Nawaz urges Hillary to remove reservations over aid bill

Friday, October 30, 2009

By our correspondent

LAHORE: PML-N Quaid Nawaz Sharif, during a meeting with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday, stressed the need for establishing Pak-US ties on the basis of mutual trust.

He said that Pakistan had been an important ally of the US and the two countries had cooperated on many key global issues. The US secretary of state tried to do away PML-N leaders’ reservations over the Kerry-Lugar Law, saying the US realised the reservations of the people of Pakistan. “That was why the US government had issued an explanatory note on it,” she added.










She appreciated Pakistan government’s role in the war on terror, saying the US knew that Pakistan had suffered a lot economically. She said the objective behind the US aid was to strengthen Pakistan financially and help it in building its civil infrastructure.

She claimed that the US wanted democracy to strengthen in Pakistan. She clarified that they did not have any intention to question the integrity and solidarity of the country and hurt the feelings of its people through the Kerry-Lugar Law.

Nawaz was of the opinion that the people of Pakistan had reservations over some sections of the KLL and they were expecting that the US would amend such conditions. He urged Hillary Clinton to remove the reservations of the Pakistani people over the KLL.

He appreciated President Obama’s policy of dialogue and engagement with all countries, especially the Muslim world, which he believed would help foster understanding, reduce tension and facilitate resolution of regional and global issues.

President Obama, Nawaz recalled, had stressed during his election campaign that the US should work towards promoting normalisation of relationship between Pakistan and India and facilitating resolution of the Kashmir issue. This now needs to be given an official shape, he said, adding any US initiative towards achieving this objective would be welcomed by the people of Pakistan.

Nawaz also appreciated Clinton’s interest in encouraging American investment in Pakistan, especially in the power and energy sectors. Nawaz was accompanied by Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Ch Nisar Ali, Ishaq Dar and Khwaja Asif. Richard Holbrooke, Anne W Patterson and others accompanied the secretary of state.Online adds: The Rah-e-Nijat operation, the Kerry-Lugar Law, Pak-Us ties, the regional situation and other issues were discussed during Nawaz-Clinton meeting, sources told Online.

The former premier told Clinton that Pakistan was in a state of war and it was in dire need of help from the international community. The US would have to understand situation of the region, he said.

Demanding halt to the US drone strikes in the country’s tribal areas, Nawaz said, such strikes were causing negative impact on the government’s efforts in the war against terrorism. He said his party was fully supporting the government in the operation. He demanded of the US to transfer drone technology to Pakistan.

Hit terror more aggressively, says Hillary

Friday, October 30, 2009

‘Pakistan to take off like rocket if ties with India normalise’; GCU students grill US officialLAHORE: US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said on Thursday that Pakistan had little choice but to take a more aggressive approach to combating the Taliban and other insurgents that threaten to destabilise the country.

With the country reeling from Wednesday’s devastating bombing in Peshawar, Clinton engaged in an intense give-and-take with students at the Government College of Lahore, insisting that inaction by the government would have ceded ground to terrorists.

“If you want to see your territory shrink, that’s your choice,” she said, adding that she believed it would be a bad choice.Dozens of students rushed to line up for the microphone when the session began. Their questions were not hostile, but showed a strong sense of doubt that the US can be a reliable and trusted partner for Pakistan.

Clinton met with the students on the second day of a three-day visit to Pakistan, her first as secretary of state. Clinton likened Pakistan’s situation with Taliban forces to a theoretical advance of terrorists into the United States from across the Canadian border.

It would be unthinkable, she said, for the US government to decide “let them have Washington (state)” first, then Montana, then the sparsely populated Dakotas, because those states are far from the major centres of population and power on the East Coast.

Clinton was responding to a student who suggested that Washington was forcing Pakistan to use military force on its own territory. It was one of several questions from the students that raised doubts about the relationship between the United States and Pakistan.

During her hour-long appearance at the college, Clinton stressed that a key purpose of her three-day visit to Pakistan, which began on Wednesday, was to reach out to ordinary Pakistanis and urge a better effort to bridge differences and improve mutual understanding.

“We are now at a point where we can chart a different course,” she said, referring to past differences over an absence of democracy in Pakistan and Pakistani association with the Taliban in Afghanistan.

As a way of repudiating past US policies toward Pakistan, Clinton told the students “there is a huge difference’’ between the Obama administration’s approach and that of former president George W Bush.

“I spent my entire eight years in the Senate opposing him,’’ she said to a burst of applause from the audience of several hundred students. “So, to me, it’s like daylight and dark.’’Although Clinton said she was making a priority of engaging frankly and openly on her visit, she declined to talk about a subject that has stirred some of the strongest feelings of anti-Americanism here — US drone aircraft attacks against extremist targets on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border. “There is a war going on,’’ she said, adding the US wants to help Pakistan be successful.

