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Afghan opposition ISLAMABAD, May 25: The Afghan opposition alliance today joined an international chorus of condemnation of the Islamic Taliban for ordering the....more
Indonesia’s
Wahid holds JAKARTA, May 25: Indonesia’s crippling leadership row today dragged the nation deeper into confusion when President Abdurrahman Wahid...more Erik become first blind KATHMANDU, May 25 : Erik Weihenmayer, a 33-year-old writer from Golden, Colorado, in the .....more Taliban defend ISLAMABAD, May 25: Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban today claimed that the dress code for Hindus......more |
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2 jailed in
Britain for smuggling Indian immigrants LONDON, May 25: Two men were jailed today for trying to smuggle 12 illegal Indian immigrants into Britain in the back of a refrigerated container packed with meat. Karnail Singh, 45, was jailed for five years and Gurokh Singh, 44, who is not related to him, for three years..........more
Bush pushes sea WASHINGTON, May 25: President George W Bush said today that the US military must "get started right away" on changing its focus from overwhelming force to rapid, stealthy deployments with high-tech weapons.........more Wahid offers JAKARTA, May 25: Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid today offered his deputy Megawati Sukarnoputri a power-sharing deal as part of a last-ditch fresh..........more |
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Afghan opposition outraged at Taliban over Hindus ISLAMABAD, May 25: The Afghan opposition alliance today joined an international chorus of condemnation of the Islamic Taliban for ordering the country’s Hindu minority to wear yellow badges to identify themselves. The Taliban’s ruling, made earlier this week, has evoked memories of Nazi Germany when Jews were forced to wear yellow stars. "We protest against this and condemn it strongly. Islamic laws have given freedom to the religious minorities and that should be observed," Mohammad Asim Sohail, an anti-Taliban spokesman, said by a satellite phone from an opposition enclave in the northeast of the country. Sohail said the order was part of a move initiated by Taliban’s supporter Pakistan in order to fan religious hatred and discord in Afghanistan and its arch-rival India where Hindus are a majority. "By such deeds through the Taliban, Pakistan wants to stir religious war between Hindus and Muslims living in India," Asim told reporters from northeastern Afghanistan, which is controlled by commander Ahmad Shah Masood, who was ousted by the Taliban in 1996. Sohail said the destruction of Buddha statues three months ago by the Taliban despite an international outcry was a similar attempt that inflamed the world and led to the burning of some copies of Koran in India, causing Hindu-Muslim tensions there. "Muslims and Hindus have lived for centuries in relative harmony in India and probably Islamabad wants to give a blow to its arch rival by such means for creating instability in India," he added. The Taliban say they are attempting to protect the estimated 1,700 Hindus — by telling them to wear the yellow badges as an identity — from its religious police which imposes rules on Muslim Afghans, such as herding them to the mosques for prayers. The Taliban have also termed the international outcry as an interference in the internal affairs of Afghanistan. Some Hindus living in Afghanistan have protested against the decision, but some others say they will follow the order and that the Taliban have not interfered in their religious rituals or traditions. Hindu representatives today said they had not yet worn the badges and would discuss the issue with Taliban’s religious police, the powerful Taliban organ which directly acts under the orders of its reclusive leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar. (REUTERS) |
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Indonesia’s Wahid holds firm as crisis deepens JAKARTA, May 25: Indonesia’s crippling leadership row today dragged the nation deeper into confusion when President Abdurrahman Wahid and his deputy quit crisis cabinet talks, raising speculation of a widening split between the two. Asked if he would declare a state of emergency, which would allow him to dissolve Parliament, Wahid said: "Not tonight." He gave no explanation as he left the cabinet meeting barely 20 minutes after it began and just a few minutes after Vice President Megawati Sukarnoputri left without comment, apparently to chair a party meeting. Earlier the day, wahid denied widespread speculation he planned a state of emergency — which the armed forces leadership has said publicly it would refuse to implement. The Cabinet meeting was called to discuss a compromise drafted by a team of seven ministers to head off moves for a special session of the top legislature to consider impeaching wahid over his stumbling rule. Cabinet continued after Wahid and Megawati left, but it was unclear what decisions it could take without the two leaders or whether anything had been settled while they were there. It is uncertain if anything short of sharing power could appease mps who are almost certain next week to demand an impeachment hearing by the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR). Megawati, the taciturn daughter of founding President Sukarno, automatically replaces wahid if he falls and, as leader of the largest party, holds his fate in her hands. "I have long been ready to compromise," Wahid told reporters on friday morning. "But there is a limit, and that is there will be no delegating of power. I decide overall policy." A short time later, Wahid added to the confusion by saying he had already compromised. Although he did not elaborate, the remark suggested he may have gone as far as he was prepared to. Although Megawati and other leading politicians say a special MPR session is virtually unstoppable, the Assembly could still decide just to rap Wahid over the knuckles rather than sack him. Thousands of Wahid’s supporters and opponents are due to rally in the capital on Wednesday and many fear his ouster would plunge the battered country back into bloodshed three years to the month after former President Suharto’s violent downfall. Police are on high alert in Wahid’s stronghold of East Java, where thousands of fanatical faithful have raised suicide squads. (REUTERS) |
