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Ranendra Sen meets Powell, discusses bilateral issues WASHINGTON, Aug 12: Indian Ambassador-designate to the US Ranendra Sen met Secretary of State Colin Powell and discussed with him various ......more Indonesia court acquits general of Muslim massacre JAKARTA, Aug 12: The head of the Indonesian Army’s special forces was acquitted today of crimes against humanity involving the massacre of 23 ....more Japan
mulls resuming TOKYO, Aug 12: Japan is considering resuming yen loans to Pakistan due to increased confidence in its ability .....more China offers perks to stop aborting baby girls BEIJING, Aug 12: Rural families in China, where there is a traditional bias for boys, are being offered cash incentives ....more |
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Lee Hsien Loong becomes Prime Minister before ordinary Singaporeans SINGAPORE, Aug 12: Guests ranging from disbelieving taxi drivers and students to the highest office holders got ready....more Two US
marines BAGHDAD, Aug 12: Two US marines were killed when a helicopter crashed in the volatile Iraqi province of Al-Anbar...more Kerry
troop stance ALBUQUERQUE, Aug 12: President George W Bush attacked John Kerry’s pledge to bring large numbers of troops.......more Computer
analyst HONG KONG, Aug 12: A computer analyst has been given a suspended jail term and fined for downloading child porn in......more |
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Ranendra Sen meets Powell, discusses bilateral issues WASHINGTON, Aug 12: Indian Ambassador-designate to the US Ranendra Sen met Secretary of State Colin Powell and discussed with him various issues, including the progress made in the "strategic partnership" between the two countries. Sen presented his credentials to the Secretary of State yesterday and had a formal meeting with Powell after that. The discussions focussed on the "the new stage in strategic partnership" between New Delhi and Washington. Sen said the conversation between him and Powell focussed on various issues, including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s forthcoming visit to the US to attend the UN General Assembly meeting, but centered primarily on the bilateral relations between the two countries. "In general terms, I would say Secretary of State Powell expressed his satisfaction at the development of the bilateral relations, following the elections in India, maintaining the momentum in these relations in diverse fields," Sen told reporters here. Expressing confidence that the momentum in Indo-US relations will be maintained, Sen said both sides support maintaining the upward swing in relations and attach utmost importance to them. He said leaders of both countries keep in touch with each other regularly over phone and defence exchanges between India and the US are continuing. Joint air exercises have been held both in India and the US and an Indian mission headed by External Affairs Ministry official S Jaishankar is here having discussions on the "new partnership", with the first stage covering peaceful uses of nuclear energy and space cooperation, he said. Sen said a delegation of economists led by Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia would also visit the US soon. Giving details of the meeting, State Deparment Deputy Spokesman Adam Ereli told reporters that it was of a formal nature as Secretary of State recieves ambassadors prior to their presentation of credentials. According to the US system, the envoy gives a copy of his credentials to the Secretary of State, as also a copy of the speech he will make when he presents his credentials to the President. The department then prepares the President’s reply and sends the copies to the White House. After his first appointment at the State Department, the new Ambassador begins his work in Washington, with access to all officials except the President. At the formal credentials ceremony, he meets the President for the first time. Sen, a 1966 batch IFS officer, replaces Lalit Mansingh, who had retired recently. Sen had taken charge of the embassy on Monday. The flag-hoisting on Independence Day will be the first official engagement of the new Indian envoy. (PTI) |
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Indonesia court acquits general of Muslim massacre JAKARTA, Aug 12: The head of the Indonesian Army’s special forces was acquitted today of crimes against humanity involving the massacre of 23 Muslim activists two decades ago. Major-General Sriyanto Muntrasan had been accused of prompting soldiers to shoot into a crowd of demonstrators when he was an army captain in 1984 near Jakarta’s Tanjung Priok port. "The Judges were not of the same opinion as the prosecution because, according to the facts presented, the incident was not a widespread and systematic attack. It was a spontaneous clash and not a gross human rights violation," Judge Herman Heller said in the verdict. At least 23 people died and more than 50 were wounded in the incident when a crowd of thousands demonstrated for the release of recently detained activists. Local rights groups have said the casualties could be higher than the official count. Looking relaxed and wearing his green army uniform, Sriyanto, who is now head of the Kopassus special forces and one of the country’s