RAWALPINDI: General Raheel Sharif, Chief of Army Staff paying tribute to Shuhada at Yadgar-e-Shuhada.

Gen Raheelassumes office,visits Yadgar

ShuhadaSTAFF REPORTER

RAWALPINDI—Chief of ArmyStaff General Raheel Sharif onMonday formally assumed thecharge of his office, visitedYadgar-e-Shuhada at GeneralHeadquarters and laid a floralwreath and offered Fateha.

According to ISPR, thewreath laying was followed bya simple but impressive cer-emony at the GHQ to formallywelcome the new COAS. Asmartly turned out contingent ofthe Pakistan Army presentedguard of honour to the COAS,who reviewed the parade.

Earlier on arrival at theGHQ, the COAS was receivedby the Chief of General Staff,Lieutenant General IshfaqNadeem Ahmad. Later, Princi-pal Staff Officers at the GHQmet the new COAS.

General Raheel Sharif tookover command of the PakistanArmy as 15th Chief of ArmyStaff, on Friday (29th Novem-ber) at a ceremony held inHockey Stadium at GHQ.—INP

Action if missingpersons not

produced today: CJAG tells court two persons died in custodyDeath under detention is murder: Iftikhar

ISLAMABAD—Supreme Court(SC) while giving 24 hours togovernment for recovery of 33missing persons and initiation ofproceedings against the officersinvolved in murder of 2 miss-ing persons has warned if miss-ing persons are not producedtoday (Tuesday) then law willtake its course.

Chief Justice of Pakistan(CJP) Iftikhar MuhammadChaudhry remarked “35 missingpersons have not been produceddespite repeated court’s orders.Report of death of two missingpersons was given. Death un-der the detention of intelligenceagencies is murder.

Tell us how the death oc-curred. Postmortem of both thedead bodies be got conducted.

The remaining 33 persons arealso held by army. One persondied in December, 2012 and thesecond person died in July,2013. The situation has turnedgrave. Now the missing personsare being killed. Governmenttoo is keeping mum. One per-son died in July and the sittinggovernment is responsible forhis death. Government shouldrecover 33 persons first and thenlegislate.

CJP further remarked “ “wewant to protect the fundamentalrights of the citizens of thiscountry. No one will be allowedto violate court’s orders. If anyone is guilty then he be pro-ceeded against under law. Gov-ernment and its subordinate in-stitutions have no right to breach

the law. Missing persons be pro-duced in the court on Tuesdayat 1130 hrs.

SC bench under CJP IftikharMuhammad Chaudhry took upthe missing persons case forhearing Monday here.

Defence minister KhawajaAsif appeared in the court say-ing that he has just been allo-cated this portfolio therefore, hebe given some time Not morethan 2 to 3 days be given to him.

CJP remarked “ample timehas already been given. Courtshould give how much moretime to you. Not a single daymore will be given. If missingpersons are not produced thenwe will initiate more proceed-ings. If some one does not ac-

Some weirdos threatening Kamran Faisal’s father‘Stay away from court or face consequences’

ZUBAIR QURESHI

ISLAMABAD—After receivingthreats from unidentified per-sons, father of Kamran Faisal,the assassinated investigator ofNational Accountability Bu-reau (NAB) is in a fix whetherto take the journey toIslamabad in order to appearbefore the Supreme Court to-morrow.

The apex court is sched-uled to conduct fresh hearing

of the murder of Kamran Faisalin the light of Punjab ForensicLaboratory report. In the lasthearing (Nov 22) the three-member bench, headed byChief Justice IftikharMuhammad Chaudhry, had di-rected the IG Islamabad to re-probe the entire case and sub-mit report on Dec 4.

However, police have notbothered to even record thestatement of the slaininvestigator’s father rather it

has declined to provide both,complainant and his counsel,proper security during their ar-rival and stay in Islamabad.Talking to Pakistan Observer,Chaudhry Abdul Hameed onMonday said he has beenstopped by some persons.“They warned me against pro-ceeding to Islamabad.” Talkingto this correspondent on phone,the distraught father who is, atpresent hiding somewhere inLahore, said during the last

week his family and neighborshave spotted out strangersroaming in the street he is pres-ently living in. “For three nightscontinuously, they were seenhovering around my door re-peatedly and once, on inquiryby one of my neighbors theyfled,” said Hameed.

“Similarly, my daugh-ter pointed out a number of per-sons who could be seen stand-ing across the road from ourwindow. They were pointing

fingers at our house,” saidHameed. He said after theseweird incidents, he immedi-ately called Inspector GeneralIslamabad Police to providehim security so that he mightsafely travel to Islamabad but“the IG refused, saying sincePunjab is not part of the fed-eral capital, he could not doanything.” When asked whothey could be, Hameed said hecould not say for sure.

Privatization be done throughstock exchange: Committee‘Our own people are dishonest and we are

selling our entities by ourselves’ISLAMABAD—The Senatestanding committee on financewhile giving positive nod to theprivatization process recom-mended to the Ministry ofPrivatization to proceed theprivatization process throughstock exchange and it should notbe in haste.

The committee also directedthe ministry not to concentrateon those entities which are prof-itable but focused on thosewhich are in loss.

The standing committee onFinance and Revenue met hereon Monday with SenatorNasreen Jalil in the chair andobserved that mismanagement isthe key issue in the loss of state

owned enterprises therefore,government should concentrateon this side. The committee said“our own people are dishonestand we are selling our entitiesby ourselves.”

Senator Fateh MuhammadHasni said that ineligible peopleare appointed in managementthat results into loss of that or-ganization.

Secretary Privatizationcommission Amjad Ali Khanbriefed the legislative body re-garding privatization process.He said that Pakistan Interna-tional Airline is in 3.3 billionrupees loss per month whilemonthly loss of Pakistan StealMill is approximately at 3.5 bil-

lion rupees. Pakistan Steal Millsin running on one percent capac-ity, secretary informed. He fur-ther informed that Pakistan StealMill’s state equity is in negative.

Amjad Ali Khan said thatthere are 550 labour in excessin PSM while 1400 officers arein excess. We are not bound inIMF conditions to privatize ourstate entities, secretaryprivatization commented.

Secretary further apprisedthe committee that thirty-six bil-lion rupees subsidy has beengiven to the Pakistan Steal Millduring last three months. He saidgovernment has 42 percentshares in HBL and 20 percent

Continued on Page 7

Continued on Page 7

FC man killedin attack oncheckpost in SibiOBSERVER REPORT

SIBI—One Frontier Corpspersonnel was killed andanother sustained seriouswounds in Sibi district in anattack on Monday by armedmilitats, an official said.

Khan Wasey, the spokes-man for FC Balochistan saidthe forces were conducting asearch operation to apprehendthe militants who had attackeda FC check post in LehriTehsil of Sibi when they hit aland mine.

Militants on motorcyclesopened fire at FC check postin the same area in themorning. There was no loss oflife as the forces quicklyretaliated.

IFC to assist Pakistan inissuing of Global rupee bond

ISLAMABAD—The Interna-tional Finance Corporation hasagreed to implement a bond pro-gram to facilitate theGovernment’s various initiativesin energy projects and infra-structure development.

It was agreed between financeminister Ishaq Dar and six-mem-ber delegation of InternationalFinance Corporation comprisingJingdong Hua, Senior CountryOfficer who called on FinanceMinister Senator Ishaq Dar hereon Monday. The delegation mem-bers included experts who haveexperience in introducing bondprogramme in various countriesincluding China, India and Nige-ria.

The Finance Minister madethe World Bank and IFC visitingteam to agree to jointly work forvarious bonds and indicated all-out support for such issues on be-half of the Government and ad-vised the team to come up with

their detailed proposals at the ear-liest.

IFC has also agreed to assistthe Ministry of Finance in issuingGlobal Rupee Bond and EuroDollar bonds.

Senator Ishaq Dar also in-formed the team that recently hehad already tasked Karachi Stockexchange, State Bank of Pakistanand Security and Exchange Com-mission of Pakistan to jointlywork for enlisting the Govern-ment T- Bills and Pakistan Invest-ment Bonds at the stock ex-changes in the country which willbe the starting point to develop aplatform for future floatation ofinfrastructure bonds for mega de-velopment projects to be ex-ecuted in Pakistan.

Jingdong Hua dilating onthe role of capital markets in thegrowth of the economy said thatIFC was ready to partner withPakistan for floatation ofbonds.—Online

9-point religiouscode of conduct

formulatedSALIM AHMED

LAHORE—Ittehad Bain ulMuslimeen Committee, set upby Punjab government for main-taining religious harmony,brotherhood and tolerance, hasissued a religious code of con-duct unanimously.

This code of conduct hasbeen issued by coordinators be-longing to all schools of thought.This code of conduct was ap-proved in the meeting of IttehadBain ul Muslimeen Committeeheld at Aiwan-e-Auqaf on Mon-day, which was presided over by

Continued on Page 7

Pak annualinflation risesto 10.9pcISLAMABAD—Pakistan’sannual inflation rate rose to10.90 per cent in Novemberfrom 9.08 per cent in October,the Pakistan Bureau ofStatistics said on Monday.

On a month-on-monthbasis, prices rose 1.27 per centin November. For October, themonthly pace was 1.97 percent.

The average annualinflation rate for July throughNovember was 8.84 percent.—Reuters

Court adjournsRaja’s indictment

to Dec 10in RPP caseOBSERVER REPORT

ISLAMABAD—An accountabil-ity court in Islamabad adjournedon Monday the indictment of theformer prime minister RajaPervez Ashraf till Dec 10 in theRental Power Project case.

Raja Pervez Ashraf waspresent in the court for the hear-ing of the RPP case duringwhich former federal law min-ister Farooq H Naek submitteda power of attorney on behalf ofthe former prime minister.

During the hearing, Naeksaid the RPP case was also be-ing tried in the high court andthat the accountability court’sindictment could not take place.

Naek informed the courtthat the National AccountabilityBureau did not provide on ref-

PM demotesex-IGmotorwaysSTAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Prime MinisterNawaz Sharif has demotedformer inspector generalmotorways Zafar Abbas Lakfor issuing a felicitationadvertisement on stateexpenses.

Lak was a Grade 21 officerand will now be downgradedto Grade 20.

The former IG had usedaround Rs1 million worth ofpublic money on congratula-tory advertisements afterNawaz was elected primeminister.

Continued on Page 7

Continued on Page 7

Fiery protests after 21 IJTmembers arrested from PUSet bus on fire; snatch keys, mobiles from drivers

OBSERVER REPORT

LAHORE—The Islami Jamiat-e-Tulaba which is the studentwing of the JI protested againstthe police and Punjab Universityadministration raid at hostelnumber 16.

Twenty-one students be-longing to the IJT accused ofcreating ruckus were arrestedduring the raid at the hostel.According to police and univer-sity administration, bottles ofalcohol, Bhang (drink madefrom cannabis leaves) and bul-

lets were recovered from room345 which was allotted to RaoAdnan who is the Nazim of thestudent organisation.

According to provincialeducation minister RanaMashood, cases under the terror-

Continued on Page 7

QUETTA: Pakistan army soldiers are busy in transporting the ballot papers to Kohlu and Dera Bugti for the upcominglocal government elections.

ISLAMABAD—The provincialgovernment in KhyberPakhtunkhwa would actively par-ticipate in and contribute to theTask Force on utilization of In-formation and CommunicationTechnologies (ICTs) for educa-tion.

At a conference on Informa-tion and Communication Tech-nologies (ICTs) for Good Gov-ernance, Provincial Minister forEducation of the province,Muhammad Atif on Monday saidalready a pilot project has alreadybeen started in two districts toteach English, Biology andMaths to students in the second-ary schools through ICTs andonce found successful it wouldbe extended to other parts of theprovince.

The Conference was orga-nized by Pakistan Institute ofICTs for Development (PIID)here. At the same time, the Min-ister said policy makers shouldnot ignore diversity in develop-ment levels and the availabilityof different facilities in differentparts of the country as “there ismuch difference in Islamabadand Torghar, Dir or Chitral.

He stressed that why plan-ning for ICTs utilization the ob-

ICTs being utilized forKP education promotion

jective conditions of differentparts of the country should bespecifically kept in view.

He regretted that even theteachers have not been trained onInformation and CommunicationTechnologies (ICTs) and that iswhy on the one hand the provin-cial government was training theprimary schools teachers onteaching through the medium ofEnglish from class-I, it will alsotrain the teachers on ICTs utili-zation.

The Minister said there is nooption with Pakistan both forexpansion, provision of accessand improvement of educationexcept the optimum utilization ofICTs and the government of KPis very much conscious of thisfact.

On the occasion, FederalSecretary CADD, FaridullahKhan said there can be no sec-ond opinion regarding impor-tance of ICTs for improvementof facilities of education andhealth or strengthening gover-nance in any field but at the sametime we must not ignore the ob-jective conditions of differentparts of the country while for-mulating any policy in this re-gard.—APP

DGSE toobserve Int’l

Day of disabledpersons

ISLAMABAD—The DirectorateGeneral of Special Education(DGSE), Capital Administrationand Development Division willcelebrate International Day ofPersons with Disabilities on Tues-day with the theme “Break Barri-ers Open Doors; for an inclusiveeducation and society for all”.

The programme in this re-gard was scheduled from No-vember 25 to December 03, inAuditorium of Al-Farabi SpecialEducation Centre for PhysicallyHandicapped Children oppositeNORI Hospital G-8/4,Islamabad, said a press releaseissued here.

The special students of allfour categories IntellectualImpairment, Visual Impair-ment, Physical Disability andHearing Impairment will per-form various activities in thisprogram.

The Directorate General ofSpecial Education, Capital Ad-ministration and DevelopmentDivision is providing SpecialEducation/Rehabilitation ser-vices to the persons with Dis-abilities.—APP

QUETTA—Chief MinisterBalochistan, Dr Abdul MalikBaloch on Monday said thatholding Local Bodies elec-tions was the responsibility ofElection Commission, how-ever government has evolvedstrategy to provide fool proofsecurity to the voters and poll-ing staff in this connection.

He expressed these viewswhile talking to the delega-tions of tribal notables, politi-cal leaders and traders at hishome town Turbat.

“Government was striv-ing hard to provide an envi-ronment of a free and fairelections so that active lead-ership from grassroot levelshould come and assist us inserving the masses in betterway,” he said.

Terming education andhealth sectors the priority ar-eas for the incumbent regime,

Fool proof security planned for LB polls: CMSeat-to-seat adjustment continues across Balochistan

CM said that strict check hasbeen made to ensure presence ofdoctors and teachers at theirschools and hospitals.

“We neither do corruptionnor allow anyone to misappro-priate the money of national ex-chequer,” Dr Malik emphasized.

The political parties havebeen continuing forging alliancefor seat to seat adjustment in dif-ferent areas for local govern-ment elections scheduled onDecember 7.

Political sources told APP,here on Monday that nine politi-cal parties including PakistanMuslim League-N, PML-Q,Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, AwamiNational Party, Balochistan Na-tional Party, Hazara DemocraticAlliance have forged alliancelimited to Quetta city for seat toseat adjustment.

It is likely that the electedchief of Quetta Metropolitan

Corporation might be chosenfrom PML-N or PkMAP whileJUI-F could also not be ignoredthat has been enjoying heavysupport of its voters and support-ers in Quetta.

In Pishin and Qila Abdullahdistricts, the main contest wouldbe held between candidates oftwo factions of JUI and PkMAP,but the division in JUI in shapeof two factions including JUI-Fand JUI-N would benefitPkMAP.The Awami NationalParty might take few seats inthese districts as it had forgedalliance with JUI-F.

In Khuzdar region, four par-ties including PML-N, BNP-Awami and JUI-F has forged seatto seat adjustment alliance, caus-ing difficulties for BNP-Mengalthat was also facing oppositionby some local tribal groups.

In Kalat district, seat to seatadjustment alliance between

three political parties includingPML-N, JUI-F, BNP has beenmade and their some candidateswere withdrawn.

In Nasirabad, Sibi divisionand two districts of Dera Bugtiand Kohlu, PML-N might clinchmajority in results of the localbodies’ elections as heavyweight local tribal chieftains andpoliticians had joined PML-N.

The noted political figuresfrom local tribes includingJamali, Domki, Bugti, Marri,Abro and others were activeleaders of PML-N and they hadfielded candidates from theirfamilies and friend on the ticketof PML-N for contesting localgovernment elections.

PML-Q may take seats fromZhob division where PML-Qprovincial president and Provin-cial Minister, Sheikh JaffarMandokhel had his political in-fluence.—APP

FAISALABAD: A nurse feeding a baby after unknown people left the child in DHQ hospi-tal.

Ministerannoyed overfaulty LRH

Echo machinesPESHAWAR—Provincial HealthMinister Shaukat YousafzaiMonday shocked to know thatfour out of total five Echo ma-chines at Lady Reading Hospi-tal, one of the famous govern-ment hospitals at Peshawar,were non functional from lasteight months. During his vis-ited to cardiology ward of LadyReading Hospital (LRH), theMinister expressed annoyanceover breakdown of the Echomachines from a eight monthsand sought explanation from theChief Executive of the hospital.

He ordered an inquiry intothe matter and viewed that it wasa serious crime on part of thehospital administration. He saidthat the government would nottolerate lethargy or hurdles inprovision of cheap and immedi-ate medical facilities to themasses.—APP

FAISALABAD—Muslim coun-tries should tap their potential asthey are rich in natural resourceswhich can play a role in theirprogress and prosperity.

This was stated by Ambas-sador of Federal Republic ofSomalia Ali Sheikh Abdullahiwhile talking to Prof Dr Iqrar

Muslim countries should tapown resources: Somalia envoy

Ahmad Khan, Vice Chancellor(VC) University of AgricultureFaisalabad (UAF) here on Mon-day.

Principal Officer Public Re-lations and Publications UAFProf Dr Jalal Arif and DirectorExternal Linkages Prof DrAshfaq Ahmad Chattha were

also present.The Somali envoy called for

increasing cooperation betweenthe two countries especially ineducation and agricultural sec-tors. He said 500 Somali stu-dents were studying in variousinstitutions of Pakistan includ-ing UAF.—APP

I S L A M A B A D — P r e s i d e n tMamnoon Hussain has urged allthe segments of society to makeconcerted efforts, ensuring com-plete participation of peoplewith disabilities in the main-stream of life.

The President, in a messageon International Day of the Per-sons with Disabilities being ob-served on Tuesday, called upongovernment departments, civilsociety, philanthropists, corpo-rate sector and media to makeconcerted and sustained effortsfor ensuring active participationof people with disability in themainstream of national life andensure them a dignified life.

“International Day of thePersons with Disabilities re-minds us of our moral, socialand religious obligations towork, individually as well ascollectively, for the bettermentof our brethren with specialneeds and to facilitate them lead

All out support to peoplewith disabilities: President

a normal life,” he added.The President said the gov-

ernment was cognizant of itsobligation to take all possiblelegal, administrative, financial,and other measures for the wel-fare of the disabled persons.

“Our Constitution guaran-tees equal opportunities to allcitizens irrespective of physicaldisadvantages,” he added.

It was, he said, an occasionto reiterate commitment as re-sponsible and conscientious so-ciety to create more space for thepeople with disabilities in thesociety and to assist them utiliz-ing their potential towards theprogress and the development ofthe society.

He said, “The theme of 2013International Day of People withDisabilities, ‘Break Barriers,Open Doors: for an inclusivesociety and development for all’,rightly draws our attention to thechallenges the special people

were facing with a view to find-ing solutions to their sufferings.”

He said under the umbrellaof UN and with the assistanceof international partners, theGovernment of Pakistan wasstriving hard to provide qualityservices to this important seg-ment of society and make themuseful members of the society.

“I assure the people withspecial needs that the govern-ment is fully committed andwould take all possible mea-sures to cater to their needs andfacilitate them to lead a healthyand normal life,” he said, add-ing “However, the governmentefforts towards this importantcause need to be comple-mented by all sections of soci-ety.”

The President also urged theinternational community to helpthe developing countries in theirefforts for the betterment of spe-cial persons.—APP

Quality, prices ofedibles checked inSahulat Bazaars

FAISALABAD—DivisionalCommissioner Sardar AkramJaved and Regional Police Of-ficer (RPO) Nawaz Warraichvisited ‘Sahulat Bazaarz’ hereand checked the quality andprices of the edibles.

They inspected stalls offruit, vegetables, pulses andother grocery items and directedthe duty staff to minutely checkthe quality of the edibles repeat-edly and sale of sub standarditems should not be allowed.

They directed that price tagshould be placed on each andevery item separately. They di-rected the duty officers to ar-range separate block for eachitem for the facility of the cus-tomers.

Talking with the consum-ers, the Commissioner saidthat under the directions ofChief Minister PunjabMuhammad Shahbaz Sharif,Sahulat Bazaars had been es-tablished through out theFaisalabad Division at localityof low income people in orderto provide essential commodi-ties to the people on controlprices.—APP

Railways toconstruct flatsfor employees

ISLAMABAD—The Ministryof Railways is planning toconstruct flats for employeeson the ten kanal big bunga-lows presently in use of itsofficers.

Condition of residentialcolonies of Railways, whichwere in a mess, would be im-proved on priority, an officialsource told APP here on Mon-day.

In this regard, the depart-ment has started working to givefinal touches to this plan. Strictaction was also being takenagainst the land mafia whichwas occupying thousands ofacres of agricultural land andresidential colonies of the de-partment.

Pakistan Railway has re-trieved 2,757 acres of its landfrom unauthorized occupantsunder a special campaignlaunched to remove encroach-ments last year.—APP

World CamelConferenceon Dec16

BAHAWALPUR—The 2ndWorld Camel Conference willbe held at Islamia University ofBahawalpur (IUB) on Decem-ber 16,2013.

Vice-Chancellor, IUB Prof.Dr. Muhammad Mukhtar toldAPP here on Monday that it is agreat honour for the universityto host this International Confer-ence.

He told that the conferencewould help to highlight the prob-lems of the people of Cholistanbesides steps needed for the pro-tection of their livestock espe-cially the Camels which is themain source of transportation indesert.

He added that the IUB hadbeen trying best to preserve andpromote the livestock andplants/herbs and shrubs ofCholistan.—APP

ISLAMABAD—Managing DirectorPakistan Baitul Mal Barrister AbidWaheed Sheikh said network ofSweet Homes for children will beexpanded across the country withthe support of international donorsand overseas Pakistanis.

The MD Baitul Mal was talk-ing to Secretary General Interna-tional Islamic Relief Organiza-tion (IIRO) Saudi Arabia IhsanSaleh Tayyab in a meeting hereon Monday. The MD Baitul Mal

More Sweet Homes across country: PBMin a briefing to the Secretary Gen-eral IIRO said a comprehensivepolicy will be introduced to startpublic private partnershipscheme to get funds for SweetHomes, where hundreds of chil-dren reside and get proper edu-cation. The Secretary GeneralIIRO took keen interest in theproject and remarked that afterknowing about children at SweetHomes, he was satisfied abouttheir living conditions and edu-

cational facilities. Ihsan SalehTayyab, who himself had beenheading an organization for or-phan, for the last forty years, as-sured of his cooperation forprojects of Baitul Mal.

The MD Baitul Mal whorecently assumed the office,vowed to bring transparency inaffairs of his organization, mak-ing it an effective and efficientset up free of irregularities andfavouritism.—APP

PML-N seeks support for Quetta MayorQUETTA—Pakistan Muslim League-NBalochistan has demanded of the coali-tion partners to support PML-N candi-date for the office of Mayor of Quetta.Addressing a press conference, atQuetta Press Club, here on Monday af-ternoon, senior leaders of PML-NBalochistan including the General Sec-retary, Nasibullah Bazai, PML-N leaderand the former Mayor and district Nazimof Quetta, Abdul Rahim Kakar, the City

General Secretary, Hamayun Alkozai and others said thatthe PML-N, a largest party of the country have given of-fices of the Governor Balochistan and Chief MinisterBalochistan to its coalition partners and now morally, itwas responsibility of them to support and vote for thePML-N candidate for the office of Mayor of Quetta. “De-spite the fact that PML-N has majority in the BalochistanAssembly, it gave the offices of Governor Balochistan toPashtoonkhawa Milli Awami Party and Chief Minister toNational Party,” they said, adding that therefore, now mor-ally, the coalition partners should support and vote for thePML-N candidate for the Mayor of Metropolitan Quetta.They said that presently, Quetta city has been facing sev-eral problems including deteriorating law and order, verypoor condition of roads, sewerage system and cleanliness,adding that after assuming charge of the MetropolitanCorporation Quetta, the PML-N would pay special heed toresolve these problems on priority basis. They said thatPML-N enjoying popularity among masses and would winseats in 58 wards of Quetta City as it fielded candidate forthe slot of Mayor of Quetta Metropolitan Corporation.—APP

Library benefits researchersHYDERABAD—Vice Chancellor LUMHSProf. Noshad A. Shaikh has said that amedical library is designed to assist phy-sicians, health professionals, studentand medical researchers in findinghealth and scientific information to im-prove, update, assess or evaluatehealth- care. He was addressing the in-augural ceremony of a newly estab-lished library at the Institute of Den-tistry at Liaquat University of Medical

and Health Sciences (LUMHS), Jamshoro here on Mon-day. Prof. Noshad A. Shaikh said that a medical libraryplays a critical role in ensuring that the clinicians in theirinstitution have access to the most current medical litera-ture and best available evidence. Earlier the Vice Chancel-lor inaugurated the newly established Synopsis Secretariat,Office of the Project Director and a Pathology Lecture Hall.Earlier, talking to APP here on Monday in connection withInternational Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease(COPD) Day, Head of Pulmonology Department, LiaqatUniversity of Medicine and Health Sciences (LUMHS) Prof.Rashid Ahmed Khan, informed that cigarette smoke alsostimulates the inflammatory cells to release elastics, anenzyme that breaks down the elastic fibres in lung tissue.Dr. Rashid Ahmed Khan said Chronic Obstructive Pulmo-nary Disease (COPD) is also a pulmonary disease in whichthere is obstruction to the flow of air out of the lungs, butunlike chronic bronchitis and emphysema, the obstruc-tion in asthma usually is reversible. About the symptomsof the COPD, Dr. Rashid Ahmed Khan said that typically,after smoking 20 or more cigarettes a day for more thantwenty years, patients with COPD develop a chronic cough,shortness of breath and frequent respiratory infections.—APP

Varsities bound to provide peaceful environHYDERABAD—The universities worldover are bound to provide peaceful,probing and researching environmentto future builders of the nation and bygrooming the raw talent for the better-ment of the society. It was stated by theVice Chancellor, University of SindhJamshoro Prof. Dr. Nazir A. Mughal inhis presidential remarks at the inaugu-ration ceremony of three- day interna-tional symposium on Analytical and En-

vironmental Chemistry organised by the National Centerof Excellence in Analytical Chemistry University of Sindhat the Convention Center of the University on Monday.The Vice Chancellor said that analytical chemistry is anexciting inter-disciplinary field that is applied in manyemerging areas of science including environmental chem-istry, biochemistry, pharmaceutical science, forensic, clini-cal chemistry and biomedical sciences. He said that theenvironmental matters are the outcome of a rising globalconcern about the protection of our environment. Duringthe last few centuries, the world has witnessed a rapid butuneven economic development, he said and added thatunsustainable economic development has resulted in di-sastrous environmental crises such as environmental pol-lution, climate change and depletion of resources and lossof biodiversity. He said that the target of sustainable de-velopment can only be achieved through an integrated,comprehensive approach involving social changes in allsectors of human life and its environment. No nation canensure progress without sufficient education in scienceand technology, he said and adding that special attentionis being given to these disciplines in order to meet chal-lenges of the present era. The Vice Chancellor hoped thatthree day symposium will provide good opportunity toexchange scientific knowledge and establish effectivemeans of communication with each other.—APP

Dialogue only way to peaceMULTAN—Vice President PakistanTehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Makhdoom ShahMehmood Qureshi said that dialoguewith Taliban was the only way to main-tain peace in the country. Addressing apress conference here at Kher-ul-Madaris, he said struggle for peacewould continue. “Afghanistan is ourneighbouring country and we also wantpeace there,” he added. He said the dia-logue process with Taliban was affected

due to drone strikes, which should be stopped. He furthersaid that the view point of Wafaq-ul-Madaris and the PTIwas same about drone attacks. He condemned theRawalpindi incident and demanded exemplary punishmentfor the culprits involved it. He lauded the role of Ulema ofall schools of thought to stop violent protests across thecountry. Speaking on the occasion, Secretary GeneralWafaq-ul-Madaris, Qari Hanif Jalandri said that propagandaagainst Madaris was continuing at international level todefame Islam. He said Islam had no link with terrorism,extremism and violence. The Rawalpindi incident was aconspiracy against the country, which was foiled by theUlema. He demanded the government to take strict actionagainst the officers/officials for their negligence in theRawalpindi incident. He also condemned the drone attacksin the country, which were against the sovereignty of thecountry. Meanwhile, it is reported from Peshawar that sit-in of Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI), Jamat-e-Islami, andAwami Jamhuri Ittehad Pakistan (AJIP) blocking NATOsupplies in protest against US drone strikes continued onMonday.—APP

TIMERGARA: Children reading books at Public Library of Progressive Resource Cen-tre.

