Monday, May 30, 2011

Mid Day International News

Mid Day International News

Pak returns 'Most Wanted' list to India, asks to rectify it

Posted:

Neighbouring country takes potshot at Indian authorities for the goof up in the list

Pakistan has returned to India its list of "Most Wanted" terrorists and asked New Delhi to recheck it, saying some of those named were in India, a media report said yesterday.

The list handed over to Pakistan by India contained names of 50 alleged terrorists who, according to New Delhi, were involved in subversive activities in the country. India demanded that Pakistan hand over the wanted people.


Terror quartet: (clockwise from left) Dawood Ibrahim, Zakiur Rahman
Lakhvi, Hafiz Saeed and Illiyas Kashmiri are hiding in Pakistan.

"But after taking a thorough review, Pakistan has objected that one terrorist out of the list was arrested from India, while another was already in the custody of Indian intelligence agency CBI, which shows the negligence of Indian authorities in preparing the list. India may ensure that no other person included in the list was not on Indian territory before again handing it over to Pakistan," a source said.

Among the names in the list are those of JuD chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, underworld don Dawood Ibrahim, LeT leader Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, and HuJI chief Ilyas Kashmiri. When contacted, Tehmina Janjua, a spokesperson of the ministry of foreign affairs, said Pakistan has sought clarifications from India about the mistakes in the list.

Pakistan would review the matter when India gives the corrected list to Pakistan, she added.


Pak PM denies attending funeral of Headley's dad

Posted:

LeT operative David Headley has told a jury in the Tahawwur Rana trial that Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani attended his father's funeral, but the latter's office rubbished the claim.

"Did the prime minister attend your father's funeral?" asked Rana's attorney Patrick Blegen.


Official connection: David Headley's half-brother Danyal Gilani works as
a public relations officer at Gilani's office

"Yes," replied Headley. Saleem Gilani was former Director General of Radio Pakistan and worked for the Pakistani Embassy in Washington DC. The Prime Minister's Office also clarified that the well- known broadcaster died in December 2008 in Lahore, and not in 2010.

"The Prime Minister never attended Saleem Gilani's funeral and had only visited Danyal Gilani's (Headley's half-brother) house to condole the death," a spokesman for Gilani's office said.

Imran Khan as next Pak PM?

Posted:

3 lakh fans on Facebook chant for the former cricketer's political progress

Pakistani cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan, also known as "Im the Dim", may have become the butt of jokes for his allegedly hypocritical ways, yet nearly three lakh people, mostly youth, want him to become the next prime minister of his country.

On a fan group created on social networking website Facebook "We want Imran Khan to be the next PM of Pakistan", his fan base is about to touch 300,000. The page is full of "we love you Imran" and "Inshallah you will be the next PM of Pakistan" messages.


Knight in shining armour? Pakistani opposition leader and former
cricketer Imran Khan waves to supporters along with party leaders
during a rally in Karachi. pic/AFP

Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf, who too has used Facebook to interact with fans, is just over a lakh fans ahead of Khan.

A tickle too
However, with Khan's ambivalence on crucial issues plaguing the country, there is no dearth of people making fun of him either.

"Can anybody tell me what Imran Khan is blabbering about here in Karachi today," tweeted Akif Bhamani. Hamza Baloch said he should "run his hospital", ask for "chanda" (funds) and keep away from politics. Another tweet read: "Down with Imran Khan's hypocrisies".

Mockery
Noted rights activist Ali Dayan's fun tweet "did he make "the impossible possible? Did he levitate?" was widely retweeted too.

The latest issue of The Friday Times weekly has a caricature of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chief saying, "My name is Imran Khan. And I am not a terrorist!" " a take on the Shahrukh Khan-blockbuster My name is Khan.
Jugnu Mohsin, the woman behind the fictitious character "Im the Dim", wrote for an Indian weekly that Khan is pursuing a doctorate in hypocrisy.

"I took my 'O' levels in Hypocrisy when I wrapped up Jemima (his former wife) in a chaddar and presented her to the gullible people of Pakistan...I then got my 'A' levels in Hypocrisy when I entered politics and took a crash course in Double Speak, Double Overs and Double Everything."


general Kayani is manipulating Pakistan government, says French official

Posted:

Pakistan's powerful military chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani is "manipulating" the government and parliament to prevent them from changing their policy on restive Pak-Afghan border, a top French official believes.



According to a secret US diplomatic cable dated Jan 22, 2010 disclosed by whistle-blower website WikiLeaks, head of the French government's inter-agency Afghanistan-Pakistan cell Jasmine Zernini told American officials that although General Kayani had "learned the lesson of Musharraf" and was staying behind the scenes. But, she felt he was manipulating the government and parliament, including to prevent change on Pakistan's policy towards....FATA along the Afghan border, and also to stir up controversy regarding the Kerry-Lugar bill."

