PresidentObama and Gen Petraeus while sparingVice President Joe Biden, Robert Gatesand Admiral Mullen as killing of Obamaand Petraeus will change the war’s pathin Afghanistan (OBL was of the view thatBiden and his other generals were notprepared to take over the task in absenceof Obama).

Osama bil Laden appears to be frus-trated with the activities of jihadist out-fits which were painting them asbloodthirsty monsters. He was quite crit-ical of jihadists attacking civilians,mosques, marketplaces, schools as suchattacks are proving quite counter-pro-ductive among common Muslims. Healso reemphasised the rules to be ad-hered to by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pak-istan for kidnappings for ransom.

But all these selected seventeen let-ters, out of hundreds of documents yet tobe translated and published, show thatOBL, as an old man lying in isolation andcut-off by electronic communication, hasbecome quite irrelevant to those runningAl-Qaeda in the field.

Obviously, jihadist outfits were notready to listen to him. Regardless of hisinstructions, jihadists continued to at-tack civilians, mosques, shrines, market-places, schools and hospitals all overPakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and else-where in the Muslim world. Kidnappingfor ransom in Karachi and other prosper-ous cities continued unabated.

Americans might have killed Osamabin Laden to declare closing of 9/11 filebut Al-Qaeda has given birth to numer-ous ideological splinter jihadist groups.These ruthless groups are not under acentral command but working at a locallevel; it is more difficult to track andeliminate them. The threat is far fromover.

MASOOD KHANSaudi Arabia

on the detention of edhiMillions of people of this country

would be in shock to read the statementattributed to Abdul Sattar Edhi - wellknown social worker appeared in thesection of the press (May 04) about hisdetention, posting of police officials out-side his house and closure of his ambu-lance service in Lyari where policeoperation for the last 8 days is in fullswing.

Needless to mention here that MrEdhi is well known social worker whohas rendered unprecedented services tohumanity without any discrimination foryears as recognised throughout theworld.

Closure of his fast, efficient andmuch needed ambulance service in Lyariis condemnable. If he has opposed theLyari operation like thousands of others,it was his right; But the Sindh govern-ment had no grounds to take the men-tioned measures against him.

It appears the Sindh governmentwhich is already suffering from ex-tremely bad governance is now defamingthe country’s heroes. Very sad!

MOHAMMAD KHAN SIALKarachi

People’s miseryRecently, there was an exceptionally

large convoy of some VIP passing by thePIDC. Traffic had, as usual, been stoppedmuch in advance of its anticipated arrivaland long lines of vehicles and pedestri-ans baked patiently in the scorching sun.

For some, there may have been nourgency of time, but for others like merushing to collect a toddler from school itwas most agonising.

Even several policemen, who sponta-neously appeared to bring traffic to ahalt, disappeared in a jiffy after the VIPpassed, leaving all and sundry to fend forthemselves.

Almost 20 minutes late for mybrother, I wrote this as I stood waiting onthe roadside for my driver to finallyreach me from the other side of the jamso I could eventually reach school, apolo-getic and consoling a toddler oblivious tothe bitter realities of the environmentshe is growing up in.

IBAD AHMEDKarachi

Respecting the elderlyThrough your prestigious newspaper,

I would like to highlight the issue of themistreatment of senior citizens and theelderly.

The elderly become dependent onyounger people to fulfil their basic re-quirements as their minds and bodiesgrow frail and desire support. Given thestrong familial bonds and the traditionalsocial structures in Pakistan, the elderlylong enjoyed the love, affection and re-spect of their children and grandchil-dren. All their needs were met by theirfamilies. They were therefore invisible.But now things are beginning to change.In Pakistan, the elderly population is es-timated to be 7.2 million and is steadilyincreasing to about 10 per cent of thepopulation. In contemporary society, theproportion of senior citizens is accelerat-ing, which is accompanied by a host ofproblems. Typically, youngsters do nothold elderly people in high regard. Thetendency will have an adverse effect onour society.

I think the following factors con-tribute to this phenomenon. In the firstplace, the youth are self-centred today.In the second place, due to a variety ofcauses, people are unwilling and unableto make time for the old. As a result,young people tend to regard senior citi-zens as non-significant individuals. Inthe third place, the governments in manycounties do not pay adequate attentionto that group.

It is an irreversible reality that peo-ple will grow old. Therefore, measuresshould be taken to take care of the eld-erly and counter the neglectful attitudetowards them. Parents and teachersshould instil good manners in the youthand make them realise that it was theelderly that took care of them when theywere younger. Moreover, the governmentshould take the requiste measures. Notonly should it provide adequate care fa-cilities and amenities to the elderly, itshould also raise awareness regarding re-spect for the elderly.

MEHREEN FAROOQKarachi

Patience pleaseAs the Supreme Court has to an-

nounce the detailed decision regardingPrime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani,till then we are supposed to be quiet in-stead of rushing to condemn the PrimeMinister and jump to all sorts of conclu-sions.

This sort of attitude may cause morecomplications and problems for thecountry and, in these circumstances,Pakistan can ill-afford that. Although theprime minister has already gotten thepunishment from the SC Supreme Court,he is still on duty and acting as primeminister. So, in the best interest of thecountry, all political parties should waitfor the detailed decision of SC becausethey will be able to better frame their fu-ture stances in light of that.

Our target should be the better fu-ture of Pakistan. It's not time for politicalpoint-scoring.

If we're sincere with Pakistan and itscitizens, then we have to be very rationaland this is what we are lacking.

MUHAMMAD AZIZ UR REHMANKarachi

Better than a dictatorshipThere was a recent article by Ikram

Sehgal published in which it seems as ifthe writer is calling for martial law whenhe says, “While nobody wants a militarytakeover, because that would be suicidal,should intervention be ruled out if thecountry’s very existence is in danger?’’Such statements should not be welcomedas we have experienced martial law fourtimes in Pakistan and the results weredisastrous.

The intervention of armed forces inpolitics was not a good thing and it isquite clear that the country suffered a lotduring military rules. Just one example

of that is that sectarian and ethnic organ-isations were created to divide the politi-cal forces during military regimes, thefallout of which is making our countryburn these days. Invitations for martiallaw classify as mutinous acts as the con-stitution of Pakistan declares it to be afederal democratic republic. It is saidthat even the worst democracy is betterthan a dictatorship.

The political parties and other socialactivists demanding for the PM’s resigna-tion seem to be overlooking the fact thatthe trial is not yet over. Similarly, thewriter’s call for martial law seems to have

been not been thought through. The twohouses of parliament, Senate and Na-tional Assembly, passed separate resolu-tions in support of Prime Minister YousafRaza Gilani, reposing confidence in himfollowing his conviction. The constitutionhas given much space to the PM anduntil he uses all his rights and exhaustsall avenues of appeal, he can’t be consid-ered disqualified. I admit performance ofthe PPP government was not ideal, but ithas set new standards of politics in a feu-dal society.

Millions of poor have been awardedby employee’s stock scheme. For the first

time in the history of Pakistan, poorworkers became partners in the profits oforganisations. The bureaucracy becameanswerable to the people and the powercentre shifted from the traditional onesto the masses. As people have gotten a re-alisation of their rights, democracy hasbecome a platform where they can sharepower. Keeping up with democracy is theway to go. The army is an institutionwhich is supposed to work under theelected government, not to govern thecountry.

SAMINA AMIR MALIKIslamabad

only the public’s burden?Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) established a new

power plant in Bin Qasim one year ago that could generate 590megawatts of electricity. It is a pity that the power plant thatcan fulfil the needs for electricity more or less in the whole cityof Karachi is yet to be functional though one year has passedsince the power plant’s establishment. The power plant costmillions of dollars and was established with the cooperation ofthe Asian Development Bank and other international financialinstitutions and I believe if the power plant were to be func-tional, no electricity loadshedding, even for a few seconds, cantake place in Karachi.

If we see the overall current condition of the loadsheddingin Karachi, 3 to 6 hours’ loadshedding is usual in the whole citywhereas various areas are deprived of electricity for an un-known number of hours. When the system is present and load-shedding can easily be coped with, so why are the people beingdeprived of electricity and being charged exorbitant rates? Inthis regard, the concerned authorities must realise the problemand bring the new power plant into operation and exploit it inorder to cope with loadshedding and facilitate the public.

HAFIZ MUHAMMAD NOMANKarachi

Reaching outWhile ‘great game’ of wrangling

power in this part of the world is beingwitnessed, all the political parties areunited on the agenda of resolvingBalochistan issue through dialogues, de-velopment and reforms. For example,President Zardari pledged to turn over anew chapter of mutual respect in theprovince; PM Gilani declared that thegovernment is prepared to hold talkswith “dissident Baloch brethren”; PTIchairman Imran Khan, terming theBalochistan issue to be of “grave con-cern”, has plans to talk to Baloch leaders– even those in exile; PML(N) chiefNawaz Sharif had also vehementlyfavoured the option of dialogue with theexiled leaders of Balochistan. All agreethat only the fulfilment of genuine rightsand redressal of long standing grievancescan discontinue the blood bath in the re-source-rich province, creating room andcapacity for the dialogue process.

Nonetheless, all this rhetoric hasbeen severely criticised by the Baloch dueto want of its implementation. Till now,only some work has been done on 34 ofthe 61 proposals in the Aghaz-e-Haqooq-e-Balochistan-2009.

A sincere and patriotic effort hasbeen recently voiced by the DemocracyAssessment Group on the basis of impor-tant points raised by various stakehold-ers during extensive discussions on thefactors determining unrest in Balochis-tan. The salient of the recommendationsare: a) invite the heads of all oppositionparties, Baloch militant groups to helpformulate a reconciliation strategystrengthened by consensus; b) Civil/mili-tary intelligence agencies operate strictlyunder officially-declared policy; c) devel-opment projects should be completed onan accelerated basis, priority be given toGwadar-Ratodero road and the Reko-Diqproject; d) Code of conduct for theFC/Police/Levies be given to govern their

dealings; e) Elected provincial govern-ment should ensure effective governance;f) The matter of the missing persons re-quires to be addressed on a high prioritybasis.

All the Marri, Mengal, Magsi, Bugti,Raisani, Zehri and other tribes should beengaged in the consultations and thearmed struggle should be terminated.Baloch Senator Mir Hasil Bizenjo be-lieved that youth in Balochistan couldstill be taken on board to resolve the is-sues in the restive province. As theBaloch people are no more a ‘tribal soci-ety’, therefore, empowering local Balochwill provide confidence; otherwise thereis no reason to believe that the tense po-litical situation in Balochistan will notdeteriorate further.

MOHSIN ALI KHANIslamabad

PtCl’s financialsA major issue in any third world

country, including Pakistan, is the lack offinancially sound state enterprises. Thereare, however, some emerging exceptionsto the rule, such as PTCL, which can nowbe counted amongst Pakistan’s few eco-nomic success stories. The stable andstrong financial status of PTCL with ris-ing trajectory of profit and expandingservices reflects the brighter side of pri-vatisation. The 11.3 percent growth inrevenue and net profit of Rs 1.4 billionearned by PTCL in its recently an-nounced 3rd Q2012, an increase of 7 per-cent over the previous year, shows aremarkable turnaround for this com-pany, despite rising inflation and eco-nomic slowdown. All this has been theresult of sound fiscal policies and expan-sion of PTCL from a voice based commu-nication operator to voice cum dataintegrated telecom giant, all the whilekeeping in view the unique market con-straints in Pakistan.

The figures speak for themselves and

that is the fruit that privatisation hasbrought to PTCL. Rather than becominga burden over state exchequer like mostother state-owned entities, PTCL hasevolved into an enterprise which is finan-cially sound, customer friendly and has aclear-cut future business agenda -achievements currently unmatched byany other state run enterprise.

ALI HASSAN BHATTILahore

on acid attacksThe criminal act of acid throwing has

risen greatly in Pakistan by the years. Tobe honest, it would be much less to justrate it as a crime. It is a way of getting se-verely punished – in this life, and laterlife. In my opinion, it is more sinful thancommitting an assassination.

Lack of education is the root cause ofacid attacks here in Pakistan. Afterwatching the Oscar winning documen-tary 'Saving Face', one can believe thatacid attacks can be fought well. Apartfrom jail, there are several ways to over-come this social evil. I never mean thatlegal punishment is an unsuitable way,but I,being a young Pakistani, believethat the acid attackers can be treated so-cially, morally, and ethically.

The social method in my point ofview is to have a total social boycott withthe doer. There total social ostracisationwould reiterate the fact that they havecommitted a heinous crime and act as adeterrent by conveying to all that there isno space for the perpetrators of such actsin society.

Another way would be having psy-chological counselling camps. This wouldbe quite helpful in decreasing the risingrate of acid attacks.

These measures can prove effective inaddition to the legal punishment alreadyin place.

M IBRAHIM TARIQLahore


Comment12Saturday, 5 May, 2012

Arif NizamiEditor

Lahore – Ph: 042-36298305-10 Fax: 042-36298302Karachi – Ph: 021-34330811-3 Fax: 021-34330900Islamabad – Ph: 051-2287414-6 Fax: 051-2287417

Web: www.pakistantoday.com.pk Email: [email protected]

Dedicated to the legacy of the late Hameed Nizami

After eight days

lyari

The over a week long Lyari operation underlinesthe lack of capacity on the part of the securityagencies to bring organised crime under controlwithin a short period particularly when it is

mixed up with politics. Lyari being a traditionalstronghold of PPP was once perceived as a safeconstituency for Bilawal Bhutto. Till a year back, thePeople’s Amn Committee which is being targeted now wastreated as a wing of the PPP. The ruling party defended itwhile the MQM accused it of being a terrorist-cum-extortionist outfit. On Thursday, the Sindh governmentasked those resisting the police and CID to lay down armswithin the next 48 hours. Uzair Baloch, the current headof the banned PAC, has however offered to surrenderhimself to the Rangers indicating that he has little faith inthe provincial government

There are questions related to the situation that needto be answered, foremost being the presence of heavyweapons in the area. Lyari is not in Waziristan. How comeall this weaponry made its way to a thickly populated partof the largest city of the country? Was it due to thenegligence of the agencies or connivance on the part ofcertain elements in the provincial government?

The gang war has taken a fairly large toll of lives. Whatis more, the police action has disturbed the life of over amillion people, mostly factory workers and the poor andlower middle class. With power and gas cut off, life for theordinary people has become exceptionally hard. Schoolsare closed and examinations have been put off. A numberof innocent people are reported to have died or injured inthe cross fire. Representatives of trading and industrialistcommunities have warned of serious consequences for theeconomy if the ongoing operation is further prolonged.There is an urgent need to bring the matter to an earlyconclusion. This has to be done with the minimum use offorce. What has to be ensured is that the haste does notendanger the lives of the non combatants.

collect them all!

newer provinces

The PML(N)’s position on new province vacillatesbetween stony intransigence to going ballistic.From not being pleasantly disposed to talk ofnew provinces to going one up on the South

Punjab bill of the PPP by asking for five new provinces aswell.

