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End of Bin Laden not WASHINGTON, Dec 13: The death or capture of Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants would deal a sharp blow to their al qaeda network, but it...more Indonesia says Al Qaeda was in Sulawesi in past JAKARTA, Dec 13: Indonesia’s intelligence chief today said the militant Al Qaeda network once had a presence in the Poso area of Sulawesi island, .....more China
star under fire BEIJING, Dec 13: It may only be "retro" fashion, but starlet Vickie Zhao Wei has learned that wearing history is no fickle matter in China......more ‘India
key partner in WASHINGTON, Dec 13: India has been praised as a key ally of the US in the war against terrorism by a premier conservative publication here, which ....more |
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Bollywood crazy Afghans go gaga over Hindi movies KABUL, Dec 13: After nearly two decades of fighting, people on the busy streets of this city, who cowered under the strict edicts of Taliban, are now .......more ‘Pak has always exploited situation in Afghanistan’ BRUSSELS, Dec 13: Pakistan has always exploited the situation in Afghanistan whenever the latter is "weak", a conference was told here.....more US
House approves WASHINGTON, Dec 13: On the first anniversary of a US Supreme Court ruling that decided the 2000 presidential election, the US House of .........more Suicide attacks renew torture debate in Israel JERUSALEM, Dec 13: A Palestinian suicide bombing campaign and the September 11 attacks in the United States have reignited ......more |
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End of Bin Laden not end of threats: US experts WASHINGTON, Dec 13: The death or capture of Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants would deal a sharp blow to their al qaeda network, but it would not end threats against US interests, according to terrorism experts. The United States must keep its guard up even if the military campaign in Afghanistan succeeds in eliminating the top tier of the Al Qaeda leadership, experts said. "It cripples them but it doesn’t destroy them," Sen. Richard Shelby, Vice Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told Reuters. "They’ve been trained to act on their own in many ways. Al Qaeda is made up of a lot of groups, in some ways you’d call it a loose federation," the Alabama Republican said. "I don’t have any belief that the capture or destruction of Osama bin Laden destroys all of the terrorist groups, it could be just a good beginning." US airstrikes and opposition Afghan forces are concentrating on the Tora Bora region near Jalalabad, Afghanistan, in an effort to defeat Al Qaeda members believed holed up in caves and tunnels in the remote mountain region. The United States has blamed Bin Laden and his network for the September 11 attacks that killed nearly 3,300 people in America and has waged a campaign to destroy them. "If the leadership has been killed or taken out in Afghanistan, the head’s been chopped off the snake," said Stanley Bedlington, a former CIA counterterrorism analyst. But self-contained cells may still continue to operate, he said. It was unknown whether Bin Laden had ordered any action in the event of his demise, and there was a danger that his death could set in motion some grand plan for attacks on American targets, experts warned. But wiping out Bin Laden and top aide Ayman Al-Zawahri, both believed to be alive, would eliminate key planners for attacks such as the coordinated hijackings of four commercial planes that were crashed into New York’s World Trade Center and the Pentagon near Washington, US experts said. A fourth plane went down in a Pennsylvania field. Bin Laden was an important symbolic and charismatic figure for the network, and he and Zawahri had shown tremendous planning capability for a string of attacks they are suspected of masterminding, such as the suicide bombing of the USS Cole in a Yemeni Port last year, Bedlington said. If Zawahri, believed to be the brains in the operation, escaped, he could take over Al Qaeda’s leadership or another top aide could step into Bin Laden’s shoes, experts said. The United States has identified about 30 top Al Qaeda leaders, many of them in Afghanistan. Some have died in the bombings, with Mohammed Atef the highest ranking leader known to have been killed, US officials said. "They have a number of people in the organization who could conceivably try to take over if they are the last man standing," one US intelligence source said. "So Bin Laden’s departure would be a serious blow but not necessarily the end of Al Qaeda," he said. "But they’re going to have a tough time without leadership and their access to funds has been severely hampered," the source said on condition of anonymity. The United States and its allies have sought to identify and freeze Al Qaeda funds around the world and close down front organizations used to move the money. Al Qaeda is believed to operate in about 60 countries. "I think there was a great degree of compartmentalization of his money so I presume there would still be access to some of it," Bedlington said. US intelligence analysts estimate Bin Laden’s wealth at up to 250 million from an inheritance from his family’s construction fortune in Saudi Arabia and various businesses. But the relatively quick defeat of the Taliban, which sheltered Bin Laden in Afghanistan, by US airstrikes that began October seven and forced his followers into the hills, may have dimmed the Saudi-born militant’s appeal among potential followers, said a former covert CIA officer. "The larger question is how this is perceived," said Vickers, Director of Strategic Studies at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. "They were cheering this guy and then he looks like some loser that got defeated too easily by the west. There’s a lot of disappointment." But arrests linked to Al Qaeda, the freezing of funds, and loss of some top leaders would take a toll on the network’s ability to mount operations, experts said. "That network has been beat up pretty badly," Vickers said. "Once they lose Afghanistan it’s not clear that anybody will be able to harbor them like that again," he said. (REUTERS) |
