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protesters await G-8 leaders in Genoa ROME, July 15: When eight of the world’s most powerful leaders gather in Genoa for their annual......more Prabhakaran intent on COLOMBO, July 15: Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam chief Velupillai Prabhakaran is intent on....more News of progress at Agra ISLAMABAD , July 15: The news of progress in the historic Agra summit between President Pervez.....more Pakistanis watch Agra ISLAMABAD, July 15: Pakistanis today watched with rapt attention as the leaders of India and.......more |
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Vajpayee-Musharraf
summit to
figure in Jiang-Putin talks BEIJING, July 15: The Indo-Pak summit and US missile plan would figure in talks between Chinese ......more RSS chief for TORONTO, July 15: India will not tolerate attempt by foreign missionaries to force Hindus to change........more Atlantis astronauts CAPE CANAVERAL, FLA., July 15: A pair of astronauts from the space shuttle Atlantis began a....more Missile "warhead" WASHINGTON, July 15: An interceptor missile has hit a dummy warhead over the pacific in...more |
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Thousands of protesters await G-8 leaders in Genoa ROME, July 15: When eight of the world’s most powerful leaders gather in Genoa for their annual summit this week, thousands of protesters will be waiting for them. Group of eight leaders, with President George W Bush making his G-8 debut, will for the first time face the now familiar sight of mass protests marking summits across the globe. Anti-globalisation demonstrations took off with a vengeance at a World Trade Organisation summit in Seattle in December 1999. Not even environmentalists greenpeace could get near last year’s G-8 meeting on the southern Japanese island of Okinawa. This year will be very different. Host nation Italy is mounting one of the biggest security operations the country has seen for years, pouring in 15,000 armed police and troops to ensure leaders from the United States, Russia, Japan, Germany, France, Italy, Britain and Canada can discuss global issues in safety on July 20-22. It will be impossible for the rich nations club not to react to the presence of the expected 120,000 protesters purporting to speak for the "have-nots" around the world. Organisations representing the environment or animal and plant preservation, or fighting debt relief, poverty, hunger, the spread of AIDS, cultural and sexual equality, have been making preparations for months to make their voice heard. "The concerns of quite a lot of these people are serious," UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who will attend the summit, told Germany’s Suddeutsche Zeitung daily. "The politicians must explain globalisation better." But as at other summits since Seattle — in Prague, Nice, Quebec City and Gothenburg — police are expecting a hard core of activists to light the tinderbox. Past protests have seen clashes with police, the destruction of property and injury. Can eight men change the world? As witnessed at the European Union summit in Gothenburg, Sweden, last month, violence can almost totally overshadow the main event, shifting the media focus and grabbing the headlines. Will it matter? critics argue over whether annual summits of the top industrialised nations can spur any change anyway. "They are reactive on the political level, but pro-active on the economic and financial level," said Franco Pavoncello, Professor of Political Science at John Cabot University in Rome. "Any system where all the major currencies and economies can get together to discuss coordination is extremely important." according to the Japanese Government, talks on the global economic slowdown and how to boost growth will figure large on the first day of the summit on Friday. The seven major economic powers were expected to exchange views on a new round of global trade talks to start at a WTO meeting in Qatar in November, and review progress on reducing third world debt, a Japanese official said. A German official in Berlin said there would be no mention of exchange rates in the G7 communique. After issuing the statement, the G7 will become eight when it is joined by Russian President Vladimir Putin to review such key issues as the Kyoto pact on climate change and combating AIDS. The G8 was expected to make a statement on regional conflicts, perhaps on the Middle East peace process or Macedonia on Saturday, and then issue a final communique on Sunday. Climate, debt, poverty The 1997 Kyoto protocol has assumed centre stage at key encounters since bush rejected it, a decision which has added fuel to environmentalist fires. "Japan will try to come up with some kind of effort not to kill the Kyoto accord," Japanese Professor of Political Science Kuniko Inoguchi told Reuters television in Tokyo. To come away with a foreign policy feather in his cap at his first G8, Bush may prefer to focus on areas where common ground is more likely, such as on AIDS or debt relief. Lobbied