|
|
Indian doctor awarded NEW YORK, Dec 11: Four time nobel peace prize nominee Dr Sharadkumar Dicksheet has been awarded the 100,000-dollar Kellogg’s Hannah ....more Colombian
boy BAGOTA (COLOMBIA), Dec 11: The tough expression and sun-cured face cannot conceal the still seething anger ..more Shadow
of Sept 11 LONDON, Dec 11: The smoke is still rising, three months on. The pall that towered above Manhattan cast a black shadow over 2001, and darkened the horizon of the year to come. ...more Nehru
jacket bit too TOKYO, Dec 11: It was a "secret" tale of two Nehru jackets for a special occasion but one . ....more |
|
Afghan leader asks US WASHINGTON, Dec 11: Afghanistan’s interim leader Hamid Karzai, set to assume power on December 22, warned the United States to never again "walk away from Afghanistan" and pledged his country will be a trusted ally and friend, ........more TOKYO, Dec 11: Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee today met emperor Akihito at the imperial palace before his departure for home. ....more Pakistan
ready for ISLAMABAD, Dec 11: Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has said he is ready for "sustained, meaningful and result-oriented" dialogue with India.......more Britain
set to lead new UNITED NATIONS, Dec 11: Britain has accepted responsibility for organization and command of a multinational force to protect the Afghan ........more |
 |
|
Indian doctor awarded Kellogg’s World of Children Award NEW YORK, Dec 11: Four time nobel peace prize nominee Dr Sharadkumar Dicksheet has been awarded the 100,000-dollar Kellogg’s Hannah Neil World of Children Award. Dicksheet - who is himself partially disabled - has been awarded in recognition of his dedication to providing free corrective surgery to 57,000 of the poor children in India. Dicksheet, 71, has survived a partially paralyzing car accident, terminal cancer of the larynx and two severe heart attacks that have left him with only 17 per cent residual heart capacity. Despite the challenges in his own life, dicksheet boards a plane to India every year to fulfill the mission he began in 1968: ‘The India Project - Plastic Surgery Camp’. Presenting the award, boxing legend Muhammad Ali, who is its Honorary Chairman along with CEO of Kellogg Company Carlos Gutierrez, said, "Dr Dicksheet is determined to give physically scarred children in India a new start in life. The difference he makes in the lives of these children and their families is immeasurable". Speaking on the occasion, Dicksheet said he will put the enrire prize money into his India project trust fund to provide medical drugs, equipment and supplies which will enable him to repair the faces of more children. Each surgery costs about 150 dollars in supplies and transportation, and 100,000 dollars would provide for 600 surgeries, he said. Dr Dicksheet’s plastic surgery camp sites are operational throughout India from October to March each year. Camps are held in the poorest regions of India in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal and Assam. A total of 200 to 500 cases are treated in each camp, and approximately 4,000 operations are performed. The camp also functions as a teaching facility, where local plastic surgeons are invited for training. Speaking on the occasion, Gutierrez said in India, thousands of babies are born with congenital facial defects. These infants are typically unable to drink or eat properly and many of them will starve to death because their parents cannot afford surgery. Others will be shunned, abandoned and even killed because of their deformities. Dr. Dicksheet’s work has a profound impact on their lives, and "we are pleased to honor him with this award," Gutierrez added. The Kellogg’s Hannah Neil World of Children Award was established in 1998 to recognise the ordinary individuals who dedicate their lives to serving them. Past recipients include William Sergeant of the US - who is working to rid the world of polio, kathleen magee - who is the co-founder of operation smile, and Rev. William Bryce Wasson of Mexico - founder of nuestros pequenos hermanos, a home for orphaned and abandoned children. The concept for the award was developed by the Hannah Neil Centre Foundation Board, which governs and supports the hannah neil centre for children in Columbus, USA, a non-profit organization that serves children who suffer from severe behavioral and emotional difficulties. The award is managed by World of Children Inc., a non-profit corporation. (PTI) |
|
Colombian boy guerilla fight rages in Rehab BAGOTA (COLOMBIA), Dec 11: The tough expression and sun-cured face cannot conceal the still seething anger that led carlos rios to become a Marxist guerilla at the age of 13 in search of vengeance. Carlos, who is 17 now, doesn’t know how many people he killed and wounded during his three and a half years with the revolutionary armed forces of Colombia — a 17,000-strong force known by the Spanish Initials Farc. But now he says he realizes that revenge brought no satisfaction and his years packing a rifle didn’t soothe the hurt caused by the murder of his aunt. His first combat came one month after joining, and he lived rough in the jungle and dodged bullets until finally his life as a guerrilla came to an end on October 20, 2000. That was the day that the Army captured carlos in a dusty village in northeastern Colombia, when he ran out of bullets after fighting for four hours. Now carlos just wants to forget the war which has left him with a damaged Pelvis and Shrapnel still dug into