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Indonesia says Al Qaeda was in Sulawesi in past JAKARTA, Dec 13: Indonesia’s intelligence chief today said the militant Al Qaeda network once had a presence in the Poso area of Sulawesi island, the scene of recent clashes between Muslims and Christians. But A M Hendropriyono also said no members of Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network were in Poso now. He was clarifying statements on Wednesday in which he said an international terrorist group was involved in recent religious clashes in poso, 1,565 km (980 miles) northeast of Jakarta, in which 15 people have been killed since the end of November. "There was a training camp used by elements of Al Qaeda, especially from Spain, but (now) in Poso the people are no longer there," Hendropriyono said. "This is coming from investigation results from those who were arrested in Spain. (they) indicate a presence in Indonesia, that is Poso," he said. He was apparently referring to investigations in Spain into the Al Qaeda network, which included reports the group had trained 3,000 multinational troops in Indonesian camps. Indonesian police had denied the reports when they emerged in November. He said he was making his statement to warn the public and prevent Al Qaeda from returning to Poso. Police on the scene in the Poso area today said they had no proof international terrorist groups were involved in recent clashes between Muslims and Christians. Hendropriyono said that the authorities would block members of Al Qaeda from returning to the area. (REUTERS) |
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China star under fire for Japan war flag dress BEIJING, Dec 13: It may only be "retro" fashion, but starlet Vickie Zhao Wei has learned that wearing history is no fickle matter in China. While outfits worn by red guards during Mao Zedong’s 1966-76 cultural revolution have come into vogue at parties, 1930s-era Japanese wartime gear will forever be out. Zhao learned her lesson the tough way after a magazine photo of her modelling a mini-dress printed with the old Japanese naval flag triggered a backlash among patriotic fans and media in china, still rife with resentment over Tokyo’s past aggression. A tabloid based in Nanjing, where hundreds of thousands of people were killed by Japanese soldiers in 1937, spearheaded a media campaign last week to boycott news of the actress and advertisements she appeared in. Zhao, who catapaulted to fame playing a sassy princess in a wildly popular soap opera set in the 1644-1912 Qing Dynasty, had no choice but to apologise. "I profoundly feel that I neglected the study of history and was insensitive towards that painful historical period," she wrote in a letter published in state media and on web sites this week. "As a young actor raised by a nation and a people, I want to tell everyone I am very patriotic." China’s bitter memories of the 1930s-40s Japanese occupation have been refreshed this year by Tokyo’s refusal to revise a history book accused of whitewashing Japan’s war record and Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s visit to a war shrine. Zhao’s own grandfather perished at AE 30 fighting the Japanese, said a letter of explanation issued by the Chinese fashion magazine which published the Zhao photo. The magazine’s Creative Director has already stepped down over the photo shot in New York and published in September, Chinese media said. Zhao is not the first starlet to endanger her own career in China over with a political no-no. Mainland authorities officially banned Taiwanese pop star Chang Huei-Mei from performing or appearing on advertisements on the mainland for over a year after she Sang Taipei’s national anthem at President Chen Shui-Bian’s inauguration last year. China regards Taiwan as a rebel province that must be reunited with the mainland, by force if necessary. Beijing took a particularly dim view of an election victory by chen who had voiced support for calls for Taiwan’s independence. There were no signs of China blacklisting Zhao, who said she did not recognise the print of the red "rising run" emitting rays of light as the hated Japanese symbol. But after her apology, many of the thousands debating the flap on China’s internet bulletin boards were still irked. One self-avowed fan of the actress said: "This is no different from a Jew wearing a Nazi banner and proudly publishing it in an Israeli magazine." The chief editor of a Beijing-based celebrity monthly said China’s free-wheeling media had "blown the incident out of proportion to some extent". But he told Reuters he would think twice before featuring Zhao in future issues. "This sort of incident really gets on people’s nerves. What’s most appalling is she didn’t even know," the editor said. (REUTERS) |