by the Vatican, Italy’s new centre-right Government led by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi wants progress on debt cancellation. Foreign Minister Renato Ruggiero intends to focus on improving access to western markets as a way to alleviate poverty in less developed countries. To show its commitment, Rome has invited South African President Thabo Mbeki, Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo and other leaders of developing nations to Genoa. Meanwhile, Ruggiero has kept dialogue open with the protest groups, but some are angry few of their demands have been met. Unauthorised protests will go ahead, they say — the biggest planned for Friday, when some groups will try to breach the top security "red zone" around the historic port, which includes the main summit venue, the 13th century Palazzo Ducale. Italy has hired a luxury liner to accommodate all the leaders apart from bush, so they can be kept under tight guard in one spot when they rest, and far away from any street battles. No details of where Bush is staying have yet been released. To safeguard against any attack, the steel cordon around the city has been reinforced with surface-to-air missiles, air force surveillance of the skies and navy monitoring of the waters. One Italian activist said the authorities were creating a climate of fear to try to keep protesters away. "After Gothenburg the situation has changed. Police shot protesters. We are getting ready to defend ourselves," Riccardo Germani told Reuters television. (REUTERS) |
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Prabhakaran
intent on disrupting COLOMBO, July 15: Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam chief Velupillai Prabhakaran is intent on disrupting the August 21 referendum, ordered by President Chandrika Kumaratunga, and several black tigers are on their way to Colombo, an intelligence report has said. The prime targets will be senior members of the Peoples’ Alliance Government, who would be exposing themselves to many security risks by addressing public rallies to support the Government s cause of the referendum, quoting intelligence sources, the island reported. Prabhakaran, whose long running animosity with Mrs Kumaratunga has completely blocked all chances of negotiating a peaceful solution, had been hoping that the main opposition United National Party would manage to topple the PA from power. A change in the political power balance in Colombo would have benefitted the LTTE since it was far more likely that the UNP would start fresh negotiations with the aim of having at least a temporary truce to the hostilities. President Kumaratunga’s refusal to negotiate on the terms demanded by the LTTE, and her opposition to the Norwegian negotiator Erik Solheim, is seen by civilians in Wanni in the north as a huge block to any hopes of peace. Few in the region believe that even the Norwegian effort will achieve much success, although they are ever hopeful. The reports quoting Tamil political sources, said the rumours doing the rounds in the LTTE-held areas of Wanni is that a large number of black tiger suicide bombers have been detailed to carry out attacks in Colombo, in the wake of the PA gaining the upper hand in political battles with the opposition. Interestingly, no major attacks are being planned in the north against the armed forces during the next few weeks by the LTTE, the sources said. The reason for this is that the Army is expected to be withdrawn from operational areas for the conduct of referendum throughout the country. (UNI) |
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News of progress at Agra summit
evokes ISLAMABAD , July 15: The news of progress in the historic Agra summit between President Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee today evoked mixed response in Pakistan. While the militant groups stuck to their stand that there was little hope of any substantial progress that could be made on Kashmir at the summit, first reactions from different political spectrum of the Pakistan appeared positive at the progress of the summit talks. When contacted for reaction, chief of Pakistan based Kashmiri militant group Hizbul Mujahideen, Sayed Salahuddin, said, "the last 53 years witnessed many bilateral agreements between the two countries, which failed to achieve any progress on Kashmir issue". "There cannot be any progress till India is not prepared for tripartite talks and accept Kashmir as a disputed territory," he said. "If India was serious in resolving the Kashmir problem it should grant the right of self-determination to Kashmiris," Salahuddin said. Another militant group Lashkar-e-Toiba has declined to react to the reports of progress at the summit. The progress, however, received positive appreciation from former Prime Minister and president of Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK), sardar Qayyum who said that Musharraf-Vajpayee summit has his full support. Qayyum’s Muslim Conference has just won the elections in PoK and tipped to form the Government there by the end