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Leading News
Ekushey Book
Fair
PM calls for publishing books of new writers
BSS, Dhaka
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Monday called upon the
country's publishers to encourage new and promising
writers by publishing their books along with the
established ones.
"Please nurture and evaluate good literature and writings
properly and encourage the writers with a view to getting
quality books," she told the publishers while inaugurating
the Amar Ekushey Book Fair-2010 at Rabindra Chattar on the
premise of Bangla Academy here Monday afternoon.
Presided over by National Professor and Chairman of Bangla
Academy Kabir Chowdhury, Information and Cultural Affairs
Minister Abul Kalma Azad, State Minister for Cultural
Affairs Adv. Promod Mankin, Owner of University Press
Limited (UPL) Mohiuddin Ahmed and Director General of the
Academy Shamsuzzaman Khan also spoke on the occasion.
Calling upon all to increase reading habit for acquiring
knowledge about various aspects, she said the role of
books is very important to establish a link between
culture and education for the sake of human development
and spread of human interest.
In this context, she said the Amar Ekushey Book Fair can
play an important role to this end as books are not only
an element of education rather a strong toll of
flourishing cultural spirit of a country.
The Prime Minister said her government like the past will
provide all necessary supports to carry forward the
activities of the Bangla Academy to fulfill the hopes and
aspiration of people. "We have to turn the academy into a
proud institution of the nation and for this we need
dedicated workers and researchers," she added.
Sheikh Hasina called upon the researchers and workers to
work in fulfillment of the hopes and aspirations of the
people.
Referring to UNESCO's decision to recognize Ekushey
February as the International Mother Language Day, the
Prime Minister said her present government is working
relentlessly to establish Bangla as an official language
of the United Nations.
Mentioning the role of Bangla Academy, the Prime Minister
said the academy is a glorious institution to flourish the
hundred years of cultural heritage of the country and
Bengali entity of the progressive people.
In this context, she also referred to the contribution of
Bangla Academy in all democratic movements including the
country's War of Liberation. Apart from this, she said the
Bangla Academy during its 54-year journey has published
and translated various important books and played an
important role in the country's cultural arena.
Lauding Bangla Academy for undertaking various programmes
to flourish Bengali culture and heritage, she said her
government would provide all out support to this end.
Later, the Prime Minister opened the Bangla Academy
Language Movement Museum on the academy premises. She also
went round of different stalls erected at the fair venue
and talked to the writers and publishers.
Pakistan
does not want to control Afghanistan: Kayani
AFP, Islamabad
Pakistan's army chief said Monday his country had no
interest in "controlling" Afghanistan, launching a robust
defence of its frequently criticised efforts to combat
extremist groups. In a rare address to foreign media,
General Ashfaq Kayani said peace and stability in its
western neighbour, where US and Nato forces are battling a
Taliban insurgency, were crucial to Pakistan's long-term
interests.
"We want Afghanistan to be our strategic depth, it does
not imply controlling Afghanistan," he said. The term
"strategic depth" is often used to describe Pakistan's
historic policy of propping up sympathetic governments in
Afghanistan, including the Taliban, to counter the
perceived threat from its arch-rival India.
"The way we understand it, if Afghanistan is peaceful,
stable and friendly, we will have our strategic depth
because our western border is secure... no one has been
able to control Afghanistan in that sense in its history."
He said Pakistan had offered to help the United States and
Nato train Afghan security forces, a key plank of the US
exit strategy after more than eight years of war against
the Islamist insurgents in Afghanistan.
"We can't wish for anything for Afghanistan that we don't
wish for ourselves," he said, adding that Pakistan does
not want a "Talibanised" Afghanistan, albeit without
elaborating further.
Pakistan is under US pressure to do more in combating
militants who use its soil to plan attacks in Afghanistan,
as well as fight homegrown extremists.
Kayani defended Pakistan's efforts saying 2,273 of its
military personnel had been killed in offensives since the
nation joined the US "war on terror"after the 2001 attacks
on the United States.
"What the world can do to help Pakistan is have a proper
understanding of our concerns and issues," he said, adding
that while other nations may only have a short-term
interest in Afghanistan, it affected Pakistan's future.
"For me, Afghanistan is my past, my present and my future,
it might not be so for others," he told reporters.
Moudud
demands trial of Fakhruddin, Moeen
TBT Report
BNP standing committee member Barrister Moudud Ahmed said
that the government would have to form a judicial
investigation council to find out real cause behind the
death of collective bargaining agent (CBA) leader BM Bakir
Hossain.
He made the plea while addressing a condolence meeting of
late BM Bakir Hossain organised by Bangladesh Banks
Employees' Federation at the National Press Club on
Monday.
Moudud Ahmed said at least two leaders of party's
associate body's were killed during the one year tenure of
the government due to the enormous physical torture behind
bars. The government will have to form a judicial
investigation council. If it does not form the council
responsibilities of the unnatural death will go on the
government shoulder.
The former law minister said chief adviser of the then
caretaker government Fakhruddin Ahmed, army chief Moeen-u-Ahmed
their close collaborators including Masud Uddin Ahmed will
have to be brought to book as they were the main
responsible for the tragic end of Bakir's life. If the
government does not bring them book for trial, it will
have to carry the total responsibilities behinds these
incidents.
Around 129 people were victim of extra judicial killing
and tortured to death in custody during the one year rule
of the government. Through these killing incidents, record
of violation of human rights has been created in the
country.
7 JCD girl activists held
Protest against PM’s DU
campus visit
UNB, Dhaka
Seven female activists of Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal were
held by police as the student associates of the opposition
BNP Monday staged protest on the Dhaka University campus
against the Prime Minister's visit for inaugurating the
Amar Ekushey Book Fair.
Witnesses said JCD brought out the protest procession at
TSC with their faces covered with black scarf.
"Police intercepted the JCD procession when they tried to
march towards the Bangla Academy and picked up seven JCD
female activists," says a spot account of the incident.
They are JCD student affairs secretary Selina Sultana
Nishita, Sawkat Ara Urmi, JCD worker Sahinur Nargis,
Mousumi Nasrin and JCD Eden College unit activists Poppy
Akhter, Taslima Ferdousi and Fahima Akhter.
On the other side of the divide in the arena of student
politics, pro-government Bangladesh Chhatra League
welcomed Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on the Bangla
Academy premises on the occasion.
Several hundred BCL leaders and activists lined up both
sides of the Bangla Academy road to welcome the Prime
Minister, also the AL president.
They chanted slogans hailing Sheikh Hasina, who opened the
month-long book fair arranged in commemoration of the
language martyrs of 1952.
BNP chief whip Joynal Abdin Farrouk, student affairs
secretary Sahiuddin Chowdhury Anie, Sayeda Asifa Ashrafi
Papiya MP, Shammi Akhter MP and Rasheda Khanam Heera MP
went to Sahbag thana and demanded "immediate" release of
the seven JCD activists.
Dhaka city divided into 7 zones for staggered
business holidays
BSS, Dhaka
The cabinet Monday approved a proposal for dividing the
Dhaka city into seven zones and staggered weekly holidays
for markets, shopping malls and commercial organizations
in those regions.
The cabinet took the decision at the regular weekly
meeting secretariat for resolving the nagging traffic
problem in the city.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina presided over the meeting
while ministers, state ministers in charge of the
ministries, concerned secretaries were present. As per
decision of the cabinet, zone-1 will have holiday on
Friday and half-day holiday on Saturday. Zone-2 will
remain closed on Sunday and half-day on Monday, zone-3
will be fully closed on Thursday and half-day on Friday.
Zone-4 will enjoy full holiday on Tuesday and half-day
holiday on Wednesday. Zone-5 will be closed fully on
Thursday and half-day on Friday. Zone-6 will have holiday
on Sunday and half-day holiday on Monday. In Zone-7,
weekly holiday will be on Wednesday and half-day holiday
on Thursday.
The zones will be constituted in the following order:
Zone-1: Banglabazar, Patuatuli, Farashganj, Shyambazar,
Jurain, Karimullahbag, Postagola, Shyampur, Mirhazirbag,
Dholaierpar, Tipu Sultan Road, Dhupkhola, Gendaria,
Dayaganj, Swamibag, Dholaikhal, Joykalimandir area,
Jatrabari South-West area, Wari, Ahsan Manjil, Lalbag,
Kotwali thana area, Bangshal, Nababpur, Chankharpole and
southern part of Gulisthan.
Zone-2: Rampura, Banasree, Khilgaon, Goran, north-east
part of Malibag, Basabo, Madartek, Mugda, Manda, Sabujbag,
east side of Kamalapur, Maniknagar, Dhalpur, Sayedabad,
Janapath, north- east part of Jatrabari, Demra, Shanir
Akhra, Rayerbag, Sanarparab and Dhania.
Zone-3: Eskatan, Magbazar, Baily Road, Siddeshwari,
Malibag Crossing, Shajahanpur, Shantinagar, Shahidbag,
Shantibag, Fakirapole, Paltan, Motijeel, Tikatuli, Gopibag,
Arambag, Dilkhusha, Kakrail, Bijoynagar, Segun Bagicha,
Topkhana Road, Press Club, High Court Mazar, north part of
Gulisthan, Ramna Park, Suharawardi Udyan, Shishu Park,
Dhaka University area, Eden and New Market.
Zone-4: Hatirpole, Kathalbagan, Manik Mia Avenue,
Rajabazar, Indira road area, Monipuripara, Tejkunipara,
Tejturibazar, Farmgate, part of Tejgaon, Nilkhet, Kataban,
Elephant road, Kalabagan, Sukrabad, Sobhanbag, New
Elephant road, Dhanmondi, Rayerbazar, Hajaribag, Jigatala,
Pilkhana and part of Lalmatia.
Zone-5: Mohammadpur, Adabar, Shyamoli, Gabtali, Mirpur-1
and 2, Mirpur Stadium, Mirpur Zoo area, Mirpur Mazar area,
Technical, Kalyanpur, Asadgate and part of Lalmatia.
Zone-6: Agargaon, Taltala, Sher-e-Bangla Nagar, Sheorapara,
Kazipara, Pallabi, Mirpur 10,11, 12, 13 and 14, Ibrahimpur,
Kachukhet, Kafrul, Mohakhali New and Old DOHS, Kakoli,
Tajgaon Old Airport, Cantonment area, Gulshan-1,
Gulshan-2, Banani, Mohakhali Commercial area, Nakhal para,
Tejgaon Industrial area and Mohakhali bus terminal area.
Zone-7: Madhya Badda, Uttar Badda, Jagannathpur,
Basundhara residential area, Baridhara, Satarkul,
Shahajadpur, Kuratuli, Kuril, Nikul 1 and 2, Khilkhet,
Uttarkhan, Dakkhin Khan, Joar Sahara, Ashkona, Uttara
Model Town and Airport road from Kuril to Tongi Bridge.
The cabinet cancelled a decision of the caretaker
government taken on March 25, 2007 as no treaty was signed
for multi-purpose South Asia sub-regional economic
cooperation.
16
children rescued in Bandarban
UNB, Bandarban
Police rescued 16 indigenous children from a residential
hotel in the town and arrested a human trafficker suspect
on Monday morning.
Acting on a tip off, Sadar thana police raided Habib
Boarding and rescued the kids from a few rooms of the
hotel.
Police arrested Mohan Tripura suspecting his involvement
with the human trafficking.
Police said a group of cheats brought the children in the
town from Tongijhiri of Lama upazila and Betchhrapar of
Bowangchhari upazila in the district in the name of
providing education in a Christian missionary hostel.
The frauds promised the guardians of the children that the
kids would be given free education in the missionary
hostel.
Meanwhile, on January 13, three traffickers were arrested
and 11 indigenous kids rescued in raids in four
residential hotels in the district town.
Local police said an organised gang is active in the
district in trafficking indigenous children in the name of
giving education.
Back Page
President for expanding opportunities for higher studies
UNB, Dhaka
President Zillur Rahman Monday emphasized on increasing
the number of seats for the students at country's
universities with a view to expanding opportunities for
higher studies.
The president made this remark while a three-member
delegation of Khulna University, led by its Vice
chancellor Prof Dr Md. Saifuddin Shah, called on him at
Bangabhaban.
Pro-vice chancellor Prof Dr Purnendu Gain and Treasurer
Fakir Abu Hos-sain were the other delegation members.
During the meeting, Zillur Rahman lauded the authorities
of the Khulna University for keeping it free from session
jam, saying "The other universities could follow the
punctuality of academic management in this university."
Vice chancellor Prof Dr Md. Saifuddin Shah infor-med the
president that the local people extended their
co-operation to the university authorities in maintaining
the congenial and politics free atmosphere on the campus.
"The KU can held all examinations and publish its results
on schedule time because of the session jam free
atmosphere," he said.
The KU delegation invited the president to preside over
its upcoming convocation to be held sometime in mid March.
Secretaries to the president office were present at the
meeting.
AL govt takes the
course of repression: Dr Mosharraf
UNB, Dhaka
BNP front ranking leader Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain on
Monday said the ruling party has taken the course of
killing and repression to stifle the voice of the people
as it is getting isolated from the masses.
He referred to the recent killing of Amirul Islam Mintu,
joint secretary of Dhaka city unit of JASAS, cultural wing
of BNP, who died in police custody.
Addressing a protest rally in front of the Nayapaltan
party office Musharraf squarely blamed the government for
the killing of Mintu. Presided over by JASAS president MA
Malek, the rally was also addressed by BNP leaders Mirza
Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, Barkatullah Bulu MP, Zainul Abdin
Farooque MP, Ruhul Quddus Talukder, M Elias Ali, Khairul
Kabir Khokon, Shahiduddin Chowdhury Anie MP, Jubo Dal
general secretary Syed Moazzem Hossain Alal, Shechha-sebok
Dal president Habib-un-Nabi Khan Sohel and JASAS general
secretary Babul Ahmed.
Mosharraf viewed that the government is getting isolated
from the people as it failed to implement the commitments
made to the people.
The ruling party now aims at re-establishing one party
repressive rule to cling to the power, he added.
Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said the government had
pledged to stop extrajudicial killing when it assumed the
power. Alleging the death of JASAS leader Mintu in police
torture he said no committee has yet been formed to
investigate into his death.
Professional leaders
hold meeting with Khaleda
TBT Report
The leaders of different professional organizations called
on BNP Chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia on Monday night to
discuses different political issues including punishment
transfer of BNP minded officials and employees at
different government and public institutions in the
country.
A good number of professional leaders led by Amar Des
editor Mahmudur Rahman and AZM Zahid leader of Doctor
Association of Bangladesh (DAB) went to meet her Gulshan
office in the capital yesterday.
During the discussion, the leaders informed Begum Khaleda
Zia of different current political issues including
accords signed in New Delhi that are going to be
implemented.
They said the ruling party is engaged in effecting
punishment transfer of the officials and employees who are
involved in BNP politics at different government and
public organizations in the country intentionally.
Cabinet adopts
shokrana reference on execution of Bangabandhu’s killers
UNB, Dhaka
The cabinet Monday adopted shokrana reference hailing the
execution of court verdict on the detained five of the
condemned killers of Father of the Nation Bang-abandhu
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, as the government stated that it
"paved the way for ensuring the rule of law".
LGRD Minister and Awami League general secretary Syed
Ashraful Islam moved the shokrana resolution at the
cabinet meeting held at Bangladesh Secretariat with Prime
Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.
The shokrana reference was read through by Cabinet
Secretary M Abdul Aziz.
"The cabinet expressed satisfaction over the execution of
the killers of the Father of the Nation," said the press
secretary.
In the reference of gratitude the government stated that
the executions rid the nation of the stigma that had
lasted over the years since the August 15, 1975
bloodletting committed by an errant group of military men.
"The historic verdict and its execution will expedite an
end to politics of murder, killing and coup in the
country," says the resolution.
The cabinet meeting also decided to cancel the decision of
the advisory council of the caretaker government taken on
March 25, 2007 as the Multilateral South Asia Sub-regional
Economic Cooperation (SASEC) ICT Agreement was not signed,
Azad said.
10 killed in
road crashes in three districts
UNB, Dhaka
At least ten people were killed and nine others injured in
road accidents in Jhe-nidah, Joypurhat and Bogra,
districts on Monday.