ISLAMABAD—A German-government fundedbiodiversity project in agri-culture and forestry sectorsin Khyber Pakhtunkhwa willhelp 3.5 million people to im-prove their lives.

The project will concen-trate in the current phase onthe implementation of pilotmeasures in the two districtsof Swat and Chitral, sourcessaid here.

The project will contrib-ute to secure and improvelivelihoods by supportingability of people to adapt toclimate change, thus reduc-ing their vulnerability.

Community driven andecosystem based adaptationproject will focus on thepreparation and implementa-tion of best practices in the

KP biodiversity project to improvelivelihood of 3.5m people

areas of sustainable forestmanagement, integrated wa-tershed management, agro-biodiversity, protected areasmanagement and value chaindevelopment of non-timberforest products.

The measures supportedby the German government,particularly the Federal Min-istry of Economic Coopera-tion and Development (BMZ)are intended to improve thecapacities of the governmentof Khyber Pakhtunkhwa toconsider bio diversity as acore element for sustainablepolicy development.

According to environ-ment experts, Pakistan ishome to an ecologicallyunique biodiversity and isacknowledged worldwide asone of the main biodiversityhotspots.

It encompasses nine maineco zones, from the man-grove forests at the ArabianSea in the South to the Al-pine tundra in the North ofthe country.

Pakistan is home to manyvarieties of endemic wildlife

and is rich in indigenous cropdiversity with an estimated3,000 varieties of cultivatedplants.

The ecosystems andtheir biodiversity are not justecologically important, theyalso play an exceptional eco-nomic role. Ecosystems andtheir services are crucial forthe livelihoods of more than3.5 million people in KhyberPakhtunkhwa province.

However, these re-sources are seriously threat-ened by natural disastersand impacts of climatechange including earth-quakes, heavy rainfalls andfloods.

Today, there is a generalconsensus that climate changealtogether has far diverse im-pacts. It heavily impacts eco-systems and sources of liveli-hoods of people in the fragilemountain regions. Water sup-ply for people, animals andplants is no longer assured allyear round. The affected peoplerespond to these developmentsby changing the way they useland or by migrating.—APP

SARGODHA: Gypsy children roaming around the streetsto collect saleable items and earn living for their family.

WWF-Pakistan organizesawareness about climate change

PESHAWAR—World WideFund for Nature-Pakistan(WWF-Pakistan) organized amedia exposure visit to Wet-land Centre, Karachi and KetiBunder and KeenjharLake,Thatta district to createawareness among journalistsregarding climate change is-sues and urged them to playtheir role in creating aware-ness about climate changeadaptation amongst themasses.

The media visit was con-ducted by WWF-Pakistanunder its Climate ChangeAdaptation Project (CCAP),funded by European Com-mission (EU), said a pressrelease issued here on Mon-day.

Main objectives of thevisit included capacity build-ing of the journalists on cli-mate change, interaction withlocal communities to get first-

hand information, ecologicalimportance of mangroves,WWF-Pakistan’s interven-tions in coastal areas and cli-mate change mitigation mea-sures.

Naveed Ali Soomro, In-charge Wetlands Centre,WWF-Pakistan, briefed jour-nalists regarding the role ofnatural resources in provi-sion of livelihood support tolocal communities. He alsosaid that WWF-Pakistan hasbeen engaged in promotingenvironmental educationamong the masses targetingstudents, teachers and cor-porate sector so that every-one can play its role in con-servation initiatives in thearea.

He further said thatWWF-Pakistan has estab-lished Wetlands centrewhich provides a platform forengaging local communities

in conservation of man-groves and green turtles lay-ing eggs at Sandspit beach.Local people have playedactive role in rescue of turtlehatchlings which are threat-ened by dogs and crows.Earlier, local communitiesused to cut down the man-groves and sell turtle eggs,unaware of the fact that thiswill affect their livelihood butWWF-Pakistan has empha-sized on the need to conservethe mangroves and turtleswhich face numerous threats.

Sandspit beach is famousfor the turtle watch whereGreen turtles come for layingeggs, he added. During thevisit to Keti Bunder, TahirAbbassi, Site Co-ordinator,Keti Bunder-Kharo ChannCCAP Project, WWF-Paki-stan highlighted the problemsof people in having a sustain-able livelihood.—APP

ISLAMABAD—Pakistan Me-teorological Department(PMD) on Monday indicatedchances of light rain withcloudy weather conditions atisolated places of Malakand,Hazara divisions and Gilgit-Baltistan during next 24 hours.

Light snow over the hillsis also expected in these areasduring the next 24 hours. Ac-cording to the synoptic situa-tion, a fresh westerly wave wasaffecting northern parts of thecountry and likely to persistduring next 24 hours.

Mainly cold and dryweather is expected in mostparts of the country includingPunjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,Sindh, Balochistan, Kashmirand Gilgit Baltistan during thenext 24 hours. The lowest mini-mum temperatures recordedduring the last 24 hours wereSkardu -08 C, Gupis -05 C,Parachinar -04 C, Kalat -03 C,Astore, Hunza, Gilgit -02 C.

The minimum tempera-

Light rain likely inMalakand, Hazara

tures in the other cities wereIslamabad 05 C , Lahore 09 C ,Karachi 15 C, Peshawar 09 C,Quetta -01 C, Murree 03 C,Muzaffarabad 07 C, Gilgit -02C, Faisalabad 09 C, Multan 10C, Hyderabad 15 C. TheLahore Met office Monday

predicted nainly cold and dryweather is expected in mostparts of the country, however,cloudy weather in the provin-cial capital with chances of lightrain is expected at isolatedplaces in the next 24 hours.

According to the localMet office, weather remainedcold and dry in most parts ofthe country during the last 48hours.—APP

BAGH—At least 10 personswere killed and several oth-ers injured when a passen-ger bus fell into deep ravinehere on Monday.

According to details,Station House Officer (SHO)Kahuta Police Station ChMunir told APP that in thewee hour a Forward Kahutabound passenger bus bear-ing no AJKP-085 was com-ing from Rawalpindi onreaching near Seediyan(Abbas Pur), the driver lostits control over the vehicle,which fell into a deep ravine.

As a result the passen-

Road mishap claims 10 livesgers including Driver SafeerAhmed, Wazir Muhammad,Ikhlas Kham, Hafiz ShabanMalik, Muhammad Shafi,Mursleen, Fayaz, Tariq,Muhammad Bashir andMuhammad Latif were diedon the spot, whileMuhammad, Fayaz, SipahiDullah Khan, MuhammadYusaf Rafaqat sustained se-vere injuries were shifted tothe Military Surgical Train-ing Institute (MST) Kahutafor treatment.

Police and locals rushedthe incident to Rescue theillfated passengers.—APP

ISLAMABAD: Former Federal Minister Muhammad Ali Durani meeting with Secretary General of the InternationalIslamic Relief Dr Ehsan Saleh Al-Taieb, who is currently on a visit to Pakistan along with a high level Saudi delega-tion. Director IRO, Abdur Rehman Al-Mattar and Abdul Mohammad Ibrahim Atain organisation’s head in Pakistanalso present.

IIRO to launch new welfare projects,expand relief operations: Taieb

ISLAMABAD—Secretary-Gen-eral of the International IslamicRelief Organisation (IIRO)Ehsan Saleh Taieb has vowedto launch new projects ofhealth, education and publicwelfare in Pakistan with a re-newed vigour and force.

He expressed these viewswhile addressing the audienceof a dinner banquet hosted inhis honour by former informa-tion minister Mohammad AliDurrani here at a local hotel.

Senator Zafar Ali Shah,Senator Farhatullah Babar,Senator Babar Awan, AzamKhan Swati, Zamurad Khan,Senator HumayonMandokhail, Senator ShahiSyed, Sheikh Waqas Akram,Asif Luqman Qazi, Dr. GhairatBaheer, Turgut Puyan attendedthe dinner reception. Red Cres-cent Pakistan chief Maj. Gen (r)Nawaz Khan and former secre-taries of information SyedAnwar Mehmood, KhawajaEjaz Sarwar, founding chairmanof PEMRA Mian Javed andothers were also present.

“The major objective of myvisit to Pakistan is to expandthe relief operations in acrossPakistan to further cementingthe cherished brotherly rela-tions between Pakistan andSaudi Arabia. Khadim-e-Harmain Sharifain KingAbdullah bin Abdul Aziz iscommitted to serving the hu-manity. I have brought a mes-sage of goodwill from KingAbdullah for the peoples ofPakistan. Pakistan and SaudiArabia are tied in a bond ofbrotherhood, religion and his-tory,” said the IIRO secretary-general.

Lauding the services ofSenator Durrani for the promo-tion of Pak-Saudi relations,Ehssan Taieb said that he was

indebted to Mr Durrani for pro-viding him an opportunity tomeet different leaders of Paki-stan and seek new ways andmeans to enhance assistanceto needy and deserving.

Talking about the role ofIIRO, the secretary general saidthat the IIRO was ranked among10 top bodies working for thehumanitarian aid across theworld. “We are thankful to thegovernment and peoples ofSaudi Arabia who contributelavishly for the cause of serv-ing the humanity,” he said andadded that he had held meet-ings with different important

personalities in Pakistan to takethe role of the IIRO’s relief workto new highs in Pakistan. Hesaid that it was heartening tonote that the IIRO Pakistan wasinvolved vigorously in reliefand rehabilitation activities incalamity-hit areas of Pakistanto help improve the living con-ditions of the affectees.

Welcoming the IIRO sec-retary-general Ehssan SalehTaieb and his delegation, Direc-tor-General of IIRO foreign of-fices Abdul Rehman Al-Matterand others, Mohammad AliDurrani expressed his gratitudeto the IIRO chief and said that

the International Islamic ReliefOrganization was doing a greatjob in helping the affectees ofnatural calamities. He said thatthe people of Pakistan had greatreverence and affection to thepeople and state of SaudiArabia. “People of Pakistanhave special respect and lovefor King Abdullah bin AbdulAziz and the royal family as theyhave always been forthcomingin helping Pakistan and itspeople”. Mohammad AliDurrani said that it was a greathonour for him to welcomeEhssan Saleh Taieb who be-longed to the family of Holy

Prophet Hazrat Mohammad(Peace Be Upon Him). “I comefrom a poor area of Bahawalpur.Let me admit that the relief workundertaken by the IIRO to theaffected people of floods andearthquake in across Pakistanis exemplary and it has no par-allel. For this help and assis-tance, Pakistan and its peopleare indebted to the fundingmade by King Abdullah, thepeople of Saudi Arabia, IIROand its Pakistan office and theSaudi ambassador in Pakistanfor the generous and valuablefunding for disaster-hit people,”he added.—Online

Azam wants strongcoordination among

security agenciesPESHAWAR—Commissioner,Peshawar Division Capital(Retd) Munir Azam Mondaydirected all concerned de-partments and security agen-cies for strengthening mutualcoordination for maintainingpeaceful environment in thedivision.

He issued these direc-tives while presiding over ahigh-level meeting regardingCoordination Task Force formaintenance of law and or-der in Peshawar, Charsadda,Nowshera, Khyber andMohmand Agencies.

The meeting was at-tended by Political Agents,Khyber & Mohmand Agen-cies, Deputy Commissioners(D.Cs), Peshawar,Charsadda, Nowshera, SSP(Operation), Peshawar,Deputy Director, IntelligenceBureau (IB) and Director Spe-cial Branch.

The meeting held detailreview of law and order situ-ation while Deputy Commis-sioners, Peshawar,Charsadda and PoliticalAgent, Khyber Agency gavedetailed briefing on situationin their respective areas andalso presented report regard-ing measures taken for themaintenance of law and or-der to CommissionerPeshawar.

Addressing the meet-ing, Commissioner,Peshawar Division, Captain(Retd) Munir Azam directedaccelerating coordinationamong all organizations formaintenance of peacefulenvironment and law andorder at local level.

The meeting for the pur-pose of controlling crimeslike kidnapping for ransomand other heinous crimesdecided tightening of sur-veillance.—APP

Rehabilitation ofvarious KKH

sections continuesISLAMABAD—The NationalHighway Authority (NHA)has undertaken work for re-pair and improvement of vari-ous sections of KarakorumHighway (KKH).

An NHA official told APPMonday that onHassanabdal-Mansehra sec-tion (90 km), geometric im-provement of sharp curvesfrom Havelian to Abbottabadand widening of carriagewayat various locations had beencompleted.

Overall condition of 100km Mansehra-Thakot sec-tion was good and did notneed major maintenancework, he said and added thatrehabilitation and improve-ment work of Batagram-Thakot section (25 km) hadalso been completed underthe National Highway Im-provement Programme, whileroutine maintenance workswere in progress.

He said 281 km Thakot-Raikot section was in a dilapi-dated condition mainly dueto 2010 floods wherein fourbridges and various road sec-tions were damaged.

However, he said, the NHAwas maintaining this road sec-tion through a routine mainte-nance contract signed with theFrontier Works Organization(FWO), which included re-moval of potholes, clearanceof landslides/snow, cleaning ofdrains/culverts, repairing ofretaining walls etc.

Under a Chinese grant, hesaid M/s China Railway 17thBureau Group Co. Ltd wouldrehabilitate 147.3 km of Thakot-Raikot section.—APP

GD Langlandscalls on KPGovernor

P E S H AWA R — R e n o w n e deducationist, G.D. Langlandscalled on the KhyberPakhtunkhwa governor, En-gineer Shaukatullah atGovernor’s House hereMonday.

G.D. Langlands whoserved in Sub-Continent asBritish soldier in 1944 pre-ferred to stay back after In-dependence and sincethen has been serving Paki-stanis in the field of educa-tion.

He establishedG.D.Langlands School andCollege at Chitral in 1988 andserved it till 2012. Prior to thishe contributed tremendouslyin establishment of CadetCollege Razmak in 1978 andalso served it as its Principalfrom 1979 to 1988.—APP

Let Afghanistango its own way

ACCORDING to a report appearing in the Washington Post, theUnited States, after its longest war in history, is suddenly contemplating to dismantle the bulk of its counter-terrorism infrastruc-

ture in the region and abandon Afghanistan’s security forces. It says thatthe US is weighing cost of letting Afghanistan go its own way.

No one can say with certainty that the report is not just anotherpiece of disinformation by the US administration aimed at pressuriz-ing Afghan President to sign the proposed security deal that givesimmunity to US occupation troops even after withdrawal of majorityof troops by the end of 2014. Karzai, even after securing mandatefrom the tribal jirga, wants to affix his signature at a time of his ownconvenience while Washington is keen to conclude it before the endof the year, apparently to deny Karzai the opportunity to use it as atool to exploit in the coming presidential elections in April 2014. Pre-viously too, the United States leaked the so-called notion of ‘ZeroOption’ meaning total withdrawal from Afghanistan and now evenAmerican media is openly saying that it was used as a bargaining chipto force Karzai to toe Washington’s line on the security accord. Thecontents of the latest story too point out towards a similar approach asit threatens Kabul that it would lose foreign aid and enduring US dip-lomatic presence in the region if the deal is not done as desired by theUS. However, we wish there is genuine thinking about total with-drawal as this would be a step in the right direction, which would notonly be beneficial for Afghanistan and the region but the United Statesitself. There can’t be restoration of Afghan sovereignty if the US main-tains nine bases and 15,000 to 20,000 troops even after formal end toforeign occupation of Afghanistan. People of Afghanistan and the coun-tries of the region are also deadly against continued US military pres-ence in Afghanistan for another ten years. Those who understand thepsyche of Afghan people are convinced that Afghans would never ac-cept that and this would become a source of perpetual instability andchaos in that country. The instability in Afghanistan would also haveimplications for the region and beyond and therefore, the United Statesshould seriously think about handing over full sovereignty to Afghansand if there are concerns about post-withdrawal security then the re-sponsibility can be entrusted the UN to take care of peace.

Need to remove flawsof 18th amendment

REPORTS in the national media indicate that the Government and theOpposition were in contact with each other to explore the possibility

of reviving the parliamentary committee that finalized the 18th Constitu-tional Amendment with a view to removing some of the flaws and theensuing difficulties being faced by the Federation and the Provinces. Fi-nance Minister Ishaq Dar and Leader of the Opposition in the NationalAssembly Syed Khurshid Shah have reportedly had initial discussions onthe issue and it is going to be taken up with other parties as well.

Despite repeated claims being made by Senator Mian Raza Rabbani,who spearheaded the Committee in question, that the 18th Amendmentwas sacrosanct and could not be touched again, the fact remains that theAmendment has created several anomalies that do not augur well forthe system. It is generally believed that the Amendment was adopted inundue haste and was product of political expediencies. Some analystsrightly point out that the two main political parties and their allies madea compromise deal to serve their political ends without realizing conse-quences of some of the amendments on administrative and legal work-ing of the government. Flaws of the amendment became evident when acontroversy surrounded about the fate of the Higher Education Com-mission (HEC) with Rabbani and others in the Government adamant towind it up and transfer its functions but the impending catastrophe wasavoided by some saner elements both in the Opposition and the Gov-ernment who saved the HEC from the deadly axe. Apart from someother issues in education like syllabus, there also several issues in thehealth sector including formation and role of the National Drug Regu-latory Authority that have become controversial or vague in the pres-ence of 18th Amendment. Some Ministries and departments were un-wisely devolved to Provinces without considering pros and cons andafterwards the very Government of the PPP revived six of those Minis-tries under different names to dodge the 18th Amendment spirit. Thereare reasons to believe that instead of strengthening the Federation, aswas claimed, the 18th Amendment has weakened the Federation andthere is, therefore, every justification to review it thoroughly.

NEPRA takes consumerfriendly decision

THE National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NAPRA) has ordered power companies to reimburse the amount collected on account

of fuel price adjustment to consumers involving aggregate benefit of Rs35 billion for consumers. The DISCOs would provide relief to powerconsumers in the monthly bills for the next five months.

This is, indeed, a consumer friendly initiative that would help allevi-ate sufferings of the people who have been made to pay the highest powerrates in the region mainly because of inefficiencies and corruption of theDISCOs and thefts and leakages. But the issue also raises questions aboutthe way the prices including the fuel adjustment are determined by theregulatory authority. In the past as well NEPRA either had to revise up-ward or downward the fuel adjustment price for consumers for previousmonths because of some error or omission. There is something seriouslywrong with the pricing formula which needs to be reviewed and revisedas pointed out repeatedly by the Supreme Court as well. We hope thatboth the Government and NEPRA as well as OGRA would take into ac-count ground realities while determining rates of utilities as their pricesare going beyond the reach of the common man despite claims of provi-sion of some subsidies by the authorities concerned.

From Maudoodi to Munawar Hasan

The prime goal isto alleviatesuffering, and notto prolong life. Andif your treatmentdoes not alleviatesuffering, but onlyprolongs life, thattreatment shouldbe stopped.

Politicskeeps

getting inway ofclosing

Guantanamo

SIX months after PresidentObama rededicated himselfto closing the Guantanamo

Bay prison, his administrationcan point to modest signs ofprogress. Two of the 164 prison-ers at the base in Cuba were trans-ferred to Algeria in August , re-suming a process of repatriationthat had been virtually frozen for2½ years. This month the Penta-gon finally initiated review hear-ings for 69 detainees who haveneither been cleared for transfernor charged with a crime, 20months after Mr. Obama orderedthe process. Two senior officialshave been appointed at the Stateand Defence departments to co-ordinate further transfers.

Congress, too, finally is edg-ing away from its counterproduc-tive refusal to allow the adminis-tration to take measures to winddown the prison and end its useby anti-American propagandistsand al-Qaeda recruiters. On Nov.19, the Senate voted to preservelanguage in the pending NationalDefence Authorization Act thatwould ease restrictions on repa-triating Guantanamo detaineesand allow their transfer to theUnited States for trial, detentionor medical treatment. Fifty-fivesenators, including three Repub-licans, voted against an amend-ment that would have left the ex-isting, highly restrictive transferrules in place, compared withonly 41 who opposed it a yearago. The Senate action made emi-nent sense. More than half ofGuantanamo’s detainees havebeen cleared for transfer, andmore could be approved in thenew hearings.

The rest could be more eas-ily prosecuted, and far more in-expensively detained, in theUnited States than at the base. AsMr. Obama has argued, “there isno justification beyond politicsfor Congress to prevent” thesesteps. That said, the sad reality isthat Guantanamo is likely to re-main open for some time. The de-fence bill is stuck in the Senateand in danger of not being passedfor the first time in 51 years. Evenif the bill clears the Senate, theGuantanamo measures wouldhave to survive a conferencecommittee with Republican-con-trolled House.

Congress, moreover, is notthe administration’s only prob-lem. The biggest obstacle may liein Yemen, the homeland of morethan half of the prisoners, includ-ing 59 of those already approvedfor transfer. The nation is a cen-tre of operations for al-Qaeda:Mr. Obama suspended repatria-tions to Yemen after a plot tobomb a U.S. airliner waslaunched there in December2009. Its fragile government co-operates with the United States oncounter-terrorism but does nothave the capacity to rehabilitatereturned prisoners or detain thosewho cannot be safely released.The Obama administration is at-tempting to organize an interna-tional effort to establish and funda new detention facility in Yementhat could take on those missions.But no agreement has been an-nounced, and it could take monthsor even years to set up the facil-ity if there were an accord. Con-gress should end its obstructionof the administration’s initiativesso that more of Guantanamo’sdetainees can be transferred ortried in US courts. But the admin-istration also has work to do:Even when Guantanamo isclosed, a legal regime will beneeded for arrest, interrogationand long-term detention of for-eign terrorist suspects who can-not be handled by domestic USjustice system. LikeGuantanamo’s closure, that leg-islation has been delayed by poli-tics for too long.— The Washington Post

MEDIA WATCH

JAMAAT-e-Islami (JI) wasfounded by Abul Ala Maudoodion August 26, 1941. He was

among the staunch opponents of ideaof Pakistan. However, once Pakistancame on the world map on August14, 1947,Maudoodi stated that Pa-kistan was destined to become anIslamic State.

Motivated by the desire to makePakistan an Islamic State governedby Shariah law, JI was instrumentalin getting Objectives Resolutionpassed by the Constituent Assemblyin 1949. JI spearheaded Ahmediyyariots in Punjab in 1953 which re-sulted in declaration of martial lawin Lahore. Lt Gen Azam Khancrushed the movement in a monthtime. Maudoodi was awarded deathsentence but under public pressurehe was released. ChaudhriMuhammad Ali obliged JI by insert-ing Islamic clauses in the 1956 Con-stitution. Collision with Gen AyubKhan started when JI demanded res-toration of Islamic articles in 1962Constitution. To pacify the Islamists,Ayub agreed to inscribe word ‘Is-lamic’ with Republic of Pakistan inthe Constitution. JI was the majorspirit behind Pakistan DemocraticMovement in 1968 when AyubKhan decided to celebrate ‘Decadeof Development’.

The JI became an ally of GenYahya Khan regime and its militantwing Islami Jamiat-e-Tulaba tookpart in the civil war against theMukti Bahinis in former East Paki-stan by forming Al-Shams and Al-Badr militias and then supported theArmy in its fight against Indian

Army in 1971 till the veryend. In October 1972, MianTufail Ahmad replacedMaudoodi as the new Ameer.By 1976, JI street power in-creased dramatically andwith 2,000, 000 new entrants

joining it, the party became a forceto reckon with. The JI took activepart in the PNA movement of nine-party alliance to protest against rig-ging in March 1977 elections by ZABhutto’s regime. While holding im-portant portfolios in Zia’s govern-ment, JI ideologues lent full supportto Zia in his drive to Islamize the so-ciety and the system of education.

Afghan war in 1980s brought theUS, Zia regime and JI as well as JUIon one platform. In order to feed theproxy war in Afghanistan against theSoviets, the US in its bid to enrollJihadis from all Muslim countriespatronized the religious right. In Pa-kistan, which had agreed to fight theproxy war as a Frontline State, JI wasdesignated as the ideological bulwarkof Islam by USA and Zia. In 1987,Qazi Hussain was elected as newAmeer of JI. Miraculous success in1988 against the Soviet forces raisedthe stature of Jihadis, Pakistan, GenZia and JI and JUI, which in turnstrengthened politico-religious forcesand led to militarization of the soci-ety because of proliferation of armsand drugs.

During the ten years democraticera from 1988 to 1999, the JI underQazi Hussain further streamlined itsinternal organizational and educa-tional structure. It joined IJI withPML in 1988, but in its bid to be-come a third force, it charted an in-dependent course in 1993 electionsand paved the way for PPP to regainpower. Although JI boycotted 1997elections, its nuisance value as pres-sure group remained intact. Dur-ing Gen Musharraf’s rule, JI became

part of MMA, a grouping of six re-ligious parties. In the 2002 elections,MMA succeeded in clinchingKhyber Pakhtunkhwa andBalochistan governments and inearning a sizable presence in the fed-eral government. MMA increased itsvote bank for the first time on theslogan of anti-Americanism whichhad peaked because of Musharraf’su-turn on Afghanistan and submit-ting to US demands. Although JIdenounced the US and Musharraf’spro-US policies, but MMA not onlyvalidated Musharraf’s rule by pass-ing the 17th Amendment in 2004, butalso nurtured extremist groups inFATA and in Swat region.Resultantly, TTP came into being inDecember 2007, which by now hasspread its tentacles in all parts of thecountry and is tenaciously fightingthe security forces as well as resort-ing to terrorism against civilians anddestroying property. Lal Masjid op-eration in July 2007 was vehementlyopposed by JI.

In the aftermath of death of TTPChief Hakeemullah, termed asShaheed by Munawar. FazlurRahman created more ripples bystating that even a dog killed by USdrone is a martyr. They not only un-dermined the sacrifices rendered bysoldiers and the masses but also glo-rified TTP. What Munawar and histypes imply is that the TTP militantsare freedom fighters and Pak Armyis an occupation Army fighting anillegal war. He has given a certifi-cate of martyrdom to terrorist andderided Pakistani soldiers.

Known for his rude and rusticbehavior, his reckless statement in-vited wrath of religious scholars anddenunciation from all segments ofsociety. Only TTP hailed his state-ment. He qualified his derogatory re-marks by saying that if an Americandying in battlefield was not a mar-

Right to Information Act

IN 2002, Right to Information Ordinance was issued with greatfanfare, but it lapsed because it

was not enacted by the Parliament.In November 2010, Right to Infor-mation Act was passed by the Par-liament applicable to whole of Pa-kistan. Recently, Punjab and Sindhassemblies have also enacted theRight to Information. In September2013, KPK Assembly passed theRight to Information Act (RIA)2013, which meets all the standardsof effective right to information leg-islation such as maximum disclo-sure, minimal exemptions; obliga-tion for proactive disclosure; processto facilitate access to information;minimum cost for the requested in-formation; disclosure taking prece-dence over exemption and assistingthe requesters. The law says thateven if the information pertains tocategories of exempted information,there should be strong presumptionfor disclosure if information exposescorruption, criminal wrongdoing,other serious breaches of the law, hu-man rights abuse, or serious harmto public safety or the environment.