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‘India key partner in war against terrorism’ WASHINGTON, Dec 13: India has been praised as a key ally of the US in the war against terrorism by a premier conservative publication here, which has advocated closer strategic and economic ties between the two countries. "Far from being a reluctant partner, India is a committed US ally. Within a week of the September 11 attacks, India provided the US with intelligence on the locations of more than 120 terrorist training camps in Afghanistan", says an article in `National Review’. The article, by H Sterling Burnett, a senior fellow, and Wess Mitchell, a research associate with the National Centre for Policy Analysis - a non-partisan research institute -praised Prime Minister A B Vajpayee’s visit to Washington in November and said it "came at a critical juncture in the Bush administration’s war on terrorism". In the present environment, when the war against terrorism is continuing in full swing, the value of a visit to Washington by the leader of India - the world’s largest democracy and second-largest Muslim community - is considerable, it said. "It highlights the growing importance of India as a world player and partner in the continuing war against international terrorism", the article said, adding the importance of India’s support for the war on terrorism cannot be overstated. "As the war widens and US military planners look beyond Afghanistan, President George W Bush should give a high priority to cultivating closer ties with India - a democratic state in the very region in which the most serious terrorist threats are based", it said. The article criticises the sanctions against India as "counter-productive" seeks their immediate removal. "Washington’s interactions with the Indian Government are currently limited by selective sanctions, ridiculously burdening the world’s largest democracy with the same stigma of illegitimacy as rogue states like Iraq and Libya. "These sanctions are counterproductive, preventing full development of positive US-India relations. Immediately ending the selective sanctions would be a wise course of action, from both a geopolitical and economic perspective", it said. The importance of establishing close relations with India extends beyond military matters, the article said, noting India’s potential as a trading partner is rapidly expanding. "By 2025, gross domestic product is expected to exceed that of Germany and France, meaning that India will become the world’s fourth-largest economic power", it said. The article also calls upon the US to "publicly acknowledge the terrorist status of Pakistani-supported groups active in India". "Fearful of endangering US air strikes against Afghanistan, American officials have not publicly discussed the terrorist operations within India, since doing so might be interpreted by the pakistanis as pro-Indian. This policy, while diplomatically shrewd in the short term, ignores reality and risks undermining the larger war on terrorism", it said. (PTI) |
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Bollywood crazy Afghans go gaga over Hindi movies KABUL, Dec 13: After nearly two decades of fighting, people on the busy streets of this city, who cowered under the strict edicts of Taliban, are now baring their love for movies from the bollywood. As you meet anybody on the streets, the first question they put to is: "Are you from Hindustan (India) or Pakistan?" And on hearing your reply, his most likely remark would be, "I knew you could not have been from Pakistan. Apart from being good people, you produce good movies, lovely ones". Ask him what is so wrong with Pakistani movies and you are sure to be deluged with heaps of praise for the bollywood movies which have a huge fan following here. "Hindi movies are really fantastic. The songs are nice, the stories are good. The heroes are manly and the heroines are beautiful," said Jamshed, who is trying to restart his business of exporting carpets to western countries. "Many a storyline of the Hindi movies have been lifted by Pakistani film makers," he added. "Before the Taliban came, we used to have premiers of Hindi movies here at Kabul. You understand? premier - the movies used to be released simultaneously in India as well as Kabul," says Latifi, a local businessman. It comes as no wonder then that the Indian Government "gifted" several cassettes of Hindi movies along with the aid material which was brought here yesterday by special envoy S K Lambah. The bulk of the cassettes that were brought with the aid were of the movies ‘Lagaan’, ‘Tadar’, ‘Dil Chahta Hai’ and ‘Kaho Naa Pyaar Hai’. One gets a queer feeling walking on the pavements of the busy marketplaces. Almost all the shops, except those for groceries and food, sport posters of a Hindi movie actor or an actress. And for a moment, one is confused as to whether one is in Mumbai or in Kabul. So how on earth did they suppress their love for the movies for such a long time under Taliban? "One had to. For the Taliban were so cruel and strict that if one was found watching a movie, he was sure to spend the next few months in prison", says Usman Abdullah, a cassette shop owner. But now that the Taliban are dead, the fear is gone. (PTI) |