In the same cable, Mariot Leslie, the Director General, Defence and Intelligence of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of the British government expressed satisfaction that China had "dumped" Pakistan in the Conference on Disarmament which in her opinion was a "good sign."


'Pak's nukes are very safe'

Posted:

Claims disgraced Pakistani nuclear scientist A Q Khan, in response to mounting global fears of a takeover by militant Taliban groups

The Taliban and external forces cannot seize Pakistan's nuclear weapons because they are "highly secured" and only a handful know where they are kept, disgraced nuclear scientist A Q Khan said in remarks published yesterday.


Towing the hardline: Pakistani protesters hold up a burning US flag
during a demonstration against the visit of Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton in Lahore. pic/AFP

Khan, still a national hero in Pakistan, also told the Dawn newspaper that the safety of the nuclear weapons "has been improved gradually" over the years.

He explained that the nuclear weapons were not stored in one place and that very few people knew about their location.

"You can count these people on fingers who exactly know about the location of (our) nuclear arsenals.

"These weapons are lying in tunnels and safe houses where no one can access them, except very few relevant people," he was quoted as saying.

Khan's views come following mounting fears globally that the escalating Islamist violence in Pakistan could result in the militants one day laying hands on the nuclear arsenal.

Khan also told the daily that Pakistan's nuclear programme was proceeding without any break for the past 10 years.

"Although I have not been associated with the programme for the past 10 years, I know it has been running without any break and the process of uranium enrichment is in progress," he said.

He stressed that though the Pakistanis were not giving "final shape to new nuclear weapons", the material was being made. It could be assembled any time if required," he added.

Khan, who mentored Pakistan's nuclear programme, had in January 2004 confessed to having sold the country's nuclear secrets to Libya, Iran and North Korea.

On Feb 5, 2004, then President Pervez Musharraf announced he had pardoned Khan, who is widely seen as a national hero in Pakistan.

In 2000, the US accused Pakistan of providing nuclear weapons' technology to North Korea in exchange for ballistic missile technology.

A year later, the Pakistani government announced it had dismissed Khan as the head of Khan Research Laboratories, a move that drew strong criticism from religious forces.


Sunglasses ban for Vietnam police

Posted:

Smoking, putting hands in pockets also banned

Communist Vietnam has banned police from wearing black sunglasses, chatting, smoking and putting their hands in their pockets while they are on duty in public places, a media report said.

Under a new order from the Ministry of Public Security, officers must also "keep appropriate manners and be in the right position when on duty," said the English-language website of state-controlled Tuoi Tre newspaper.

"This means traffic cops must not hide behind trees to ambush" and issue fines.

The report, published on Saturday, also said on-duty police were now banned from reading books, making or answering non-work related phone calls, drinking alcohol or eating at restaurants that illegally encroach onto pavements.

Vietnam's traffic police are seen by citizens as notoriously corrupt. Last year US-based Human Rights Watch urged Vietnam to investigate "widespread police brutality", saying it had documented 19 incidents of reported brutality by law enforcers over the previous year, resulting in 15 deaths.


Maltese say yes to divorce

Posted:

Overwhelmingly Catholic Malta has voted in favour of legalising divorce, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi announced yesterday after a referendum in one of the only two countries where it is still banned.

Gonzi, who campaigned against the introduction of divorce ahead of Saturday's non-binding referendum, said it was now up to the Mediterranean archipelago's parliament to legalise the dissolution of marriage.

"This is not the result that I wished for, but the will of the people has to be respected and parliament should enact a law for the introduction of divorce," the conservative prime minister said.

Malta is one of only two countries in the world " the Philippines is the other " that bans divorce. Chile was the last country to legalise divorce in 2004 after overwhelming public pressure.

Saturday's referendum asked the island's 306,000 mainly Catholic voters whether parliament should introduce a new law that would allow couples to obtain a divorce after four years of separation.

Legal separation is widespread in the European Union's smallest member state, but there are many legal obstacles to re-marrying.


Brit PM's wife enjoys rave party at Ibiza

Posted:

Samantha Cameron joined 2,500 young clubbers at a drug-fuelled rave on party island Ibiza.

The British PM's wife kicked off her family break at the International Music Summit party hosted by Radio1 legend DJ Pete Tong.


Rave-ishing: UK Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife Samantha
walk hand in hand through Santa Gertrudis on the island of Ibiza in Spain
yesterday. pic/getty images

One clubber said the place was full of people "off their heads" on illegal ecstasy and cocaine.

Samantha (40) was spotted in the VIP bar at the summit's Grand Finale Festival until midnight. A guest said, "Sam wasn't dancing or anything, just having a quiet drink in the VIP area."