of this month. He said the chances of resolving the Kashmir issue were bright as the military was at the helm of affairs in Pakistan. "It would be a political suicide for both the countries if they failed to clinch a deal at Agra," he said. Former Information Minister in the deposed Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s Government in his reaction said "the first signs from Agra summit are good and the talks appeared to be moving in the right direction". He said "credit should be given to Musharraf for taking forward the peace process with India despite 18 months dead-lock". He said the news that Vajpayee has accepted invitation from Musharraf to visit Islamabad itself was an indication that there was enough progress at the summit. There appeared to be a general sense of expectation among the Pakistan public as reports of progress of the talks poured in from Agra. Streets in Islamabad wore a deserted look as people were glued to the television to watch the live telecast of summit proceedings. (PTI) |
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Pakistanis watch Agra summit
amid hope, ISLAMABAD, July 15: Pakistanis today watched with rapt attention as the leaders of India and Pakistan knuckled down to a landmark summit in Agra, but feelings were mixed on the chances of a turnaround in bilateral relations. Despite sweltering mid-day heat, people thronged roadside kiosks and restaurants to watch non-stop television coverage on the state-run station. Some said the landmark summit between Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee would find a way through over 50 years of hostility, while others doubted the talks would achieve anything. "The handshake was warm, it lasted quite a few seconds" said a student, devouring every sign that could give a clue to the mindset of the leaders as they met in Agra. "The smile on their faces was less sarcastic (than during their brief meeting yesterday)," said a shopworker. Mahmood Naqvi, a 56-year-old Karachi businessman, said "despite my poor health I have been watching various television channels the whole night, just to hear some good news. "I hope something shall come out of the talks, otherwise the future will be devastated for both of us." Musharraf and Vajpayee met alone for about 105 minutes in the first session of the summit today. "The serious business starts today — we are watching the developments very keenly," said Yahya Mujahid, spokesman for Kashmir’s leading militant group, Lashkar-i-Taiba. "We will see what happens today. We are not very hopeful." The summit is the leaders’ first meeting since Musharraf, a general and armed forces chief, seized power in a coup in 1999, toppling the Government of then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Politicians from the disbanded Pakistani Parliament watched the events unfold with a blend of envy and deep concern. They complain Musharraf has no right to negotiate on behalf of the Pakistani people. "It was like a fashion show on the first day (yesterday), with Musharraf changing four dresses," Sharif’s aide, Ejaz Shafi, observed. "The body language of the Indian leaders was not very good. Let us hope for the best." Pakistan’s main english-language dailies were trying to be optimistic, and implored both leaders to ignore the past for the sake of a brighter future for all in South Asia. "Peace and prosperity in south asia depends on the agra summit," The Nation daily said. "The two countries have wasted enough of their resources on acquiring lethal weapons and fighting wars with a forbidding cost in human and material terms." The News daily said only the "deadwood of the past and the compulsions of their domestic politics" could prevent the leaders from grasping the chance of peace between the two countries. The Agra meeting brought together "two diametrically opposite personalities who had nothing in common except that they had realised that there was no other way except to talk to each other," it said. (AFP) |
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Vajpayee-Musharraf summit to figure in Jiang-Putin talks BEIJING, July 15: The Indo-Pak summit and US missile plan would figure in talks between Chinese President Jiang Zemin and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Moscow beginning tomorrow. "President Jiang, during his visit to Russia, will have an extensive and in-depth exchange of views on a number of important regional and international issues of common concern, with his Russian counterpart," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue said when asked whether the Indo-Pak summit would figure during their talks. Beijing and Moscow, key players in South Asia, are keenly watching the outcome of the Agra summit, diplomatic sources said, adding it is "quite natural" for them to review the outcome of Indo-Pak talks which would have an important bearing on regional as well as global peace and stability. Moscow will be the first stop in Jiang’s 11-day five-nation tour that would take him to Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova and Malta. Jiang who left for Moscow today, is accompanied by his wife Wang Yeping, Vice-Premier Qian Qichen, Minister Incharge of the State Development Planning Commission Zeng Peiyan, Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation Shi Guangsheng, Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Deguang and other senior officials. China and Russia will sign a treaty on bilateral good-neighbourly friendship, cooperation and a joint statement on July 16, a senior Chinese Foreign Ministry official told reporters. "The major purpose of this visit is the signing of the treaty between Jiang and Putin, which will legalise the concept of peace of the two sides featuring a friendship from generation to generation and never target each other as enemies," a senior Chinese Foreign Ministry official said. This would show the will and determination of the two peoples to be everlasting good neighbours, partners and friends, he said. The treaty, a guideline document directing the development of bilateral relations in the new century, will cover principles and directions for their cooperation in politics, economy, trade, science, te chnology, culture and international arenas, the official said. The contents of the new sino-russian treaty would be made public soon so as not to give rise to misgivings on the nature of their relationship "I want to put you at ease," the official told a reporter, adding "this treaty will not touch upon military cooperation. It will not be kept a secret." Jiang and Putin are also to sign another "important" political document/joint statement to demonstrate concrete results of Jiang’s visit to Russia, the Chinese official added. (PTI) |
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RSS chief for global movement against conversions TORONTO, July 15: India will not tolerate attempt by foreign missionaries to force Hindus to change their religion, Rashtriya Sawayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief K S Sudarshan said here today. "There is an urgent need to launch world-wide movement against conversions," Sudarshan told a largely attended public meeting of Indians organised by the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh of Canada. He said that all out efforts should be made to resist and prevent attempts by certain Chrisitian and Muslim units to force Hindus to change their religion. "If Hindus do not maintain Hinduism, who shall save it? if India’s own children do not cling to her faith, who should guard it?" he asked, and added that Indians alone could save India and Hindus were one. He said, "Hinduism is a tolerant faith. It is that tolerance that enabled Islam, Christianity, Jainism, Budhism, Zoroastrianism and Sikhism to find shelter and support in India. But it should not be treated its weakness." Sudarshan was of the view that Hindu relgion was used and understood as a synonym of "Indianisation"-development of uniform culture by obliterating the differences between all the cultures co-existing in the country. In his forty five minutes address, Sudarshan said the Hindu nation was born with Sanatana Dharma, it would live and grow with Dharma. When Sanatana Dharma would degerate, so would India. (PTI) |
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Atlantis astronauts begin spacewalk CAPE CANAVERAL, FLA., July 15: A pair of astronauts from the space shuttle Atlantis began a seven-hour spacewalk last night, the first of three on an 11-day mission to install a new air lock on the international space station. Spacewalkers Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly were running about an hour behind schedule when they switched their bulky spacesuits onto internal battery power, marking the official start of their excursion. "There we go," said Gernhardt as he opened the shuttle’s own air lock to the vaccum of space. "Coming out." The job of hoisting the 6-1/2 ton air lock from the cargo bay on Atlantis and delivering it to its new home on the hull of the space station module unity belongs to the station’s new 58-foot (17 metre) robotic arm, sometimes called the big arm to distinguish it from the older, smaller model that flies aboard shuttles. An astronaut from the space station’s expedition two crew, Susan Helms, will command the big arm from a science station inside the US laboratory module, destiny. Her only view of the operation will come from video cameras and she will rely on directions from spacewalkers Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly to make sure she hits the bull’s eye with the 18-foot (5.5 metre) air lock. The robot arm, the most advanced and complicated piece of robotics to fly in space, was the subject of concern because it stalled during test workouts. But lead Flight Director Paul hill told reporters on Saturday that he had no worries about its performance in what would be its first big construction job. "We’ll get this air lock up," said Hill. "We’re expecting the air lock to work just fine." Since a hatch cannot open in space unless there is equal air pressure on both sides, the