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‘Pak has always exploited situation in Afghanistan’ BRUSSELS, Dec 13: Pakistan has always exploited the situation in Afghanistan whenever the latter is "weak", a conference was told here. Participating in a conference themed "Build women’s leadership in the reconstruction of Afghanistan", Afghan women delegates rejected a role for Islamabad in the internal affairs for the war-ravaged country. Ahmad Yar, one of the 12 women elected to the 1977 Loya Jirga (Grand Assembly), Seddighe Balkhi, incharge of Political and Cultural Affairs of Afghan Women in Iran and Habibi, former head of Afghan radio and television were among those who wanted Pakistan to be kept out of Afghanistan. "We respect the Pakistani people, with whom he have historical ties of friendship. But Pakistan has helped the Taliban in order to take advantage of the situation in Afghanistan," said Balkhi. Habibi said people in Afghanistan and Pakistan were sympathetic towards each other. However, "whenever Afghanistan is weak, Pakistan tries to take advantage of the situation". The conference demanded that restoring women’s rights should be a priority and 50 per cent of the participants in the Loya Jirga should be women. It also called for the establishment of a commission of Afghan women to work directly with the interim authority and to ensure that women are considered for leadership positions in the new Government structures. The conference was organised by the UN Development Fund for Women and the Belgium Government to get first hand inputs on the priorities of Afghan women. "International support is very important to keep the focus on this issue. Afghan women won’t be able to do on their own," said Balkhi. Balkhi also challenged the suggestion that two women had been included in the interim authority in order to appease western donors. "Women are not being used as a symbol. The participation of Afghan women has a historical background. It is not a new thing," she added. (PTI) |
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US House approves sweeping election reform bill WASHINGTON, Dec 13: On the first anniversary of a US Supreme Court ruling that decided the 2000 presidential election, the US House of Representatives have approved a bill to implement the most sweeping reform of the nation’s election system in more than a generation. The legislation would provide funding for a number of improvements and for new equipment and establish election standards, including for what constitutes a vote on various kinds of voting machines. The 2.65 billion dollars measure, which passed 362-63, now goes to the senate, where democratic and Republican negotiators reached agreement on a similar bill late on Wednesday, congressional sources said. Georgia Democratic Rep. John Lewis, a civil rights activist from the 1960s and one of more than 170 co-sponsors of the bipartisan house bill, said it would protect "the almost sacred right to vote." Responding to critics who said the measure does not go far enough, Lewis said, "this bill is a necessary step in the right direction." In fact, Lewis said, "it is the most important voting rights bill ... Since the voting rights act of 1965," which was enacted to help blacks and members of other minority groups go to the polls. While federal elections have traditionally been handled and funded by states and localities, the house-passed bill would provide states with 2.25 billion over three years for new equipment and a number of other improvements. States would also adopt minimum election standards, ranging from defining what constitutes a vote on different kinds of equipment to giving voters a chance to fix errors to maintaining statewide voter registration systems. The measure would also provide 400 million dollars to replace old punch-card voting machines, whose many problems were documented by the thousands of disputed ballots in the presidential race in Florida last year. Former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford, Co-Chairmen of the National Commission on Federal Election Reform, hailed the house measure, which mirrored many of the recommendations they offered earlier this year. At the White House, President George W Bush commended the house vote, stating, "this legislation goes a long way toward adopting reforms advocated by the ford/carter commission ... And is based on principles I endorsed and recommended to Congress in July." It remained unclear when the legislation would be taken up by the full senate. Before a bill can be sent to bush to sign into law, both chambers must approve it. Scores of election-reform bills have been introduced since congress convened about a month after the US Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling of Dec. 12, 2000, which made Bush the winner of the 2000 White House contest by refusing to permit democrat Al Gore a hand recount of the thousands of disputed Florida ballots. But most of those bills were blocked and as recently as October, there seemed to be no chance either chamber would pass a measure this year. But in November, with the anniversary of the 2000 White House election, there were renewed efforts on both sides of capitol hill. Just hours after the house passed its bill, Senate Democratic and Republican Negotiators reached agreemen on a similar measure and planned to hold a news conference today to announce it, a source close to the negotiations said. The source said a chief difference between the two measures was that the senate bill includes a number of anti-voter fraud provisions. Chief sponsors of the senate bill include Democratic Sens. Christopher Dodd of Connecticut and Charles Schumer of New York and Republican Sens. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Christopher bond of Missouri, the source said. Both the house and senate measures would establish election standards. But the house bill, unlike the senate’s, would leave it up to the states to decide how to meet them. The senate bill would have the federal Government enforce compliance. A number of civil rights groups favor the senate bill, complaining the house version does not go far enough. Rep. Steny Hoyer, a Maryland Democrat and a chief sponsor of the house bill, said before Wednesday’s vote: "One year ago — in bush versus gore — the United States Supreme Court effectively determined the outcome of our last presidential election." "Today this house has an historic opportunity to let this date be remembered not for one of the most controversial decisions in the court’s history, but for congressional action to protect our most cherished democratic right — the right to vote and the right to have our votes counted," he said. (REUTERS) |
