Vajpayee visits ‘ground zero’

NEW YORK, Nov 12: Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee visited ‘ground zero’, the site where terrorists crashed into the World Trade Centre towers in New York on September 11.

Before leaving for London last evening after attending the United Nations General Assembly session, Vajpayee visited the site where about 5,000 people including over 200 indians were killed.

The Prime Minister placed a wreath at the site.

He was received by Mayor of New York Rudolph W Giuliani who said Indians had done a tremendous job there. (PTI)

Musharraf says Pakistan never had democracy

NEW DELHI, Nov 12: "I will remain the President," General Pervez Musharraf told an interviewer who wanted to know whether he will run for office when Pakistan goes to polls in eleven months, an American newspaper has reported.

"We have to see to the legalities of it, " President Musharraf, who is currently visiting the United States, was quoted by the Washington Post yesterday as saying in an interview.

In a report monitored in New Delhi, the paper said Gen Musharraf was asked if he had given thought to when and how to move Pakistan back to democracy.

Musharraf : "We are going to have elections in October 2002 —provincial, local and national. When you said returning to democracy, I beg to differ. There was no democracy in Pakistan. We will introduce democracy.

Question : Won’t you run for President?

Musharraf : I will remain the President. We have to see to the legalities of it.

Musharraf, who took office in a bloodless coup two years ago, was quoted as saying that he has his agitated country under complete control. Asked if he was worried about opposition at home, Musharraf said : "It’s dying out. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be sitting here."

The Post said that shortly after arriving in New York, Gen Musharraf made clear that he expects a lot of economic assistance from the US in return for his support of the US-led coalition against terrorism. He also hoped to "develop a consensus on understanding terrorism, to talk about the operation in Afghanistan and to speak about Pakistan’s national interest."

Gen Musharraf said allying with the US was "a big decision, based on principle." He then went on to say that "now that we are part of the coalition, the people of Pakistan expect that our concerns will be addressed..."

The wide ranging interview had Gen Musharraf distancing Pakistan and its intelligence from the Taliban, yet expressing himself against involving ground troops to defeat them and against letting Northern Alliance enter Kabul. He even insisted that there were ‘moderate’ among the Taliban who should be included in a future coalition.

Asked about progress of the war, Musharraf said, "I would not call it a war. . . . It is an action or an operation against terrorists and their supporters. But the media is projecting it as if it were a war against the poor people of Afghanistan."

On the fall of Mazar-e-Sharif to the Northern Alliance, he said, "it has military significance because there are two airfields near this town that can be used for air operations inside Afghanistan. The political implications are that it will weaken the Taliban."

On the prospect of the NA moving on to the Afghan capital, Musharraf said, "I believe that Kabul should be maintained as a demilitarised city. In the past, there were atrocities and infighting among the various ethnic groups. To prevent this, no one should enter Kabul."

Asked if the NA taking Kabul would start a civil war, he said, "yes, certainly. The problem is there are different ethnic groups—the Uzbeks, the Hazars, the Tajiks and the Pashtuns. The taking of Kabul by the minority groups— the Northern Alliance is composed of minority groups— will be fiercely opposed by the Pashtuns and will lead to anarchy."

On Afghanistan’s political future, Musharraf said former king Zahir Shah "enjoys some respect in certain areas. Maybe he is the only personality that has acceptability across Afghanistan. Therefore, he does have a role to play in a future political settlement. One can lay down certain barometers: the unity and stability of Afghanistan ought to be ensured.

"A broad-based multiethnic Government that takes into consideration the country’s demographic composition should be created. No solution should be imposed on the Afghans. A political solution should be homegrown and friendly to Afghanistan’s neighbours."

Asked if ground troops were necessary to change the Taliban, he said, "I don’t think bringing in ground troops would be wise. Special operations is the maximum that one should go to... The moderate Taliban are willing to bring about change. They should be accepted in a future coalition."

On the charge that Pakistan’s intelligence service— ISI—created the Taliban, Musharraf said, "no. The Taliban are homegrown. After the Soviets left, the ethnic groups were fighting, and gave rise to the Taliban. They are not a creation of Pakistan at all."

Asked if there was not sympathy in Pakistan’s military for the Taliban, he said, "not at all. We had diplomatic relations with the Taliban for a reason: they represented the Pashtun community and controlled... 90 per cent of Afghanistan. There are Pashtuns on our side of the border. There was no alternative but to have diplomatic relations. It was not wrong then or now."

Asked if he fired intelligence service chief Gen Mahmoud Ahmad because he was sympathetic to the Taliban, Gen Musharraf said, "his removal was a routine matter of promotions. We had no difference of opinion at all."

On his advocating a pause in the bombing of Afghanistan during the holy period of Ramadan and whether that won’t give Osama bin Laden time to regroup, Musharraf said, "there may be some military negatives, but there are political positives. It is important to consider the sensitivities of the Muslims during this period."

On reports that Pakistan is thinking of putting nuclear weapons in China, he said, "this is ridiculous. I don’t think China would allow this, nor are we interested in taking our strategic assets to another country."

Asked whether the US goal was to get rid of the Taliban or to capture bin Laden, Musharraf said, "both ought to be... Catching bin Laden is a matter of having the correct intelligence. If that is available, it can be done in a day.

Question : Do we have the correct intelligence?

Musharraf : At the moment, no.

Asked whether Pakistan’s nuclear scientists had given bin Laden nuclear know-how, he said, "these were retired scientists involved in NGO activity with Afghanistan. I can’t imagine how it is possible to fabricate a nuclear device in a war-ravaged and devastated country like Afghanistan or by Osama bin Laden sitting in caves. A nuclear device needs a trigger mechanism, it needs a delivery system." (UNI)

‘Taliban, Laden contacted Pak scientists to build nukes’

WASHINGTON, Nov 12: Agents for the Taliban and Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda network contacted at least ten Pakistani nuclear scientists for help in starting a nuclear weapons programme inside Afghanistan, the newspaper USA today reported today, quoting senior US and Pakistani officials.

Several of the Pakistani scientists - which included sympathisers of Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban militia -accepted the offers, but said they would work only with Pakistani Government approval, US officials with direct knowledge of the offers told the paper.

The offers were made in Pakistan within the past two years and were in the "early stages," Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency told the paper.

Only one of the scientists had traveled to Afghanistan since the offers were made, ISI officials told the paper.

US officials yesterday cast doubts over terror suspect bin Laden’s claim to possess nuclear weapons, but did say he was trying to get such means of mass destruction and would not hesitate to use them.

Top US officials also said it was likely that bin Laden, who is blamed for the September 11 terrorist attacks, had chemical and biological weapons.

"I think it’s unlikely he has a nuclear weapon," Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on CBS, adding that he "certainly wants them, there’s no question."

National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice said the US administration was nevertheless taking bin Laden’s claim seriously.

"We have no credible evidence that he has them at this point in time but we’re not going to take any chances," she said on CNN. (AFP)

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