different parts of his body. His old wounds ache in the high andean cold where he now lives in the capital Bogota, in a safe house run by the Government’s Colombian Family Welfare Institute. Like many other child fighters taken prisoner, he was included in a program entitled boys and girls rehabilitated from the armed conflict. Since its commencement in 1997, some 740 former child fighters have passed through the programme, which usually lasts five months and which prepares them to return to civilian life. The current batch of teen-agers live in groups of about 30 in five houses — whose locations are secret, for security reasons. Many of them can barely write their name when they begin the programme, which seeks to give them reading and writing skills and offers them training in trades such as carpentry. They also receive psychological counseling. The United Nations believes that 6,000 minors are fighting for colombia’s illegal armies of the left and the right, which are waging a war that has killed about 40,000 people in the past decade alone. Despite suffering losses, too, the guerillas have a steady supply of recruits. But earlier this year, it recognized that some were too young, and said that it would stop accepting fighters less than 14 years old. Carlos’ voice trembles when he describes how a group of about 30 armed men entered his aunt’s general store and dragged her away together with a helper. The two women’s bodies were never found. Carlos says the men who did it were members of a far-right paramilitary group. So he went and joined the rebels, and in so doing became another example of the cycle of violence that feeds Colombia’s 37-year old war. "I filled up with hatred of the paracos," he said, using the pejorative nickname for the far-right fighters, "I left home and went to work in the mountains. But I was depressed, I felt bad, so I went and joined the guerillas." Carlos says that he was fighting for social equality. But, asked about the meaning of the word "democracy", he is baffled and laughed nervously. He is little more coherent describing something of which he has far more direct experience: Killing people. "You feel lots of things. When you kill, you don’t feel anything. You think that at last you’ve done something which has hurt the soldiers. The same that they feel when they kill us," he said. The Institute’s Director, Juan Manuel Urrutia, says that his wards were the victims of the armed groups that recruited them. But he added that the Government should not forget its own responsibility in a country where 40 per cent of children grow up in poverty. The ranks of the young poor provide the war’s cannon fodder and fingers to squeeze the triggers in a country that is also ravaged by the struggle to overcome the world’s largest cocaine industry. "We don’t forget our responsibility, the state’s responsibility, for letting those kids be recruited," Urrutia said in his modest office. The rehabilitation program costs 300-500 dollars per child per month, quite a lot of money in a country where the minimum monthly wage is about 125 dollars. Urrutia says that former child guerillas are very disciplined, accustomed as they are to following orders. But it takes quite a bit of work to build up their self-esteem and convince them they can and should take decisions for themselves. Ninety per cent of the program’s beneficiaries came from leftist guerilla groups, mainly the farc. The rest were members of the far-right paramilitaries. Occasionally, Urrutia says, the guerilla groups send spies to join the program. They sign up, sniff around, and then run away back to their jungle or mountain bases to report on what’s going on. (REUTERS) |
|
Shadow of Sept 11 stretches into year to come LONDON, Dec 11: The smoke is still rising, three months on. The pall that towered above Manhattan cast a black shadow over 2001, and darkened the horizon of the year to come. September 11, it was often said in the aftermath, changed everything convulsing emotions, cultural attitudes and political and military alignments across much of the planet. The international headlines the world was reading hours before the planes hit New York and Washington seem quaintly parochial now. There was room on front pages for Norwegian election results and a case of mad cow disease in Japan. But there were also distant rumblings, on September 10, of the coming storm: An exodus of Afghan refugees towards australia, and the mysterious assassination by suicide bomb of an anti-Taliban leader in northern Afghanistan. Then it happened. The blow-by-blow account of how the World Trade Center, part of the Pentagon, four planes and thousands of lives were destroyed in moments needs no retelling. The apocalyptic images of the collapsing twin towers transfixed most of the world with horror, and a few with glee. Perhaps the only society in which they were hardly seen at all was Taliban Afghanistan, where television was officially a sin. Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda guerrilla network was blamed. In videotaped pronouncements of eerie power, the Afghan-based Islamic militant did not vigorously deny guilt and threatened there would be more outrages to come. He looked like a prophet, and by December at least one of his prophecies looked close to fulfilment. "This place may be bombed," he once told an interviewer in his Afghan cave base. "And we will be killed. We love death. The US loves life. That is the big difference between us." If, by early December, Bin Laden was close to winning the death he longed for, he seemed to have lost everything else. The Worldwide Islamic Jihad he wanted against the West, Israel and "corrupt" Muslim rulers showed no signs of igniting. The regime of his Taliban protectors collapsed, most of its fighters deciding they loved death less than defeat after all. Non-Taliban Muslim Afghans enthusiastically collaborated with US warplanes in conquering them. Women unveiled their faces and boys flew kites again in Kabul. And Bin Laden, who had dismissed US soldiers as cowards for loving life too much, seemed to have inadvertently imbued them with new resolve. September 11 excised the "Bodybag" phobia which had hobbled US forces in previous conflicts — although by early december only three Americans had been killed in the Afghan conflict, two of them by a US bomb. The atrocious loss of nearly 4,000 civilians at home also seemed to make Americans less troubled than in past wars by the killings of many civilians by stray US missiles, or of Taliban fighters after they were taken prisoner. Far from retreating from the Islamic world as Bin Laden hoped, US forces were by the year’s end being newly deployed in Muslim Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, along with some European units. US and British troops remained in the Gulf, although there was deep unease over the US bombing among the rulers of Saudi Arabia and other Arab states, as many of their subjects openly sympathised with the Saudi-born Bin Laden. Some western commentators asked aloud why western forces were defending the societies which had produced him and many of the suspected suicide attackers of September 11, and whether Gulf oil needed guarding after all. Others however called for the "war on terror" to be spread to Iraq and Somalia. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict was simmering at the start of 2001 and boiling by the year’s end. As in every year, it threatened to destabilise the region and polarise the world more effectively than Bin Laden had managed. Palestinian suicide bombers killed 25 Israelis in a single December weekend, Israeli aircraft bombed Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian authority and Arafat’s police battled militant Hamas supporters on the streets of Gaza. Israelis told Pollsters they wanted Arafat overthrown few Israelis or Arabs seemed to know what might come after him. Outside the Islamic world, the shockwaves of September 11 were almost as seismic. States at loggerheads in spring were by autumn allies in a campaign described sometimes not only as a "war on terror", but as a battle for civilisation itself. For Moscow, September 11 vindicated its past warnings about the threat Bin Laden posed in separatist Chechnya and elsewhere. Russia offered intelligence cooperation with Washington and made no objection to the sending of western troops to former Soviet Republics north of Afghanistan, deployments once unthinkable. Relations blossomed, after being clouded early in the year by Moscow’s suspicion of US plans to build a defence shield to intercept missiles. The issue remained touchy, but after a warm summit in Texas, Presidents George W Bush and Vladimir Putin seemed to be nearing a deal linking missile defence to cuts in nuclear arsenals. Hostility between China and the US hit furious levels in April after a US spy plane collided with a Chinese fighter, killing its pilot. China seized the US plane and crew. Some in an increasingly nationalistic China later cheered the film of the burning of the twin towers. But by the year’s end relations had improved dramatically, even if they were still haggling over compensation for the spy plane incident. There was an October summit, and talk of posting FBI agents in Beijing. China rounded up Muslim separatists in its western province Xinjiang — "terrorists", naturally. China was not alone in finding the word a usefully elastic one. The fight against "terrorism" was used as a plea of justification by ex-President Slobodan Milosevic, on trial for war crimes after being handed over to the Hague by Belgrade. It was used too by nationalist politicians in Macedonia, who nevertheless stumbled towards peace with Albanian rebels under an internationally-brokered agreement. Others tried to brush the "terrorist" label off their own clothes. Libya, Syria and Iran, accused of past support for terrorism, were quick to denounce it after September 11. The IRA in October handed over weapons for the first time in its struggle against British rule — prompted, it was said, by the ebbing of sympathy among americans for its violent methods. Britain became the closest US ally against terror, and forgot troubles like its epidemic of foot-and-mouth cattle disease. (REUTERS) |
|
Nehru jacket bit too tight for PM TOKYO, Dec 11: It was a "secret" tale of two Nehru jackets for a special occasion but one of them turned out to be a bit too tight. Disclosing the private understanding between him and his Japanese counterpart Junichiro Koizumi on wearing the jackets at the banquet, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee today said the jacket with special buttons he was to wear did not fit him. "Probably I gained weight during my five-day stay in Japan or the Nehru jacket stitched for me was small," Vajpayee in his characteristic humour told a press conference before leaving for India. But Koizumi did keep his part of the promise, he said adding that "I assured him that when we meet next I will either reduce weight or wear a larger jacket". Asked if he liked Japanese food, Vajpayee said he did but hastened to add that he thought the Japanese enjoyed Chinese cuisine. (PTI) |