In Jhenidah, three people were killed and three others
injured as a bus rammed into an auto rickshaw at
Gobindapur in Shailakupa upazila this morning.
The dead were identified as Rabiul Islam, 25, Matiar
Rahman, 45, and Akash, 10, of the upazila.
Police and witness said the Dhaka-bound bus rammed into
the auto rickshaw at about 8:am, killing its three
passengers on the spot and inuring three others
critically.
The injured were admitted to the Sadar Hospital where
condition of Rabeya Khatun stated to be critical.
In Joypurhat, three people were killed and four others
injured as a tractor rammed into a van at bordering
Koria-Chorakeshpur in Panchbibi upazila Monday afternoon.
The deceased were identified as van-puller Lokman Hossain
and its two passengers Alal Hossain and Benajul Islam,
hailed from west Kuria village in the upazila. Police said
the accident took place on Panchbibi-Koria road when the
tractor rammed into the van coming from the opposite
direction, leaving Lokman, Alal dead on the spot and
injuring five others.
Of the injured, Benajul died at Sadar Adhunik Hospital in
the afternoon. The other injured were admitted to the same
hospital and local health complex. Among them, Abu Jafar,
was shifted to Bogra Shaheed Ziaur Rahman Medical College
Hospital as his condition deteriorated.
In Bogra, a Dhaka-bound night coach smashed a private car
at Rahbal in Shibganj upazila at about 4:30am, killing
private car passenger Nazmul Haq Babu, 28, on the spot and
injuring two others. Injured car driver Nayan, 26, and
passenger Ejaj Mia, 27, succumbed at Bogra Ziaur Rahman
Medical College Hospital. Police seized both the vehicles.
A case was filed.
In Dinajpur, a rickshaw-puller was killed in a road
accident at T&T road in the district town Monday morning.
Hamidul Islam wins
first gold for Bangladesh
UNB, Dhaka
Hamidul Islam wrote his name in golden letters in the
history of Bangladesh weig-htlifting, clinching the first
gold medal for the country in the 11th South Asian Gam-es
in the 77 Kg weight category on Monday.
Hamidul lifted a total of 257 kgs to present the maiden
gold to Bangladesh on the 3rd day of the competition at
the NSC gymnasium. He lifted 117 kgs in snatch and 140 kgs
in clean and jerk. With the day's feat, Army lifter
Hamidul's five-year-long effort finally succeeded as he
proved his supremacy in the event after winning the silver
medal in Islamabad SAF Games and the bronze in the Colombo
SA Games.
Hamidul, who has been training hard for the last 13
months, lifted 117 kgs in snatch and 140 kgs in clean &
jerk to make the total 257, just two kgs more than his
compatriot Monoranjan Roy. Monoranjan Roy, also from
Bangladesh Army, won the silver medal lifting total 255
kgs -- 120 kgs in snatch and 135 kgs in clean & jerk.
Mohammad Mustafa Karamand of Afghanistan became a distant
third to take the bronze lifting 90 kgs in snatch, 110 kgs
in clean & jerk (total 200 kgs).
Soon after winning the gold, an ecstatic Hamidul said: "'I
don't have words to express my feelings. It is like a
dream come true after a long time. I've been working very
hard to win the gold for the country, not just for me. I'm
happy that I've achieved my target."
Section 144 withdrawn,
business at Ctg footpaths resumes
BSS, Chittagong
After five days, Chittagong Metropolitan Police (CMP) has
withdrawn Section 144 that had been in force in Reazuddin
Bazar and Station Road areas from Monday afternoon paving
the way for resumption of business activities in the
city's important trade hubs.
The withdrawal came following a successful quadrangle
meeting of the CMP authorities, leaders of trade bodies
and hawker organizations and representatives of Chittagong
Mayor A B M Mohiuddin Chowdhury, CMP and meeting sources
said.
The meeting began at 2 pm in the CMP conference room with
Additional CMP Commissioner Abdul Jalil Mondal in the
chair.
As the meeting reached an understanding among the
businessmen and hawkers, the CMP authorities made the
announcement of withdrawing administrative prohibition of
all sorts of gatherings in Reazuddin Bazar and Station
Road areas from Monday afternoon.
Earlier, Mohiuddin Chow-dhury held a series of meetings
with the hawkers and the business leaders which led to
reaching of an amicable solution to the impasse.
The solution resulted in ending temporarily the dispute
and tussles among traders and hawkers of the areas that
brewed over a hot altercation between businessmen and
hawkers in Station Road area on Wednesday night.
The incident led to a fierce clash between two groups the
following day and a large number of small shops of hawkers
were torched while shops of a number of shopping malls
were damaged during the clash.
The business transaction in dozens of markets in the areas
was suspended from last Thursday when the CMP authorities
forced to impose Section 144 to defuse the tension and
halt destruction of properties.
Govt to meet ICAO deadline
on MRP, MRV
UNB, Dhaka
The government is trying hard to issue Machine Readable
Passport (MRP) and Machine Readable Visa (MRV) from April
to meet the deadline set by the International Civil
Aviation Organization (ICAO).
According to the ICAO, all member countries of the
Organization would have to issue MRP and MRV by April 1
this and that all traditional non-MRP passports must be
withdrawn from circulation by 2015.
However, it said, there is no deadline for the validity of
MRPs, nor is there a requirement or deadline established
for countries to issue electronic passports (e-passports).
Talking to UNB, Brig Gen Md Refayet Ullah, director of MRP
and MRV project, the government is trying to issue MRPs
and MRVs by April. Passports having expiry date beyond
April 1 will, however, be acceptable up to 2015, he said.
Official sources said the government may introduce
alternative methods if it could not meet the ICAO deadline
of April 1, 2010.
The Department of Immigration and Passport will issue
notification of award (NOA) shortly as the Prime Minister
has already approved the project.
On November 24 last year, the Home Ministry sent the
project to the cabinet committee on purchase for
evaluation. The purchase committee sent back the project
proposal twice to the Home Ministry for its further
scrutiny and improvement.
On January 12, the cabinet committee on purchase approved
most provisions of the project and finally on January 14
approved in principle the whole project.
Editorial
The spectre of
loadshedding
Although
the winter season is yet to depart and the summer is quite
some time away, the spectre of loadshedding has already
returned and is set to intensify in the days to come. The city
dwellers have been experiencing power outage several times for
the last few days. What remains in the store is quite clear
from the recent remark of the Agriculture Minister that more
power would be supplied to rural areas for ensuring irrigation
even if it causes inconvenience to the urban people. This
clearly signals that dark and dry days are lying ahead for the
city dwellers.
Meanwhile, according to an agency report, as the government
couldn't yet sign any agreement to set up the planned 8 new
rental power plants, farming in the coming irrigation season
runs the risk of a setback for severe power crisis, some
experts apprehend. The overall power shortage may be in the
order of 3,000 megawatts in the peak irrigation season and the
irrigation sector will alone face more than 1000 MW power
shortage. The experts said the power-supply situation would
aggravate this year as no electricity was added to the
national grid in the last one year. Rather more than 500 MW of
electricity was extracted from the national grid as operation
of a number of power plants was closed because of technical
fault. As a result, the power generation went down to 3,600 MW
in January this year from 4,200 MW in October last year. But
now the demand increased by another 500-600 MW within one
year.
The irrigation season starts from February 15 of the year with
farmers starting to cultivate boro paddy on a massive scale
and continuing it till June 15. Farmers need huge electricity
during this period to operate their irrigation pumps for
watering their paddies with a view to producing food. For
irrigation extra electricity is necessary and for this
purpose, country's northern region alone needs additional
1000-MW electricity for the pumps. Taking this likely
necessity in consideration, the government had earlier planned
to set up 8 rental power plants with 530 MW capacity. To this
end contract awards and agreements were supposed to be
completed by November 2009 and the plants were supposed to
come into operation by March 30. But, so far, no progress has
been made in this regard making the prospect for meeting the
demand for extra electricity bleak.
Under these circumstances, it appears that in the coming days
the country is destined to face a severe power crisis which
will cause sufferings to city dwellers, hamper industrial
production and affect the irrigation for agricultural
production as well. Over the last one year the present
government tried in various ways to resolve the power crisis,
but only with little or no positive development. The
government earlier introduced the controversial daylight
saving system through advancing the clock by an hour, but it
yielded no tangible results.
Such measures may contribute to easing the power crisis only
in a limited scale, but effective resolution of the grave
power crisis is possible only through increasing generation of
electricity and arranging additional electricity from every
available source. As the gas crisis is contributing to the
aggravation of power crisis urgent steps should also be taken
to enhance gas extraction and supply to power plants. It goes
without saying that food production is a priority of the state
and so electricity supply must be ensured for irrigation. But
alongside all possible attempts should also be made to ensure
supply of as much electricity as possible to industries and
urban households and enforce loadshedding only in a well
planned way.
All about SSC
exam
Education
Minister Nurul Islam Nahid on Sunday called for taking proper
initiative for ensuring adequate secrecy of the question
papers side by side with security of the examination centers
in the country. In this respect, he stressed the need for
ensuring peaceful atmosphere and copying-free environment in
all the centers of Secondary School Certificate (SSC)
examination. "We will not allow adopting unfair means during
the SSC examination as the government will take a hard-line
against such evil practice inside the examination halls,"
Nahid told a review meeting on the coming SSC examination at
Chittagong.
The education minister's remarks are important specially
because of the fact that leakage of question papers of
different examinations take place frequently and copying is
also a common matter in public examinations now a days. To
make an examination free, credible and effective, maintaining
secrecy of question papers is a must and so the minister has
rightly emphasized on this. It is a fact that copying in
examinations has reduced, but it still takes place at
different examinations. This unfair means in the examination
should be totally stopped at all costs, because those who pass
examinations by copying are rather liability for themselves
and the society. Above all, the ensuing SSC examination should
be held in a secure and peaceful atmosphere and it is the duty
of the government to ensure that.
Analysis
Choose the other road
Zardari has openly challenged the Supreme
Court, the guardian of the Constitution, the defender of all
our liberties. He has betrayed his oath to uphold the
Constitution.
Roedad Khan
In
Pakistan nothing has altered the fortunes of so many people so
suddenly as political power. Here money and power seek each
other. No wonder, the business of politics attracts the scum
of the community and a legion of scoundrels. In the name of
democracy, unspeakable sins are committed. These practitioners
of the art of grand larceny, loot and plunder in broad
daylight, with no fear of accountability, reminiscent of the
situation in the early 19th century in India when highway
robbers, professional dacoits, assassins and the thugs
travelled in gangs in the darkness of the night throughout
Central India. The country was rid of this evil only when
Captain Sleeman hanged over 400 members of this confederacy of
robbers. The people of Hindustan heaved a sigh of relief and
welcomed the Raj. What is distressing is that mega-corruption
has reached the summit of power in this country and is
acquiring an aspect of high respectability and great social
distinction. And with Zardari in the presidency, one doesn't
have to read the tea leaves for a glimpse of our future.
All presidents fall from their honeymoon highs, but no elected
president in history has fallen this far this fast. All
presidents are opposed, of course, and many are disliked; but
few suffer widespread attacks on their personal integrity or
veracity. President Zardari is one of those.
A year after he captured the presidency, Mr Zardari has lost
his "mandate of heaven." His presidency is collapsing all
around us; the wolf is at the door. At a time when leadership
is desperately needed to cope with matters of vital importance
to the very survival of the country, Pakistan is led by a
president who lacks both credibility and integrity. If you
came up with ten words to describe Zardari, integrity and
credibility would not be two of them.
No corrupt authoritarian ruler can afford a free press or an
independent judiciary. No wonder, both are under attack in
this country. Zardari has openly challenged the Supreme Court,
the guardian of the Constitution, the defender of all our
liberties. He has betrayed his oath to uphold the
Constitution. At a time when his fortunes have sunk to their
lowest and his foes picture him as a man consumed by rancour
and determined on revenge, his reluctance to implement the
landmark Supreme Court judgment, and his plan to pack the
superior courts have aroused people's anger and disgust.
It is hard to exaggerate the baleful impact of Zardari's rule:
the oligarchs who have stolen away every asset of any value,
the inflation that has ruined the middle class and the poor,
the corruption that has corroded all values and humiliated
every decent citizen; and the insecurities that have filled
everyone with fear and anxiety. What will become of poor
Pakistan? "What the end will be," Carlyle wrote, "is known to
no mortal; that the end is near all mortals may know." Henry
Adams once wrote that the essence of leadership in the
presidency is "a helm to grasp, a course to steer, a port to
seek." President Zardari grasped the helm more then a year ago
but the country still doesn't know whether he has an inner
compass or a course to steer or a port to seek. It is now
abundantly clear that Zardari is not worthy of the trust
placed in him by his people. He carries a serious baggage,
dogged for years by charges of corruption until they were
abruptly dropped under the NRO. No democrat should come to
power through such an array of backroom machinations, deals
with generals or with Washington. No wonder too many people
reject his political legitimacy.
Today, the nation is clearly at a fork in the road. We can
follow the line of least resistance, turn a blind eye to all
that Zardari is doing and continue to follow the road that has
led us to where we are today. Or we can choose the other road.
We don't need pitchforks and guns. If parliament is unable or
unwilling to respond to public demands and declines to defend
the Constitution and support the Supreme Court, people will,
perforce, take the issue to parliament of man and parliament
of the streets, as they have done in the past.
If people want change, they will have to vote with their
bodies, and keep voting in the streets. A regime like this,
which is defying the Supreme Court, can only be brought down
or changed if enough people vote in the streets. This is what
the regime fears most, because it either has to shoot its
people or quit.
In a recent TV interview, President Zardari associated me with
the "establishment," a curious observation that can be
explained only by Zardari himself. What seems to have aroused
his ire is that in pursuit of my rights as a free citizen of
Pakistan, and no longer constrained by government-service
rules, I have, from time to time, made public expressions of
my concern over the serious charges of corruption that have
been levelled against Zardari, at home and abroad. I also had
the privilege of moving a petition in the Supreme Court
challenging the validity of a deplorable legislation. Not
because I had an animus against any particular person, nor did
I stand to personally gain anything. I did so because, as a
citizen, I felt it my duty to challenge such an iniquity being
imposed on millions of my fellow citizens.
I have publicly denounced the policies of Gen Musharraf in the
print and electronic media when he was at the peak of his
power. I have participated in rallies and demonstrations for
the independence of the media and the restoration of the chief
justice and other deposed judges. Today I can say with great
pride that I was there.
Mr Zardari's statement associating me with the establishment
is, therefore, utterly baseless. I shall continue to exercise
my right of free expression and association, as I have done in
the past. All I want is that justice be done without fear and
favour. Nothing shall deter me from following this course of
action. As the chief prosecutor for the United States at the
Nuremberg trials, Robert Jackson, warned: "Law shall not stop
with the punishment of petty crimes by little people. It must
also reach men who possess themselves of great power." Fiat
justitia ruat coelum. (Let justice be done though the heavens
fall). Heaven won't fall. That is for sure. It will be morning
once again in Pakistan.
I end this article with these profound observations of
Confucius:
"The ruler must be careful about his own virtue. Possessing
the virtue will give him the people. Possessing the people
will give him territory. Possessing the territory will give
him wealth. Possessing the wealth, he will have resources for
his expenditure. Virtue is the root, wealth is its branches.
If the ruler makes the root his secondary object and the
branches his first, he will only anger the people and teach
them dishonesty. Hence, the accumulation of wealth is the way
to disintegrate the people, and the distribution of wealth is
the way to consolidate the people. Likewise, when his words
are not in accord with that which is right, they will come
back to him in the same way, and wealth got by improper means
will leave him by the same road."
The writer is a former federal secretary. Email: roedad@comsats.net.pk,
www.roedadkhan.com
Will the new
strategy work?
Thursday’s conference was a “waste of time”. And offers to
rehabilitate Talib foot soldiers were an infidel “trick”.
Simon Tisdall
If
nothing else, the London conference on Afghanistan
concentrated minds. It defined the parameters of success
and failure. It went some way towards charting a
cooperative path out of the morass after eight years of
often directionless drift. It dangled the prospect of a
longed-for peace. But it provided no answer to the only
question that really matters: will the new strategy work?
