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Leading News
PM launches MRP, MRV
Country's passport system to int'l standard
UNB, Dhaka
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Wednesday launched the
long-awaited Machine Readable Passport (MRP) and Machine
Readable Visa (MRV) elevating the country's passport and
visa system to international standard.
"Introduction of MRP and MRV would put an end to tampering
of passport and visa and harassment particularly faced by
the innocent expatriate Bangladeshi workers," she said
while inaugurating the launching of the MRP and MRV at a
function at the Osmani Memorial Hall.
The Prime Minister said the MRP and MRV would also play a
role in checking drugs and arms smugglers as well as
militant and terrorist activities.
"No more handwritten passport… Today we entered the
digital era with the introduction of MRP and MRV," an
upbeat Hasina told the function.
In March 2009, the present government approved the
Introduction of Machine Readable Passport (MRP) and
Machine Readable Visa (MRV) project at a cost of Tk 526
crore.
Hasina said the five-year project is progressing fast and
on completion of the project, the MRP and MRV activities
would not end as it is a continuing process. With the
introduction of the MRP and MRV, she said one will not be
able to use double passports. Data and statistics of the
Bangladeshi travelers, who will leave the country or who
will enter the country from abroad, will be preserved.
Home Minister Sahara Khatun first handed over the Prime
Minister's MRP to her. Later, the Prime Minister handed
over 14 MRPs to 14 people, including ministers, teacher,
journalists, student and labourer. Those who received the
MRPs from the Prime Minister include: Deputy Leader in
Parliament Syeda Sajeda Chowdhury, Finance Minister AMA
Muhith, Planning Minister AK Khandaker, Army Chief General
M Abdul Mubeen, Attorney General Mahbubey Alam, DU
vice-chancellor Prof AAMS Arefin Siddique, RAB DG Hasan
Mahmud Khandaker, FBCCI president Annisul Huq, Samakal
Editor Golam Sarwar and BSS Editor Ehsanul Karim.
The Prime Minister informed that nineteen new regional
passport offices will be set up in the country in addition
to the existing 15 regional passport offices.
Regional passport offices will be established in phase in
each district to reach the MRP and MRV to the doorstep of
the people, she said.
Hasina said necessary equipment and manpower will be in
place at Bangladesh missions abroad to issue MRP and MRV
for Bangladeshis living in foreign countries. She asked
the Foreign Minister and the Home Minister to take
necessary actions in this respect.
Home Minister Sahara Khatun, State Minister for Home
Shamsul Huq Tuku, Director General of Passport and
Immigration Abdul Mabud, MRP/MRV Project Director Brig Gen
Rafeyet Ullah and chairman of Iris Corporation, Malaysia
Tan Sri Razali Ismail also spoke at the function.
Amar
Desh shut down, acting editor sent to jail
UNB, Dhaka
The metropolitan magistrate court Wednesday rejected the
petition for police remand of Mahmudur Rahman, acting
editor of daily Amar Desh, asking the police to
interrogate him at the jail gate.
Arrested from his office at the wee hours Wednesday in two
cases, Rahman was sent to jail in the Tejgaon Shilpanchal
police case that accused him of assaulting and obstructing
them to perform their duty.
Police raided the Amar Desh office at Karwan bazaar at
about 11 pm Tuesday and kept it under seize till he was
taken into custody early in the morning. Simultaneously,
the press of the daily at Tejgaon was sealed on government
order canceling the declaration of Amar Desh.
The court granted him bail in the fraud case filed Tuesday
afternoon by Hashmat Ali, publisher of Amar Desh
Publications Limited.
Police produced Mahmudur Rahman before the court of
Magistrate Nazrul Islam at 4-30 pm and sought for five-day
remand.
A host of lawyers stood for him in the court with bail
petitions when BNP supporters agitated in the court
premises demanding release of Mahmudur Rahman as he was
taken to the court.
They chanted slogans against the government and also
demanded immediate withdrawal of ban on publication of
Amar Desh.
Meanwhile, Different organizations across the country on
Wednesday denounced the cancellation of the declaration of
daily Amar Desh and called upon the government to withdraw
the cancellation order immediately.
In separate press releases, the organizations also
expressed deep concern over the incident through which
journalists lost their jobs due to cancellation of the
declaration and shut down of the Daily Amar Desh.
They called upon the concerned authoritiesw to withdraw
the cancellation order and take initiatives to solve the
unemployment problem of the journalists immediately.
The organizations are National Press Club, Bangladesh
Federal Journalists Union (BFUJ), Dhaka Union of
Journalists (DUJ), Dhaka Reporters Unity (DRU),
Revolutionary Workers Party of Bangladesh (RWPB), Tangail
Press Club, Jatiya Gonotantrik Front, and Bangladesh
Nationalist Party German Branch.
Begunbari
building collapse
22 bodies recovered, army in rescue operation
UNB, Dhaka
With the recovery of two more bodies on Wednesday night
from the rubble of a five-storey building that collapsed
Tuesday night in the capital's Begunbari, the death toll
rose to 22.
Rescuers recovered the bodies of Shaon aged 2 and his
three-month old brother Falaina. The victims' father
Alamgir Hossain said his wife Anwara Begum and daughter
Asia were still missing.
The army, police and fire brigade personnel continued
rescue operations till Wednesday night.
However, Dhaka District Administration officials earlier
said they have information of deaths of 18 people.
Fire Brigade officials said they have recovered 20 dead
bodies so far, including four minors.
Meanwhile, State Minister for Housing and Publics works
Advocate Abdul Mannan Khan visited the spot and inquired
about the rescue activities around noon Wednesday.
Talking to reporters the State Minister said the building
was constructed without maintaining the building code.
Besides, it was under the Hatirjheel project. But the
building could not be demolished due to a court
injunction.
Army, police and fire brigade personnel continued the
salvage operation as local people feared that the death
toll might go further up.
About 100 members of Bangladesh Army, including one
platoon from 16 Engineer Construction Battalion (ECB) and
one platoon from 2 Engineer Battalion, were engaged in
rescue operation at the collapsed 5-storey building at
South Begunbari from Tuesday midnight.
Twenty bodies were recovered and several injured persons
rescued from the debris of the collapsed building till
Wednesday evening.
Principal Staff Officer of Armed Forces Division Lt Gen
Abdul Wadud visited the spot today (Wednesday).
Petrobangla moves to
raise CNG price to Tk 25 per unit
UNB, Dhaka
Despite the Prime Minister's negative instruction, the
state-owned Petrobangla has moved to raise the price of
compressed natural gas (CNG) to Tk 25 per unit (one cubic
metre) from the present rate of Tk 16.75.
According to official sources, as instructed by
Petrobangla, Rupantarita Prakritik Gas Company Limited (RPGCL),
submitted a proposal on CNG price hike to its mother
organisation.
"Now, Petrobangla is scrutinizing the pros and cons of the
proposal," said one senior official of the principal
organisation in the energy sector. The proposal will be
finally placed before the Bangladesh Energy Regulatory
Commission (BERC) for approval, he said, adding that if
the BERC approves the proposal, there will be 49.25
percent increase on the current CNG price.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, while holding a meeting with
the senior officials of Power and Energy Ministry in April
this year, outright rejected a proposal from the Energy
Ministry to raise the CNG price.
At that time, the Prime Minister asked the officials to
drop the plan for time being.
But within two months of the PM's instruction, Petrobangla
again took a move and asked its subsidiary RPGCL to send a
proposal to raise the CNG price.
Sources said the main target of the proposal is to contain
the growth of CNG-run private vehicles in the city that
has been experiencing severe traffic congestion.
Petrobangla Chairman Prof Hossain Mansur, however, said
the matter is still in the "thinking stage" and the final
decision will be made by the BERC.
About the Prime Minister's instruction, he said: "Nothing
will happen beyond her directives. But there should be a
balance between the price of CNG and liquid fuel."
The price of CNG was last raised to Tk 16.75 from Tk 8.50
per unit by the caretaker government in April 2008. The
hike was almost 100 percent.
23 killed in
road crashes
UNB, Bagerhat
At least 16 people were killed and another 50 injured in a
tragic road accident in Madrassah Ghat area of Mollahat
upazila here on Dhaka-Maowa highway early Wednesday.
Two of the deceased were identified as Mozaffar Hossain,
35, of Koyla village and Arifa Akhter Anny, 8, of
Gobindapur village in the upazila. The identity of other
deceased could not be known immediately. The rescuers
feared that the death toll might go up.
UNB from Sirajganj says, Two people were killed and seven
others injured in a road accident at Sat Tikli in Salanga
thana on Wednesday.
Police said the accident took place as a truck and a
pick-up van collided on Hatiqumrul-Banpara highway,
leaving truck driver Abdus Salam,30, and anther
unidentified dead on the spot.
UNB from Comilla says, Five people, including four
children, were killed and another four injured as a bus
hit a CNG-run auto-rickshaw at Chansri in Chauddagram
upazila on Wednesday.
The deceased were identified as Fulmati Begum, 55, wife of
Haji Habibullah, and her four grand-daughters Ranu Akhter,
12, Mamuna Akhter, 6, Farhana Akhter, 5, and Fahima Akhter,
7. They all hailed from Sadar South upazila and
Chauddagram upazila. Police said the accident occurred on
Dhaka-Chittagong highway when a bus of Jamuna Paribahan
dashed the auto-rickshaw coming from opposite direction
leaving the five passengers of the CNG dead on the spot
and injuring another four at 11am.
Second walkout
BNP protests closure of Amar Desh, arrest of its acting
editor
UNB, Sangsad Bhaban
Opposition BNP staged a walkout for the second time on
Wednesday to protest the cancellation of the declaration
of Daily Amar Desh and arrest of its editor Mahmudur
Rahman.
"It was the blackest day for democracy yesterday. It was
an unprecedented incident. The declaration of the most
popular daily was cancelled and its editor arrested from
his office," BNP leader Barrister Moudud Ahmed said on a
point of order before leading the walkout at 8:10 pm.
Moudud said the declaration was cancelled and the editor
arrested as the daily was critical of the government and
used to speak the truth. Calling for immediate withdrawal
of the cancellation order and release of Mahmudur Rahman,
he said the incident proves that press freedom no longer
exists in the country.
He said the present government does not believe in press
freedom. The government controls the freedom of the press,
shut down private TV Channel 1, and stopped TV talk shows.
The way the past caretaker government ran the country
illegally repressing the people, the same way the present
government is running the government.
The BNP leader said the way incumbent Prime Minister
Sheikh Hasina was arrested the day Azam J Chowdhury had
filed the case against her during the army controlled
caretaker regime, in the same way Mahmudur Rahman was
arrested yesterday.
Moudud said they had thought that with the restoration of
an elected government, no newspaper would be shutdown and
no editor arrested. But he said "the charter of change has
become the charter of pain."
He said there may be wheels within wheels in running the
affairs of the state but it seems that the country is
being run by unseen forces where even ministers do not
know what is happening.
Referring to the background of the arrest of Mahmudur
Rahman, Moudud said first the publisher of Amar Desh was
detained in an intelligence office for six-seven hours and
he was forced to sign applications for filing the case.
He said in the name of democracy the country has been
placed under one-party rule.
Back Page
RAJUK to construct 2 flyovers by
1012 to ease traffic jam
BSS, Dhaka
The government will construct two flyovers - from
Golapshah Mazar to Babubazar and from Kuril to Airport -
at a cost of Taka 600 crore to ease traffic jam in the
city.
Besides, link roads would be built from Karwan Bazar
Railway Crossing to Mohakhali, from Indira Road to
Panthapath and from extended Madani Avenue (Progati Sarani)
to the Balu river.
Work on a feasibility study of these projects is going on
and this will be followed by appointment of expert firms.
State Minister for Housing and Public Works Abdul Mannan
Khan told BSS today that the Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha
(RAJUK) would implement the projects.
The flyover from Golapshah Mazar would be four kilometres
in length and its estimated cost is Taka 300 crore.
The cost of Kuril-Airport flyover has been estimated at
Taka 306 crore.
The state minister said the flyovers and link roads would
be constructed by 2012.
He said the government has adopted the projects in
consultation with local and foreign experts.
Referring to the huge population in the city, the state
minister said the transportation facilities are inadequate
compared to the population.
Therefore, the government has taken initiatives for
construction of roads, flyovers, elevated expressway,
circular railway and river way, he added.
Abdul Mannan Khan said RAJUK has already started
construction of Bijoy Sarani-Tejgaon flyover with its own
fund.
RAJUK Member (development) Mahbubul Alam said the Kuril-
Airport flyover would link the airport with Purbachal New
Town.
The RAJUK has a plan to connect Badda-Malibagh-Kakrail
with this flyover in future, he added.
Fatwa victim
partially admits execution of edict
UNB, Dhaka
A fatwa-victim of Banchharampur has admitted partially
before the High Court the execution of extrajudicial
punishment in the name of Fatwa, the religious edict.
"We had a rare occasion to talk with the victim and her
mother who partially admitted the occurrence," the court
disclosed the outcome of the talks in the courtroom on
Wednesday.
"This confession will be reflected in the judgment," said
Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain, who heads the division bench.
The bench, however, did not fix any date for the judgment.
The exclusive talks were held in the chamber attached to
the courtroom, court sources said.
The HC bench also directed Brahmanbaria Superin-tendent of
Police and the Officer-in-Charge of Banchharampur to
ensure the safe journey of the victim and her mother back
home and also their security once they reach home.
In addition, the HC asked the office of the Attorney
General to talk to the Deputy Commissioner of Brahman-baria
in connection with the report about the fatwa-incident.
Earlier, Officer-in-Charge of Banchharampur police station
in compliance with the HC order escorted the fatwa-victim
damsel (17) along with her mother to the court.
On May 24, the High Court following a Public Interest
Litigation (PIL) writ petition over execution of Fatwa
filed by three lawyers issued a rule upon the government
to explain why the act of extrajudicial punishment in the
name of Islamic Sharia/fatwa should not be declared
illegal and unconstitutional.
Passing the order, an HC had also asked the government to
explain why a direction should not be given to incorporate
various articles discouraging such acts in the syllabus
from primary to university levels including madrasah
education.
