Eight Afghan army personnel killed in bomb attacks

Kabul : Eight Afghan army personnel have been killed in separate bomb attacks since early Thursday, authorities said Friday. In one attack, six air force personnel were killed in an improvised explosive device (IED) blast in Rodgard area of Shindand district in western Herat province, Xinhua quoted district governor Lal Mohammad Omarzai as saying. "The officers were returning from (a) army air force base to the provincial capital Herat city. The van they were travelling in touch off the IED on the roadside, killing all six people aboard," the governor told Xinhua. The Afghan Taliban has launched massive IED attacks against Afghan national security forces and over 87,000 NATO-led troops stationed in the country. Two other soldiers were killed and six injured in five IED attacks in Kunar, Ghazni, Kandahar and Helmand provinces over the same period of time, the Afghan Defence Ministry reported on its website. In addition, a civilian was killed in a similar attack in eastern Paktika province. Early Friday morning, three militants were killed and two injured when the militants launched an attack on police security checkpoints near a power dam in Helmand province. No policeman was hurt in the attack. Separately, eight Taliban militants were killed in an army operation in Nirkh district of the eastern Wardak province overnight, the provincial government said earlier Friday. The Taliban-led attacks and unrest have plagued parts of the war-torn country since late April when the insurgent group launched an offensive.

Nobody ready to rein in ISI: Pakistan court

Islamabad : A court in Pakistan has observed that nobody, be it the federal government or parliament, was ready to bring in legislation to rein in the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Pakistan's all-powerful intelligence agency controlled by the military. While hearing the case of 282 missing people in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province Thursday, Chief Justice of the Peshawar High Court (PHC) Dost Muhammad Khan warned that the courts would be forced to restrict the members of the law enforcing agencies and security forces to their barracks if they continued to whisk away citizens on a daily basis through unlawful means, The News International reported Friday. The report quoted Khan as saying that the provincial and federal governments had become spectators to the violation of the constitution, law and fundamental rights of the citizens by the intelligence agencies and security forces. The chief justice observed that the government and the democratic system of the country would run smoothly only when the law enforcing agencies acted under the law. He also pointed out that the US intelligence agency CIA too was a powerful intelligence agency but its top officials would appear immediately before a court whenever asked to do so. The court submitted that like the US, the civilian government should also make the ISI its subordinate. The judge said that the people's problems are on the rise and illegal detention centres in the country have also become a big problem for the judiciary. However, Additional Attorney General of Pakistan Syed Attique Shah submitted before the two-member bench comprising the chief justice and Justice Asadullah Khan Chamkani in the missing persons case that the federal government, following the guidelines of the high courts and Supreme Court, had established a task force for missing persons. He said that the task force comprised an additional secretary of the interior ministry as chairman and chief secretaries, inspectors general of police, home secretaries, additional inspectors general and commissioner Islamabad and one representative of the attorney general's office as members. The task force would adopt a methodology for recovery of the missing persons. However, the chief justice said the task force would remain ineffective unless effective legislation was made on the issue of missing persons. "We couldn't stop the cries of families of the missing persons in the court. No force or agency of the country is above the law," the chief justice said. He also added that the judiciary should not be forced to pass strict orders regarding these acts of the agencies that were in violation of the law and constitution. The bench gave four weeks' time to the federal government, the task force and the agencies concerned to find the missing persons.

US okay with Pakistan holding talks with Taliban

Islamabad : The US has supported Pakistan's initiative to start a dialogue with Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), saying the move has strong domestic consensus. Speaking at the conclusion of Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's visit, a senior State Department official Thursday said the US has no objection to the aims laid out in the negotiation approach. "He (Nawaz Sharif) indicated his intentions (to hold talks with the Taliban) and we indicated our support," the Associated Press of Pakistan (APP) quoted the official as saying. "It is his decision. We are not trying to steer him in one direction or another. We certainly have no objections that there is a strong domestic consensus in, at least, trying a negotiated approach. "As we understand, the conditions are that the TTP has to accept the constitution and the rule of law and of course we accept those objectives. We support those objectives," the official added. Earlier, Sharif said the US was informed that Pakistan had made a conscious decision on holding talks with the Taliban as part of efforts to contain militancy and that Washington should support Islamabad's decision.