Constitution is said to be a so-cial contract between the govern-ment and the governed in which thelatter give up sovereignty to theformer in return of civil rights andliberties. It defines the powers of thevarious pillars and organs of the statefor its smooth functioning. It alsosets objectives and goals to beachieved; but laws have to be framed

HURMAT GROUP OF PUBLICATIONSZahid Malik

President & Editor-in-ChiefPh: 051-2256006

Faisal Zahid MalikEditor

Ph: 021-32631102

Gauhar Zahid MalikExecutive Editor

Ph: 051-2853818

IslamabadPh Exchange: 051-2852027

Reporting Desk: 051-2852028, News Desk: 051-5879329Marketing: 051-2262254, 2852029 Fax: 051-2262258

Email: observer@pakobserver.net Website: www.pakobserver.net

KarachiFaisal Zahid Malik

EditorPh: 021-32211777, 32635403

Fax: 021-32626902Email: obskhi@pakobserver.net

LahoreKhalid ButtResident Editor

Ph: 042-37593341, 37566702Marketing Ph: 37597364

Fax: 042-36300043Email: obslhr@pakobserver.net

QuettaGhulam TahirResident Editor

Mobile: 0333-7944760E-mail:obsqta@pakobserver.net

PeshawarTariq SaeedResident Editor

Mobile: 0321-9001476E-mail:obspwr@pakobserver.net

Sunday Magazine

Sadia Zahid MalikEditor

Ph: 2852027-8, Ext: 116Email: magazinesocialdiary@hotmail.com

Christiaan Barnard—SA surgeon

tyr, how come his backers could becalled martyrs when their goalswere common. While the JI lead-ers claim to be against terrorism inall its manifestations, Munawardoesn’t consider beheading of sol-diers, public hangings and bodiesstrung up from lampposts, bomb-ing of mosques and Imambargahs,destroying schools, attack on funer-als, kidnappings for ransom by TTPmilitants under Hakeemullah fromAugust 2009 till end October 2013as acts of terrorism. He forgets thatTTP is funded and equipped bynon-Muslim foreign agencies in-cluding CIA.

Munawar’s offensive remarkswere strongly condemned by DGISPR. He said that his remarks havecaused immense pain to the fami-lies of those who died fighting fortheir country. He added that JI chief‘insulted’ the martyrdom off thou-sands of innocent Pakistanis andsoldiers. He sought unconditionalapology from him. Unfazed byArmy’s tough rejoinder, Munawarrefused to regret and stuck to hisguns, while JI Shura also defendedhis stance. JI’s advice to the Armynot to indulge in politics by issu-ing political statements is indeedsurprising when seen in the back-drop of its prolonged alliance withmilitary rulers. Because of its longassociation with the military, JI isdubbed as B team of the military.Decades long alliance of the duo isin doldrums and may snap unlessthe JI Ameer picks up moral cour-age to own up its mistake andclarify his position. If he doesn’t,it will lend strength to the commonperception that he has lost sense ofproportion and capacity to thinklogically and to behave in a civi-lized manner.—The writer is a retired Brig,defence analyst and columnist.

to make those objectives areality. Article 19A states:“Every citizen shall haveaccess to information in allmatters of public impor-tance subject to regulationand reasonable limits im-posed by law”. Lastmonth, Senators across

party lines endorsed a report of theStanding Committee on Informationand Broadcasting on the Right to In-formation Bill, 2013. The commit-tee had unanimously approved thedraft bill on August 28 this year, andthere is no apparent reason for thedelay in passing the said bill.

According to the report, the pro-posed bill gives an all-encompassingdefinition of ‘national security’,which includes matters pertaining tointegrity, security or defence of Pa-kistan or any part thereof. Further-more, no information could be madeavailable about Pakistan’s relationswith other states or internationalorganisations if that informationcould put the interests of the countryin jeopardy. Of course this is in linewith the Article 19A of the Constitu-tion of Pakistan. Last week, FederalMinister for Information and Broad-casting Senator Pervaiz Rashid saidthat access to information concern-ing national security could not begiven to everyone, citing that it wasthe rule throughout the world that nocountry leaked its information whichposed any sort of threat to its nationalsecurity. So-called liberals and someanalysts are criticizing the draft billon the grounds that it seeks to rejectthe application for information onone pretext or another.

Anyhow, a designated officerwill be bound to provide informationwithin 21 days of receiving an appli-cation. In case of rejection, the ap-plicant can seek a review from the

principal officer of the departmentconcerned within 30 days. The ap-plicant will be able to file a complaintwith the Wafaqi Mohtasib and fed-eral tax ombudsman. However, itshould be our endeavour to honestlyprobe into matters of public interestwithout trepidation or fear. In 1990,a bill was introduced in the Senate asa private Bill, which was resisted andfailed to be enacted. In 1994, the Pub-lic Accounts Committee, headed bySenator Malik Qasim, made the sec-ond attempt, but the proposed billdrafted by the committee wasstrongly resisted by the bureaucracy,and therefore, could not be enacted.

In 1997, on the initiative ofFukharuddin G. Ibrahim, the FederalMinister of Law in the Interim Gov-ernment headed by Malik MerajKhalid, the President of Pakistan pro-mulgated a Freedom of InformationOrdinance on January 29, 1997.However, the successive governmentallowed this Ordinance to lapse anddid not enact it into law. Formerpresident General Pervez Musharrafhad promulgated the Freedom of In-formation Ordinance in October,2002, but no legislation was done.Now is the time that the bill bepassed by the Parliament, as thereare many advantages of such bill. Inevery field of activity, be it business,profession or vocation; be it a pri-vate or public institution, decisionstaken on the basis of reliable infor-mation are more effective than thosetaken in the absence of information.It provides the tool to take correctdecisions, and there is maxim that“Information is power”.

Government servants or eventhose at the helm in private organiza-tion have the tendency to keep the in-formation to themselves, becausethey feel a sense of power. But some-times withholding information can

cause a great loss. In Pakistan, lowliteracy level, abject poverty and ig-norance of citizens have placed so-ciety at low spectrum of socialawareness on the right to informa-tion. Simultaneously colonial eraOfficial Secrets Act of 1920, Secu-rity Act of 1952 and Maintenanceof Public Act 1960 secure the inter-est of closed system of governance.In a civil society, excessive secrecyis viewed as detrimental to thepeople’s interest. Anyhow, only in asociety where democracy has takenroots, the people are aware and con-scious about their rights, that theycan exert pressure on the membersof the parliament to pass appropri-ate laws to acknowledge people’sright to information.

In the developing countries, bu-reaucracy often holds back the in-formation because it feels that re-leasing information is not in publicinterest. In Pakistan, secretive styleof governance has weakened thestate and society. In developed coun-tries, citizens’ access to publicrecords and transparency in pro-cesses that affect their lives have a‘disinfecting’ effect on the adminis-tration and the government. Peopletoday wish to be informed about theway three pillars of the state – Ex-ecutive, Legislature and Judiciary –conduct them, and how it affectstheir lives. In the recent past, sugar,cement, flour and stock exchangescams adversely impacted the na-tional exchequer and people’s lives.Investigative reporting helped ex-pose the elements that exploited thepeople or caused loss to the exche-quer. Yet, a lot has to be done to endthe corrupt practices, wrong doingsof some parliamentarians and mem-bers of the bureaucracy.—The writer is Lahore-basedsenior journalist.

Mohammad JamilEmail: mjamil1938@hotmail.com

News & ViewsNews & ViewsNews & ViewsNews & ViewsNews & Views

Asif Haroon RajaEmail: asifharoon7751@yahoo.com

Voice of the People

Mehsud andthe mediaPARAS AKHTAR

I was astonished to see the live cov-erage of the funeral prayers offeredfor Hakimullah Mehsud on everynews channel. Why was the deathof Hakimullah Mehsud given somuch of importance? This was pri-marily the first question that arosein my mind. Media portrayed apolicy totally myopic in scope andnature and could not visualise thatthe deceased was a worst enemy ofPakistan and a killer of innocentpeople. It was in fact a glamorisingthe Taliban and amounted to sup-porting their acts of terrorism.These channels were speakingcompletely against their owncountry’s government and showedall their sympathies for Mehsud. Allthe patriots forgot how brutally hehad been killing their brothers inblasts and our TV anchors con-verted all his inhuman strategiesinto a series of sympathies. Theywere brain washing the audienceagainst their own country.

Voice of America was of coursejustified in showing Mehsud’sdeath as ‘Breaking News’; wecould also show his death as a re-lief for us, for Pakistan, for man-kind. It was argued that in his deaththe prospects of peace talks hadbeen sabotaged. What peace talks?And with whom? Was it not an actto recognise the ruthless killers atpar with the state of Pakistan?Shame on us. They are intruders,law breakers, outlaws and deserveno leniency. The drone attacks havekilled thousands of innocent peoplewhat is wrong if a killer is alsokilled? This was somehow a fail-ure of our TV channels instead ofvictory. He was a terrorist and re-sponsible for a million lives. Themedia of our own country is againstour government (state), then whatcan we expect from others. Theflaw is in our ownselves rather thanothers.—Via email

Familiy politicsin Pakistan

GULDAR ALI KHAN WAZIR

Since the inception of Parliamen-tary system in Pakistan, familypolitics is on the rise. This is mainlybecause of the monopoly estab-lished by party heads and lack ofhealthy and mature political tradi-tions. No party has any transparentand above board mechanism ofconducting intra-party elections tochoose a real, democratic, uprightand scrupulous leadership bearingqualities of meeting challengingtasks. Every political boss knowsand prefers the areas of prioritieswhen he comes to power.

Our past history is full of amultitude of examples where po-litical leaders inducted membersof their own families in politicsand then gave them key positionsin the state affairs or corridors ofpower. No political party took anydecision on merit nor it treated itspolitical activists and cohortsequally and without any discrimi-nation. In the recently held gen-eral polls it was Maulana FazlurRehman who contested from threeNational Assembly constituencieslike D.I.Khan, Lakki Marwat andTank districts and won them withoverwhelming majority.

After quitting the constituen-cies of Tank and Lakki Marwat andretaining D.I. Khan’s, he made hisbrother and son contest on theseseats in the by-elections and lostboth of them against the PTI un-popular candidates. The main rea-son behind losing the seats was thatthe people got annoyed over thefamily choice of Maulana and thusrejected his nominees.

Likewise, a nationalist leaderof Balochistan Mehmood KhanAchakzai played the same gamein politics and assigned the officeof Governor to his retired bureau-crat step-brother, MohammadKhan Achakzai instead of confer-ring it on any political figure ofhis party. During the previous gov-

PPP Raising DayCOL. RIAZ JAFRI (RETD)

The PPP observed its 46th Yaum-e-Tasees or the Raising Day on November 30th at Bilawal HouseKarachi. As usual the speakers including the rarely seen party Chairman Bilawal Zardari Bhutto

tried but in vain to highlight the sacrifices and achievements of Benazir Bhutto and Asif Ali Zardari.They wanted to convey to the people that the PPP had always challenged the status quo and wouldshow to the world in 2008 that it was still very much alive. Not only, the young Bilawal didn’t lookor sound very convincing or sure of himself and his party, the stalwarts like Qaim Ali Shah (whomixed up Bilawal House with MQM’s 90) and Raza Rabbani also had not much to offer except thetheatrical harangues, mannerism and gesticulation. One wonders why can’t our so called seasonedand learned leaders address the audience in a more mature and sober way – the way the Quaid eAzam, the Quaid e Millat Liaqat Ali Khan, the great Shaheed Suherwardy and many other leadersof the yore did? They should know that in these days of electronic media they are not addressing theTangawalas only but they are also being watched and heard in almost every home of Pakistanwhere some men of reasonable knowledge and intellect also live. Frankly, at present it is more funand amusing to watch these so called leaders than listen to what they are saying!!—Rawalpindi

Iran & US are neither blind nor stupid

WE are not blind, and I don’tthink we are stupid,” saidUS Secretary of State John

Kerry in response to fierce Israelicriticism after the first round of talksabout Iran’s nuclear program earlierthis month failed to reach a deal. Nowthe deal is done, and Israeli PrimeMinister Benjamin Netanyahu is evenharsher in his condemnation ofKerry’s handiwork.

“Israel has many friends and al-lies,” said Netanyahu, “but whenthey’re mistaken, it’s my duty tospeak out. … What was achieved lastnight (Nov. 24) in Geneva is not ahistoric agreement; it was a historicmistake. Today the world has becomea much more dangerous place be-cause the most dangerous regime inthe world took a significant step to-ward obtaining the world’s most dan-gerous weapon.”

What he meant was that the in-terim agreement implicitly recognizesIran’s right to enrich uranium forpeaceful uses. But that right is alreadyenshrined in the Non-ProliferationTreaty, which Iran has signed, andnobody ever thought that Iran wasreally going to renounce it. What wasat issue was whether Iran would en-

rich its uranium to “weapons grade”— 90 percent pure — and makenuclear bombs. The “Plan of Action”signed by Iran, the United States,Russia, Britain, France, Germany andthe European Union ensures that itwill not, at least for the next sixmonths. All uranium enrichmentabove 5 percent is to be halted, andIran’s entire stockpile of 20 percentenriched material — the potentialfeedstock for a “dash” to weapons-grade material — is to be diluted orconverted to a form not suitable forfurther enrichment.

Iran is not to install any more cen-trifuges (the machines used to enrichmaterial), and large numbers of theexisting banks of centrifuges are tobe left inoperable. Even Iran’s stock-pile of 3.5 percent enriched uranium(for use in nuclear power reactors) isto remain the same between now andthe end of the six-month period. Andthere will be no further work doneon the Arak reactor, which might giveIran plutonium, and thus a secondroute to a nuclear bomb.

Iran will also allow more intru-sive inspections by InternationalAtomic Energy Agency officials, in-cluding daily access to the key enrich-ment sites at Natanz and Fordow. Allit gets in return is $7 billion worth ofrelief (about $100 per Iranian) on thesanctions that are crippling its

Views From Abroad

economy. All the main sanctions willstay in place until a final agreementhas been signed — if it is — sixmonths from now. Iran can thereforemake no further progress towardnuclear weapons while the detailednegotiations continue, if that is actu-ally what Tehran ever had in mind. YetIsraeli officials are talking as if the UShas been both blind and stupid.

A week ago Sunday, Israeli In-telligence Minister Yuval Steinitzsaid that “Israel cannot participatein the international celebration,which is based on Iranian deceptionand the world’s self-delusion.” AndNaftali Bennett, Israel’s minister oftrade and industry, warned: “If infive years a nuclear suitcase ex-plodes in New York or Madrid, itwill be because of the agreement thatwas signed this morning.”

Israel’s basic position is that theIranian regime is entirely composedof evil terrorist fanatics who shouldnever be allowed to have refined ura-nium of any sort. The only recourseis therefore to tighten the sanctionsmore and more until Iran’s entireeconomy and government crumbleand a completely different sort ofpeople emerge from somewhere totake over the country. No deal can bea good deal.Israel’s leaders are dis-mayed that they can no longer keeptheir allies and friends pinned in this

Gwynne Dyer

DISCLAIMER

Email:editorial@pakobserver.net

THE articles, columns andletters are published on thesepages in good faith. However,the contents of these writingsmay not necessarily match theviews of the newspaper.

—Editor

Drone dilemma and terrorism

AGITATION against dronestrikes is legitimate but themode adopted in KPK was

more mocking than a serious effort.Protests intended to stop NATO sup-ply containers were unable to stopeven a single container in three days.It is for sure that drone strikes cannotbe stopped by such like protests buton the contrary the agitation gave amessage as death of militants inHangu drone attack was beingmourned. Pro militants and Talibanleaders protested very strongly afterthe death of TTP chief HakeemullahMehsud and are again doing the sameagainst drone attack in Hangu whichtargeted five Afghan militants be-longing to Haqqani Group.

Such protests in the name of safe-guarding the sovereignty of Pakistancreate an impression that terroristshave a support in the Pakistani Soci-ety. In reality also it is ironical thatmilitants, terrorists and criminals findsupport and refuge in some parts ofPakistan. Internally, country is suf-fering in the hands of terrorists but at

the same time is being blamed inter-nationally for harbouring and sup-porting the terrorists. This is becauseof such like actions by a small seg-ment of the society supported by sec-tion of media and some political andreligious parties which get publicityin international media. This segmentof society never has protested evenfor one day on the deaths of thousandsof innocent Pakistani citizens in bombblasts and suicide attacks.

Provincial Government of KPKhas been taking pro Taliban positionson one pretext or other for its ownreasons but the federal governmentis neither here nor there. Some of itsministers took pro militants and antiAmerica posture which is against theofficial policy adopted by the gov-ernment. This is being done as not tolose the righteous vote bank of theruling party. The ambiguous stancetaken by the government creates moredangerous impression in the societyas Law Enforcement Agencies(LEAs) are keener in fight againstmilitancy and terrorism than govt.

Recent protests against passageof NATO containers are not onlystrange but also ridicules as such likeactions cause division in the society.Instead of protesting in the parlia-

ment, where policies are made, thou-sands of people gathered on roads andcaused in-convince to general pub-lic. If the Provincial Government isgenuinely so keen to stop NATO sup-ply than it can be done more effec-tively by few efficient traffic ser-geants and constables who will per-manently stop NATO supply contain-ers passage through the province pro-vided authorised by the provincialgovernment.

During these protests politicalworkers of the ruling party were seenforcibly checking trucks, manhan-dling and humiliating truck drivers forworst. When a ruling party agitatesand blocks roads in the jurisdictionof its own government, it speaks oftwo things, either it is ineffective toget its orders implement through ex-ecutives or is not serious in the issueand just wants to play with the senti-ments of general public by exploit-ing anti America sentiments in thesociety. Such like protest neither im-press US to stop drone strikes noryield any substantial and tangibleoutcome but Pakistan, because ofsuch minority actions, is consideredas supporting terrorism especially sowhen such protests are after the deathof a prominent terrorist. Pakistan as

a nation is fighting a war against ter-rorism for last over thirteen years andhave paid a heavy price but somepolitical and religious parties insteadof giving true picture to general pub-lic term it as America’s war to gainpolitical support by exploiting his-torical hate against America in thegeneral populace. Pakistan is theworst sufferer of terrorism and WOTbut at the same time it is propagatedas epicentre of terrorism and safe ha-ven for the terrorists. Neither its col-lation partners in war against terror-ism nor terrorist are ready to showany amount of trust in PakistaniGovernment. Both blame it for sup-porting the rival side and also holdit responsible for their failuresagainst each other. Nation is fed upof the terrorists and their agenda.They want peace and prosperity butat the same time they also do notwant government to be apologeticand giving up to US or any otherstate on vital national interests. Jobof leadership is to guide the peoplein right direction and not to instigateor exploit their ignorance or inno-cence for political advantage at thecast of damaging the state.—The writer is a Rawalpindi-basedfreelance columnist.

extreme position, but endlessly quot-ing the ravings of former IranianPrime Minister MahmoudAhmedinejad is not enough. Theywould have to demonstrate that Iranactually intends to attack Israel, andthey cannot. So eventually their al-lies just moved without them.

As Israel’s Finance MinisterYair Lapid told Time magazine:“We’ve lost the world’s ear. We havesix months, at the end of which weneed to be in a situation in whichthe Americans listen to us the waythey used to listen to us in the past.”The game is not over yet. Israel’sinfluence in the US Congress is stillimmense, and its congressional al-lies are already talking about heap-ing more sanctions on Iran (in or-der to kill the deal, though theydon’t admit that).

President Barack Obama couldveto those new sanctions, of course,but he will find it a lot harder to getCongress to revoke the existingsanctions if the final deal is done sixmonths from now. That’s why Irangets so little relief from sanctionsnow in return for its concessions:Obama needs more time to work onCongress. But Israel may still winthis tug of war. The writer is an in-dependent journalist whose articlesare published in 45 countries.— Courtesy: The Japan Times

I remember that Sunday morning: Three women with smileson their faces shared their lives

with the audience who had gatheredin the air-conditioned hall of a five-star hotel.

Celine was the first to come tothe mike. There was a smile on herface as she sang with assurance that,“When troubles surround us, God“sends down His love on the wingsof a dove.” There were not many in

the audience who knew that althoughshe sang with total peace, herhusband’s body had grown weak witha massive stroke. Day by day, she hadfound that there was no need to worrybecause God sustained her.

An hour later, I was the AIDSawareness programme in the samehall, and I heard Heather speak of herwork with people who were HIVpositive. As her name was an-nounced, she bent down to click onthe strap for her polio-stricken leg andthen limped to the podium.

There was a smile on her face,and no one in the audience had anydoubt that she was happy in her work.Very few knew that with her disabledlimb she trudged to work in rain or

sun, leaving her home every day withno ideas as to what would be sold byher alcoholic husband to get moneyfor his next drink. The HIV patientswho came to her centre every daythought she was mad as she sharedher meager lunch with them, dis-pensed medicine and spoke to themabout a God who carried her throughher own suffering. “God uses the bro-ken,” she said to the audience, “toreach out to the broken.”

Then a frail, tiny figure stood up.“I am HIV positive,” said Flavia. “Iwas a maid and got married to a driverwho I didn’t know was already HIVpositive.” She related her struggle asshe had looked after a dying husbandand then a dying son.

Using broken people..!After they had died, she had de-

cided to commit suicide, but some-thing had made her look to God forguidance and she had felt the needto care for other victims of her owndisease. We heard how she lookedafter homes where little oneswatched with terror as their parentssuffered and died of AIDS, and thenran to her for comfort; about howshe helped wives as they struggledto minister to a dying husband.There was a hush in the audience.We knew that it was only becauseof knowing pain herself that shecould minister to those in pain. Goduses the broken to reach out andheal the broken..!—Email:bobsbanter@gmail.com

Tahir MahmoodEmail:tahir4mahmood4@yahoo.com

Pesticide poisoning our environment

THE international Pesticide Action Network (PAN) launchedDecember 3 as the Global “No

Pesticides Use Day” in 1998, to com-memorate the world’s worst chemi-cal disaster in 1984. That day inBhopal (India) a pesticide factoryexploded, releasing a toxic gas thatcaused more than 500,000 injuredand 20,000 deaths in the years since.The global PAN has highlighted thetragedy of Bhopal as an example of atragic instance of chemical pesticidecontamination for which its victimscontinue to suffer to this day. Bhopalhas been called the worst commer-cial industrial disaster in history—butnot the last.

Overuse of pesticides causes re-surgence of primary pests; induceoutbreaks of secondary pests and de-velopment of pest resistance. Pesti-cide resistance is the natural abilityof an organism (biotype) to surviveexposure to a pesticide. Some pestsdue intensive application of pesti-

cides (apart from other factors) de-velop resistance to these pesticides.

There is an ecological principlethat the poison we put in the environ-ment comes right back to us. Pesticidescan enter human body through inges-tion, inhalation and dermal contact.Once inside the body, pesticides canhave acute or chronic health implica-tions. Acute effects include skin andeye irritation or damage, headaches,dizziness, nausea, fatigue, convulsionand death. Chronic health effects mayoccur years after even minimal expo-sure to pesticides in the environment,or result from the pesticide residueswhich we ingest through our food andwater. Such effects includeParkinson’s disease, cancer, mutagen-esis (genetical disorder) and teratoge-nesis (birth defects). Pesticides disruptthe endocrine system thus playinghavoc with the complex regulation ofhormones, the reproductive system,and embryonic development that cancause incomplete sexual development,infertility, impaired brain developmentand behavioral disorders etc. In Paki-stan, pesticides related health impli-cations are relatively high due to lack

of awareness, low literacy, and easyaccess to highly toxic compounds andnon-adherence to the principles ofgood agriculture practices. The data onchildren exposure to pesticides arevery limited and mainly confined toprivate discussions. However, childrenare more susceptible to pesticide riskthan elders because of their hand-to-mouth and sit/crawl behavior, delicateand more permeable skin, immatureimmune system and less detoxifyingcapability.

Unfortunately Pakistan is a coun-try that has neither indigenous MRLsnor policy guidelines on GAP. More-over, the banned and restricted orga-nochlorine pesticides like DDT alsoenter the market through illegalmeans and are applied in horticultureand public health. The absence ofGAP, adulteration, lack of awarenessand un-access of farmers to alternateplant protection technologies leads tohigher levels of pesticide residues inour agriculture produce.

Pakistan Agriculture ResearchCouncil (PARC) is the apex agricul-ture organization having its rootsthroughout the country. National Ag-

riculture Research Centre (NARC) isits premier research setup. The cur-rent PARC/NARC management iswell aware of this issue. National Ag-ricultural Research Centre (NARC),Islamabad established in 1984, is thelargest research centre of the PakistanAgricultural Research Council(PARC) is striving hard through itsvarious programmes (Insect PestManagement Programme,Ecotoxicology Research Program,Integrated Pest ManagementProgramme, Organic Farming, CropDisease Research Institute and Insti-tute of Bioremediation etc) to workfor eco-friendly and environmentally-sound approaches for crop manage-ment and protection. Pesticides arepoisons. They are intended to kill.Therefore, farmers and consumersshould be given the right to knowwhat they are using, what they areproducing and what they are consum-ing. In this regard electronic mediacan play a positive role instead ofbombarding pesticide promotion ad-vertisements.—The writer is Chairman PARC,Islamabad.

Dr Iftikhar AhmadEmail: observer@pakobserver.net

ernments of Musharraf and PPP thesame family politics was in vogueand almost all political partiestrampled democratic traditions re-quiring for a stable and healthydemocratic system. Be it the Bhuttofamily, Zardari tribe, theChoudharies of Gujrat, the SindhiPirs, the Baluchi sardars, theGillanis or Pirs of Multan or otherlandlords of southern Punjab all arefostering their own family membersat the cost of their party workersand the nation as a whole.

All of them claim to be in thepolitics of principles; but in fact theyhave spoiled the politics and pro-moted corruption. Father is labelledas ‘corrupt’, the son is also labelledas such and both corrupts are stand-ing in front of an anti-corruptionjudge – where is morality, respectfor elders, affection for youngstersand a self esteem and regard be-tween relations.

We have stooped so low inmoral values, family traditions andethical pursuits. The ruling party ledby Mian Mohammad Nawaz Sharifis also not an exception. They arealso following the previous policiesof favouritism by absorbing moreand more people from the Shariffamily in politics, ignoring servicesof those who stood by him in theodd hours. His Cabinet is eccentri-cally a handsome blend of those whohail from his own family or arelinked in any relations with him.Only a handful of Ministers are fromthe other three Provinces.

The political parties need struc-tural reforms to bring visiblechange in their manifestos of poli-cies instead of focusing on familypolitics. Their approach must berealistic and public-oriented in or-der to promote a real and consoli-dated democratic culture.—Via emalil

UnemploymentAANSA AFZAL

I want to appeal to PM Nawaz Sharifto take serious action on unemploy-ment which is a serious issue facedby Pakistan today. Mr. Nawaz Sharifis only working and introducing newprojects for youth, electricity. Hisgovernment has done nothing to de-crease unemployment in rural andurban areas. Our PM should intro-duce new projects for the removal ofunemployment so that the present andthe coming generation have good fu-ture and could work for the welfareof Pakistan—Lahore

Parking issuein KarachiRUTABA MUNEER

Parking vehicles in no-parkingzones is a growing phenomenon. Ithas prompted traffic police to workround the clock to counter this prac-tice. Parking in the wrong lanecauses immense inconvenience tothe passers-by and give way to roadincidents. Hence, there are calls fora stringent action against motoristswho park on the wrong side of thestreet.

It is very difficult to find park-ing in a public place due to trafficcongestion in Karachi. Thereshould be a comprehensive reviewof the problem because the situa-tion is getting worse with the pas-sage of time. This is especially truebecause of a huge increase in thenumber of vehicles and the grow-ing trend of drivers to ignore traf-fic rules and regulations. Manypeople are accustomed to parkingtheir vehicles in no-parking zones,especially in front of governmentoffices and business premises.

These wrongly parked vehiclescreate problems for local residents.When a person parks in the middleof a street or in front of a shop thetraffic comes to a halt. When traf-fic police officers see such viola-tions they simply use loudspeakersto ask the violators to move. Butsome people pay no heed to thewarnings as they know that theywill not be fined.

The main cause of the problemis the insufficient parking space inareas with high density of popula-

tion. The authorities should conducttraffic campaigns to enforce trafficregulations. Traffic tickets or finesshould be issued to all violators.

Some drivers park without theleast bit of a consideration for otherroad users. Such phenomenon is vis-ible especially near mosques duringFriday prayers. The way to addressthis problem is by maintaining therule of law and taking punitive mea-sures against violators.—Karachi

Planning forfuture career

IQRA NOSHEEN

Youth is the age of idealism. It isalso the age of confusion when boysbecome men and girl rise to wom-anhood. It is the time when most ofus go undergo the process of intro-spection to decide what is of valueto us and what our careers shouldbe and even make plans for love andmarriage. On the negative side, thisis also the time when young peoplewould choose to get into drugs andcrime.