CCC polls:
‘Ship’ for Mohiuddin ‘pineapple’ for Monzu
UNB, Chittagong
Two major candidates contesting the mayoral post of the
Chittgaong City Corporation (CCC) elections, ABM Mohiuddin
Chowdhury and M Monzur Alam Monzu, have been assigned
"Ship" and "Pineapple" as their electoral symbol
respectively.
The symbols among the candidates, contesting for mayoral
post and councilors were allocated formally through a
function Wednesday at the city's Muslim Institute
auditorium.
Apart from Awami League backed Nagorik Committee candidate
ABM Mohiuddin Chowdhury and BNP backed Chattagram Unnyan
Andolon candidate M Manzur Alam Manzu, Solaiman Alam
Sheith of Jatiya Party (Ershad) got 'Television', Md
Rafiqul Islam of Islamic Andolone 'Locker' while four
independent candidates Jane Alam 'Inkpot-pen', Md Ibrahim
'Motorcycle', Syed Sajjad Zoha 'Spectacles' and Professor
Mozammel Hossain Bhuiyan 'Helicopter.'
Returning Officer (RO) Jesmin Tuli allocated the symbols
among the candidates contesting the mayoral post.
All the candidates, except M Manzur Alam, were present on
the occasion. Sorwar Alam, son of Monzur Alam, collected
the symbol on behalf of his father.
The CCC elections will be held on June 17.
The Election Commission will assign an executive
magistrate along with video cameras for each of the two
major mayoral candidates of the CCC polls from June 5 to
monitor their electioneering activities.
Talking to reporters at his office on Wednesday, Election
Commissioner M Sohul Hussain disclosed the EC's decision
on appointing an executive magistrate and a video camera
for ABM Mohiuddin Chowdhury and Manjurul Alam, two
candidates for the CCC mayoral election.
"Those two mayoral candidates were warned of violating the
electoral code of conducts. So cameras will be attached to
each of them," he said, adding that if necessary, more
cameras would be provided to make the elections free and
fair.
Sohul Hussain mentioned that cameras would be provided to
some 41 wards of the CCC election area during the polling
date.
He also mentioned that the EC would hold a dialogue on
June 7-8 with all the contesting mayoral candidates of the
CCC elections.
Asked whether the electoral code of conduct was violated
or not when the Prime Minister gave directives about the
CCC elections, the Election Commissioner said she (PM)
could give directives from Dhaka, and in this way the code
of onduct would not be violated.
Replying to a question about amendments to the party
constitution of Jamaat-e-Islami, he said the Election
Commissioned is scheduled to hold a meeting with the
Jamaat on June 7 and then they would discuss their party
constitution.
Mahmudur Rahman and
four others face contempt of court charge
UNB, Dhaka
Hours after being taken into custody in a fraud case,
Mahmudur Rahman, acting editor of just- proscribed daily
Amar Desh, along with four others, faces contempt of court
charges for publishing a "contemptuous" report on the apex
court.
A six-member Appellate Division bench of the Supreme Court
headed by Chief Justice M Fazlul Karim on Wednesday issued
a rule upon Rahman and four others to explain why
proceedings should not be drawn against them on charges of
contempt of court.
The four others against whom the case was filed are the
publisher, the deputy editor, the news editor and a
reporter of the daily.
Passing the order upon a contempt petition filed by two
lawyers, the apex court asked the accused to appear in
person before the court on July 5 to explain their
standpoint.
The petitioners-Barrister Mainul Hassan and advocate
Reazuddin Reza-filed the contempt petition over a report
published on April 21 in the daily Amar Desh captioned
"Chamber means favouring government' s stay," pointing the
finger at the Chamber Judge of the Supreme Court.
Additional Attorney General MK Rahman appeared as
prosecutor for the Supreme Court.
Country’s total mosque 2,42,500, Imam
and Muajjins 4.85 lakh
BSS, Sangsad Bhaban
The number of mosques across the country is 2,42,500 while
Imam and muajjins is nearly 4.85 lakh.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina stated this in the Jatiya
Sangsad citing the latest study of Islamic Foundation
while replying to a question from treasury bench member
Junaid Ahmed Palak.
Besides, she said according to a study of Hindu Religious
Welfare Trust, the number of temples in the country is
nearly 24,000.
The Prime Minister said a total of 5.70 lakh children and
19,200 elderly people were provided with pre-primary
education under Child and Mass Education Programme while
4.20 lakh children were given Quran education under "Quran
Education Programme" in 2009-2010.
The Leader of the House informed the Jatiya Sangsad that
employment opportunities for a total 39,004 people
including 36,768 children has been generated so far
through Mosque based Child and Mass Education Programme.
She said her government has set up "Imam-Muajjins Welfare
Trust" for ensuring their overall welfare and taken stepx
to impart them training through Imam Training Academy.
Govt committed
to ensuring sustainable development of ICT sector :
Yeafesh
BSS, Dhaka
State Minister for Science and Information Communication
Technology Architect Yeafesh Osman Wednesday said the
present government is committed to ensuring sustainable
development of the ICT sector.
He was addressing as the chief guest a seminar on
"Electronics and Telecommunications for Digital
Bangladesh", organised by Bangladesh Electronics Society (BES)
at the Atomic Energy Centre in the city.
Vice-Chancellor of BUET Dr AMM. Safiullah and Chairman of
Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission Dr Mosharraf Hossain
attended the function as the special guests while
President of BES Prof Farruk Ahmed chaired it.
The state minister said the government has a plan to
establish a few technology parks in different parts of the
country.
He said that Bangladesh would be transformed from low-
income agriculture-based economy into a knowledge-based
middle income country by the year 2021.
He said Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has given us a target
of building 'Digital Bangladesh' by 2021, which would
eventually help build 'Sonar Bangla' as dreamt by Father
of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
Yeafesh Osman said it would be possible to establish
Digital Bangladesh much ahead of the year 2021 if the
administration from top to bottom works properly.
Editorial
Israeli attack on
Flotilla
The
Jewish state Israel has once again unmasked its real face
through the latest action. Its attack Tuesday on an unarmed
humanitarian flotilla carrying relief goods for the besieged
people of Gaza has revealed beyond any doubt that Israel is a
barbaric state and brutal enemy of freedom, peace and
humanity. Nineteen people are reported to have been killed
when Israeli commandos swooped on the vessels in international
waters. The boats, the passengers, and the relief materials
being carried were captured, seized and detained. Among those
detained by the Israelis include a number of journalists from
around the world who had joined the flotilla to cover the
news. Israel had cut off Gaza from the rest of the world in
June 2007 to cripple Hamas and reduce its hold on the area.
Gaza is virtually under the occupation of Israel in violation
of international laws and the people there are suffering
immensely as besieged citizens. It may be pointed out that the
Israeli invasion of 2008-09 led to the commission of war
crimes as documented by the UN-mandated Goldstone Commission
and the blockade of Gaza and its people amounts to collective
punishment of civilians.
The Israeli attack on the flotilla in the sea on Tuesday is
very much a war crime. The world has condemned this barbaric
Israeli attack in a single voice. With the rest of the
international community the Bangladesh government condemned
the attack by the Israeli troops . "Bangladesh is shocked and
saddened at the unwarranted attack on unarmed civilians on
board the Mavi Marmara on 31st May and the resultant loss of
lives," a government statement said. The statement of the
Foreign Ministry said Bangladesh expressed its profound
condolences and sincerest sympathy to the bereaved families.
The Bangladesh government also called for collective
international action to end the siege immediately and to allow
the people of Palestine to return to normal life.
The Bangladesh government statement has echoed the feelings of
the people of the country and also the peace loving world.
Israel has crossed all limits and time has come for the world
nations to force Israel to stop atrocities and barbarity
against the Palestinians.
Unrest in RMG
sector
The
country's Readymade Garments(RMG) sector is becoming restive
every now and then. In the latest incident more than one
thousand garments workers blocked the busy Dhaka-Chittagong
highway near Kanchpur Tuesday provoking police to fire rubber
bullets and tear gas shells.At least 50 people including 12
policemen were wounded. A bus was set on fire and 20 other
vehicles were damaged by angry workers of SA Fashion &
Apparels demanding reinstatement of workers retrenched
recently. Witnesses said a section of about 7,000 workers of
the garments factory came out of work and blocked the busy
highway. They vandalized the passing vehicles and set fire on
a bus. Police rushed to the spot and their bid to quell the
situation triggered clash with the workers. They chased the
policemen and pelted them leaving 12 wounded. In retaliation
police fired rubber bullets and tear gas shells to disperse
the demonstrators.
What has happened in Kanchpur on Tuesday is no isolated event.
In fact, unrest in the RMG sector appears to have become a
regular phenomenon . In the recent past a number of such
demonstration, road-blockade and torching of vehicles by
garments works took place in Savar, Gazipur, Ashulia, Tongi,
Narayanganj and in the city. In most cases the workers took to
the streets to realize their demands for higher pay or payment
of outstanding salary. And needless to say, the RMG workers
are very low paid and deprived in different ways. So, in some
cases their agitation is not without cause, but at the same
time in some cases they also resort to violence on the basis
of rumours and political instigation
It must be said that violent action by the workers on the
basis of just rumours and without verifying them is
unacceptable and should be condemned and seriously dealt with.
However, on some occasions there may be some valid grounds for
the workers' discontent and agitation and if so those should
be addressed sympathetically. The workers should be guided by
reasoning and not by emotion and they should not fall in the
trap of those who want the RMG sector of Bangladesh to be
ruined. On the other hand, the owners of the factories should
meet the genuine demands of the workers.
Violence erupts in the RMG sector every now and then and
results in heavy loss to properties and sometimes to life
also. Workers have the right to raise their demands and stage
demonstrations to press those no doubt, but they have no right
to damage the factories, set those ablaze, vandalize and
damage vehicles and disrupt traffic movement. When they take
law in their own hands, law enforcers are left with no option
but to go into action and that ultimately leads to clashes and
even loss of valuable lives. The best possible way for the
workers is to try to realize their demands through peaceful
movement and for the law enforcers to tackle the situation
without using force. Opening fire on agitating works to
disperse them is an extreme measure and it must be averted.
The actions of the workers in many cases amount to excesses
which cannot be considered acceptable. But it is also true
that in most RMG mills the workers are exploited and deprived
of their rights and due salary and allowances although the RMG
owners reportedly earn quite good profits. If the mill owners
are generous enough to meet the genuine demands of the workers
the frequent unrest in the RMG sector may largely be averted.
We hope, good sense will prevail upon all sides and the
alarming situation in the RMG sector will be eased.
Analysis
Pak-China security cooperation
China is Pakistan's principal source of
military supplies. China has provided vitally needed
technological assistance for Pakistan's nuclear and ballistic
missile programmes throughout the 1980s and 1990s.
Dr Rashid Ahmad Khan
While bilateral
military ties between Pakistan and China remain strong, the
two countries are looking forward to expanding the parameters
of their cooperation to address new security concerns that
threaten not only the peace and security in the region but
also pose a serious challenge to the national security
interests of the two countries. This was evident from the
accords reached between the two countries during Chinese
Defence Minister General Liang's recent visit to Pakistan as
the head of a 17-member delegation. Underlining the Chinese
commitment to bolstering Pakistan's defence capabilities and
supporting it politically, General Liang, in his statement,
told his Pakistani hosts that his country would continue to
provide Pakistan with military and economic assistance, and
support its stance on different political issues. However, the
focus on measures like holding joint counter-terrorism
military exercises involving all the three services and
provision of Chinese military equipment to the Pakistani armed
forces to be used in counter-terrorist operations, represents
a new perception of regional security that takes into account
the threats posed by extremism and terrorism more seriously.
China is Pakistan's principal source of military supplies.
China has provided vitally needed technological assistance for
Pakistan's nuclear and ballistic missile programmes throughout
the 1980s and 1990s. This was the period Pakistan was
subjected to stringent economic and military sanctions by
Western countries, especially the US. Chinese military
assistance to Pakistan in conventional weapons includes the
JF-17 aircraft, JF-17 production facility, F-22P frigates with
helicopters, K-8 jet trainers, F-85 tanks and small arms and
ammunition. According to Western sources, China has also built
a turnkey ballistic missile manufacturing facility near the
city of Rawalpindi and has helped Pakistan develop the 750 km
range Shaheen-I ballistic missile. Hitherto, the focus of this
robust Pakistan-China defence relationship has been the common
goal of countering Indian power in the South Asian region, but
the resurgence of militants in Pakistan's tribal areas and
their expanding trans-national networks may force Pakistan and
China to shift their focus and concentrate more on joint
mechanisms to counter the growing threat of terrorism. The
Chinese anxiety to move, in collaboration with Pakistan,
quickly and effectively in this direction stems from their
three major national security concerns.
First of all, China faces a direct threat to its national
unity and territorial integrity from the unrest in its
Xinjiang province created by Uighur separatist elements, who,
the Chinese believe, have had links with militants based in
Afghanistan and Pakistan. The Chinese ambassador to Pakistan
has publicly stated that separatist elements responsible for
trouble in Xinjiang received training in Pakistan's tribal
areas and Afghanistan during the 1980s. Pakistan has taken
steps to mollify Chinese concerns by clamping down on Uighur
settlements and on religious schools used for training
purposes. Pakistan is also reported to have extradited, in
April last year, a number of Uighur activists to China after
they were found involved in terrorist activities. Pakistan and
China have put in place a joint counter-terrorism mechanism at
the interior minister's level. The two countries have also
held a couple of joint military exercises to promote
coordination between their armed forces against the threats of
terrorism and separatism.
Secondly, China is very concerned about the deteriorating law
and order and security situation in Pakistan as it not only
undermines the stability of a staunch ally and an important
pillar in the Chinese Indian Ocean strategy, but also impedes
joint initiatives for the expansion of the Pakistan-China
economic relationship in the fields of trade, investment and
joint ventures in mining, infrastructure building,
construction and energy. In 2005, Pakistan and China concluded
dozens of agreements to expand economic ties through enhanced
trade and investment, but progress has been very slow chiefly
because of the bad security situation marked by growing
incidents of terrorism, kidnapping and killing of Chinese
workers and engineers. In 2006, the two countries concluded a
Free Trade Agreement, but bilateral trade remains low and is
nowhere near reaching the target of $ 15 billion by 2011. Both
Pakistan and China accord top priority to the strengthening
and expansion of economic and trade relations to provide a
durable base for already strong friendly relations between the
two countries. But the menace of terrorism stands in the way
of realising this dream. There are, therefore, strong
imperatives for both Pakistan and China to cooperate with each
other to eliminate the menace of terrorism.