|
Afghan leader asks US not to ‘walk away’ WASHINGTON, Dec 11: Afghanistan’s interim leader Hamid Karzai, set to assume power on December 22, warned the United States to never again "walk away from Afghanistan" and pledged his country will be a trusted ally and friend, the Washington Post reported today. Karzai issued the warning during an interview in Kandahar, also telling reporters he fully supports US efforts to capture or kill members of Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network. "We must finish them all, completely burn them out," Karzai said. The Pashtun commander labeled toppled Taliban leader Mohammad Omar a "fugitive, a criminal" and vowed to put him on trial, the newspaper reported. "Omar has committed crimes, he’s killed thousands of people, he’s destroyed vineyards, he’s butchered my country, he’s brought terrorists here," Karzai said. "I want him tried. Karzai spoke to reporters at his new headquarters, formerly Omar’s sprawling residence, the Post said. Saying the international community recognizes Afghanistan needs to be rebuilt, Karzai told the newspaper the United States must not repeat the mistake it made 12 years ago when it abandoned Afghanistan after helping rid the country of Soviet occupation. "Things went wrong in Afghanistan because the United States walked away," Karzai said. "So don’t walk away again." The newspaper said Karzai also revealed that he had written a thank-you letter to President George W Bush for the assistance he has received thus far. "I thanked him for his help and for liberating us from this horrible force," he said, "and then I reassured him that we would very, very earnestly work to destroy terrorism in Afghanistan." Karzai again pledged to disarm Afghan factions who have lived through more than 20 years of war. "The gun has to stop ruling the country," said Karzai, the son of a prominent Afghan politician assassinated two years ago. In a series of meetings aimed at avoiding an eruption of the factional fighting that brought Afghanistan to its knees in the 1990s, Karzai on monday brokered a deal allowing a former Governor of Kandahar, Gul Agha Sherzai, to resume his former position, the Post said. Tribal leaders had decided to appoint Gul Agha to the position and he swiftly installed himself in Governor house on Friday, as the city’s interim leader. Karzai, who dined with Gul Agha on Monday night, told the post the deal was "peanuts" and called it "the first touch of democracy in Afghanistan." Gul Agha’s first reign in Kandahar was marked by corruption and chaos and his return has troubled many Afghans, the report said. But Karzai was quoted as saying he was not worried about what happened before because "things are very different from the past." "Afghans have suffered. We saw Afghans butchered by the Taliban and saw how the Taliban became terrorists as well," Karzai said. "We won’t repeat those mistakes." (REUTERS) |
|
|
TOKYO, Dec 11: Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee today met emperor Akihito at the imperial palace before his departure for home. The two met for about 20 minutes before they proceeded to a luncheon in honour of Vajpayee. Crown Prince Naruhito, Prince Tomohito of Mikasa and Japanese Premier Junichiro Koizumi and Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka were among those who attended the luncheon. Earlier, Vajpayee met Japanese parliamentarians at a meeting organised by Indo-Japan Parliamentarians’ Friendship League. The League works for promotion of friendship and cooperation between India and Japan. Ninety-two members of Japanese Parliament, 70 MPs from the House of Representatives and 22 MPs from the House of Councillors were present at the meeting. Prominent among those who were present included former Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone, President of the India-Japan Association Y Sakurauchi, Chairman of the Komeito Takenori Kanzaki and leader of the opposition Toshitsugu Saito. (PTI) |
|
Pakistan ready for sustained talks with India: Musharraf ISLAMABAD, Dec 11: Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has said he is ready for "sustained, meaningful and result-oriented" dialogue with India to resolve the Kashmir issue on the basis of UN Security Council resolutions. Musharraf said India and Pakistan were bound by their commitment to the international community and to the Kashmiri people to resolve the issue according to the relevant UN Security Council resolutions. Pakistan was willing to enter into a sustained, meaningful and result-oriented dialogue with India to find a just solution of the issue on that basis, he said. In an interview with Russian newspaper ‘Nezavisimaya Gazeta’, Musharraf rejected suggestions that his decision to join the international coalitmon and support military strikes in Afghanistan had caused a split in the Pakistani society. "The vast majority of the Pakistanis have strongly backed the Government’s stance to support the international coalition in its fight against terrorism," he said. "It has been our principled position to oppose terrorism in all its forms and manifestations", he added. About the division among Pakistan’s political parties over his Afghan policy, he said he did not think one can divide the political parties into categories. "There are many political parties in Pakistan, which are functioning freely. The political parties may differ with some aspects of the Government policy