A willingness to receive and ac-cept guidance from the elders and asense of discipline can relieve theconfusion and help the youth to ac-quire a positive direction towards asuccessful future life. It would be agood time to get involved with somedisciplined and organised activity atthis crucial stage of our lives. Sinceit is also the time of our lives whenwe are full of energy it may be use-ful to find some positive avenues forall that energy. Military service,community service or, still better, acombination of both could be a goodoption for future planning.—Via email

Unfair treatmentIQRA FAROQUI

On 27 November 2013 while hear-ing the case on law and order situa-tion in Karachi, the Chief Justice ofthe Supreme court expressed a de-gree of satisfaction on the way tar-geted operation against terrorists andcriminal in Karachi had progressed.He sought its continuation but heshould also see that the treatmentbeing meted out Security Agenciesto those arrested.

Indeed many criminals have beencaught in these operations ,but thequestion arises that all the peopleswho are arrested are really criminalsor they have arrest no innocentpeoples. If they are really criminalsso why the police and rangers notshowing their faces in front of media

The treatment of security agen-cies is very unfair. They torture them.The government should realize theirduty and take some bold steps tocheck this social or civil evil becausethe good actions taken by the gov-ernment are negated by such actions.—Via email

Unregisteredvehicles

ENGINEER M.ASADULLAH

In Peshawar the number of unregis-tered vehicles is double of registeredones.Which causes many problemsin society.Like unregistered vehiclesare being used in many crimes suchas in robbery,kidnapping,target kill-ing and in other street crimes.It isalso becoming a serious security is-sue. So,I would like to request Chiefminister Pervez khattak,Incharge oftraffic police and other civil authori-ties to take timely action to controllthis problem.—Peshawar

HISHAM ALLAM

SUBSIDIES from theArab world are large andreflect Arabs’ love to-

wards the Egyptian people,but we cannot depend on thatto build an economy that cancompete with other coun-tries,” said economist Dr Aliael Mahdi.

She was explaining theeconomic situation in Egyptafter the current governmentmade repeated requests for fi-nancial assistance from Gulfcountries.

“Our dependence on themshould not exceed temporaryassistance, and it should notbecome the mainstay of thenational economy, just to gaina better international credit

rating,” he added.The credit rating agency

Standard & Poor’s raised itslong- and short-term foreign andlocal currency sovereign creditratings for Egypt on Nov. 15,from “CCC+/C” to “B-/B” witha “stable” rating outlook.

In his short trip to the UnitedArab Emirates last October,Egyptian Prime Minister Hazemel-Beblawi was told by thedeputy prime minister of theUAE, Sheikh Mansour BinZayed Al Nahyan, that “Arabsupport for Egypt will not lastlong, and Egypt should come upwith innovative and unconven-tional solutions.”

El Mahdi, a former dean ofthe economics and political sci-ence faculty at Cairo University,told IPS that “The armed forces

should stop funding the nationaleconomy and go back to theiressential mission, which ismaintaining security along theborders.”

She said foreign investmenthas almost fled from Egypt, asreflected by the small numbersof experts and foreign investorswho attend economic confer-ences and seminars held inEgypt. “If we want to bring themback again, then there is no al-ternative other than political sta-bility and security,” she said.

“Small industries in Egypt,which represent 87 percent ofthe volume of industrial plantsand 13 percent of industrial pro-duction, are suffering badly,”she added.

El-Beblawi’s cabinet had agreat opportunity to curb the

Egypt begs gulf for rescue

The American Southas self and other

PAUL ROSENBERG

DURING the recent US government shutdown, we saw arenewed outpouring of articles drawing historical connections between the Tea Party and earlier examples of South-

ern-based obstructionist movements. I myself was part of thatoutpouring in my column “US Civil War redux”.

But a couple of days after the shutdown ended, Salon pub-lished a contrarian view from Seth Ackermannn, “Thank Yanksfor the Tea Party!” in which he critiques this sort of analysisthrough the lens of one example, a New Republic article by JohnJudis, “The Shutdown Standoff Is One of the Worst Crises inAmerican History.” Ackermannn presents his prime objectionsthus:

“But like much of the liberal pop-history genre it belongs to,Judis’s New Republic analysis seems governed by two overarchingreflexes: (1) an insistence on seeing this crisis, not as structural,but as a product of the wicked recklessness of Republican ex-tremists; and (2) a desire to attribute it to the influence of somealien force, from some other place, one that is archaic and unlikeour own. For Judis, that place is an imagined neo-ConfederateSouth.

In either case, the danger comes from outside - from someplace exterior to the familiar, modern, consensual United Stateswe all thought we lived in. I disagree. As I see things, the realityis much less comforting.”

Of course, I agree with Ackermann that the US’ political struc-tures were deeply implicated in the crisis. But why must it be aneither/or matter? Why not see both sorts of causes involved - alongwith others as well? After all, the structural problems have beenthere for centuries without making budget crises a regular featureof our government.

The same goes for the matter of alien, archaic influence. TheAmerican South has always been culturally different from thenation as a whole. It has been, in multiple ways, both self andother. You can’t talk about it as wholly other or wholly similar. Itis partially both, by turns.

This new-fangled multinational system bound together themost “advanced” and most “backward” parts of the world, in-cluding the American South - a prodigious producer of raw mate-rials - and the American North - a centre of shipping, commerceand manufacturing.

We can begin with gross economics and political power. TheSouth has always had to have help - and the South has been help- for either reactionary or progressive economic policies. It is aneconomic colony of the North. They could not have done theselatest things without a lot of outside help - they didn’t have enoughdelegates. And, of course, the Tea Party is financed by outsiders.So any blame is merited, but they still have to have allies fromoutside the region.

This can be easily expanded to a global canvas, since theSouth’s colonial status and relationship to the North was hardlyunique. The entire European colonial system emerged in a waythat enabled European modernity to flourish - particularly theEnlightenment and the Industrial Revolution, neither of whichowes anything at all to the vast, archaic, agricultural foundationsof human history (much less their present-day continuation) ac-cording to their own official narratives, which are, like all officialnarratives, composed almost entirely of comforting fictions.

But it’s the careful scholars, rather than grand theoreticians,who’ve done the most to bring the real stories into focus, so I’dlike to briefly touch on some of what they’ve uncovered, begin-ning with historian David Brion Davis in works such as The Prob-lem of Slavery in Western Culture, The Problem of Slavery in theAge of Revolution, 1770-1823, and others.

Davis viewed slavery as integral to the first system of mass-market multinational production - for sugar, tobacco, coffee, dye-stuffs, rice, hemp, and cotton, all produced by slave labour. Thisnew-fangled multinational system bound together the most “ad-vanced” and most “backward” parts of the world, including theAmerican South - a prodigious producer of raw materials - andthe American North - a centre of shipping, commerce and manu-facturing.

In Of One Blood: Abolitionism and the Origins of RacialEquality, historian Paul Goodman describes how the organisedresponse of the North’s free black community to colonialisationin the late 1810s planted the seeds of white abolitionism. Then,when white abolitionists began making real progress in the early1830s, Southerners suddenly discovered that slavery wasn’t anecessary evil to be gotten rid of some day after all, but that itwas a positive good. The chief source for such arguments was theBible. But, as Larry E Tise showed in Proslavery: A History ofthe Defense of Slavery in America, 1701-1840, the authors firstpromoting such views were New England preachers and academ-ics, and the arguments themselves had roots in writings from acrossthe trans-Atlantic slave trade.

The grand bargain keeping segregation in place lasted untilafter World War II, when the Nazis had completely discreditedracism and Soviet Communism was competing ideologicallythroughout the Third World, where the US’ highly visible raceproblem put it at a distinct disadvantage.

The Civil War was not originally waged over slavery, but overpreserving the union. The two causes were eventually joined bynecessity, and hundreds of thousands of blacks were involved inthe struggle. But after the war, over time, white Northern interestschanged, eventually coming to favour reconciliation and economicreintegration with the re-established white supremacist South.

As this process unfolded over half a century, a national con-sensus on the meaning of the Civil War was forged which delib-erately excluded the perspective of the African Americans andtheir white abolitionist allies, a process described in detail by DavidW Blight in Race and Reunion: The Civil War in AmericanMemory. A comment on Blight could be found in my review forthe Denver Post.

The dominance of the white supremacist reconciliationist vi-sion represented yet another “grand bargain” between Northernand Southern white elites. At the same time that a tightly regu-lated system of racial segregation was imposed in the South, aless-recognised, but similarly sweeping system arose in the Northas well, where thousands of communities purged themselves ofall their black residents beginning around 1890, as documentedby James Loewen in his book Sundown Towns: A Hidden Di-mension of American Racism, my review of which can be foundhere.

—Courtesy Aljazeera

economic decline that the gov-ernment of ousted presidentMohamed Morsi (2012-2013)exacerbated, “but they didn’t,”el Mahdi said.

“The current state of Egypt’seconomy has become a disasterthat requires immediate inter-vention to save it before it’s toolate,” said Salah Gouda, head ofthe Economic Studies Centre inCairo.

“The monetary reserves de-creased from 36 billion dollarsin January 2011 to 22 billiondollars by late November 2011,”he said. “Then they descendedto 13.6 billion dollars by March2013, due to a rise in imports asa result of not running at fullproduction capacity.”

The unemployment rate hasreached 15 percent, which

means there are about 10 mil-lion people unemployed in thiscountry of 84 million, Goudasaid.

“Everyone was expecting alot from Beblawi’s cabinet, whotook the oath after the Jul. 3 mili-tary crackdown against Morsi,”he added. “But all the crisesplaguing Egyptians while Morsiwas in power still exist gasshortages, traffic jams, lack ofsecurity - even train accidents.

“I can say that interim Presi-dent Adly Mansour’s first hun-dred days have resembled thefirst 100 days of former presi-dent Morsi - both are disappoint-ing,” Gouda told IPS.

He said the current regimefrittered away public supportafter the Jun. 30 public uprising,in addition to 12 billion dollars

in financial aid from the Gulfcountries.

“Despite all this, thegovernment’s performance wasweak, with the ministries work-ing merely to make it throughthe current period without beingexposed to legal questions later,”he argued.

The military are now lead-ing Egypt in many fields, es-pecially the economy, standingby the current government toenforce law and security, andaddressing any crises thatarise. “The military are verykeen to keep their prestige,” headded.

Another problem the currentregime is facing, Gouda said,was that “after foreign invest-ment fled as a result of the secu-rity situation, large numbers of

businessmen belonging to theMuslim Brotherhood or support-ers of the ousted president de-cided to withdraw their invest-ments to strike an economicblow to the current system, andthey succeeded to some extent.”

Ali Fayez, a former head ofthe Federation of EgyptianBanks, told IPS “the bankingsystem stopped funding smalland big projects, which led tohundreds of businessmen beingon the black lists of banks as aresult of their inability to paysome instalments.

“European and Gulf subsi-dies are vitamins and painkill-ers,” he said. “It would be bet-ter if they pumped real invest-ments into Egypt, because theresults would be more sustain-able than cash payments.”

“Domestic debt has ex-ceeded all safe limits since be-fore the Jan. 25, 2011 revolu-tion, and all the cabinets thathave ruled since the fall ofHosni Mubarak have dependedon delaying and reschedulingpayments,” Fayez told IPS.“None of the successive gov-ernments have tried to face it,and this is seen as a major bur-den for the coming genera-tions.

“The only difference be-tween the two governments,the Muslim Brotherhood andthe current administration, isthat the former was relying onaid from Qatar and Turkeywhile the second is dependingon the UAE, Saudi Arabia andKuwait,” Fayez said.—Courtesy Inter Press Service

YEREVAN—About 500 peoplemarched through the capital of Ar-menia to denounce visiting RussianPresident Vladimir Putin and toprotest against plans to join a Mos-cow-led customs union.

Some of the crowd in centralYerevan held banners declaring“Putin, go home” or “No to theUSSR”, a reference to the Russianleader’s efforts to bind former So-viet republics together more closelyin economic and security alliances.

Putin flew to the SouthCaucasus country for talks on itsdecision in September to join theCustoms Union with Russia,Belarus and Kazakhstan, but be-gan his visit in another city,Gyumri. He was due in Yerevanlater on Monday.

The rally in Yerevan followedmuch larger protests in Ukraine,which suspended plans to sign atrade deal with the European Unionlast week and decided to rebuildeconomic ties with Russia instead.

Kremlin critics in the Westaccuse Putin of putting pressure onUkraine, Armenia and other formerSoviet republics to reject agree-ments that would increase their in-tegration with the EU.

Putin has made clear Moscowwants to increase its influence inthe strategic region sandwiched

between Russia, Turkey, Iran andthe oil and gas deposits of theCaspian Sea basin.

“We are going to strengthenour position in the South Caucasus,drawing on the best of what wehave inherited from ancestors andgood relations with all countries inthe region,” Putin told a Russian-Armenian regional forum inGyumri.

“Participation in the CustomsUnion ... already is bringing Rus-sia, Kazakhstan and Belarus tan-gible dividends,” he said.

Police blocked a central streetas the demonstrators headed closerto the headquarters of PresidentSerzh Sarksyan’s administration,and protesters handed over a letterurging the government to renounceits decision to join the customsunion.

Russia is the biggest foreigninvestor in Armenia and its largesttrading partner. Bilateral trade grew22 percent to $1.2 billion last year.Most trade has been imports toArmenia.

Three years ago Russia ex-tended its lease on a militarybase in the landlocked, resource-poor nation of 3.2 million until2044, ensuring it maintains afirm foothold in the SouthCaucasus.—Reuters

Putin faces protestsas he woos Armenia

ARBIL—Turkey said on Mon-day it stood by a bilateral oil dealwith Iraq’s Kurdistan region thatbypassed central governmentbut sought to appease Baghdadby drawing it into the arrange-ment.

Reuters reported Turkey andIraqi Kurdistan signed a multi-billion-dollar energy packagelast week, infuriating Baghdadwhich claims sole authority overoil exports and is wary of anymove that could extend politi-cal autonomy in the region.

Turkish Energy MinisterTaner Yildiz met Iraqi deputyprime minister for energy, Hussainal-Shahristani, in Baghdad to tryto mend ties with a federal gov-ernment which says independentKurdish oil exports would be ille-gal. The affair has soured relationsbetween Ankara and Baghdad.

“We stand by the agreementwe did with northern Iraq but wehope this can be carried outthrough a three-way mecha-nism,” Yildiz told a conferenceafter flying into Arbil, the capi-tal city of the Kurdistan region

(KRG). “As Turkey, we are try-ing to move this forward in acareful and courteous way.”

“We also would like to havethe consent of the Central Gov-ernment of Iraq for the commer-cial export of oil from the KRGto Turkey and start a trilateralcooperation scheme that will bebeneficial to all.”

The Turkish-KRG deal hasenormous significance for majoroil companies as well as for theKurds and Turkey, which can ben-efit in domestic supply and on-ward westward export through themediterranean port of Ceyhan.“Turkey is trying to follow a bal-ancing act here,” a source close tothe talks said. “These are reallysignificant contracts and the Turk-ish Republic just doesn’t signdeals like this every day.

“But Turkey...can’t just looklike it’s acting hand-in-handwith the KRG and doesn’t careabout Baghdad and that’s neverbeen the case anyway...IfBaghdad agrees, great. If theydon’t, the exports will neverthe-less go ahead, I think.—Reuters

Turkey stands byKurdish oil deal, seeks

to appease Baghdad

VIENNA—Bijan Zanganeh re-turns this week to the sameVienna hotel suite he last occu-pied eight years ago as Iranianoil minister, ready to prepareOPEC for what Tehran hopeswill mark its return as thecartel’s second biggest producer.

Emboldened by its nucleardeal with the West, Iranian oilnegotiators led again by indus-try veteran Zanganeh, will seekto reassert Tehran’s authority inthe Organization of the Petro-leum Exporting Countries at aWednesday meeting.

Western sanctions imposedin 2012 on Iran for its nuclearprogram have cost it dearly, los-ing it billions of dollars in oilrevenues and market share inOPEC - largely to its main re-gional political rival SaudiArabia, and neighbor Iraq.

With its exports still shack-led by sanctions for at least an-other six months, Iran poses noimmediate threat to the status

quo. Oil ministers are widelyexpected to roll forward untilJune an agreement to hold theiroutput near 30 million barrelsdaily for 12 member countries.

But oil traders will bewatching closely for signs ofcooperation, or otherwise, be-tween the big three producers inOPEC, knowing that Riyadh andBaghdad will need to find roomfor Iran should its interimnuclear deal be verified andsanctions lifted.

Reappointed to the oil minis-try by Iran’s new and more west-ern-friendly President HassanRouhani, Zanganeh has openlycriticized Iraq, now OPEC’s sec-ond biggest producer, for increas-ing its market share at Tehran’sexpense. “Iraq has replaced Iran’soil with its own,” Zanganeh saidin November. “This Iraq move isnot friendly at all.”

“We expect the Iranians tosay, ‘We’re coming back to themarket and we need some

space,’” said an OPEC delegatefrom a rival Gulf Arab producer.

Rising volumes from theUnited States spurred by pro-duction from new shale technol-ogy may mean OPEC will needto cut output in the second halfof 2014 if it wants to keep oilprices above $100 a barrel.

“From now until the end ofMarch, the market looks wellbalanced and the price shouldstay supported. But from June,there will be a need for a cut,”said a senior OPEC delegate.

“The onus would be onSaudi Arabia and a few otherGulf producers to rein in the in-cremental output they put intothe market,” said SamuelCiszuk, oil analyst at the Swed-ish Energy Agency.

Because of sanctions, Iran’soutput is down a million bpdsince the start of 2012 to 2.7million bpd while Iraq, recover-ing from years of war and sanc-tions under Saddam Hussein,

has boosted production to nearly3 million bpd.

“Iran’s position has beenstrengthened after the Genevadeal, but there is still a long wayto go,” said energy consultantMehdi Varzi, formerly of stateNational Iranian Oil Company.

“The bottom line is the Ira-nians don’t want to rock the boatand put $100 oil under threat, sothey need the cooperation of theSaudis.”

Oil prices now near $110 abarrel are close to ideal for SaudiArabia, OPEC’s most influentialproducer because of its one-thirdshare of group output, and itsposition as the only producerglobally that keeps any signifi-cant spare capacity.

Riyadh pumped at recordlevels above 10 million bpd whensanctions were imposed on Iranand to fill the gap left by post civilwar disruption in Libya, throt-tling back a little recently to sup-port prices.—Reuters

Iran to reassert authorityat OPEC after nuclear deal

Hundreds ofGazans protest atsea over Israelinaval blockade

GAZA—Hundreds of Palestin-ian youth activists sailed fromthe shores of the Gaza Strip toprotest at Israel’s restrictions onfishing in the seas off the Islam-ist-ruled enclave.

Palestinian fishermen saythey cannot meet demand inGaza due to Israel’s naval block-ade on the territory and limit ofsix nautical miles in which theycan take out their boats off shore.

Israel eased the blockadesomewhat in 2010 after an Is-raeli commando raid on a shipin an activist flotilla bent onreaching Gaza left nine Turksdead and raised an internationaluproar, but Palestinians say thegestures were not enough.

On Monday, Gaza’s Coali-tion Intifada group said about 200youths boarded fishing boatsheading out of Gaza City towardthe fishing zone boundary, beforereturning to shore. Organizerssaid some boats crossed the six-mile maritime limit.

“We have sent a message ofsolidarity with the fishermen anda message to the world that theymust act to end the Gaza block-ade,” said Shorouq Mahmoud, thegroup’s spokeswoman.—Reuters

MAIDUGURI—Hundreds ofmilitants in trucks and a stolenarmored personnel carrier at-tacked an air force base on theoutskirts of a Nigerian city be-fore dawn, officials and wit-nesses said, possibly leavingscores of people dead in one ofthe insurgent group’s most dar-ing attacks ever.

A military official who wasat the base said he saw three air-craft and several vehicles hit inthe attack. The state governmentquickly ordered everyone to stayhome and extended a night-timecurfew to 24 hours inMaiduguri, the city near the airbase which is also the birthplaceof the extremist Boko Harammovement.

Explosions and automaticgunfire could be heard across thenortheastern city from around2:30 a.m. when the insurgentslaunched the attack with screamsof “Allahu akbar,” or “God isgreat.”

Government and militaryofficials said scores of peoplemay be dead. Reporters sawmilitary ambulances ferryingbodies to the hospital morgue.

Civilians living around themilitary base, which is off amain road, said they saw bodieswith slit throats and corpses ofinsurgents burning in vehicles.

The witnesses and officialsspoke only on condition of ano-nymity for security reasons.

The attack comes a week

after the military bombardedforest hideouts of the BokoHaram terrorist network near theborder with Cameroon with airstrikes and ground assaults.

President GoodluckJonathan imposed a state ofemergency in May in threestates, acknowledging the insur-gents had seized control of manytowns and villages, and floodedthe area with security forces.The military quickly forced themilitants out of urban centers buthave appeared unable to halt at-tacks on soft targets like schools,remote villages and major high-ways where they set up im-promptu roadblocks.

The Islamic extremist upris-ing, which began in 2009 andhas killed thousands, poses thebiggest threat in decades to thesecurity and cohesion of Africa’sbiggest oil producer and its mostpopulous nation, with more than160 million people. The nationis divided almost equally be-tween the mainly Christiansouth and the predominantlyMuslim north.

The extremists say theywant to impose Islamic ruleacross all Nigeria.

In one of the group’s high-est-profile attacks, a BokoHaram member detonated a carbomb at the United Nationsmain offices in Nigeria’s capi-tal, Abuja, on Aug. 26, 2011,killing 25 people and woundingmore than 100 others.—AP

Militants attackNigerian air force base

BEIRUT—The death toll inSyria’s civil war has risen to atleast 125,835, more than a thirdof them civilians, but the realfigure is probably much higher,the Syrian Observatory for Hu-man Rights said.

The pro-opposition monitor-ing group also appealed to U.N.Secretary General Ban Ki-moonand “all people in the interna-tional community who have aconscience” to increase their ef-forts to end the 2-1/2 year war.

The conflict began as peace-ful protests against four decadesof rule by President Bashar al-Assad’s family, but under afierce security force crackdown,turned into an armed insurgencywhose sectarian dimensionshave echoed across the MiddleEast.

The Observatory, based in

Syria death toll hitsnearly 126,000

Britain but with a network ofactivists across Syria, put thenumber of children killed in theconflict so far at 6,627.

It put the death toll amongrebels fighting the Assad gov-ernment at least 27,746 rebels,including more than 6,000 cat-egorized as foreign fighters orunknown combatants.

“The number is likely muchhigher but in many battles, thenumber of rebels killed is hid-den, especially by the (al Qaeda-linked) Nusra Front and IslamicState of Iraq and the Levant,”Rami Abdelrahman, head of theObservatory, told Reuters.

He said the observatory haddocumented 50,430 deathsamong the Syrian armed forcesand local militias supportingAssad, but said that number toowas probably higher.—Reuters

Palestinians wave national flags at the seaport during a protest against the blockade on Gaza.

Somali PM votedout by lawmakersMOGADISHU—Somalia’s par-liament voted to sack PrimeMinister Abdi Farah Shirdon,the speaker of parliament said,after a row with the presidentthat has paralyzed the state andthreatened a shaky recoveryfrom war.

The prime minister, whowas appointed last year, fell outwith President Hassan SheikhMohamud over what legislatorssaid was a dispute over the com-position of a new cabinet,prompting Monday’s no confi-dence vote. The rift has worriedWestern donors who say it willdisrupt efforts to shore up na-scent institutions of state anddrive back al Qaeda-linked Is-lamist militants who still controlswathes of countryside.

Parliament speakerMohamed Sheikh Osman Jawarisaid 184 lawmakers votedagainst the prime minister, while65 members supported him. Theprime minister’s deputies areexpected to handle his dutiesuntil a replacement is found.

The political turmoil fol-lows a row about corruption re-lated to the central bank. Thathad already rattled donors whosee the probity of that institu-tion as vital to unlocking futuredebt relief and rebuilding statefinances.—Reuters

Though however my unclesalways treated me according to the wishes of my

grand mother but at that age Icouldn’t understand the compli-cations being created in the fam-ily on account of my special treat-ment by the entire family. Thougheven today I feel that jealousiesstarted from that time are still thereand even during my school andcollege days the life she gave me,today it looks like a fairy tale asshe was very status conscious andshe was always keen that my com-pany and friends should be fromthe highest social status. So, con-sequently my very close friendswere either from old traditionalfamilies or from the ruling class.There was a very important fac-tor that my grand mother alwayslived with my uncle AitquadHussain who was a civil servantand in those days that service wasthe most prestigious status wiseas my uncle had not married uptill then and he was so close to methat sometimes people mistookme to be his son. I had very goodcompany even in school days^Just before partition my uncle andgrand mother decided to marry meon i7th June, 1947 with a ladyAisha Begum.

These were very disturbedtimes and although Hindu Mus-lim riots were rampant so to go toa Hill station like Mussoorie orNainital was impossible for hon-eymoon. In my marriage a veryclose friend of mine by the nameof D.S Saksena came and insistedthat as I can’t go anywhere forhoney moon. So for this reason,he invited me to go with him toMeerut where I had lot of friends,Saksena. Apart from being a bigindustrialist also owned a largechain of European style bars andrestaurants in Meerut. He had avery large restaurant and a bar bythe name of Cafe D Rane it wassituated in the most prestigiouscantonment area of the city, whichwas called “pull Begum” (begumBridge) and just at the back of it.It was a large residential areawhich was called begum Bagh. Soin Meerut we stayed in his househe had a young daughter about 13to 14 years of age whose namewas Manoo and instantly my wifealso became very close to Manoobecause she was also very youngand so the whole day both Aishaand Manoo were driving throughthe entire city doing shopping orsight seeing but in the evening myfriend Saksena whom we calleddadda (which in Hindi is for eiderbrother) and every evening on thelarge lawn of cafe D. Rane thereused to be a large table laid forabout 15 to 20 persons where heinvited all our common friends,he was so large hearted that hedidn’t allow us to go back toAligarh and more or less every-day there was a party on the lawnand on one side of the lawn a beau-tifully laid bar was placed with thebest of wines, lacquers, cognacand whiskies of the highest, qual-ity and we stayed there for abouttwo months.

There is a very small ex-ample of dadda’s love and sin-cerity that while in Meerut mywife had developed a taste tohave her tea with cream insteadof milk those were the dayswhen fresh cream, butter andbread were only available incantonment towns. So after oneyear when i returned to Aligarhfrom Pakistan I was told thatdadda had made the arrange-ment to send a jar of fresh creamto be delivered to my house inAligarh for my wife everydayand it was sent by a special cou-rier as the distance was only onehour so the cream alwaysreached freshly there.

There were certain reasonsthat I wanted to migrate from In-dia to Pakistan against thewishes of my family, so it wasmy independent decision.

Then I decided to leavewith out informing the familyand for this purpose I only tookmy younger brother into con-

fidence, he was very close tome, I told him that the waythings had developed we haveno scope in India. He also de-cided that he would accom-pany me so we planned in thisway that as usual one day wetold the family that we are go-ing to Delhi just for a shoppingtrip and there we got our seatsbooked for Lahore by IndianNational Airways .After aweek one day before our book-ing to fly to Lahore we againwent to Delhi the same wayand sent a letter to the familyof our departure.

In Lahore I came to know thatone of my far off relations but aclose friend of my father CaptainZafar Aalam was in Lahore, a verybig industrialist Gujarmal Modihad appointed him as a represen-tative in Lahore whose product’smain market was Punjab when Imet Zafar Aalam he immediatelyoffered me to work with him ashe himself had no idea of anycommercial dealings.

The main item they importedfrom India (Begum-abad) was avery popular brand of soap by thename of “Hamam” and for exportto India, badly needed was rocksalt from Khewra mines, he of-fered me either commission or asalary. After that the Kashmir warhad started and the entire commer-cial activities with India werebanned so I had no job or work todo but however I used to get upearly morning and roam aboutLahore.