Thirdly, Chinese stakes in a peaceful and stable South Asia
have increased manifold over the last three decades with a
phenomenal expansion of its economic and commercial relations
with the countries of the region. It also has an observer's
status in SAARC. Bilateral trade between China and India
jumped from $ 5 billion to $ 40 billion during a period of
just five years. For achieving the goals of modernisation and
welfare of the people through economic development, China
needs a peaceful neighbourhood. In 2004, China was one of
those countries that played a behind-the-scenes role in
facilitating the resumption of Pakistan-India talks under the
now stalled peace process. A peaceful and stable South Asian
region serves the strategic interests of China as well as
other countries of the region because Chinese involvement in
various projects in Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka is growing
rapidly. This is possible only when the countries of the
region shun confrontation and join hands to fight the common
threats of terrorism, backwardness and poverty.
The decision by Pakistan and China to forge close cooperation
in counter-terrorism under the framework based on the three
MoUs signed during the visit of the Chinese minister has
far-reaching implications for peace and security in the South
Asian region. It will not only strengthen the strategic
partnership between Pakistan and China, it will lead to a much
needed regional approach to tackle the threat of extremism and
terrorism in South Asia.
The writer is a professor of International Relations at
Sargodha University. He can be reached at rashid_khan192@yahoo.com
The seduction
of maximum force
Winning the war against Maoists does not need combat jets
or artillery. It needs police forces with
counter-insurgency capacities and training.
Praveen Swami
Aizawal
woke that Thursday morning to the thunder of combat jet
engines and falling bombs. Earlier that week, Mizo
National Army insurgents had engaged military garrisons
strung across the State. Mizoram's capital fell days
later. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi responded by ordering
the Indian Air Force to attack the city. "Most houses in
Dawrpui and the Chhinga Veng area were reduced to ashes,"
a survivor recalled. No one knows for certain just how
many died.
Three decades after the March 4, 1966 bombing of Aizawal,
India is once again debating the use of massive military
force - including air strikes - to fight an insurgency.
Last week's tragedy in West Bengal, preceded by
large-scale killings of civilians in Chhattisgarh, have
made clear that New Delhi's offensive against the Maoist
insurgency that has torn apart swathes of eastern and
central India is floundering.
Policymakers are now considering committing the Army and
air assets to provide logistical and fire support to
counter the Maoist campaign. For the most part, the plans
envisage only a limited support role for the armed forces
- the use of helicopters, for example, for transporting
commandos in remote forest areas, or unmanned aerial
vehicles equipped with foliage-penetrating radar to locate
large Maoist formations. But as public pressure mounts on
a government that promised quick success against the
Maoists, more aggressive military options will seem
increasingly seductive to policymakers. India's rich
experience of fighting insurgencies, though, shows that
maximum force not only inflicts hideous levels of civilian
casualties but it rarely secures decisive outcomes.
Lessons from Manipur
In June 1986, Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi arrived at an
agreement with the Mizo National Front, laying the
foundations for a peace that has survived more than two
decades. The 1986 Accord, though, was preceded by a
counter-insurgency campaign of colonial-era barbarism:
hundreds were executed; thousands tortured; rape was
carried out on a massive scale. Designed to crush a
rebellion that seemed, at one stage, to be on the edge of
success, India's use of the military in Mizoram ended up
engendering an insurgency that festered for decades.
Like the Maoist insurgency, the Mizoram conflict had its
roots in deprivation. In 1959, the region saw a famine
which claimed thousands of lives. In 1961, former Indian
Army officer Pu Laldenga formed the Mizo National Famine
Front to campaign against New Delhi's apathy. Laldenga
later transformed the Famine Front's political offspring,
the Mizo National Front, into a potent political force.
But by 1963, the lack of state action to address
conditions in the Mizo hills led the MNF to initiate an
insurgency seeking independence from India.
The army campaign seemed, at first, to work. Forces from
the Silchar-based 61 Mountain Brigade were able to rapidly
recapture key towns, including Aizawal. Posts taken by the
MNA were recovered and its guerrillas forced to shift
their headquarters across the border into East Pakistan.
The fighting was intense: the Indian forces suffered 59
fatalities, 126 were injured and 23 went missing; 95 of
the MNA died and 35 were injured.
But from the summer of 1966, the MNA merged into the
population and began launching guerrilla strikes against
the Army. Lacking effective local intelligence, unfamiliar
with the terrain, and forced to rely on a vulnerable road
network for logistical support, the Army lost 95 men
between March and December 1966 - more than the number
killed in the first phase of fighting.
Military strategists found a template for their response
in imperial Great Britain's war against the Malayan
Communist Party. In much modern writing, the
anti-communist campaign in Malaya is marketed as an
example of how victory can be had by winning hearts and
minds, rather than the application of force. The idea
suffuses much writing on contemporary counter-insurgency.
But, as David Benet has noted, "coercion was the reality -
'hearts and minds' the myth." Field Marshal Gerald
Templar, the architect of the Malaya campaign, referred in
1968 to the 'hearts and minds' doctrine as a "nauseating
phrase I think I invented."
From January 1967, the security forces in Mizoram began
cutting the insurgency off from its peasant base. Eighty
per cent of Mizoram's population was resettled, mostly by
force, into barricaded enclaves known as Protected and
Progressive Villages.
In a signal 2001 essay for the journal Faultlines, the
former Assam Chief Secretary, Vijendra Singh Jafa,
recorded how the village of Darzo was relocated. "My
orders," a soldier he interviewed said, "were to get the
villagers to collect whatever moveable property they could
and to set their own village on fire at seven in the
evening. I also had orders to burn all the paddy and other
grain that could not be carried away by the villagers."
The officer, Jafa recounted, ordered village elders at
gunpoint to certify "that they had burnt down their own
village."
Despite this massive application of force, the insurgency
did not end. Even though the MNA was enfeebled by
Pakistan's decisive defeat in the 1971 war, which stripped
it of its bases in what is now Bangladesh, it was able to
stage a series of bloody attacks. New Delhi and Laldenga
were able to agree on the contours of a peace agreement as
early as 1976 but the deep anger provoked by the Army's
campaign made it impossible to settle the deal.
It is not hard to see why the use of massive military
power against the Maoists appears seductive to
policymakers. In November last year, as Central forces
began to push into Chhattisgarh, Union Home Secretary
announced that "within 30 days of security forces moving
in and dominating the area, we should be able to restore
civil administration there." The promise has been brutally
exposed. Unless New Delhi and the naxal-infested States
are first able to restore order, developmental programmes
targeting the Maoists' constituency are unlikely to get
off the ground.
Inadequate force
But the simple fact is this: there just aren't enough
security personnel in Chhattisgarh to hold, let alone
dominate, the area. The Bastar division of Chhattisgarh
sprawls across 40,000 square kilometres, an area larger
than the Kashmir Valley. New Delhi has pumped in 14
battalions of the Central Reserve Police Force - each made
up of approximately 1,000 men - as well as 5 of the Border
Security Force. There are, in addition, some 7 battalions
of armed police, and some 5,000 police.
That means each battalion of security forces must engage
with insurgents in areas larger than 2,000 square
kilometres - and in areas where the use of roads is
impossible because of the large-scale use of improvised
explosive devices by Maoists. Some police stations are
responsible for more than 700 square kilometres of
territory.
In Jammu and Kashmir, an estimated 70 battalions of the
CRPF are available for counter-insurgency duties, along
with 54 battalions of the Army's Rashtriya Rifles. In
addition, about a third of the Jammu and Kashmir Police's
75,000 personnel are committed to counter-terrorism work.
That means approximately 145,000 personnel are available
to guard the 101,437 square kilometre territory on India's
side of the Line of Control-an average of one for 1.4 for
every square kilometre, and one for every 53 residents of
the State. Manipur, with an estimated population of 2.3
million, has 67 battalions of counter-insurgency forces,
including 11 army battalions - one for 34 residents. The
police in Chhattisgarh, moreover, often confront Maoist
formations that outnumber them 4 to 1. Most
counter-insurgency doctrines call for government forces to
outnumber their adversaries by at least 12:1, or higher -
the levels exceeded in both Jammu and Kashmir, and
Manipur.
More men alone, though, will not solve the problem. Phnom
Penh, on the eve of the triumph of Khmer Rouge in
Kampuchea, had one police officer for every 60 residents.
The force, however, lacked tactical skills. It is also
worth recalling that the United States dropped three times
more ordnance on Indochina during the Vietnam war than all
combatants put together did during World War II - but
still lost.
In recent decades, Indian tacticians have come to realise
that well-trained police forces are key to defeating
insurgencies. Many have pointed out that the Army played a
frontline role in decimating the Maoist insurgency that
broke out in West Bengal in 1967. In October 1969,
Lieutenant-General JFR Jacob led an offensive against the
Maoist groups in the State, spearheaded by the 4 Infantry
Division, the 9 Infantry Division and the 50 Parachute
Brigade. No written account of the campaign was maintained
by the Army's Eastern Command, but participants say
intelligence provided by the West Bengal police led to the
success. That lesson has been driven home in recent years:
India's major counter-insurgency successes - whether
against the tribal insurgents in Tripura, the Maoists in
Andhra Pradesh, or Khalistan terrorists in Punjab - were
all police-led.
"Occasional police operations timidly carried out with
inadequate forces" the theoretician of counter-insurgency,
Roger Trinquier, warned in his 1964 classic Modern War,
"will fail pitifully." With the force levels and resources
now available in areas like Bastar, defeat is certain.
Winning the war against the Maoists doesn't need combat
jets or artillery; it needs police forces with
counter-insurgency capacities and training. Those forces
can be raised - but New Delhi needs to get to work now,
instead of wasting lives chasing the phantom of a quick
victory.
Viewpoints
The madness of arrogance
Israel has
imposed a blockade on Gaza, probably if not certainly in
violation of international law, supported largely by US vetoes
in the UN Security Council.
Dr Alan Sabrosky
Israel's
attack on the Gaza-bound aid flotilla on America's Memorial
Day was all too predictable, although the form it took
surprised many. And it confirms the old proverb that "Those
whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad," for the
attack was the kind of madness only unbridled arrogance can
assume.
It wasn't just that foreigners as well as Palestinians, flying
flags other than that of Palestine, were attacked. Israel has
a long history of doing such things, especially to the UN. But
except for the USS Liberty incident in 1967, it has generally
done that on inland sites - Gaza, the West Bank, the Lebanon -
where it can largely block news and visual evidence, and
control the spin it puts on events, counting on its friends in
the US and other mainstream media to say little or nothing to
contradict them.
Not this time. An attack on the open seas, in acknowledged
international waters, against unarmed ships carrying
humanitarian aid with passengers and crews from many countries
- especially a direct attack against a Turkish ship - is a
different matter, and potentially an explosive one. The number
of shipboard casualties indicates that once fighting started,
the Israeli commandos simply sprayed automatic weapons fire
into the people around them - another of their long-standing
habits.
And technology is their enemy here, just as it became in an
earlier day the enemy of communist regimes in the former
Soviet Union and other Eastern European countries. Too many
images and videos were taken, and some sent, and too many
witnesses reported what was happening, before the Israelis
were able to suppress communications ?from their victims.
Bad for their victims, but also potentially very bad for
Israel, and the initial Israeli public-relations damage
control efforts show that they are at least dimly aware of
that fact. Trying to cast the attack in international waters
as an exercise in self-defense would be ludicrous in the best
or worst of circumstances - has anyone ever seen wheelchairs
used as offensive weaponry?
And for the Israeli spokeswoman to try to spin an assault by
warships and armed commandos as defense against a "lynch" (I
guess she was trying to push an American "hot button" for
Obama - someone should tell her it is "lynching" or "lynch
mob") would have embarrassed even her public relations
soul-mate, Dr. Josef Goebbels. But desperate do what
desperation dictates, I suppose, although this time they may
well have gone way too far.
And that is what the initial responses appear to affirm. All
of the major US and many other media outlets are carrying this
story, and even with the slant from many Jewish correspondents
based in Jerusalem or Ashdod, the bloody particulars are
slowly coming through to at least a general American audience
for the first time:
1. The unarmed ships with unarmed passengers were trying to
ferry humanitarian and reconstruction aid to ravaged and
embattled Gaza.
2. Israel has imposed a blockade on Gaza, probably if not
certainly in violation of international law, supported largely
by US vetoes in the UN ?Security Council.
3. Israeli warships and commandos intercepted and attacked the
aid flotilla in international waters - which is an act of war,
piracy or state terrorism, depending on one's view of the
details.
4. Under attack, some of the passengers tried to defend
themselves, scores were killed or wounded, and some Israeli
commandos were also wounded - doubtless a surprise to them,
but then their usual run of victims may have made them a bit
too cocky.
5. Many governments and publics around the world - not only in
Arab capitals - are openly outraged, and the discussion forums
on US news websites carrying the story suggest that much the
same is happening at a public level in this country.
6. But for Israel, this is just another "we are the
misunderstood victim" incident in a long, sordid and utterly
unbelievable litany of such things - except that this time,
they may not get away with it.
This is a time for those interested in justice for Palestine
to seize the moment and act, building on the promise
engendered but not fulfilled after the submission of the
Goldstone Report to the HRC.
Americans shouldn't bother with letters or emails to US
Senators or Representatives, or Obama; AIPAC will be there
ahead of you with more letters and money than you can
generate. Go instead directly to the local offices of US
Senators and Representatives, stay until you speak personally
to the senior person there, and make your case as forcefully
as you can.
Make sure as many people hear you as possible - but be polite,
and leave your signs at home.
For the world community, now is the time and this is the
incident to drive home the UN "Uniting for Peace" Resolution,
in both the Security Council and the General Assembly as
needed. The nationalities of the victims will at least
neutralise many European countries that might have opposed it
before. Sanctions, embargoes, even the suspension or expulsion
of Israel from the UN itself, do as much as quickly and as
forcefully as possible.
Remember that the cornerstone of our oaths is not to
obedience, but to "support and defend the Constitution of the
United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic."
Think about it on this Memorial Day.