All this is rather troubling. This is in no way acomment on the issue of new provinces. This paper, likemost patriotic Pakistanis, has come to conclude thatnewer and more federating units are perhaps the only wayforward. Anything else will be a flawed retardation. But,far from a reasoned debate on what is, and will continue tobe, an extremely divisive issue, not only have are thepolitical parties basing their stances on petty politics, butthere are making no attempts to even hide this fact.

The PPP seeks, based on whatever math it has done onthe issue, to eke out a new haven for itself in the form ofsouthern Punjab. Whether the region actually is to proveto be the Sindh 2.0 the party’s members from the area arepurporting it to be is another matter entirely.

The MQM, not particularly known for its largessetowards the Hindko and Seraiki speaking residents ofKarachi, seeks newer provinces, one because ofencroachment on its turf by the ANP, and opposition tothe League. Plus, for a media-obsessed party equallyobsessed with its image as a “national” entity, it thinks itmight hold some sway in the future along those lines.

The PML(N), not to be outdone by the resolution ofthe other day, decided to play on this pitch itself. Tocounter the PPP, a demand for the Bahawalpur province,throwing a wedge in the Seraikistan situation. To counterthe PML(Q), the demand for the Hazara province. Tocounter the ANP, the resolution for a “tribal” province.

Again, our lop-sided federation does need newer,smaller federating units. And let no one say somethingsilly like now not being the right time (it never is the righttime) but the whole exercise requires immenseintrospection, research, canvassing and consensus. Therather half-baked arguments on all sides of the variousdivides if the issue present a disaster in the making.

a year after the raidno questions answered yet

whiteliESBy ess aich

An interesting situation developed atthe Sheikhupura jail premises. A

prisoner was being brought out of thebuilding and a fake jailbreak being en-acted.

It all seemed like a fake encounter in

the making and the prisoner sensing im-pending doom was shivering. At thispoint, a DSP came running to the CPOshouting “stop there is a petition pend-ing against this man’s detention in theLahore High Court” Realising that this

could be a huge issue in the making, theCPO quickly ordered the prisoner to betaken back into lock up. And so it hap-pens that since the incident, this partic-ular inmate is being treated like a VIP inthe Sheikhupura prison.

Osama bin Laden’s first deathanniversary, after he waskilled at the hands of theelite US Navy seals a yearago at his safe house in the

garrison town of Abbottabad, has beencelebrated with much fanfare by the USPresident Barack Obama. The imperialpresident abroad but beleaguered athome in an election year paid a surprisevisit to Kabul on the anniversary wherehe signed a security pact with Karzaiamid a lot of fanfare.

In Pakistan, however, despite alapse of one year, questions that wereunanswered in the immediate aftermathof Osama’s assassination still remain anenigma. Pakistanis, like the rest of theworld, were shocked to learn on May 2a year ago that the most wanted fugitiveglobally, since his escape from ToraBora almost a decade ago, was living inPakistan comfortably amongst them.

The Pakistani military and its pre-mier intelligence agency the ISI had noprior knowledge of the fly-by-night op-eration. Their prime ally in the waragainst terror, the US, made a strategicdecision to not take them on board lesttheir mentors in the ISI tipped off binLaden.

The clandestine manner of the tak-ing out of the Al-Qaeda supremo wassymptomatic of the complete break-down of trust between Washington andIslamabad. One year down the line, thetrust deficit has exponentially in-creased.

It started with the arrest of CIA con-tractor Raymond Davis in January 2011,was exacerbated by the assassination ofOsama bin Laden on May 2 and reachedits high point after the US troops killed24 Pakistani troops in a skirmish atSalala on the Afghan border in Novem-

ber the same year. Not only NATO sup-plies through Pakistan were halted as aresult, there has been a complete break-down of relations between the CIA andthe ISI.

In a sense, the Abbottabad incidentwas a watershed. As later events wouldprove, Pakistan’s relations with the USwere damaged beyond repair.

Recent attempts to repair frayed re-lations between Washington and Islam-abad have come to naught. Pakistanperhaps over estimating its strategic im-portance for the US played hard-to-getpost Salala. It asked for an apology fromWashington, which initially it was will-ing to offer, but it later on reneged.

Our policy makers are in a quandaryabout how to bring relations back ontrack without losing face with their ownpeople. Despite Islamabad’s protesta-tions, the White House on the anniver-sary of Osama’s death announced thatdrone attacks in Pakistan would con-tinue. With the absence of an apology,NATO supplies through Pakistan re-main suspended.

The ISI had a lot of egg on its face inthe post-Abbottabad scenario. It wasclaimed that the spy agency was oblivi-ous of Osama living in a purpose-builtcompound a stone’s throw away fromKakul Military Academy, the Pakistaniversion of West Point.

If it actually had no knowledge ofbin Laden's presence in Pakistan, it wasan intelligence lapse of Herculean pro-portions. It has been acknowledgedeven by the US that the Pakistani secu-rity apparatus was not aware of Osama’slong presence in the country. If, how-ever, the ISI had known all along aboutthe presence of bin Laden in Pakistanalong with his three wives and eightchildren and a grand child in tow, it isopen to the charge of duplicity and com-plicity.

Well-known American journalistPeter Bergen who has extensively writ-ten on the OBL raid in his latest bookManhunt: The Ten Year Search for BinLaden – from 9/11 to Abbottabad, hasonly confirmed what most Pakistanis al-ready know. Quoting the then head ofUS National Counter Terrorism CenterMichael Lieter, the author reveals, “Wewere just amazed by the lack of a Pak-istani response (on the night of theraid). It was even by Pakistani standardsremarkably slow.” Bergen also detailsKayani’s surprise at the raid andZardari’s emotional reaction welcoming

it.Bin Laden being safely ensconced in

Abbottabad for years and the subse-quent raid there are widely perceived tobe unforgiveable intelligence lapses.That is why The ISI Chief General ShujaPasha was made o leave. He was a per-son which the COAS General Kayani im-mensely trusted and he expected anextension in his tenure for another year.At the end of his third term last month,however, he was eased out. His contro-versial role in Pakistan’s politics andgeopolitics nonetheless remains anenigma.

It is common knowledge that Pashaflew to London last October to quizMansoor Ijaz, a controversial figure,about the Memogate affair after consult-ing Kayani. Pasha’s clandestine meetingwith the maverick American of Pak-istani origin took place without theknowledge of the civilian government.

In the aftermath of Memogate, Pak-istan’s ambassador to the US, HusainHaqqani was forced to resign for al-legedly writing a memo requesting USintervention to save Zardari from thewrath of the army. Haqqani is not will-ing to return to Pakistan to depose be-fore the commission on health groundsas well as security concerns. However,in recent interviews, he has demanded aprobe into the security lapse about thewhereabouts of bin Laden in Pakistanfor almost a decade.

It is obvious that, as a result of theUS raid on Abbottabad, not only didPakistan’s relations with the US take anosedive but the military’s relationswith the democratically elected govern-ment became extremely strained as well.In the past, a coup would have takenplace for much less!

Merely razing to the ground the Ab-bottabad compound where bin Ladenlived for years ostensibly as a familyman will not erase from the collectivememory of the Pakistani nation anotherunsavory chapter of numerous acts ofomission and commission of its militaryestablishment.

The judicial commission appointedby the Supreme Court to probe the Ab-bottabad incident is yet to wrap up itswork. Few in Pakistan believe that thecommission will be able to apportionblame for the raid. Nor it is expected tofind a smoking gun leading to the pres-ident.

The writer is Editor, Pakistan Today

By Arif Nizami

Does the Punjab gov-ernment writ ex-tend to Lahore’s

cantonment areas in mat-ters of wedding activities?Apparently not! There is agrey, rather a khaki areahere and it has been notedthat wedding celebrationsin these areas of Lahoreextend way past the cut-offtime.

Recently, a steel mag-nate celebrated his daugh-ter’s wedding at a clubwith a golf course that alsohas several banquet halls.The song and dance lastedundisturbed till the weehours of the morning andno police bust was notedeven for the purpose ofcollecting “donations”.And that is despite the factthat Lahore’s top cop wasseen mixing among guests.

For feedback, comments, suggestions and, most importantly, tips, contact us at [email protected]


Comment 13Saturday, 5 May, 2012

Khadim HussainSoomro’s The GreatGame and the Indus

Valley is a multifaceted book.What has interested me mostis the way the book portraysthe development of the think-ing of G M Syed after 1947.

G M Syed was an outstand-ing leader of the Sind MuslimLeague in the 1930’s and early40’s. He was present with Jin-nah on the stage in Lahorewhen the 1940 Pakistan Reso-lution was passed. He got themotion in favour of Pakistanthrough the Sindh Assembly.Later, Syed developed reserva-tions about the politics of boththe Congress and MuslimLeague. He opposed the for-mer on account of its penchantfor a strong centre and the lat-ter for what he now consideredits communal agenda that hehad himself once pursued withfanatical zeal. He stood nowfor maximum rights forprovinces under a loose feder-ation which he feared neitherthe Congress nor the MuslimLeague was willing to concede.The issue of provincial auton-omy was very much in the airin the 40’s. This explains thecommonly agreed wording ofthe Lahore Resolution whichstates that “the areas in whichthe Muslims are numerically inmajority as in the North-West-ern and Eastern zones of Indiashould be grouped to consti-tute independent states inwhich the constituent unitsshall be autonomous and sov-ereign".

Syed accepted the partitionof India with an open mindthough. After the creation ofPakistan, he worked hard tocreate a countrywide opposi-tion party to keep under checkthe communal, anti-federal,and undemocratic tendenciesin the new rulers.

In 1948, at Syed’s initia-tive, a number of politiciansfrom all over West Pakistanjoined hands to form the Peo-ple’s Party. Later, Syedbrought together prominentpoliticians from Punjab,NWFP, Balochistan and EastPakistan to form the Anti OneUnit Front aimed at therestoration of the provinces ofWest Pakistan. The Front waslater merged into the shortlived Pakistan National Party.In 1957, he was an active part-ner in the creation of NationalAwami Party, a broad-basedall-Pakistan outfit. The partystruggled for the economic andpolitical rights of the people,empowerment of the provinceswithin a loose federation andan independent foreign policy.Syed and other leaders of theNAP believed in change strictlythrough parliamentary means.

Syed was first elected tothe Sindh Assembly and thento the West Pakistan Assem-bly. Inside the assembly, he di-rected his criticism against theauthoritarian tendencies thathad become further strength-ened with power passing overto Liaquat Ali Khan. Syed hadalready rejected the ObjectivesResolution introduced afterJinnah’s death as a divisivemeasure which he said wouldturn Pakistan into a theocraticstate. He also underlined thedangers to the unity of the fed-eration posed by the accumu-lation of power in a strongcentre.

The ruling elite was how-ever deadly opposed to the en-lightened views of the leadersof the new opposition. In theearly years of the country’s his-tory, the establishment t waspresided over by the bureau-cracy which was soon replacedby the army belonging mainlyto Punjab and UP. Maliciouspropaganda was launchedagainst the new oppositionthrough an obscurantist sec-tion of the media. Leaders likeG M Syed, Bacha Khan, AbdusSamad Achakzai, Bhashaniand Mian Iftikharuddin weredubbed as secessionists, trai-tors and agents of India,Afghanistan and Soviet Union.

The propaganda coincidedwith repression of a most bar-barous type. Bacha Khan who

was a member of the Con-stituent Assembly remained incustody most of the time dur-ing the existence of the consti-tution making body. He was ona tour of NWFP in 1948 whenhe was arrested and sent tojails outside the province. InCharsadda, the police fired at apeaceful meeting of the KhudaiKhidmatgars killing, accordingto an official handout,17 per-sons. Earlier, G M Syed hadbeen detained fir threemonths. Both Bacha Khan andG M Syed spent a fairly signif-icant part of their lives lan-guishing in jails.

By 1973, a disappointedGM Syed bade good bye to theidea of a united Pakistan andannounced support for a sepa-rate Sindhu Desh. In hiswords, “We have lost hope toget our national and provincialrights through parliament.”Similar experiences had earlierforced Bhashani, who hadcampaigned for the inclusionof Assam in Pakistan, to an-nounce in 1970 that he wasbidding farewell to a unitedPakistan. Bacha Khan was sofed up with all this that he de-cided not to be buried in thecountry.

The establishment’s poli-cies continue to turn many insmaller provinces into sepa-ratists. Khair Bux Marri andAtaulllah Mengal were doingpolitics in the context of a fed-eration till the constant denialof provincial autonomy com-bined with successive militaryoperations forced them intobecoming separatists. Bugtiwho remained wedded to theidea of federation and parlia-mentary politics till the endwas killed under the orders ofMusharraf. Te tragic incidentforced many Balochis to con-clude that the parliament is nomore than a talk shop whilethere is no federal institutionincluding the courts to stopforced disappearances andkillings of Balochi youth. Theway the security agencies havedefied the authority of the SCduring the hearings in Quettawould further strengthen thealienation in Balochistan.

The writer is a former ac-ademic and a political ana-lyst.

The controversy surrounding the verdicthanded down to Mr Gilani in the contempt ofcourt case has degenerated to a free-for-all in

the National Assembly with PML(N) agitating forthe ouster of a prime minister whom they, and forthat matter most of the country, don’t recognise any-more. They have also come out with a comprehen-sive programme comprising a series of protestsleading to a long march on Islamabad to see the backof Mr Gilani. The government’s response has comein shape of the passage of a bill for the creation ofthe South-Punjab province and a reiteration of trustin Mr Gilani’s leadership. PML(N) responded bysubmitting in the National Assembly a resolutiondemanding the creation of not one but fourprovinces.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has taken astand that is qualitatively different from PML(N)’s:while they also don’t recognise Mr Gilani as theprime minister any longer, they shall wait for the de-tailed judgement to outline their programme. In themeanwhile, the party has announced a rally for May6 in expression of solidarity with the judiciary. Theyhave also asked PML(N) to quit the assemblies as apre-condition to pave the way for an alliance to oustthe government.