Clinton repeated her conviction that the two countries’ common interests far outweighed their differences. “I am well aware that there is a trust deficit,” Clinton said. “My message is that’s not the way it should be. We cannot let a minority of people in both countries determine our relationship.”

Clinton urged Pakistan’s youth to stand firm against the forces of religious extremism, saying it threatened everything that both Americans and Pakistanis hold dear. She said, “Though the terror war is being fought on your (Pakistan) land, but it is not Pakistan’s war alone; Pakistan is fighting on the front and the US stands by it.” She observed if peace was restored between Pakistan and India and their mutual disputes were resolved, Pakistan would take off as a rocket in terms of economic development

Before leaving for Lahore, Clinton covered her head and chest with a royal blue scarf to visit the shrine of a Sufi saint in Islamabad. Accompanied by Interior Minister Rehman Malik, Clinton closed her eyes and pressed her fingers together in prayer, then gave alms to the needy at the Bari Imam mausoleum.

Quake jolts northern parts of country

Friday, October 30, 2009

ISLAMABAD: An earthquake jolted cities of the NWFP and Punjab and the federal capital on Thursday night at about 11.49pm and the intensity of the earthquake was reported 6.1 on the Rector scale.



There was no report of damage of property or life from anywhere so far. According to details, the earthquake jolted Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Lahore, Gujranwala, Attock, Sargodha, Peshawar, Mansehra, Abbottabad, Swat, Upper Dir, Lower Dir and some other cities of the provinces of Punjab and the NWFP, besides some parts of AJ&K and Gilgit and Baltistan.

Ten killed in car bomb blast in Peshawar

Islamabad, Oct 28 (PTI) A car bomb ripped through a crowded market in northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar today killing atleast 10 people and wounding over 30, hours after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Islamabad on her maiden official visit.

The powerful explosion occurred in the congested Peepal Mandi area of Peshawar shortly after 1 pm and the sound was so loud it was heard across the city, witnesses said.




A reporter of Dawn News channel said he had seen at least 10 charred and mutilated bodies being pulled out of the rubble of buildings that collapsed.

Officials said over 30 people were injured in the attack.

The blast sparked a major fire and white smoke billowed over the market.

More than a dozen shops and several cars were gutted in the blaze.

Zardari gives Nawaz hope once again

ISLAMABAD: The meeting between President Asif Ali Zardari and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) chief Nawaz Sharif could not make any breakthrough – the PML-N explained its position on all “contentious” issues, except the controversial National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) and made its concerns public after the meeting, but the presidential spokesman claimed there was an understanding between the two sides to resolve all these issues.

The meeting was held on the invitation of the president with an open agenda. Understandably, a formal agenda was not set to move forward in a bid to mend fences rather than sticking to “demands and conditions” in an already volatile political situation with clouds of uncertainty thickening amid reports of growing tension between the state institutions.

While talking to media before going to the meeting with the president, Nawaz Sharif had, however, made it clear that his party’s position was that the NRO, if passed, would tarnish the image of parliament besides embarrassing the legislators and that his party would not be a part of any such legislation. Although it was expected that the PML-N delegation would formally convey its position to the president that the PPP-led government should not get the NRO passed from parliament, none of the members of the delegation even slightly referred to it.

The coalition partners of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) have yet not taken a clear position on the NRO. They are following a wait and see policy. The Awami National Party (ANP) says it will not disappoint the nation and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) says it will not vote for the NRO. The Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM) is tight-lipped. The insiders, however, say that the ANP and JUI-F would tacitly support the NRO by abstaining from voting while the MQM would possibly vote for it.

Though the PML-Q has categorically announced to vote against the NRO in both houses of parliament, the PML-N’s silence on this issue during the meeting between its chief and the president suggests that it would go for a quid pro quo and get maximum out of the prevailing political and security situation, which has supposedly pushed the president in a tight corner.

What the PML-N can ask for is repeal of Article 58(2-B), removal of the restriction to become prime minister and chief minister for the third term and transfer of power to appoint the services chiefs to the prime minister. And if the president agrees to the first two conditions and keeps the power to appoint the services chiefs by tabling a package of constitutional reforms in parliament, the PML-N may choose to either abstain or boycott the National Assembly and the Senate sessions at the time of voting knowing that the Supreme Court will finally decide the fate of the NRO.

The Nawaz-Zardari meeting is also being seen as a formality with the PML-N apparently not budging from its stated position on political and constitutional issues. The reference to “bad governance” in the meeting that this may derail the democratic system and at the same time reiterating that the PML-N will not become a party to any “unconstitutional move” against the political set-up is simply to take a position that in the event of any “extraordinary” situation on the basis of bad governance it could justify its position and role as opposition party for having warned the government time and again.