Alan Sabrosky (Ph.D, University of Michigan) is a 10-year
US Marine Corps veteran and a graduate of the US Army War
College
A
Zionist-Apartheid dirty deal
In a secret
deal, South Africa lifted safeguards on 450 tonnes of
yellowcake sold to Israel, in return for Israeli supplies
of tritium, a nuclear weapons booster.
Praful Bidwai
As
the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference
concludes in New York, the western powers led by the
United States are focussing on west Asia, because they
want Iran to freeze its nuclear activities. But
inevitably, attention is getting riveted on Israel, the
region's sole nuclear weapons power.
Against this backdrop comes the sensational disclosure
from the just-released book, The Unspoken Alliance:
Israel's Secret Relationship with Apartheid South Africa,
that Israel offered to sell nuclear warheads to
white-racist, apartheid South Africa in 1975, and the two
states closely coordinated their military programmes and
strategic approaches.
This expose is based on "top secret" minutes of meetings
between senior South African and Israeli officials
accessed by the author, US-based scholar Sasha
Pulakow-Suransky. The minutes were recently declassified
by the South African government, despite Israel's strong
opposition. The disclosure will seriously embarrass
Israel, whose intransigence against ending its illegal
occupation of Palestine and halting settlements is
increasingly isolating it internationally and in western
public opinion.
The book says South Africa's defence minister P W Botha
asked for nuclear warheads when he met Shimon Peres,
Israel's defence minister and now its president, who
agreed to supply them "in three sizes". They signed a
wide-ranging agreement on bilateral military relations,
with a clause stipulating that its "very existence" must
remain secret. The military relations were crucial. Israel
generously supplied South Africa arms when it faced
international economic-military sanctions. South Africa is
believed to have made at least six nuclear weapons, but
destroyed them before apartheid ended.
The book drives one more stake into Israel's "nuclear
ambiguity" policy of neither confirming nor denying
nuclear weapons possession. Independent sources, including
Israeli whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu, confirm that
Israel has 200 to 300 nuclear warheads. The book also
demolishes Israel's claim that it's a "responsible" state
which wouldn't use nuclear weapons even if it had them --
unlike Iran, which might well use them or transfer them to
Hezbollah. But a nation which not only helped pariah
apartheid South Africa overcome richly-deserved
international sanctions, but also supplied it
mass-destruction weapons, cannot be "responsible". South
Africa's military wanted nuclear weapons as a deterrent
and for potential attacks upon its neighbours -- just as
Israel did, and still does.
No state in modern history has been more shamelessly
racist, unequal, undemocratic, and inhuman than apartheid
South Africa. If that was at minimum a rogue state,
Zionist Israel is in the same league. Pulakow-Suransky
shows that Israeli and South African officials held
crucial talks in March 1975, at which the former "formally
offered to sell South Africa" some nuclear-capable Jericho
missiles. Present there was South African military chief
RF Armstrong whose "top secret" memorandum detailed the
missiles' benefits for South Africa -- but only if they
were fitted with nuclear weapons.
After the 1973 Yom Kippur war, Israel was short of
uranium, of which South Africa has large reserves. Israel
also needed hard currency. It got both by selling
conventional weapons, and by sharing nuclear know-how with
South Africa and converting some of its yellowcake (mixed
oxides of uranium) into weapons-grade plutonium. The
Israel-South Africa alliance was close and strategic. In
1987, Israel adopted its own sanctions against South
Africa but continued with existing arms contracts worth
hundreds of millions of dollars.
The alliance was based less on military imperatives than
on the two leaderships' shared belief that theirs were two
relatively small nations guarding "their land" and
"identity" in a hostile environment. Both wanted their
privileged colonial settlers to continue in power. Their
self-assigned role as regional bulwarks against Communism
brought them western support --until global opinion turned
against apartheid. Israel forgot Nazi sympathisers' role
in putting apartheid's architects into power.
In a secret deal, South Africa lifted safeguards on 450
tonnes of yellowcake sold to Israel, in return for Israeli
supplies of tritium, a nuclear weapons booster. Israel
bailed out a South African politician whose bankruptcy
would have scuppered the deal. These revelations expose
Israel as an ultra-cynical nation culpable of nuclear
proliferation.
Yet, South Africa isn't the only country with which Israel
had shady nuclear dealings. Equally implicated from the
1950s onwards were Britain and France, which clandestinely
supplied it nuclear materials, including heavy water.
Israel is different from other nuclear weapons-states (NWSs).
Its nuclear weapons are undeclared -- unlike those of the
US, Russia, Britain, France, China, India and Pakistan (or
of North Korea, which exploded a crude nuclear bomb in
2006 and another one last year). Israel, like India and
Pakistan, hasn't signed the NPT.
However, although dubious, Israel's record of clandestine
nuclear collaborations, shady deals and complicity in
other countries' weapons pursuits mirrors that of the US,
UK, USSR-Russia, China, India and Pakistan. They are all
culpable.
India has had overt and clandestine nuclear dealings with
the US, UK, Canada, the USSR, China, Russia, even Norway.
India built its first bomb using CIRUS, a
Canadian-designed reactor to which the US supplied heavy
water. The 1974 explosion was called "peaceful", because
India didn't want to be seen violating its professed
commitment to nuclear disarmament or its "peaceful" use
legal commitments to the US and Canada. It also lacked the
stomach for more tests.
Pakistan has long collaborated with China clandestinely,
which transferred nuclear weapons designs. Dr AQ Khan also
pilfered centrifuge designs and suppliers' lists from the
Netherlands. The Khan network's dealings with North Korea,
Libya and Iran are legend. These needed the collusion of
the Pakistani military which exclusively controls the
nuclear weapons programme. The US turned a blind eye to
Islamabad's nuclear preparations during the Soviet
intervention in Afghanistan, which made Pakistan a
"frontline" state. Poor, technologically primitive North
Korea couldn't have made its bomb without a small
Soviet-built reactor.
The point is, all NWSs are guilty of either deliberate
proliferation or acting in violation of their dual-use
technology commitments. Worse, they are the only nations
to have used nuclear weapons and practised nuclear
blackmail. So, they are totally hypocritical when they
single out countries like Iran. Nuclear weapons are
unacceptably dangerous in everybody's hands. Although all
NWSs rationalise their nuclear arsenals via "deterrence",
they have doctrines for actually using nuclear weapons
against unarmed civilians. Even deterrence entails that
they're in a state of readiness to use them.
The US and USSR came close to doing this during the Cold
War. Even Israel contemplated doing so in 1973. Pakistan
and India launched nuclear preparations during the 1999
Kargil conflict, and even more dangerously, in the 10
months-long standoff in 2001.
No government that is committed to exterminating millions
of non-combatant civilians is "responsible". The current
hype about "terrorist groups" acquiring nuclear material
serves to legitimise the NWSs' possession of them and to
fraudulently distinguish between "responsible" and
"irresponsible" actors.
"Responsible NWSs" is a contradiction in terms. The
greatest nuclear danger emanates from the NWSs, which seek
security through nuclear terror. Non-state actors like Al
Qaeda cannot build the elaborate and relatively
sophisticated infrastructure that nuclear programmes need.
They have even failed to clandestinely buy fissile
material. Yet, so long as nuclear weapons exist and are
regarded as a currency of power, both state and non-state
actors will be tempted to acquire them. The only way of
preventing them is to eliminate all nuclear weapons
globally.
The writer, a former newspaper editor, is a researcher
and peace and human-rights activist based in Delhi. Email:
prafulbidwai1@yahoo.co.in
Thailand is the loser
On May 19 Thai soldiers succeeded in dispersing more than
5,000 Thaksin supporters, whose ranks once numbered more
than 100,000, but have gradually thinned.
Anees Jillani
Thailand
is one of the best holiday destinations in the world and
its affordability makes it ideal for the middle class in
Pakistan. It is also a shoppers' paradise, as one can tell
by the number of bags Pakistanis return with on flights
from Bangkok. It is thus sad to see what is happening on
Bangkok's streets in recent weeks.
The background to the impasse is simple. Thaksin
Shinawatra was ousted in a September 2006 coup after
remaining prime minister from 2001 to 2006, and now lives
in exile apparently in Dubai to avoid a jail sentence for
abuse of power. A military junta, calling itself the
Council for National Security, dissolved Thaksin's Thai
Rak Thai party for electoral fraud and banned its
officials from politics for five years.
Thaksin was abroad when the military took over. He
returned to Thailand in February 2008, after the People's
Power Party, supported by him, won the post-coup
elections. In October, courts found him guilty of a
conflict of interest and sentenced him in absentia while
he was visiting China, to two years in jail. The courts
dissolved this party supported by Thaksin, whose
supporters then regrouped to form the Pheu Thai Party and
became part of the United Front for Democracy against
Dictatorship (the 'red-shirts').
Abhisit Vejjajiva, the current prime minister of Thailand,
leads the Democrat Party and lost the junta-administered
2007 election to the People's Power Party. His party is
part of the People's Alliance for Democracy (the
'yellow-shirts'), which seized Government House as well as
the Don Muang and Suvarnabhumi airports. This ended after
the constitutional court banned Thaksin's party.
The Thai army, which had replaced the 1997 constitution by
a new one in 2007, coerced several of Thaksin's party
members of parliament to defect to Abhisit's Democrat
Party, which led to British-born, Oxford-educated Abhisit
being elected the new prime minister.
Thaksin since then has been apparently trying to foment
trouble in the kingdom. Ironically, despite being one of
the richest men in the country, he remains a popular
leader and his rule is still remembered by the rural and
urban poor. He introduced a number of effective policies
to alleviate poverty, which reduced poverty by half in
four years. He launched Thailand's first universal
healthcare programme and a popular anti-drugs campaign. In
2005 his party won the election with the highest voter
turnout in the country's history.
Thaksin's supporters are demanding dissolution of the
present parliament and the holding of elections. They are
sure of victory and this is perhaps one of the reasons
that the government is reluctant to give them an open
field.
The situation is akin to what we experienced in the
mid-1980s during Gen Ziaul Haq's rule. The PPP, led by
Benazir Bhutto at the time, was sure of winning any free
and fair elections and the military regime was bent upon
playing every trick to deny it that. The Pakistan Army
succeeded in 1985 when partyless polls were held and the
military appears to have been triumphant at least for now
in Thailand.
On May 19 Thai soldiers succeeded in dispersing more than
5,000 Thaksin supporters, whose ranks once numbered more
than 100,000, but have gradually thinned. The sad part is
that the clashes between the protesters and the military
have resulted in more than 70 deaths.
The ring leaders have surrendered. A former army general,
Kattiya Sawatdiphol, who had joined the red-shirt movement
and was organising security for their protest rallies, and
was accused of being behind dozens of grenade attacks
around Bangkok over the past two months, was shot in the
head by a sniper and died.
After the official surrender of the protest leaders, a
radio station aligned with the red-shirts urged supporters
to unleash "all-out arson". A few government buildings
were torched in rural north-eastern Thailand, a red-shirt
stronghold and several shopping malls, many buses, media
offices and the stock exchange building were set on fire.
Bursts of gunfire echoed across Bangkok, and curfew was in
force in the Thai capital and 21 provinces for three days.
Abhisit may have won this round, but his country has
already lost $2bn and it is feared that two percentage
points could be lost from this year's GDP growth. Tourism,
which helps keep the local economy afloat, has been badly
affected.
The soldiers presently may be playing Thai country music
from trucks' loudspeakers on Bangkok streets, but one gets
the feeling that we have unfortunately not seen the end of
this crisis. One only wishes that a solution to the
impasse could have been found through dialogue instead of
bloodshed and so much ill-will.
International
Violence mars
Afghanistan peace meeting in Kabul
BBC Online
Militants have tried to attack a national peace meeting
being opened by President Hamid Karzai in the Afghan
capital, Kabul. Three rockets landed close to the venue.
Officials said two attackers were killed and one captured.
Mr Karzai is aiming to use the three-day "peace jirga" to
enlist support for his plan to offer economic incentives
to reformed Taliban militants.
Taliban chiefs have dismissed the talks and threatened
delegates with death. Mr Karzai's opening speech was
interrupted by the sound of explosions and gunfire some
distance away.
He told the delegates: "Someone is trying with a rocket
perhaps... Don't worry about it, let's proceed." Three
rockets fired at the giant tent at a university in Kabul
where the meeting is being held landed 100m (110 yards)
away. The UN's top envoy to Afghanistan - who is at the
meeting - said that none of the Afghans moved as the
rockets landed. "All stood [still] including 300 women,
they were defiant. The signal was 'we are used to this, we
are ready for it but we want to continue'," Staffan de
Mistura told the BBC. The meeting is continuing. An
official in charge of organising the event, Farooq Wardak,
said three heavily-armed militants dressed in burqas were
involved in the attack.
He said two died in fighting outside the venue and one was
captured. No delegates were hurt. The BBC's Martin
Patience in Kabul says President Karzai had been scheduled
to stay at the jirga but left the meeting. A
representative of the Taliban told news agencies that they
carried out the attacks on the jirga. The Taliban have
been waging a nine-year battle to overthrow the US-backed
government and expel the 130,000 foreign troops there. Up
to 1,600 delegates - including tribal elders, religious
leaders and members of parliament from all over the
country - have convened for the traditional meeting.
But they are far outnumbered by the 12,000 security
personnel guarding against any Taliban attack. Our
correspondent says one of the aims of the jirga is to
bolster the position of President Karzai but there is also
growing realisation in Afghanistan and the West that to
end the conflict will mean reaching some sort of
arrangement with the Taliban. President Karzai appealed to
the Taliban, saying that their actions were keeping the
international troops they resent in Afghanistan. "You
should provide the opportunity for the foreign forces to
leave," he told the meeting.
"Make peace with me and there will be no need for
foreigners here. As long as you are not talking to us, not
making peace with us, we will not let the foreigners
leave."
The jirga is due to finish late on Friday, with a
declaration expected on what steps should be taken to end
the insurgency, which groups should be included in the
process, and how they should be approached.
President Karzai has proposed offering an amnesty and
reintegration incentives to low-level Taliban who accept
the constitution.