The war's western principals have now made clear how they
plan to proceed and roughly how long they think it will
take. The Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, no great
democrat but a great political survivor, completed his
latest rehabilitation. The key regional player, Pakistan,
renewed its pro-western vows just as divorce beckoned.
But Taliban leaders looking down from their Hindu Kush
fastnesses stuck stubbornly to the old script.
"Invading forces" must withdraw before there could be any
talk of talks, they said. Thursday's conference was a
"waste of time". And offers to rehabilitate Talib foot
soldiers were an infidel "trick".
Important things changed in London nonetheless. Karzai's
prominent appeal to Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah,
presumably agreed in advance, for guidance and assistance
for the new peace and reintegration programme was a sharp
move. Potential Saudi leverage over the militants, going
back to the Soviet invasion, is unmatched.
As recent events in Yemen show, the old Saudi posture of
standing back, cashing the West's oil receipts, and
indulging fantasies of an untrammelled, conservative Islam
is no longer affordable. The London message to all parties
- the need to commit - seems to have been heard at last.
Pakistan, too, is back on side after a difficult year of
spillover political and physical insecurity in Islamabad
and widening public rifts with the Obama administration.
Pakistan's relations with Kabul are also much improved.
Islamabad seems to have belatedly recognised that its aim
of curbing Indian influence in Afghanistan is best served
by supporting the western-backed government, especially
given the prospect, post-London, of power-sharing with
Taliban elements friendly to, or schooled by, Pakistan.
Interviewed before the conference, the foreign minister,
Shah Mahmood Qureshi, said Pakistan was ready and able to
mediate any future talks with the Taliban. This increased
engagement by regional countries signals acceptance of the
long-standing British argument that Afghanistan poses
regional problems that require collective, self-generated
regional answers. Iran's decision to boycott the
conference does not necessarily invalidate that assessment
and may in fact reinforce it.
The regional approach, coupled with the current heavy
emphasis on Afghan self-reliance in security matters, a
progressive reconciliation and reintegration process, and
ongoing financial, developmental and institutional
assistance, is the way Britain and the US hope finally,
and in the not too distant future, to extract their
military legions. Like past empires, they have learned the
hard way that nobody wins in Afghanistan. London confirmed
the best they now hope for is an orderly and honourable
retreat, scattering alms as they leave.
Yet to succeed, even this limited, stripped-down objective
must negotiate a string of booby-traps both numerous and
daunting, such as endemic corruption.
Karzai's suggestion that it may be 15 years before
Afghanistan's security forces achieve reliable
self-sufficiency seems more realistic than the more
ambitious transition targets touted by Gordon Brown.
In the regional context, India's refusal or inability to
respond substantively to efforts to reboot its peace
process with Pakistan is deeply troubling for western
policy-makers.
China’s new Silk Road
China is
rediscovering the importance of Central Asia and is hoping
that this could lead to the geopolitical reorganisation of
'Asia' itself.
John Lee
Towards
the end of the Second World War, the godfather of
geopolitics, Nicholas Spykman, offered his famous analysis
that was to become a rule of thumb for many strategists
ever since: Who controls the Rimland rules Eurasia, and
who rules Eurasia controls the destinies of the world. In
this 'Asian Century', Eurasia is dismissed as having lost
its importance after the Cold War. But China is
rediscovering the importance of Central Asia and is hoping
that this could lead to the geopolitical reorganisation of
'Asia' itself.
There are two proud itinerant traditions in Chinese
history that did much to extend the reach of its
civilisation, the trade and tributary system. The first is
the seafaring one best exemplified by Admiral Zheng He's
leading the Ming dynasty's immense Armada of hundreds of
vessels on seven epic voyages that went as far as
Indonesia, India, Africa and even Arabia some 600 years
ago.
The second is China's significant role in the development
of the land-based Old Silk Road which connected East,
South and West Asia with Europe, the Middle East and North
Africa. At its peak, the Silk Road ran for more than
11,000 kilometres and served as an established route for
traders, missionaries and soldiers across Eurasia for over
3,000 years.
China extended its influence in East and Southeast Asia
through its seafaring tradition. After all, it imports
most of its energy needs and over four-fifths of these
sail through the US-patrolled Malacca Straits. But China
remains at a huge disadvantage to its east and southeast
by virtue of its maritime encirclement by the US and its
network of littoral allies and partners. Its great
strategic vulnerability is reliance on energy imports that
are transported by sea.
But although geography is permanent, geo-strategy is not.
China is seeking to change the geostrategic parameters of
the existing game and this is where its second great
tradition the Old Silk Road comes in.
Reshaping geo-strategy
While attention is focused on the naval rivalry simmering
in East and Southeast Asia, China has been using a 'New
Silk Road' strategy that it hopes will reshape
geo-strategy in Asia.
First, it is attempting to build its own 'hub-and spokes'
system in the region. Bear in mind that through the
multi-lateral Shanghai Cooperation Organisation,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Russia
are in practice building strategic, economic and
diplomatic relationships with China.
Second, Old Silk Road routes offer China the prospect of
growing relief from reliance on sea-based energy imports
leaving the Strait of Hormuz and the Malacca Straits. For
example, there are pipelines linking Kazakhstan (with
three per cent of the world's proven oil reserves) to
Chinese refineries. There are gas pipelines stretching
from Turkmenistan through Uzbekistan through Kazakhstan
and Kyrgyzstan and ending in China. There are plans to
develop pipelines from the port of Gwadar in Pakistan,
winding all the way to Xinjiang, China's westernmost
province.
Third, if Central Asia experiences a new economic
renaissance via energy resources, Beijing has plans to be
the future hub between Central Asian states and those in
East and Southeast Asia.
There are inherent limitations to even the best laid
plans. For example, an Afghanistan leaning towards the US
and India would seriously compromise proposed gas
pipelines stretching from Gwadar through Afghanistan and
into Turkmenistan. Even if the Kazakhstan-China pipeline
operates at full capacity, more than half of China's oil
needs will still come from the Middle East.
Even so, as far as China is concerned, broadening the
geostrategic construction of 'Asia' to include Central
Asia makes sense. By creating a second, land-based centre
of strategic importance, it is well placed to dilute the
traditional geostrategic order based on control of the
seas in Asia. Although Beijing still has some distance to
go in realising these plans, current strategists would do
well to re-read their Spykman.
Dr John Lee is the Foreign Policy Fellow at the Centre
for Independent Studies in Sydney and a Visiting Fellow at
the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C.
Viewpoints
Reclaiming Islam
Nearly
two-thirds of Americans say they have little or no knowledge
of Islam. Still, a majority dislikes the faith.
Dr. Nazir Khaja
It
is hardly any surprise that a recently released poll in US
finds that Americans are more than twice as likely to express
prejudice against Muslims than they are against Christians,
Jews or Buddhists. Nearly two-thirds of Americans say they
have little or no knowledge of Islam. Still, a majority
dislikes the faith.
Day after day news regarding Islam and Muslims bring new fears
to the world. The daily episodes of suicide bombers killing
themselves and scores of innocent people have become a staple
of the headline news. Recently in Malaysia churches have been
firebombed allegedly by angry Muslims who have assumed sole
proprietorship of the Arabic word Allah; their violent
objection to the use of the Arabic word for God by the local
Christians in their liturgy is causing tensions and also
headache for the Malaysian government and their judiciary.
From Egypt the news of the killing of Egyptian Copts - one of
the oldest Christian communities going back to St. Mark - by
the Muslims for the usual excuse that we see in similar
episodes of periodic violence against minorities in many
majority Muslim countries, that of desecrating the Qur'an or
insulting Prophet Muhammad. Violent protests in Kenya by
Muslim youth over detention of a fiery preacher from Britain,
riots between Muslims and others in Nigeria over imposition of
Shariah law, is yet another example of how deep the confusion
among Muslims themselves about Islam is. This reflects a
profound lack of confidence among Muslims who having fallen
from ascendancy 200 years back have continued in a downward
spiral without the end in sight. It is being increasingly
argued that Muslims when they are a majority are oppressive to
others and when they are a minority they are troublemakers.
It is no surprise that in the dialectics of history Muslims
and Islam have replaced communism as the arch villain against
which the battle must be won by an increasingly globalized
world community.
The idea that Islamic extremism is rooted in Islamic doctrine
is gaining wide currency among non-Muslims and is a constant
topic of discussion in the news and in blogsphere.
The fear of Islam is being instrumentalized by different
populist parties and "anti-Islamization politics" which are
finding resonance within the silent majority of Western
countries where Muslims have migrated. This fear of Islam and
Muslims is affecting official policies of Western governments.
The growing antipathy to Muslims living in the pluralistic
West is evident from the recent vote against the minarets in
Switzerland and the demand to outlaw the burqa in France,
increased air travel scrutiny between the West and a list of
countries, mainly Muslim. Virtually all media outlets are
discussing whether all Arab Muslims should be profiled.
The binary world view of Muslim masses generated due to many
festering historical political and social causes is the
driving force leading to violence and extremism in the name of
Islam; the Muslim males between ages 17 and 40 seem specially
to be affected by this attitude of "Us vs. Them". This idea of
"Us vs. Them" by no means is the exclusive domain of the
Muslims, but remains a dominant way of how many Muslims
understand this world. Muslim especially the Arab societies
for long have remained closed to outside influences. It is no
surprise that these societies remain least influenced by
liberal and secular values and thus least open to new ideas
and change. Although the "backwardness" or lack of development
of Muslim societies has many historical, political and social
reasons, Islam is easily scapegoated by all - the Muslim
extremists by their violent actions in the name of Islam and
the non-Muslims.
Muslims seem afraid about survival in a secular world; they
are afraid of assimilation. Many see "a radical otherness" to
their own self-understanding in the world they now live in.
From statecraft to aspects of individual daily life, Muslims
must live under the pail of Shariah or Islamic law. All rules
of conduct, transactions and policies are derived directly
from the Qur'an, the example of the Prophet, and interpretive
precedents established by the consensus of recognized
scholars. Most of the Islamic texts on law, penal codes, civil
codes, etc., are based on 14th century law at best - it could
be 11th or 12th century. The word of God quite often needs
explanation. So far, the explanation comes only from a small
group of men who are certainly competent to provide it. The
scholars of Islam, the ulema, who claim the rights to say what
God means are trained in Islamic methodology rooted in the
Qur'an and the Prophet's example codified in Hadith, yet their
interpretive or cognitive deliberations suffer because of a
lack of understanding of the complexities of modernity. Hence
the corporal punishment, the severing of hands for theft, the
stoning of women for violation of marital laws, the law of
apostasy and other legal formulations in the treatment of
minorities, which still are a part of law in many Muslim
countries.
All this points to the fact that the religious law hasn't been
reformed or advanced to bring it into human rights framework
with fresh insights and interpretations of the Shariah. It is
interesting to note that Shariah or Islamic law can be applied
and enforced only in Muslim majority states. Ironically the
control of power in most Muslim states by the rulers, as one
sees now, has not been acquired through any Islamic principle
or Shariah besides being inconsistent with democratic
principles. This has remained a source of persistent unrest
and strife throughout Islam's history.
A major issue adding to the present-day problems of Muslims is
the fact that Shariah or its rules have hardly been formulated
to apply to growing communities of Muslims living as
minorities in different parts of an increasingly secular
world; also the issue of the rights of the minorities living
in Muslim countries needs urgent attention.
It is clear that as a religion formulated during an era of
political ascendancy, the mainstream tradition of Islam is
struggling to find comfortable moorings in an increasingly
globalized world which functions in a secular, pluralistic
framework. To find satisfactory ways of institutionalizing
Islam within their national polities under the guidance of
Shariah but also to make it consistent with the demands of
modernity is a task that has remained largely unattended. The
argument or the fear expressed by Muslims in this regard is
that "God's law or Shariah" would then be subverted to "Human
law". This kind of reasoning has narrowed the range of
allowable discourse within Islam. The ulema and the state
authorities in control of the masses will contend that any
compromise with the absolute truth of the Qur'an will lead to
the slippery slope to unbelief that so many Christians have
taken.
Also part of the confusion is due to the fragmentary and
contested nature of Islamic spiritual authority after the
dismantling of the Caliphate, in which (with the partial
exception of Shiism) no formal priesthood stands between the
individual and a God who reveals himself in texts that are
subject to a wide variety of interpretations. Historically the
concept of Ummah or community has remained fissured on account
of the multiple attachments - to languages, ethnic groups,
nationalities, and sects - which Muslims have among them. All
of these factors have allowed the extremist elements among
Muslims to propagate hatred and act out against those who
reject their narrow and dangerous worldview.
Unquestionably there is now an urgent need for Muslims to look
at the "inclusive" message of the Qur'an, which demands
respect and tolerance for others. The dominant literalist
understanding of the Qur'an through which extremists like of
all other religions make the argument for violence must be
rejected in favor of fresh insights and understanding. Muslims
must raise their voices and demand that Muslim governments and
those in authority act responsibly in bringing about the
necessary changes which will ensure that the understanding and
ruling based on Shariah is consistent with accepted standards
of human rights and civil society. This is also the intent of
the Shariah. It need not be pointed out that Islam itself
encourages balance between Reason and Theology; the process of
Ijtehad - an essential tool in the exercise of reason in
seeking solutions to ongoing problem must now be reactivated
and vigorously pursued. New educational policies and curricula
for schools and also for the imams in control of mosques and
large constituencies of people must lead to new hermeneutics.
The challenge is to work diligently toward narrowing that gap
between the promise of Qur'anic ideals and the reality of the
time. Recasting defense of human dignity and upholding civil
rights in the Qur'anic framework is an urgent requirement.
For an individual Muslim, the challenge remains - to seek a
balance in the struggle between an investment in this life and
a longing for the next. Adhering to and performing the five
"pillars" or duties in Islam must be coupled with the
discharge of higher obligation of doing duty to God by serving
humanity. This they can only do with fresh attitude and
insights into the challenges they face. A broader
understanding of the Qur'anic message without a literalist
orientation, and without fear and coercion is necessary. Islam
can reclaim its position within the world community of
religions only if Muslims would show their capacity to reclaim
Islam for themselves. The Qur'an has the last word on this.
Dr. Nazir Khaja is chairman of Los Angeles-based Islamic
Information Service. He can be contacted at: nazir.khaja@gmail.com
The Iraq
Inquiry: Bending it Like Blair!
Blair is also
insisting that all countries that took part in the
invasion of Iraq, believed in the potential threat they
were confronting and that they "believed they had a sound
legal basis for doing so."
Anand Sagar
The
closure of the military detention center at Guantanamo
Bay, Cuba, is beginning to look like a protracted and
uncertain project for the Obama administration as a host
of political, legal and security concerns limit the
president's options.
Having missed the one-year closure deadline set last
January in an executive order, the administration is
planning to transfer some detainees to a state prison it
hopes to acquire in Illinois. But there appears to be
little mood in Congress to provide the administration with
either the funding for the prison or the authority to
transfer detainees who will be held indefinitely.
At the same time, opposition is building to plans to
transfer a number of detainees, including Khalid Sheikh
Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11,
2001, attacks, to a civilian court in Lower Manhattan for
federal trial. "My hope is that the attorney general and
the president decide to change their mind," New York Mayor
Michael Bloomberg said this week, after having welcomed
the choice of venue in November.
Facing rising local concern about disruption to life in
the city, and with some estimates for security costs
touching $1 billion, Bloomberg said that an alternative
proposal to hold a trial on a military base is a
"reasonably good one." Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., plans
to introduce a bill next week that would prohibit funding
of a federal trial for Mohammed and other Sept. 11
defendants in an effort to force the case into a military
tribunal. An earlier such legislative effort failed, but a
spokesman for Graham said that the senator has been taking
the pulse of his colleagues and that "momentum has been
building."
White House officials said Thursday that President Barack
Obama is committed to federal trials for Mohammed and
other detainees. "The president is committed to seeing
that he's brought to justice," Bill Burton, a White House
spokesman, said onboard Air Force One as Obama flew to
Tampa for the day.
"He agrees with the attorney general's opinion in November
that he and others can be litigated successfully and
(secured) in the United States of America."