Time to respond decisively to Pakistan shelling: BJP

Srinagar : The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Friday said the time has come for India to respond decisively to Pakistan's ceasefire violations in Jammu and Kashmir. Addressing a press conference here, the party's national spokesperson Prakash Javadekar said: "For the past two months, whatever Pakistan has been doing on the Line of Control and the International Border is unacceptable. In two months, there have been 200 violations by Pakistan. "Time has come when we should give a befitting reply to Pakistan. There are also political ways and means to restrain Pakistan from doing this." Javadekar said that when Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde and state Chief Minister Omar Abdullah were visiting the International Border (Oct 22), Pakistan was still raining shells there. "They have killed and injured our jawans. This is not tolerable. "Pakistan's politics is Kashmir-centric while according to us the only issue that needs to be resolved is stopping Pakistan-aided terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir. "Pakistan gives covering fire to encourage infiltration. Our soldiers were beheaded and ambushed... there was a terror attack in Samba. These are absolutely unacceptable. "Terrorism and talks cannot go together," he said. Replying to a question on Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi's Oct 24 remark at an Indore rally that, singed by the riots in Muzaffarnagar of Uttar Pradesh, many Muslim youths were in touch with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Javadekar said: "For campaigning he is free, but he is not free to insult Muslims." "When he said those who started and helped clashes in Muzaffarnagar had links with ISI and would like to go to Pakistan, it is an insult to Indian Muslims. "Indian Muslims have made a deliberate and conscious decision to be part of India. They have no sympathy for Pakistan," he said. Replying to another question on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's statement that he is ready to go to CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) if they wanted (to question him in the coal block allocation case), Javadekar said: "The CBI is under the administrative control of the PMO." "This is another way of getting a clean chit from the CBI as it was given to Lalu Prasad and Mayawati (ex-chief ministers of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, respectively). "It was not the government, but our complaint which the CVC (Central Vigilance Commission) forwarded to the CBI that started the coalgate investigations. "Seventeen billion tonnes of coal were given to 140 private companies causing a loss of Rs.50 lakh crore to the people of the country," Javadekar said.