Dozen militants
killed in Pakistan clashes
AFP, Peshawar, Pakistan
More than a dozen militants were killed Wednesday in a
district where Pakistan declared an end to major combat
operations hours earlier after a two-month assault,
security officials said. Helicopter gunships shelled
suspected Taliban hideouts near the towns of Kaasha and
Toti Mela in the northwest Orakzai tribal district,
killing seven militants, local administration official
Sajjad Ahmed told AFP. More than a dozen militants
attacked an army checkpost in the Shahu Khel area in which
two soldiers were wounded, the official said.
"Troops retaliated killing six militants and wounding
eight. The attack was launched by a group of 15-20
militants," Ahmed said.
Other security officials said 20 militants were killed and
12 wounded in helicopter gunship attacks and ground
clashes in upper parts of Orakzai.
It is impossible, however, to confirm casualty statistics
independently in what is a closed military zone
inaccessible to aid workers and journalists. A military
spokesman in the northwest said there was "complete peace"
in the lower reaches of Orakzai, where displaced families
had started to return over the past two weeks, he said.
Intelligence sources said upper Orakzai was more volatile
and troops were engaged against militants in Ghalju and
Dabori towns.
Military spokesman Major General Athar Abbas told AFP that
major operations in Orakzai were over, although "stabilisation"
operations may continue. "There are very small pockets of
resistance which are being cleared, but the major
population centres have been cleared and that includes the
passes that were connected to the Tirah valley in the
north," he said.
Since March 26, 46 soldiers and 106 militants had been
killed in Orakzai, Abbas said. Around 333 suspects were
arrested and 200 military personnel wounded, he added.
Pakistani forces opened a new front in Orakzai on March 24
in a bid to flush out Taliban who escaped a major assault
last year on South Waziristan, which the Tehreek-e-Taliban
Pakistan (TTP) leadership turned into its headquarters.
US out to ease India
concerns
AFP, Washington
The United States will try to reassure India that it
remains at the top of its priority list as the two
countries hold talks Wednesday on stepping up cooperation
around the world.
President Barack Obama has voiced support for warming ties
between the world's two largest democracies but focused on
fighting extremism in Pakistan, raising alarm in India
about the flow of US resources to its historic rival.
Senior US official William Burns acknowledged that some
Indians worried the United States saw India through the
prism of ties with Pakistan or cared less about New Delhi
than the other rising Asian power, China.
"Let me speak plainly to those concerns-this
administration has been, and will remain, deeply committed
to supporting India's rise and to building the strongest
possible partnership between us," said Burns, the under
secretary of state for political affairs. Burns said a
strong India was "in the strategic interest of the United
States," with the two countries in agreement on global
issues ranging from promoting democracy to reducing
poverty.
"Never has there been a moment when partnership between
India and America mattered more to the rest of the globe,"
he said.
Burns, the top US career diplomat, will hold talks with
his Indian counterpart, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao.
The two-day meetings will expand Thursday to include
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Foreign Minister
S.M. Krishna. Indian foreign ministry spokesman Vishnu
Prakash, previewing the talks, said the two countries
shared a "common objective of promoting peace, stability
and economic development in the region and beyond."
The Obama administration has increasingly turned to
"strategic dialogues" of this sort to show its commitment
to broadening relationships with key nations.
The United States held such talks with Pakistan in March,
hoping to dent the country's rampant anti-Americanism by
showing that Washington was interested in ties beyond just
cooperation on its war against the Taliban and its
Al-Qaeda allies in Afghanistan and the lawless border
region with Pakistan. One-upping that dialogue, Obama
himself will attend the reception Thursday for the talks
with India. He also plans to pay his first presidential
visit to India later this year.
The United States approved a 7.5-billion-dollar package
last year for Pakistan to build infrastructure and
democratic institutions. Washington has also praised what
it sees as Islamabad's growing determination to fight
Taliban insurgents.
But the Obama administration says it will press Pakistan
to also take the battle to rabidly anti-Indian militants
on its soil such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, which was linked to
the 2008 siege of Mumbai.
Robert Blake, the assistant secretary of state for South
Asia, said the United States "has consistently called for
greater action on the part of Pakistan to stop the
activities of these groups."
Japan PM resigns after US
base row
AFP, Tokyo
Japan's centre-left Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama
tearfully resigned Wednesday, just nine months after a
stunning election win, his brief reign derailed by a row
over an unpopular US airbase.
Hatoyama ended more than half a century of conservative
rule in an electoral earthquake last August, but soon
earned a reputation for crippling indecision at the helm
of the world's second-biggest economy. The 63-year-old
millionaire, the scion of an influential family dubbed
"Japan's Kennedys", quit at a meeting of his Democratic
Party of Japan (DPJ), blaming the base dispute and
political funding scandals.
"I will step down," an emotional Hatoyama told party
lawmakers at a special meeting in parliament, while also
vowing to "create a new DPJ". "I apologise to all of you
lawmakers here for causing enormous trouble."
Finance Minister Naoto Kan, 63, who is a deputy prime
minister, was widely tipped to succeed Hatoyama and in the
afternoon declared his intention to take over the party
leadership in a vote Friday. Kan, a former grassroots
civic activist, achieved popularity in the mid-1990s when
as health minister he admitted government culpability in a
scandal over HIV-tainted blood products.
The new DPJ chief must be elected as prime minister by
parliament in a vote expected later Friday. On Monday the
new premier is expected to give a policy address and
formally launch his new cabinet, said the DPJ. Speculation
had swirled for days that Hatoyama would quit as his
approval ratings, once above 70 percent, crashed below the
20-percent mark.
The premier's rapid demise since he took office in
mid-September was driven by the festering dispute over a
US Marine Corps airbase on Okinawa island that badly
strained ties with the United States, Tokyo's bedrock
ally. Hatoyama, a Stanford-trained engineering scholar,
took power vowing less subservient ties with Washington
and closer engagement with Asia, worrying many Japan
watchers in the United States.
He promised to move the US base off Okinawa, to ease the
burden for locals who have long complained of aircraft
noise, pollution and crime associated with a heavy
American military presence since World War II. But, after
failing to find an alternative location for the base in
Japan, the premier backtracked and decided to keep it on
the island, enraging Okinawans and his pacifist coalition
partners the Social Democrats.
Thai PM survives
no-confidence vote
AFP, Bangkok
Thailand's premier easily survived a parliamentary
no-confidence vote Wednesday over his handling of deadly
street protests, but a row erupted within his fragile
ruling coalition.
Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has been accused by his
political opponents of violating human rights in the tense
standoff between protesters and armed troops, who fired
live rounds during several confrontations in the capital.
Thanks to his ruling coalition's majority in the lower
house, however, the censure motion submitted by the
opposition was rejected by 246 votes to 186.
The Red Shirts' rally, broken up on May 19 in an army
assault on their vast encampment in the retail heart of
Bangkok, sparked outbreaks of violence that have left 89
people dead, mostly civilians, and nearly 1,900 injured.
The Red Shirts were campaigning for elections they hoped
would oust the government, which they view as undemocratic
because it came to power with the backing of the army
after a court ruling threw out the previous
administration.
Deputy premier Suthep Thaugsuban, reviled by many
protesters because he oversaw an earlier deadly crackdown
on April 10, also survived a no-confidence vote, along
with the foreign, finance, interior and transport
ministers.
But a row flared within the coalition government as the
Bhumjai Thai party said it could no longer work with Puea
Pandin lawmakers who withheld votes of confidence in the
interior and transport ministers, both from Bhumjai Thai.
Deputy Transport Minister Suchart Chokchaiwattanakorn
demanded the premier "choose between" the two parties.
"The prime minister must give an answer within this week,"
said Suchart, who belongs to Bhumjai Thai. "But I can
assure you that these two parties cannot work together any
longer."
The two parties each have 32 seats in the lower house of
parliament and if one bolts it would leave Abhisit's
coalition with a very narrow majority of 243 seats out of
475.
S.Koreans go to polls as
N.Korea looms large
AFP, South Korea
South Koreans went to the polls Wednesday in larger
numbers than expected for elections overshadowed by
security concerns over North Korea with surveys showing
the ruling party ahead in key races. The sinking of a
South Korean warship in March with the loss of 46 lives
cast a long shadow over the nationwide elections for local
posts.
Analysts had predicted a strong showing for President Lee
Myung-Bak's ruling party since cross-border threats at
election time-known as the "North wind"-tend to cause
voters to rally to the conservatives. Joint exit polls
conducted by three major TV stations showed the ruling
Grand National Party (GNP) was forecast to win five of 16
posts for provincial governors or city mayors.
The left-leaning Democratic Party (DP) was comfortably
ahead in five races while five others were too close to
call. One is expected to go to a minor party.
Exit polls showed the ruling party candidates ahead in two
key races-for the mayoralty of Seoul and the governorship
of Gyeonggi province surrounding the capital. Victory in
these crucial posts would give a boost to the Lee
government in pushing through its large-scale projects in
Asia's fourth biggest economy.
Election officials said turnout was higher than expected,
especially in closely contested constituencies. Official
results are expected early Thursday.
A total of 39 million voters were eligible to choose among
9,900 candidates for 4,000 posts including provincial
governors, mayors, councillors and education chiefs. A
multinational probe concluded last month that North Korea
torpedoed South Korea's warship.
The North flatly denies responsibility but a survey showed
54 percent of voters would take the "provocation" into
account in casting their vote.
Turkey
demands int'l panel probe Gaza boat deaths
ANKARA, Turkey
Turkey on Wednesday called for an international commission
to investigate the deaths on the Gaza aid ship flotilla,
and its foreign minister said Israel has agreed to release
all Turks involved in clash.
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said 210 Turks were
scheduled to be flown home from Israel on Turkish planes
later Wednesday. He said Israel also assured Turkey it
would not put any Turkish protesters on trial.
"We have clearly stated that we would review our ties with
Israel if all Turks not released by the end of the day,"
Davutoglu said. "All citizens of foreign countries will be
set free."
Israel's bloody raid on a flotilla of aid ships that
carried about 400 Turks dramatically escalated tensions
with Turkey. The attack killed nine people, including at
least four Turks. Turkey withdrew its ambassador and
scrapped war games with Israel as a result.
"No one has the right to try people who were kidnapped in
international waters," Davutoglu told a news conference.
There was no way to immediately reconcile the different
numbers of Turks said to be involved in the Gaza
operation.
The foreign minister, however, said two Turkish citizens
who were in serious condition will remain in Israeli
hospitals with a Turkish doctor.
"We will not leave them to the mercy of anyone," Davutoglu
said. Earlier Wednesday, Interior Minister Besir Atalay
said Turkey has beefed up security to protect its Jewish
minority as well as Israel's diplomatic missions amid the
tensions.
He said security was increased at 20 points alone in
Istanbul, which has several synagogues and centers serving
23,000 Jews. Israel has ordered the families of Israeli
diplomats out of Turkey.
The move came as hundreds of Turks protested against
Israel's commando raids on the ships for a third day
Wednesday.
Global military
spending soars despite crisis: report
AFP, Stockholm
Global military expenditures soared to a record high last
year, unscathed by the economic downturn, with the United
States accounting for more than half of increase, a think
tank said Wednesday.
In 2009, 1,531 billion dollars (1,244 billion euros) were
spent worldwide in the military sector, a 5.9 percent rise
from 2008 and a 49 percent jump from 2000, the Stockholm
International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said in its
report.
"Many countries were increasing public spending generally
in 2009, as a way of boosting demand to combat the
recession," explained Sam Perlo-Freeman, the head of
SIPRI's military expenditure project.
"Although military spending wasn't usually a major part of
the economic stimulus packages, it wasn't cut either," he
said in a statement.The institute said 65 percent of
countries for which data was available had hiked their
military spending last year.
The United States remains by far the top military spender,
dishing out 661 billion dollars to the industry in 2009,
or a whopping 43 percent of the total global military
expenditure. Washington thus paid 47 billion dollars more
than a year earlier and accounted for 54 percent of the
global increase, SIPRI said. China is believed to be the
world's second largest military spender, the institute
said, adding that while it did not have access to the
official figures from Beijing it estimated the country had
spent around 100 billion dollars in the sector last year.
With its 63.9 billion dollars in military expenditures
last year, France came in third place, SIPRI said.
"The figures also demonstrate that for major or
intermediate powers such as the US, China, Russia, India
and Brazil, military spending represents a long-term
strategic choice which they are willing to make even in
hard economic times," Perlo-Freeman said. A portion of the
2009 military spending hike can be attributed to a sharp
increase in so-called peacekeeping operations, especially
in Afghanistan, which also reached record levels last
year. In all, 54 peacekeeping missions took place around
the globe in 2009, costing a record total of 9.1 billion
dollars, SIPRI said. In terms of deployed personnel, last
year was also record-breaking, the institute said: 219,278
people, 89 percent of whom were military personnel, were
deployed, up 16 percent from 2008.
"The increase was due to troop reinforcement for existing
peace operations, most significantly for the NATO-led
International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in
Afghanistan," the report said.
The United States last year "more than doubled its troop
levels in Afghanistan and annual US spending in
Afghanistan now exceeds that in Iraq," SIPRI said.
White House backs
investigation into Israeli raid
AP, Washington
The Obama administration walked a fine line Tuesday in
response to Israel's lethal raid on a flotilla trying to
break the blockade of Gaza, calling on Israeli leaders to
let more aid into the beleaguered territory but refusing
to criticize the U.S. ally for the use of deadly force.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton supported a U.N.
Security Council statement that condemned the "acts" that
cost the lives of nine pro-Palestinian activists off the
Gaza coast. But U.S. officials refused to say whether they
held Israel or the activists responsible for the
bloodshed.
The administration is in a bind, caught between pressing
Israel to permit an easing of harsh conditions in the Gaza
Strip while accepting the need to stop the smuggling of
arms into Gaza that could be used to attack Israel.
At stake is the Obama administration's struggle to revive
the long-stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, a
difficult task in the best of times. To achieve this, the
United States is trying to keep both sides focused on the
goal of restarting talks, with the eventual promise of
peace for Israel and a homeland for the Palestinians.
Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East program at the
Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the
raid has complicated U.S. efforts to reassure Israel about
its security concerns while pushing for a comprehensive
Middle East peace deal. "It's hard to imagine any set of
actions which would have played more into the hands of
Israel's enemies," he said in a telephone interview.