and in the wisdom of the decision to back the international coalition against terrorism," he said. Musharraf said Pakistani forces were capable of defending the country’s territorial integrity. "They would also ensure that Pakistan played its due role in the fight against terrorism." On the risk of extremists taking control of the nuclear weapons in Pakistan, he said national command authority oversees a strict custodial control over country’s nuclear assets. Specially selected and trained officials operate the nuclear command and control system, which is constantly upgraded, he told the daily. A clear chain of command has been established to ensure that nuclear weapons were never used accidentally or without authorisation, he said adding "over the years, there has not been a single instance of theft or leakage of strategic materials of Pakistan". Talking about the future of Afghanistan, he said any new Government in the war-torn country should be broad-based, multi-ethnic, freely chosen and friendly towards its neighbours. "Efforts for domination of one group over the other would only compound the problem causing chaos and anarchy," he said. Asked why Pakistan maintained diplomatic relations with Taliban, he said Pakistan recognised Taliban in the past as they controlled 95 per cent of the territory including Kabul. However, Taliban Embassy and consulate in Pakistan had been closed, as Taliban does not exist any longer, he added. On the role of former Afghan King Zahir Shah in any future dispensation, Musharraf said Shah was a respected figure who could keep the country united. "The former king could act as a symbol around which Afghans could rally for peace," he said. (PTI) |
|
Britain set to lead new force for Afghanistan UNITED NATIONS, Dec 11: Britain has accepted responsibility for organization and command of a multinational force to protect the Afghan capital of Kabul, with an announcement anticipated today when US Secretary of State Colin Powell arrives in London, US officials and western diplomats said. The 15-member UN Security Council plans to authorize the operation in a resolution being drawn up by US, French and British diplomats. They hope for adoption by Friday. NATO members Germany, France, Turkey, Italy and Canada are expected to provide the core of the force and agreed to allow Britain to lead it during informal talks over the past week. The British command is expected to last up to six months. Jordan, which has worked with French troops in Bosnia, will probably join. Bangladesh has volunteered but their soldiers will need funds first to finance the mission. Troop contributors are to meet in London in the coming days to decide of how and when to deploy the force UN officials had hoped would be in place by December 22, when a new Afghan provisional Government is to take office. Britain was the obvious choice because it could deploy troops quickly and has had experience in leading a multinational force, such as commanding UN troops in Bosnia. On the other hand, some had favored Germany, which has offered some 1,000 soldiers, because it had no colonial history in the region and did not join the United States in its war in Afghanistan, as Britain has. Formation of the force, which may have 5,000 soldiers, has been delayed, in part because of hesitations by the US central command, which is in charge of the war in Afghanistan. Its commander, Gen. Tommy Franks, as well as the Pentagon have misgivings about a parallel operation in Afghanistan while Washington is trying to dislodge the Taliban and capture Saudi-born extremist Osama bin Laden for his suspected role in the September 11 attacks against the United States. Franks wants the force to report to him, the diplomats said. But Britain and others say that unless the United States contributes troops, which it is reluctant to do at this time, it cannot lead the force. Instead they have suggested a liaison and close coordination with Franks. German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, for one, has warned publicly that the two militaries should not overlap. "There must be a clear separation between the current deployment against the Taliban and UN troops to support the accord," Schroeder said in Berlin. Powell, after meeting Schroeder in Berlin on Monday, stressed that the new force would be quite separate from the American operation. "They are two completely different missions. Obviously there will have to be some coordination," he said. The United Nations last week brokered an agreement in Bonn, Germany, among anti-Taliban factions for a new provisional Government that is to take office in Kabul on December 22. The force is to provide security in Kabul and its environs in an effort to offer some protection to the new coalition and then could "as appropriate be progressively expanded to other urban centers and other areas," the Bonn agreement says. Lakhdar Brahimi, the chief UN Envoy for Afghanistan and a former Algerian Foreign Minister, weeks ago ruled out an all-Muslim force as some US officials had suggested, saying they would be regarded as foreigners as much as any group. A UN peacekeeping force was also ruled out, with officials saying it would take too long to organize and would include too many troops who had never worked together. What precisely the new operation will do is still under discussion. In Kabul, the Northern Alliance troops took over the capital and one purpose of the multinational force is to make sure no one military faction dominated the capital. (REUTERS) |
|
|