PRESSED about whether the White House would continue to
favor a trial in New York, officials said they are not
taking a position on the location. They said the decision
rests with the Justice Department.
Mohammed and about 34 other detainees, who will be
prosecuted in either federal court or military
commissions, are, in some respects, the least of the
challenges facing the administration.
Of the 192 detainees remaining at Guantanamo Bay, nearly
50 are too dangerous to release but are unprosecutable and
should be held under the laws of war, according to
recommendations by a Justice Department-led review of all
detainee cases. The administration also has suspended the
repatriation of any Yemenis cleared for release, a
decision that is based on security concerns in their
country but that could leave as many as 60 Yemenis in
limbo.
Currently, the administration can only move detainees to
the United States for prosecution, repatriate them or
transfer them to a third country for resettlement. That
leaves no clear answer on how to handle detainees held
indefinitely and the Yemenis.
Republicans are flatly opposed to closing the Guantanamo
Bay facility, and some Democrats are unwilling to back the
administration. "I don't think it's appropriate for them
to be held on American soil, so I would oppose both"
funding for the acquisition of the Illinois prison and
authority for the administration to move detainees there,
Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., said in a conference call with
reporters Thursday.
Webb and five other senators, including Joseph Lieberman,
I-Conn., and Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., said in a letter
this week to Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. that the
security risks and price tag of federal trials were too
great. "Holding Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's trial in that
city, and trying other enemy combatants in venues such as
Washington, D.C. and northern Virginia, would
unnecessarily increase the burden of facing those
challenges, including the increased risk of terrorist
attacks," the senators wrote.
THE District's top federal judge said Thursday that his
court can safely handle high-profile terrorism trials but
that the prosecutions would pose a "security burden." The
federal courthouse is three blocks from the US Capitol.
"Ultimately, if the political branches decide the courts
are going to do it, then we're going to do it," Chief US
District Judge Royce C. Lamberth said in an interview.
"We'll work with the marshals and other officials to
ensure we do it safely." He said the security enhancements
would include blocking streets and other undisclosed
screening measures. He said he did not know how much the
stepped-up security would cost.
Lamberth said Justice Department officials have told him
which terrorism suspects they are considering bringing to
trial in the district's federal court, but he declined to
identify them.
Human rights activists acknowledged that Obama appears to
have a dwindling set of choices but suggested that might
lead to decisions Republicans could find even more
unpalatable than closing Guantanamo Bay. "He has no way to
bring them in at the moment unless he prosecutes them,"
said Tom Malinowski, head of the Washington office of
Human Rights Watch.
"The irony, from the point of view of the Republicans, who
have chosen to use this against the president, is that
they are making it more likely that people they consider
to be dangerous are going to be sent home because that
becomes the only conceivable option."
Open letter to Obama
According to The Economist, Obama is "the man who fell to
earth." According to Time magazine Obama's "agenda is on
life support."
Dr Farrukh Saleem
Dear President Obama,
Question
1: Sir, you have doubled the number of American troops in
Afghanistan and, at the same time, given a withdrawal
timeline beginning June 2011. The militants swiftly
adapted and have now begun declining combat. Close to 80
per cent of marine casualties are now from roadside
Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs). How would you now
define American victory when your Afghan opponents are
simply declining combat?
Question 2: Sir, your Plan A is to transfer security
duties to the Afghan National Police (ANP) and the Afghan
National Army (ANA). Officers of ANP continue to fire at
westerners and officers of ANA penetrated FOB Chapman
killing seven CIA officers. What if Plan A fails? Admiral
Mullen does not have a Plan B. General Petraeus does not
have a Plan B and neither does General McCrystal. Do you
have Plan B?
Question 3: Sir, 2010 is election year for America; 435
seats in the House of Representatives, 36 in the Senate
and 38 gubernatorial elections. Your war, therefore, has a
definite political time-line while your opponents have no
time-line. Do you feel that time is on the side of your
opponents?
Question 4: Sir, America wants to maintain stability in
Pakistan and at the same time wants Pakistan to 'do more'.
Aren't those mutually contradictory goals?
Question 5: Sir, Democrats have lost Massachusetts for the
first time in half a century. Sir, what would happen to
your agenda of 'change' if you loose your majority in the
House in November 2010?
Question 6: Sir, the Afghan National Army is 80 per cent
illiterate and America has been unable to recruit from the
Pashtun belt. Sir, ANA, by any standard, is not a national
army. Can the ANA ever be an effective partner?
Question 7: Sir, your opponents in Afghanistan are denying
combat. Your opponents are fighting a war of exhaustion.
Most American causalities are not from combat but from
IEDs. How would the surge help? Wouldn't the surge provide
your opponents with more targets?
Question 8: Sir, the Pakistan Army has deployed two
infantry divisions in Swat. Pakistan Army's XI Corps, with
both its divisions, is in South Waziristan. The
Pakistan-India border is tense and the army is spread too
thin. Who will then take on the Haqqani network?
Question 9: Sir, General McCrystal has a $1.5 billion
special fund to buy Taliban and make them talk. What if
the Taliban, brimming with the sweet smell of victory in
the immediate future, take your money and wait for 2011?
Question 10: Sir, you won on an agenda of 'change'.
Afghanistan has surely changed. In 2007, there were half a
dozen Afghan provinces with shadow Taliban governors. In
2008, there were a dozen and last year 33 of the 34
provinces had shadow Taliban governors. Sir, how would
this war end?
P.S. According to The Economist, Obama is "the man who
fell to earth." According to Time magazine Obama's "agenda
is on life support." Would the real Obama please stand up?
I read somewhere, "sorry, but there is no real Obama.
There never was and there never will be. The ultimate
empty suit?"
The writer is a columnist based in Islamabad. Email:
farrukh15@hotmail.com
International
Zardari fighting
for political survival
Dawn Online
Analysts said that months out of the public eye earned him
the nickname "Bunker President," but Pakistan's Asif Ali
Zardari has made a lively comeback, desperate to drum up
support as challenges mount.
Zardari "is fighting for his political survival,"
international relations professor Mutahir Sheikh told AFP,
as ministers face corruption cases, unrest grips the
nation, and relations with the powerful military falter.
Sporting a towering white turban and vigorously pumping
his arms behind a plate of bullet-proof glass, Zardari in
January toured Punjab province addressing members of his
Pakistan People's Party (PPP) with rousing speeches.
Punctuated with frequent cries of "Long Live Pakistan!"
his tour made television news nearly every day - in
contrast with the first year of his presidency when public
engagements were a rare and sombre affair.
But analysts warn his rabble-rousing could backfire.
"Zardari is doing local and provincial politics instead of
behaving like the nation's president," said retired
general and political analyst Talat Masood, accusing the
president of misreading the public mood. "He is trying to
deflect attention from the problems being faced by the
people who want leaders to deliver.... The country is
facing a plethora of problems, internal and external, as
well as pressure from the Taliban."
Zardari's approval ratings have steadily declined since
the PPP won elections in February 2008 on a wave of
support after the assassination less than two months
earlier of his wife, two-time prime minister Benazir
Bhutto.
Tensions have simmered between Zardari and the army for
months, notably over a US aid package, which has raised
jitters in a nation that only emerged from a long spell of
military rule two years ago.
Apart from this, the Supreme Court overturned a decree
shielding government figures including Zardari from
prosecution, with courts reopening corruption cases
against hundreds of people including ministers.
"Zardari wants to show he can fight," said Hasan Askari, a
visiting professor at Johns Hopkins University.
"He wants to tell the military and the judiciary he will
contest any effort to oust him. But challenges are there
and he will remain under pressure."
Zardari is immune from prosecution while in office, but
his immunity and his eligibility for the presidency can be
challenged.
After the Supreme Court verdict, experts predicted that
such a challenge could happen within days, but so far
there has been little movement, while opposition party the
Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) also remain muted.
Askari said Zardari's opponents may just be biding their
time to see how he weathers the political storm created by
the Supreme Court ruling.
Analysts are divided over Zardari's future. Sheikh
believes the recent publicity blast has had some impact
and weakened the opposition, but others say Zardari has
too many enemies and his time in power is running out.
"I doubt he can survive. He is overwhelmed with problems,"
said Masood.
Sri Lanka says army
officers sacked over security fears
AFP, Colombo
Sri Lanka's president on Monday sacked a dozen senior
military officers whom the defence ministry said were a
"direct threat to national security" after last week's
presidential elections.
President Mahinda Rajapakse had accused the defeated
opposition of planning to assassinate him after he beat
former army general Sarath Fonseka in the bitterly fought
January 26 poll. Security forces kept Fonseka under siege
while election results were announced on Wednesday, and 15
retired officers working at Fonseka's offices were later
arrested by police.
A military source who declined to be named told AFP that
12 top officers were sacked to thwart any attempted coup
by Fonseka's supporters inside the military.
The defence ministry in a statement said an undisclosed
number were "sent on compulsory retirement" because they
were considered a "direct threat to national security".
The ministry said the officers had breached military
discipline by becoming involved in politics.
Rajapakse and Fonseka were close allies in the massive
offensive that finally crushed the separatist Tamil Tigers
in May, but they fell out after the victory and went
head-to-head in the presidential elections. When he
resigned from the military in November and launched his
ill-fated bid to unseat the president, Fonseka accused
Rajapakse of falsely suspecting him of planning a coup.
Rajapakse also carried out a major shake-up of the army
over the weekend, transferring 40 officers and promoting
several considered loyal to his administration.
Fonseka told reporters in Colombo on Monday that he "was
very surprised to know that I had so many loyal people at
the very top and middle level in the army".
He accused Rajapakse of politicising the military and said
his party workers and supporters were still being
harassed.
"Even retired army officers who helped me have been taken
in (to custody), and no one knows where they are being
held," he said.
Fonseka said the government had targeted his office to
prevent his party from collecting evidence to mount a
legal challenge to the election result.
Rajapakse won 58 percent of the vote, trouncing Fonseka,
who got 40 percent, after a contest that many had expected
to be much closer.
Rajapakse called the vote four years into his six-year
term to capitalise on popular support for the defeat of
Tamil rebels that ended a decades-long separatist war. The
government insisted the election was free and fair but the
United States has pressed for a probe into the charges of
vote fraud.
The European Commission too issued a statement calling for
an investigation.
Before polling day, the country's independent election
commissioner had complained about misuse of state
resources for the president's re-election campaign and
bias in the state media.
K.D. Knight, chairman of the Commonwealth observer
mission, said Fonseka would have to find hard evidence of
malpractice to launch any legal challenge to the result.
Filipinos vulnerable to
nuclear attack
Xinhua, Manila
The Philippine government needs to contribute to finding
solutions to global problems such as nuclear disarmament
and non-proliferation, as this will in turn provide better
security for its citizens, a senior diplomat said Monday.
Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo said
that Filipinos are among the world's most vulnerable to
nuclear attack as there are over eight million of them
based in areas where there is proliferation of nuclear
weapons or most probable target of attacks.
"It is our responsibility in government to protect our
people, wherever they may be, and ensure that they feel
secure. With millions of Filipinos abroad, we will strive
to protect them from harm arising from a nuclear incident,
the only way to do this is to curtail the spread of and
totally eliminate nuclear weapons," Romulo said in a
speech delivered at the opening of the two-day workshop on
the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) held here.
"We have a world no longer divided when it comes to ending
the scourge of nuclear weapons. We have the critical mass
to finally be rid of those weapons," Romulo said
The NPT, which took effect in 1970 and was extended
indefinitely in 1995, calls for a review to be held every
five years to assess the operation and implementation of
the treaty.
Among the essential matters of the treaty include the
global pursuit of nuclear disarmament, to prevent the
spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology, to
further the goal of nuclear disarmament and general and
complete disarmament, and to promote cooperation in the
peaceful uses of nuclear energy.
Philippine offers ‘enhanced
autonomy’ to Muslims
AFP, Manila
The Philippines has offered southern Muslim separatists
"enhanced autonomy" in the hope of sealing a peace accord
to end 40 years of rebellion, the government's chief
negotiator said Monday.
Annabelle Abaya said the government hoped the fresh offer
would convince the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) to
sign a peace accord before a new Philippine president is
sworn in on June 30.
"In enhanced autonomy, the president is offering to share
powers," Abaya told reporters.
Power-sharing with the large Muslim minority would cover
such areas as tax collection and the control of natural
resources in areas of the south that Filipino Muslims
claim as their ancestral domain.
The offer was made in Malaysia last week when MILF and
government panels met in Kuala Lumpur in the first formal
peace talks since fighting broke out in 2008 over a failed
draft peace accord.
That earlier draft was struck down by the Supreme Court,
which ruled it unconstitutional.
Abaya stressed that the fresh government offer did not
seek to "fractionalise" the country and would not require
amendments to the constitution.
The MILF, in a statement issued at the weekend, said that
the government "had nothing new to offer", and as a
result, they had decided last week to discontinue the
latest round of negotiations.
However Abaya said after the exchange of draft agreements
that both sides had agreed to consult with their
grassroots back home before continuing talks.
The MILF confirmed that peace talks were to resume in
Kuala Lumpur on February 18.
President Gloria Arroyo opened peace talks with the
12,000-strong MILF in 2001 in an effort to end the bloody
secessionist war on the restive but mineral-rich island of
Mindanao.
But talks collapsed after the Supreme Court ruling in
August 2008. The outlawed proposed deal would have given
the MILF control over large areas of the south that were
claimed by the rebel group.
Over 700,000 people were displaced at the height of the
fighting and nearly 400 were killed. A new ceasefire was
signed in September, paving the way for the resumption of
peace talks.
Killing provokes Kashmir
protests
BBC Online
There have been violent protests in Indian-administered
Kashmir, one day after a 15-year-old boy was killed by a
police tear gas shell.
Protesters clashed with police in the town of Srinagar,
throwing rocks and shouting anti-India slogans.
Huge crowds gathered at the home of the boy before his
body was carried through the town in a funeral procession.
Correspondents say there are frequent clashes between
police and anti-India protesters in the region.
But violence across Indian-administered Kashmir has
declined significantly in recent years, officials say.
Officer suspended
The boy was killed after police fired tear gas shells to
disperse people protesting against Indian rule on Sunday.
One shell hit his head and he later died in hospital.
A senior police official in Srinagar said that the officer
who fired the tear gas on Sunday had been suspended.
"Preliminary investigation suggests that it was a callous
and irresponsible action on the part of the officer,"
Hemant Lohia told the Associated Press news agency.
"Further action will be taken once the investigation is
completed," he said.
Anti-India sentiment runs deep in the Muslim majority
valley.
Both India and Pakistan claim sovereignty over Kashmir and
have fought two wars over it.
US ready to talk over Japan
base row: Pentagon
AFP, Tokyo
The United States is ready to negotiate with Japan in a
months-old row over a US military base, a Pentagon
official said Monday, suggesting a softer stance from
Washington.
US Assistant Secretary of Defense Wallace Gregson said the
administration would not seek an "American-imposed"
solution to the dispute, which has simmered since a
centre-left government took power in Tokyo last year. "Our
plan is based on our alliance relationships, and if we
have to go back to negotiating, we'll go back to
negotiating," he said in a Tokyo speech.
"And it's not negotiating like the United States and the
Soviet Union in the old days of the Cold War. This is less
negotiation than it is collaboration and mutual effort,"
said the retired Marine general. The row centres on a US
Marine Corps air base on Okinawa island which many locals
want closed, citing aircraft noise, pollution, the risk of
accidents and crimes committed by American troops.
Japan's new government has launched a review of a 2006
agreement to move the base from a crowded urban area to a
coastal part of the island. It has said the base may have
to be relocated off Okinawa or even outside Japan.
Last month, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pressed
Japan to "move on" with the original plan, insisting the
base's relocation within Okinawa was "the way forward".
Striking a milder tone, Gregson said: "We certainly
understand the need for the new government to reexamine
that, we are patient on that."
China
tells Tibet envoys no compromise on sovereignty
Reuters, Beijing
Chinese officials told envoys of the Dalai Lama there
would be no compromise on China's control of Tibet and
Communist rule was a boon to the mountain region, state
media said Monday.
The Xinhua news agency report on the talks in China with
envoys from the Tibetan government in exile suggested
little has been accomplished in the latest discussions.