All this is happening as Karachi slides into an-archy and the SC Registry in Quetta tries to tacklethe missing persons’ issue in earnest. Balochistancontinues to burn while explosions have also beenreported from various parts of Sindh. Terroriststrikes and drone attacks continue unabated. On theexternal front, Pakistan’s relations with the US re-

main frozen with reports of differ-ences between the civil and themilitary leaderships accentuatingwith the former trying vainly for anearly breakthrough. Its new ambas-sador to the US is spending an out-landish time in Pakistan trying toforce an acceptable compromisewhich is becoming increasingly diffi-cult in the wake of the US refusal totender an apology for the dastardlyattack on the Salala check-post. It isin this backdrop that GeneralKayani’s address at a solemn cere-mony marking the Martyrs’ Dayshould be evaluated. Reiterating hisbelief in the continuity of the demo-cratic system, he linked Pakistan’sprogress, prosperity and uplift withrespect for the democratic traditions.Simultaneously, he warned that weshould not forget that the singularpurpose of the democratic system isto work for the welfare, prosperityand self-respect of the people as alsoto strive for a society that affordsequal justice for all.

Pakistan is in a mess today. Evendreaming that there would be any-thing remotely resembling respect forthe democratic traditions would beconstrued as heretic. Welfare, pros-perity and self-respect of the peopleare alien terms that do not find a

mention in the leaders’ dictionary. So deeply miredare they in advancing personal profits that nationalinterest has no relevance in their thought process.Prospect of equal justice for all is a concept that is abillion miles removed from the governing strategyof the ruling mafias. While Mr Gilani can go aroundblatantly advocating his resolve not to obey the SCinjunctions, he expects that the powerless, econom-ically enslaved, utterly underprivileged and disen-franchised mortals should submit uncomplaininglyto the orders of his government. What is the genesisof this endemic ailment and will this remain the per-petual fate of Pakistan’s teeming millions? Not be-cause they want it to be so, but because they havelost hope and faith in themselves and in the leader-ships that they keep throwing up through an ineptand perennially corrupt system dubbed as ‘democ-racy’.

Another feature that distinguishes the Pakistanileadership is their unmatched expertise at tellingblatant lies and claiming ownership of events thatthey, at some stage or the other, were brazenly op-posed to. Take the case of the restoration of the ju-diciary. The entire PPP leadership does not tire ofrepeating countless sacrifices that they rendered forthe coveted cause. They even claim the honour forrestoring the judges which they were only forced todo by the military leadership in the middle of thenight. They did it not because they wanted to do it.They did it because they were given no option. Thesubsequent conduct of the ruling mafia only con-firms that their willingness was no part of the deci-sion as, ever since its restoration, they have donenothing but ridicule the judiciary by refusing to ac-cept its decisions and initiating a cancerous cam-paign to belittle the importance and relevance of theinstitution in the affairs of the state. They have evenbrought the loyalty and commitment of the judgesinto question to render them controversial.

The military and the premier intelligence agencyhave also not been spared the government’s ire asthey have been variously accused of running “a statewithin a state” and of working to undermine the ‘de-mocratic’ government. Ethnic, sectarian and provin-cial hatreds have been systematically fanned tospread fear and attain longevity to an evil rule. Abunch of ‘convicted’ individuals comprise the teamthat is running the affairs of the state in an environ-ment loaded with venom and animosities and whereeven an inkling of opposition is dealt with provok-ingly playing the Sindhi, Seraiki, Hazara, Mohajirand such other cards.

If Pakistan is to survive this ordeal, it has tomove quickly to get rid of the criminal mafias whohave landed in the realm of power. They are neitherqualified to be there nor do they have the credentialsto be entrusted with the onerous task of governingthis country. The cardinal issue is that they wouldnot be ousted through any so-called ‘democratic’move. They would be ousted only when every singlecitizen of this country is out on the streets demand-ing their right to live a secure and honourable life.Do we have it in us to do that?

The writer is a political analyst and a memberof the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf. He can be reachedat [email protected]

A popular movement is the only way outonly after one injustice too many

Making of a secessionist unending madness

candid cornerBy Raoof Hasan

By Aziz-ud-Din Ahmad



NEWS DESK

P AKISTAN’S musicplatform ‘CokeStudio’ returnsthis year with anew season start-

ing 13 May, bringing back amusical fusion of excitingelements and diverse influ-ences, ranging from tradi-tional Eastern, modernWestern and regionally in-spired music. ‘Coke StudioSeason 5’ aims to introducenew genres and fusionwhere featured artists ex-plore their heritage whileshowcasing their uniquestyles. Since its inception,‘Coke Studio’ has exploredlayers of meaning, culturalidentity and spiritualphilosophies. Season 5 wit-nesses Rohail Hyatt back atthe helm and features, AtifAslam, Bilal Khan, Bo-hemia, Chakwalis, FareedAyaz and Abu Muhammad,Hadiqa Kiyani, HumayunKhan, Meesha Shafi, Tahir

Mithu, Overload, Qayaas,SYMT and Uzair Jaswal.Season 5 also marks the re-turn of the house bandwith Asad Ahmed on gui-tar, Babar Ali Khanna ondholak, Javed Iqbal on vio-lin, Kamran 'Mannu' Zafaron bass, Omran ‘Momo’Shafique on guitar, Sikan-der Mufti on multi-percus-sions and Rachel Viccajiand Zoe Viccaji on backingvocals. Joining the houseband this season are twonew talents: Farhad Hu-mayun on drums andMubashir Admani on key-boards. ‘Coke Studio’ Exec-utive Producer Rohail

Hyatt said; “Entering intoour 5th season, we at ‘CokeStudio’ believe our journeycontinues to explore thewealth of talent and cul-tural diversity that we as anation are blessed with. Itis without doubt that thelove and respect that ouraudience has showered uswith, serves as our inspira-tion." ‘Coke Studio Season5’ debuts on Sunday, 13May and will air rightthrough the summer with anew episode every fort-night with exclusive behindthe scenes footage, on tele-vision channels and radiostations every fortnight.

Bipasha Basu reacts to

dating rumours

loS anGeleS:will Smith,tommy leeJones and JoshBrolin pose ata photo callfor ColumbiaPictures' ‘MenIn Black 3’. aFP

loS anGeleS: eva Mendes attendsthe screening of ‘Girl In Progress’. aFP

new yoRK:Christine taylor,Ben Stiller andKanye west atthe new yorkKnicks host theMiami Heat inGame three ofthe 2012 nBaPlayoffs. aFP

IN LIMELIGHT

mumBAi: Bipasha Basu is fed upof being linked up with co-stars.the actress was linked with ‘dumMaro dum’ costar Rana dagubattiand ‘Singularity’ actor JoshHartnett during the shoot of herrespective films. Calling it justrumours Bipasha reacts, "for along time my name has been yo-yoed with a few people. Rumoursabout me dating, breaking-up, thenpatching-up are being made. Ireally wish all this stops as noneof it is happening. a fun-lovingperson does not translate into afrivolous person. Meeting someonedoesn't mean dating them."Bipasha informs she is very muchsingle and when she will be inrelationship she will not hide it."when love happens I will embraceit and give it respect and not hideit ever. It takes a lot in a man formy heart to tick and flutter. nothappened yet,” she says. AgEnciES

Michael Jackson to dance again for Pepsi LOS ANGELES: Michael Jackson is dancing again, on Pepsi cans. The soft drink

maker and the estate for the late pop star unveiled plans to put the singer's

silhouette on one billion soft drink cans in a global pop culture ad campaign.

The late King of Pop, who pitched Pepsi in 1980s commercials as "the choice

of a new generation", will appear in some of his iconic dance poses for the

promotion, which will also coincide with the 25th anniversary of the singer's

‘Bad’ album. The limited edition Pepsi cans will go on sale throughout 2012.

Fans of the singer will also be able to enter contests for tickets to Cirque du

Soleil's show ‘Michael Jackson: The Immortal World

Tour’. Pepsi, Jackson's estate, and his Sony Music

record company are also teaming up to share new

mixes of music from the ‘Bad’ album as part of the

campaign. The Jackson cans are part of Pepsi's new

‘Live for Now’ campaign, which seeks to harness pop

culture. Pepsi said earlier this week that rapper Nicki

Minaj would feature in a commercial as part of the

campaign. Jackson has been associated with Pepsi

since 1983 when he appeared alongside his Jack-

son 5 brothers in his first Pepsi campaign. But the

memories are not all good. Jackson's hair famously

caught fire while filming a Pepsi commercial in 1984

in Los Angeles, scorching his scalp. The incident was

later blamed for triggering Jackson's addiction to

painkillers that caused him to enter rehab in 1993. REUTERS

mumBAi: “excited”, “proud” and “humbled”and even “amused” were the feelings thewinners went through after beingconferred the 59th national film awardsthursday. Vidya Balan, who got an awardfor best actress for ‘the dirty Picture’, said: I am very happy and I feel humbledbecause it is the highest honour for an

actor. I wish my entire teamof 'dirty Picture' would havebeen here to share theaward, but this goes out tothe team. It is actuallyhitting me now."Choreographers Bosco-Ceaser, who won an awardfor ‘Zindagi na Milegidobara’, said: "this feelingwould almost be like alifetime achievement award.we never thought we wouldever get it. It is a steppingstone and motives us tokeep working hard, be morecreative and try our best."designer niharika Khan,who won best costumedesigner for ‘the dirtyPicture’, said: "I am still inshock and nervous. I didn'texpect it to come my way. Itis a great honour and hope Ilive up to it." AgEnciES

National award goes to 'Dirty Picture' team,

says Vidya

mumBAi: the arrival of his babyboy a few months ago was anevent in itself. and now, inaddition to azad Rao Khan, whois quite a handful and more,aamir Khan has ‘talaash’,‘dhoom 3’ and a lot more up hissleeve. It's a full house indeed.addressing rumours about hisdifferences with Reema Kagti,she said: “It was beingsaid that portions of‘talaash’ need areshoot. that's nottrue. Reema has donea fabulous job and Iam very happy withthe way ‘talaash’ hasshaped up. It is myhome production and Iwant to be there forit. Since the past fewmonths, I have beentoo busy with mybrainchild, my tVshow.” talking aboutthe number one racein Bollywood, he says,“I am not no.1. Salmanis. look at his fanfollowing and youwill know what Imean. AgEnciES


15

NEW DELHIAgEnciES

Zoya Akhtar’s road movie‘Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara’ isleading the nomination packof the 13th International In-dian Film Academy (IIFA)awards with 14 nods, whileVidya Balan’s ‘The Dirty Pic-ture’ follows closely behindwith 13. ‘Zindagi Na MilegiDobara’ has bagged nomina-tions including best picture,best direction for ZoyaAkhtar, best actor in a lead-ing role for Hrithik Roshan.Abhay Deol and FarhanAkhtar have been nominatedin best performance in asupporting role, male, whileKalki Koechlin has beennominated in best actress insupporting role, female. Mu-sical trio Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy have been nominatedfor music direction, whileJaved Akhtar for best lyricsfor ‘Khaabon ke Parindey’.The film has also been nom-inated in the best story cate-gory. Milan Luthria’s ‘TheDirty Picture’ has bagged 13nominations including best

actress for Vidya for playingSilk Smitha. Other nomina-tions include best picture,best direction, best perform-ance in supporting role malefor Emraan Hashmi andNaseerudding Shah. Naseerhas also been nominated inthe best actor in a negativerole category. ‘The Dirty Pic-ture’ has also bagged nomi-nation for best story, bestlyrics and best playbacksinger male for KamaalKhan for ‘Ishq Sufiyana’,who will vie for the winner’strophy with Rahat Fateh AliKhan for ‘Teri meri’ andMohit Chauhan for ‘Nadaanparindey’. In best perform-ance in the leading role malecategory, Hrithik will becompeting along with

Amitabh Bachchan for‘Aarakshan’, Salman Khanfor ‘Bodyguard’, RanbirKapoor for ‘Rockstar’ andAjay Devgn for ‘Singham’.The nominations of best per-formance in a leading rolefemale include PriyankaChopra for ‘7 Khoon Maaf’,Kareena Kapoor for ‘Body-guard’ and Kangna Ranautfor ‘Tanu Weds Manu’.Those competing in best per-formance in supporting rolefemale include ParineetiChopra for ‘Ladies Vs RickyBahl’ and Divya Dutta for‘Stanley Ka Dabba’. Thenominations for best per-formance in a negative roleinclude Irrfan Khan for ‘7Khoon Maaf’ and BomanIrani for ‘Don 2’.

Demi Moore sheds

'MrsKutcher' twitter handleLOS ANGELES: Herdivorce has yet to befinalised, but DemiMoore has officiallyshed the title of MrsKutcher-On Twitter,that is. "Thanks every-one for your help infinding my newname!" posted Mooreto her Twitter page, as she unveiled herstraightforward new handle to theworld. "So hard finding a name thatwas fun somewhat playful and avail-able. So for now it will be @justdemi Itcould grow on me!" Last December, theformerly prolific tweeter announced toher followers that the change wasn't "apriority" following enquiry as to whyshe hadn't changed her handle nearlya month after filing for divorce fromAshton Kutcher. "Sorry it bothers somany of u," she wrote. "Should I nottweet until I do? Does it really matter?"In the months since, Moore has re-mained in the public eye following ahighly publicised meltdown and subse-quent stint in a treatment centre. Mostrecently, the 49-year-old debuted hernew show ‘The Conversation’, for whichshe is a producer. Demi and Ashton an-nounced their divorce last Novemberafter six years of marriage. AgEnciES

Sonakshi too old for Shahid, Ranbir? mumBAi: when 24 years old Sonakshi Sinha claimed thatshe felt comfortable working with older men, little did sheknow that her statement would turn against her and hercareer. the ‘dabangg’ actress made her debut against 40something Salman Khan and now will be seen romancingakshay Kumar, who also happens to be in his 40s. now,after working with ‘senior’ actors, Sonakshi seemed tohave rubbed the younger lot in a wrong way. news has it,that both Ranbir Kapoor and Shahid Kapoor haveapprehensions working with Sonakshi as they fear shewould look older than them on screen. while Sonakshi isaware of Shahid thinks of her, she seems to be unaware ofRanbir’s opinion on her. In fact, Sonakshi was mightypeeved with Shahid for walking out of Puneet Malhotra’snext which was supposed to star the two. Sonakshi wasthen offered the hindi remake of ‘Vettai’ with Sasha butthe actor took digs at her looks which Sonakshi did notlike. a source informed, “Sonakshi is very keen to workwith Ranbir and Shahid, who are closer to her age. More sosince she’s also working with Imran Khan in Milan luthria’ssequel to ‘once Upon a time In Mumbaai’.” the perceptionthat Sonakshi looks older than the younger heroes canalso be attributed to the kind of films she is doing. She hasa film with Salman Khan, three with akshay Kumar andanother with ajay devgn. ‘lootera’ is the only film whereshe romances a young actor- Ranveer Singh. “Probably, thatis why Ranbir declined a film, whose producer wanted tocast Sonakshi,” reasoned the source. AgEnciES

nEW YoRK: Kateupton attends the

new York Knicksgame against themiami Heat. AFP

mumBAi: amitabh Bachchan is all set toshoot a song with his son abhishek andajay devgn for Rohit Shetty's film ‘BolBachchan’. the actor blogged, "It is a song.we shoot for it in a few days time.Goodness always a frightening prospect todo a song and danceroutine." abhishek andamitabh have workedtogether in five filmsincluding ‘Sarkar’, ‘SarkarRaj’, ‘Bunty aur Babli’, ‘Paa’and ‘Jhoom Barabar Jhoom’.the two are also slated toact in ‘Sarkar 3’ to bedirected by Ram GopalVarma. amitabh has justfinished dubbing for thefilm ‘department’ in whichhe plays a politician andhas also shot the promosof ‘Kaun Banega Crorepati’.the actor tweeted, "KBCpromo shoot over .. did 5 ofthem in a day ! and thenthe talented avinashGowarikar took stills .. shallput them up - thedesigning of the look onKBC by Rohit ' gudda' Bal ...just lifts your spirits whenyou wear his outfits .. thatjacket .. hmm" AgEnciES

Big B to shoot song with Abhishek for ‘Bol Bachchan’

mumBAi:Ali zafarwins the

dadasahebPhalke

award. AFP

L ONDON: Soul singer Adele’s Grammy winning

album ‘21’ has outsold King of Pop Michael

Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ in the UK. The 23-year-old

‘Rolling In The Deep’ hit-maker’s second

album, which released in January 2011 has

sold 4,274,300 copies in Britain, 500 more than the late

singer’s 1982 classic record, reported Daily Mail online.