most powerful soldiers, smiled and said: "This decision is objective, rational and logical." Several army generals and dozens of Kopassus soldiers turned up at the court for the verdict. Fellow soldiers have attended all the hearings. The trials of military men over the Tanjung Priok killings have come to be seen as a litmus test of Indonesia’s willingness to deal with alleged crimes committed by the army during the 32-year rule of autocratic President Suharto. Since the fall of Suharto in 1998, the army has lost some of its influence. One general has been sentenced to 10 years in jail over the Tanjung Priok case, but another was acquitted this week. Last week, the only three army officers convicted over the violence surrounding east Timor’s 1999 vote for Independence were acquitted by an appeals court. The United States froze defence ties with Indonesia following the east Timor violence. Australia also curbed cooperation, but recently renewed links with Kopassus to help fight terror in the region. (AGENCIES) |
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Japan mulls resuming yen loans to Pakistan TOKYO, Aug 12: Japan is considering resuming yen loans to Pakistan due to increased confidence in its ability to repay debt, a Foreign Ministry official said on Thursday. Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi told Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, a key US ally in the US-led war on terrorism, of the decision in Pakistan on Wednesday, he said. "She said Japan will start thinking about a resumption of yen loans," the official said. There are no projects requiring yen loans at present, he said. Japan froze all new loans and grants except for humanitarian aid to Pakistan and India after they carried out tit-for-tat nuclear tests in May 1998. Those sanctions were lifted in October 2001 in the wake of the 9/11 attacks on the United States, in a show of support for the two nations during US-led strikes on Afghanistan. But while Japan has since resumed yen loans to India, fresh yen loans for Pakistan have been put on hold as the country worked out a deal to restructure 12.5 billion of debt with international creditors in December 2001. Japan, in an agreement that covered Pakistan’s largest loan from a single bilateral creditor, signed a deal in March 2003 to reschedule 4.5 billion of that debt. It now thinks Pakistan has made progress in tackling its economic problems and wants to resume yen loans, taking into account the importance of Pakistan’s role in the fight against terrorism, the official said. In 1997, the year before the sanctions, Japan gave Pakistan 32.0 billion yen in yen loans. Last year it gave Pakistan 6.3 billion yen in grant aid and 1.8 billion yen in technological cooperation. (AGENCIES) |
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China offers perks to stop aborting baby girls BEIJING, Aug 12: Rural families in China, where there is a traditional bias for boys, are being offered cash incentives to stop aborting baby girls and help correct the sex imbalance, the China Daily said today. Under the "care for girls" pilot programme, girls would be exempted from paying school fees, insurance would be given to households until their daughters grow up and families with just one daughter would enjoy housing, employment, education and welfare privileges, the newspaper said. China has stringent rules on family planning, which allow couples usually to have just one child, at least in the cities, and limit numbers elsewhere. If a farming family’s first-born is a girl, it is allowed to have another baby. But the bias for boys, especially in the countryside, means many parents decide to abort if the unborn child is found to be a girl. In China, an average of 117 boys are born to every 100 girls. Authorities are aiming to bring the number of boys down to an average of between 103 and 107. The national population and family Planning Commission called for a nationwide effort to "create a favourable environment" for females and correct the sex imbalance at a conference yesterday, the newspaper said. Zhang weiqing, head of the national population and planning Commission, told the newspaper that correcting the gender imbalance was only a short-term goal, with the long-term aim of promoting gender equality. (AGENCIES) |
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Lee Hsien Loong
becomes Prime Minister SINGAPORE, Aug 12: Guests ranging from disbelieving taxi drivers and students to the highest office holders got ready today for the swearing-in of Lee Hsien Loong as Singapore’s third premier. Lee, the 52-year-old son of founding father Lee Kuan Yew, wanted the event to be as inclusive as possible, signalling the tone he intends to set with his Government, said his private secretary, Ong Ye Kung. The 1,400 people receiving invitations represent all walks of life, from ambassadors to hawkers, entrepreneurs to students. A multicultural feast celebrating the city-state’s diversity follows the hour-long swearing-in ceremonies in the garden of the Istana, the elegant building containing the Prime Minister’s office. Lee, previously Deputy Prime Minister, Finance Minister and head of the Central bank, will take over the reins of power under the night sky on a stage erected on the garden steps. He becomes the country’s first premier to retain another cabinet post, that of Finance Minister. Swearing-in for members of the 20-member cabinet follows, according to the agenda, with outgoing Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, 63, becoming senior minister or no. 2 in Lee’s cabinet and chairman of the Central bank. The elder Lee, turning 81 next month, was given the post of "minister mentor", an advisory role created to draw on his long experience of 25 years in the premiership and 14 years as senior minister under Goh. In a tribute to Goh published in the local media, Lee Kuan Yew cited the "testing times with Indonesia under President habibie and with Malaysia under Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad" when Goh "kept relations in working order". (AGENCIES) |