Goodbye US, Israeli, Saudi alliance: A new order beckons

The Saudi refusal of the rotating Security Council seat has been seen for what it partly is: a tantrum. But it is also a clue to a coming political reality: West Asian politics may well be reverting to normality. The frenetic pace at which events moved in the Bush years after 9/11 when the US could ride two horses, Israel and Saudi Arabia at the same time, on the gallop, is only possible on an extensive “straight”. This was the delusional part of the neo-cons thinking. They thought the US would be on the “straight” forever, having defeated the Soviet Union. But now there is a bend in the race track. As we know, other powers have arisen. The threesome -- Israel, Saudi Arabia and the US -- must perforce pause and take stock. What is the genius? Is the triangular alliance coming apart? Marxists have a fine system of analysis. As long as Israel and Saudi Arabia serve imperialism’s basic interests in the region, their influence in Washington cannot be discounted. But if this “basic” interest, that of being economically and strategically indispensable of imperialism is not being served, special relationships or powerful lobbies in the US will not be able to keep these together. Riyadh and Tel Aviv must ponder. Are they useful or a drag on the US “core interests”? The trio was focused on one vision of West Asia. But the opening to Iran now being followed up by the British reopening their embassy in Teheran next week has rendered unfeasible that vision. Israel and Saudi Arabia had set their heart on “getting” Iran. That game stands suspended. Why should an enemy’s enemy now be a friend? The alliance had gummed up a fundamental regional contradiction. How can the Saudis in their original incarnation as leaders of the Arab world be in an alliance with Israel which has occupied Palestinian Arab lands and will not budge? One implication of the apparent Saudi estrangement with the US is that Riyadh will now pull out its peace plan of 2002 and resume its role as an Arab player. This brings into focus such of the Kingdom’s foreign policy thinkers as Prince Turki Al Faisal, former intelligence chief and ambassador to the US. Note the tone of the article he wrote in "The New York Times" over a year ago. “The special relationship between the two countries would increasingly be seen as toxic by the vast majority of Arabs and Muslims who demand justice for the Palestinian people.” So, focus shifts to Palestine. The Saudis dissipated their energies promoting Shia-Sunni strife on an unspeakable scale simply to keep an external focus, away from internal threats. The US too was dragged into this mess. But the Saudis could not keep their eye off tussles within. They began to see Muslim Brotherhood ogres in all the GCC countries; when Mohammad Morse began to consolidate the Brotherhood in Egypt, they rushed and supported the army coup, embarrassing Obama whose photographs were posted in Egypt as a supporter of Morsi. Indeed, photographs of the US ambassador Anne Patterson also came up as a Brotherhood “stooge”. That she was replaced is a sign of which side the US backed. In any case, Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel’s head was constantly popping up as the Egyptian army’s supporter. The Saudis came barging in with their billions and billions to keep the armed forces buoyant. Such a mess. Then Prince Bandar bin Sultan flew into Moscow. His conversation with Vladimir Putin is a study in how diplomacy should not be done. Give us Syria, said Bandar, and take the world. It was like the Biblical yarn about the Devil tempting Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. “Get thee behind me, Satan”, said Christ, refusing the blandishments. When Bandar offered all the guarantees for a “terror free” Sochi Winter Olympic games next year, Putin said “we know you control terrorists”. This amazing conversation was supposed to be under wraps but one of two sides leaked it to the Russian press. Bandar’s other startling undertaking was that whatever he offered the Russians had American backing. This was the trump card, Bandar handed Putin at the global Casino’s high table. The US, Saudis and Israelis together overpower everything else in the region is no longer the name of the game. Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Iran, the Levant will have to seek their salvation together slowly, step by step with other countries of the region. The Saudis may not have wanted to be on the UN high perch because in the new emerging regional system, they have to manage changes secretly which has been their classical style. The new style that Bandar tried to introduce may suit him but it cannot be the style of a cumbersome monarchy, weakened by age, where competing factions must be given voice, until the order changes. King Abdullah will be 90 in a few months. The Saudi system, indeed, the Umma was convulsed by the siege of Mecca in 1979 led by Juhayman bin Sief al Uteybi, a few months after the Iranian revolution. The elders of the monarchy focused on the external Shia threat to manage the internal upheaval. And now, the external target is receding. Refocusing is required. Who knows, the US and the Saudi may pore over a compromise formula that had been worked out in Bahrain, much the most emotive issue in Najaf and Qom. Meanwhile, no one is throwing in the towel, not yet. Israel and Saudi Arabia will beat their breasts and stamp their feet to test if Obama has been able to shuffle out of the establishment strait jacket, custom made for George W. Bush and with which the President has been grappling like a trapped man in a Marcel Marceau skit.

Pakistan, US cannot be close friends: Pakistani daily

Islamabad : While Pakistan and the US continue to cooperate on strengthening bilateral relations, the two sides cannot be "close friends", said a Pakistani daily in an editorial Friday. "Perhaps the raw reality of the Pakistan-US relationship is that while the two countries continue to cooperate because they need each other, neither has any illusions anymore that the two sides can be close friends," the Dawn newspaper said. It said US President Barack Obama is "willing to engage Pakistan on the economic and aid fronts, but the terrorism and militancy issues are as urgent and real as they have ever been". "Even so, Obama himself did not exactly shirk from giving a matter-of-fact assessment of the difficulties in going from the mutually expressed desire to build more sustainable ties to actually achieving that kind of relationship between the US and Pakistan. "But then, neither did Sharif really try to downplay the terrorism threat inside Pakistan nor did he look to overly blame the outside world for Pakistan’s internal troubles," the editorial noted. The daily said the main job that awaits Sharif on his return to Pakistan from the US is "getting to grips with the internal security challenges".

US community groups seek probe into spying on Muslims

Washington: A coalition of 125 religious, racial justice, civil rights, and community-based organizations including South Asians have demanded a civil rights probe into the New York City Police Department's alleged programme of spying on Muslims. The plea has been made in a letter sent Thursday to the Justice Department by the coalition including the American Civil Liberties Union, South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT), and the National Network for Arab American Communities (NNAAC). Groups representing diverse faith traditions and beliefs who signed the letter include Hindu, Sikh, Muslim, Christian and Jewish, organizations, such as the Hindu American Foundation, the Sikh Coalition, and national, regional, and New York-based Muslim groups. According to SAALT, for years now, the NYPD has been spying on the Muslim American community and in fact, even created a programme dedicated to unwarranted and suspicionless surveillance of Muslims in the New York City area. In addition to spying on mosques and trying to infiltrate community-based organizations, they also monitored restaurants, bookstores, and student groups, it alleged But, the NYPD's actions have implications beyond the civil rights violations of Muslims in the New York City area, SAALT said. "Putting a class of Americans under surveillance based on their religion is a clear violation of our Constitution's guarantees of equality and religious freedom," said Hina Shamsi, director of the ACLU National Security Project. "The NYPD's surveillance programme has stigmatized Muslims as suspect and had deeply negative effects on their free speech, association, and religious practice," she said.