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Suicide attacks renew torture debate in Israel JERUSALEM, Dec 13: A Palestinian suicide bombing campaign and the September 11 attacks in the United States have reignited an old debate in Israel on torture. The question many Israelis are asking during these turbulent days is whether anti-torture restrictions should be eased to allow an interrogator to apply physical pressure or even torture a suspect believed to have knowledge of an imminent bombing. The dilemma reached the shores of the United States after suicide attackers flew airliners into New York’s World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington three months ago. The killing of thousands of people in the US attacks and the reported refusal of several suspects arrested by US intelligence agencies to talk, prompted newsweek magazine to publish an article called "Time to think about torture". "There is a direct connection between terror attacks and this issue. As the situation worsens, the issue becomes more pressing," said Gideon Ezra, a Deputy Israeli Cabinet Minister and former Deputy Chief of the Shin Bet Internal Security Agency. Ezra told Reuters the wave of Palestinian suicide bombings in Israel, in which 29 people have been killed since november 29, has revived the issue of "physical pressure" in Parliament, which is preparing legislation governing the Shin Bet. Some officials have called for the shin bet law to include a provision allowing investigators to apply "moderate physical pressure" in "ticking bomb" situations in the wake of the deadliest suicide bombing campaign in israel in years. "Any sort of physical pressure is not healthy and is not desirable. But sometimes there is no alternative," Ezra said. Israeli human rights campaigners thought they had won their war against torture when Israel’s Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling in 1999 banning a variety of techniques used by the shin bet against Palestinian detainees. Until the ruling, the shin bet had used interrogation methods such as violent shaking, sleep deprivation, tying prisoners into uncomfortable positions for long periods and exposure to loud noises and extreme cold or heat. Human rights advocates called it outright torture. A Palestinian man died from the most notorious of those methods, violent shaking, in 1995, and others complain of lasting physical and psychological damage as a result of interrogation. But the debate in the United States and the latest suicide bombings have brought the torture debate back to the fore. Israeli lawyer Lea Tsemel, who has represented hundreds of Palestinian torture victims, said Washington’s post-September 11 war on terror has given ammunition to Israeli torture advocates. "They want to take advantage of the situation, of the international atmosphere," Tsemel said. "They say if the Americans can break human rights and can torture, why can’t we?" Human rights groups say Shin Bet agents have been abusing a loophole in the 1999 Supreme Court decision by inflicting sleep deprivation, loud noises and other banned interrogation methods. The loophole allows Shin Bet agents to cite "the defence of necessity" by saying they had no choice as there was a "ticking bomb" as a legal defence if they are prosecuted for their deeds. So far no one has been prosecuted even though Israeli anti-torture campaigners have documented numerous cases of people who have been deprived of sleep for 24 hours, exposed to loud noises and in some cases tied to an uncomfortable chair and put in overly air-conditioned rooms since the 1999 verdict. Israeli Justice Ministry lawyer Yehuda Schaffer said torture is banned under all circumstances in Israel, and what he termed "physical pressure" is used only when there is a "ticking bomb". "Resorting to physical means is the absolute last resort. There are many other techniques and ways of extorting information which are all used and preferable before using physical means," Schaffer told Reuters. Some judicial experts say it is unfair to put the burden on the interrogators. Others say torture and physical pressure occur in all democracies even if it is against the law and controls should be put on the phenomenon through legislation. Human rights campaigners say such legislation is tantamount to officially advocating torture. Harvard University Law Professor Alan Dershowitz wrote in the Los Angeles Times "the real debate is whether such torture should take place outside our legal system or within it". "The answer to this seems clear," Dershowitz wrote recently. "If we are to have torture it should be authorised by law. Judges should have to issue a ‘torture warrant’ in each case." (REUTERS) |
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