"This seems to be a perfect storm of negative outcomes at
a time when the United States wants to do something quite
different, which is reassure Israelis, re-engage on
negotiations and try to resolve the underlying issues once
and for all." The Israeli raid came at a particularly
delicate moment in U.S.-Israeli relations, badly strained
by open conflict over Israeli settlement policy in the
West Bank.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was to have
visited the White House on Tuesday, in part to help heal
that rift, but he canceled in order to return home to deal
with the crisis. The State Department said Netanyahu's
visit would be rescheduled. President Barack Obama is to
meet at the White House next week with Palestinian
Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, and he sent his Middle
East peace envoy, former Sen. George Mitchell, back to the
region for meetings Wednesday with Palestinian officials.
Alejandro Wolff, deputy U.S. ambassador to the United
Nations, suggested to reporters in New York that some of
the activists aboard the raided vessels may have sought to
provoke the Israelis into a harsh response.
More aid ships headed to
Gaza, claims of Israeli sabotage
Internet
The Free Gaza Movement was Wednesday preparing to send
more aid ships to Gaza, amid claims that Israel may have
sabotaged the aid flotilla, one of the founders of the
pro-Palestinian movement told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
The Irish cargo-ship MV Rachel Corrie could reach Gaza
within two weeks, said Greta Berlin. Among the activists
on board was Irish Nobel Peace laureate Mairead Corrigan
Maguire Helen as well as former UB assistant secretary
general Dennis Halliday.
Berlin refused to give the exact position of the vessel as
she said the movement suspected Israel had been trying to
sabotage the aid flotilla bound for Gaza.
The MS Rachel Corrie had been set to join the convoy
headed by the Turkish Marvi Marmara but had suffered
sudden damage, forcing it to interrupt its voyage at
Cyprus. Another two vessels, the Challenger I and
Challenger II had also malfunctioned suddenly, Berlin
said. Inspections of the ships had shown that the electric
wires may have been tampered with, Berlin said, adding
they were still awaiting the results of a full
investigation. The rest of the convoy headed by the Marvi
Marmara was Monday forcefully intercepted by Israel. Nine
activists were killed when Israeli soldiers stormed the
boats, prompting a wave of international outrage against
Israel's operation.
Four of the dead have so far been identified as
Turks,Turkish officials said Wednesday. Berlin's remarks
followed comments by Israeli Deputy Defence Minister Matan
Vilnai on Israel Radio, clearly hinting Israel took covert
action to sabotage the convoy. Asked whether there had
been alternatives to an assault, Vilnai said, "All
possibilities had been considered", adding: "The fact is
that there were fewer than the 10 ships that were supposed
to participate in the flotilla."
The Irish cargo ship is loaded with 1,200 tons of aid
earmarked for Gaza, including 560 tons of cement, 100 tons
of medical equipment among them CAT scanners, a dental
office and 200 electric and regular wheelchairs, as well
as papers, sports gear and crayons for children. "We are
determined to continue with sending boats to Gaza," she
said.
She rejected Israel's charges that the activists on board
the Mavi Marmara had initiated the violence by attacking
the Israeli commandos landing on deck from helicopters
with iron rods, chairs and knives. The Israelis had
started to shoot into the crowd for no justifiable
reasons, she said.
"And for anyone to be so awful as to says that some sticks
are a match for machine guns, stun guns, teargas
cannisters and a heavily armed Israeli militia that's
boarding our ships in international waters has a serious
issue with who is the real terrorist," she said.
Israel Wednesday released 449 of the some 600 foreign
activists who had been on board the Gaza aid flotilla and
were subsequently detained by Israel in a prison in the
south of the country, a spokeswoman for Israel Prison
Service told dpa.
They included 123 nationals from Arab states, among
Jordanians and Kuwaitis, who were bussed to Israel's
Allenby border crossing over the River Jordan with
Israel's eastern neighbour over night.
UN rights council approves
probe into Israel's ship raid
AFP, Geneva
The UN Human Rights Council on Wednesday condemned
Israeli's "outrageous attack" on Gaza-bound aid ships and
set up an independent international investigation into the
raid.
The criticism came in a resolution proposed by Pakistan,
Sudan and the Palestinian delegation and adopted with 32
countries voting in favour, three against and eight
abstentions. The resolution "Condemns in the strongest
terms the outrageous attack by the Israeli forces against
the humanitarian flotilla of ships which resulted in the
killing and injuring of many innocent civilians from
different countries."
It "decides to dispatch an independent international
fact-finding mission to investigate violations of
international law, including international humanitarian
aid and human rights law" resulting from the attack.
It also authorises the president of the council to appoint
members of the mission.
Israeli commandos boarded one of the aid ships bound for
the Gaza Strip in a pre-dawn raid on Monday that left at
least nine passengers dead. Hundreds of pro-Palestinian
activists were also arrested.
The raid sparked global outrage and prompted states from
the Arab League and the Organisation of the Islamic
Conference (OIC) to ask for the special session of the 47
member states in the UN rights council.
Israel deports 126 Gaza
flotilla activists to Jordan
AFP, Amman
More than 120 people held by Israel after a botched raid
on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla that killed nine activists
were deported to Jordan on Wednesday, the Petra news
agency said.
The group comprised 30 Jordanians as well as nationals
from Bahrain, Kuwait, Morocco, Syria, Algeria, Oman,
Yemen, Mauritania, Indonesia, Pakistan, Malaysia and
Azerbaijan, the state-run agency said.
The detainees were deported through the King Hussein land
border crossing, the report said, without giving further
details.
Israeli army radio said the Jewish state was on Wednesday
deporting about 250 detainees, among them 60 Turks who
were at Ben Gurion airport, near Tel Aviv, awaiting
special flights home.
Another 70 Turkish citizens were on their way from prison
to the airport, the radio said.
Of the 682 people from 42 countries aboard the six ships
that were towed to an Israeli port after Monday's bloody
raid, 45 were flown out Monday and Tuesday.
Jordan's King Abdullah II on Monday instructed his
government to facilitate the transfer to the kingdom of
those wounded in the attack "and provide them with
necessary treatment and care before sending them to their
countries."
Abbas to ask Obama for
‘bold decisions’ on Middle East
AFP, Bethlehem
Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on Wednesday called for
US President Barack Obama to make "bold decisions" on
Middle East peace and accused Israel of "terrorism."
His remarks at the opening of an investment conference in
the occupied West Bank came ahead of a visit to Washington
next week and after Israel's deadly capture of an aid
convoy bound for the Hamas-run Gaza Strip on Monday.
"My message to Obama during our meeting in Washington next
week will be that we need bold decisions to change the
face of the region," Abbas said. Later in the day Abbas
returned to the West Bank political capital of Ramallah to
meet US envoy George Mitchell for the latest round of
indirect "proximity" talks with Israel launched on May 9.
"My message to all parties is that we need bold decisions
to change the face of the region and end the suffering and
the pain and the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands,"
Abbas told the investment conference.
The president spoke at the opening of the 2010 Palestine
Investment Conference, which he referred to as the
"Freedom Conference" in honour of those killed on Monday
aboard the "Freedom Flotilla" bound for Gaza.
Organisers said delegations from 26 countries would be
attending the conference, including a US presidential
delegation led by Mitchell. International peace envoy Tony
Blair was also in attendance. The West Bank economy saw
8.5-percent growth last year as Israel eased some movement
restrictions and hundreds of millions of dollars in
international aid flowed to prime minister Salam Fayyad's
Western-backed government. All festivities connected to
the conference were cancelled following the deadly seizure
of the aid convoy, but organisers said they would still
hold plenary sessions and working meetings between
delegates and officials.
Meanwhile, Abbas accused Israel of "state terrorism" over
the violent seizure of the ships by naval commandos in a
botched assault in which nine activists were killed and
scores wounded, including some Israeli soldiers.
Business/Economy
TCB
undertakes advance steps for upcoming Ramadan
BSS, Dhaka
Unlike the recent previous years, the Trading Corporation
of Bangladesh (TCB) this year has undertaken several steps
in advance to check price hike of essential commodities
during the upcoming month of Ramadan.
The state-run trading agency plans import of the
commodities- pulses, edible oil, palm oil, sugar and
onion-for supplying those to the people of low-income
groups at fair prices.
"We have taken risk as far as possible for this year's
Ramadan," M Khalilur Rahman, chairman of TCB, told BSS. He
said the TCB has already opened four letters of credit (LCs)
to procure the items to rein in price hike of essentials
during the holy month of fasting.
Four local and international tenders have been invited to
procure 6,000 tonnes of soyabean oil, 25,000 tonnes, of
sugar, 6000 tonnes of edible oil, 15000 tonnes of pulse
and 2000 tonnes of gram. "We will procure 4,000 tonnes of
gram, 25,000 tonnes of edible oil and 50,000 tonnes of
sugar before the holy month," said Rahman.
When asked whether they have any special measures to
control sugar price this year, he said the TCB has taken a
strategic plan to procure the item from local sources this
year and thus there is no scope of price volatility during
the month of fasting. The procured goods will be stored in
the government's warehouses and later be supplied to the
people through 1,700 dealers which are now being appointed
by the trading agency, the TCB chairman said. The TCB has
signed an agreement with a Mongla-based Indian company-SG
Oil Refineries Limited- to procure 6,000 metric tonnes of
refined edible oil every month.
For the first time, Rahman said, the agency will sell its
own brand of packets of edible oil weighing one, two and
five liters. The country needs one lakh tonnes of edible
oil per month, but the demand soars nearly to 1.5 lakh
tonnes during the Ramada. Other essentials such as pulses,
onion and sugar also go up at the same time.
When contacted, President of Federation of Bangladesh
Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI) Annisul Huq
said, "I think the prices of essentials remained somewhat
stable during last year's Ramadan due to the participation
of FBCCI in market monitoring." Replying to a question, he
said the FBCCI will monitor market this year if necessary.
PM
urges sympathy and fairness from industrialists
UNB, Sangsad Bhaban
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wednesday urged
industrialists to be more sympathetic towards the workers
in their industries for paying their wages.
"I will urge the owners to show more sympathy to the
workers while paying their wages and to please consider
inflation and other such factors during the calculation of
the wages," she said while responding to a supplementary
question of Golam Dastagir Gazi (Narayanganj-1) during the
PM's question and answer session.
She said that it was not always true that the workers are
involved in destructive activities in the factories.
"Often the outsiders are involved in destructive
activities in industries," she said pointing to the
garment factory destruction various times.
Hasina also said that the Awami League is very much
cordial towards the workers and their welfare. She said
that an 18-member committee has been formed to modernize
and update the Labor Policy 2010.
In the meantime, this committee has formed an 8-member
working cell to formulate Labor Policy quickly. "This
working cell held 8 meetings and then submitted their
draft policy," she said. The Prime Minister said that the
remarks from the industrialists have arrived on the Labor
Policy 2010 while the draft policy was sent to different
labour organizations, including Jatiya Sramik League, to
get their views. "After getting the remarks the draft
policy would be sent to the cabinet division to finalize
the policy," she said. She mentioned that in the draft
Labor Policy 2010, the spotlight has been thrown on 26
issues including fare wages, social safety net, skill
development, employment and guarantee for job.
Hasina said that the labor policy had been formulated in
line with Vision 2021, where there will be no wages
discrimination between male and female workers and the
welfare of the expatriate workers will be included.
Joint
Cooperation Strategy agreement signed with donors
UNB, Dhaka
Finance Minister AMA Muhith on Wednesday said that the
government is seeking the highest amount of foreign
assistance on a priority basis in the energy and power
sector, followed by the communications sector, climate
change and environment. "We want foreign assistance to a
great extent in the energy and power sector and then we
seek foreign assistance in communications and encompassing
all things to climate change and environment," he said
while talking to reporters after the signing ceremony of
the Joint Cooperation Strategy (JCS) between the
government and 18 development partners at NEC-2.
Muhith, however, said that in terms of money, foreign
assistance in the country's agriculture sector is very
limited although research in agriculture is a very
important issue. "Most of the studies in the country's
agriculture sector were done internally where the
contribution from the government was very little. The
contribution from the public is rather greater and the
government plays a catalyst's role," he said.
Asked whether the accountability of the development
partners were ensured in the JCS, the Finance Minister
said that the development partners would also have some
responsibility as per the JCS.
He also termed it a 'red letter day' as the agreement has
been signed after five long years since the government and
the development partners started working on it. "Our
target was also to ensure harmonization between the two
sides and through this signing the journey for it has
begun," he added. On aid effectiveness, the Finance
Minister said that the government has taken many steps to
improve its implementation capacity, adding: "In the last
9 months, we have achieved implementation progress of
57-58 percent which we have never achieved in the past."
60,000 jobs to
be created upon completion of KEPZ
UNB, Dhaka
Korean ambassador to Bangladesh Taiyoung Cho on Wednesday
said that employment opportunities for 60,000 more people
would be created in Bangladesh when the construction work
on the Korean Export Processing Zone (EPZ) ends in
Chittagong.
"The construction works of Korean EPZ in Chittagong is at
the closing stage and upon completion of the works 60,000
more employment opportunities would be created," said the
ambassador when he called on the Planning Minister AK
Khandaker at the latter's office.
During the meeting, they discussed different issues,
including the agreements signed during Prime Minister
Sheikh Hasina's recent visit to Korea, about the
construction work of Korean EPZ in Chittagong, Korean
investment scope in Bangladesh and the bilateral
relationship between the two countries. The Korean
ambassador underscored the investment potential of his
country in the power, ICT, garments, leather and
industrial sectors of Bangladesh. Mentioning that the
Korean investors are eager to invest in Bangladesh, he
said that some 1 lakh Bangladeshis became employed in 150
Korean ventures in Bangladesh.
BB scoops out
prospect for Spanish investment in power sector
BSS, Dhaka
Bangladesh Bank (BB) has scooped out an opportunity for
getting investment in the country's power sector from
Spain.
BB Governor Dr Atiur Rahman got a positive nod on the
issue at bilateral talks with the chief of the Spanish
central bank, Miguel Fernandez, in Madrid on Tuesday.
"Spain has expertise in renewable energy sector and they
are interested about Bangladesh's efforts to develop this
area," Dr Atiur told BSS today by phone from Madrid.
He said the country's power sector would also get
significant investment from the Bangladeshi expatriates in
Spain.