The president may appear to be in a difficult situation but he still holds the fort with all powers enabling him to control all “institutions” which matter. Though he knows that in the present security environment the powers that-be may not venture into equally troubled political waters, he also understands that his only weakness in this situation is that his party does not have even a simple majority, also indicated by Nawaz Sharif in a press talk on Monday, to independently form government in the Centre. And this weakness can only turn into his strength to save the democratic system if he takes the political parties along on the basis of give and take – the ball is in his court.

Though Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira has indicated that the president is ready to relinquish his powers, the history of broken promises has already widened the gulf between the PPP and the PML-N and this gulf can only be bridged if the government, in consultation with other political parties, hastens to table the much-awaited constitutional package. This will not only soften the PML-N in particular but will also help disperse the clouds of political uncertainty in the country.

Wasim Akram's wife passes away

CHENNAI: Huma Akram, the wife of former Pakistan captain and legendary fast bowler Wasim Akram, died at a hospital here on Sunday.

Huma, 42, died following heart and kidney complications.

She was admitted to the hospital on Oct 20 in an emergency situation, suffering from fever. The air ambulance carrying her from Lahore to Singapore had stopped in Chennai for refuelling when her condition worsened.

Wasim was at her bedside for the last five days.

Arrangements are being made to fly her body back to Pakistan, hospital sources told local media.

Huma’s body is expected to be flown to Lahore early on Monday. According to television reports, she would be laid to rest by the afternoon in Defence.

Besides her husband, Huma is survived by sons Taimur and Akbar.

A trained medical practitioner herself, Huma had stints with some of the leading hospitals in Pakistan as a psychologist and a hypnotherapist.

In the mid-1990s, during Wasim’s second stint as captain, Huma also worked with the Pakistan team for a while as a psychological counsellor. Wasim also regularly credited her for helping him psychologically, especially in the aftermath of the players’ revolt against his captaincy in 1993-94.

Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Ijaz Butt expressed the board’s grief.

‘We are with Wasim and his family at this hour of need and pray to God to give them strength to bear this great and irreparable loss,’ Mr Butt said in a statement. ‘All the management of PCB and fellow cricketers have also extended their condolences and prayed for eternal peace for the departed soul.’

Wasim played 104 Tests in an illustrious 17-year career before retiring in 2003 with 414 wickets. He was the first bowler to achieve 500-wicket landmark in One-day Internationals and claimed 502 wickets from 368 ODIs. — Agencies.

BNP's Nick Griffin on Question Time

Controversial British National Party leader Nick Griffin is set to appear on Question Time tonight - join in the debate

The BBC Trust have met and concluded that Nick Griffin should appear on Tomorrow's Question Time despite a letter from cabinet minister Peter Hain to Sir Michael Lyons, Chairman of the BBC Trust, appealing for Griffin to be removed from the show.


Anti-racism campaigners will stage a demonstration outside BBC Television Centre from this morning and leaflet Corporation staff arriving for work.
Unite Against Fascism (UAF) will hand a letter to the corporation as part of a last-ditch attempt to prevent Mr Griffin appearing on the flagship show.

Some of the BNP's key manifesto promises and beliefs

* Stop immigration of non-Caucasian ethnic groups
* 'No' to EU rule
* Prevention of kosher and halal school meals
* Bring troops home
* Non-British citizens who commit a crime should be deported
* Restore the use of Britain's weights and measures

What do you have to say?

We received hundreds of texts and emails to GMTV this morning in light of the BNP's appearance on Question Time tonight, and here's what you had to say:

Jill Bonney in London: As much as I dislike the BNP, if we can give murderers, terrorists and radical preachers human rights, why not give a group of people THEIR human right to free speech

Julie in Barking: Nick Griffin has as much right as any other politician to be on Question Time. The BNP, whether people like it or not, get a lot of votes around here and as an official party have the same rights as other parties to air their views.

Stevie in Lincoln: If people don't wish to watch Nick on TV tonight then please don't tune into the BBC. Simple!

Mark Brothers in Swindon: They should have the right to appear as they are a party that are running for election. I myself am not a voter of the BNP but I do believe in some of their proposals.

Andy Coleman in Brighton: The reason people are resorting to the BNP is because none of the other parties are doing the things we want - which is actually what a democracy is MEANT to do. Border controls. A proper immigration policy. A better penal system. Far less EU influence. I could go on.

Sarah-Jane Pick in Southampton: I totally agree. The other parties are not listening to what the people really want, so why shouldn't he be on TV?

Jeannette Elliott in Lydney: We should be able to hear what this man is saying, if we in this country let other religions and groups air their views we should let everyone.