The representatives of the Dalai Lama, exiled from his
homeland since 1959, arrived in China last month after
Beijing laid out a new policy approach that for the first
time includes all Tibetan regions, including those outside
the official Tibetan Autonomous Region. But Du Qinglin,
the Chinese Communist Party official in charge of dealings
with religious and ethnic groups, said his government
would never back down from claiming full sovereignty over
Tibet.
"There is no space at all for any discussion of
sovereignty and territorial issues, and not the slightest
room for any concessions," Du told the envoys, according
to the report.
Beijing has become increasingly irate over the Dalai
Lama's international travels and meetings with foreign
political leaders. He may meet U.S. President Barack Obama
in coming months. Du said that while the Dalai Lama
continued such activities, "there can be no progress in
any contacts or discussions" with the envoys of the exiled
Buddhist leader.
Talks began in 2002 but broke down amid acrimony in 2008.
China says the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Dalai Lama is a
violent separatist. He says he only wants genuine autonomy
for his homeland.
Israel ‘responsible’ on
Iran, Obama adviser says
Reuters, Jerusalem
Israel and the United States are closely conferring about
the Iranian nuclear program, U.S. National Security
Adviser Jim Jones said in an interview published Sunday,
calling Israel's conduct "responsible."
Western governments fear that Iran wants to produce
nuclear weapons but Tehran says the program is for
peaceful purposes. Iran has vowed to respond to any
unilateral Israeli strike over the nuclear program.
The five permanent Security Council members-the United
States, Britain, France, Russia and China-along with
Germany have been negotiating with Iran, but U.S.
officials say drafts of possible sanctions should
circulate among the group soon.
Jones said the United States and Israel are in close
coordination over how to handle Iran. "We have very good
dialogue with Israel, continual dialogue," he told The
Jerusalem Post. "We're working very closely with them."
Asked whether Washington was concerned about Israel trying
to take on its arch-foe alone, Jones said: "Our Israeli
partners are very responsible." Michael Oren, Israel's
envoy to the United States, said last month the military
option "was not a subject of discussion."
U.N. SANCTIONS
The Obama administration is eyeing the possibility of a
fourth round of U.N. Security Council sanctions against
Iran-despite the past misgivings of Russia and China.
Iran rejects Western charges that its nuclear program has
military designs, and has vowed to retaliate with
ballistic missiles for any strikes on its facilities by
Israel, which is assumed to have the Middle East's only
atomic arsenal.
Israel says a nuclear-armed Iran would be a threat to its
existence and points to Iranian President Mahmoud
Ahma-dinejad's calls for the Jewish state to be wiped off
the map. Addressing a Washington think-tank Friday, Jones
envisaged Iran trying to distract from the diplomatic
pressure by ordering proxy attacks from its Islamist
guerrilla allies on the Jewish state's borders.
China accuses US of
arrogance over Taiwan deal
BBC Online
China's state media has accused the United States of
"arrogance" and "double standards" in pursuing arms sales
to Taiwan.
The state-run China Daily and the Global Times also warned
that China's threats of retaliation were real. The Obama
administration approved the $6.4bn arms sale to Taiwan
last week. China has warned of "serious harm" to relations
between the two powers, the suspension of military contact
and sanctions against the firms involved. The US has said
it will go ahead with the sale anyway.
'Cold war thinking'
China's state media said President Barack Obama must have
been "insincere" when he promised not to "contain" China.
The US move "exposes [its] usage of double standards and
hypocrisy on major issues related to China's core
interests," the China Daily said. "Washington's arrogance
also reflects the stark reality of how a nation's
interests could be trampled upon by another," it added.
The Global Times, which is run by the People's Daily, the
Communist Party's propaganda mouthpiece, said: "It's time
the US was made to feel the heat for the continuing arms
sales to Taiwan. "It would be folly to underestimate
Chinese unity over the Taiwan question. Punishing
companies that sell weapons to Taiwan is a move that would
be supported by most Chinese." The People's Daily said in
a commentary that the arms sales showed Washington's "rude
and unreasonable Cold War thinking". "When it comes down
to it, the United States is still drawing lines based on
ideology and coming up with a million ways to stymie
China's development and progress," the paper's overseas
edition said.
One China?
Taiwan has been ruled by a separate government from China
since the end of the civil war in 1949, but China still
considers the island to be part of its territory.
Iran remembers Khomeini
amid political tensions
AFP, Tehran
School bells pealed as trains and ships throughout Iran
sounded their horns on Monday, marking the 1979 return
from exile of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who triggered a
revolution that spawned an Islamic state that is now mired
in a political crisis.
The clamour, at precisely 9:33 am (0603 GMT), mar-ked the
moment that Khomeini's chartered Air France 747 touched
down at Tehran's Mehrabad airport on February 1, 1979.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and other senior Iranian
officials paid homage to the cleric at his golden-domed
mausoleum in southern Tehran.
The celebrations that kic-ked off Monday climax on
February 11, the 31st anniversary of the fall of the
US-backed shah who had ruled the country for nearly four
decades, but who fled two weeks before Khomeini's return.
The charismatic cleric assumed the role of Iran's supreme
leader, which he held until his death in 1989.
During his conservative rule, Iran became embroiled in a
brutal conflict with Saddam Hussein's neighbouring Iraq.
Over a million people were killed on both sides during the
war. Khomeini had also backed Islamist students who
stormed the US emb-assy in Tehran in Nove-mber 1979 and
took its personnel hostage for 444 days, prompting
Washington to sever ties with the Islamic republic.
Khomeini branded the United States as the "Great Satan"
and diplomatic ties were severed.
Relations between Iran and the US have deteriorated
further during the rule of hardliner Ahmadinejad, who was
controversially re-elected last June in a poll the
opposition claims was massively rigged.
Israel disciplines top
officers on white phosphorus
BBC Online
Israel has revealed it has disciplined two top army
officers for using white phosphorus shells during an
attack on a UN compound in Gaza last year.
The admission is contained in the Israeli resp-onse to the
Goldstone rep-ort, which concluded both Israel and Hamas
had committed war crimes.
Details of any punishment given to the pair have not yet
been made clear.
Until now the Israeli army has denied breaking the rules
of engagement over the use of white phosphorus. During the
22-day conflict last year media pictures showed incendiary
shells raining down on a UN compound. The officers' ranks
have been confirmed as a Brigadier-General and a Colonel.
They were named in Israeli media reports as Gaza Division
Commander Brig Gen Eyal Eisenberg and Givati Brigade
Commander Col Ilan Malka.
"Several artillery shells were fired in violation of the
rules of engagement prohibiting use of such artillery near
populated areas," the report says.
The officers were charged with "exceeding their authority"
in ordering the use of the weapons in an attack on 15
January 2009.
'Hush money'
A Hamas spokesman said the disciplinary action was
"further admission of Israel's guilt" over alleged war
crimes.
But he said he did not expect any further action to be
taken against military officers.
He said Israel had paid the UN $10.5 million (£6.6
million) in damages to repair their compounds, which he
called "hush money".
A UN representative who was in the compound in Gaza city
during the attack told the BBC he "expected full
accountability from the Israelis."
Baptists say they were
trying to do good in Haiti
AP/ UNB, Port-Au-Prince
Ten U.S. Baptists arrested trying to take 33 children out
of earthquake-shattered Haiti say they were just trying to
do the right thing, applying Christian principles to save
Haitian children.
Prime Minister Max Bellerive told The Associated Press
Sunday he was outraged by the group's "illegal trafficking
of children" in a country long afflicted by the scourge
and by foreign meddling. But the hard reality on the
ground in this desperately poor country - especially after
the catastrophic Jan. 12 quake - is that some parents
openly attest to their willingness to part with their
children if it will mean a better life. It was a sentiment
expre-ssed by all but one of some 20 Haitian parents
interviewed at a tent camp Sunday that teemed with
children whose toys were hewn from garbage.
"Some parents I know have already given their children to
foreigners," said Adonis Helman, 44. "I've been thinking
how I will choose which one I may give-probably my
youngest."
Haiti's overwhelmed government has halted all adoptions
unless they were in motion before the quake amid fears
that parentless or lost children are more vulnerable than
ever to being seized and sold. Without proper documents
and concerted efforts to track down their parents, they
could be forever separated from family members able and
willing to care for them. Bellerive's personal
authorization is now required for the departure of any
child.
Beyonce is queen of Grammy
Awards
BBC Online
Pop star Beyonce was the big winner at the prestigious
Grammy Awards ceremony in Los Angeles, winning six prizes.
Starting the night with 10 nominations, her awards
included song of the year and best R&B song, both for
Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It).
Twenty-year-old country star Taylor Swift picked up four
prizes, including the coveted album of the year title.
The Black Eyed Peas, Jay-Z and Kings of Leon all picked up
three trophies each, while Lady GaGa and Eminem won two.
Beyonce has set a new record for the most awards won in a
single year by a solo female, and takes her career tally
to 16. Her other awards this year included best
contemporary R&B album, best R&B female vocal for Single
Ladies and best traditional R&B performance for At Last,
which she performed at President Obama's inauguration.
She also won best pop vocal performance for Halo.
Accepting that trophy, she said: "This has been such an
amazing night for me and I'd like to thank the Grammys.
"I'd like to thank my family including my husband, I love
you," she added, referring to rapper Jay-Z.
But she lost out to Tennessee rock band Kings of Leon in
the record of the year category. In a surprise result, the
group's song Use Somebody won that prize, also beating
hits by Lady GaGa, Taylor Swift and The Black Eyed Peas.
The song had also earlier been named best rock song -
triumphing over tracks by heavyweights like Bruce
Springsteen, U2 and Green Day - as well as best rock
performance by a duo or group with vocals.
Michael Jackson's children Paris and Prince accepted a
lifetime achievement award on behalf of the King of Pop,
who died last June. "Daddy was going to perform this
year," 11-year-old Paris told the audience. "He couldn't
perform last year.
Business/Economy
BD offers untapped potential for NRBs for investment
BSS, Dhaka
A Seminar on "Investment Opportu-nities in Bangladesh for
the NRBs: Untapped Potentials" was held at the Bangabandhu
auditorium of Bangladesh Embassy in Washington DC. The
seminar was jointly organized by the Venture Investment
Partners Bangladesh Ltd. (VIPB), the AIMS of Bangladesh
and CMSL Securities Ltd. in collaboration with the
Bangladesh Embassy, according to a message received here
on Monday.
The event was co-hosted by the American Association of
Bangladeshi Engineers and Architects (AABEA), Washington
DC chapter.
Speaking on the occasion, Akramul Qader, Bangladesh
Ambassador to USA informed the audience that pursuing
vigorous diaspora diplomacy is one of the priority areas
of this Embassy. He added that Prime Minister Sheikh
Hasina outlined a vision for making Bangladesh into a
middle- income country by 2021 and channeling foreign
investment is a vital component of that vision.
While urging the NRBs to invest more in their country of
origin, Ambassador Qader narrated the policy incentives of
the new democratic government of Bangladesh. He also
shared his experience about the just-concluded Road Show
held in New York, which generated tremendous interest
among a large number of US companies particularly in the
energy and power sector.
The Ambassador also called upon the non-resident
Bangladeshis (NRBs) to come forward to attain the goal of
making Bangladesh a Digital one by helping materialize the
vision-2021 envisioned by the Prime Minister of
Bangladesh. He assured of all possible support from the
Embassy in Washington, and the Consulates General in New
York and Los Angeles for any initiative from the NRBs.
Dr. Zia Ahmed, Chairman-VIPB, Zahidus Salam Mia (Dipok),
Director the Aims, Hafiz Chowdhury-Director, CSML
Securities Ltd. also spoke on the occasion. In their
presentations, the CEOs of the investment houses briefed
the audience about their companies, the projects
undertaken by them in different areas in Bangladesh and on
the ways the expatriates could invest in Bangladesh in
collaboration with their companies.In his keynote speech,
Dr. Zia elaborated, among others, on how the NRBs could
invest in Bangladesh and there by engage in a win-win
project in Bangladesh. Dr. Zia narrated on how his
projects are helping ordinary farmers and villagers in
different parts of Bangladesh.
Other speakers also enumerated on the potential of
investments in Bangladesh and highlighted unmatched
returns from such investments in Bangladesh. Their
presentations were followed by a lively questions and
answars session.
A large number of expatriate Bangladeshis residing in
greater Washington DC area and the embassy officials were
present at the seminar.
Surging
bank issues drive DSE index over 5400-point mark
BSS, Dhaka
Surging bank issues drove Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE)
general price index over 5400-point mark on Monday,
bringing the bullish trend back after a singled-day break
on Sunday. DSE on Sunday closed lower on profit-taking
selling at the week's opening, but the scenario changed at
Monday's opening with increased number of buying orders
than selling options.
Brokers said the supply side still remained slim mainly
because of dry primary market. The primary market was yet
to see any initial pubic offering (IPO) in the new year.
Two companies, however, is offering bonds and mutual fund
this month. The subscriptions to the ACI Bond started on
Monday. IFIC Bank first mutual fund is coming next week.
Another company, RAK Ceramic will soon offer IPO, using
book-building method for the first time in the country's
capital market.
Brokers expect these would increase supply, but with
little flow compared to the persisting huge demands.
Because of the weak supply side on the primary market,
secondary market has long been witnessing a price spiral,
taking all the major indices to ever high. The DSE index,
turnover and market capital on Monday reach to a new high,
breaking all previous records.
The index recorded a new high of 5451.15 at the day's
closing with the highest- ever single-day transaction of
Taka 1,689 crore. The market capitalization also shot up
to a new record of Taka 2,21,990 crore.
The DSE market update showed banks issues were the driving
force for the surge. Eleven banking issues occupied the
day's top 20 table. GP was also another driving factor as
the issue became 4.83 percent dearer at the day's close
with voluminous transaction.
Investors are buying banks' share, anticipating healthy
dividend in few months time, market sources said. Besides,
bank issues, Beximco Limited, Bextex, Titas Gas, Desco and
Lanka Bangla Finance were also on the top 20 list of DSE.
Process underway to form BD-Bhutan
Chamber
UNB, Dhaka
Steps have been taken to form a new trade body,
Bangladesh-Bhutan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, to
boost trade between the two neighboring countries. Talking
to UNB, Bangladesh-Bhutan Chamber of Commerce and Industry
convener Ejaj Al Qudrat A Majid said they submitted an
application to the Commerce Ministry on Monday seeking the
required Trade Organisation (TO) license.
He said the idea to form a business chamber was first
discussed with the concerned ministers, high officials of
the Bhutanese government and business leaders during Prime
Minister Sheikh Hasina's official visit to Bhutan on
November 6-9 last year. Commerce Minister Faruk Khan was
also in the Bangladesh delegation.
As a follow-up measure, the businessmen linked with import
and export trade with Bhutan took the initiative to form a
joint chamber under the Trade Organisation Ordinance 1961
and the Trade Organisation Rules 1994 to expand trade and
economic activities, increase import and export and
promote joint investment.
"Our business delegation will soon sit with the Commerce
Minister in this regard," Ejaj said.
Bangladesh suffers a trade deficit of around US$ 11.4
million with Bhutan as its current exports to that country
totals only US$0.60 million against imports worth over
US$12 million.
Bangladesh exports small quantities of readymade garments,
chemical products, cosmetics, medicine, dry food, frozen
food and few other items to Bhutan. Its imports from
Bhutan include fruits and vegetables, minerals, chemicals,
prepared foods, wood and wood products, machinery and
mechanical appliances, electrical equipment, and plastic
products. Ejaj, who is also the CEO of Green Aid (foreign
trade and marketing), said that there is a good prospect
of attracting Bhutanese students for higher studies in
Bangladesh.
He also observed that steps could be taken to set up some
joint venture industries of jam, juice and jelly in Bhutan
considering the availability of raw materials and
uninterrupted power supply.
Products of such joint venture industries would be cost
effective and can be brought back to Bangladesh market,
Ejaj said.
More than half of financial
year gone but no PPP policy finalized
UNB, Dhaka
A block allocation of Tk 2,500 crore has been made in the
budget for utilization under public-private partnership
(PPP) projects but none of the money was used during the
first half of the fiscal year to the frustration of the
policy makers.