Samantha flew to the Spanish island on Friday with baby daughter Florence and family friends, while the PM was still at the G8 summit of world leaders in France.

Cameron joined her yesterday with the couple's other two children, Nancy (7) and Arthur (5).


Naomi Campbell sees red over chocolate ad

Posted:

Supermodel accuses Cadbury of racism after being compared to chocolate

Supermodel Naomi Campbell has threatened to take legal action over a Cadbury advertisement that uses her name to promote a chocolate bar.

The catwalk beauty, known for her diva-like tantrums, insists she is "shocked" and "upset" by the ad for Cadbury's Bliss that shows a chocolate bar surrounded by diamonds with the slogan, 'Move over Naomi, there's a new diva in town', in apparent homage to Campbell receiving so-called "blood diamonds" from the then-Liberian leader Charles Taylor in a 1997 incident.



Campbell alleges the tag line is a jibe aimed at her and claims she is offended at being compared to a chocolate bar, telling a British newspaper, "I am shocked. It's upsetting to be described as chocolate, not just for me, but for all black women and black people. I do not find any humour in this. It is insulting and hurtful."

A spokesperson for Cadbury said, "(The ad is) a light-hearted take on the social pretensions of Cadbury Dairy Milk Bliss ... we would never produce any type of marketing we felt might cause any offence to any section of society."

The racism row comes just one week after a London School of Economics lecturer, Satoshi Kanazawa, hit the headlines for "research" claiming to show that black women are less attractive than those of other races.


Schools, parents, education officials find meeting ground

Posted:

Brought together by MiD DAY, all agree jaw-jaw better than war-war to resolve several issues of concern

A campaign by MiD DAY to bring to the fore issues parents have with schools came to a befitting end yesterday at a symposium called 'School Concerns', with Zilla Parishad (ZP) officials announcing at the open forum organised by this newspaper that they would start a helpline and introduce the concept of an open house to address parents' concerns.


A parent of a child studying in a city school gives vent to his grouse at a
symposium organised by MiD DAY titled 'School Concerns' yesterday at
a popular hotel

The announcement was made by Vidya Shinde, secondary education officer, ZP, who attended the symposium at a popular hotel.

The symposium, organised as the finale event of a 10-day campaign run by this newspaper on various issues concerning parents in schools, was attended by school principals, parents and officials from the ZP and the Pune Municipal Corporation's education board.

MiD DAY campaign
During the 10-day campaign, MiD DAY had received complaints from parents across various schools, on issues ranging from illegal admission interviews and forcible sale of study material to irregular fee hikes.

While the campaign was on, though education officials promised action against errant schools, some of which even reprimanded through notices, no concrete action was seen. MiD DAY realised the need for a dialogue between education officials and parents as well as school principals so that solutions to long-pending issues could come out of it.

The symposium
Principals from various schools attended the debate with parents and put forth the best practices adopted by their school to tackle some issues that other schools were facing.

Romen Ghosh, director of IB school Victorious Kidss Educares, pointed out that having regular meetings with parents can help solve a lot of issues and also help parents understand the reasons behind a school's decisions by making them active participants.

At the same time, some school managements introspected and agreed that schools need to cooperate with parents to break through the communication barriers.

Koyna Zaveri, director of BG Academy, pointed out how issues of fee hikes can be resolved if schools are transparent about their auditing process and their expenses.

MiD DAY impact
While the debate was very interesting and did turn heated in bits and parts, what was important was that solutions were put forth by both principals and parents.

Priya Singh, chairperson of Parents Teacher Association from Rewachand Bhojwani Academy (RBA), said that most issues of parents concerning schools stem from the fact that there is no redressal mechanism.

"When school managements don't respond to parents' concerns, they approach education officials. But we go away disappointed as there is no effective redressal there as well. Can the authorities start a helpline where a parent finds a one-point contact for lodging all his concerns as well as a fixed time limit for redressal?" she said.
Vidya Shinde quickly agreed to this, and said that she would soon introduce a helpline for parents. "I like this idea and it can be done. We will think of a mechanism where we will introduce some kind of a roster for all complaints with a time schedule for solutions," she said.

Principal Nalini Sengupta from Vidya Valley School suggested creating a forum where all principals, parents as well as education officials can meet.

"Let there be across-the-table discussions with concerned schools and parents and we as principals can help in coming to an agreeable solution," she said.

This solution, too, was promptly taken up and Shinde requested MiD DAY to be a part of the implementation.

"Every six months we have a meeting with principals but parents aren't a part of it. But now on we can have one member from each school's PTA to be a part of it. Apart from them, those attending this meeting can be a part of it by giving names to MiD DAY, who can submit a list of people and issues to us," said Shinde.


Posted by Harshad at 7:40 AM

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)