I was doing it to the extent thatail day I was without food or wa-ter and ultimately! had reached astage when I didn’t have even afew aanas to travel by bus so frommall road Lahore up to the canalBank on ferozpur road where Ilived ! Used to walk and the wholeday my brother and my wife usedto wait for me that I may bringsome thing to eat and some timesthey went to sleep without meals.During this period I remember anincident that I was on mall roadin the afternoon when peoplestarted collecting on both sides ofthe road because the king of Per-sia Raza Shah Pehalvi was visit-ing Lahore and he was supposedto be coming to mall road as a statevisitor to be cheered by the publicand then I saw that a cava! cadesof cars following a j’eepster cameand in front of the caval cade po-lice men in ceremonial dress werein front of the V.V.I.P jeepster asa protocol to the honorable guest,in which on the front seat was sit-ting Sardar Abdul Rab Nishtarwho was at. that time Governorof Punjab and on the back seat wassitting Nawabzada Liaquat AliKhan prime minister of Pakistanand Raza Shah Pehalvi the kingof Persia and thousands of peoplewere cheering them from bothsides of the mall road and oncethe procession had passed then allof a sudden there was a rush ofpeople towards the bus stand butin those days there were very fewbuses in Lahore and peoples werein thousands waiting for the bus,I didn’t see any chance for me toget on a bus.

Then ali of a sudden I real-ized that the total amount in mypocket was 1 aana (that means 4copper coins) which could carryme from regal cinema upto theGanga Ram hospital. And Ithought that 1 aana would carryme from Ganga Ram hospital toIchra which was the longeststretch of my journey so, afterwalking up to Ganga Ram hospi-tal again I saw the same rush onthe bus stand and while I waswaiting I just started thinking thatwhen I will reach home then mywife would have borrowed somewheat flour or something to eatmay be daal or something else butwe had no such relationship fromthe shop to buy fuel (charcoal) soI walked all the way home andsaved that one aana for eventual-ity and when I reached home, Iwas so right that I saw my wifehad mad-e the dough and she hadplanted some brinjal tree in thecourtyard and cooked the brinjal

curry but she was sitting and wait-ing for me because she didn’t havethe charcoal to bake the bread andso ! gave that 1 aana to my brotherwho went and bought charcoal,then the food was cooked.

I the meantime two thingshappened one was that my brotherfell in Love with a beautiful girlwho was the daughter of our land-lord then all of sudden I met afriend and far off relation Mr.Zameer Abbas and I suggestedthat it’s a long time that we havenot played solo together.

Now soio is a game of cardswhich comes from France onlypeople of Aligarh used to play soloactually this is a game a combi-nation of bridge and poker and Iused to be very good in this gameactually this game is played byfour people card distribution is 13Cards to each four persons and thecalls are like Bridge but the dif-ference is that those calls are in-dividual and whoever wins the callhe has to play against all the otherthree who against the solo play-ers became partners then interest-ingly we got one partner who wasan executive engineer in canaldepartment in India and a fatherof one of my aunts and anotherelderly person Faizul-Hasan whowas an officer in the office of con-troller of military accounts, in thisway our quota of four was com-plete and we played solo fromSaturday evening upto Sundayevening and some time even upto Monday morning and in thisway I was usually a winner but Ihad to have some cash to start thegame which somehow or the othermy wife used to borrow from MrsBasheer Ahmed who was ourneighbor and his wife had becomea great friend of my wife.

So I was so vigilant in mygame because for others it wastheir past time and for me it wasmy bread and butter. And all thetime while we were playing mybrother and my wife used to waitfor the result because this gamehad become more or less our liv-ing with this meager amountwhich was available after winningand it was enough to pass theweek. And sometimes also whenthe<-wining amount was substan-tia! we used to have a luxury ofgoing to movie and after that usedto buy a dish of “katakat” and oneplate of Katakat used to cost 12aanas but problem arose in thatweek when i was a loser and I usedto be frustrated and waiting for thenext week though my wife man-aged to buy daai and flour oncredit and then all of a sudden thatgroup broke off, shamsad Hassainfather of my aunt who was a veryfriendly and pleasant old man whonever gave us a feeling of his eld-erly position rather his friendshipwas particularly loveabie for mehe got a job in Murree as a Garri-son engineer in the army core ofengineers and then I don’t remem-ber now I passed another six oreight months without money orany other income and then anotherproblem arose that my wife waspregnant and when the deliverytime came it was late at night andI took her to lady wilingdon Hos-pital Lahore where the best Doc-tor was Dr. Col Sami and theremy 1st son Salim Ansar was bornand as during the pregnancy mywife was so under nourished thatwhen the child was born he wasabout three ponds only and rightat the time of his birth he was suf-fering from a disease which wascalled Beri beri and now again ididn’t know how to pay the hos-pital biil.

When after giving ali sorts ofconfidence to my wife i camehome. I just met a tenant of adja-cent house where we were livingpreviously which was actuallythe guest house and we hadshifted to the main bungalow. Inthat house Mr. Moor MuhammadSidique who was an excise in-spector. But I think after makingenough money he had decided toresign from there to start his ownbusiness and i already knew thegentleman while I was a studentin Sikandarabad where my unclewas posted as S.D.O. So with agreat difficulty I collected all mycourage to ask him a loan of 200rupees which luckily he gave mewithout hesitation and at that timeit was equivalent to a billion forme. Then I bought some fruit formy wife and went to hospital andshe stayed in the hospital forabout four to five days and thetotal bill for a private room withthe consultant fees of the finestdoctor of Lahore total bill came10 about 130 rupees and then wecame back home with the child.It will not be out of place to men-tion that the day we had landedin Lahore and came to a newcountry against the wishes of thefamily , had promised myself thatmy brother had done his gradua-tion only then I asked him tocomplete his masters and thenappear in civil service examina-tion that was my burning desireand 1 had made it my aim of lifeto see him a CSP officer.

After the child came home ithad become very difficult for usto feed the child at that time 1 gotoffers of some jobs but i didn’t

want that job unless it was enoughto fulfill my ambitions of makingmy brother a civil servant and lookafter my family with a same com-fort and status as we were livingin India. It became so hard thatthe house we were living was ona rent of 75 rupees per month, thenS was also very worried becausemy brother had became verydeeply involved with that girl and! knew that the financial condi-tion of our family can’t fulfill hisdesire. So one day I shifted fromthat house to a much smallerhouse but at that time my brotherhad gone out somewhere andwhen he returned he found out thatwe have left that house and thenfor three days neither he was eat-ing anything rather he was cryingall the time because remainingaway from that house was to becompletely out of touch from hislady love.

Then also one day 3 came toknow that he had joinedAGPR(Accountant General ofPakistan) on 125 rupees a monthas a junior clerk i came to knowabout it after a few days and assoon as i came to know i went,straight to his office I was so an-noyed that,! picked him up rightfrom his seat holding his collar inthe middle of the hall and shoutedin front of everybody that how andwhy he has done it without mypermission and he cryingly saidto me that 1 can live without foodbut I can’t see the young childrenmy nephew and niece to be starv-ing. Then I took him straight to anear by restaurant which wascalled “Pak Tea House’”’ the ad-vantage of that restaurant was thatyou could sit In that restaurant forhours without buying anythingthere I talked to him for one hourand convinced him that if he wantsto join this job then he should for-get about the giri he wants tomarry because they were well todc people and they will never al-low their daughter to be marriedto a junior clerk and moreover ourparents also wanted to marry him.one of their nieces,, So ! also toldhim that neither he can be mar-ried there our own uncle wouldnot want to marry his own daugh-ter to a junior clerk and I con-vinced him that from the veryearly childhood VOL: have livedwith me always had a confidencein me so please keep up that con-fidence and we will some how orthe other make it up and you justconcentrate on passing your mas-ters examination then you willappear in civil service competi-tion, Then he put up a conditionthat we will shift back to thehouse, otherwise his contact withhis lady love will break. So I im-mediately agreed as ! knew thatotherwise he will keep on starv-ing himself and will not be ableto concentrate on anything so onour return home I went straight toour previous landlord requestinghim the house hack though withhis greed he increased the rentfrom 75 rupees to 110 rupees permonth on which I immediatelyagreed without hesitation as Iknew that from last three days mybrother neither had eaten anythingnor had slopped crying. Mow thebig question was that where fromto produce these 110 rupees thefirst month rent.

After making this arrange-ment with the land lord we bothwalked back to the house wherewe were living now and whenAisha heard this she was so ex-cited that all her worries vanishedas my brother for her was moreof a son than brother-in-law andvice versa and for my brother alsoshe was a mother figure.

Now the, first: tiling Aishadid was whatever was availablein the house to eat she insistedon my brother to have somethingto eat as he had not been eatingfor last three days. After that weall three sat clown to discuss thatnow and from where we shouldproduce 110 rupees to shift backto the house as my brother wasdesperately keen that somebodyelse may not take that house onrent so the only thing we couldthink was a bicycle and it wasalso marketable which we im-mediately decided to sell andwithout any hesitation, immedi-ately myself and my brotherwent to Nila Gumbad which wasa cycle market and with a greatdifficulty we got only 75 rupeesfrom that cycle and after sellingthe cycle when we were return-ing back to mall road and on thecorner of mall road near YMCArestaurant.

Icons of glorious traditions and classical valuesPart IIAnsar Hussain

To be continued

Now one can easilyimagine that going to anew country in a newcity at the age of 22 witha liability of a youngwife and a youngerbrother, where wedidn’t know any bodywith out any resourcesor substantial cash howwe would have sur-vived. The first thing wedid was taking a houseon rent for 60 rupeesper month and in thosedays my maternal uncleIntezar Hussain was al-ready in Lahore work-ing for a weekly maga-zine by the name of“Nizam” but he was liv-ing with his friend , healso shifted with me.

We met a very old friendby the name of M.H.Aarzo, who met us verywarmly and immedi-ately offered us to havea tea in YMCA restau-rant it was again a Godsent opportunity andmore than tea while wewere on the verge ofstarvation we helpedourselves with pastriesand patls.

The writer looks into the pastwith focus on social environ-ment of the respectable Mus-lim families of the sub-conti-nent who remained resilientwhen adverse circumstancesclouded their fortunes.

cept your directives then give usin writing.

CJP remarked “government iskeeping mum and non coopera-tion is continuing with court per-sistently.

CJP remarked “produce themissing persons till 1130 hrs onTuesday. Otherwise we will con-sider you helpless. Government issilent and if we go silent then howthe matters will run. What yourlegislation will give to those twopersons who have died. No doubtmissing persons are not innocentbut they be presented. We cannotgive you 3 to 4 days.

CJP observed “ get recover 33persons first and then enact legis-lation. Two persons have gone tograveyard. Their death was notnatural.

Defence minister said institu-tions are not non cooperating. Billwill soon be tabled in NationalAssembly session.

Attorney General (AG) saidhe supports the statement given bydefence secretary.

CJP remarked “ FIR be gotregistered in respect of the personswho have died. The law will takeits course if they have been mur-dered or have been kidnapped. Wecan not give more time becausewe know what they want to do.Evidence is available. What youwant more now.

Defence minister KhawajaAsif said “ please give three daysmore. The matters will becomeclear.

CJP observed “ you shouldget cases registered as defenceminister. Tell the court about FIRand arrests till the evening. Wehave no relevance with the re-maining matter. Case will be reg-istered in Malakand. IG Jails wastold that army was taking awaythese persons. Put the criminalson trial but we can not allow anyone to kill any one.

He further remarked “ intelli-gence agencies think they have

Action if missing personsnot produced today: CJ

From Page 1

powers above law. They are notunderstanding its consequencesthen what we can do. We hadmade you bridge but you are alsodoing nothing. We will now issueorders in this regard. Arrests willhave to be made today.

Justice Jawwad remarked “human life is not cheap in civi-lized societies. So many peopleare killed in bomb blast here. Hu-man life has no value here. Gov-ernment is doing what.

AG said “ who is subedarAman Ullah and who is MajorZulfiqar. We will have to obtaininformation about them. If timeis given then information can be-come available.

CJP remarked “ defence min-ister should realize another gov-ernment is running parallel to thegovernment. And this is not goodomen for the government too. Thecase will have to be registered atevery cost. Whosoever thesepeople are, they be arrested.

AG said acting defence sec-retary does not know law withregard to proceedings. How thisall will be done.

Khawaja Asif said this is hisfirst working day Prime Minister(PM) was also out of the country.I will take up this matter beforePM and we will do some thing inthis regard. Please give me time.This is also first working day ofchief of army staff.

CJP remarked “ acting de-fence secretary should go and reg-ister case. We can not go after theaccused. This is not our job. Wewant to ensure that all the mattersare being run in consonance withlaw and rule of law prevails in thestate. Law will have to be imple-mented for the sake of rule of lawand protection of fundamentalrights. Betterment will not cometo the country unless we bow ourhead before constitution. Such asituation is there that instead gov-ernment would have protected its

erence a copy of the contract anddocuments pertaining to the ref-erence.

He added that the allegationagainst Raja Ashraf regardingabuse of power were wrong.

The bench then directedNAB to provide the specifieddocuments to Ashraf’s attorney.

The court adjourned RajaPervez Ashraf’s indictment andsought all relevant records untilthe next hearing which wouldtake place on Dec 14.

Court adjournsFrom Page 1

Ultimately when wewent to Aligarh and Idecided to come to Pa-kistan and when addacame to know about ithe came to Aligarh toconvince me to stay onin India and offered mean equal partnership inan industrial projectsituated in Blundshehar and run it inde-pendently. However,circumstances weresuch that I had to leaveIndia leaving my wifewith my grand mother.

Counsel for Ch Hameed,Aftab Ahmed Bajwa when con-tacted admitted he was not go-ing to appear before the Su-preme Court in this high pro-file case. “My assistant wouldappear in my place and shall ap-prise the court of the loomingthreats to myself and my cli-ent.”

Police spokesman whenasked to comment, said policewould provide all-out security toCh Abdul Hameed on his arrivalin Islamabad and there was noquestion of risk involved in pur-suance of this case.”

Faisal was investigatingRs22 billion rental powerprojects scam. He was foundhanging from the ceiling fan inhis residence in FederalLodges, Islamabad, on Jan 18this year. His death came threedays after the Supreme Courtordered arrest of Prime Minis-ter Raja Pervaiz Ashraf and 15others in connection with thescam.

First, the police and theNAB high ups submitted beforethe apex court he had commit-ted suicide but according to thePunjab Forensic laboratory’srecent report he was tortured andkilled.

Some weirdosthreatening

From Page 1

law officer, departure of law of-ficer is being talked of. If he isright in what he is speaking aboutthen why the government doesnot support him,.

During the hearing, letter toAG with reference to AdditionalAttorney General (AAG) TariqKhokhar was presented in thecourt.

CJP said to the person whohad written letter “ you have triedto make direct interference in thecourt’s hearing that AAG hadgiven wrong statement. If defenceministry does not remove you tillthe evening then we will registercase against you. It is not writtenanywhere in today’s letter thatdeath of both the persons wasnatural.

AG said higher authoritieswill see this matter. Please givetwo days more.

CJP remarked “ we will saynothing to defence minister. Werespect him. We are saying to sec-retary that evidence has becomeavailable about the killing of twopersons. What is left more now.Produce the persons on Tuesday.Cases be got registered and copyof FIR be presented before thecourt too.

Khawaja Asif sought twodays but the CJP rejected his re-quest remarking “ Produce thepersons till 113o hrs .You havebeen fighting for the national in-terest. We respect you

Court said in the order “Muhammad Irfan has tried to in-terfere in court’s affairs, therefore,action be initiated against him asper law. Defence secretary is di-rected to ensure recovery of 33persons. It has been told that 4more persons have been handedover to the army. Defence secre-tary should review the matter andgive reply to the court that as towhy such statement has beengiven against law officer.

The court adjourned the hear-ing till Tuesday.—Online

Provincial Minister for Auqafand Religious Affairs AtaMuhammad Maneka. SecretaryAuqaf and Religious AffairsSaqib Aziz, CoordinatorsIttehad Bain ul MuslimeenMufti Intekhab Ahmed Noori,Alhaj Haider Ali Mirza,Maulana Hafiz Tahir MahmoodAshrafi, Dr. Abdul GhafoorRashid, Alhaj Habib UllahBhatti, Dr. Sufi Zaheer Ahmedand DG Auqaf were also presenton the occasion.

According to the code ofconduct no speaker, khateeb orzakir will show disrespect toAhle Bait, companions of HolyProphet (PBUH), four Caliphs(RA), wives of Holy Prophet(PBUH), Holy Imams and ImamMehdi in their speeches.

No person belonging to anysect will be declared “kafir” or“wajibul qatal”. No speech willbe made against any sect creat-ing hatred.

The use of loudspeaker willbe completely banned except“Azaan” and Friday sermon inArabic besides permission fromlocal administration will becompulsory for holding congre-gations of all schools of thought.

Such meetings would bearranged at public level in whichulema of all schools of thoughtwill give proof of national unityand religious harmony by ad-dressing jointly.

Ulema of all sects will begiven due respect and protectionof worship places of all schoolsof thought will be ensured.There will be complete ban ondisplay of weapons in meetings,processions, mosques, imambargahs and other worshipplaces.

Government will ensureeffective monitoring system forthe practical enforcement of thiscode of conduct and administra-tion will take legal action againstthe violators irrespective of theirsect.

Slogans hurting the feel-ings, creating hatred and provo-cation will be avoided com-pletely.

As the non-Muslims livewith the Muslims of variousschools of thought in Pakistan,therefore, according to Shariah,it is responsibility of govern-ment of Pakistan to protect lifeand property and worship placesof non-Muslims. Strict legal ac-tion would be taken againstthose desecrating the life andproperty and worship places ofnon-Muslims.

There will be complete banon publication and distributionof books, pamphlets, literature,cassettes and websites contain-ing hatred material.

9-pointreligious code

of conductformulated

From Page 1

ism act have been registeredagainst students accused of mis-behaving with professors.

Following the raid, IJT stu-dents protested on several ma-jor roads of the city. IJT mem-bers snatched keys of severalbuses and cars leaving passen-gers stranded on Canal Road,Multan Road and Band Roads.Buses were also used to blocktraffic on these roads. A studentassociated with the IJT also setfire to a bus on Wahadat road.

CCPO Lahore told the me-dia that 21 students had beenarrested and no one would beallowed to take the law into theirown hands. The CCPO addedthat a case would be lodged

Fiery protestsFrom Page 1

against those responsible for set-ting the bus ablaze and a casewould be lodged against them.

The spokesman for IJT saidit was not strange that bulletsand empty bottles of alcoholwere recovered from the hostel.He claimed that if the vice chan-cellor of the university wanted,even rocket launchers and handgrenades could have been recov-ered. According to the spokes-man the police and universityadministration had evacuatedthe hostel and kept it under theircontrol for several hours. Headded that no one was allowedto enter the hostel for four hours.

Fiery protests after 17Jamiat members arrested fromPU The protest was held on abridge connecting the universitywith the hostels. The agitatedstudents blocked traffic on thebridge.

A contingent of police offic-ers arrested 13 boys and clearedout the university’s Hostel No16, as it is considered a strong-hold for Jamiat members.

Following the evacuation, agroup of students started peltingstones and police arrested an-other four IJT members.

IJT students continued vio-lent protests till late evening,blocking traffic and causingchaos on the streets of Lahore.

in UBL. The standing commit-tee on Finance further directedthe Ministry of Privatization tohire the services of internationalconsultant to ensure transpar-ency in the privatization process.

The standing committee re-sented the absence of FinanceMinister and Secretary Financefrom the meeting and said thatcommittee will hold an in cam-era meeting regarding the is-sue.—Online

PrivatizationFrom Page 1

Published by: Zahid Malik from Ali Akbar House Markaz G-8, Islamabad and printed by Gauhar Zahid Malik at Al Umar Printers

KABUL—Afghan PresidentHamid Karzai accused his USally on Sunday of withhold-ing military supplies to presshim to sign a bilateral secu-rity deal that will shape theUS military presence aftermost foreign troops leave in2014.

Washington, whichswiftly denied the assertion,has said that unless the pactis signed promptly, it couldpull out most of its troops,as it did in Iraq two years ago.

“The cutting of fuel sup-plies and support services tothe Afghan army and policeis being used as a means ofpressure to ensure Afghani-stan ... signs the Bilateral Se-curity Agreement,” a state-ment from Karzai’s palacesaid.

Karzai said last week hemight refuse to sign the dealuntil after Afghanistan’spresidential election in April2014.

US officials said logisti-cal problems in Pakistanmight have given rise to thealleged delays in deliveries.

“There has been no stop-page in the delivery of re-quested fuel and we con-tinue to process all orders assoon as they are received,”the Nato-led force in Af-ghanistan said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Afghan Presi-dent Hamid Karzai has sug-gested delaying April elec-

Karzai accuses US ofcutting military supplies

— suggests delay in April polls

NE W DE L H I—Pakistan’soutgoing envoy to NewDelhi said Monday he saw“light at the end of the tun-nel” in diplomatic relationsand predicted the improve-ment would survive nextyear’s Indian elections.

High CommissionerSalman Bashir said calmhad returned to theneighbours’ de facto bor-der in disputed Kashmirafter a deadly flare-up ear-l ier in the year and bothsides were committed to im-proving ties.

“I do not want tosound over-optimist ic orexaggerate but what I amsaying is that there is lightat the end of the tunnel,”Bashir told a farewell pressconference in the Indiancapital.

“We have constantly

worked for the improve-ment in relations betweenthe two countries and atthis point of time I am per-sonally optimistic that wewill be on the upward trajec-tory in the coming months.”

Some observers havepredicted ties between theneighbours could be hit ifhardline Hindu nationalistleader Narendra Modiemerges as prime minister af-ter elections due in India bynext May.

Modi, who is ahead inthe polls, has been an out-spoken critic of Pakistanand has accused the currentIndian Prime MinisterManmohan Singh of not be-ing tough enough towardsIslamabad.

But Bashir said the out-come of the Indian electionswas “not material” to Paki-

stani Prime Minister NawazSharif ’s stated goal of im-proving ties.

“The improvement in re-lations with India is very em-phatically a state policy. Webelieve it’s in our interestand we believe it’s in the in-terest of the region,” saidthe high commissioner.

“Our prime minister ison record as having very em-phatically stated that im-provement of relations withIndia is a priority.

“An improvement in re-lations with Pakistan is alsosomething that is of impor-tance to India and the In-dian leadership.”

Bashir refused to bedrawn on the impact of aModi premiership, sayingPakistan would “respectwhatever is the decision ofthe people of India”.—AFP

Pakistani envoy sees ‘light atend of tunnel’ with India

RIYADH—Iran has reachedout to Saudi Arabia, by re-assuring its regional rivalthat Tehran’s budding rap-prochement with the Westin the aftermath of the re-cently signed Geneva ac-cord did not pose any threatto Kingdom.

During a whirlwind visitof a string of Persian Gulfmonarchies, Iran’s foreignminister Mohammad JavadZarif invited Saudi Arabiato “work together in order

to promote peace and stabil-ity in the region”. “We lookat Saudi Arabia as an impor-tant and influential countryin the region”, AFP quotedMr. Zarif as saying duringhis stop in Kuwait city.

The call for a thaw withSaudi Arabia follows the an-ticipation in Iran that a breakin the 34 year cycle of hos-tility with the West that be-gan after the 1979 IslamicRevolution may not be faraway after the signing of the

ice-breaking nuclear deal inGeneva. Yet, Tehran’sdétente with the West canbe undermined if thewealthy Saudi royals con-tinue to use their consider-able influence in the regionto hurt Iranian interests incountries, such as Iraq, Syriaand Lebanon, by playingthe sectarian card and en-couraging violence.

Mr. Zarif assured Iran’sGulf neighbours that theGeneva agreement “cannot

be at the expense of anycountry in the region”. Headded: “Be assured that thenuclear deal is in favour ofthe stability and security ofthe region.”

The foreign minister ’swords of reassurance aresignificant, as prior to theGeneva accord, members ofthe Saudi establishment hadmade it clear that they stoodopposed to the deal. In aninterview with a British daily,The Times, Saudi ambassa-

Iran: Geneva accord no threat Saudi Arabia

PM to visit AJKtodayISLAMABAD—Prime MinisterMian Muhammad NawazSharif will visit Azad Kash-mir on a one day official visitto Muzaffarabad today. PrimeMinister Nawaz Sharif hassummoned budget sessionof the Azad Jammu and Kash-mir Council in Muzaffarabadon Tuesday. The Prime Min-ister, who is Chairman of theCouncil, will preside over thesession. Nawaz Sharif will bewelcomed by Prime MinisterAzad Kashmir ChaudhryAbdul Majeed, members ofthe respected cabinet andother heads when he arrivesin Muzaffarabad.—Online

FC’s police powersextendedQUETTA—Balochistan gov-ernment has extended theduration of police powersdelegated to Frontier Corpsfor 2 months. As per Interiorsecretary Balochistan AsadGillani, FC was delegated thepowers of police few monthsagoto bring improvement inthe law and order situationof the Quetta. This durationof powers had ended on No-vember 16 and after that ChiefMinister Abdul Malik Balochwas again sent the summaryto extend the duration of FCpowers for 2 months more.The CM has approved theproposed summary and nowFC will exercise the powers ofpolice till January 16.—Online

Huge cache ofarms recoveredPESHAWAR—Police foiled amassive bid to smuggle armsas it recovered a huge cacheof arms from a truck here onMonday. During snap check-ing, police stopped a sus-pected truck at Kohat Roadin Matni area of Peshawar.During search of the vehiclearms including 10 repeaters,10 pistols, threeKalashnikovs, three riflesand 11,000 rounds of differ-ent bores hidden in the se-cret chambers of truck wererecovered. Police seized therecovered arms and arrestedthe truck driver.—INP

Iran releases 34PakistanisQUETTA—ran has handedover thirty-four illegal Paki-stani immigrants to TaftanLevies at Pakistan border.ose arrested had entered Iranwithout traveling docu-ments.—Online

Musharraf: SHCforms new benchKARACHI— The SHC hasformed new judicial bench forhearing application seekingto remove former presidentMusharraf ’s name from theExit Control List. Chief Jus-tice SHC Baqar Ali has namedJustices NaimatullahPhalphuto and Sajjad AliShah for the upcoming hear-ing of the case scheduled onDecember 9.—Online

tions to avoid heavy snow,organisers said, an idea thatwill rattle the United Statesand critics who fear he maybe trying to drag out his sec-ond and final term.

Karzai is barred by theconstitution from running fora third term and has so farrefrained from backing any ofthe candidates, although heis widely expected to supporthis elder brother Qayum,seen as one of the front run-ners. But Karzai has also re-fused to sign a pact thatwould keep thousands of UStroops in Afghanistan afternext year when most interna-tional troops pull out.

He has said the agree-ment shouldn’t be signeduntil after the election, whichsome say illustrates his reluc-tance to step out of thelimelight.“Regarding theweather, there have beenconcerns,” the chairman ofthe Independent ElectionCommission (IEC), YousofNooristani, told the upperhouse of parliament on Sun-day. “Even the president hassuggested we could makechanges to this (the electiondate) because he received com-plaints from the people. I toldhim we couldn’t because thedate is set, based on theconstit.—Reuters

Khuhro demands90 days for LB polls

STAFF REPORTER

K A R A C H I—Sindh SeniorMinister for education NisarAhmed Khuhro said thatSindh government’s demandfor holding elections for thelocal body after a grace pe-riod of 90 days should be ac-cepted and respected.

It was mandatory to give90 days period prior to con-ducting the general electionsso the same spirit should alsobe manifested in letter andspirit regarding the conduc-tion of the local body polls.

Sindh senior Ministersaid that while taking tonewsmen at a local hotelMonday.

The Minister said thatthe period of 90 days shouldbe onward to completion ofnecessary arrangements re-garding the local body pollsby the provincial governmentand it should start after theprovincial finalizes the hand-ing over of the necessarywork to the election commis-sion,

On the other hand,Khuhro said that SukkurBarrage had completed itslife and needed a replace-ment with a new barrage forwhich the feasibility reportwould be sought from theexperts from the countryand abroad.

The Barrage had linkedthe province from two sidesand till the feasibility reportwould be prepared it was un-avoidable to rehabilitate theexisting Sukkur Barrage andin this regard, the provincialgovernment was taking allnecessary steps.

BANGKOK — The UnitedNations closed its main officein Bangkok, dozens ofschools were shut and civilservants skipped work asstone-throwing protestersbattled through clouds of teargas in renewed assaults onkey government buildings inthe Thai capital on Monday.

The protests aimed attoppling the government ofPrime Minister YingluckShinawatra have renewedfears of prolonged instabilityin one of Southeast Asia’sbiggest economies and comejust ahead of the peak holi-day tourist season.