The huge success of the album has made it to the fifth

best-selling album of all time in the UK.

"To add to her many landmark records, Adele’s

achievement in overtaking ‘Thriller’ in the all-time sales

list is truly remarkable. ‘Thriller’ has long been recog-

nised as one of the most iconic albums of all time, there

is now no doubt that ‘21’ can be spoken of in the same

breath," said Martin Talbot, MD, Official Charts Company.

According to the organisation, ‘21’, which has spent 23

weeks at the top of the UK singles chart, continues to sell

around 20,000 copies a week. To date, ‘Thriller’ has sold

more than 100 million copies worldwide while ‘21’ has

clocked up global sales of around 20 million. AGENCIES

Jolie hates her engagement ring

LOS ANGELESAgEnciES

Actress Angelina Jolie, who is set to wedlong-time partner Brad Pitt this summer,reportedly hates her engagement ring.The Hollywood couple, who raise six chil-dren together, recently announced theywere getting married, and according toreports, Jolie is not keen on her$500,000 ring. “She isn’t fond of it.Nothing against Brad’s design. She’s justnever been enamoured of white dia-monds,” showbizspy.com quoted asource as saying. “Emeralds are herfavourite. The diamond shows how littlehe knows her. She’s so demanding. She’sacting like a bridezilla,” the source added.

Rahat nominated at IIFA, ZNMD leads with 14 nods

Vogue slaps worldwide ban on under-16 models NEW yORK: The editors of all 19 edi-tions of Vogue around the world pledgedto use only healthy models no youngerthan 16 on their editorial pages in an at-tempt to shift fashion's approach tobody image. Anna Wintour, editor ofVogue's flagship US edition, and Em-manuelle Alt of Paris Vogue, whichtouched off a furore in 2010 with aphoto spread featuring a 10-year-oldgirl, are among the editors who agreedto the pact. The editors said that in a six-point pact to appear in their respectiveJune issues, they would pledge not toknowingly work with models under theage of 16 or with those "who appear tohave an eating disorder." The editorswill also instruct modeling agencies notto send them underage models, requirecasting directors to check models' IDprior to photo shoots and encourage"healthy backstage working conditions,"including food options. The Model Al-liance, launched by New York-basedfashion models to campaign for betterworking conditions, said it welcomedVogue's "impressive lead" and hopedother magazines would follow suit. AFP



16 Foreign News

DAMASCUSAFP

Syrians took to the streets intheir thousands Friday to showtheir determination to oustPresident Bashar al-Assad’sregime, as the office of envoyKofi Annan insisted his peaceplan was “on track.”

The demonstrations came asgovernment forces crackingdown on dissent reportedlykilled at least 10 civilians, onlyhours after UN peacekeepersurged Damascus to make thefirst move to end nearly 14months of bloodshed. “The

Annan plan is on track and a cri-sis that has been going on forover a year is not going to be re-solved in a day or a week,” theUN-Arab League envoy’sspokesman, Ahmad Fawzi, toldjournalists in Geneva. “There aresigns on the ground of move-ment, albeit slow and small.“Some heavy weapons have beenwithdrawn, some heavyweapons remain. Some violencehas receded, some violence con-tinues. And that is not satisfac-tory, I’m not saying it is,” Fawzisaid. Major General RobertMood, who heads the UN mis-sion to oversee Annan’s hard-

won ceasefire agreement, had is-sued an appeal late Thursday forthe Assad regime to make thefirst move to end the violence.“The strongest party needs tomake the first move,” he told re-porters in Syria, stressing he wasreferring to the government andarmy.

“They have the strength,they have the position and theyalso have the potential generos-ity to make the first step in agood direction,” he said. Despitethe appeal, the Syrian Observa-tory for Human Rights said se-curity forces killed at least 10civilians across the country on

Friday. Three died at dawn whentroops fired on their vehicle nearan intersection in the central cityof Hama, and a fourth was shotin Homs province, said theBritain-based watchdog.

Gunfire killed a couple andtheir child in the northern cityof Aleppo, it said, addingregime forces killed anothercivilian in eastern Deir Ezzorprovince. Activists said pro-regime gunmen killed the fam-ily in Aleppo, scene of a bloodyraid by government forces theday before that killed four uni-versity students, in responseto a series of protests.Another

200 students were arrested inwhat the Observatory saidcould prove a turning point ofthe uprising in the northernregional capital. The killingsmarked a serious escalation inAleppo, Syria’s second cityand commercial hub, largelyspared the violence shakingthe country for nearly 14months. “The city of Aleppohasn’t joined the anti-regimerevolt thus far but the serious-ness of these events will pushresidents to mobilise in soli-darity with the students,” theObservatory’s Rami AbdelRahman told AFP.

MOSCOWAFP

A double car bombing in Russia’stroubled North Caucasus killed atleast 14 people and injured morethan 120 just days before VladimirPutin returns to the Kremlin,officials said Friday.The attacks late Thursday outsideDagestan’s main city, whichauthorities said may have beentriggered by suicide bombers, werethe deadliest in the Caucasus inmonths and smashed any illusion ofincreasing stability.The power of the blasts sent hugeyellow flames into the night sky,reduced cars to burned wreckageand left a crater in the ground,television pictures showed.A representative of the regionalhealth ministry told AFP that 13people died on the spot whileanother victim died later in ahospital. One more person is consideredmissing, said a health ministryofficial. Another 122 people wereinjured, and 83 were hospitalised,the emergencies ministry said. The latest attacks come just daysbefore President Dmitry Medvedevcedes the Kremlin on May 7 to

president-elect Putin who famouslypledged to “wipe out (militants) inthe outhouse” and has vowed todestroy Islamic militants.Investigators said the first blastwent off on the outskirts of the cityof Makhachkala when a car ladenwith explosives was detonated neara traffic police post at 10:10 pm(1810 GMT) damaging nearbybuildings and cars but causing nofatalities.The second car bomb went off 15minutes later hitting policemen,rescue workers and passers-by whohad gathered at the scene,investigators said.Regional police said in a statementthat the first blast went off when asuicide bomber parked anddetonated his vehicle near the trafficpolice post.A representative of the Dagestanregional investigators, speaking toAFP, refused to confirm the reportbut said investigators believed that asuicide bomber caused the secondblast when he drove a vehicle intothe crowd.The force of the second blast wasequal to around 100 kilograms ofTNT equivalent, police said.State television said it appeared thatthe initial blast was aimed at

attracting emergency workers andsecurity forces to the scene whowere then hit by a more powerfulsecond explosion.The regional health official saidauthorities had found one femalefoot and two male feet at the sceneof the blast, adding that the twosuicide bombers might be among thedead.The twin attacks appeared to bearthe hallmarks of bombingsconducted by radical militantsfighting the Kremlin in the Caucasuswhere they seek to establish anIslamist state.The blasts were by far the deadliestattacks in the Caucasus this year anddeal a huge blow to Kremlin hopesof restoring relative stability to aregion that has been a headache forMoscow since the collapse of theUSSR. Interior minister RashidNurgaliyev ordered security to bestepped up as the country gears upfor a national holiday to celebratevictory in World War II on May 9.He added that militants aimed tosow panic by staging terror acts.“We should fully understand thatthey are not human, and they arenot able to return to peacefullife,” he said in comment releasedby his office.

Prosecutionwraps up casein Karadzic trial

THE HAGUEAFP

A final witness closed the prosecution’scase against ex-Bosnian Serb leaderRadovan Karadzic on Friday, telling theYugoslav war crimes court how he escapedthe Srebrenica massacre. The protectedwitness, only referred to as “KDZ071” isthe last for the prosecution in the trial,which wrapped up its case by focusing onthe July 1995 killings during Bosnia’s1992-95 war. After being rounded up bytroops commanded by Bosnian Serb armychief Ratko Mladic around July 13, 1995,the witness said some 2,000 Muslim menwere taken to a warehouse a fewkilometres (miles) from Srebrenica. There,the men were mowed down by BosnianSerb troops who “laughed and joked” afterthe shooting stopped, the witness told theInternational Criminal Tribunal for theformer Yugoslavia. Speaking in an elderlyvoice the man, who was blocked frombeing viewed by the public gallery, said hespent 24 hours “under the dead bodies,before I sat up.” Prosecutor KimberleyWest earlier told the court the witnessescaped the warehouse and “fled into acorn field”. Once the most powerful leaderamong Bosnian Serbs, Karadzic, 66, faces11 counts of genocide, crimes againsthumanity and war crimes for his role in theBosnia conflict which left some 100,000people dead and 2.2 million homeless. Heis particularly wanted for mastermindingthe killings that followed the Serbs’ captureof the eastern Bosnian enclave ofSrebrenica in July 1995, deemed Europe’sworst atrocity since Nazi rule. More than7,000 Muslim men and boys weremurdered over the course of a few days.Cross-examining the man, Karadzic askedif he knew any Bosnian Serbs before warbroke out and the witness said: “I knew alot of them. If anybody told me that thingslike this would have happened, I wouldhave not believed it.” Karadzic, who ishandling his own defence, asked thewitness — who became increasinglyagitated — about inconsistencies in astatement he made in 1995 over the colourof earth-moving equipment — ostensiblyused to bury bodies.

French scientistsentenced to 5 yearson terror charge

PARISAFP

A Franco-Algerian nuclear physicist wassentenced Friday to five years in jail —with one year suspended — for plottingterror attacks in France. Police arrestedAdlene Hicheur, a 35-year-old researcherstudying the universe’s birth — the BigBang — at the European Organisation forNuclear Research (CERN) in October 2009after intercepting his emails. His fatherembraced him in the Paris court roombefore he was taken away to serve his termin prison. Hicheur has already spent twoand a half years in jail while awaiting trial.Hicheur admitted at the start of his trial inlate March that he was going through a“turbulent” time when he wrote the mailsbut denied he intended to carry outattacks. The trial of Hicheur, who wascharged with criminal association as partof a terrorist enterprise, began a week afterpolice shot dead Franco-AlgerianMohamed Merah for killing seven peoplein and around the city of Toulouse.Prosecutors focused on emails betweenHicheur and an alleged Al-Qaeda contact.Hicheur told the court the emails werewritten while his “physical andpsychological state” was impaired while hewas on sick leave for a slipped disc.Following Hicheur’s arrest at his parents’home near CERN, the research institutewhich lies on the Franco-Swiss bordernorthwest of Geneva, police discovered atrove of Al-Qaeda and Islamist militantliterature. France’s DCRI domesticintelligence agency’s suspicions wereraised after a statement from Al-Qaeda inthe Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) was sent toPresident Nicolas Sarkozy’s Elysee Palacein early 2008.

cAiRo: Egyptians protest against the military rule in tahrir square on Friday with the slogan (foreground): “our blood is a red line”, as thousands of people took to the streets in the

Egyptian capital and the mediterranean port city of Alexandria, days after bloody clashes near the defence ministry raised tensions ahead of landmark presidential elections. aFP

Syrians rally as envoy says peace plan ‘on track’

Blasts kill 14 in Caucasus aheadof Putin’s Kremlin return

aussie, 97,becomes ‘world’soldest graduate’

SYDNEYAFP

A 97-year-old retired Australian dentist wasto receive his masters degree in clinicalscience on Friday in what Southern CrossUniversity said could make him the world’soldest new graduate. Allan Stewart, born onMarch 7, 1915, is already the holder of theGuinness World Records title for being theoldest graduate after completing a lawdegree in 2006 at the age of 91. It was notimmediately clear whether anyone olderhad graduated since. “I think I can hang upmy mortar board and academic robes afterthis one — although I said that after my lastdegree and then I got bored,” said Stewart,from Port Stephens, north of Sydney, aheadof his graduation ceremony. “I have somuch time on my hands these days and Ilike to keep mentally active.” The clinicalscience masters is the fourth degree for thegreat-grandfather, who began his universitystudies in the 1930s with a degree indentistry. After a long career as a dentist,during which time he became a Doctor ofDental Surgery on completion of his seconddegree, Stewart decided in his eighties tostudy law to help keep his mind active. “AsI approached the age of 90 I realised thattime was of the essence and I had better geta wriggle on in case I didn’t make mygraduation,” he said.