Nor the government has yet finalized policy to implement
PPP projects, admitted the officials.
The allocation was intended for funding infrastructure
projects in different sectors including power, energy,
roads and tourism in collaboration with private sector. It
came in the wake of keen interest shown by local and
foreign entrepreneurs to invest in infrastructure
development in collaboration of the government as in other
developing countries.
Announcing the PPP fund allocation in the national budget,
Finance Minister AMA Muhith had assured of forming PPP
utilization policy within 3 months. But no policy could be
formed during the last seven months since the budget was
adopted. Muhith recently expressed frustration at the slow
process of PPP policy making.
Relevant officials told UNB that the Finance Ministry
prepared a draft policy which was placed at the cabinet
meeting in September. The cabinet referred it to the Board
of Investment (BoI) for a review and make necessary
changes. BoI now under the Prime Minister's office is
sitting on the policy, without any tangible progress.
"Actually, right at this moment, we've nothing to do but
to wait for the policy to be prepared by the BoI", a
senior official said. He said as soon as the policy is
available, all ministries will be asked to submit projects
for implementation under PPP.
Indian PM warns against
complacency over food security
AFP, New Delhi
Premier Manmohan Singh said Monday that India had been
lulled into a "false sense of security" over its food
reserves, and warned that income and population growth
were pressuring supplies.
At a meeting of top bureaucrats from India's 28 states,
Singh urged a renewed emphasis on the agriculture sector
to bolster production to meet growing demand from India's
billion plus population.
"For some time past, there was, if I may say so, a false
sense of security that availability of food has ceased to
be a concern," said Singh, whose government is under
pressure over spiralling food prices.
"But we have learnt that our growing population and higher
levels of living necessitate augmentation of our food
supplies," he said, calling on state governments to forge
"appropriate strategies" to bolster food production and
tackle shortages.
A weak monsoon pushed up food prices by 19 percent in
2009, putting household budgets under strain. It also hit
sugar output before flooding in key growing areas did
further damage.
As a result, sugar prices have almost doubled in India-the
world's biggest consumer of the commodity-since January
last year.
Myanmar to
privatize port terminals handling business
BSS/Xinhua, Yangon
The Myanmar authorities will privatize some port
terminals' handling business, designating at least three
port terminals in Yangon to be handed over to tender
winning private enterprises for continued and effective
operation, the local weekly Voice reported on Monday.
The three Yangon port terminals, operated by the
government's Transport Ministry before and now covered by
the privatization plan, include Botataung's, Sule's and Bo
Aung Kyaw's as well as some other port areas, the Union of
Myanmar Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry
said.
According to the government's Privatization Commission,
since 2000, two port terminals in Yangon-Asia World's in
Ahlone township and Myanmar International Terminal Thilawa
(MITT) in Kyauktan township have been put into private
run.
The privatization of port terminals in Myanmar would
contribute to the development of sea-borne trade and boost
the country's foreign trade, merchants said.
Obama seeks to create jobs, cut deficit in 2011 budget
AFP, Washington
President Barack Obama will Monday project a record
deficit this year in a 2011 budget featuring billions of
dollars for jobs but program cuts and tax rises on the
rich to tame huge fiscal shortfalls.
The 3.834 trillion dollar budget the White House will
unveil at 10:00 am (1500 GMT) includes a freeze on
non-security discretionary spending, a 100 billion dollar
jobs package and more money for education and homeland
security.
It foresees a record, and higher than expected deficit of
1.556 trillion dollars in 2010, falling to 1.267 billion
dollars in 2011, and abandons a US bid to send men back to
the moon, by ending the Constellation space vehicle
program.
The Obama administration said the 2011 budget is aimed at
dealing with the aftermath of the financial, fiscal,
housing and unemployment crises, and to put the United
States on a path to long-term economic security.
"This budget embodies the president's efforts to deal with
all those situations," said Obama's communications
director Dan Pfeiffer, who said the budget contained
"tough choices" in a bid to curb spending.
The budget will also set the battle lines for the
political debate in the run-up to mid-term congre-ssional
elections in Novem-ber, in which Obama's Democrats, paying
the price for high unemploy-ment, fear heavy losses.
Republicans are trying to brand Obama as a big-spending
liberal, but the administration says new growth figures
last week showing a 5.7 percent expansion in the economy
in the past quarter prove his policies are working.
The administration says that the deficit will stand at
1.267 trillion dollars in 2011, which will represent 8.3
percent of Gross Domestic Product, compared to 10.6
percent of GDP in 2010.
Republicans and some conservative Democrats have raised
the alarm at high government spending, which has swelled
the deficit, and the issue has been a source of
considerable political pressure for Obama.
But some analysts warn it is too early to focus on cutting
deficits and fear the tactic risks slowing the spending
needed to stimulate the economy and generate jobs.
Obama's budget chief Peter Orszag told reporters that the
administration thought it had the balance right, between
spurring recovery and making a start of trimming deficits
which pose a grave long-term economic threat.
China boosts rural spending to reduce wealth gap
AFP, Beijing
China said on Monday it would boost spending to aid
farmers amid rising concern over a growing rural-urban
wealth gap and the potential for corresponding unrest.
Senior officials told reporters the fiscal support would
include increased subsidies to help farmers produce more
crops and also spend more, and making it easier for rural
residents to migrate to urban areas. The government "will
certainly increase by a large margin" investment in the
agricultural sector this year, said Tang Renjian, deputy
director of a top agricultural policy-making body. The
amount of new spending would be unveiled after the session
of the National People's Congress, China's parliament,
which is scheduled to open next month, he said.
Asia is now world's biggest air travel market: IATA
AFP, Singapore
The Asia-Pacific region has overtaken North America as the
world's largest air travel market with 647 million
passengers in 2009, the International Air Transport
Association (IATA) said Monday.
By contrast, 638 million people flew on commercial flights
in North America last year, IATA announced at an aviation
business conference on the eve of the Singapore Airshow
featuring the world's leading aviation industry players.
Within Asia, China has eclipsed Japan over the past decade
as the region's largest domestic market, with 1,400
aircraft compared with Japan's 540 and 5.7 million weekly
seats against 2.6 million in Japan.
The Singapore Airshow is taking place after a harrowing
year in the global aviation industry, which lost an
estimated 11 billion dollars in 2009 as a result of the
financial meltdown that began in the United States.
IATA director general Giovanni Bisignani told the
conference that the Asia-Pacific market would continue to
grow rapidly with an estimated 217 million additional air
passengers a year in the region by 2013.
"While we see dynamism and diversity within the region,
the aspect of Asia-Pacific that excites me most is its
potential," said Bisignani.
National
Cancer claims 1.5 lakh lives,
grasps 2 lakh new people every year
BSS, Dhaka
Cancer claims an estimated 1.5 lakh lives in Bangladesh
every year and most deaths come from preventable cases of
the disease among males and females, experts told a
seminar here on Monday. "Forty to 43 percent of cancers
are preventable in developed world while the percentage
can be much higher in a developing country like
Bangladesh," Prof. Dr Mollah Obaidullah Baqi, president of
Bangladesh Cancer Society (BCS), said to the seminar at
Jatiya Press Club. Bangladesh Cancer Hospital and Welfare
Home and the BCS jointly organized the seminar to mark the
World Cancer Day to be observed in the country and
elsewhere in the world on February 4.
Dr Baqi said Bangladesh has now a burden of eight to 10
lakh of cancer patients, in addition to the growing number
of new cases of more than two lakh every year. He said
four common form of cancers-lung, cervical, breast as well
as oral and larynx- could be prevented through early
detection and timely treatments.
The BCS president said very few people are aware about the
prevention of cancer, a disease which was earlier
considered as deadly and not curable. Things have been
changed, he said, adding delayed marriage and proper birth
spacing can save many female lives from cancer at cervix.
Dr Latifa Shamsuddin, known to be the pioneer in cervical
cancer detection, said the visually inspection by acetic
acid (VIAA) methods for detection of servical cancer among
female should be made available at upazila public
hospitals. She also suggested incorporating VIAA method in
the primary healthcare programmes of the government to
save lives of poor women, who have little knowledge about
it.
Dr M Mostaf Zaman of World Health Organization (WHO) said
the rate of cancer affected people and their deaths in
Bangladesh was very high, mainly because of low literacy,
poor awareness level and poor economic condition. The
tobacco consumption, he said, should be attributed as the
main culprit for cancer, while consumption of sweets
instead of fruits plays vital role to aggravate the
situation. "We must give up traditional culture to gift
sweets to neighbors and relatives on special occasions,"
Dr Zaman said, urging people to consume more fruits than
sweetmeats to prevent cancer.
Tobacco farming in Rajshahi creates concern among the
cereal farmers
BSS,Rajshahi
The tobacco cultivation has appeared in Rajshahi as
contract farming for the first time this season creating a
massive apprehension among the vegetable and other winters
crop farmers and the experts concerned.
After the tomato and potato, the tobacco growing has been
launched at Godagari and Paba upazilas as contract
farming, under which, the farmers were given extra
facilities. Around 500 bigha of land have so far been
brought under the farming.
"Farmers of Kushtia and Rajshahi have initiated the
tobacco farming here in joint collaboration", said Shahin
Ali of Paharpur village under Mirpur upazila of Kushtia.
Shahin Ali got Sohrab, Shibir and Mollah of Baya under
Paba upazila of Rajshahi as partner and cultivated tobacco
on 40 bigha of land at Kodomshahar under Godagari uppazila
of the district. Talking to BSS, Sohrab said the lease
value of land has been enhanced to a double following the
tobacco farming.
He said the tomato and potato farmers are seen thronging
towards the cash crop farming as they are more benefited
with the tobacco outputs. In this regard, he added that
one kilogram of processed tobacco is being sold at Taka
160 to Taka 170 this season.
Two varieties- 26 Ketu and Kurman Shut- are being
cultivated here but the Kurmal shut is golden tobacco and
the cigarette companies normally purchase its leaf.
Farmer Shahin Ali said both leaves and branches of the
plant are sold and it is a six-month crop. He revealed
that the farmers can harvest at least 10 to 12 mounds of
tobacco as yield from per bigha of land by spending Taka
30,000 and fetch Taka 10,000 to Taka 30,000 as proft.
Meanwhile, tobacco data has also been built at the farming
areas for processing purposes. Talking to BSS, the
agriculturists said the cash crop farming would trigger
the farmers' diverting to other professions for their
livelihood. Besides, it would create a bad impact on
normal livelihood and public health of the commoners as
the entire nation is familiar with the Rangpur monga and
other starvation.
Int’l
Mother Language Institute to open Feb 21
BSS, Dhaka
Work on setting up the International Mother Language
Institute (IMLI), remained suspended for the last eight
years, is nearing completion and expected to be opened on
Feb 21, the Language Movement Day and International Mother
Language Day.
An official of the IMLI told BSS here on Monday that Prime
Minister Sheikh Hasina is expected to inaugurate the
newly-built Bhaban of the IMLI at a function in the city
on the day.
Inaugurating the month-long Amar Ekushey Book Fair 2010
here on Monday, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina expressed her
firm optimism that the IMLI would be opened by this month.
The premier said an information reservoir would be set up
at the IMLI where state of development of languages of
different countries and the languages of different regions
of Bangladesh would be stored.
Education Engineering Department under the Ministry of
Education is implementing the project at an estimated cost
of Taka 21.58 crore located in the city's Segunbagicha
area.
Preparations are afoot to inaugurate the IMLI, assistant
director of IMLI Saifa Sultana told the news agency.
When completion, the IMLI will have two auditoriums, an
archive, a language museum, a library, and a car parking
lot in the basement, besides other facilities.
The IMLI sources said work on the IMLI first started in
2001 with an aim of developing Bangla language and other
languages of the world but the project had been suspended
later.
UNESCO had declared February 21 as the International
Mother Language Day on November 17, 1999 in recognition of
the historic achievement of Bangla as the state language.
To uphold the rare honour and pride, the then Awami League
government had decided to establish an International
Mother Language Institute at a cost of Taka 19.50 crore.
Strawberry
farming ushers new hope for economic uplifts in N-region
BSS, Rangpur
Successful farming and excellent production of strawberry
has ushered in a new hope for economic uplift and self-
reliance as cultivation of the aristocrat fruit has been
expanding faster in the country's northern region.
Harvest of the high-priced fruits has already started and
it will continue till April/May next and attractive market
prices have made the farmers happy despite some problems
being faced while marketing the produce.
Strawberry farming got momentum when Bangladesh Strawberry
Association (BSA) launched coordinated strawberry research
and cultivation activities involving various seed farms
sand nurseries in recent years in the region.
Prof Dr Manjur Hossain of the Department of Botany of
Rajshahi University (RU), pioneer of the technology, first
launched strawberry farming using tissue culture method
and the BSA undertook a series of programmes for its
expanded farming.
Under the programmes, strawberry farming became popular in
village Haldharjyote under Sadar upazila of Panchagarh a
couple of years ago paving the way for its expanded
commercial cultivation in the region. Golden Seed Farm (JGSF),
a subsidiary organisation of Jessore Ulshi Himagar,
achieved the success after eight months of undertaking a
strawberry farming programme on 2.7 acres of land in the
village during the past two years.
The JGSF then also launched a Strawberry Nursery Research
Project (SNRP) in the village of Haldharjyote with the
assistances of pioneer of strawberry farming Prof Dr
Manjur Hossain.
Strawberry farming soon gained huge popularity, as its
farming was also successful in the Barind area for the
last few years with tremendous economic prospects that
inspired the farmers to go for its massive cultivation
this season.
The strawberry experts told BSS that the yield rates of
strawberry might be up to 1.5 tonnes per bigha (every 33
decimals) this season, market price of which stands at
around Taka 10-15 lakh on an average. They said that the
trading houses of Agora and Nondon in Dhaka have been
purchasing the produced strawberry at attractive rates
during the past few years and added that the country now
imports 50 tonnes of it annually from Thailand, Australia
and USA.
The field level farmers could sell the produced fruits at
Taka 700 per kg after harvesting about 2,000 kg fruits
from one bigha of land after cultivating at the cost of
Taka 25, 000 to earn up to Taka 10 lakh every season.
Ensuring fundamental rights of
the disabled people stressed
BSS, Rajshahi
Speakers at a seminar here on Sunday afternoon unanimously
called for ensuring fundamental rights of the disabled
people for the sake of their mainstreaming and decent
livelihood. Terming the poverty and disability as
interrelated they underlined the need for creating working
atmosphere for the disadvantaged group people so that they
could derive the scope of becoming self-reliant to cut
dependence on others.
National Grassroots Disabled Organization with assistance
of Disability Rights Fund of America organized the seminar
styled "Implementation of the United Nations Convention on
Rights of Persons with Disabilities: Role of Media" at
Public Library here on Sunday afternoon.
NGDO President Akhter Hossain chaired the discussion while
Chairman and Associate Professor Mosihur Rahman of Mass
Communication Department of Rajshahi University and editor
of the daily Sonali Sangbad Liaqat Ali addressed as the
chief and special guests respectively.
Prof Mosihur stated that the media has a vital role to
play to intensify the rights implementation process of the
disabled persons so that the policy makers could be
influenced in this regard. In this regard, he added that a
collective effort of all concerned including the media
personnel has become essential to attain the cherished
goal of making them capable to manage economic
emancipation.
In his address of welcome, NGDO General Secretary Habibur
Rahman illustrated various aspects of ensuring rights of
the persons with disabilities side by side with
making them free from the vicious cycle of poverty and
begging.
President of Rajshahi Union of Journalists Akbarul Hassan
Millat was the keynote speaker while President of Shaw
Unnayan and Member of Disability Rights Watch Group
Mustafizur Rahman Khan Alam and Human Rights Worker of
Action on Disability and Development (ADD) Abul Kalam Azad
spoke as panel discussants.
11
shops, one house gutted in separate fire incidents in
Bhola
UNB Bhola
At least 11 shops and one dwelling house were gutted in
separate fire incidents in Sadar and Charfashion upazilas
on Saturday night.
Local people said the shops were gutted in a devastating
fire at Hajirhat in Charfashion upazila at dead of night.