After a weekend of chaosin pockets of Bangkok, pro-testers regrouped outside theheavily-barricaded primeminister’s office compoundMonday and repeatedlyclashed with the police whofired tear gas, water cannonsand rubber bullets.Emboldened by their leader’svow to topple Yingluck byWednesday, they threw rocksat police and tore away sec-tions of barbed wire and con-crete barriers. At least threepeople were killed and 103 in-jured in skirmishes over the

weekend.In a nationally televised

appeal, Yingluck’s deputy,Surapong Tovichakchaikul,called on protesters to stophurting Thailand’s image andthe economy. Yingluck hasnot appeared in public sinceSaturday, and has not beento her office since last week.On Monday, she posted a pic-ture of herself on Facebookin a meeting with senior offi-cials at the national policeheadquarters.

Using a conciliatory tone,Surapong said “the govern-ment will exercise utmost pa-tience and adhere to nonvio-lent principles.”

“The government wouldlike to insist that it will leadThailand back to peacesoon,” he said.The protest-ers, who are mostly middle-class Bangkok supporters ofthe opposition DemocratParty, want Yingluck to stepdown, claiming she is a proxyfor her brother, former PrimeMinister Thaksin Shinawatra.He was deposed in a 2006 mili-tary coup but remains centralto Thailand’s political crisis,and is a focal point for theprotester’s hatred.—AP

Violence pushes Thailanddeeper into crisis

BD Opp confirmspoll boycotton deadline

DHAKA—Bangladesh’s 18-party opposition coalitionconfirmed Monday it wouldboycott a general electionscheduled for January justhours before a final deadlinefor nominations, plunging thevolatile country into politicaluncertainty.

“There is no question ofus filing nominations for theJanuary 5 election under thepresent circumstances. We’renot going to take part in theJanuary 5 elections,”Shamsher Mobin Chowdhury,a vice president of theBangladesh Nationalist Party,told media.

Monday was the last dayfor nominations with the finalcutoff at 05:00 pm (1100 GMT).Chowdhury said the BNP andits 17 smaller allies includingthe country’s largest Islamicparty would only change theirmind “if the polls are organisedby a non-party, neutral gov-ernment”. Bangladesh haswitnessed escalating streetviolence over the last fiveweeks that left 51 people deadand thousands injured, withalmost all opposition leadersnow in hiding.—AFP

Cases againstPTI, JI workers

OBSERVER REPORT

PESHAWAR—Cases havebeen registered against PTIand Jamaat-e-Islami workersfor breaking the seal of aNato container bound for Af-ghanistan during the sit-in atHayatabad toll plaza.

The driver of the Natocontainer protested againstthe PTI and JI workers break-ing the seal and stated thatthe Afghanistan bound con-tainer was carrying cookingoil. JI leader, Kasif Azam andPTI camp in charge MalikRaees have been named inthe FIR.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—The ElectionCommission of Pakistan hasannounced that the schedulefor local bodies polls inSindh and Balochistan willbe issued on December 7.The ECP has asked the prov-inces to complete prepara-tions for the LB polls, oth-erwise, they would be heldresponsible for any delays.

The polls in Sindh arescheduled to be held onJanuary 18 and January 20in Punjab.

The schedule was to beissued on November 29 andthe ECP had directed theprovinces to complete theirpreparations for the LBelections on November 28but they failed to fulfill thelegal requirements.

According to ECPsources, letters were writ-ten to the provinces inform-ing them that the pollsschedule would be issuedon December 7 and allpreparations should becompleted before thisdate.Meanwhile, the print-ing process of all requiredballot papers and deliveryto 14 districts has beencompleted for local bodies’polls in Balochistan.

Over 6.5 million ballotpapers have been printed,in different printing facili-ties of Karachi, Lahore, andIslamabad, for local bodies’polls on December 7 inBalochistan but delivery toQuetta is delayed by oneday, told the provincial Elec-tion Commissioner, SyedSultan Bayazid.

Sindh, Punjab LBpolls schedule on Dec 7

LAHORE: IJT students blocked the traffic at Campus bridge and underpass after closure of Punjab University hostel.

dor to Britain, Mohammedbin Nawaf bin Abdulazizwarned that the Kingdomwould not “sit idly by” ifworld powers failed to haltIran’s nuclear programme.

From Kuwait, the Iranianforeign minister travelled toOman-the country that ap-parently hosted back chan-nel talks between the Irani-ans and the Americans thatpaved the way for theGeneva rounds. On Monday,Mr. Zarif arrived in Qatar, a

country, which shares agiant gas-field with Iran.

Prior to his visit to theneighbouring petro-mon-archies, Mr. Zarif hadwritten an opinion piecein the Saudi-owned daily,Asharq Al-Awsat, Mr.Zarif, where he stressedthat “notwithstanding thefocus on our interactionswith the West, the realityis that our primary foreignpolicy priority is our re-gion”.—AFP

Ukraineprotesters launch

general strikeafter clashes

KIEV—Ukrainian protesterslaunched a nationwide strikeand began to blockade gov-ernment buildings Mondayafter violent clashes in whichmore than 100,000 soughtearly elections over the au-thorities’ rejection of a his-toric EU pact.

About 100,000 support-ers of the ex-Soviet state’scloser alliance with the Euro-pean Union and disavowal ofold master Russia camped outovernight into Monday onKiev’s iconic IndependenceSquare.

The group huddled in 20huge military tents to keepwarm against the winter chillwhile musicians performedon a makeshift stage and op-position lawmakers paid pe-riodic visits to boost morale.

More than 5,000 of themthen moved toward the gov-ernment and presidential ad-ministration buildings in a bidto force authorities to imme-diately step down.

Streams of cars honkedtheir horns in support whilechurch bells rang out acrossthe heart of the ancientcapital.—AFP

ALONG with the usual reasons for losing weight, like fitting into a bikini andimproving health, fitness experts say

raising money for a good cause is another in-centive for people to get in shape. Entering acharity run in memory of a loved one or abicycle ride for a worthycause has pushed manycouch potatoes from theirsedentary lifestyle on to thepath of fitness.

Kelly Flynn, runningcoach for Team In Training,a charity sports enduranceprogram from the Leukemia& Lymphoma Society, hasbeen teaching novice run-ners to tackle the BosonMarathon since 2005. “Thepeople who’ve never runbefore and have a motiva-tion, like a loved one, are theeasiest people to coach,”said Flynn, a 40-year-oldBoston-based attorney.“They stick it out. And whenthey cross the finish line,they’ve become running junkies.”

Flynn, a soccer and softball player in herteenage years, said it was the death of a highschool friend from lymphoma that inspiredher to become a running coach for charity. “Isaw a flyer (from Team in Training) and went,on a lark,” she said. “His death was my cata-lyst.”

Team in Training, which is 25 years old,has raised more than $1.4 billion, with morethan 600,000 people from across the countrytaking part in different endurance events toraise money for Leukemia & Lymphoma So-ciety. Flynn, whose 200-strong team soon willstart training for 2014, has helped to train

more than 800 Boston marathoners and herteams have raised over $4 million.

For Sarah Jane Constantine, a self-de-scribed recreational runner, marathon run-ning was a bucket-list dream until she startedrunning for charity. “I didn’t think at 39 I

was going to startmarathoning,” saidConstantine, a 41-year-oldmanager for a pharmaceuticalcompany in Boston who hasraised money for cancer re-search.

“That’s what I’m mostproud of,” said Constantine,who finds some way to exer-cise every day, from runningto strength training to swim-ming with her daughter.Constantine dedicated her firstmarathon to her stepfather,who died of melanoma at 44.Last year it was for herdaughter’s school friend’smother, who died of lung can-cer.

This year she plans torun for the cancer-stricken daughter of herhusband’s co-worker. “You feel helpless,”she said. “I’ll be running for money for re-search and treatment.”

Charity events are a nationwide stapleof Flywheel Sports, a chain of indoor cy-cling studios founded in 2010. New York-based co-founder and creative director RuthZukerman said the fundraising events hercompany holds throughout the year are ben-eficial for people new to the sport, for chari-ties and for her business. “A lot of peoplecome to these charity rides who’ve neverbeen to us before. Typically some 80 per-cent of the people are new,” she said.

Charity sporting eventsoffer incentives to get fit

Ambassador of Lebanon to Pakistan, Mona Adnan El Tanir called on President Mamnoon Hussain at the Aiwan-e-Sadr.

CDA workers busy in cleaning flowers field at Constitutional Avenue.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—A two-day na-tional workshop to explore de-velopment in advanced elec-tronics and bring specific ex-pertise to this field, organizedby Faculty of Engineering andTechnology of InternationalIslamic University Islamabad(IIUI), started at FaisalMosque Campus of the uni-versity on Monday which wit-nessed renowned scientistsand technology researchers.

Pro Vice Chancellor ISRAUniversity Islamabad Prof.Altaf Ali Shaikh was the chiefguest of the inaugural sessionof the “National Workshop onAdvanced Electronics: DeviceDesign and Process Character-ization” while it was presided

over by Rector IIUI Dr.Masoom Yasinzai, PresidentIIUI Dr. Ahmed Yousif Al-Draiweesh, Director General(AF&P) Gulzar AhmedKhwaja and Dean FET Dr.Aqdas Naveed Malik also at-tended the session.

Speaking on the occasion,Prof. Altaf lauded the initiativeof FET and also appreciated therole of HEC for providing sup-port to universities for arrang-ing such workshops on ad-vanced technology research. Hetermed the workshop as tre-mendous opportunity for theyoung researchers and urgedthem to work on innovativeideas which may lead to theprosperity and development ofcountry.

Rector IIUI, Dr Masoom

Yasinzai said advancement inscience and technology is pre-requisite in the present era fordevelopment of nation. “Wehave to focus on basic and en-gineering sciences to competethe modern challenges,” Headded. Rector IIUI vowed toprovide best educational facili-ties to IIUI students while say-ing that advancement in tech-nology is prime focus of theuniversity.

President IIUI, Dr. AhmedYousif Al-Draiweesh said Pa-kistan owns best engineers anddoctors while saying Pakistana talented nation. “We have toutilize our abilities and re-sources to compete with con-temporary challenges and thefield of science and technologyshould be our prime focus” he

added. Dr. Al-Draiweesh saidIIUI is committed to completeprojects pertaining to technol-ogy advancement and univer-sity would provide every pos-sible support to its researchersin this regard. He urged facultymembers to get united for de-velopment of the institution andMuslim Umma.

Dean FET Dr. Aqdas, in hiswelcome address said work-shop is aimed at exploringspeedy changes pertaining toelectronic engineering and thegathering would provide plat-form to learn about the changesand advancements.” Nation as-sociates hopes with scientistsand we have to pay somethingconstructive, the workshop ispart of that struggle” he main-tained. He also thanked IIUI top

management for support toarrange the workshop.

Earlier, Principal Investi-gator and Advisor to IIUI En-gineering programs Dr. AhmedShuja Syed gave a brief intro-duction of the workshop.

The participants wereguided regarding AdvancedElectronic Design & Fabrica-tion, Research and Develop-ment in flexible and re-configurable and power adap-tive power amplifiers for wire-less communication, High Fre-quency Phototransistor forOpto-electronic Applications,Design and Fabrication of HighSpeed and Low Power ADCsand various other important top-ics on the first day of the work-shop. The workshop would con-clude on Tuesday.

Workshop on ‘Advanced electronics: Device design and process characterization’

Prof. Altaf Ali Shaikh, Pro Vice Chancellor ISRA University, Dr. Masoom Yasin Zai, RectorIIUI, Dr. Ahmed Yousif Al-Draiweesh, President IIUI, Dr. Aqdas Naveed Malik, Dean FETIIUI, on the occasion of ‘National Workshop on Advanced Electronic: Devices Design andProcess Characterization’ held at IIUI.

Pak to continue rolefor stable, peaceful

Lebanon: MamnoonSTAFF REPORTER

I S L A M A B A D — P r e s i d e n tMamnoon Hussain has said thatPakistan is keen to enhance bi-lateral cooperation in varioussectors and trade relations withLebanon and other countries.

He was talking to ambassa-dor of Lebanon to Pakistan,Mona Adnan El Tanir whocalled on him at President Houseon Monday.

During the meeting impor-tant issues of mutual interestsand various regional matterscame under discussion.

Mamnoon Hussain said thatPakistan highly values its tradi-tional relations with Lebanonand desired to further strengthenbilateral trade and commercialties. He viewed that Pakistanwould continue to extend itssupport towards a stable andpeaceful Lebanon.

Ambassador Mona AdnanEl Tanir thanked the Presidentfor his goodwill gestures andsaid that Lebanon was keen tofurther enhance its existing bi-lateral ties with Pakistan in di-verse fields.

Youth asked tofollow Iqbal’s

philosophy for unityISLAMABAD—Speakers at aseminar here on Monday askedthe youth to follow the true phi-losophy of Poet Philosopher DrAllama Muhammed Iqbal tomaintain unity among the Mus-lim Ummah . Speaking at a semi-nar in connection with “IqbalDay”, literary figures said thatIqbal’s vision is a source of guid-ance for the young generationand following that vision andphilosophy is the need of hour.

“Iqbal was a Sufi poet for themodern age who infused a revolu-tionary spirit in the nation throughhis poetry. The poetry of the greatphilosopher is the promotion ofpositive values in every age,” theysaid. “There was a need to adoptand follow the principles of Iqbalto bring peace, stability and har-mony in the region,” they said. SirSyed Memorial Society and CASEorganized the seminar while Paki-stan Movement Gold MedalistBrigd. Iqbal M Shafi delivered aspecial lecture on Iqbal’s philoso-phy and poetry.—APP

AIOU to improveresearch work

ISLAMABAD—Board of Ad-vanced Studies and Research(BASR) of the Allama IqbalOpen University (AIOU) at itstwo-day meeting held here Mon-day decided to take necessarymeasures to further improve andstreamline the academic researchwork at M.Phil and Ph.D level.

This is a part of theUniversity’s efforts’ for upgrad-ing the quality and standard ofeducation at the higher educa-tion level. The meeting dis-cussed in details various propos-als to achieve the desired objec-tives.

The Vice-Chancellor Prof.Dr. Nazir Sangi who presidedover the meeting advised theofficers concerned to hold quar-terly meetings of BARS toevaluate the research work insystemic manner.—APP

ISLAMABAD—The governmenthouses and quarters in varioussectors of the federal capital arein shabby condition due to le-thargic attitude of the concernedauthorities. Talking to APP, resi-dents living in sectors of thecapital complained that situationis getting more grave as allotteesof these houses continue to con-struct illegal structures in viola-tion of by laws and there is no-body to stop them.

The government quarterswere designed as one storeystructures but now the allotteesare in a race to build secondstorey to get more rooms. Theallottees also make illegal con-struction in front of houses. This

over construction on alreadyshabby and decades old struc-tures poses a serious risk to livesof residents of these homes, saidan engineer.

The allottees have their ownreasons and they complain of theshabby condition of their quar-ters and lack of response fromthe concerned authorities. Theseillegal structures can be seenespecially in A, B and C quar-ters for low cadre employees invarious sectors including G-9,G-8, G-6, G-7 and I-10.

As usual the concerned de-partments have turned a blind eyeto this illegal practice and viola-tion of by laws. A resident of G-6said, “There are a number of

houses that have been extendedabout four to five feet outside theiroriginal boundaries and as a re-sult portions of streets have beenoccupied and turned into parkingspaces.” Regarding illegal con-struction in government houses,an official of the Estate Office saidthe department was fully aware ofthis issue but a proper mechanismand enforcement was required tostop this practice.

He said they only work onwritten complaints instead oftaking action on their own. Talk-ing to APP on condition of ano-nymity, the official said that tak-ing care of flats in some areas isthe responsibility of CapitalDevelopment Authority. —APP

Illegal constructiongoes unchecked

Seminar onDengue today

CITY REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Capital Devel-opment Authority (CDA) willorganize a seminar on to oblit-erate menace of dengue fromthe Capital City here on Tues-day (today) at Pak ChinaFriendship Centre. The eventtitled “Seminar on Preventionand Management of DengueFever” will improve the capac-ity building of doctors in thisregard, says a statement issuedby CDA spokesman.

He said that this seminar isa weighty segment of a com-prehensive and multi prongedstrategy by CDA to cleanse thecity of Dengue virus. “Down-right elimination of dengue isthe destination”, he added.

He further informed thatChairman CDA NadeemHassan Asif will initiate theproceedings of the seminar,whereas the seminar will beheld in two session i-e Gen-eral (Awareness) Session andTechnical (Clinical Manage-ment) session. Presentationsby several participants in-c luding by Dr. WaseemAkram, Dr. Jaffar Ilyas, Dr.Faisal Masood and WHORepresentatives will be partof the seminar, he told.

The event will be con-cluded by question answersessions. Doctors from bothpublic and private sectors willattend the seminar. The par-ticipation will impart latesttechniques regarding denguepatient management, headded.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Residents fromdifferent sectors of FederalCapital have called for instal-lation and proper maintenanceof street lights at main pointswhich turn pitch black aftersunset. They said Capital De-velopment Authority (CDA)needs to take urgent steps toarrange street lights despitetheir repeated complains in thisregard.

They said certain streets andmain roads in the city remainunder cover of darkness, andpeople generally prefer to avoid

these areas during the nighthours.

Certain areas have power-ful streetlights whereas in otherparts of capital, there are veryfew lights,” said MurshadAbbas, a security guard whoworks in Blue Area. Night dutyoffice bearers and residentsfrom Sectors G,H,I said theynow worry more about allow-ing their children to go to shopsat nights.

An old citizen Abdul Khaliqof sector I-9 said that “We areconcerned about our safety,”. “Irealize that street lighting issomething that contributes to

public safety.” he added. Certainstreetlights in Federal Capitalare not only turned off but atcertain places people had rippedthem out.

Rauf Baloch, a student ofQuaid e Azam University said,Islamabad was the capital citybut faced street lights problemin the evening whereas in small-est towns of other developingcountries, situation was not soworse. Murad Ali, a journalistsaid: “It’s just too dark. When Icome out of the office, I can’tsee what’s in front of me thuscausing inconvenience for me toreach home properly.”

Citizens urge CDA to arrangestreetlights in Capital

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Speaker NationalAssembly Sardar Ayaz Sadiq hassaid the government is determinedto making Pakistan a place whereeveryone has the same opportuni-ties to participate in all walks of lifewith dignity and self-esteen.

He said this in a message to thenation on the occasion of Interna-tional Day of Persons with Disabili-ties which is observed on Decem-ber 3 throughout the World under

the auspices of United Nation.He said that the aim of this

Day is to promote a better under-standing of disability issues witha focus on the rights of personswith disabilities and gains to bederived from the integration ofpersons with disabilities in everyaspect of the political, social, eco-nomic and cultural life of theircommunities.

Ayaz said that the governmentwas committed to build a hopefulfuture for all segments of the soci-

ety including the persons with dis-ability. He said that providingequality of access to all peoplewhich they need and deserve wasthe challenge for government. “Onthis Int’l Day, let us recognize thatthe battles against poverty, diseaseand discrimination will not be wonwithout targeted laws, policies andprograms that empower this group,Ayaz said and added that let uspledge to keep the promise of thegoals alive in the community ofpersons with disabilities.

Govt committed to bright future for citizens

ISLAMABAD—Majority of theparents and teachers have wel-comed the decision of cancella-tion of Saturday holiday in theFDE run educational institutionsfor the timely covering of sylla-bus.

However, few of them arenot happy over the decision fear-ing the intense cold wave thiswinter and shortage of publictransport due to unavailability ofCompressed Natural Gas (CNG)for most of the days.

The decision to cancel Satur-day holiday at all schools andcolleges working under FederalDirectorate of Education (FDE)from December 7 was announcedby Ministry of Capital Adminis-

Saturday holiday cancellationto help students cover syllabus

tration and Development (CAD).Zahid Shah, Lecturer at F.G col-lege, said “It was easy for us towork five days weekly due toshortage of public transport dur-ing CNG suspension days. Andnow going to work on Saturdaytoo by paying high fares wouldcreate burden on us”.

However, he said, these allissues do not matter when itcomes to the betterment of stu-dents, he said. He suggested thatSaturday holiday must be can-celed for the other public depart-ments too so that the teachersmay not face any discrimination.

Another teacher at modelcollege, Fauzia Kiyani said thecancellation of Saturday holiday

would definitely leave good im-pact on the academic perfor-mance of students, helping themto cover the pending syllabus intime, revise and get good grades.She said the teachers have beenfacing problems to make the stu-dents cover their syllabus in timedue to unscheduled holidays inMoharram and other days andcancellation of the Saturdayholiday would help them in cov-ering the syllabus.

Shagufta, a mother said“Students have become used toof going for study five days aweek and the news of cancella-tion of Saturday holiday wasperhaps a shocking news for mychildren”.—APP

ISLAMABAD: A group photo of participants and resource persons of weeklong courseon “Pakistani Federalism and Decentralization” organized by Centre for CCE &UNDP.—PO photo by Sultan Bashir

Heavy machinery is being used to demolish the buildings affected in the Ashura incident in Rawalpindi.

06:10

01:30

03:45

07:00

Zohr

Brothers in Islam establishregular prayers and charity

IGP Islamabad Sikandar Hayat unveiling the plaque to inaugurate the Public Concilia-tory Committee at Aabpara Police Station.

December 5

LITERARY organizationJosh Abadi Foundation willorganize Josh NationalConference to mark 115thbirth anniversary of poetof revolution and youthJosh Malihabadi here onDecember 5 at PakistanAcademy of Letters (PAL).

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Director forUniversity of London Inter-national Programmes at Lon-don School of Economics,Dr. Keith Sharp along withhis team Ms. Racheal MaryGibson Liaison ManagerUniversity of London Inter-national Programmes at Lon-don School of Economicsand Political Science, Mr.Andrew David DamarcoConsultant InternationalFoundation Programme atUniversity of London visitedRoots College InternationalIVY Campus and DHA1

Campus Islamabad. CEO Ms.Khadija Mushtaq and theCampus Heads welcomed thedistinguished guests.

The visit was designed tobridge and develop strong tiesbetween the two partners LSEand Roots College Interna-tional IVY Campus. Over fourhundred students are cur-rently enrolled in the under-graduate programmes andwere present to attend the cer-emony and networking ses-sions. Concurrently, the An-nual Graduation Ceremony2013 was also held that waspresided over by Dr. KeithSharp.

A decade ago, Roots Un-dergraduate programme wasestablished under the dynamicleadership of Ms. KhadijaMushtaq to provide continu-ation of the British system ofeducation at the undergradu-ate level. The main objectiveof the establishment of thecollege was to provide highquality, internationally recog-nized undergraduate educa-tion opportunity to the stu-dents of the twin cities. To en-sure this continued excellence,she decided to launch the Uni-versity of London InternationalProgrammes through distantand flexible learning.

The main focus of this visit

was to explore, examine, stu-

dent and scholarship ex-

change opportunities for Pa-

kistani students in UK Univer-sities. In line with this objec-tive, a complete tour of theDHA campuses was arrangedwhere they had sessions withA-Levels students who alsodisplayed their schoolprojects. Orientation sessionswere held with perspectivestudents.

The team then proceededto the IVY Campus where an-other Networking session wasattended. This was followedby a grand graduation cer-emony and a Corporate Net-working dinner arranged as ajoint venture of both RootsIVY and LSE.

The Corporate Network-ing Dinner was attended byCEOs, Presidents, MDs andVmembers of the corporatecommunity who graced theauspicious occasion. Mr. HajiRafique Pardesi, Chairman Al-Ghurair Giga & Emaar Pakistanand Mr. Raja Amir Iqbal Execu-tive Member RCCI were theGuests of honour. Alumni Uni-versity of London, Interna-tional Programmes formergraduates of RCI, DHA/IVYwere also there to grace the oc-casion. Some of the prominentalumni belonging to presti-gious corporate organizationsincluding Khowla Shoaib Cor-

porate Project SpecialistTelenor Pakistan, Bilal KianiAlumni Ambassador for UOLin Pakistan currently workingas Team Leader BusinessDevelopment at Bank AlfalahLimited, Muneeba HaleemTax & Treasury Analyst inPhilip Morris InternationalKarachi, Annum Abbasi In-ternational Law Consultant& Research Associate at Re-search Society of Interna-tional Law and AmmaraKhalid Manager HR PakistanOil Fields were present espe-cially to be a part of this megaevent from all around theworld and share their views.

LSE visits Roots IVY International College

BBH still waitingfor its CT scan

machineRAWALPINDI—Health de-partment has failed in pur-chasing the CT scan machinefor Benazir Bhutto Hospital(BBH) for last 6 months,while patients are facing mis-erable conditions due to un-availability of machine.

Details said, Chief Min-ister (CM) had issued a for-mal directive in regard toprovide new CT scan ma-chine to BBH 6 months be-fore but, health departmenthas failed in purchasing themachine due to traditional filework. Sources said, HealthDepartment Punjab has sev-eral time sent the report toconcerned department forthe provision of machine butno sufficient answer has re-ceived from high officials yet.

BBH administration isforced to send the patientsof CT scan to District Head-quarter Hospital (DHQ),where only 1 machine is avail-able for tests. Patients andtheir family members havedemanded from CM Punjabto take notice of this issue tosolve the problem on emer-gency basis.—Online

Police net 18outlaws

RAWALPINDI—Rawalpindipolice have arrested 18 out-laws including a drunkard andseized 2840 grams charras, 208bottles of liquor, one pistol 30bore with six rounds and gasrefilling gadgets from the pos-session of arrested accused.

According to policespokesman, Rattaamral policeheld Organzaib on recovery of1120 grams charras. Waris Khanpolice arrested Sabir Khan andrecovered 455 grams charras.Nawab Khan was rounded upfor having 260 grams charras.Westridge police nettedMahmood Khan and seized125 grams charras. Naseerabadpolice apprehended Tanveerfor possessing 450 grams char-ras. Asif was held with 430grams charras. Rattaamral po-lice nabbed Organzaib Khan forhaving 200 bottles of liquor.Naseerabad police arrestedNoor Khan for carrying five li-quor bottles. Race Course Po-lice arrested Waqar and recov-ered three bottles of liquor.Cantt police sent behind thebars an accused namely Nasirwho was allegedly under theinfluence of alcohol.—APP

Course onfederalismconcludesSTAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—A five-dayCourse on Federalism andDecentralisation foracademia concluded herecalling for teaching ofcourses on political sciencecontemporaneous by inte-grating studies on recentconstitutional developmentsinto the curriculum.

The course is part ofUNDP’s project ‘Strengthen-ing Participatory Federalismand Decentralization’ aimedat providing support for theimplementation of the 18thAmendment by informing,facilitating, and optimizingthe process of transitionmanagement at federal, pro-vincial and grassroots levels.

It has been designed tobring together academics onsocial sciences from about 20universities of four provincesto integrate the conceptuallinkages of taught courseswith contemporary constitu-tional developments in Paki-stan.

The Course focussed onthe concepts, issues andpolicy options on federalismand decentralization in Paki-stan with suggested method-ology as how to embed theseconcepts in existing univer-sity courses or introduce newcourses on the subject at theirhost universities.

Taji Khokhar’sson escapes from

police custodyR AWA L P I N D I — F a r r u k hKhokhar, son of TajiKhokhar, an accused ofSabira Bibi murder case, es-caped from police custody onMonday after his supportersclashed with police.

According to Policesources, the accused namedFarrukh Khokhar wasbrought to a Rawalpindicourt for the hearing of theSabira Bibi murder case andmanaged to flee while he wasbeing taken back the AdialaJail. Police said that overtwo dozen armed men at-tacked the police convoyand fought with the policeand helped the accused runaway.

Sabira Bibi was mur-dered on August 17, 2012over a property dispute.

Sabira and her husbandRaja Yaqoob were presentat the disputed place inDhoke Gangal on that dayto give their statements tolocal commissioner whenImtiaz alias Taji Khokhar’sgunmen shot her.—INP

Azerbaijan-Pakistan YouthClub launched

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—The Azerbaijan-Pakistan Youth Club has beenlaunched In Islamabad. Speak-ing on the inaugural session theAmbassador of AzerbaijanDashgin Shikarov said the clubhas been established to furtheraugment the existing cordial andmutually beneficial relationshipbetween the two countries.