Foreign News 17Saturday, 05 May, 2012

JERuSAlEm: Palestinian protesters hold slogans and portraits of Palestinian prisoners, held in israeli jails, during a demonstration in east Jerusalem on Friday in solidarity with the prisoners. aFP

West must take‘concrete steps’in N-talks: Iran

TEHRANAFP

The West must take concrete confidence-building steps in its nuclear negotiationswith Iran, a senior Islamic republic officialpreparing the next round of talks saidFriday, after returning from discussionswith China and Russia. Ali Baqeri, thedeputy to Iran’s chief nuclear negotiatorSaeed Jalili, called on “the West to takeconcrete steps to build trust with theIranian people,” Iranian news agenciesreported. That appeared to echo moreexplicit demands from Tehran in recentdays that the West ease its economicsanctions hitting Iran’s oil and financesectors. Baqeri said he held “seriousdiscussions” in Beijing and Moscow aboutthe talks between Iran and the P5+1 groupcomprising the five permanent UN SecurityCouncil members plus Germany. The twosides last month renewed dialogue inIstanbul that had been in limbo for theprevious 15 months. Another round of talksis scheduled for May 23 in Baghdad. Baqeristressed the “importance of the P5+1countries’ commitments concerning Iran’snuclear rights in the framework of the NPT(the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty) inline with both sides’ agreement in theIstanbul talks.” He also noted that bothsides aim to move forward on “the basis ofa step-by-step approach and reciprocity,”and said the outline of that process “will bedetermined before the Baghdad meeting.”The “step-by-step” formulation relies oneach side offering matching compromisesat around the same time in an effort tobuild up trust that has been sorely depletedover past years.

egypt protesters,

army clash in CairoCAIRO

AFP

Protesters and soldiers threw rocks at eachother over a barbed wire barricade near thedefence ministry in Cairo on Friday, withseveral protesters injured, AFP reporterssaid. Bleeding protesters were ferried awayby motorbike by fellow demonstrators andambulances rushed to the scene of the anti-military rally. Islamist and secularprotesters had gathered in Abbassiya nearthe defence ministry since the morning,separated from the army by the wire. Somebegan to throw rocks at the military police,prompting troops to respond with watercannon, AFP reporters said. Military police,holding their shields in one hand, pickedup rocks from the ground and hurled themback at the protesters. Soldiers chargedforward and retreated several times fromthe wire barricade separating them fromthe protesters. A water cannon truck hosedthe protesters several times before pullingaway. Thousands of anti-militaryprotesters took to the streets in both Cairoand Alexandria, days after deadly clashesnear the defence ministry raised tensionsahead of landmark presidential electionslater this month.

BEIJINGAFP

THE United States said Fridaythat China had indicated itwould let blind activist ChenGuangcheng and his familyleave the country soon, raising

hopes of a resolution to a damagingdiplomatic crisis.

State Department spokeswoman Vic-toria Nuland said China would expeditetravel documents for the rights cam-paigner, who escaped house arrest andfled to the US embassy, where he spentsix days before emerging Wednesday.“The Chinese government has indicatedthat it will accept Mr. Chen’s applicationsfor appropriate travel documents,” Nu-land said in a statement. “The UnitedStates government expects that the Chi-nese government will expeditiouslyprocess his applications for these docu-ments. The United States governmentwould then give visa requests for him andhis immediate family priority attention.”

Nuland said Chen had been offered a

fellowship from an American university,where he could be accompanied by hiswife and two children. The US statementappeared to be deliberately vague inhopes of giving China a face-saving wayout of the crisis. Officials declined to givea timeframe or to say whether they hadfirm assurances from the Chinese govern-ment. Beijing earlier said Chen was freeto apply to go abroad, after the activistsaid he feared for his and his family’ssafety in China and wanted to go to theUnited States to study. US Secretary ofState Hillary Clinton said she was “en-couraged” by that development in the af-fair, which erupted ahead of her arrival inBeijing for annual talks that have beenovershadowed by the drama.

“Progress has been made to help himhave the future that he wants. We will bestaying in touch with him as this processmoves forward,” Clinton said. The activist,who spent four years in jail after exposingforced abortions and sterilisations underthe “one-child” policy, unleashed a diplo-matic furore with his flight from his homein northeast Shandong province. US offi-

cials said Chen, 40, left the embassy afterBeijing pledged he and his family would betreated “humanely”, but since then he hassaid he fears retribution by Chinese au-thorities. “I am in great danger... I hopethe government will respect the commit-ments to guarantee my rights agreed to be-tween China and the United States,” hetold AFP by telephone earlier Friday fromthe hospital where he is being treated.

The unravelling of the deal promptedthe United States to renew talks with Chento try to establish the next move for the ac-tivist, who has said he does not want to gointo permanent exile but is seeking a pe-riod of rest abroad. Clinton said the USambassador to China spoke with Chen byphone Friday and that an embassy doctorvisited him at the hospital where he isbeing treated for injuries sustained in hisescape. China has reacted angrily to thecase, demanding a US apology for “inter-ference” in its affairs. But analysts said Bei-jing would likely allow him to leave thecountry. “The Obama administration isputting a lot of pressure on the Chinese tomake sure this story will end up nicely for

Chen Guangcheng,” said Jean-PierreCabestan, politics professor at the HongKong Baptist University. “I think the (Chi-nese) foreign ministry is going to arrangea deal.” The United States has scrambledto contain the growing diplomatic row overChen, which disrupted the annual Strategicand Economic Dialogue and threatened tohurt cooperation on Iran, Syria and keyeconomic issues. In extraordinary sceneson Capitol Hill, Chen phoned in to a con-gressional hearing on his case Thursday toask lawmakers for help to travel to theUnited States and appealed directly toClinton. “I really am fearing for my familymembers’ lives,” he said, speaking througha mobile phone held up to the hearing.“The thing I’m most concerned with now isthe safety of my mother and my brother,”he told the hearing, as stunned witnessesand reporters looked on. “I really want toknow what’s going on with them.”

Chen, a self-taught lawyer, has saidhe felt pressured to leave the embassy,fearing for the safety of his family whosuffered repeated abuses at the hands oflocal officials in their hometown.

China indicates will allowactivist to leave soon: US

LONDONAFP

Prime Minister David Cameron’sConservative Party took a bashing Fri-day in mid-term local elections, cap-ping a bad month for the governmentafter Britain slid back into recession.

The main opposition LabourParty made big gains in the partialelections at the expense of the Conser-vatives and their Liberal Democratpartners in the coalition government.In a further blow to Cameron twoyears after he came to power, his pushto create the posts of elected mayorsin England’s biggest cities was re-jected in referendums. However, earlyvote indications showed ConservativeBoris Johnson may hold on to the

mayor’s job in London in the year ofthe 2012 Olympics. Results are due inthe capital from around 1900 GMT.

A BBC vote share estimate basedon results in England put Labour upthree percent on 39 percent, the Con-servatives down four on 31, the Lib-eral Democrats unchanged on 16 andothers on 14. They projected a lowturnout of 32 percent. With results infrom 104 of the 181 local councils atstake, the centre-right Conservativescontrolled 29 councils, losing powerin 11, and held 604 seats, a loss of289. Centre-left Labour were the bigwinners, gaining control of 22 coun-cils to give them power in 52, andwinning 1,158 seats (up 483).

The centrist Lib Dems run justthree councils, down one, and hold 220

seats (down 133). Across Britain, fewerthan a third of English seats were up forgrabs, while almost all those in Waleswere up for election. Results from Scot-land are due later, while Northern Ire-land is not voting this time. Labour’sshowpiece gain was wresting back con-trol of Britain’s second city Birminghamfrom a Conservative-Lib Dem coalitionafter eight years. The council is Eu-rope’s largest local authority, represent-ing more than one million people.

Cameron said he felt “sorry” forall the unseated Conservatives, butadded that the poll had taken placeagainst a “difficult national back-drop”. “These are difficult times andthere aren’t easy answers,” he said.“What we have to do is take the diffi-cult decisions to deal with the debt,

deficit and broken economy thatwe’ve inherited and we will go onmaking those decisions and we’ve gotto do the right thing for our country.”In an added embarrassment forCameron, the Conservatives even lostseats to Labour in his own con-stituency in Oxfordshire, southernEngland. Cameron wants electedmayors in all major English cities, butfinal results so far from four of the 10conurbations voting on the issueshowed Manchester, Nottingham,Coventry and Bradford had all re-jected the idea. Labour’s gainsshowed they were winning support inthe sort of towns and suburbs in themore affluent south of England wherethey need backing if they hope to winthe next general election, due in 2015.

British PM’s party suffers heavy losses in mid-term polls Japan to go N-free forfirst time since 1970

TOKYOAFP

Japan is set to go without nuclear energy for the first timesince 1970 from Saturday, when the last operating reactorshuts down for maintenance, heightening fears of alooming power crunch this summer. Only one of Japan’s50 reactors — at the Tomari nuclear plant in northernmostHokkaido — is operating at present, but it is scheduled tostop for maintenance work which will last more than 70days. Resource-hungry Japan relied on nuclear energy forabout one-third of its electricity demand until a massiveearthquake and tsunami in March last year caused reactormeltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. Utility firmsmanaged to make up much of the power shortfalls after thenuclear accident by imposing scheduled blackouts onoffices, factories and households while cranking up the useof thermal plants and gas turbines.


Saturday, 5 may, 2012

Page 21

del Potro powersto Portugal victory

KARACHIAgEnciES

PAKISTAN fast bowler Moham-mad Asif on Friday said therehad been no evidence for hisconviction in Britain for cor-

ruption and spot-fixing, a day after he wasreleased following six months in prison."I spent the six months under difficult cir-cumstances," Asif told Pakistan's Geo tel-evision in London, in his first publicremarks since being freed from Canter-bury jail on Thursday after serving halfhis 12-month prison term.

Asif, who was released from jail inBritain on Thursday, has thanked hisfamily members, friends and fans for sup-porting and encouraging him during hisimprisonment. Recalling movementsfrom the jail term, the former fast bowlerof the Pakistani team said he would call tohis house back in Pakistan twice or thricea day. He would play soccer and bad-minton instead of cricket.

In his first media interaction, Muham-mad Asif said that he was hopeful of joiningthe Pakistan’s national team. He said thathis lawyers would move a review petitionagainst the sentence handed down to himin cricket corruption case. When askedwhether he would be able to bowl like hedid in the bast, He said: Fish doesn’t forgetswimming . Asif said he was absolutely fitto play any type of cricket. To a questionthat what lesson he did learn from the pun-ishment, Asif said he had now recognize hisfriends and enemies. The former worldnumber two Test fast bowler expressed his

joy at being released and not being de-ported to Pakistan, vowing that he was de-termined to clear his name and be back onthe field again. “I couldn’t believe that I wasfound guilty by the jury,” said the ace crick-eter who vehemently denies any part in thespot-fixing that rocked the world of cricket.

Accompanied by Ravi Sukul of BalhamChambers, who is dealing with Asif’s crim-inal conviction appeal in the UK, andSavita Sukul of SJS Solicitors, who arguedsuccessfully against Asif’s deportation toPakistan and is in conduct of the Interna-

tional Cricket council ban, Asif expressedhis resolve that his legal team will look intoany “legal errors” in his case and will at-tempt to redress the legal mistakes. Asifsaid he will not speak about any matterwhich will prejudice his upcoming appealsand would prefer his legal team to dealwith such matters. “I am hopeful that I willcome out of the problem that I found my-self in unwittingly.” At the SouthwarkCrown Court former Test captain SalmanButt, 27, was jailed for two and a half yearsfor his role as the "orchestrator" of a plotto bowl deliberate no-balls in the2010Lord's Test against England; MohammadAmir, 19, who had been tipped to becomeone of the all-time great fast bowlers, wasgiven six-month sentence.

Mazhar Majeed, 36, the London-basedsports agent at the heart of the fixing scan-dal, was jailed for two years and eightmonths. Asif said he was able to serve halfa12-month sentence for his part in thespot-fixing scam by keeping himself busyin the gym and by regularly playing footballand badminton. Simple, easy going andprofessional, Asif continues to plead that hehad nothing to do with the spot-fixing scamand he found himself caught with the fel-low players only by association.

“Thanks to Almighty Allah. I am outfrom the prison. I am really happy, I haveseen very hard time,” said the geniusbowler. Asif saw his release as a land-mark step as he begins a new battle toclear his name. He thanked his fans andwell-wishers for standing by him in thetime of trials and tribulations. “I am sohappy I have fans who are still support-

ing me in this way, through social media.I am in touch with them. They wanted tosee me on the ground playing again.”

"But despite the difficulties, I keptmy fitness and I am thankful to my fansand family for supporting me during thisdifficult phase," he said.

The 29-year-old was jailed by a Londoncourt in November after being found guiltyof conspiring to cheat and conspiring to ac-cept corrupt payments over deliberate no-balls during the Lord's Test againstEngland in August 2010. Team-mate Mo-hammad Aamer was released in February,while former Test captain Salman Butt isstill serving his 30-month term in the sameprison from which Asif was released.

The International Cricket Council(ICC) separately banned the trio from play-ing all cricket for five years. "I was shockedwhen I was handed that 12-month jailterm, and when they termed me guilty Iwas very surprised because there was noevidence against me," said Asif. He ex-pressed hope that his lawyer, Ravi Sukul,can overturn the ICC ban. "I am fitter thanbefore because I was using the gym and al-though I didn't get to play much cricket, Iplayed badminton and football," said Asif,confident he could still bowl as well as ever.

"You don't tell a fish how to swim, soI have not forgot how to bowl." Onceconsidered a fast-rising talent, Asif twicefailed dope tests, in 2006 and 2008, thesecond during the inaugural Indian Pre-mier League season which ended in one-year ban. He was also detained in Dubaifor 19 days in June 2008 for possessionof a banned drug.

No evidence against me: Asif

LAHOREStAFF REPoRt

The Australian High Commissioner toPakistan has portrayed his desire tosee the return of international cricketto Pakistan but did not give any time-frame when would the Kangaroos visithere to play a full series.

Talking to journalists during a re-ception at a local hotel, Tim Georgesaid: “I want to see the revival of in-ternational cricket in Pakistan but amnot sure when the Australian teamwould come here to play.

He said that he is not in a positionto say when the team will visit Pak-istan, but he personally believes thatthe Australian team must visit Pak-istan. “Its Australian governmentwhich would be taking the decision onthe Australian team’s visit to Pakistanbut in my personal opinion, theyshould visit here.

He also praised PCB chairmanZaka Ashraf in his efforts for the re-vival of cricket in Pakistan. “I see verybright future of Pakistan cricket the

way Zaka is endeavoring for the devel-opment of the game in the country.Under him the Pakistan cricket wouldsurely flourish and if he maintainedthe same zest, its sure the interna-tional cricket would revive in Pak-istan, he maintained.

Earlier, similar views were ex-pressed by British High Commis-sioner in Pakistan Adam Thomson.He said that he wished to see Englandcricket team play Pakistan here.Thomson hoped that the Englandteam would visit Pakistan soon.

“One day not far away it will hap-pen,” he said. The High Commissionersaid that it was wrong perception thatPakistan only faces political turmoiland terrorism adding that the countrypossesses a wonderful cultural and so-cial heritage.

The attacks on Sri Lankan cricketteam in Lahore suspended the inter-national cricket to Pakistan wherepeople are enthusiastic about cricketand the Pakistan team had to opt foraway venues for its home series.