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Erik become first blind person to climb Everest KATHMANDU, May 25 : Erik Weihenmayer, a 33-year-old writer from Golden, Colorado, in the United States, today became the first blind person to climb Mount Everest, the Nepalese Tourism Ministry announced. His success came on a day that saw 18 other climbers, including the oldest person to reach the Everest summit, scale the world’s highest mountain, the ministry said. Weihenmayer climbed to the top along with nine other team members and eight Nepalese sherpas between 9:30 a.m. and 10 a.m. local time today. The eighteen climbers belonged to the NFB Everest expedition led by Pasquale Scaturro, who hails from Lakewood, Colorado. Also reaching the top of Everest Friday was Sherman Bull, a doctor, who at 64 years of age became the oldest person to climb the mountain. He reached the summit at 8:15 this morning, the ministry said. He belongs to the Step Stone Everest Expedition led by Ben Webster, 39-year-old climbing instructor from Canada. Bull might have been doubly happy today as his son, Bradford Bull, 33, also reached the summit this morning. Bradford Bull, however, was with the NFB Everest Expedition. The ministry was unable to say if the father and son met at the top this morning. The ministry announced today that an additional 24 climbers had reached the Everest summit between Wednesday and today. This brought the number of those reaching the Everest summit within this week to 80 from the Nepalese side. There are 12 expedition to Everest from the Nepalese (south) side and 18 from the Tibet (north) side during the present spring climbing season. (DPA) |
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Taliban defend decree on dress code for Hindus ISLAMABAD, May 25: Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban today claimed that the dress code for Hindus had been proposed at a request by the Hindus to protect them from any harassment by the religious police. "This is not something new. In fact, this tradition has been in place since the times of the holy prophet for non-Muslims for the safety of minorities," Afghan ambassador to Pakistan Mulla Abdul Salam Zaeef told reporters here. Zaef, however, appeared to be at sea when the newsmen asked him to produce proof from Quran or any Islamic religious edict that permitted such discriminatory measures against minorities. The order was widely condemned by several countries, including India, the US and the UN. "Sometime, the Hindu Afghan nationals, who in most cases resemble the Muslim Afghans, were also stopped for questioning and the religious police had the impression that they were Muslims. This caused annoyance to Hindus. On this basis they repeatedly complained to the department of promotion of virtue and suppression of vice," Mulla Zaeef said. The order, yet to be approved by Taliban supreme leader Mulla Mohammad Omar, has been issued in order to avoid harassment to Hindus and also to distinguish them easily, the Afghan ambassador said. Zaeef rejected the criticism of the Taliban move and said "some countries have reacted due to ignorance and some for political reasons. But understanding is quite necessary and some people and nations, which make a resemblance of this to the Star of David... I think they are wrong". Minorities in Afghanistan enjoy equal rights and if a Muslim robs the property of any Hindu, provided he is mature, then his hand is chopped. And if a Muslim kills a Hindu then he will be executed. It means that their rights are preserved in Islam. Then if others misunderstand such right doings it is their own affairs, he said. He also dispelled the impression that the decision has been taken for political motives, adding the objective is only to protect the minorities. (PTI) |
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2 jailed in Britain for smuggling Indian immigrants LONDON, May 25: Two men were jailed today for trying to smuggle 12 illegal Indian immigrants into Britain in the back of a refrigerated container packed with meat. Karnail Singh, 45, was jailed for five years and Gurokh Singh, 44, who is not related to him, for three years. The pair, from the northern English city of Bradford, which has a large Asian population, had pleaded guilty to smuggling the immigrants into Britain on January 5 last year. "This type of offence is all too prevalent. It is trading in human lives. It is trading in human misery," judge Timothy Nash said, passing sentence at Canterbury, southeast England. "It also prejudices genuine asylum seekers who wish for good reasons to come and settle down in this country," he said. The court heard how immigration officers, acting on a tip-off, stopped the lorry at the channel port of Dover as it left a ferry from calais in northern France. The 12 immigrants were hidden in a solid-sided refrigerated container. They were sitting, wearing coats, on packs of chilled meat. The court was told there was also evidence that the immigrants had been put up in a warehouse in Paris before being driven to Paris. (AFP) |
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Bush pushes sea change in US military WASHINGTON, May 25: President George W Bush said today that the US military must "get started right away" on changing its focus from overwhelming force to rapid, stealthy deployments with high-tech weapons. "We must build forces that draw upon the revolutionary advances in the technology of war that will allow us to keep the peace by redefining war on our terms," he said in a speech to US Naval Academy graduates in Annapolis, Maryland. The address gave a taste of the recommendations expected to result from the top-to-bottom review US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has been conducting under Bush’s orders at the Pentagon. "I’m committed to building a future force that is defined less by size and more by mobility and swiftness, one that is easier to deploy and sustain, one that relies more heavily on stealth, precision weaponry and information technologies," said the President, who warned the task ahead was "not going to be easy." "Changing the direction of our military is like changing the course of a mighty ship, all the more reason for more research and development, and all the more reason to get started right away," he said. Bush, who spoke of a future in which the controversial missile defense might be "protecting entire continents from the threat of ballistic missile attack" cast his push for a sea change in US military policy in the tradition of great innovators. (AFP) |
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Wahid offers power sharing deal JAKARTA, May 25: Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid today offered his deputy Megawati Sukarnoputri a power-sharing deal as part of a last-ditch fresh bid to stave off impeachement, as the military warned of chaos if the deal was refused. But a Government minister said Megawati had asked for time to consider the offer, made at an emergency cabinet meeting five days before the House was to decide whether to call an impeachment session of the National Assembly. "The President offered handing authorities to Megawati but the Vice President said she wanted to study it (the offer) first," Cooperatives Minister Zarkasih Nur told journalists after the meeting. Officials from her party later insisted that she had rejected the proposal. But her spokesman Bambang Kesowo told a press conference she had made no decision, indicating the impasse could drag on through the week end. Kesowo, who attended the cabinet meeting, also told journalists that Wahid had mentioned the possibility of declaring a state of emergency at midnight tonight, which would allow him to dissolve Parliament. "If by midnight of May 25, there are still no signs from the DPR (Lower House) that they will stop their drive for a special session ... He (Wahid said he) will issue a state of emergency and speed up general elections," Kesowo said. (AFP) |
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