Addressing a gathering ofParliamentarians, Diplomats,Deans, Faculty members andstudents of the University onthe occasion, Ambassador ofAzerbaijan H.E. DashginShikarov said “Azerbaijan-Pakistan are two souls in onebody Pakistan and Azerbaijanenjoys deep-rooted relationsand our affability is based onthe common objectives oflove, peace, harmony andmutual understanding of eachother’s problems”.

The project, he maintained,has been initiated with the ex-pressed intent of creating abridge between Azerbaijan andPakistan, and bringing the twobrotherly nations close to eachother through dialogue andunderstanding.

STAFF REPORTER

RAWALPINDI—Owing to en-gagement of doctors andparamedical staff in anti den-gue campaign, 34 dispensa-ries of Tehsil Rawalpindistand closed virtually.

Among these dispensa-ries 10 are those which havebeen upgraded at the cost ofRs 10 million. 8 among these34 dispensaries stand in theconstituency of ChaudhryNisar Ali Khan interior min-ister.

Health DepartmentRawalpindi has engaged 16doctors and 100 paramedicalstaff of these municipal dis-pensaries in anti dengue cam-paign. These 34 dispensariesare located in Kall Garh, AmarPura, Rajba Park, Sarfraz road,Chaklala, Gangal, DhabanSyedan, Kori Khuda Bakhshand others.

A department under DrIqbal Haider is functioning inhealth departmentRawalpindi on permanentbasis to deal with the matters

related to dengue fever andother epidemics but the staffand doctors of dispensarieshave been deployed in antidengue drive instead of as-signing this campaign to thedepartment which has beencreated solely for this pur-pose.

The engagement of thedoctors and the staff of the34 dispensaries in the antidengue drive has led to clo-sure of these dispensariesadding to the miseries of thecitizens in the rural areas.

Engagement of doctors, staff in anti-denguecampaign leads to closure of dispensaries

NPF bans sale,purchaseof plots

ISLAMABAD—National Ac-countability Bureau (NAB)has imposed ban on sale andpurchase of National PoliceFoundation (NPF) plots un-der the orders of SupremeCourt (SC).

NPF on the other handhas started using tactics toundermine the ban orders. Asper documents availablewith a private TV channel ,NAB Rawalpindi has startedtaking action in the matter ofillegal allotment of plots byNPF and has summoned 156allottees to whom these plotswere allotted in defiance ofrules and regulations.

These allottees include45 former Inspector GeneralPolice, 13 former DIGs and 3former SPs. All of theseallottees have been directedto appear before NAB onDecember, 5 to record theirstatements.

On the other hand NPFhas sent a letter to NAB in-forming the latter that imple-mentation of court’s ordersfor stopping sale and pur-chase of its plots does not fallin its jurisdiction.—Online

RAWALPINDI—Twenty-onemore accused involved in thetragic incident of Raja Bazaartook place here on the occa-sion of Ashura, have been ar-rested.

According to Rawalpindipolice spokesman, so far to-tal 35 accused who were iden-tified earlier, have been sentbehind the bars including oneof the main accused namelyNadeem Shah alias ‘Demi’ resi-dent of Dhoke Syedan,Rawalpindi.

Other accused arrestedare; Aamir Abbas, son of HaqNawaz resident of KashmirLane, Rawalpindi, Syed Zia urRehman s/o Syed Abul Qasimr/o Dhoke SyedanRawalpindi, Ghulam Toqeer s/o Ghulam Bashir r/o RaceCourse, Rawalpindi, Asif Shahs/o Mulazam Hussain r/oMasrial Road Rawalpindi,

Syed Qalb-e-Abbas s/o SyedAbsar Hussain r/o TenchBhatta Rawalpindi, KhurramMukhtar s/o Ghulam Mukhtarr/o Kamalabad Rawalpindi,Syed Atif Hussain s/o SyedAfsar r/o MorgahRawalpindi, Syed FawadHussain s/o Syed Afsar r/oMorgah Rawalpindi, ZeeshanHaider r/o Tench BhattaRawalpindi, Imran Hussain s/o Abdul Rasheed r/o AzizabadRawalpindi, Mudasir Abbass/o Matloob Hussain r/oAzizabad Rawalpindi, FayzanAli s/o Muhammad Iqbal r/oWestridge Rawalpindi, MalikMazhar Hussain s/o AbdulRehman r/o Muslim TownRawalpindi, Mohsin Ali s/oAmjad Ali r/o Tench BhattaRawalpindi, Malik QamarAbbas s/o Muhammad Sadiqr/o Muslim Town Rawalpindi,Junaid and Afzal Haider.

The spokesman informedthat three cops, namelyShafqat Hussain Shah andAmjad Ali Shah, constablesIslamabad police and one,Fayyaz Shah constableRawalpindi police, who werealso involved in the incidenthave also been netted.

Adil Shahzad, NasirHussain Shah, Syed Afraz Ali,Farzand Ali Bangush, SyedMuhammad Arham Raza aliasYaman Shah, Tayyab Shakeel,Syed Asad Ali Shah, SyedHussain Kazmi, WaqarHussain, Syed Yasir AbbasKazmi, Ishtiaq Hussain and aconstable Shamimul Hassan,who was dismissed from ser-vice and others were arrestedearalier. He informed policeraiding teams are trying hardto make arrests of remainingaccused who have been iden-tified.—APP

21 more accused in RajaBazaar tragedy case arrested

ISLAMABAD—Residents of thetwin cities of Rawalpindi andIslamabad are using unsafewater, contaminated with totalcoliforms, nitrate, and total dis-solved solids.

According to PakistanCouncil of Research in WaterResources (PCRWR), only 59per cent water samples in theFederal Capital and its ruralareas were found unsafe fordrinking.

Some 150 water sampleswere collected from 20 per centvillages of all union councilsand analyzed which revealedthat 40 per cent samples werecontaminated with totalcoliforms, 33 per cent with ni-trate, and 11 per cent sampleshad higher level of total dis-solved solids (TDS) whencompared with Pakistan Stan-dards and Quality ControlAuthority (PSQCA) stan-

dards.In Rawalpindi, 1,125 water

samples from 20 per cent vil-lages of all the union councilswere collected and analyzed,which showed that 73 per centwater samples were contami-nated with total coliforms, 29per cent with nitrate and TDS15 per cent beyond the PSQCAwater quality standards.

According to data avail-able, 83 per cent watersamples were found unsafeand remaining 17 per cent oflocations were supplying safewater for drinking purposesin the rural areas ofRawalpindi district.

The global water shortageof affordable and safe drink-ing water is manifested in Pa-kistan with an estimated 44 percent of the population withoutaccess to safe drinking water.PCRWR sources told APP that

90 per cent of the populationin rural areas lacked access tosafe drinking water.

While indicating the inten-sity of the problem, the sourcessaid about 200,000 children inPakistan died every year of di-arrhoea diseases alone.

Pakistan was a water richcountry just a few decadesago, however, a recent WorldBank report stated that it wasnow among 17 countries,which were currently facingwater shortage. With decreaseof quantity, the quality of wa-ter is also deteriorating badlyby municipal, industrial andagriculture wastes.

The PCRWR sources saidthe government was fullyaware of the needs of rural ar-eas, that constituted about 67per cent of population, whereliving condition was belowstandards.—APP

Residents of twin citiesusing contaminated water

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Mr. MuhammadAli Gardezi, Secretary Aviationalongwith Air Marshal (Retd)Muhammad Yousaf, DirectorGeneral CAA visited NewBenazir Bhutto InternationalAirport project (NBBIA) to re-view progress of on-goingworks.

A comprehensive brief-

ing was given, followed bya detailed site visit to thePassenger Terminal Build-ing being constructed byM/s China State-FWO(JV).

During the progress re-view it was noted by the Sec-retary Aviation that M/sLouis Berger Group (LBG)Project Management Con-sultant were responsible for

cost overrun/delays in execu-tion of project due to poorquality of services.

As they have alreadybeen served with termina-t ion notice, any balancepayment due to the con-sultant may also be ad-justed against probablelosses suffered by PakistanCivil Aviat ion Authori tydue to them.

DG CAA reviews progressof on-going NBBIA project

ATHAR PARVAIZ

A vast and picturesquemeadow called Tosamaidan,about 112 km west of Jammuand Kashmir’s capitalSrinagar, has now become therallying point for hundreds ofvillagers who want the artilleryexercises being carried outthere by the Indian Army tostop.

For, the unexploded shellsof Tosamaidan have been tear-ing their lives apart. Reshma,a villager, lost her 19-year-oldson Bilal Ahmad in 1997 to anunexploded shell while he wasplaying around the meadow.“As a mother, I don’t want tosee children getting killed inlike this,” Reshma told IPS.

In 1964, the meadow spreadover 375 acres had been takenon lease by the Indian Armyfrom the state government for 50years. Now that the lease periodis coming to an end in April nextyear, the residents of more than30 villages around Tosamaidanhave started a massive campaignagainst its renewal.3

They say the shells have re-sulted in heavy casualties andmaimed hundreds of people, be-sides killing livestock and hit-ting the picturesque area’s tour-ism potential.

“We don’t want our childrento suffer like us,” said FatimaBegam of Khag village who hasthree children.

“If our parents had said in1964 that the army should not

be allowed to carry out militaryexercises in the vicinity of ourvillages, we would not have suf-fered,” Begam told IPS outsideher home.

Picturesque Kashmir valleyhas for decades been at the heartof a bloody conflict between In-dia and Pakistan. At least 60,000people have lost their lives sincean insurgency broke out in 1989,with the fighters demanding‘freedom’ for Kashmir. The re-gion has seen heavymobilisation of troops by theIndian government.

Now the army has ap-proached the Kashmir govern-ment for a fresh lease forTosamaidan for another 20years.

Lt Col. N. N. Joshi, army

spokesperson in Srinagar, toldIPS: “I can’t comment on thisbeyond the fact that the issue oflease extension is currently be-ing deliberated upon.”

But the residents of Khag,Beerwah, Arzal and many othervillages are bitterly opposed toan extension.

An inquiry by a Kashmirilawmaker in the state assemblyin August this year revealed thatmany shells left behind duringarmy exercises have acciden-tally exploded, killing 63 peopleover the years. The statisticswere provided by Chief Minis-ter Omar Abdullah.

Ever since, the villagerswho had been demanding an endto the military exercises aroundtheir homes have garnered the

support of human rights activ-ists as well as Kashmiri politi-cians.

Mehbooba Mufti, presidentof the Peoples Democratic Party(PDP), has demanded that in-stead of military exercises, theidyllic beauty of Tosamaidanshould be used as a tourist des-tination. “You can’t ignore thepleas of thousands of villagerswho have been suffering onmany fronts because of thesemilitary exercises,” Mufti toldIPS.

Members of her rival politi-cal party, the ruling NationalConference party, also agree thatthe lease should not be extendedfor the army.

The Kashmir governmenthas constituted a high-level

Unexploded shells tearing lives apartcommittee to give its report tothe state government. But manyfeel the government should denyan extension at the current sitedue to the ground realities.

“Both on principle and le-gally, the government hasenough reason (to say no). Be-sides, a democratically electedgovernment should always con-sider the genuine demands of itspeople,” a widely circulatedUrdu daily, Kashmir Uzma,wrote in its editorial on Nov. 12.

Villagers say artillery exer-cises also hit their livelihoods.

“These artillery exerciseshamper agricultural and live-stock related activities apartfrom spoiling all chances of de-veloping the area as a touristdestination,” said Arjumand

Talib who has extensively writ-ten on conflict and economy inKashmir.

Akhtar Hussain, another vil-lager of Khag, said that devel-opmental activities had becomevirtually impossible. “A fewyears back, the army disallowedthe construction of the road inthe area on the plea that it wouldgive villagers easy access to thearmy camp,” Hussain told IPS.

Villagers say not only dothey stumble upon unexplodedshells in the upper areas whilegrazing their livestock, butshells also roll down to lowerareas when torrential rains comein summer. In May this year, amajor tragedy was averted whena villager informed a social ac-tivist about an unexploded shell

in a nearby stream.“One of our villagers, Bashir

Ahmed, telephoned me saying hehad found a suspicious item nearthe stream. I informed the policeright away and got the shell ex-ploded safely,” Raja Muzaffar, asocial activist, told IPS. “Butunfortunately this does not al-ways happen. Most often peoplestumble upon these shells andstart tampering with them or stepon them accidentally.”

Raja and other social activ-ists have filed a petition beforethe State Human Rights Com-mission (SHRC). “We arequite hopeful that the SHRCwill give clear directions to thestate government about notleasing out the land any fur-ther,” Raja told IPS.

ISLAMABAD—The veteranHurriyet leader, Syed AliGeelani has said that theNarendara Modi’s nomination asBJP’s prime ministerial candi-date is a blot on India’s secularand democratic credentials.

Addressing a massive rallyin Kulgam, Syed Ali Geelanidescribed Modi as a “killer ofhumanity, whose hands aresoaked with the blood of thou-sands of innocent Muslims.“Whatever happened in Gujaratduring the 2002 anti-Muslim ri-ots happened under the patron-age of Modi.”

Geelani said that the BJPleader’s visit to Jammu andKashmir posed a threat to theterritory’s peace. “This men-tally-sick person is trying to sowthe seeds of communal hatred inJammu and Kashmir,” he said.

Referring to a recent orderby a Delhi court about SyedSalah-uddin, Geelani said theHizbul Mujahideen chief wasfighting for a just cause and therewas no justification for the courtto “brand a freedom fighter as aproclaimed offender.”

Reiterating the call for boy-cott of the upcoming Assemblyelections, Syed Ali Geelani saidthat attempts were being madeby some elements to lure peopleinto polls by portraying somepro-India parties as some kindof lesser evil. “The fact is thatall pro-India parties are equallyresponsible for lending supportto the Indian occupation,” hesaid.

“They have barteredKashmir’s natural resourcesfor the lust of power. This isthe reasons that people of

Kashmir have been pushedinto perpetual darkness. Ourwater resources are being usedto generate electricity and thesame is being sold to differentstates while the people ofKashmir have been left to bearthe brunt,” he added. “What-ever the reasons, when peoplecast votes it is detrimental forthe cause of freedom and onlyhelps India to sell the so-calledelections as collective ap-proval of Kashmiris to its oc-cupation of Kashmir,” he said.

Blaming the pro-India par-ties for bartering the resourcesof Kashmir for occupying seatsof power, the veteran leader saidthese parties have pushed Kash-mir into medieval ages.

Affirming that the people ofKashmir will not accept any so-lution other than complete free-

dom, he said their political as-pirations have to be respected.

“Let me assure my non-Muslim brethren that after weget independence, their livesand properties will remain safeand secure. I appeal them tosupport the Kashmir’s freedommovement and I assure themthat their rights would be safe-guarded after independence.We will fail every attemptwhich is aimed to divide Kash-mir on regional, religious orcultural basis.”

“My rallies are aimed to makethe international communityaware that India is continuing itsoccupation in Jammu and Kash-mir forcibly. It is also to makeclear to the world that Kashmir isnot an integral part of India but adisputed territory, which is yet tobe resolved.”—APP

Modi’s nomination as PMby BJP blot on

Indian democracy: Geelani

Tehran to pushfor Kashmir’s

resolution,hopes Abbas

ISLAMABAD—Senior APHCleader Maulana Abbas Ansarihas hoped Iran reaching anuclear deal with the UnitedStates and six major world pow-ers, will push for the resolutionof Kashmir issue at an interna-tional level.

Maulana Abbas Ansari in ain a media interview said that thedeal had paved the way for Iranto push for Kashmir’s resolutionwith other world powers.

“Now, Iran would be able topress for the resolution of long-pending Kashmir issue withWashington and other powers.”

Ansari said there was a solidthread, which connected Iran,Pakistan, Palestine and Kashmirtogether. —APP

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Speakers in aninternational conference heldhere Sunday supportedKashmiris’ right to self-deter-mination and appealed the in-ternational community to askIndia to stop human rights vio-lations in Kashmir.

The conference titled ‘Kash-mir, the lynchpin of peace inSouth Asia,’ which was orga-nized by the Kashmir WomenForum in collaboration with In-ternational Muslim WomenUnion was attended by represen-tatives of different women orga-nizations from 21 countries.

Besides, ‘Azad Kashmir’senior minister ChaudharyMohammad Yasin, Hurriyatleaders and scholars of Kashmirwhich included MohammadFarooq Rehmani, MehmoodAhmad Saghar, Shaikh TajamulIslam, Prof Nazir Ahmad Shawl,Hassanul Bana, Rafiq AhmadDar, Salim Haroon, ManzoorulHaq Bhat, Nisar Ahmad Mirza,Abdullah Geelani, MohammadShafi Dar, Shoiab Shah and RajaMohammad Ayoub attended theconference which was held atthe Kashmir House.

The speakers includedchairperson of InternationalMuslim Women Union, DrKausar Firdous, Rufidya fromSyria, Aifat, a popular leaderfrom Palestine, Dr Nabila fromIndonesia, Mansia from Rus-

sian Federation, Rahila Qazi,and the chairperson of KashmirWomen Forum, ShamimShawl.

The speakers while appeal-ing to the international commu-nity to take cognisance of worstsituation of Kashmir perpe-trated by Indian troops in oc-cupied Kashmir assured the or-dinance that they will givevoice to the suffering in theirrespect countries and supportthe on going just freedomstruggle.

Chief guest ChaudharyMuhammad Yasin in his speechsaid, “The cry for peace in Kash-mir is going all over the world,but Kashmiris require a peacebased on justice. The people ofJammu and Kashmir have al-ways welcomed efforts directedtowards this goal. We believe inthe process of grand reconcilia-tion based on stark ground re-alities. In this context a sustaineddialogue between Pakistan andIndia augurs well but what webelieve is that this dialogue willbecome meaningful and resultoriented by the participation ofthe basic stakeholders that is thepeople of Jammu and Kashmir.In order to discover a way for-ward it is imperative that the in-ternational community shouldfacilitate this process.”

Declaration of Kashmirconference “This conferenceexpresses its solidarity with theKashmir freedom struggle and

the people of occupied Jammuand Kashmir. We assure youthat the women of the worldwill join your genuine voice forright to self-determination. Weappeal the international com-munity to ask India to stop allthe human rights violations tak-ing place with impunity in oc-cupied Kashmir, atrocitiesagainst women should bebrought to an end and the per-petrators should be brought tojustice.

“Black laws like PublicSafety Act and Armed ForcesSpecial Powers Act should berevoked and all fundamentalfreedoms should be restored.

“The international commu-nity should take up the issue ofmass graves in international foraand this crime against humanityshould be investigated by a UNSpecial representative. The po-litical leadership in occupiedKashmir should be provided ademocratic political space andall detenues should be released.

“This conference hopes thatinternational community willfacilitate a dialogue betweenPakistan, India and the peopleof Kashmir so that the peopleof Jammu and Kashmir exer-cise their right to self determi-nation a per UN resolutions.

“We declare with one voicethat Kashmir is the lynchpin ofpeace and by addressing thisdispute a durable peace will beestablished in South Asia.”

Int’l moot upholds right toself-determination for Kashmiris

SRINAGAR—Clerics, scholars,senior citizens and noted Islamicjurisprudents have discussedvarious issues including theproblems faced by Kashmir’shalf widows.

Ehsaas, a civil society ini-tiative, organized congregationin a local hotel in Srinagar onthe problems faced by the af-fected lot of the decades old con-flict in the light of Islamic juris-prudence.

Besides Ulemas and Muftisof various schools of thoughtintellectuals including Womensocial activists also participatedin the congregation and madevaluable interventions. Promi-nent religious scholar and presi-dent of Anjuman-e- HimayatulIslam Moulana Showket

Ulema, scholars discuss issuesfaced by Kashmir’s half widows

Hussain Keng presided over theseminar.

Mufti Mohammad IshaqNazki from Darul UloomRaheemiya Bandipora,Mujahid Shabir Ahmed Falahifrom Jamat-e- Islami, MoulanaM S Rehman Shams represent-ing Mirwaiz Dr MoulviMohammed Umar Farooq,Mulana Manzoor Ahmed fromKarwani Islami, MoulanaHakeem Sajjad Hussain fromAhlul Bait Foundation,Moulana Shafat AhmedFarooqi from Jmai’at Ahl-e-Hadees Jammu & Kashmir, re-nowned scholar and academicProf G M Madhosh, RifatAndrabi, Fahmeeda Shah andothers participated in the delib-erations.

The issue was deliberatedupon in detail and many of itsaspects were debated with all itscomplexities. Participants pro-vided perspectives on the basisof ‘Shariya Law’ regarding dis-appeared husband and his prop-erty.

Some participants presentedwritten papers on the issue.Parveena Ahenger includingmany other victims were alsopresent on the occasion and ap-prised the gathering of variousproblems that affected womenare facing in the society.

In statement issued here, itsaid that it was unanimouslydecided to meet again on De-cember, 24 2013 and find solu-tions to these problems as perIslamic jurisprudence.—NNI

SRINAGAR—Seeking cancella-tion of admissions of taintedcandidates who allegedly boughtpapers to qualify CET 2012,hundreds of undergraduate stu-dents from Government Medi-cal College Srinagar hit tostreets.

The agitated male and fe-male students set the sketch offormer BOPEE ChairmanMushtaq Peer on fire and de-manded that in order to restorethe pride and glory of the Col-lege, tainted students should beexpelled without any delay.

According to reports, hun-dreds of students gathered in theGMC premises and raised slo-gans against former BOPEEchairman Mushtaq Ahmed Peer,main accused in the paper-sell-

BOPEE Scam: GMC students boycottclass work, stage protest against Peer

ing scam. The students marchedpeacefully towards Karan Nagarwhere police stopped them. Thestudents returned back to thecollege premises amid anti-scamand anti-Mushtaq Peer slogans.

The protesting studentswere carrying the banners andplacards depicting the sloganslike, ‘Restore Pride, Expel Cul-prits’ ‘Kick The Backdoors Out’‘Hang Mushtaq Peer’.

President of UndergraduateStudents Union, Faizan Yunus,said the protest of studentswould continue until govern-ment initiates action against theguilty. ‘Our reputation is atstake. We all are being lookedas suspects and therefore theguilty should be ousted from theCollege so that all other students

could breathe freely,” he saiddemanding that governmentshould make public the list ofcandidates who have made it tothe GMC through unfair meansand action should be initiatedagainst them to ensure that en-tire college doesn’t get a badname.

Meanwhile, scores ofJammu and Kashmir Doctorsfrom Safdar Jung and otherhospitals staged a twin protestat Jantar Mantar and 10Janpath outside the Officialresidence of UPA ChairpersonSonia Gandhi in New Delhiagainst the recently surfacedBOPEE CET paper leak andselling scam.

Holding Chief MinisterOmar Abdullah directly respon-sible for the BOPEE Scam thedoctors demanded his immedi-ate removal and harsh punish-ment for former BOPEE chair-man Mushtaq Ahmed Peer.

The Doctors alleged thatextension was granted to Peerwith the consent of Chief Min-ister Omar Abdullah. The J&Kdoctors presently working in dif-ferent hospitals of New Delhiincluding Safdar Jung, MetroHeart and Hindu Rao Hospitalsstaged a peaceful sit-in in frontof Sonia Gandhi’s 10 Janpathresidence.

They were carrying plac-ards and banners seeking pun-ishment for the guilty involvedin CET scam and immediateremoval of Chief MinisterOmar Abdullah.

The doctors also staged apeaceful protest at Jantar Mantardescribing BOPEE fraud ashame for the Jammu and Kash-mir government.—NNI

Newly builddesigns of buildingviolation of heritage

norms: ExpertsSRINAGAR—With the boom inmodern construction acrossSrinagar city, the experts saidthat the newly build designs ofthe buildings have come up ingross violation of heritage normsrecommended by the Jammuand Kashmir Heritage Conser-vation and Preservation (HCPA)Act 2010.

Experts accuse that the “un-caring approach” of the stategovernment in implementingthis Act has failed to saveKashmir’s 5000 years old heri-tage as construction of modernbuildings was increasingly onrise in the Kashmir valley es-pecially summer capital ofstate.

Convener, Kashmir chapterof Indian National Trust for Artand Cultural Heritage(INTACH) Muhammad SaleemBaigh told Rising Kashmir thatthe authorities were not conserv-ing the heritage sites of the val-ley as nobody pays attention to-wards the growing trend of mak-ing buildings and malls in mod-ern design against heritage richSrinagar.

“The architecture of thenewly constructed buildings isnot faulty but it does not fit inthe indigenous tradition and con-struction system of the valley asper the act of conservation ofheritage,” Baigh said.

He said that the constructionof modern buildings in the statewas totally in conflict with thecharacter of the state and theHCPA.

“There are no efforts fromthe department of art and cul-ture, and other concerned depart-ments to look after such viola-tions prevailing in the state,” headded.—NNI

Father waitingfor missingson’s return

SRINAGAR—An old man, run-ning from pillar to post for thepast two years to locate his sonwho went missing from Jammu,is still waiting for his son’s re-turn.

The whereabouts of oneIshtiyaq Ahmad Shah ofSrinagar who went missing onMay 28, 2012 from Zabarwanhotel in Jammu is not knownsince then.

The father of the missingyouth Ghulam Ahmad Shahwhile talking to media men saidthat the Jammu police whodidn’t show any interest in trac-ing his son had closed the inves-tigation process on May 1, 2013.He appealed to the authorities toput efforts to trace his son on hu-manitarian grounds.—KMS

Muzaffarabad: Minister of Electricity Raja Faisal Rathore addressing a gathering.

Police officer killed,2 cops injuredin IHK attack

SRINAGAR—A Station HouseOfficer (SHO) was killed andtwo policemen were injured inan attack in Budgam district.

The attackers fired upon thepolice officer from point blankrange outside Chadoora PoliceStation killing him on the spot andinjured two cops and a civilian.

The injured were rushed toSrinagar for treatment, officialssaid.—KMS

A child shouts slogans during a protest in Srinagar.

Muzaffarabad: AJK Minister of Forests and Wildlife Sardar Javed Ayub in conversationwith Minister for Structures Chaudhary Muhammad Rasheed.

KARACHI—Follow-ing were the bullionrates in major citiesyesterday.

KARACHI:

MULTAN:

Currency Selling Buying

Bullion Rates

RS PER 10 GRAMS

Gold Tezab 48,642.00Silver Tezabi 810.00

Gold Tezabi (24-Ct)48000.00Gold 22 Ct 43890.00SilverTezabi 830.00Silver Thobi 800.00

USA 107.90 107.70

UK 174.29 173.96

Euro 146.00 145.73

Canada 102.43 102.24

Switzerland 118.43 118.21

Australia 99.18 98.99

Sweden 16.43 16.40

Japan 1.0632 1.0612

Norway 17.70 17.67

Singapore 86.25 85.09

Denmark 19.57 19.54

Saudi Arabia 28.77 28.72

Hong Kong 13.92 13.89

Kuwait 381.14 380.44

Malaysia 33.51 33.45

Newzealand 88.93 88.76

Qatar 29.38 29.58

UAE 29.38 29.32

KR. WON 0.1018 0.1016

Thailand 3.369 3.363

STAFF REPORTER

KA R A C H I—Al BarakaBank, an emerging Islamic

Bank in Pakistan has an-nounced the launch ofUnionPay debit cards withEuronet Pakistan as itstechnological partner. Un-

der this arrangement,Euronet will be providingcomplete outsourced ser-vices to the bank for its Elec-

tronic Financial Transac-tion Services which in-cludes Debit Card Process-ing and Management, ATM

Driving & Monitoring

and UnionPay InternationalGateway Services. By utiliz-ing Euronet’s state-of- the artand PCI DSS compliant facil-

ity, Al Baraka is also addinga wide range of new transac-tion sets on its channelssuch as Utility Bill Paymentsfor additional companies, In-

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—The All PakistanCNG Association (APCNGA)on Monday lauded the PrimeMinister Nawaz Sharif for an-nouncing a comprehensivepackage to revive drying in-vestments and boost confi-dence of the downheartedbusiness community. All theproblems being faced by Paki-stan have something to dowith the prevailing economicsituation which cannot be ad-dressed unless the businesscommunity feel safe and en-couraged, said GhiyasAbdullah Paracha, ChairmanSupreme Council APCNGA.

In a statement issued heretoday, he said that the incen-tive package intended to en-courage investment in thecountry was need of the hourif we are to solve the increas-ing problems. We fully sup-port the PM’s package whichwill accelerate economicgrowth, reduce unemploy-ment and benefit masses, headded. Ghiyas Paracha saidthat the business-friendlygovernment should also an-nounce incentives for CNGsector providing employmentto millions and benefittingmajority of population by pro-

vision of affordable fuel. Hesaid that almost four millionvehicles are using CNG mak-ing Pakistan world numberone country but the incompe-tence of the former govern-ment has pushed this indus-try to the brink.