The governor is now visiting Europe for holding bilateral
meetings with the central bank of Spain, addressing the FT
Sustainable Banking Conference in London, and
participating in the plenary session of the Global YES
Summit in the Swedish town of Leksand.
Besides the meeting with the Spanish central bank, Dr
Atiur also held a meeting with the expatriate Bangladeshis
in Madrid where Bangladesh embassy officials were present.
The governor said the Bangladeshi expatriates at the
meeting expressed their firm willingness to invest in
Bangladesh power sector.
Dr Atiur said he had discussed the matter with the Spanish
central bank so the 30,000 Bangladeshi people living in
Spain can remit their savings through an affordable
official channel.
He said the Spanish governor agreed on allowing an
exchange house in Madrid for facilitating Bangladeshi
people a convenient channel for sending remittance.
Dr Atiur said the major objective of his meeting with
Miguel Fernandez was to establish a technical partnership
between the central banks of the two countries.
National
Call for steps to protect women,
children from tobacco grip
BSS, Rajshahi
Speakers at a views-sharing session here Tuesday
underscored the need for an immediate step to protect the
women and children from tobacco curses.
Terming tobacco as the most harmful for the women health
especially the pregnant mothers, they called for a
collective effort of all quarters to overcome the crises.
Association for Community Development (ACD) under its
'Peoples Initiative to Tobacco Control: A Step towards
Smoke-free Rajshahi Division Project' organized the
meeting titled "Women and Tobacco: Bangladesh Perspective"
at the ACD conference hall in observance of the No Tobacco
Day. Project Coordinator Ehsanul Amin Emon presented a
keynote paper on "Women in Tobacco's Aggression: Our roles
to protect and prevent it" illustrating the demerits of
the tobacco uses.
Chaired by Executive Director of ACD Salima Sarwar, the
session was addressed by Local unit Chairman of Jatiya
Mohila Sangstha Advocate Morzina Parveen, Medical Officer
of Civil Surgeon Office Dr Habiba Ara Begum and its Senior
Health Education Officer Sharifa Begum and Advocate
Shamsunnaher Mukti as panel discussants.
The speakers revealed that the smoking of cigarette and
bidi contains over 4,000 harmful chemical substances and
about 57,000 people die of tobacco use every year in the
country, while 3.82 lakh become worthless. Apart from
this, they informed that smoking is the cause of heart
diseases and lung cancer, which also creates problems to
breathing. Smoking and consumption of tobacco enhance
risks of tuberculosis by four times and the passive
smokers might be affected equally.
Besides, smoking reduces immunity of the body so the
smokers must be motivated through creating awareness, they
said. To get rid of the problem, they suggested
sensitizing the relevant stakeholders about the harm of
secondhand smocking and importance of smoke-free
public-places and transports to protect the women and
children from tobacco. Besides, they added that the
authorities of the public places and transports should be
influenced for establishing 100 percent smoke-free public-
paces and transports. Stressing the need for proper
enforcement of the tobacco control act they mentioned that
the enterprises producing tobacco products should print
the health warnings on the packed and packages in capital
letters clearly.
The speakers said joint efforts between the government and
the non- government organizations (NGOs) are necessary to
speed up the tobacco control movement. They suggested
controlling smoking and tobacco use. Councilors of
Rajshahi City Corporation Firoja Khatun.
New mango varieties waiting for release in C’nawabganj
BSS, Chapainawabganj
Regional Horticulture Research Station (RHRS) in
Chapainawabganj has been conducting research on a number
of new varieties of mango that are likely to be released
within a few years.
Scientists and experts at the center said among these
varieties, two are named as 'Kutcha Mitha', two local
selected varieties, one American colour variety and a
number of hybrid varieties.
A high profile evaluation committee from Bangladesh
Agriculture Research Institute (BARI) comprising breeders,
horticulturists, entomologists and pathologists will
evaluate these varieties of mango and after their
evaluation these are expected to be released in phases.
Principal Scientific Officer and in charge of the Chief
Scientific Officer (CSO) of RHRS, Dr. Md. Shafiqul Islam
said, they are expecting that at least two new varieties
will be released this year after the evaluation.
He added that the evaluation is done on the basis of
regularity in bearing, shape, colour, size, taste, yield
and resistance to disease and insects. He further added
that two to four under process varieties are performing
well.
Meanwhile, the research station has released seven new
varieties of mango identified as BARI Aam 1,2,3,4,6,7 and
8. Of them, BARI Aam 2 (Lakhanbhog) and BARI Aam 7 (Apela)
are colour varieties and BARI Aam 4 is a hybrid variety.
Of these varieties, BARI Aam 1 was released in 1995, BARI
Aam 2 in 1996, BARI Aam 3 in 1999, BARI Aam 4 in 2003 and
at last BARI Aam 6,7 and 8 were released in October in
2009.
About BARI Aam 6,7 and 8, he said these varieties are
regular bearer and excellent in taste. Each mango weighs
180 grams to 300 grams. Each eight to twelve years old
tree can yield 130 kg to 170 kg of mango in one season.
The RHRS was established on 33 acres of land in
Chapainawabganj town in 1985 as Chapainawabganj Mango
Research Centre with a view to conducting research on
variety development, plant protection, cultural management
and post harvest management.
At present one chief scientific officer, one principal
scientific officer, three senior scientific officers, two
scientific officers, 13 supporting staffs and 24 labourers
are working here.
Sustainable dev possible thru’
successful implementation of MDG: Speakers
BSS, Rangpur
Speakers at a workshop at Chilmari in Kurigram district
Wednesday said that sustainable developments could be
achieved through successful implementation of the
Millennium Development Goals (MDG) at the local levels.
Implementation of the locally planned need-based
programmes through locally monitored, supervised, directed
and accountable management could ensure the long-cherished
developments of the common people to eradicate poverty,
they said.
They were addressing the daylong regional workshop titled
'Localization of the MDG at Local Levels' organised by
Chilmari upazila administration at the Tere Des Homes (TDH)
auditorium in Chilmari upazila town Wednesday. The
workshop was arranged under the auspices of 'Support to
Monitoring Poverty Reduction Strategies and MDGs in
Bangladesh' under the assistances of the UNDP for all of
the regional stakeholders to make the MDGs successful at
the grassroots levels.
Chaired by Chilmari UNO M Enamul Haque, the workshop was
attended and addressed by Chilmari upazila chairman and
valiant Freedom Fighter Shawkat Ali Sarker, Bir Bikram, as
the chief guest. Assistant Chief of the Planning
Commission of the Government of Bangladesh Mahbub Alam
Siddique, UNDP representatives Dr Sodananda Mishra and
Prashun Kanti Talukder were present as the special guests.
A total of 40 participants, including government and NGO
officials, community leaders, professionals, civil society
members, journalists and elite took part in the workshop.
The speakers informed that some 189 member states of the
United Nations (UN) unitedly and unequivocally fixed the
MDGs and committed for its implementation in 2000 to
achieve eight concrete targets in all countries by the
year 2015.
RU students stage demonstration
against introduction of night course
BSS, Rajshahi
A large number of students of Rajshahi University here
Wednesday staged a demonstration to protest the
introduction of night course in seven departments of the
university.
The students under the banner of Progressive Students
Alliance (PSA) comprising four progressive student
organizations- Bangladesh Chhatra Union, Chhatra Front,
Chhatra Federation and Chhatra Moitree- brought out a
protest rally on the campus.
Speaking on the occasion, the protesting students said
seven departments- Mass Communication and Journalism,
Economics, Public Administration, Social Work, Sociology,
Information Science and Library Management and Political
Science- have decided to conduct the two-year night course
from the current year in exchange of Taka 50,000 per
student.
They alleged that the new course would affect the normal
day- course system badly as the teachers are going to gain
financially after operating the additional course
bypassing their sole responsibilities, they added.
Addressing the rally Chhatra Front President Al Mahmud
Mitul sought intervention of the Bangladesh University
Grant Commission authority in this regard saying that the
new course system would trigger the commercialization
process in the public university.
Sports
Bangladesh League
Abahani savours defeat against Mohammedan
TBT Report
Dhaka Abahani tasted its first defeat in the Bangladesh
Football League when the three-time champions suffered a 2-1
defeat against perennial foe Dhaka Mohammedan Sporting Club at
Bangabandhu National Stadium in the city on Wednesday.
Dhaka Mohammedan took the lead when prolific Bangladesh
international Zahid Hasan Ameli struck on the hour mark (1-0).
But the Black and White brigade failed to maintain its lead as
the defending champions hit back just three minutes before the
break with Awudu Ibrahim scoring the equalizer to level the
scores 1-1 at the half time.
Amid the attacks and counter attacks between the two arch
rivals, Mamunul Islam scored the all important goal for Dhaka
Mohammedan on 75 minutes to give the Black and Whites a 2-1
victory over Dhaka Abahani, which toiled hard in the remainder
to preserve its unbeaten run in the Bangladesh League.
But all its attempts to find an equalizer went futile as its
forwards looked listless to break the Mohamme-dan's citadel.
Bothers Union and Feni Soccer Club played to a 1-1 draw in the
other match of the day at Feni Stadium.
Brothers Union went ahead with Enock Bentil scoring after 16
minutes but the advantage was cancelled out when Raju brought
the roof down scoring the equalizer for the hosts with his
68th-minute strike, forcing the Dhaka team to share points.
Dhaka
Div emerges champion in divisional karate
UNB, Dhaka
Dhaka Division emerged champions in the 4th Electra Divisional
Karate Championship securing seven gold medals in the
eleven-category meet held on Wednesday at the NSC auditorium
in the city.
Chittagong Division finished a distant 2nd collecting two
gold, four silver and four bronze medals while Rajshahi
Division was placed third with two gold medals.
Vice President of Bangladesh Olympic Asso-ciation Mizanur
Rah-man Manu was the chief guest at the day's closing function
and distributed the prizes.
President of Bangladesh Karate Federation Masud Parvez Rubel
was the special guest at the function, also attended by
federation general secretary Moazzem Hossain Sentu.
The eleven gold winners: Girls Kata - SA Games gold winner
Munni Khatun (Dhaka); -45 kgs Kumi - Sharifa Khatun (Rajshahi);
-53 Kgs Kumi - Huma Khatun (Rajshahi); -60 kgs Kumi - Farhana
Halim (Dhaka);
+60 kgs Kumi - Nazma Akhter (Dhaka); Boys Kata - Parvez
(Dhaka); -50 kgs Kumi - Hossain Ali (Chittagong); -55 kgs Kumi
- Mohammad Sharif (Dhaka); -60 kgs Kumi - Shamim Osman
(Dhaka); -67 kgs Kumi - Lokman Hossain (Dhaka); and +67 kgs
Kumi- Mamunur Rashid (Chitta-gong).
Sixty-six top ranking karatekas from six divisions of the
country took part in the meet.
Federer
falls to Soderling
AFP, Paris
Robin Soderling gatecrashed Roland Garros for the second
successive year on Tuesday as the free-swinging Swede sent
defending champion and 16-time Grand Slam king Roger
Federer spinning to a shock defeat.
Twelve months on from condemning four-time champion Rafael
Nadal to his first loss in Paris, Soderling again
unleashed his sledgehammer forehand to beat the world
number one 3-6, 6-3, 7-5, 6-4 in the quarter-finals.
It was Federer's earliest Grand Slam exit in six years and
Soderling's first triumph over the Swiss in 12 meetings,
including the final here last year.
Soderling's win, achieved on a gloomy, wet evening in
Paris, brought to an end Federer's record run of 23
successive Grand Slam semi-final appearances, stretching
back to his third round defeat to Gustavo Kuerten here in
2004.
It also set up a semi-final clash against Tomas Berdych of
the Czech Republic who eased past Mikhail Youzhny of
Russia.
Federer, who saw 14 aces and 19 forehand winners from the
Swede sap his spirit, said he had let his chances slip
away, but paid tribute to his opponent.
"I'm disappointed to a certain degree. I didn't think I
played a bad match so it's easier to go out this way,"
said Federer. "The conditions were really rough, but he
came up with some great tennis. In best of five set
matches, you always get chances. I had those at 5-4 in the
second set. "But he kept on coming and played aggressive."
Soderling was delighted to have achieved a second
successive French Open shock.
"I love playing on this court. I have been here for two
weeks and have been playing better and better with each
match," said the Swede. "Today I played really well. It
can't get much better than this to beat the world number
one on this court." The fifth seed added: "It's great to
beat the world number one and the defending champion two
years running here. I played great tennis even in the
first set, I just didn't serve very well. The balls got
heavier and these kind of conditions suit my game pretty
well. I wanted to serve well and take the ball early."
"He had chances in the second set as well as the first.
But I saved some big points and that was very important. I
could relax and then I played better and better." Federer
swept through the first set with a crucial break in the
eighth game, having surrendered just two points on his own
serve.
Donovan enjoys World Cup boost
BSS/AFP, Washington
Landon Donovan has set aside memories of a tension-filled
2006 flop, taken confidence from a long-sought European
success and finds himself ready to spark the
United States at the World Cup. The 28-year-old midfielder
is the all-time American leader with 42 goals and an even
more dangerous set-up man, able to roam the right or left
side and push the attack with crisp passing and quick
runs.
But his most dangerous improvement has been his mindset.
His help in a 2002 US run to the last eight is a distant
memory. So is the pressure of a joyless 2006 first-round
ouster. Donovan is a man of the moment and that moment is
now.
"The biggest improvement I've made has been mentally,"
Donovan said. "At 20, it was youthful exuberance and
naivete and literally just playing every day because you
loved to play every day.
"Now there's more responsibility. There's also greater
opportunity and I enjoy the challenge of that. In 2006,
that became I think burdensome because I wasn't ready for
it and now I'm ready for it. And I'm really excited for
it."
Donovan signed a six-year deal with Germany's Bayer
Leverkusen in 1999 at age 16 but was back with San Jose of
Major League Soccer two years later without playing a
match.
A return in 2005 saw him playing but homesick and he left
for the Los Angeles Galaxy, his current club, after just
two months.
After also going scoreless in six matches on a 2009 loan
to Bayern Munich, Donovan found a taste of Toffee and the
Merseyside to his liking, scoring twice in 13 matches for
Everton in a three-month English Pre-miership stint this
year.