They said the fire originated from an electric short
circuit at a readymade garments shop and soon engulfed the
nearby 10 shops.
The affected shop owners claimed that cash and valuables
worth Tk 50 lakh were gutted in the blaze.
In another incident, the dwelling house of Yunus Mia of
Rajapur union in Sadar upazila was burnt to the ground
late at night.
The reason behind the fire could not be known immediately.
Two siblings to go to gallows in
Bogra murder case
UNB, Bogra
A court here on Monday sentenced two people to death
whiles two to life in a murder case.
The condemned convicts are Shahadat Hossain, 55, and his
brother Abdul Khaleq, 50, while the lifers are Bakul, 26,
and Mukul, 23, sons of Shahadat. They all hail from Induil
village in Adamdighi upazila.
The Additional District and Sessions Judge Court-3 also
fined the lifers Tk 50,000 each, in default, to serve
three years more in jail.
According to the prosecution, the convicts hacked their
co-villager Sadek Ali to death on his paddy field on May
21, 2000 over a land dispute.
Later, the victim's son filed a murder case with the
respective police station.
After examining the records and witnesses, Judge Kazi
Shahina Nigar handed down the verdict in a crowed
courtroom in presence of the convicts.
The court, however, acquitted an accused as his guilt was
not proved.
One gets life term for violating
girl in Satkhira
UNB, Satkhira
A tribunal here on Sunday convicted a man and awarded him
life term imprisonment for violating a minor girl in 2008.
The accused was identified as Majibor Rahman, 23, son of
Safikul Islam at Valuka Chandpur village in Sadar upazila.
The tribunal also fined him Tk 5,000, in default to suffer
one year more in jail.
According to the prosecution, in brief, Majibor took a
4-year old girl to his house while she was playing in a
nearby area and violated her on August 24, 2008.
Hearing her shrill cry local people rescued her in a
profusely bleeding condition. Later, victim's father filed
a case with the police. After examining the records and
witnesses Tribunal Judge S M Rezanur Rahman handed down
the
verdict.
Business, civil society leaders
express mixed reaction to city zoning
UNB, Dhaka
Business and civil society leaders on Monday voiced mixed
reaction over the government's decision to divide the city
markets, shopping malls and commercial establishments into
seven zones with staggered weekly holidays for tackling
traffic tailbacks in the capital.
In the wake of worsening traffic congestions that cost
people their valuable man-hours and also upsets
emergencies, the business zoning decision was taken at the
regular meeting of the cabinet held at the Secretariat on
Monday with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.
The apportioning of holidays for the businesspeople on
different days of the week will also have an implication
for load management of in electricity supply to deal with
the nagging power crisis in the country.
Talking to UNB, Bangladesh Dokan Malik Samity (shop-owners
association) president Amir Hossain Khan said they have
earlier suggested the government to introduce staggered
holidays for the shops and shopping centers in the city
with a view to reducing the traffic tailbacks and saving
electricity.
He opined that under the new cabinet decision, there would
be one full-day holiday and one half-day holiday (9 am-2
pm), which is expected to reduce the traffic tailbacks.
Asked whether there would be any negative impact on
business due to holiday staggering, Amir Hossain Khan
said: "I don't think so. The people will gradually become
habituated to do shopping in the markets of their
respective areas."
The first vice president of Federation of Bangladesh
Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI) Abul Kashem
Ahmed said the implementation of the decision would help
to reduce traffic congestion and save electricity.
Traffic congestion hampers the business activities, which
ultimately affects the country's economy, he said, adding:
"The government decision will have a positive impact."
Replying to a query, the FBCCI leader said there would be
no negative impact in the country's businesses.
Holiday-staggering is also taking place in the country's
industrial sector to save electricity, he added.
Badiul Alam Majumder, secretary of Shushashoner Janney
Nagorik (Shujon), came up with a slightly different
opinion that the new decision may be a temporary solution
to the problem. But as a permanent solution to the problem
certain other issues would have to be addressed, he said.
Majumder said: "There are many reasons for traffic jams
like our indiscipline nature, tendency of vehicle drivers
not to abide by the traffic rules, unplanned urbanization
and the overwhelming trend of migration towards the
capital."
He added: "To have a permanent solution, there is a need
to bring changes in our behaviour, decentralization of
administration, planned urbanization and to stop the
migration of rural people towards the city."
Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association
(BGMEA) president Abdus Salam Murshedi welcomed the latest
government decision as a measure to reduce traffic
congestion, but was skeptical about its success.
"It's a good initiative towards reducing the traffic jam,
but it would be difficult to say whether it would bring
success… let's us if the decision could be properly
implemented," he added.
As per the cabinet decision on the zones and weekly
holidays with immediate effect, Friday and Saturday have
been set respectively for full-day and half-day holidays
for Zone-1, Sunday as full holiday and Monday as half
holiday for Zone-2, Thursday and Friday as full and half
holidays respectively for Zone-3.
Tuesday and Wednesday are full and half holidays for
Zone-4, Thursday and Friday will be full and half holidays
for Zone-5, Sunday and Monday fixed as full and half
holidays for Zone-6, and Wednesday and Thursday as full
and half holidays for Zone-7.
The city zoning system and the assigned holidays will be
implemented immediately as per the day's cabinet meeting
decision.
2 siblings awarded life term
imprisonment in Narsingdi
UNB, Narsingdi
A court here on Sunday convicted two siblings and
sentenced them to life term imprisonment in a murder case.
The lifers are Anwar Hossain and his brother Monir Hossain,
sons of Hanif of Majlishpur village in Shibpur upazila.
The court also fined them Tk 5,000 each, in default, to
suffer six months more rigorous imprisonment.
According to the prosecution, small trader Manu Mia of the
village was killed on January 23, 2005 by the siblings
following a previous enmity while he was returning home by
a boat.
Victim's elder brother Suroj Mia filed a case with Shibpur
thana against the two and their father Hanif.
Later, police submitted charge-sheet against the three
accused.
After examining the records and witnesses Additional
District and Sessions Judge Abul Kashem handed down the
verdict acquitting Hanif.
Five members of a family killed in
Ctg fire
BSS, Chittagong
A woman and her four children including one infant were
burnt alive in a fire at their kuccha house at Hathazari
Upazila of the district on Sunday night. All the family
members met their tragic end when they were asleep and
trapped in the fire that engulfed their house from the
adjacent house at around 11.30 pm Sunday night. Officer in
Charge of Hathazari police
Ismail Hossain said the fire was originated from an oven
of the house of Ali Ahmad at around 11:30 pm and then
spread to the neighbouring houses of Md Babul and Md
Shukkur located at Kakakhali village under Gumanmardan
union.
Sports
Bangladesh promises best efforts
against Pakistan
TBT report
With a morale-enhancing victory against Sri Lanka in the
opening match, Bangladesh hockey team is going into its second
match against the gold-favourite Pakistan with a hope of
putting up its best performances today.
Bangladesh, which defeated Sri Lanka 3-1 in its first match,
faces off Pakistan in its second match of the 11th South Asian
Games (SAG) hockey event at Moulana Bhasani National Hockey
Stadium in Dhaka, starting at 3:00pm.
The second string Pakistan hockey team, consists of under-21
players, scored an emphatic 19-0 victory against Nepal in its
first match.
Though Bangladesh set a target of winning a bronze in the
five-team hockey event, it has a distant dream of breaking
into the top two teams of the meet. To meet the highly
ambitious expectation, Bangladesh's match against Pakistan is
a very vital one. Bangladesh must have to beat one of the two
Asian giants - Pakistan and India-to reach the final.
Mohammad Ashiquzzaman suffered a cut in his cheek against Sri
Lanka and he needed four stitches but it would not keep him
down and he is ready to take the field, Bangladesh team
Manager Anvir Adil Khan said on Monday.
"We'll play for a win against Pakistan. Our boys are
determined to fight hard to achieve success. They showed signs
of improvements in their opening match against Sri Lanka.
Though they committed some mistakes we've discussed the weak
points in the team meeting," Khan said.
"We're trying to overcome our flaws. The players held the ball
too much and the passing was slow. Their laxity in front of
the opponents' goal was also another weak point. We should
have scored more goals against Sri Lanka," the team manager
added..
Gerhard Peter Rach, the head coach of the Bangladesh team,
said, "We played well in the first match though we've much to
improve. Bangladesh lost to Sri Lanka in last SAG. Now we beat
them in the first match. It means we're improving."
"However, though Pakistan did not send their national team it
is not going to be an easy task to beat them. Their standards
always have been very high. Our players must show something
extra-special to overcome their challenge," Rach added.
The General Secretary of Bangladesh Hockey Federation (BHF)
Khondoker Jamil Uddin said, "We have come into the Games with
some good preparations. Boys worked hard over the last one
year under the guidance of high profile German coach Gerhard
Peter Rach. They have learnt a lot during their tour in
Europe."
Replying to a query, Jamil said, "Though we have targeted a
bronze in the SAG but it would not be surprising if our boys
go beyond our expectations. If they can learn from their
mistakes they can beat any team. It is difficult but not
improbable."
Bangladesh: Mehrab Hossain Kiron, Zahid Hossain
(Goalkeeper), Mohammad Kamruzzaman, Aasaduzzaman Chandan,
Mohammad Ashiquzzaman, Moshiur Rahman Biplob (Captain),
Mamunur Rahman Chayan, Irfan Haque, Russell Mahmud Jimmy,
Abdus Sajjad John, Sheikh Nannu, Zahidul Islam, Moshiur Rahman
Feroze, Golam Mustafa, Mosharraf Hossain Kuti, Imran Hasan
Pintu, Pushkar Khisha, Taposh Barman.
Pakistan: Mohammad Khurram (Goalkeeper), Wasif Siddique,
Zeeshan Ali, Mohsin Bilal, Aamir Shahzad, Waqas Akbar, Abdul
Qayyum, Abdul Khaliq, Sabtain Raza (Captain), Kashif Javid,
Abdul Ghaffar, Imran Butt, Mohammad Khalid, Zubair Ahmed,
Zeeshan Ali.
Bangladesh
reaches final in women kabaddi
TBT report
Bangladesh women kabaddi team ensured its place in the final
defeating Sri Lanka 34-20 in the 11th South Asian Games (SAG)
at Dhaka Kabaddi Stadium on Monday. Bangladesh earned two
lonas to mark its supremacy in the South Asian meet.
Bangladeshi women team, which won its first match against
Nepal, ensured its participation in the final of the event
that means the Bangladesh women team, which won a bronze in
2006 SAG, confirmed a silver this time.
Bangladesh: Shahnaz Parvin, Maleka Parvin, Fatema Akter,
Kazi Shahin Ara, Farzana Baby, Jony Chakma, Hasna Mariam,
Fatema Akter 2, Raju Ahmed Poly, Doly Shefaly, Rupali Akter,
Sharmin Sultana, Coach: Hakim, Manager: Kamrun Nahar Dana.
Sri Lanka: Dillni Dilha Wirapperu, Dinushi Ma
Hathurusin, Happuhen Fernando, Madushan Ranhote, Manoja Lal
Maddumag, Nilusha Dil Sooriya Pal, Priyatha Skodagoda, Samadhi
A Galagama, Suranga Sh Sumhasingh, Sanath Priyantha (coach),
D. Hettiarachchi (manager).
Pakistan wins over Maldives in
SAG cricket
UNB, Dhaka
Pakistan made a flying start in the South Asian Games T20
cricket with an emphatic 10-wicket win over Maldives in
its opening match at Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium here
on Monday.
Batting first after winning the toss, Maldives were
restricted at 88 for 7 in stipulated 20 overs with opener
Husham Ibrahim scoring 27 runs off 41 balls that included
a six while Hassan Ibrahim made not out 15 off 13 balls
with two fours.
Kamran Hossain captured three wickets for 25 runs.
In reply, Pakistan easily reached their target of 89 runs
in 9.4 overs without loss. Opener Ali Waqas contributed 43
runs off 32 balls with five fours and a six while Umar
Amin hammered 38 runs off 26 balls with six fours.
In the day's other T20 match, Sri Lanka beat Nepal by 64
runs, also in their opening match at the Shaheed
Kamruzzaman Stadium in Rajshahi.
Opting to bat first, Sri Lanka posted 166 runs for 8
wickets in 20 overs.
Chasing a stiff target, Nepal scored 103 runs for 3
wickets in stipulated 20 overs.
Bangladesh beats Nepal 40-18 in handball
UNB, Dhaka
Host Bangladesh beat Nepal 40-18 in the South Asian Games
men's handball at the Handball Stadium here Monday.
The winners led the first half 20-9 and romp through the
play into the victory.
Saiduzzaman of Bangladesh scored the highest eight goals
in the match.
In another handball match at the same venue, India crushed
Sri Lanka by 58-10 goals at the same venue after leading
the first half 28-2. Deepak of India scored maximum 10
goals.
South Africa ready for tough challenge
AFP, Nagpur
Graeme Smith's South Africa open its tour of India today
with a practice match ahead of its bid to dislodge the
hosts as the number one Test nation.
The tourists take on the Indian board president's XI in a
two-day match in Nagpur before the first Test begins at
the new Vidarbha Cricket Association ground on the
outskirts of the city on Saturday.
The two-Test series-the second match will be played at the
Eden Gardens in Kolkata from February 14 -- could be one
of the most important the Proteas have played in recent
years.
The second-ranked South Africa need a 2-0 series win to
displace India from the top. A 1-0 result in favour of the
tourists will leave both teams level on 123 rating points.
South Africa were rattled last week by the resignation of
long-time coach Mickey Arthur over what he said were
differences with Cricket South Africa on the future course
of action.
The entire selection committee, headed by former Test
all-rounder Mike Procter, was also sacked following a 1-1
series draw to England at home.
National high performance coach Corrie van Zyl has taken
over from Arthur for the Indian tour, which includes three
one-day internationals after the Tests.
Skipper Smith was, however, confident the team would
recover from the recent setbacks and perform well in
India.
"It's been an emotional week and not many teams go to
India and win," Smith was quoted as saying in Johannesburg
prior to the team's departure over the weekend.
"The players who have been part of the set-up for a while
have dealt with a few difficult things in recent years and
handled them very well.
"I expect them to be as professional as normal, and I'm
looking to them for responsibility and guidance for the
youth."
Nadal on the slide, Murray on the up
AFP, Paris
Former world number one Rafael Nadal has slipped two
places to fourth in the latest ATP world rankings
published on Monday.
The Spaniard, who pulled out of his quarter-final with
Andy Murray at the Australian Open due to injury, has not
been ranked outside the top three since before his first
French Open victory in 2005.
Britain's Murray lost to Roger Federer in the Melbourne
decider but his run to the final sees him climb a place to
third.
Serbia's Novak Djokovic was beaten by Frenchman Jo-Wilfried
Tsonga in the last eight but he moves up to second, 510
points ahead of Murray. Croatia's Marin Cilic, who reached
his first ever Grand Slam semi-final at Melbourne Park,
makes the top 10 for the first time in his career.
Egypt retains Africa Cup crown
AFP, Luanda
Egypt entered the record books here on Sunday, beating
Ghana 1-0 in the final of the Africa Cup of Nations with
supersub Mohamed 'Gedo' Nagy lifting the Pharaohs to their
third straight title.
Gedo, who has scored from the bench in Egypt's last four
games in Angola, came on in the 63rd minute and produced
his magic with five minutes left on the clock to cement
Egypt's standing as the kings of Africa.
The win also gave Egyptian coach Hassan Shehata a
history-making third championship and extended Egypt's
unbeaten record in the competition to an astonishing 19
games.
Egypt were unchanged from the XI that crushed Algeria 4-0
in the semi-finals save for the absence of suspended
defender Mahmoud Fatalla - former Spurs midfielder Hossam
Ghaly started in his place.
Fears that striker Emad Motaeb may have to miss the final
due to a hamstring strain proved unfounded.
Ghana named an identical line-up to their last four win
over Nigeria, with captain Richard Kingson taking up
residence between the posts despite a late fitness scare.
The Black Stars made it to the final playing pragmatic
rather than beautiful football, but they began in
enterprising fashion, matching the Egyptians for speed and
dexterity.