air lock provides an antechamber where the atmosphere can be pumped out before spacewalking astronaut exit. Improved conditions for spacewalks Otherwise, an entire space station module would have to be emptied of its precious air supply. Until this mission, spacewalkers have only exited the station through air locks on the space shuttle. Now the crews, who live for months at a time on the station, will be able to make spacewalks when no shuttle is docked there. The air lock is the first with umbilical connections for both Russian and US spacesuits. The 95 billion dollars space station program is a joint project of space agencies in the United States, Russia, Europe and Japan. Atlantis arrived at the station late on Friday following a chase through space that began with a pre-Dawn launch from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center on Thursday. The Atlantis crew is led by Steven Lindsey, a US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel, making his third flight but his first in command. He is joined by Rookie pilot Charles Hobaugh, a Marine Corps Major, and Janet Kavandi, the Flight Engineer and robot-arm operator making her third flight. Gernhardt and Reilly round out the crew. The three astronauts living on the space station are Russian Yury Usachev and Americans James Voss and Helms. Nasa was still debating what to do with a spare spacesuit that was contaminated by a leaking battery on Friday. A two-inch (five cm) "blob" on the suit was suspected to be potassium hydroxide from the suit’s battery, and Nasa ordered a full toxic materials response, with astronauts donning protective gloves, wiping down the area with wet towels and bagging the battery. The suit was supposed to be left on the space station for use by future crews, but hill said the space agency may decide to have Atlantis bring it back. (REUTERS) |
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WASHINGTON, July 15: An interceptor missile has hit a dummy warhead over the pacific in a successful test of a controversial US missile defense system designed to defend the United States against attack by intercontinental ballistic missiles. Cheers erupted as the flash from the explosion late yesterday, picked up by an infrared camera from an aircraft, was beamed back to video screens at the launch control room in Kwajalein Atoll in the marshall islands and at a pentagon conference monitored by reporters. Military officers in camouflage uniforms and civilians clapped each other on the back and shook hands in celebration moments after the intercept, which occurred precisely 42 seconds after 0839 Ist. It was only the second time that the pentagon has succeded in intercepting an intercontinental ballistic missile warhead after more than two years of trying, and it represented a big boost for program that has been dogged by failure and controversy. The interception came just under half an hour after a codified minuteman missile roared into space from Vandenberg Air Force base in California, boosting into space a dummy warhead with a balloon decoy. A network of early warning satellites and radars tracked the simulated warhead across the pacific. When the target came over Kwajalein’s horizon, the bulbous intercept missile blasted off from a seaside launch past and streaked into space, closing with the target at speed of more than 15,000 miles per hour. The two-stage intercept missile released a kill vehicle which steered into a pulverizing collision with the dummy warhead, using data from a high-powered ground-based targeting radar and its own onboard infrared sensors to set its course. The only apparent glitch came when the countdown for the target missile’s launch was stopped for 40 minutes. Two greenpeace swimmers were arrested at about the same time after landing on a beach close to the launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force base, according to the group. Air Force Lieutenant General Ronald Kadish, Director of the Pentagon’s Ballistic Missile Defense Organization, had said the day before the test the chances of an intercept were slightly better than even but told reporters he was "quietly confident" of success. Two of three previous attempted intercepts have failed and something as minor as a faulty valve or a software glitch could throw off the whole intricate system. The last test on July 8 was dashed when the kill vehicle failed to release from its booster rocket. In a test on January 19, 2000, it missed its target when a clogged cooling pipe blinded its infrared seekers seconds before impact. Secretary of State Colin Powell said in a newspaper interview yesterday that Washington would seek a new, comprehensive nuclear weapons agreement with Russia to allow the United States to develop its missile defense program, which has drawn angry protests from Moscow. "We need an understanding, an agreement, a treaty, something with the Russians that allows us to move forward with our missile defense programs," Powell told the Washington Post. (AFP) |
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