Pakistan were on the verge of

hosting international cricket at theGaddafi Stadium last month whenBangladesh agreed to play oneTwenty20 and One-dayer at the end ofthis month. But the Bangladeshteam's scheduled tour of Pakistanlater this month was postponed aweek back after some natives and for-mer players filed a writ petition in thecourt asserting that it was not safe forthe team to tour Pakistan.

However, Pakistan did host theBritish Universities team comprisingsome MCC and British army players.And now PCB has invited Canada andAfghanistan to play a tri-series in Pak-istan.

PCB Chairman Zaka Ashraf in re-sponse to the Australian High Com-mission said that it’s a positive signfor the Pakistan cricket that the mis-sion of a country where cricket is a bigtime game.

“The views of Australian andBritish high commissions about Pak-istan cricket would surely help us getinternational cricket back to Pak-istan,” he maintained.

LAHOREStAFF REPoRt

After being snubbed by Bangladesh, Pak-istan Cricket Board (PCB) has started offits efforts to work on its contingencyplans in a bid to end the cricketingdrought from the country.

In this regard, the board has invitedInternational Cricket Council’s (ICC) as-sociate member teams, Afghanistan andCanada, to play a tri-nation series in thenear future. Both countries’ cricketing au-thorities have responded positively toPCB’s invitation and have signaled theirconsent for the proposed tour.

“We have received a positive responsefrom both teams. Canada has shown inter-est in sending their senior team and willshortly send a letter to the PCB in this re-

gard,” PCB Governing Board member,Amir Nawab reported to have said. The tri-nation series is the third initiativebeing taken by the PCB afterthe Bangladesh High Courtpostponed their na-tional team’s tour forfour weeks due to se-curity concerns.Earlier, the chair-man PCB, ZakaAshraf, had an-nounced the organ-izing of the secondedition of Pakistan’sChampions League,in May, where fourforeign domestic levelclubs will participate forthe first time. The other

prospective step by the board is the initia-tion of the Pakistan Premier League (PPL).

The exciting Twenty20 tourna-ment, has surprisingly re-

ceived a positive responsefrom its stakeholders,

not only within thecountry but fromoutside as well, andis scheduled to takeplace in Octoberthis year. Severalrenowned playershave already con-

firmed their partici-pation in the PPL,

including the likes ofSanath Jayasuriya, An-

drew Symonds and BrianLara. The board has not yet fi-

nalized the schedule of the tri-nation seriesas the national team is gearing for a tightschedule ahead. Men in Green will lockhorns against Sri Lanka for a month-longtour in June, which will be followed by aseries against Australia in August, andtheir Twenty20 World Cup campaign,which kicks off in September.

“The plan is in its initial stages butwe’re looking to host the teams as soonas possible. Our team has a busy scheduleand we’ll see when we can host theevent,” said Nawab. Pakistan has notseen any international cricket after the2009 terrifying gunmen attack on the SriLankan cricket team bus. The cricketboard, however, is making every little ef-fort to convince foreign teams to comeand play in Pakistan, aiming to put anend to the cricketing deadlock.

‘Mr Cricket’Husseystruggling withIndian heat

NEW DELHIAFP

Veteran Australian batsman MichaelHussey, newly arrived in the Indian Pre-mier League (IPL) to play for the defend-ing champions, admitted Friday that hewas struggling with the heat and humid-ity. The middle-order batsman, whoturns 37 later this month, was run out for18 in his first match on Monday after ar-riving to play for Chennai Super Kings(CSK) following a Test series for Australiain the West Indies. "I do struggle in theheat and humidity. That is a lot. It's very,very tough," Hussey, nicknamed "MrCricket", told NDTV in an interviewahead of Friday's match between Chennaiand the Deccan Chargers. Hussey, repre-senting CSK since the IPL's inauguralseason in 2008, said it was "fantastic" tobe back playing for Chennai. "It's good tocatch up with the other players," Husseysaid, adding he loved the hot and spicyfood in the industrial southern port city,where the temperature was 40 degreesCelsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) on Fri-day. Hussey conceded it was a big chal-lenge playing against the Kolkata KnightRiders on Monday after a long flight fromthe Caribbean. "It was a dream actually. Iwas not sure what was going on. It was abit of a battle getting on the field. Quite abig jetlag," said Hussey. Hussey hasscored 5,708 runs in 73 Tests and 5,262runs in 181 one-dayers since making hisinternational debut in 2004. The 76-match IPL tournament has nine teamsplaying each other on a home-and-awaybasis before the top-four sides qualify forthe play-offs. The final will be on May 27.Chennai are currently fifth in the leaguewith nine points from 10 matches.

Pakistanjuniors win asiaCup opener

LAHOREStAFF REPoRt

The Pakistan junior hockey team now par-ticipating in the 7th Men’s Junior AsiaCup has started its campaign with a win inthe opening match. The event whichstarted at Malacca, Malaysia on Fridaysaw Pakistan juniors got 1–0 win overChina. Muhammad Suleman scored the allimportant goals of the match in the 32ndminute. On May 6 Pakistan will playagainst India at 1505 hours (PST).

ZimbabweanBrown joins Kenyacoaching staff

NAIROBIAFP

Kenya have appointed former Zimbabwecricket coach Robin Brown as head of itsnational elite programme to oversee thedevelopment of the game from the grass-roots to the top level.The programme which is aimed atstrengthening the structure of the sport,was initiated last year by the outgoingCricket Kenya chief executive Tom Searsafter Kenya's dismal performance in the2011 World Cup.Sears, who is set to leave his post at theend of June said the appointment ofBrown as head of elite development will bea huge benefit in many areas."Robin is a vastly experienced coach whohas played and coached at the highestlevel and is highly respected in the game,"said Sears."His primary role will be to ensure we areidentifying the best players in our systemfrom junior level right through to ourEmerging Players squad and ensuring theyreceive all the coaching and support theyneed to fulfil their potential."

australian hC wants to seeaussie cricketers play in Pakistan

Pakistan invited Canada, Afghanistan for tri-series


Sports 25Saturday, 5 May, 2012

PUNEcRicinFo

IN the end, Mumbai Indians de-served two points for having ren-dered a target of 121 so difficultthat Pune Warriors played catch-

up for most of the chase. And the one-runmargin magnified the impact of SouravGanguly's crawl in the final analysis.There were other Warriors batsmen whofound run-scoring difficult on the lowpitch, but they did not hang around for aslong as Ganguly did and consequently,did not make it as difficult for thedoughty Mithun Manhas as Ganguly did.

When Ganguly arrived at 40 for 2 inthe seventh over, the asking-rate wasjust over six runs an over. By the time hewas bowled for 16 off 24 by Lasith Ma-linga off the last ball of the 17th over,slogging and missing tamely, the asking-rate had climbed to nine. Manhas triedto make the most of the strike he got ina 47-run fifth-wicket stand in whichGanguly contributed 13. But he was upagainst a class Mumbai Indians attack,and with Malinga to bowl two overs atthe death, Warriors' chances diminishedeven further. They needed 12 off thefinal over, but Munaf Patel managed tohold them off, just about. The earlydamage had been done by Munaf whenhe trapped Robin Uthappa lbw, after thebatsman had kickstarted the chase withsome big strokes. Mumbai Indians' bat-tery of specialist spinners - though oneof them, Robin Peterson, was never used- then broke the back of Warriors' chase.Jesse Ryder chipped Harbhajan Singh tolong-on, Michael Clarke got a rough lbwdecision and Steven Smith walked pasta Pragyan Ojha delivery to be bowled.Warriors had slipped from 40 for 1 to 47for 4 but with 74 needed from 61, theywere right in the game still.

Ganguly's innings ensured theyslowly went out of it. He was on 12 off 22at one stage, unable to earn anythingmore than singles. He managed to make

room and lift Malinga down the groundfor a four, but was bowled in the sameover. Manhas wasn't giving up, though.Backing himself to cut almost everything,he and Wayne Parnell took 11 off PragyanOjha in the 18th over. But Harbhajan hadanother over from Malinga left, and it didwhat Morne Morkel's penultimate overhad done for Delhi Daredevils againstRajasthan Royals. Malinga gave just fourruns, and left Warriors with too much todo in the last over.

With eight needed off the last twoballs, Bhuvneshwar Kumar drilledMunaf over extra cover for four, butcould only hit a low full toss - the finalball - to deep midwicket as Warriorsended agonizingly short.

That Mumbai Indians managedeven 120 was down to the opening part-nership between Sachin Tendulkar andJames Franklin. Mumbai Indians didnot begin badly for a side that has now

changed its opening combination seventimes in ten matches. Well past thehalfway stage of the tournament, theymight have finally even found the com-bination that clicks. Tendulkar andFranklin added fifty-plus runs for thethird time in as many matches, butMumbai Indians could not build muchon that base, losing 5 for 12 from a posi-tion of 81 for 2 after 12 overs.

Warriors were accurate with theirfast bowlers. Smith led the way in thefield with three run-outs, two of them atcrucial junctures. He first ran out RohitSharma to dent Mumbai Indians afterthe steady start, and then caught This-ara Perera short to hurt their hopes of alower-order fightback.

Ashish Nehra recovered from an ex-pensive first over to go for just five runs inhis next three overs. It was Nehra whotriggered the collapse, getting Tendulkarto edge a steer to the wicketkeeper in the

12th over. He then surprised Petersonwith a skiddy short delivery in the 14th,and the top-edged pull was taken by Gan-guly. The middle-order implosion undidthe decent start from Tendulkar andFranklin. The duo were kept quiet by War-riors but took Nehra and Ashok Dinda foran expensive over each to ensure the run-rate did not suffer much. Bhuvneshwargot the breakthrough in the eighth overwhen Franklin top-edged a pull.

Tendulkar could not pick up his scor-ing-rate beyond a run a ball, and after hefell, Mumbai Indians stalled. Gangulycould not score at remotely close to a runa ball, and after he finally fell, it was toolate for Warriors, who have now lost sixof their last seven games.SCORES: Mumbai Indians 120 for 9(Tendulkar 34, Bhuvneshwar 2-9,Nehra 2-19) beat Pune Warriors 119 for6 (Manhas 42*, Harbhajan 2-18, Ma-linga 2-25) by one run

PUne: Mumbai Indians' cricketers celebrate their victory over Pune warriors at the end of the IPl twenty20 match. aFP

Mumbai defend 120 by one run

LONDONAFP

Chris Gayle could be on the brink of a return to internationalcricket after pulling out of a deal with English county sideSomerset in a bid to revive his West Indies career.

Former West Indies captain Gayle, renowned as a big-hitting batsman, has not played international cricket formore than a year following a dispute with the West IndiesCricket Board (WICB) sparked by critical comments he madeabout officials in a radio interview.

The 32-year-old Jamaican left-hander, also a useful off-spin bowler, signed to play Twenty20 cricket for Somersetthis season. However, Gayle -- currently starring in the lu-crative Indian Premier League (IPL) -- issued a statementon Thursday saying he had made himself available for inter-national cricket again following talks with the WICB.

He said he would not be joining south-west side Somer-set, even though he has received no guarantees he will be se-lected by the West Indies. "I wish to advise that as of today(Thursday), I have written to Somerset and advised themthat I will not be honouring the commitment I made to themwhen I signed a contract with them," Gayle said.

"I made it clear to them that my decision was made be-cause of my commitment to West Indies cricket and to WestIndies cricket fans, and because I believe that it is time forthe WICB to make a decision which will provide a clearerview of my own future. "I understand that by making this de-cision, it may place me in a position of considerable risk,since I am foregoing a signed contract, without any guaran-tees whatsoever, with only the hope that I will be selected toplay for the West Indies again.

"I have now satisfied all of the requests of the WICB andtheir selection panel, with whom I met via teleconferenceyesterday (Wednesday), and to whom I reiterated previousassurances given to the board regarding my availability.

"So that there is no doubt, I confirmed to the selectorsthat I was available for West Indies duty in all forms ofcricket, immediately following the conclusion of my con-tractual obligations to my IPL franchise, Royal Chal-lengers Bangalore." Gayle has not played for the WestIndies since the 2011 World Cup, but has been in blister-ing form in the IPL, where he is third in the list of thetournament's highest run scorers and has made 81, 87, 4,86 and 71 in his past five innings. Although he was not se-lected in the West Indies Test squad for a three-match se-ries starting at Lord's on May 17, he could now return tothe side for the subsequent one-day series, which getsunder way in Southampton on June 16. But those one-day

matches clash with the county Twenty20 tournament,hence Gayle's decision to pull out of his Somerset con-tract. Somerset were, unsurprisingly, upset by Gayle'smove. "We are very disappointed that Chris Gayle will notbe joining us for this season's FLt20 (Friends Life T20),particularly as we have a signed contract and a no-objec-tion certificate from the West Indies Cricket Board," saidSomerset chief executive Guy Lavender. Somerset subse-quently announced that they had signed South Africanbatsman Francois du Plessis as a replacement for Gayle.

The West Indies squad arrived in England on Wednes-day and they begin their tour with a three-day match againstsouth coast county Sussex at Hove starting on Saturday.WEST INDIES READy TO WELCOME BACKGAyLE: West Indies coach Ottis Gibson and captain Dar-ren Sammy said Thursday they would have no problems withChris Gayle returning to the squad after he promised to endhis international exile on Thursday.

Former West Indies captain Gayle, renowned as a big-hitting batsman, has not played international cricket formore than a year following a dispute with the West IndiesCricket Board (WICB) sparked by critical comments he madeabout officials in a radio interview.

But on Thursday the 32-year-old Jamaican left-hander,currently starring in the Indian Premier League (IPL), an-nounced Thursday he would not be honouring his contractwith county side Somerset so as to make himself available tothe West Indies during their tour of England, even thoughhe'd received no guarantees about selection.

Although he was not chosen in the West Indies Testsquad for a three-match series starting at Lord's on May 17,Gayle could now return to the side for the subsequent one-day series, which gets under way in Southampton on June16. Gibson, speaking at Hove where West Indies begin theirtour of England with a three-day match against Sussex start-ing on Saturday, said: "It's great to hear that Chris is avail-able again. I'm sure the selectors will pick him, because he'sworld-class...He's the best one-day batsman in the world."

Meanwhile Sammy said Gayle would be welcomed backso long as he accepted the team's work ethic. "The ChrisGayle issue has been going on for a while. But we as a teamhave moved on," said Sammy. "When Chris joins the set-up,he will be coming into a very hard-working environment --which he has to fit into," the all-rounder added.

"We all know what he is capable of doing and we hopehe could fit in nicely and do the job to take West Indiescricket forward." Gayle said he realised the gamble he wastaking in turning down an agreed deal to play English do-mestic Twenty20 cricket for Somerset.