Pakistan
appoints Salman Butt vice captain
AFP, Lahore
Pakistan on Wednesday appointed opener Salman Butt as vice
captain for the upcoming tours of Sri Lanka and England
after he lost the Test captaincy to Shahid Afridi.
"Butt has been appointed vice captain for the Asia Cup in
Sri Lanka and for the tour of England," a Pakistan Cricket
Board spokesman said.
The 25-year-old will be deputy to Afridi who was last week
appointed captain for the two tours.
Butt was seen as a top contender for the Test captaincy
after Mohammad Yousuf was sacked following Pakistan's
dismal tour of Australia in February. Pakistan lost all
three Tests, five one-day and a Twenty20 match in
Australia.
But once Afridi, who has not played a Test since 2006,
made himself available for the longer version of the game
Butt was pushed to the deputy's spot.
Pakistan take on hosts and defending champions Sri Lanka,
India and Bangladesh in the Asia Cup from June 15-24
before their tour of England.
Pakistan play two Twenty20 and two Tests against Australia
before taking on England in four Tests, five one-day and
two Twenty20 matches.
Butt was previously vice captain of the team led by Shoaib
Malik in 2007. The left-hander has so far played 27 Tests,
76 one-day and 22 Twenty20 games for Pakistan since making
his debut in 2003.
Eto'o sending off eases
Portugal’s win
AFP, Covilha
Portugal claimed a deserved 3-1 friendly win over Cameroon
on Tuesday, a victory that was given a helping hand by the
first half sending-off of Inter Milan striker Samuel Eto'o.
Portugal dominated the early stages and opened the scoring
just after the half hour mark through FC Porto's Raul
Meireles.
Eto'o protested the goal to the referee and, having
already been booked for a foul on Portugal defender Duda,
the Cameroon star was shown a second yellow and then a red
card in the 33rd minute.
Portugal took advantage of their numerical superiority and
the on-form Meireles grabbed his second of the game in the
46th minute.
Eto'o was making his first appearance for Cameroon since
helping his Italian club to an historic treble of the
Serie A title, Italian Cup and Champions League.
However even in his absence the Indomitable Lions, who
will play Denmark, Japan and the Netherlands in Group E of
the World Cup, fought back valiantly and reduced arrears
in the 69th minute when Webo rose to meet a superb cross
into the area and fired a bullet header
Cameroon hustled and bustled in a bid to grab an equaliser
but despite Portugal midfielder Pedro Mendes leaving the
field with an injury in the 72nd minute the Africans were
kept in check.
Real Madrid striker Cristiano Ronaldo has struggled to
make an impact for his national side in recent months and
that streak continued, with Manchester United's Nani
providing the hosts' third goal nine minutes from time.
Cameroon will play one more friendly, against Serbia on
June 5 in Belgrade, before flying to South Africa.
Portugal fly out to South Africa later this week and open
their tournament against Ivory Coast on June 15, with
further Group G matches against Brazil and North Korea.
Brazil fever sweeps Harare
AFP, Harare
Five-time World Cup winners Brazil arrived here late
Tuesday to a tumultuous welcome ahead of a friendly clash
with Zimbabwe.
The South Americans boast stars like Dani Alves, Julio
Cesar, Robinho, Lucio, Maicon, Kaka and Luis Fabiano and
were met at the airport by cabinet ministers, government
officials and supporters wearing the famous yellow and
blue strip. Coach Dunga, captain of the 1994 World
Cup-winning side, were also welcomed by fans chanting
"Kaka, Kaka, Kaka" in tribute to the Real Madrid midfield
star.
Among those who cheered the Brazilians was a teenage son
of long-serving President Robert Mugabe.
The 70-strong delegation, comprising coaches, players and
officials, boarded a luxury white bus and police escorted
them to a city hotel ahead of their game against Zimbabwe
Wednesday at the 60,000-capacity National Stadium.
Zimbabwe have chosen 13 foreign-based professionals plus
local stars and the 'Warriors' will be led by out-of-favour
Manchaster City striker Benjamin 'Benjani' Mwaruwari
against one of the favourites for the 2010 World Cup which
kicks off on June 11 in South Africa.
Shariff Mussa, the Zimbabwe team manager, said his team
was well prepared for the South American giants.
"The guys are bubbling with confidence," Mussa told AFP.
"We know the magnitude of this match as we are playing
Brazil, but the ball is round and anything can happen."
The 'Samba Boys' rarely play against African teams and
Zimbabwe will become only the fifth to face them during
the past 30 years after Cameroon, Egypt, Nigeria and South
Africa.
England tour crucial for Pakistan
AFP, Lahore
Pakistan coach Waqar Younis said Wednesday next month's
England tour would be crucial for rebuilding the team,
pinning his hopes on an influx of fresh blood to turn
their fortunes around.
Pakistan face a hectic four months, starting with the
four-nation Asia Cup in Sri Lanka from June 15, then
playing Australia in two Twenty20 and two Tests in England
before taking on their hosts in four Tests, two Twenty20
and five one-day games.
Waqar, who returned from Sydney on Tuesday, said he needs
focus and unity from the team.
"We are starting a hectic period with the Asia Cup but I
think the England tour is very important for the team,
where we need to adopt a rotation policy and I think some
new players will come into the fray," Waqar told
reporters.
Waqar, 40, took over as coach in March following
Pakistan's disastrous tour of Australia where the team
lost all three Tests, five one-day and a Twenty20 match.
Under him Pakistan made the semi-final of the World
Twenty20 last month.
The Pakistan Cricket Board has named a 35-man preliminary
squad for the Asia Cup and tour of England, including a
number of newcomers. A final squad for the Asia Cup is
expected to be announced on Thursday.
"I think the objective behind naming a number of
youngsters is to encourage them and it is important that
players be rotated because we have a series against South
Africa in October-November this year as well," said Waqar.
Waqar backed Shahid Afridi, who was last week named
captain for the Asia Cup and tour of England.
"Afridi has not led Pakistan in Tests before," said Waqar.
"But he conducted himself well in the World Twenty20 and
unity and fighting spirit would be the key to success and
he can achieve both from the team."
Waqar said ace batsman Mohammad Yousuf cannot be forced
out of retirement.
"Yousuf seems to be adamant on his retirement and although
we need him for Tests, we cannot force him out of
retirement," said Waqar.
Yousuf was one of seven players banned and fined by an
inquiry committee in March soon after the Australia tour.
He retired in protest while the other six players have
appealed against the sanctions.
Shoaib Malik, one of the penalised players, had his
one-year ban overturned last week and is now free to play
for Pakistan.
Appeals against Younus Khan's indefinite ban and a
one-year ban on Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, plus fines on Afridi,
Kamran Akmal and Umar Akmal are pending.
Ruthless Capello
sends message by dropping Walcott
AFP, London
Fabio Capello's decision to leave Theo Walcott out of his
final 23-man squad for the World Cup has sent a clear
message to England's stars as they head to South Africa.
Walcott is the latest high-profile victim of Capello's
ruthless determination to stamp his authority on his teams
and his absence should leave the squad in no doubt that
their manager won't tolerate underachievement in the
finals.
The Arsenal winger was widely expected to feature in
Capello's plans for the World Cup in South Africa after
playing a significant role in the qualifying campaign. He
appeared to underline his importance with a hat-trick in
the vital 4-1 victory over Croatia in September 2008, but
injuries and a series of erractic performances for Arsenal
this season have changed Capello's thinking.
Walcott showed his pace remains a tremendous asset when he
briefly flickered into life in last week's friendly win
over Mexico, yet his decision-making is poor and his
crossing well below the standard required at the highest
level.
He had been receiving lessons in delivering the ball from
David Beckham but in the end Capello decided that the more
experienced Shaun Wright-Phillips and Aaron Lennon would
provide better options on the right flank.
Four years ago Walcott was selected by then England coach
Sven Goran Eriksson for the finals in Germany, even though
the teenager had yet to make his Premier League debut.
Walcott has since admitted he didn't deserve that call-up
but he felt certain he would make it this time and being
disgarded by Capello came as a big shock.
Yet it whouldn't have been so surprising if he had
remembered how easily Capello dispatched Michael Owen into
international exile despite the Manchester United
striker's superb goal-scoring record for his country.
Walcott said: "I am very disappointed not to be included
in the squad going out to South Africa, but completely
respect Mr Capello's decision.
Jankovic edges Shvedova in quarterfinal
AFP, Paris
Serbian fourth seed Jelena Jankovic reached her third
French Open semifinal on Wednesday with a 7-5, 6-4 victory
over Kazakhstan's Yaroslava Shvedova in a mistake-plagued
quarterfinal clash.
Jankovic, who also made the last four in 2007 and 2008,
will face either top seed Serena Williams or Samantha
Stosur of Australia for a place in the final after a
last-eight clash which saw 10 breaks of serve and 42
unforced errors.
The 22-year-old Shvedova, the world 36, had stunned
Jankovic in the second round of the US Open last year and
even in her two defeats to the Serbian, she had gone down
fighting, stretching her opponent to three sets.
She was quickly ahead on Wednesday with a break in the
opening game on Court Suzanne Lenglen which, for the first
time in a week, was bathed in bright sunshine as bright as
Jankovic's yellow dress.
However, the fourth seed settled into a steady rhythm and
broke back for 3-3 before wrapping up the first set after
41 minutes in the 12th game.
The lanky Shvedova, standing at a slender 1.80m and who
had never previously got beyond the third round of a Grand
Slam, then exchanged breaks with Jankovic in the opening
four games of the second set as errors piled up on both
sides.
After a lengthy fifth game, the 25-year-old Serbian held
serve to nip ahead 3-2, but the Kazakh refused to yield
and took the next two games with her third break of the
set secured by a deep, pinpoint forehand.
Again Shvedova was unable to capitalise and handed back
the break in the eighth game when she missed a simple
overhead, performing an embarrassing air shot instead,
much to Jankovic's stunned, open-mouthed amusement.
It was typical of the 91-minute affair that Jankovic
clinched victory when her Russian-born opponent served up
a fourth double fault.
Federer eyes Wimbledon boost
AFP, Paris
Roger Federer insists there will be no inquests into his
shattering French Open quarter-final defeat, claiming he
is already dreaming of a seventh Wimbledon title instead.
The world number one was bludgeoned into submission by the
Swedish sledge-hammer of Robin Soderling which also
accounted for four-time champion Rafael Nadal's first
Roland Garros career loss a year ago.
Federer's shock 3-6, 6-3, 7-5, 6-4 defeat, which ended his
one-year reign as French Open champion, also brought to an
end his record, six-year run of 23 successive Grand Slam
semi-finals appearances.
But the great Swiss refuses to dwell on the implications
of the defeat which could also see him relinquish the
world number one spot to Nadal should the Spaniard clinch
a fifth Paris crown on Sunday.
Federer believes Tuesday's outcome may have been different
if the tie was played out beneath bright sunshine rather
than the damp, chilly murkiness which has shrouded most
days at Roland Garros.
"You can't really practice with these kind of conditions,"
said the 16-time Grand Slam title winner whose rhythm
against Soderling was further unsettled by a 75-minute
rain interruption.
"You just take them the way they come. That's why it's
disappointing. And honestly, I don't look too deep into
why I lost today.
"For me, it's very clear, very quickly. That's why I think
I can move away from this rather fast and concentrate on
the grass season coming up."
The quarter-final loss meant the end of Federer's record
of 12 wins in 12 meetings with the Soderling and, should
Nadal triumph on Sunday, an end to his chances of
equalling Pete Sampras's mark of 286 weeks as world number
one.
"It was a great run. It started here when I lost to
Kuerten back in '04. If then I could have signed for all
those semis in a row, I would have done it right away,"
added the 28-year-old. "I've made incredible progress in
terms of my play at the highest of level to be able to
always come back and play semis after semis after semis in
Slams and give myself chances to win."
Federer also insisted his European claycourt swing had
been badly affected by the weather with the damp, heavy
conditions here virtually identical to those he endured in
early losses in Estoril and Rome in April.
His lack of serving strength also played a part in his
defeat.
"I'm not blaming the conditions, but I think they were in
his favour towards the end," explained Federer.
"These were serious, tough conditions. If you serve
225kmh, 230, you can still hit through the court on the
serve.
"I may be lacking those 5 to 10ks extra on the serve to
hit through a guy, but that's the way conditions are. I
can't complain, because it was the same for both of us.
"But of course I'm disappointed to have lost three matches
in the rain on clay this season - in Estoril, in Rome, and
now here again. So I just couldn't come up with the plays
when I had to today."
Nicklaus still expects Woods to break major
landmark
AFP, Dublin
Jack Nicklaus still expects Tiger Woods to break his
all-time record of 18 major golf titles, even though the
world number one is struggling with injury, scandal and
second-ranked Phil Mickelson.
Nicklaus will host defending champion Woods and Mickelson
at Muirfield Village this week for the six million-dollar
PGA Memorial, a key test just two weeks ahead of the US
Open at Pebble Beach, where Woods won the 2000 US Open.
"It's interesting that Tiger and Phil are sort of battling
for No. 1 at this point in time. That should be
interesting here," Nicklaus said Tuesday.
"Tiger has played better than Phil has here, but Phil has
played well here."
Woods, who also won the Memorial from 1999 through 2001,
withdrew from the Players Championship last month with an
inflamed facet joint in his neck.
Add that to a five-month layoff in the wake of a marital
infidelity scandal that left Woods ridiculed and
apologetic and it would be no shock if Nicklaus thought
the 14-time major winner had lost his chance at the
all-time mark.
Italians deny Supercup date
AFP, Rome
The Italian Football League denied on Tuesday that a date
in Beijing had been set for next season's season-opening
Supercup despite earlier reports to the contrary.
Italian Ambassador to China Riccardo Sessa had announced
the match between Inter Milan and AS Roma would take place
in Beijing on August 21.
However the Football League said: "We want to stipulate
that we have not yet taken any decision with regards the
location or date for the match."
The stumbling block appears to be Inter's commitment to
play Atletico Madrid in the European Supercup in Monaco on
August 27. Inter are unwilling to play in China just six
days before their Monaco date. "The reality is that we
told the Football League that we can't play the Italian
Supercup in China on August 21 because we have to play the
European Supercup in Monaco on August 27," said Inter
director Ernesto Paolillo.
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