Libya: Gadhafi's son, others indicted

October 24: A Libyan court today referred Moammar Gadhafi's son and more than 30 others to trial before a higher tribunal on charges ranging from murder to treason during the 2011 uprising, a senior prosecutor said. Prosecutor Al-Seddik al-Sur said the court also decided to appoint defense lawyers for Gadhafi's son, Seif al-Islam, and the late dictator's intelligence chief, Abdullah al-Senoussi. He did not announce a date for the trial before the Criminal Court. Al-Senoussi and al-Baghdadi al-Mahmoudi, Gadhafi's last prime minister, were among about 10 of the 38 Gadhafi-era officials to attend the hearing, held under tight security in the Libyan capital, Tripoli. Seif al-Islam, held by a militia group that captured him as he attempted to flee to neighboring Niger in 2011, was not present. Gadhafi, killed by the rebels, was in power for more than 40 years. Underscoring Libya's lawlessness since the ouster of the Gadhafi regime, gunmen shot dead an air force colonel today as he left his home in the eastern city of Benghazi, the birthplace of the 2011 revolt. It was the latest in a spate of assassinations in Benghazi recently. The killings are blamed on militiamen who fought against Gadhafi's forces but now operate outside state control. Security officials said Col. Adel Khalil al-Tawahi from Benghazi's Beninah air base died instantly when gunmen shot him in the chest and head. Air force personnel from that base joined rebel ranks during the early days of the 2011 uprising. The motive for al-Tawahi's slaying was not immediately clear. Security officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

US offers funds to move Iranian exiles out of Iraq

October 24: The United States today offered USD 1 million to help resettle Iranian opposition exiles currently in Iraq, contributing to a UN appeal in the wake of violence. More than 3,000 members of the People's Mujahedeen Organization of Iran, allowed by late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to operate in the country, are staying at a former US military base known as Camp Hurriya, or Liberty, on Baghdad's outskirts. The United States will contribute USD 1 million to a fund launched yesterday by UN chief Ban Ki-moon aimed at finding new homes abroad for the exiles, State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said. "We share the conviction that relocation is the only lasting means of guaranteeing the safety and well-being of those residing at Camp Hurriya," Harf said in a statement. Iraqi authorities had ordered the transfer of remaining members of the group's Camp Ashraf, which is in the central province of Diyala, after 52 members died in violence on September 2. The authorities blame infighting in the group for the deaths. The People's Mujahedeen gave a vastly different account of what happened, saying troops entered the camp and set fire to property. The People's Mujahedeen initially took up arms against Iran's shah and then set its sights on toppling the clerical regime that came to power after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The group says it has renounced violence and has enlisted high-profile US supporters in their cause. Last year, the State Department removed its designation as a terrorist organization following similar decisions in Europe. Albania and Germany have agreed to take in exiles, but the UN has struggled to resettle most of them

Eight civilians injured in Pakistan firing

Jammu : Eight civilians were injured Thursday evening after Pakistani troops fired at the international border in Kanachak, Ranbir Singh (R.S.) Pura, Suchetgarh and Abdullian areas of Jammu and Kashmir. A senior police officer told IANS that Pakistan Rangers used mortars, rockets and automatic weapons to target Border Security Force (BSF) posts in the Jammu region. He said, "A Pakistani shell exploded in Garkhal village, injuring eight people, including four women and a child, all from the same family. "The injured have been shifted to a hospital. BSF troops retaliated to the unprovoked shelling and firing by Pakistan, using same calibre weapons. "Pakistani troops also resorted to shelling and light weapons, firing at BSF posts in R.S. Pura, Suchetgarh and Abdullian areas of the international border this (Thursday) evening. BSF retaliated in these areas and till last reports came in, exchange of fire was continuing."