Muslim, Mt Gyms win LAHORE: Muslim Gymkhana, ModelTown Greens, Model Town Gymkhana,Tausef Club and Universal were the winnersin the Lahore Sprite League while AhmedShahzad scored 95 and Aizaz Cheema tookfive wickets. At LCCA ground MuslimGymkhana beat Shining Club by 184 runs.ScoRES: Muslim Gym 314/8 50 overs, ahmed Shahzad95, taufeeq Umer 79, Usman Slahuddin 72*, UsmanMalik 3/44, Shining Club 130/10 in 28.5 overs, ayaz urRehman 30, Usman Malik 26, waqas aslam 3/26, MShahzad 2/26, ahmed Shahzad was declared man of thematch. at Model town Greens ground Model town Greenbeat Shalimar Gymkhana by 6 wickets scores: ShalimarGymkhana 145/10 in 24.3 overs, ahmed liaqat 21, aizazCheema 5/47, akber ali 4/28, Model town Green 149/4in 21.1 overs, abdul wahab 59*, ahmed dar 43, aizazCheema was declared man of the match. at Model townClub Ground Model town Gymkhana beat Prince Club by2 wickets scores: Prince Club 227/10 in 48.2 overs, fahadul Haq 81, aamar tariq 36, Shakir Mushtaq 33, awaisnawaz 2/16, aitmad ul Haq 2/16, Model town Gymkhana228/8 in 41.4 overs, abdul Basit 85, aitmad ul Haq 53,Sameer akram 3/53, abdul Basit was declared man ofthe match. at Ittefaq Ground lCCa tauseef Club beattown Ship whites by 1 wicket scores: township whites247/10 in 45.1 overs, M Sharif 53, Kamran Hussain 43,Hamza akber 43, Israr Baig 2/49, Sheraz Baig 2/48,tauseef Club 248/9 in 49.3 overs, Sherbaz Khan 66,waqas Khan 58, qaiser Khan 4/59, Sherbaz Khan wasdeclared man of the match. at nawaz Sharif ComplexGround Shahdra, Universal beat nayyer Soch by 5 wicketsscores: 179/10 in 39 overs, azhar Mahmood Khan 50, atiqShabbir 41, Roni Gill 3/58, Universal 182/5 in 40.2 overs, MShahid 38*, Roni Gill 30*, Muneeb Shahid Butt 3/29 RoniGill was declared man of the match. StAFF REPoRt

win for PtCl Sukkur ISLAMABAD: In a nail-biting contest,Pakistan Telecommunication CompanyLimited (PTCL) Sukkur team won the an-nual regional cricket tournament held inKarachi. The Sukkur Telecom Regionteam won the match by defeating KarachiTelecom Region-III. Held at DHA RahatCricket Ground. PTCL SEVP BusinessZone South, Furqan Habib Qureshi, wasthe chief guest on the occasion. TheChampions’ Trophy of the match went toSTR. Mr. Nadeem (KTR-III Karachi) re-ceived award for ‘Best Batsman’ while Mr.Mansoor Shah (STR) received the awardsfor Man of the Match of Final, Best Bowlerand Man of the Series. StAFF REPoRt

LONDONAFP

It is a measure of how much things havechanged since the West Indies' glory days thatthe overwhelming feeling amongst homecricket fans ahead of their tour of England issympathy.

From the mid 1970s through the 1980s theWest Indies dominated world cricket with asfearsome a battery of fast bowlers as the gamehas known and dynamic, hard-hitting bats-men.

They seemed to reserve their most pul-verising displays for England, the old colonialpower.

Yet the English crowds, while they fearedfor the safety of their own batsmen and the fig-ures of their bowlers, had no trouble relishingthe exuberant skill of the West Indies.

Fast forward a generation, and this seemsscarcely credible: the West Indies arrive inEngland having won just two out of their last30 Tests.

For what was once a world-beating side tobe reduced to a three-Test series, mostly inMay, ahead of world number one England'sshowpiece encounter with South Africa is un-deniably sad.

Whether it is a lack of planning, inconsis-tent selection and questionable administra-tion, many of the West Indies' wounds areself-inflicted.

But certain developments in world crickethave been unkind to their cause.

For example the cash-rich Indian PremierLeague Twenty20 tournament cuts across theWest Indies' domestic season. And that offersplayers a financial lifeline if, they are in dis-pute with the West Indies Cricket Board.

And that of course is just what happenedwith the hard-hitting opener, former captainChris Gayle.

That may be good for Gayle -- and indeedany other players who have fallen out with aWICB, whose "general incompetence" wascriticised recently by former Wisden editorScyld Berry.

But the West Indies have missed Gayle'sruns during an international exile of morethan a year.

It does appear though that he will be avail-able, after completing his IPL duties, for theone-day matches against England that followthe Tests.

Against this backdrop the tourists, re-cently beaten 2-0 in a home Test series byAustralia, have arrived in cold, wet England,where the seam-bowler friendly conditionscould suit the likes of West Indies quickKemar Roach.

"I am quite confident our guys can put theEnglish batsmen under pressure," said WestIndies captain Darren Sammy ahead of thetour opener against Sussex at Hove, whichstarts on Saturday.

But do the West Indies have the batsmento counter the conditions in which they expecttheir bowlers to thrive?

Certainly, in the experienced left-handerShivnarine Chanderpaul, now officially rankedthe world's best batsmen, they have a cricketerfor whom the adjective 'gritty' was invented.Here is a man so experienced in salvage mis-sions it is little wonder he hasn't been asked toraise the Titanic.

Chanderpaul however is a middle-orderbatsman and even he can only do so much ifthose above him fall cheaply.

To his credit Sammy, whose team showedglimpses of their potential against Australia,didn't duck the issue.

"Stats don't lie and it is fair to say our toporder has looked vulnerable," he said. "It didnot click against Australia, but the selectorsstill have shown faith in Adrian Barath andKieran Powell.

"They are quite young, they are still learn-ing on the job."

Sammy has won plaudits for his leader-ship skills but doubts remain over whether heis worth his place in the side.

After 24 Tests, the 28-year-old has justtwo fifties to his name and he averages nearly31 with the ball.

"I have developed a formula for myself inwhich I could play and I worked out that onceI play my way, the aggressive way, I get moreresults," said Sammy.

"As a team, the culture and the environ-ment is very good, and the players are startingto shape up as a family."

Gayle opts for Westindies over somerset

World cricket waits onWest Indies revival


Sports20Saturday, 5 May, 2012

LONDON: A Starstreak high velocity missile (HVM)

system, which could play a role in providing air

security during the Olympics, is manned by members

of the British Royal Artillery as a Rapier ground-based

air defence (GBAD) system stands in the backround

(R) during a media demonstration at Blackheath. AFP

LONDONAFP

British military chiefs said they hopedthe deployment of surface-to-air mis-siles in a London park Thursday would"allay people's fears" as the armed forcesgeared up for the 2012 Olympic Games.

The Rapier and smaller high-velocitymissiles were deployed as part of ExerciseOlympic Guardian, a nine-day trainingoperation to test the response to a possi-ble attack during the Games. The missileswere shown off in Blackheath, southeast

London, on high ground overlookingGreenwich Park, where the equestrianevents will be held, and the steel-and-glass towers of the Canary Wharf financialservices district. The military hardwarecaught the attention of passing dog walk-ers on the common. Colonel Jon Camp-bell, commander of the Joint GroundBased Air Defence, said: "We have doneas much as we can to allay people's fears.

"The Rapier system has a world-class radar on it and is particularly goodat picking up low and slow-moving ob-jects in the sky. "It means we're able to

get the very best picture of what is hap-pening in the skies of London."

The London Games run from July27 to August 12. Air Vice Marshal StuartAtha said there was no specific threat tothe Olympics, but that system aimed to"detect at the earliest possible stage arange of potential airborne threats"."What we would also hope is that wewould also deter anyone who had ma-lign intent for the Olympics," he added.

"We want the focus to be on UsainBolt this summer and not us." Black-heath Common -- where the annual

London Marathon begins -- is one offour planned sites around London forRapier deployment. As part of the train-ing exercise, Typhoon fighter jets arestationed near the capital, along withmilitary helicopters and the amphibiousassault ship HMS Ocean.

Meanwhile three sports test eventsgot under way Thursday: water polo andwheelchair tennis on the Olympic Parkand Paralympic archery at the Royal Ar-tillery Barracks. The hockey competi-tions, featuring top international sides,were into their second day.

Missiles deployed in London park

A few weeks earlier this column had apiece titled, “How City bottled it”. Thatwas published a day before the Arsenal-Manchester City game, losing whichwould’ve had been akin to the proverbialfinal nail in the coffin of City’s titlehopes. City ended up on the wrong endof a one-goal defeat and the red half ofManchester began preparing their ham-mers and nails for a fond farewell to theirarchenemy’s hopes of vanquishing theirfirst league title since the days of Adamand Eve. And then Wigan happened!

Manchester United’s loss at Wigansmacked of all brands of complacency.Every single one of them, including the“been there, done that” veteransseemed to have their minds on the sum-mer break, with the title having alreadyhad been bagged apparently. Even so, itwas the game against Everton whichoutdid the complacency of the Wigangame, and we all witnessed a Unitedperformance that is almost unheard ofthis time of the year under current cir-cumstances. Squandering a two goallead late on, against a team with next tonothing to play for, meant that Unitedwere now a loss against City away frombeing supplanted from the apex of the

league table.Roberto Mancini has been quite un-

expectedly brilliant in his mind games –and we rarely get to say this about theman who’s up against the purple nosedwily old fox. Sir Alex Ferguson is the beall and end all of title race mind games,

but Mancini’s rhetoric that the “title racehas ended” since the Arsenal defeatmight just have worked wonders. Evenin the lead up to probably the biggestManchester Derby ever, Mancini gavethe impression that the United ostensi-bly had wrapped up the title.

City needed to win Monday night’sderby and for United a draw would’vehad been bigger than City winning. Thiswas reflected by the way the managersset their teams up and how the two sidesactually played. United were ultra defen-sive from the word go and barely trou-

bled anything within proximity of JoeHart’s goal throughout the 90 minutes.While the first half was marred by zeroattacking intent from Sir Alex’s side, thesecond half – after going a goal down atthe tail end of the first 45 – was marredby United’s inability to conjure up anyattacking impetus even though they werechasing the game.

All the same, the title race isn’t ex-actly over as the two Manchesters areseparated by mere goal difference withtwo games to go. City’s seven goal leadin the GD column virtually equals apoint, unless United pull off a goal slide– which they clearly don’t look capableof doing as things stand – againstSwansea or Sunderland. City meanwhilehave the tougher of the pair of fixtures,playing against Champions League foot-ball chasing Newcastle United and rele-gation threatened Queens Park Rangers.

It’s the game against Newcastle thatshould be the clincher for City, since noone would put a wager on them losingout against QPR at home with historylooming. Newcastle are a tough nut tocrack at home, and would be a real testof City’s credentials, as the bottle spinstowards the blue half of Manchester inthis bottling game.

As for the Red Devils, they must con-tinue to have faith in United. NewcastleUnited that is.

Railways,wapda top GirlsHockey table

LAHOREStAFF REPoRt

Wapda and Railways maintained theirposition on top of the points table witheasy wins in the 2nd PHF U-21 GirlsHockey Championship in progress atNational Hockey Stadium, Lahore. Ms. Nina Maria Fite, Consul General ofthe United States of America will beGuest-of-Honour on the 3rd & 4th Po-sition match between PUNJAB(C)/PUNJAB (W) at 1500 hours.on mAY 4, tHREE mAtcHES WERE PlAYEd: RESultS: Pak Board beat Sindh 2-1 (full time) 0-1(Half time) Pak-Board: Gulnaz Parveen 2 Goals38th & 55th minutes (fG).Sindh: Sadaf 10th minute (PC). wapda beatBalochistan 10-0 (full time) 7-0 (Half time).waPda: ambreen 3 Goals 4th, 22nd & 39th min-utes (fG), fakhra 2 Goals 12th & 20th minutes (fG),Irum 16th minute (PC), Shahida Raza 2 Goals 26thminute (PC) & 40th minute (fG) Sehrish 39thminute (PC) & Sana arshad 47th minute (fG). Rail-way beat Punjab (C) 6-2 (full time) 2-1 (Half time). Railway: Mayira Sabir 3 Goals 12th, 46th & 54thminutes (fG), Marina anwar 16th minute (PC),Kalsoom Shahzadi 39th minute (fG) & aqsa Mum-taz 51st minute (fG). Punjab (C): Kalsoom Munir26th minute (fG) & Sadia akram 56th minute (fG).Point tABlEPS teams P w d l Gf Ga PtS Gd1 Railway 6 6 0 0 35 4 18 +312 wapda 6 5 0 1 25 2 15 +233 Punjab (C) 6 4 0 2 17 8 12 +94 Punjab (w) 6 3 0 3 15 8 9 +75 Pak. Board 6 2 0 4 6 23 6 -176 Sindh 6 1 0 5 3 26 3 -237 Balochistan 6 0 0 6 2 32 0 -30

army, Sindh winin U-23 football

LAHOREStAFF REPoRt

Army and Sindh won their quarter-fi-nals of the National U-22 FootballChampionship-2012 being played atBahawalpur. In the first quarter-final match of theday, Army beat National Youth 2-0 atthe Dring Football Stadium. Army gotits goals from Muhammad Jamil (FW)in the 11 minute and Muhammad As-ghar (FW) in the 49 minute. Sindh beat Punjab 3-0 at the samevenue. Sindh scorers were AbdulWahab (FW) 2 Goals in the 27 & 89minutes and Imran Hussain (FW) inthe minutes.

How United bottled it

KUNWAR KHULDUNE SHAHID

EPL CRYSTAL BALL

If City win the league, it would be courtesy one of the greatest United capitulations in recent memory


Sports 21Saturday, 5 May, 2012

WAtCH It LIve

GEO SUPERIPL-5: Kolkata KnightRiders v Pune Warriors03:30PM

ESTORILAFP

JUAN Martin del Potro made astrong start to his French Openpreparations with a 6-1, 6-0hammering of Portugal's Rui

Machado to reach the quarter-finals of theEstoril Open on Thursday. Del Potro, thetop seed and defending champion, wasplaying an ATP match on the surface forthe first time this season after winningtwo clay Davis Cup rubbers at home inApril when Argentina defeated Croatia.

