CJ urges institutions to assure rule of law

ISLAMABAD: Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry said it is the duty of courts to define constitution and courts are working according to constitution.

Addressing the function of lawyers’ enrolment, chief justice said providing justice to public is the responsibility of the government and courts and lawyers are also equally responsible for this. He urged the lawyers to play due role for the supremacy of law. No other ideology except supremacy of law is acceptable. All institutions make sure rule of law.The judiciary has pivotal role in the country. We should work to strengthen institutions, he added.

PSO stations to handle home remittance

KARACHI: Payments sent from abroad could be collected from the special booths at selected outlets of Pakistan State Oil (PSO).

The PSO and a private exchange company have entered into an agreement whereby payment booths/branches will be established at selected PSO retail outlets located throughout Pakistan.

Through this venture, both PSO and the exchange company will facilitate disbursement of Home Remittances to a large population through PSO retail outlets that shall prove to be a safe, convenient and an easily accessible option to meet their financial needs.

PSO officials said this deal will facilitate the 3 million customers that visit company’s forecourts every day by providing them with further convenience.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik ordered an inquiry into the attack on the house of Azaz Syed. – AFP Photo


ISLAMABAD: Pakistani journalists covering parliament walked out of the assembly on Tuesday to protest against an attack on a reporter working for a private television channel.

Spurred by new technology and unrestrained by censors, Pakistan's media, in particular television, have flourished over the past 10 years with dozens of new channels springing up.

But despite a significant degree of media freedom, attacks on journalists do take place.

Suspected Taliban militants sent a suicide bomber to attack a press club in the city of Peshawar last month.

Some reporters suspect other attacks on individual journalists have been carried out by members of security agencies angered by particular news reports.

Early on Tuesday unknown men threw stones and bricks at the house of Azaz Syed, a reporter with the Dawn television channel, Syed and his colleagues said. His car was damaged but no one was injured.

Syed declined to say who he thought might have been behind the attack but said he had filed reports critical of the military.

“They were not in favour of Pakistan's military establishment,” he told his television station, referring to his reports.

He said he was about to file another report and had received a communication that he should not. He did not say from whom.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik ordered an inquiry into the attack after Syed's colleagues boycotted the National Assembly session and demanded the arrest of those responsible.

Criticism of the military, especially of any suggestion it is getting involved in politics, is common in Pakistan. Some sections of the media are also hostile towards President Asif Ali Zardari.

Pakistan blocks agenda at UN disarmament conference

An overview of the UN Conference on Disarmament is pictured at the United Nations European headquarters in Geneva. – Reuters (File Photo)


GENEVA: Arms negotiators failed to start talks on Tuesday on cutting nuclear weapons when Pakistan blocked the adoption of the 2010 agenda for the UN-sponsored Conference on Disarmament.

The conference, the world's sole multinational negotiating forum for disarmament, spent much of 2009 stuck on procedural wrangles raised by Pakistan after breaking a 12-year deadlock to agree a programme of work.

The impasse on Tuesday suggested 2010 would be another year of halting progress.

Pakistan, which tested a nuclear weapon in 1998, is wary of the proposed focus in the programme on limiting the production of fissile material, which would put it at a disadvantage against longer-standing nuclear powers such as India.

It therefore has an interest in delaying the start of substantive talks, diplomats say.

“Even in the darkest days the agenda was adopted, because everything can be discussed under the agenda,” said one veteran official, unable to recall a similar delay in the past.

Adoption of the agenda at the start of the annual session is normally a formality, but Pakistan Ambassador Zamir Akram took the floor to call for the agenda to be broadened to cover two other issues.

Akram said the 65-member forum should consider conventional arms control at the regional and sub-regional level, in line with a United Nations General Assembly resolution sponsored by Pakistan and passed last year.

The conference should also negotiate a global regime on all aspects of missiles, he said.

“It is not our intention to create an obstacle but it's also not our intention to create a situation which is oblivious to what is happening around us,” Akram said.

The move forced the conference president, Bangladesh ambassador Abdul Hannan, to adjourn the meeting for consultations to find a consensus. He said he hoped to resume on Jan. 21 with a renewed discussion of the agenda.

Sergei Ordzhonikidze, the former Russian diplomat who heads the UN in Geneva and is secretary of the conference, said failure to adopt the agenda would be a move backwards, arguing that it was flexible enough to include all topics of concern.

But Akram said Pakistan did not want to work with a programme that was “frozen in time”.

Reaching a consensus is likely to prove difficult, as India rejected a discussion of regional conventional arms control, arguing that the conference should focus on global issues.

Diplomats said Pakistan's attempt to include regional arms control appeared directed at its bigger and better-armed neighbour.

The UN General Assembly also called on the conference last December to agree a 2010 work programme including immediate negotiations to ban the production of fissile material, in a resolution sponsored by Canada.

$16mn US aid to upgrade Tarbela power plant

Secretary Water and Power Shahid Rafi and US special envoy Richard Holbrookeexchange document after signing the agreement for Tarbela repair and maintenance. - APP p

ISLAMABAD: The United States will provide $16 million for improving the operational capacity of the Tarbela dam hydroelectric plant. It will help generate additional electricity of 375MW.

An agreement to the effect was signed by Economic Affairs Secretary Sibtain Fazal Halim and US Ambassador Anne W. Patterson here on Wednesday in the presence of US Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke.

Rehabilitation of the Tarbela dam capacity is part of a $125 million programme announced by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in October last year.

Mr Holbrooke said his government would provide $1 billion in assistance over the next four years to boost Pakistan’s energy sector. The US wanted to make Pakistan energy efficient, he added.

“Power blackouts cripple commerce and cause suffering in the daily life of millions of Pakistanis.

“An efficient system of power generation and distribution is a critical factor in spurring economic development to the benefit of all,” Mr Holbrooke said.

The US envoy said the US secretary of state planned to host a high-level power policy dialogue between representatives of the energy sectors of Pakistan and the United States.
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No democracy sans institutions: President Zardari

LAHORE: President Asif Ali Zardari has said that our survival is linked with the survival of democracy, which depends on smooth functioning of state intuitions.

Addressing a gathering here at the Governor House Thursday, he said he would deliver the speech in Punjabi language as he was presented a Punjabi turban by the Governor.

“I learnt Punjabi in the jail,” he asserted.

He further said Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto laid their lives for the sake of democracy. We will continue their mission.

“We have empowered women in accordance with the vision of Benazir Bhutto. Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) is working for the poor class. We will continue the politics of reconciliation.”

President said Pakistan is dealing with a number of challenges and sincere efforts should be made to solve country’s issues.

He said water is the main reason behind Kashmir dispute that is why dams are being built across the country and loans worth $700 million have been taken for their construction.

He said he is aware of the issues of party workers. He said he will spend one week in Lahore to listen to party workers’ issues every month.