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Two US marines killed in Iraq helicopter crash BAGHDAD, Aug 12: Two US marines were killed when a helicopter crashed in the volatile Iraqi province of Al-Anbar, west of Baghdad, the US military said. The Ch-53 helicopter came down at around 10:15 pm (2345 ist yesterday) while supporting what the US military described as "security and stabilisation operations". "No enemy fire was observed in the vicinity of the aircraft. The cause of the mishap is currently under investigation," said a statement. Three other people were injured in the incident and are being treated at a military medical unit. The deaths bring to 240 the number of US troops killed in non-hostile incidents in Iraq since the 2003 US-led invasion, aside from the 691 US soldiers killed in action, according to Pentagon statistics. (AFP) |
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Kerry troop stance threatens Iraq mission ALBUQUERQUE, Aug 12: President George W Bush attacked John Kerry’s pledge to bring large numbers of troops home from Iraq within a year, saying it would embolden the Iraqi insurgency and jeopardize the mission. For a second day in a row, Bush sought to undercut Kerry’s war-leadership credentials, accusing the democratic Presidential candidate of sending mixed signals over Iraq. "We all want the mission to be completed as quickly as possible, but we want the mission to be complete," bush told an "ask President Bush" event in Albuquerque yesterday. "The mission is not going to be completed as quickly as possible if the enemy thinks we’re going to be removing a substantial number of troops in six months," he said. Kerry said on Monday that reducing US troops in Iraq by next August was an "appropriate goal," and that if he wins, he would seek to pull out a large number of troops within six months of taking office next January. The Massachusetts senator and decorated Vietnam veteran said he could do a better job than Bush of enlisting other countries to help in Iraq, easing the burden on US troops. Bush has said the US military would remain in Iraq as long as needed to ensure stability and as long as their presence is requested by the Iraqi Government. (AGENCIES) |
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Computer analyst fined over
child porn HONG KONG, Aug 12: A computer analyst has been given a suspended jail term and fined for downloading child porn in one of the first cases of its kind in hong kong, a news report said today. Bachelor Chow-Wai-Yung, 42, admitted possessing 1,000 child porn images which were found on his laptop when police raided his home in May, the south China morning post reported. He was given a four month suspended jail term and fined 2,500 US dollars in only the fourth case to be prosecuted under a new anti-child porn law which came into effect in Hong Kong in May. At a court hearing yesterday, Chow’s Barrister Alex NG described his client’s case as tragic and said he downloaded the images because he considered them to be "objects of beauty". He pleaded for a non-custodial sentence, saying the pornography chow downloaded had been on the lower end of the scale in terms of obscenity. Child welfare groups have expressed concern over the handling of Hong Kong’s first cases under the new anti-child porn laws, saying courts should be ordering offenders to undergo treatment. One group, against child abuse, argues that child porn can lead to actual abuse and that unless paedophiles are treated, they are liable to re-offend. (DPA) Gene treatment turns lazy monkeys into workaholics WASHINGTON, Aug 12: Scientists in the United States have found a treatment that is sure to interest bosses everywhere. They found a gene treatment that they say turned lazy monkeys into monkeys that didn’t procrastinate when they were given a task. The research was conducted at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) near Washington and was led by Barry Richmond, the NIMH said in a news release. "Normal monkeys and people procrastinate - tend not to work very well when they have a lot of time to get the job done, and work better when the reward is nearer in time," Richmond yesterday said in the release. But the monkeys who received the gene therapy didn’t procrastinate and did their best all the time. "The monkeys became extreme workaholics, as evidenced by a sustained low rate of errors in performing the experimental task, irrespective of how distant the reward might be," said Richmond. "This was conspicuously out-of-character for these