Despite the scoreline, the 23-year-oldadmitted that Machado had tested him ashe looks to build up his form. "I played wellfor only my first match after Davis Cup. The

score might not have looked it, but he'sdangerous on clay," said Del Potro, whowon his last title at Marseille in February,prior to a semi-final in Dubai against RogerFederer. "But I played much better thanhim and took all of my break points." A yearago, Del Potro arrived at the Estadio Na-cionale ranked 46th and unsure of his gameafter missing much of 2010 following wristsurgery. However, the 2009 US Openchampion dug deep to claim his first title inthe country with a victory over SpaniardFernando Verdasco. Now ranked a morerespectable 12th, the Argentinian added:"I'm pleased with my performance. Thiswas good for a first match of this part of theseason." Victory over Machado improvedDel Potro's 2012 record to 24-6 ahead of his

semi-final against two-time champion Al-bert Montanes on Friday. Montanes,seeded seventh, advanced to the last eightwith a 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 win over AmericanBobby Reynolds. Fourth seed AlbertRamos of Spain beat German Bjorn Phau7-5, 6-0 to reach the quarters, where he willface the last Portuguese in contention, JoaoSousa. The local player won 3-6, 6-3, 4-2when Uzbek Denis Istomin quit after a 30-minute evening rain interruption, citing abad back as his reason for not returning tothe court. In the women's draw, Italian topseed Roberta Vinci reached the semi-finalsby defeating Russian seventh seed NadiaPetrova 6-2, 1-6, 6-4. "I'm playing very wellagain this season," said 29-year-old Vinci,who won three clay trophies in 2011.

Pakistan rugbygets Irish coach

LAHOREStAFF REPoRt

Pakistan Rugby Union has arranged aprofessional foreign coach for NationalRugby team ahead of their internationalassignments. Justin Fitzpatrick from Ire-land joined Pakistan national rugby teamcamp at Lahore Rugby ground here. PRUPresident Fawzi Kawaja and secretary ArifSaeed welcomed the new coach and saidthat PRU is happy that the national teamwill get properly geared for the upcomingA5N tournament at Kuala Lumpur laterthis month. The Pakistan team will playthere first game against India on May 31.Fitzpatrick, a former Irish national playerplayed rugby for Ireland during 1998 to2003 during the period he also played inthe Rugby World Cup for Ireland. He iscurrently working as Director of Rugby atDuncannon Rugby Foot ball Club, IrishWomen's Scrum Coach at Irish RugbyFootball Union, Head Coach at Duncan-non Rugby football club, ProfessionalPlayer at Ulster Rugby, ProfessionalPlayer at Castres Olympique Rugby. Heplayed All Ireland League Division 2 Win-ner 98/99, All Ireland League Winner2000/2001, Founding Member of IRUPA2001, Ulster’s IRUPA reprehensive 2001-03. He played as Irish InternationalPlayer, 26 Ireland Caps. He also played asProfessional Player at London Irish RugbyClub. As a coach he is qualified IRFULevel 2 (stage 4) Head Coach (Accred-ited), IRFU Certified ConditioningCourse, IRFU Tutor, IRB Educator, IRFULevel 3 (stage 5) Coach (Attendee).

KAKAMIGAHARAAFP

Japan's men take on South Africa for aplace in the Olympics after the hostsstormed back to squeeze past China 3-2on Friday and destroy Chinese hopes ofmaking it to the London Games.

Japan sealed a place in Sunday'sface-off by finishing top in the six-teamround robin, with South Africa second.Both were unbeaten after five games,leaving China in third and going home.

"It was a difficult match. When wewere down 1-0 and 2-1, our players

played very well and finally we won thematch. I'm very happy," Japan's SouthKorean coach David Kang said.

"We've prepared for this tournamentfor one year. We are going to put ineverything we have and play 100 percentin the final."

Skipper Kei Kawakami said: "It wasthe most difficult match today. It was aresult playing as one united team. Wetried to play our own game, but the Chi-nese players had strong determination towin and controlled the game.

"At half time, our coach told us to be-lieve in ourselves and we started to play

our game. Now we must beat SouthAfrica to go to the Olympics."

Japan twice had to come back froma goal down after Ya Yubo scored forChina in the 10th and 30th minutes.

knowing a draw was not enough,China played the last two minutes with-out a goalkeeper, who was replaced byan outfield player, allowing Japan tograb the winner thanks to KazuhiroTsubouchi's goal on the counter-attack.BRITISH MEN BEAT INDIA INOLyMPIC WARM-UP: Great Britainoverpowered India 4-2 in the London2012 warm-up event here on Thursday

to set up a clash with Australia on Satur-day to reach the final of the OlympicPark tournament.

Britain were 2-0 up inside 11 min-utes as they exploited gaps in the Indi-ans' defence with striker Rob Moore firstfiring in a reverse-stick shot from the topof the circle before Simon Mantell's runand cross-shot was deflected in bySandeep Singh.

VR Raghunath pulled one back forIndia from a penalty corner before Ash-ley Jackson scored twice in three min-utes, touching in Ben Hawes's long balland then converting from close range.

oeIRaS: Roberta Vinci returns the ball to KaiaKanepi during their estoril open tennis. aFP

MUnICH: Spain's feliciano lopez returns the ball against Ukraine's Sergiy Stakhovskyduring their atP BMw open last sixteen round match. aFP

Del Potro powersto Portugal victory

Japan play south africa for olympic berth



22

Published by Arif Nizami for Nawa Media Corporation (Pvt) Ltd at Plot # 7, Al-Baber Centre, F/8 Markaz, Islamabad. Editor: Arif Nizami, Resident Editor: Rana Qaisar

KARACHIAgEnciES

INTERIOR Minister RehmanMalik on Friday said the operationin Lyari had been temporarilyhalted but the senior police officerleading the campaign says he has-

n’t received any order in this regard.Talking to a private TV channel, the in-

terior minister clarified that the operationwas temporarily halted in order to allowthe criminals who had accepted the gov-ernment’s offer to surrender.

Malik added that the police would re-

main in the troubled locality and respond toany future attacks. Earlier, the interior min-ister was quoted as saying that the operationin the area had concluded and police forceswere being withdrawn. Malik had said thatthe warring gangs and criminals would haveto face stern action if they did not surrender.He promised that peace would be resumedat any cost, adding that time had been giveto these criminal elements to lay down theirarms before the law enforcement agencies.

He assured Uzair Baloch, one of themost wanted criminals, that he and his al-lies would be treated according to the law ifthey surrendered. The minister said the

water crisis in Lyari had been resolved bythe administration and communicationservices, including mobile phone services,had been resumed. Malik’s statements,however, conflicted with those of the city’spolice chief Akhtar Gorchani.

Gorchani said the operation was going onand a meeting chaired by the Sindh IG wasdeliberating upon the future course of actionin Lyari. On Friday, sporadic gunfire could beheard across Lyari as authorities reportedly fi-nalised plans to use helicopters for the opera-tion and deploy Rangers in the area. Firingerupted in Cheel Chowk, Afshani Gali andNawalane areas. Sindh IG Mushtaq Shah

claimed that the war against criminals had en-tered into its final phase. He also said that theTaliban were present in Lyari. Shah later saidthe operation had been stopped for 48 hours.

He said the operation was being stoppeddue to the offer to surrender made by Inte-rior Minister Rehman Malik and Sindh ChiefMinister Qaim Ali Shah. “The criminals have48 hours to lay down their arms,” Shah said.However, Criminal Investigation Depart-ment (CID) SSP Chaudhry Aslam said hehad not received any orders to halt the Lyarioperation. “The crackdown on the miscre-ants is currently in progress and today wewill launch fresh incursion into the area,”

Aslam told a private TV channel. Meanwhile,at least two people were killed and severalothers injured in separate incidents of vio-lence in other localities of Karachi on Friday.

According to police, unknown armedmen shot and injured a man in Sector 5Eof New Karachi. In another incident, aman was shot dead in firing by an uniden-tified criminal in Qasba Colony. Therewere reports that a police sub-inspector ofPirabad police station was gunned downby unidentified people at ManghopirRoad. According to police, sub-inspectorGhulam Sibtain was targeted in a well-planned attacked.


Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N)senators on Friday continued disrupting asmooth sailing for the ruling coalition in theUpper House of parliament and boycotted thedebate on president’s address to the joint sit-ting of parliament, calling the prime ministerand his cabinet “unlawful”.

PML-Quaid Secretary General MushahidHussain Sayed warned the treasury and oppo-sition benches against adopting a confronta-tional political path, saying if confrontationwent beyond the red lines, the democraticprocess might see another derailment.

Speaking on a point of order immediatelyafter the Question Hour, PML-N Secretary In-formation Mushahidullah Khan announcedhis party’s decision to stage a walkout and saidthat after the apex court’s decision, there wasno justification for the PM to take part in thedebate on president’s address to parliament.

He contended that following the SC deci-sion, the legal status of the prime minister andhis cabinet had been questioned and thereforethey would not take part in the debate.

Mushahidullah was followed by SyedZafar Ali Shah of the PML-N, who said hisparty legislators had decided not to take partin the debate. Later, the PML-N senators, ledby leader of the opposition Ishaq Dar walkedout from the House. In a desperate move,Leader of the House Senator Jahanagir Badrattempted to urge the PML-N legislators to re-view their decision and not walk out. He, how-ever, expressed disappointment over thenegative attitude of the PML-N senators.

“If the political parties express their lack oftrust on the parliamentary system, this wouldtantamount to be withdrawing from the demo-cratic process. The court did not issue a stayorder against the prime minister,” he argued.

He said that the court had yet to issue adetailed judgment and there was no logic forthe opposition MPs to question the primeminister’s position. He said the parliamentshould continue to work.

Senator Saeed Ghani of the PPP said sincethe Islamabad High Court (IHC) had rejected aplea questioning the prime minister’s function-ing, so there was no logic for the PML-N to stagea walkout. He reminded the PML-N to also re-spect the court verdict of the IHC as they raisedslogans for the independence of judiciary.

Senator Raza Rabbani also urged the PML-N legislators to review their decision of not tak-ing part in the debate on the presidentialaddress to the parliament and said when thepresident had made a speech to the joint sittingof the parliament on March 17, there was nocourt verdict against the prime minister.

“Since there was no decision against theprime minister on March 17, this debate is law-ful,” he said. Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayedurged all political parties to support the demo-cratic process and avoid politics of destabilisa-tion, failing which might jeopardize for entiredemocratic system. Cautioning the political elitesagainst politics of confrontation, Mushahid saidhistory revealed that whenever a ‘one-point’agenda was put forth by opposition parties, theconfrontation reached to a point that the demo-cratic process of the country was derailed.ISLAMABAD

onlinE

Zahid Bukhari, counsel for formerPakistani Ambassador to US Hu-sain Haqqani, concluded his wide-ranging arguments Friday and gavecomprehensive answers to the var-ious facets of memo controversy.

He pleaded the Commissionmust restrict itself to addressing theissue of origins, authenticity andpurpose of the memo. ‘Commissionwas created in environment of hos-tility towards Haqqani, generatedby those who hate PPP governmentand President Zardari’ he added.

He said although the Memofever was over but the Commissionhad digressed by seeking detailsabout the person of HusainHaqqani, who was not on trial.

He also reminded the Commis-sion probing into issues such as ask-ing for details regarding use ofSecret Fund and Haqqani’s terms ofemployment or property details wasextraneous and tantamount to goingbeyond the mandate of the Commis-sion. ’Mansoor Ijaz’s lawyer AkramShaikh made many allegations with-out any proof which were onlymeant for newspapers and have nolegal effect or value,’ he appended.

Clarifying position of HusainHaqqani on the controversy, hesaid he did not need to prove any-thing beyond saying that he hadnothing to do with the memo.

He lamented the burden ofproof had not been met by Man-soor Ijaz, which is why he and hislawyer had resorted to propagandaand falsehoods.

In his detailed argumentsZahid Bukhari cited Qanun-e-Sha-hadat and added the so-called cor-roborative evidence in form ofemails and Blackberry messagescannot be accepted without foren-sics under Qanun-e-Shahadat.

‘There is no email or BBM mes-sage presented by Ijaz that showsHaqqani asked Mansoor Ijaz towrite the memo or deliver it’ heaverred. ‘In his cross-questioning’,continued Bukhari, ‘Mr. Ijaz has ad-mitted that he wrote the memo.’Hence the origin of the memo isfrom Mansoor Ijaz’ he said. He fur-ther elaborated there was no proofof what was said in any phone callmade by Mansoor Ijaz to Haqqani.

He made it clear Haqqani re-ceived more than 800 phone callsin May2011 because of bin Ladenraid so one or two calls fromMansoor Ijaz out of 800are notimportant.

Zahid Bukhari argued beforethe Commission no further au-thenticity of the memo had beenestablished beyond the point thatit was delivered by Mansoor Ijaz.He recalled the language andideas in the memo were similar toideas expressed by Mansoor Ijazin his articles.

shahbaz rejects

2-weekly holidays LAHORE: Punjab Chief Minister ShahbazSharif has rejected the summary suggestingtwo-weekly offs in the province as part ofmeasures to overcome electricity shortage.Shahbaz said until load shedding of gas andelectricity was conducted on an equal basisin all provinces, Punjab would not have twoweekly holidays. He lamented that industriesof Punjab had been badly affected by loadshedding, adding that the provinces must beprovided with the basic right before carryingout any plan to save energy. According tosources, the summary had been forwardedby the Punjab Energy Department. iNP

Malik says Lyari operation halted, Aslam says notg interior minister says operation halted to allow criminals to surrender g ssP says he hasn’t received any such order

Opp, treasury sparring

continues in Senate

KARAcHi: Policemen push their vehicle which broke down during the lyari operation on Friday. oNLiNe

g PMl-n calls prime minister, his cabinet ‘unlawful’ g walks

out of Upper House to protest Gilani’s refusal to quit office

Man’s feet, shinsnailed for changing sect GUJRANWALA : A 30-year-old manwho was a follower of the Ahl-e-Sunnat sectwas abducted and severely tortured after heconverted to the Ahl-e-Tashhee (Shia)school of thought. The incident occurred inthe Aroop Town area of Gujranwala on Fri-day. Qari Zulfiqar, who was a prayer leaderat an Ahl-e-Sunnat Mosque in Aroop Townchanged his faith and became a follower ofthe Ahl-e-Tashhee school of thought re-cently. Adnan, a local, said Zulfiqar was kid-napped around noon from the area and itwas found later that the motorbike he wasriding had been burnt to ashes and his feetand shins had been hammered with nailsand he was left injured close to the Nandipurarea. The Rescue 1122 recovered the manfrom the area and moved him to DHQwhere he was given medical aid. atiF MasooD

haqqani’s counselconcludes argumentsin memo hearing

CONTINUED ON PagE 04


E-paper PakistanToday 5yh May, 2012

Documents

Transcript of E-paper PakistanToday 5yh May, 2012