Katie in Gloucester: The BNP are another party in a democratic society. Whether we agree with their views or not people have a right to hear what they have to say and make their own decisions

'Glee': Bust a move, Sweet Caroline

Tonight on "Glee," there are no music mash-ups but there are some great real ones. Sue gets a date, Will and Sue swing dance. But the best? Puck and Rachel make out!

Your regularly scheduled recapper Liz had an apartment emergency tonight and I am so privileged to be stepping in for her. I love "Glee" so much you don't even know.

Finn & Quinn
The Hockey Jocks (HoJos) have waged war on Finn for joining the glee club and Quinn for being the pregnant "Queen of the Chastity Club." Even his own football players won't listen to Finn anymore. My boyfriend comments, "Just whup someone's ass." Yep. Kick one dude's butt and the rest will back down.
Ken & Emma & Will
They're officially getting married in Hawaii. For their first dance, Emma wants "I Could've Danced All Night" and Ken wants "The Thong Song." Oh dear. They ask Will for dance lessons and when he dances for Emma to the "Thong Song" you can practically see the little cartoon hearts coming off her head. Of course Ken sees, so what does he do? Schedule a football practice during glee club practice so that Finn has to choose. Jerk.

Will confronts him about the conflicting practices but Ken says what it really is is that he's a consolation for Emma. Will tells him he doesn't have to worry about it anymore but Ken still says the practice stays so the kids can decide who's first choice and who's a consolation prize. I guess pettiness doesn't end in high school.

The next day, Will goes wedding dress shopping with Emma and of course she looks like a vision in white. My boyfriend goes, "Who does she look like? It's the hair and the gloves... 'Breakfast at Tiffany's.'" I'm going to say I like that he knows his Audrey Hepburn... and just leave it at that.

Will and Emma dance as she sings "I Could've Danced All Night" and wow, she has a nice voice! She's no Julie Andrews, but she'll do. It's a lovely scene but he tells her he has to go for the big showdown and fills her in on Ken's ultimatum.

Luckily (and somewhat unbelievably) the players choose glee over football. Except Finn. And when he has to throw a slushee on Kurt, Kurt does it for him and tells him to stop and think if any football players would've done that for Finn.

Will talks some sense into Finn about seizing this opportunity to create who he is and stop letting others decide. So Finn tells Ken he doesn't want to have to choose and Ken cancels the Thursday practice.

Meanwhile, Will goes to Emma about how he can't make their wedding mash-up work and they agree it's because those two songs don't go together.

Finn comes back to glee with apology slushees in tow and Quinn drops the bomb that she's been ditched from the Cheerios. Will assures her that they'll be there to clean slushee off her, then the team douses him with slushee because he's never had one.

Rachel & Puck
Turns out Puck had a sex dream about Rachel, so when they're at her house rehearsing their mash-up they make out. AWESOME. But she stops because she says she can't be with a guy not man enough to do a solo (what she really means is a guy who isn't Finn). But it inspires Puck to perform "Sweet Caroline" in Glee. Quinn, Rachel and every girl watching swoons.

Of course, the HoJos don't like him in glee or parading around with Rachel so he gets splashed with slushee too. He tells Rachel he's choosing football over glee but he changes his mind. He and Rachel talk about how she likes Finn and he likes Quinn, so they won't work out. Awww. Darnit!

Sue & Rod
Sue gets asked out by an anchor from the news show where she does Sue's Corner. She is surprised but says yes and then tells Will she's in love after one date (of playing battleship, no less). Will teaches her to dance because Rod asked her to a dance-a-thon.

She shows up in a PIMPIN' zoot suit and catches Rod making out with his co-anchor (her name is Andrea, boooo). Sue is crushed. Awwww. But getting flung like that turns her right back into the bitch we all know and love.

Thoughts & Tidbits

• When is the storyline of a student being madly in love with Mr. Schuester? Because if my high school choir director had danced like that while rapping "Bust a Move," my panties would've burst into flames.
  
  
• Mr. Schu asking Finn if he wanted to "have" a catch made me want to tear my hair out. We don't say "have a catch" in the midwest. We say "play catch." It's the one and only quibble I have with "Field of Dreams" and it still bugs me.
  
  
• There are always so many good quotes from "Glee" that my whole recap could just be a transcript. But tonight's award goes to Ken Tanaka for:
  
  
• Ken: It's the Emster here you really have to work with. I had a monster case of athlete's foot a couple years back and got all my toenails removed so if she steps on my feet during the dance I might pass out.
  
  
• Ken: Football is war and no one single man can win that war, not even if they strap nukes on him.
  
  
• Tonight's music: Bust a Move by Young MC, The Thong Song by Sisqo, What a Girl Wants by Xtina, Sing Sing Sing with a Swing by Benny Goodman, Sweet Caroline by Neil Diamond and I Could've Danced all Night by Lerner & Loewe.