animals." The treatment temporarily suppresses a gene in a brain circuit involved in reward learning, the NIMH said. Without the gene, the monkeys lost their sense how much work must be accomplished in order to receive a reward. After about 10 weeks the treatment wore off, and the monkeys returned to being unmotivated. Researchers are not discussing using the treatment to improve the productivity of ordinary workers. Instead they say treatments based on the research could one day benefit people with conditions like depression, schizophrenia, mood disorders and obsessive-compulsive disorder, conditions in which motivation largely disappears. (DPA) Dengue fever cases hit weekly high in Singapore SINGAPORE, Aug 12: Dengue fever hit a new weekly high in Singapore with 312 new cases confirmed last week, the National Environment Agency (NEA) said. The figure topped by 54 cases last year’s peak of 258 during a week in June. In citing a worldwide resurgence of the disease carried by the Aedes mosquito, the NEA urged people here to ensure they are not creating or maintaining conditions that encourage the mosquito to breed. One person died from suspected dengue fever in April. Six died from the disease last year. Up until August 7, a total of 3,525 people had been infected, the official figures showed. Overall, there have been 114 cases a week on average this year, 26 per cent higher than last year’s average. The NEA yesterday said the reason for so many new cases is an "excessive number" of breeding spots uncovered in homes. The hot and humid weather is also a contributing factor. Singaporeans were urged to clear any open containers that collect stagnant water where the dengue-carrying mosquitoes breeds. "NEA’s officers and contractors continue to actively search and destroy aedes mosquito breeding grounds in public areas," said Khoo Seow Poh, NEA’s Director General for public health. Of every 10 mosquito breeding sites found in areas where there were clusters of dengue fever cases, between six and eight were in homes. (DPA) Argentine ants create super colony in Australia MELBOURNE, Aug 12: Like some "B-grade" horror movie, a giant colony of Argentine ants stretching 100 has been discovered in the Australian city of Melbourne, threatening the local insect population. Argentine ants may look like any ordinary household ant, but they are aggressive and are regarded as one of the world’s 100 worst animal invaders, displacing native plants and animals, according to Monash university scientist Elissa Suhr. "In Argentina ant colonies span tens of metres...And are highly aggressive towards one another," said Suhr, who has studied the giant Argentine ant colony. "Population numbers (in Argentina) never explode and they are no threat to other plants and animals," Suhr said in a statement received today. "In Melbourne, their genetic make-up and behaviour is really different. Here, argentine ants no longer fight and have formed a supercolony extending at least 100 kilometres across the city." Argentine ants have been discovered across Australia. Suhr said the ants had genetically changed during their voyage from Argentina and that had in turn changed their behaviour, which now threatened local plants and insects. "Two Argentine ants (in Australia) from quite different locations won’t be aggressive towards one another and so they will work together to combat other native ants and that’s the method that they use to invade," Suhr told local radio. "They certainly affect the biodiversity, and the way that they do this is by displacing the native Australian ants and taking over by preying on the insects that native ants prey on." (AGENCIES) China raises alarm on Beijing power shortage BEIJING, Aug 12: China has issued a warning on power shortages in the capital, Beijing, and urged residents and businesses to scale back electricity use, the China daily said on Thursday. The Beijing Municipal Development and reform commission has issued a "yellow alert", suggesting an expected power shortfall of 300,000 kilowatts requiring local businesses and Government offices to take action, the newspaper said. The move was the latest by energy-thirsty China to battle its worst power crunch in years that has been fuelled by breakneck economic growth and scorching summer heat affecting swathes of the world’s most populous nation. Temperatures in the day in the eastern financial hub of Shanghai have hit 35 degrees celsius (95 degrees fahrenheit) over the last three weeks, prompting a failed effort on tuesday to seed clouds to create rain. Lights have been switched off on the city’s famed riverside bund, the Government has told 2,100 factories to switch to graveyard shifts and restaurants to restrict use of air-conditioners. Government offices in Beijing, where it rained heavily on Thursday, must use energy-saving lighting and raise air-conditioned room temperatures to around 26 degrees celsius (79 F), the China Daily said. Industrial firms were urged to operate when residential electricity consumption was low, i.e. At night, it said. Yellow is the Commission’s lowest warning level, followed by orange and then red, which denotes an electricity shortfall greater than 700,000 kilowatts and requires emergency measures, it said, without elaborating. (AGENCIES) |
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