In-form striker Asamoah Gyan had an early shot go high
over the Pharaoh's crossbar and Serie A-based Kwadwo
Asamoah had a long range effort safely scooped up by Essam
al-Hadary as the supposed 'underdogs' counter attacked
with menace.
Down at the other end Egypt were proving slippery down
their right flank.
On 25 minutes Kingson, clearly feeling his injury, had
Mohamed Zidan's long ranger covered by the far post.
Towards the end of the first period both skipper Ahmed
Hassan, on his 172nd international appearance, and Motaeb,
failed to connect with a floating 25m Egyptian freekick
into the box.
Honours even it was as the sides re-emerged after the
break with the 50,000 capacity Chinese-built stadium by
now three-quarters full and the near 40 degree heat which
greeted the players at kick-off cooling down as night
fell.
Opoku Agyemang went into Mali referee Coulibaly Koman's
book for an ill-judged tackle on Ahmed al-Mohamady and not
to be outdone Egypt's Sayed Moawad picked up a yellow card
seconds later for handball. Koman had his hand in his
pocket again to fish out a card for al-Mohamady after a
collision with Opoku, with Gyan's resulting 28m freekick
edging over the woodwork. Shehata introduced Zamalek
defender Mohamed Abdel Shafi for Moawad on 56 minutes.
The game badly needed a goal but what it got was another
booking, this time Ghaly for pulling Asamoah.
Gyan had al-Hadary at full stretch on the hour but the
keeper needn't have worried as the Rennes forward's shot
curled round to the left of the near-post with the ball
crashing into the side netting.
Ghana's best chance came in the 78th minute when al-Hadary
did well to punch away Gyan's lethal looking 28m freekick
as Ghana's youngsters had Egypt's red shirts on the run.
Unbelievably with the game heading towards extra-time Gedo
conjured up the decisive goal with a sublime 1-2 with
Zidan down the left to slot an angled shot past Kingson.
Henin's return adds spice to women's tennis
AFP, Melbourne
Just as Belgium's Kim Clijsters lit up women's tennis at
the 2009 US Open, countrywoman Justine Henin's return to
the sport did as much to invigorate the game at this
year's Australian Open.
Henin fell at the last hurdle on Saturday when she lost a
thrilling final to Serena Williams 6-4, 3-6, 6-2, but not
before providing the feelgood story of the tournament.
Women's tennis needed Henin to come back in the same way
it needed Clijsters.
In the six Grand Slams played between Henin's retirement
in May 2008 and Clijsters' return before the 2009 US Open,
the Williams sisters were victorious in four.
But with the Belgians' return-even with Clijsters'
disappointing third round exit here-there is a sense that
the field is now wide open and fierce rivalries of the
past will be reignited once again.
That rivalry was in evidence here in the final as a
match-hardened and ultra-competitive Williams took seven
minutes over two hours to see off Henin, playing just her
second tournament since making her comeback.
Williams' victory underlined her claim to greatness-it was
her fifth Australian Open and 12th Grand Slam singles
trophy, equalling fellow American and long-time mentor
Billie Jean King.
She is now only six titles behind Chris Evert and Martina
Navratilova on the all-time list, and seven behind Helen
Wills Moody.
Steffi Graf has 22 titles with Australian Margaret Court
Smith, who presented Williams with the trophy on Saturday,
out in front with 24.
"I don't even think of me as a great, I think of me just
as normal," Williams said.
"I remember when I won eight and I thought it was so
cool-eight Grand Slams! Now I've got 12 and, oh my gosh,
it's so cool."
With Henin back on the scene Williams will find winning
Grand Slams much harder to come by in the future. The
27-year-old Belgian showed that when she gets some
tournaments under her belt she will be one of the few
players able to match the world number one.
"I'll be focused on what I have to improve in the next few
weeks, the next few months," Henin said.
"I've only played two tournaments. The season is still
very long. I want to enjoy every moment I spend on the
court and be very smart about the calendar and everything.
"Winning big tournaments... just get better, get better,
get better."
Grabbing almost as much attention as Williams and Henin
were Chinese semi-finalists Li Na and Zheng Jie, the
"Golden Flowers" who created history when they both
reached the quarter-finals of the same Grand Slam, then
went a step further to reach the final four.
The tennis world was abuzz at the prospect of the world's
most populous nation putting its not inconsiderable
resources into developing players.
"It was good for both players and, of course, I think also
good for China tennis," Li said after pushing Williams in
the semi-finals.
"I think if the children, they saw this time, maybe they
have more confidence. They will think that maybe someday
they can do this also."
Bangladesh reaches semis in men's football
UNB, Dhaka
Bangladesh smartly reached the semifinal of the South
Asian Games men's football beating Bhutan 4-0 in its
second match at Bangabandhu National Stadium here on
Monday.
This was the second successive win for Bangladesh after
beating Nepal by 3-0 goals in their opening match.
In the day's match, promising striker Enamul Haque,
Nasirul Islam Nasir, Mohammad Yousuf and Imtiaz Sultan
Jitu scored one goal each for the winners, who led the
first half 1-0.
Enamul opened the account for Bangladesh in the 42nd
minute with a powerful right-footer from the top of the
D-box taking a pass from Waly Faisal (1-0).
The home side came close to scoring in the 37th minute but
Emily's header from vantage position off a Meshu close
pass returned to play after hitting the cross bar.
In the very next minute, Bangladesh got another scoring
chance, but this time Shakil Ahmed, who stood on the goal
line, failed to push the ball off Enamul pass.
After them lemon break, Nasir pushed the ball home off
Enamul pass in the 50th minute to double the winners'
margin (2-0).
Yousuf scored the third goal for Bangladesh in the 68th
minute with a placing shot from inside the danger zone
capitalizing on a close pass from Mamun (3-0).
Jitu completed the winners' tally scoring from penalty
kick in the 73rd minute (4-0). The referee awarded the
spot kick in favor of Bangladesh as Mamunul Islam's
attempted back volley from the danger zone touched the
hands of a Bhutan defender.
Bangladesh clearly dominated the entire proceedings and
notched their deserving victory while Bhutan was totally
off-color and failed to produce any real attack.
Teams
Bangladesh: Aminul, Nasirul, Waly, Mintu, Rezaul, Meshu,
Yousuf, Enamul (Jitu), Emily (Sabuj), Shakil (Mithun) and
Mamun.
Bhutan: Chimi, Dawa, Karun, Thinley, Nim Sangey, Pema,
Hari, Wangchunk, Kinga, Nawang and Passang.
Referee: Nivon Robesh (Sri Lanka).
Bangladesh earns one silver,
one bronze in Judo
UNB, Dhaka
Bangladesh earned one silver medal and one bronze in the
11th SA Games Judo at the BKSP in Savar Monday.
Mohammad Mamunur Rashid clinched the silver medal in the
men's 100 Kg weight category competing with four other
participants while Farhana Halim grabbed the bronze in the
women's -63 Kg weight category contesting with five
competitors.
Results of the day's event:
Men's 100 Kg : Gold- Zahid Iqbal (Pak), Silver- M
Mamunur Rashid (Ban), Bronze- Rajan Joshi (Nep) and Afgun
Zargul (Afg).
Men's -66 KG : Gold- Aiatulla (Pak), Silver-
Chandana Jayantha Bandara (Sri), Bronze- Krishan Kumar (Ind)
and Zabiullah Nazabi (Afg).
Men's -60 Kg : Gold- Akram Shah (Ind), Silver-
Zafar Iqbal (Pak), Bronze- Madura Milan (Sri) and Mohammad
Reja Abdul Hali (Afg).
Women's -63 Kg : Gold- Lourembam Brojeshori (Ind),
Silver- Fouzia Mumtaz (Pak), Bronze- Farhana Halim (Ban)
and Devu Thapa (Nep).
Women's 52 Kg : Gold- Nighthoujam Chanu (Ind),
Silver- Chamila Dilhani Wijerathna (Sri) and Bronze- Radha
Devi Rai (Nep) and Humaira Ashiq (Pak).
Federer, Serena- undisputed
king and queen
AFP, Melbourne
Roger Federer and Serena Williams reaffirmed themselves as
the undisputed king and queen of tennis as the Australian
Open kicked off the new season, while Chinese players gave
a glimpse of the future.
The opening Grand Slam of the year will also be remembered
for the remarkable return of Justine Henin, who entered as
a wildcard and set pulses racing with her run to the
final. Meanwhile, injuries to some of the world's top
players, including Rafael Nadal and Dinara Safina, once
again reheated the debate over a shorter season.
In the end, the championships belonged to Federer and
Williams, who once again justified their rankings as the
number one players in the world.
The consistent Federer was in the zone as he won his 16th
Grand Slam title, beating a gutsy, and hugely improved,
Andy Murray 6-3, 6-4, 7-6 (13/11) in the final.
It means the British men's Grand Slam drought continues,
74 years after the last win. "I'm over the moon winning
this title again," said Federer. "I played some of the
best tennis in my life over the last two weeks."
At 28, Williams now has 12 Grand Slam titles and said she
has no plans to slow down as she looks to cement her place
among the all-time greats.
"I don't even think of me as a great, I think of me just
as normal," she said after ending the Henin dream, 6-4,
3-6, 6-2, in the final. "I don't see an end now-I feel
like (I'll keep playing) as long as I'm happy and I want
to do it and I enjoy being out there."
The return of former world number one Henin added a
welcome new twist to the women's game and her comeback was
the feel good story of the tournament as she chewed up
three seeds on the way to the final. The Belgian proved
she has lost none of her tenacity or skills.
"I learned a lot of things in the last few weeks," she
said. "Many things were positive in my game, on and off
the court, and I think I really enjoyed every moment of
it." The breakthrough of Chinese players was another theme
running through the tournament, with Li Na and Zheng Jie
both making the semi-finals.
It was an historic achievement that had never been managed
before at Grand Slam level and WTA chief executive Stacey
Allaster acknowledged how important the growth of the game
in China was to the future of women's tennis.
"It is very significant," she said of China. "Building the
business in China is critically important." While Li and
Zheng's star was shining, others were fading.
Maria Sharapova, the 2008 champion, crashed out in the
first round with other early casualties including Serbian
pair, Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic.
Injuries came back to haunt several players with world
number two Nadal forced to retire from his quarter-final
with Murray with a hamstring-related injury. Similarly,
women's world number two Safina was forced out in the
fourth round with a recurrence of back problems. The
shattered Russian described her latest injury setback as
"really, really terrible," with her immediate career in
limbo.
Andy Roddick, Lleyton Hewitt and Novak Djokovic were
others to leave the tournament with injuries or health
issues. Djokovic said the leading players were united in
their push for a shorter season, to allow their bodies
time to heal.
"That is the highest priority, because players feel like
the season is just too long," he said. While Melbourne's
traditional January heat did not compromise the schedule,
rain did in the first few days. But overall organisers
were happy, with plans announced for a major redevelopment
of Melbourne Park to ensure the Grand Slam stays in
Australia, with cities like Shanghai and Doha keen to get
their hands on the tournament. The only black mark was the
return of hooligans on the opening day, with 11 people
thrown out for unruly behaviour and another group banned
from entering.
Bangladesh cyclists add
black chapter in sports
UNB, Dhaka
India clinched its third cycling gold in the 11th SA Games
in the women's 50 kilometers Road Race Mass Start as
Mahita Mohan covered the distance clocking 1:25.42 hours
on the 3rd day on Monday. Sri Lankan cyclist Lasanthi
Krishna bagged the silver with timing of 1:28.34 hours
while another Indian Rameswari Devi took the bronze
clocking 1:28.35 hours.
It was, however, a very shameful day for Bangladesh sports
as two local cyclists were disqualified from the event due
to intentional defaults.
Bangladesh cyclist Farhana Sultana Sheila was declared
gold medalist in the event earlier, but later she was
disqualified because of not taking the necessary "U-Turn"
point.
Another Bangladeshi cyclist Fatema Chingby Marma was also
disqualified for the event in a shameful way as she has
been pushed by a motor cycle rider from behind. Earlier,
Indian men's team won the gold medal in 80-kilometer Road
Team Time Trial with a timing of 1:44.11.81 hours on
Sunday. India also lifted the cycling gold medal of the
women's 30-kilometer Road Team Time Trial race with a
timing of 44:22.15 minutes on Saturday.
Bangladesh took its lone medal, a bronze, in cycling in
the men's 80 km Road Team Time Trial taking 1:46.44.11
hours to cover the distance on Sunday.
Egyptians dance in streets after
triumph
AFP, Cairo
Cairo erupted with joy on Sunday after the national
football team's 1-0 triumph over Ghana in the Africa Cup
of Nations final that secured Egypt's third successive
championship on the continent.
A huge roar rose over the teeming Egyptian capital as
national hero Mohammed "Gedo" Nagy scored in the 85th
minute, clinching victory for the Pharaohs in the final
played in the Angolan capital.
Dancing and drumming broke out in the streets-from Giza in
the south to Nasr City in the north-as delirious Egyptians
rushed out onto the streets from homes and cafes, draped
in the national flag and setting off bangers.
"Egypt, Egypt!" cried dozens of fans as they darted
between cars in the Dokki district, blocking traffic.
"It was a bit of a crazy game! I can't express how happy I
am," cried Hisham, an overwhelmed young man in the Maadi
district. Hani, a 35-year-old resident of Heliopolis, said
it was "a footballing miracle!"
Amid patriotic music on television stations, President
Hosni Mubarak sent personal congratulations to the team
which remain champions of Africa despite the
disappointment of not reaching the World Cup finals in
South Africa.
Egypt's victory in the Africa Cup of Nations was the
country's seventh and also took the Pharaohs into the
record books as it was their third win of the title in a
row.
The joy was shared by thousands of Palestinians in the
neighbouring Gaza Strip, where cars took to the streets of
Gaza City blowing their horns accompanied by cries of
"Egypt, Egypt!"
Supporters waved Egyptian and Palestinian flags as police
of the Islamist movement Hamas which controls the
territory looked on.
Afridi apologises in
ball-tampering row
AFP, Karachi
Pakistan's
star all-rounder Shahid Afridi apologised on Sunday after
being caught biting the ball in the final one-dayer
against Australia, a bizarre episode which cost him a
two-match ban. The 29-year-old Afridi, leading the team in
the absence of rested captain Mohammad Yousuf, was caught
by television cameras chewing on one side of the ball
while walking with bowler Rana Naved-ul-Hasan in the fifth
and final match at the WACA in Perth.
Under International Cricket Council rules any attempt to
change the condition of the ball through illegal means is
a violation of the players' code of conduct and is liable
to punishment.
The on-field and third umpires reported the incident to
match referee Ranjan Madugalle who conducted separate
hearings with team manager Abdur Raqeeb and Afridi before
handing the player a two-match international Twenty 20
ban. Afridi pleaded guilty and told AFP from Perth he was
ashamed of the mistake.
"I am ashamed. I did it in the heat of the moment as the
match was a close one, but I should not have done that,
it's a serious offence," Afridi said.
"I apologise to all and everyone involved in the match and
to the fans around the world. This will never happen
again." Pakistan lost Sunday's match by two wickets for a
5-0 cleansweep, only their second such whitewash in
one-day history.
The ban means Afridi, who is Pakistan's captain in the
shortest format, will miss the February 5 Twenty20 match
against Australia in Melbourne and also the first of two
Twenty20 games against England in Dubai on February 18.
The dashing allrounder was banned for four one-day matches
after he tried to hit a spectator during a match in South
Africa in 2007.
He was also banned for a Test and two one-day
internationals for deliberately damaging the pitch in the
second Test against England at Faisalabad in 2005. "Being
the captain I should have been a role model for my players
which I was not but I hope I will be forgiven," added
Afridi. The International Cricket Council confirmed that
Afridi had received two suspension points after breaching
the ICC Code of Conduct during the game. Two suspension
points in the code means a ban of a Test, two ODIs or two
T20Is. Match referee Ranjan Madugalle handed Afridi the
maximum penalty under the provision of the code.
"I imposed the maximum penalty under the code to Shahid
and reminded him of his responsibilities as a national
captain which is to ensure that the match is played
according to the laws of the game and in the spirit in
which it is intended to be played," said Madugalle. "Shahid,
when pleading guilty, apologised and regretted his
actions."
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