He added that oil importbill is the main contributor tothe high inflation which canbe reduced by promotingCNG which will benefit wholepopulation of Pakistan.Paracha said that high inter-est rate is chocking growthwhile increasing unemploy-ment is triggering povertyforcing people to compromiseon education and healthwhich in turn is supportingmilitancy, and extremism. Ha-rassment by officials, bureau-cratic procedures, taxation is-sues and bhatta culture aresome issues that need urgentattention to rebuild the confi-dence of the weary businesscommunity, he said.

The leader of the CNGsector said that governmenthas realised that standard ofliving of majority will con-tinue to deteriorate unlessbusiness community is al-lowed to work with peace ofmind which is beginning ofthe change.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—The Competi-tion Commission of Pakistan(CCP) while conducting ahearing in the matter of showcause notice issued to M/sShangrila (Private) Limited forprima facie violation of Sec-tion 10 of Competition Act thatdeals with deceptive market-ing practices, accepted theircommitments and disposed ofthe matter. The matter washeard by a three memberbench comprising of Dr. Jo-seph Wilson, Chairman, Mr.Mueen Batlay, Member andDr. Shehzad Ansar, Member.

The representative ofNational Foods argued thatin terms of clear findings ofthe enquiry report and theRetail Audit Survey con-ducted by A.C. Neilson, Na-tional Food had major mar-ket share while the marketshare of Shangrila was quitelow. It was also submittedthat even the Brands Foun-dation has not allowedShangrila to use ‘No. 1’tagline. On the other hand theCounsel appearing on behalfof the Shangrila filed Com-

mitment under Regulation 30of the Competition Commis-sion (General Enforcement)Regulations, 2007 that themarketing campaign underquestion had already beendiscontinued and they willensure compliance with theCompetition Act and the di-rections of the CCP in thematter thereof.

Based on the aforesaidcommitment and the forth-coming approach ofShangrila, the CCP’s benchdisposed of the matter whileaccepting the commitmentsfiled by Shangrila ensuringcompliance thereof and alsodirecting to file compliancereport that none of marketingmaterial contains deceptiveclaim i.e. Pakistan’s No. 1 usedin the marketing campaign inquestion. Consumer protec-tion is a key area of Competi-tion Law Enforcement andCCP’s Office of Fair Trade(OFT) has been establishedto further the Commission’sobjective of creating a busi-ness environment based onhealthy competition and pro-tecting consumers from anticompetitive practices.

SALIM AHMED

LAHORE—The second Peas-ants’ Convention sponsoredby the Human rights Com-mission of Pakistan (HRCP)has called for removal of allobstacles to land reforms,adoption of appropriate lawsto protect the rights of farmlabour, and preparation of afive-year plan for solvingagriculture sector’s prob-lems. The state of agricultureand the various difficultiesfaced by peasants and land-less tenants were analysedby peasant organizations andpeasants’ friends in the hu-man rights movement fromthe four provinces at HRCP’ssecond peasant’s Conven-tion at Multan the other day.The participants endorsed

the recommendations of lastyear’s convention and rede-fined their demands/targets.

They also adopted a 10-point Multan Declaration list-ing their priority tasks for2014. The peasant demandsadopted at the convention areas follows: The state mustadopt a five-year plan for theuplift of the agriculture sec-tor and the people dependenton it; Land reforms should beenforced forthwith.

All obstacles to thisobjective must be speedilyremoved because without ajust redistribution of landneither the state can makeeconomic progress nor canthe people be guaranteedtheir right to food security;Land ownership ceilingshould be fixed per family

and all surplus land distrib-uted among cultivators.

While doing so womenand men should be allowedequality of entitlement.Women-headed familiesshould also be given landwithout any discrimination;All moves to encourage cor-porate farming must be aban-doned; The practice of allot-ting state land to landlordsshould be given up. Thecommunity lands, grazingfields and state-owned farmsin Sindh occupied by land-lords should be recoveredfrom them and allotted to cul-tivators; The peasants whohave been cultivating stateland for a long time in Okara,Khanewal, Cholistan andThal area must be given pro-prietary rights forthwith.

SALIM AHMED

LAHORE—The World BankLead Economist on Mondaygave a clearly defined frame-work to overcome the chal-lenge of competitiveness in theprovince of Punjab and calledfor a time bound action plan toincrease its export worthiness.Mr. Vincent Palmade, LeadEconomist, Private & FinancialSector Development, SouthAfrica Region, World Bankwas talking to LCCI PresidentEngineer Sohail Lashari hereat the Lahore Chamber of Com-merce & Industry.

Senior Vice PresidentMian Tariq Misbah, formerPresident Mian Anjum Nisar,Chairman Contractor andBuilders Association AkbarSheikh, Executive CommitteeMembers Ibrar Ahmad,Mudassar MasoodChaudhry and former ECMember Rehmatullah Javedalso spoke on the occasion.The World Bank Economistsaid that implementation of aset of integrated services

could help achieve the re-quired level of competitive-

ness needed to win greaterportion of world market. Iden-tifying the key factors for theimplementation of an action

plan, he said that there was aneed to sustained commit-

ment from the very top withdedicated world class team atevery tier either it is privatesector or the public sector.

ter Bank Funds Transfers fa-cility, Internet Banking inter-face etc. UnionPay Interna-tional – a subsidiary ofUnionPay has an acceptancenetwork in more than 140countries and regions, pro-viding payment services tothe world’s largestcardholders group. This is amajor step for the bank to-wards internationalism.

“Euronet’s outsourcedmodel was a perfect fit forour business requirement oflaunching UnionPaycards”, said Farah Naz,Head of Strategic Planning& Marketing, Al Baraka.“It’s cost effective with thequickest time to marketwhich is our top most prior-ity for any initiative.Euronet keeps up with thetechnological and regula-tory requirements which willenable us to focus on ourcore banking business. Webelieve this partnershipwith Euronet and UPI willhelp us grow and add moreadvance, valuable and rev-enue generating servicesquickly and cost effec-tively.”

Al Baraka Bank launches UnionPaycards in collaboration with Euronet

APCNGA lauds PMeconomic package

Time bound action plan to increaseexport worthyness of Punjab

Show cause notice issuedto Shangrila disposed off

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Taiwan ExternalTrade Development Counciland Taiwan Bureau of ForeignTrade have shown their incli-nation to conduct market sur-veys in Pakistan to tap bilat-eral trade and investment po-tentials. This was revealed bythe LCCI President EngineerSohail Lashari on his returnfrom four-day visit to Taiwanas head of a ten-member del-egation. The other members ofthe delegation were: LCCI Ex-ecutive Committee MembersKhawaja Khawar Rashid,Abrar Ahmad, former Execu-tive Committee MembersNabila Intisar, Margoob ShakirIzhar and Awais Saeed Piracha.

The LCCI President saidthat a two member team of TaipeiEconomic and Cultural Center

(TECC) comprising TECC Eco-nomic Counselor Dr Guann-JyhLee would visit Pakistan lateDecember this year to have firsthand knowledge about tradeand investment opportunities.Engineer Sohail Lashari saidthat Executive Vice PresidentTaiwan External Trade Devel-opment Council Simon Wangassured his full support to theLahore Chamber of Commerceand Industry to expedite dis-semination of trade-related in-formation.

David HSU, Deputy Direc-tor General, Bureau of ForeignTrade, Ministry of EconomicAffairs, had promised to sendhis officials deputed in Indianforeign mission to Pakistan toconduct market survey forTaiwanese businessmen, theLCCI President added. TheLCCI President said that the

Deputy Director General, Bu-reau of Foreign Trade had alsoinvited Pakistani business-men to enhance interactionwith their Taiwani counter-parts to learn more about theirstrengths in various eco-nomic sectors and ways toenter into Taiwani market.

Engineer Sohail Lasharisaid that the very objectiveof signing Memorandum ofUnderstanding (MOU) withTaiwan External Trade Devel-opment Council (TAITRA)was to step up B2B partner-ship between the two coun-tries. He said that the LCCIand TAITRA would initiatejoint working for strengthen-ing the private sectors intheir respective countries.Exchange trade delegationsand expeditious exchange ofmarket.

Taiwan interested intapping economic potential

Land reforms must forprogress, says Kisan convention

LSE loses0.88 points

LAHORE—Lahore Stock Ex-change here Monday wit-nessed bearsh trend by los-ing 0.88 points, as the LSEIndex-25 opened with 4681.26points and closed at 4680.38points. The market’s overallsituation, however, corre-sponded to an upward trendas it remained at 1.850 millionshares to close against previ-ous turnover of 1.100 millionshares, showing an upwardmove of 750,100 shares.While, out of the total active96 scrips 34 moved up, 9 shedvalues and 53 remained equal.

The Major Gainers of theday were Mari PetroleumCompany, Pakistan State OilCompany Limited and TreetCorporation Limited by re-cording increase in their pershare value by Rs 7.97, Rs5.16 and Rs 4.52 respectively.Adamjee Insurance Com-pany, D.G.Khan CementCompany and Silk Bank Lim-ited (Saudi) lost their pershare value by Rs 1.74, Rs1.25 and Re 0.94 respectively.

Top three Volume Lead-ers of the day included SuiNorthern Gas Pipeline Lim-ited with 403,000 shares,Lafarge Pakistan Cementwith 326,000 shares.—APP

CPI up by 10.9%during last monthISLAMABAD—The ConsumerPrice Index (CPI) based infla-tion increased by 10.9% dur-ing the month of November2013 as compared to samemonth of last year. Accord-ing the data of Pakistan Bu-reau of Statistics, on month-on-month basis, CPI in-creased by 1.3% in Novem-ber 2013 as compared to2.0% in the previous monthand a decrease of 0.4% inNovember 2012.

Core inflation measuredby non-food non-energy CPI(Core NFNE) increased by8.5% during previous month.Core NFNE inflation on monthon month basis increased by0.3% in November 2013 ascompared to 0.9% a monthearlier and 0.2% in November2012. According to PBS,Month on month basis, SPIincreased by 3.2% in Novem-ber 2013 as compared to a in-crease of 1.2% in October and0.01% in November 2012.

WPI inflation on year onyear basis increased by 10.4%in November 2013 as comparedwith 9.8% a month earlier and7.7% in November 2012. WPIinflation on month on monthbasis increased by 0.3% in No-vember 2013 as compared to anincrease of 1.1% a month ear-lier and a decrease of 0.4% inNovember 2012.—APPSafety regulations,

inspections vital toindustrial growth

SALIM AHMED

LAHORE—The governmenthas to make proper legisla-tion to avoid tragic incidentsof explosions and fire erup-tions at industrial & plantsites with a view to achievetarget of standard economicgrowth as poor regulationsreflect the utter collapse ofenforcement of plant safetystandards in the country.This was observed by thespeakers at a training work-shop on “Process and PlantSafety & Risk Based Inspec-tion” organized by TUV Aus-tria Bureau of Inspection &Certification, formerlyMoody International.

Mr. Reinhard Preiss, whois an expert in the field ofplant safety & Risk BasedInspections from TÜV Aus-tria Holding Vienna, sharedhis expertise and knowledgewith the participants of thefirst ever training on plantsafety and risk based inspec-tion in Pakistan. The partici-pant companies’ personals,who expressed their keen in-terest and enthusiasm intraining workshop, includedNational Refinery Ltd, AttockRefinery Ltd, United EnergyPakistan Ltd, Pak Arab Refin-ery Ltd, OMV Pakistan Ex-ploration & Production Inc,Shell Pakistan Ltd, Engro Fer-tilizers Ltd & Oil & Gas De-velopment Company Ltd andseveral other key companies.

Intel supportslaunch of

entrepreneurshipworking groupISLAMABAD—Intel sup-ported the National Entrepre-neurship Working Group(NEW-G) in organizing its in-augural seminar on impor-tance of building entrepre-neurship ecosystem in Paki-stan.

The seminar was held incollaboration with the UnitedStates Consul General,Karachi and Injaz Pakistanwith the support of Instituteof Business Administration(IBA), MITEFP (MIT Enter-prise Forum Pakistan),Gillette Pakistan and GlobalEntrepreneurship Week-Pa-kistan, an initiative of theKauffman Foundation.

The National Entrepre-neurship Working Group(NEW-G) was recentlyformed to serve as a na-tional, multi-stakeholder fo-rum for sharing ideas, infor-mation and knowledge tosupport the growth of entre-preneurship and innovationin Pakistan.

Speaking on the occa-sion, Naveed Siraj, CountryManager Intel said “Intel Pa-kistan has a proud record ofhelping women improvetheir lives and acceleratingtheir inclusion in nationaleconomic development. Weprovide ICT-based learningand skill-development plat-forms like Intel E-Basics &Intel Easy-Steps which openup a world of possibilities forwomen through knowledgetools which could help themto start their businesses.

Edible oilimports fallSTAFF REPORTER

IS L A M A B A D—Import ofedible oil in the country in-cluding soyabean andpalm, witnessed decreas-ing trend during first fourmonths of current finan-cial year as compared tosame period of last year.During the period fromJuly-October, this year,the import of soyabean oildecreased by 20.28 percent and reached at 29,701metric tons costing US$31.488 million. Accordingthe data of Pakistan Bu-reau of Statistics the im-port of soyabean was re-corded at 30,596 metrictons valuing US$ 39.49million in same period oflast year. During the pe-riod under review, palm oilimport decreased by 11.28per cent and reached at756,373 metric tons cost-ing US$ 615.130 millionwhich was recorded at662,130 metric tons worthUS$ 693.35 million in cor-responding period of lastyear.

However, the data rev-eled that on month onmonth basis, the import ofsoyabean oil and palm oilincreased by 128.22 per centand 43.16 per cent respec-tively. In month of October,2013 country spent US$ 5.2million to import 5,341 met-ric tons of soyabean oilwhich was recorded at 1,698metric tons of US$ 2.2 mil-lion during same month oflast year, it added. Mean-while, during last monthpalm oil import swelled by43.16 per cent and reachedat 192,258 metric tons cost-ing US$ 153.677 millionagainst the imports of106,087 worth US$ 107.344million of same period lastyear, the data reveled.

On the other hand,food group imports incountry during first fourmonths of current finan-cial year decreased by9.10 per cent as comparedto same period of last year.From July-October, 2013,food group importsreached at $ 1.38 billionwhich was recorded at$1.51 billion in same pe-riod of last year, said thedata of Pakistan Bureau ofStatistics. During the pe-riod under review, importsof edible oil includingsoyabean and palm oil de-creased by 20.28 per cent,11.28 per cent respec-tively.

During the period fromJuly-October, tea import inthe country decreased by20.01 per cent. About37,275 metric tons of teaimported worth US$87.60million imported to fulfilthe domestic require-ments as against 36,838metric tons valuing US$1.19 million imported insame period of last year.The other food commodi-ties which witnessed nega-tive growth in their im-ports during the periodreview included spices11.09 per cent and legumi-nous vegetables (pluses)by 33.40 per cent.

SALIM AHMED

LAHORE—A high level del-egation of an internationalChinese company, ShanghaiElectric Group, led by its VicePresidents Lv Yachen andCheng Yuan met Punjab ChiefMinister Muhammad ShahbazSharif here today and dis-cussed matters regarding co-operation in various energyprojects in Pakistan. Shang-hai Electric Group expressedinterest in investment inpower sector in Punjab. Wel-

coming the offer of invest-ment in energy sector, theChief Minister assured thatPunjab government wouldextend maximum cooperationto Shanghai Electric Groupand other investors.

Chairman UniversalMetal Corporation JapanHaseeb Rehman, ChairmanNishat Group MianMuhammad Mansha, Direc-tor Shanghai Electric ZhangXing, Assistant DirectorZhao Hui, General ManagerImran Khan, Additional Chief

Secretary Energy, Vice Chair-man Punjab InvestmentBoard and other concernedofficers were present on theoccasion. Welcoming thedelegation of Shanghai Elec-tric Group to Lahore, the ChiefMinister said that Pakistanand China are bound to-gether in strong ties offriendship and their eco-nomic relations are strength-ening. He said that China hasextended maximum help toPakistan in every hour ofneed.

Shanghai group showsinterest for investment

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—The 7th Paki-stan Microfinance countryforum concluded last weekat Ramada Hotel, Islamabadwith a joint agenda for em-powering the women in Pa-kistan. Khushhalibank thelargest Microfinance bankwas a joint sponsor of thisevent.

The topic for this year’sforum was “Striking a Balancebetween Poverty Reductionand Access to Finance” andcomprised two interactivesessions on ‘Poverty Reduc-tion – An Attainable Goal’ and‘Access to Finance – Tech-nology at Hand’, including apanel discussion on thetheme. Addressing the eventChief guest Dr. Prof AhsanIqbal Federal Minister forPlanning & Development andDeputy Chairman, PlanningCommission of Pakistan ap-plauded the efforts made bythe Microfinance sector ofPakistan in poverty allevia-

Khushhalibank supports womenempowerment through its vision

tion.He said, “Poverty in Paki-

stan in not very deep, it needs

meaningful intervention sothat it can generate growth

that is inclusive; microfinanceis not about doling out cashtransactions but developing

skills that can augment thepoorer segments of society.”

ISLAMABAD: Canadian High Commissioner in Pakistan, Greg Giokas giving away a cheque of Rs.100,000 tomember of Pakistan Cricket Association for the Physically Handicapped.

BAJAUR AGENCY: Commandant Bajaur Scouts Col Mir Amir Ali awarding winning trophy of Rahat Shaheed Cricket Tournament to the captainof winning team.

MULTAN: Players in action during practice match for the selection of Multan Boardteam for All Pakistan Boards Basketball Tournament.

HYDERABAD: Position holder players with their trophies during closing ceremony ofHyderabad Sprots Festival 2013 at Board Stadium.

KARACHI—Former captainShahid Afridi hit out at hisand team’s critics on Mon-day declared them Heckle,Jeckle and Mr Bean.

“Heckle, Jeckle, Mr Beanare commenting on the tele-visions channels like teamhave had not lost a matchduring their playing days,”he told reporters on arrivalfrom South Africa where Pa-kistan beat the host 2-1 forthe first time in ODI seriesand draw the T20 series 1-1.

Misbah-ul-Haq howevermissed the golden opportu-nity to make history makingclean-sweep against SouthAfrica by surprisingly rest-ing Shahid Afridi andMuhammad Hafeez in thirdODI in Centurion.

He was referring to com-ments of former skipper andace batsman MuhammadYousuf and speedsterShoaib Akhtar on the pri-vate TV Channel duringPakistan’s home series inUnited Arab Emirates and inSouth Africa.

Afridi hits out at criticsWithout naming anyone,

Afridi said he was fully awareof the past and discipline ofthese players.

He praised the outstand-ing performances of AnwarAli and Bilawal Bhatti ontheir debut in Cape Town.

However he said it wastoo early to match and com-pare Bilawal Bhatti comparedwith Razzaq and others.

He criticized the players

I S L A M A B A D — P a k i s t a nHockey Federation (PHF),Secretary, Rana Mujahidfeels the participation of na-tional team in Asian Gamesis in danger due to the on-going tussle between twoparallel Olympic Associa-tions saying the governmentmust step-in to resolve theissue.

The 17th Asian Gameswill be staged in Korea fromSeptember 19 to October 4,2014, and will involve 13,000athletes and officials from the45 NOCs in 36 sports.

Talking to a private newschannel, the newly electedPHF Secretary said after miss-ing the berth in the Common-wealth Games, the participa-tion of the Pakistan Hockeyteam, in the next year’s Asian

PHF appeals Govt to makehockey’s participation in

Asian Games possibleGames, is also in jeopardy.

Commenting on the situ-ation Rana Mujahid, whileputting the onus of the on-going tussle between twoparallel Olympic Associa-tions, appealed the Govern-ment to step-in. “The Gov-ernment provides PHF withNOC, funds etc hence wehave to follow their direc-tives. The PHF does not fa-vor a particular faction ofPQA, however wants to seethe resolution of this con-frontation”, Rana Mujahidsaid.

Rana said the govern-ment should intervene in thematter as the deadline to sub-mit the entry for the AsianGames is also approaching.Pakistan is the defendingchampion of the Asian

Games.The Pakistan Olympic

Association under Syed ArifHassan recognized by Inter-national Olympic Committee(IOC) is the only channelavailable for Pakistan to sendathletes at internationalevents.

On the other hand, thePOA led by Akram Sahiclaims to be country’s legiti-mate Olympic Association, inview of a court ruling whichput restriction on a third-termfor a POA office bearer.

“We have apprised theInter-provincial Coordina-tion Minister, Riaz HussainPirzada of the situation whohas assured the PHF ofplaying his part in resolv-ing the standoff”, Ranaadded.—APP

All Pakistanhockey from

Dec 6RAHIM YAR KHAN—An-nual 20th All Pakistan Sonacup hockey tournament willcommence here from Decem-ber 6 with the participationof 15 teams.

Organising secretary ofthe event Abdul SattarSindhu, while talking to APPhere on Monday, high-lighted that the tournamentis being regularly held in thedistrict for the last twentyyears.

PAF, Wapda, Gojra, KPKpolice, RYK, Steel Mills,Bahawalpur, Vehari,Okara,Hyderabad and PTV and oth-ers teams would contest forthe title whose final matchwould be played onDecemmber 13 in Sadiqabad.

“Chairman of the NAstanding committee forWapda,Sardar MohammadArshad Khan Leghariwould be chief guest at theinaugural match”, saidSindu.—APP

KARACHI—New emergingstar all-rounder Anwar Ali hassaid that he was looking toserve Pakistan cricket in a bigway after getting an instantsuccess in his debut One-dayer against South Africa atCape Town.

“It was great honor toachieve something in first ODIfor Pakistan. But I am settinghigher targets to serve Paki-stan cricket team for a long timeto come,” he told APP in anexclusive interview on Mon-day on his return fromJohannesburg after an encour-aging tour.

He said it was great mo-ment that he was the part ofPakistan team which won theirfirst One-Day Internationalseries against South Africa intheir home grounds in a quar-ter century. “It was great feel-ing and honour being part ofhistory-making team as webeat South Africans in front oftheir home conditions andcrowd,” 26-year-old Karachi-born Pathan, said, beamingly.

“I was bit nervous whentold half hour before the matchthat I was part of the team with

Deuces performshat-trick with win

in KC BridgeCongress

KARACHI—Team Deucescompleted unique hat-trickon Karachi Bridge Circuitwhen they won the KarachiClub Bridge Congress at KCAnnexe on Sunday evening.

Quite contrary to their ear-lier clean-wash win in theKarachi Gold Gold Cup, Deuceshad to work hard for thecompletion of hat-trick inKarachi Bridge circle. It wastheir third successive win, andfourth for Abdul Muqeet andAnwer Kizilbash. Deuces yetannexed another major title.When the last round began,Deuces faced GFQ and DataSteel faced another fanciedteam Giants.

It was quite a dramatic fin-ish, when only two boards re-mained to decide the fate, atthis stage, Deuces was win-ning by 0.15 Victory Points(VPs) with score for Deuces at76.75 as against 76.60 of DataSteel. But Deuces got a cleanswing on the last board whichraised their score to 83.70.

However Giants not al-lowed Data Steel by their ex-cellent defence to take anyundue advantage. FormerNational Champions DataSteel finished second with78.54 VPs in their kitty.

In this ordeal, Deuces wonfive out of six matches, fromGiants 13.45, Karachi Club17.08, Data Steel 17.56, AKB13.71 and finally GFQ 16.38 lostfourth round match to star-stud-ded Allana 6.03. Deuces com-prised A. Muqeet, Wajahat Suri,Anwer kizilbash, Farhat Abbasand Tanvir Mazahir.

Data Steel restricted tosecond position having 78.54VPs to their credit. Havingold stars like Pervaiz Mirza,Rashid jaffer and on-formplayers like Hasan Askari,Tariq Rasheed Khan, GulzarBilal and Shakeel Chandna,They won four matches,20.00 from Zia Tigers, 16.73from Dynamite, 15.15 fromInvincible and 14.22 from Gi-ants, drawn on level termswith AKB and lost toDeuces.—APP

National hockeychampionshipfrom Dec 19

LAHORE—The 60th editionof National Hockey Champi-onship will be played herefrom December 19-29 at Na-tional hockey stadium.

“Teams of PIA, WAPDA,NBP, SSGC, Army, PortQasim, Navy, Police, PTV andHEC will participate in thepremier hockey activity,” saida member of the organizingcommittee on Monday.

The Championship willbe organised by the PunjabHockey Association on be-half of Pakistan Hockey Fed-eration will be played onRound Robin League , hesaid.—APP

Sharjeel vowsto continue his

aggressivebatting style

ISLAMABAD—Sharjeel Khanhas vowed to continue hisaggressive batting if got achance to represent Pakistanin the playing eleven in T20sagainst Afghanistan and SriLanka at United Arab Emir-ates (UAE) later this month.

Sharjeel, the left-handedopener who has been se-lected in the 14-membersquad for T20 seriesagainst Sri Lanka and a lonematch against Afghanistan,had scored 194 runs off 124balls in the President’s CupOne-Day Tournament thisyear.

The left-handed openerwhile talking toPakpassion.net said, “I’vealways promised myselfthat if I get the chance toplay for my country, I willplay in the same aggressiveway that I always have fromjunior cricket to FirstClass.”

“I don’t think that oneshould drastically change hisbatting approach from do-mestic cricket to internationalcricket,” he added.—APP

Bilawal Bhatti,” he said.He said he was feeling

some pressure when Pakistanslipped to 131-7 when and hewent to bat against Dale Steyn,who at his brilliant best.

“After early pressure, I feltconfident when I started tomiddle Steyn and played innormal fashion which helpedme to score some runs,” herecalled.

He said he enjoyed play-

ing with Bilawal Bhatti as theyraised second ODI best part-nership of 74 runs for theeighth wicket.

Anwar Ali scored an un-beaten 43 off 55 balls with halfa dozen boundaries andsnapped-up the wickets ofJacques Kallis and DavidMiller for 24 runs in six overand was named man of thematch.

He said during his earlierperiod with Pakistan Under-19,he was not focused on his bat-ting but later started to payattention to his batting andscored my maiden century acouple season ago.

Anwar said he wanted tofollow in foots of Pakistan all-rounders like Abdul Razzaqand Azhar Mahmood. “Afterachieving a bit of internationalsuccess, I am eager to be con-sistent and perform wellagainst Sri Lankans,” headded. He said in CorporateRamazan Cricket, he played amatch winning knocks underintense pressure which raisedmy confidence and it was firststep in establishing me as anall-rounder.—APP

appearing on the differenttelevision channels that in-stead of building the team inloss they are downing thePakistan team.

Shahid Afridi said he willkeep working hard and per-form for the country.

In the meantime newlyemerged all-rounder AnwarAli said it was his dream toserve the country to the bestof ability.

“Its is my endeavour toperform the best of my abili-ties with the bat, ball and inthe field for Pakistan,” hecommented. Anwar Ali wonthe man of the match awardon his debut after defeatedSouth Africa in the openingone-day international at CapeTown.

Pakistan team came underfor heavy bashing after Paki-stan stunning in UAE after4-1 in ODIs and 2-0 loss intwo T20 loss and playing 1-1draw in the Test series afterhaving won the opening Testat Shaikh Zayed Stadium inAbu Dhabi.—APP

Anwar looking to servePakistan cricket in a big way

ISLAMABAD—Former Paki-stan Captain Amir Sohail feelsPakistan Cricket Board (PCB)should hire a batsman headcoach for the national teamafter Dav Whatmore whosecontract expires in Februarynext year.

The PCB will not renewWhatmore’s contract asWhatmore had earlier in-formed the board that hewould not be seeking an ex-tension in the job due to per-sonal and family reasons.His last assignment with Pa-kistan will be the upcomingSri Lanka series in the UAE,to be held this month.

According to media re-ports it has been learnt thatdiscussions had been heldwith former coach WaqarYounis is a top contender toreplace Whatmore as headcoach.

Waqar who is settled inAustralia has shown interestin the coaching assignmentbut has also kept forth somestrong conditions to sign afresh contract. Waqar hasalso asked for more author-ity and a pay package

PCB must hire abatsman head coach

after Whatmore: Amirequivalent to what the boardis paying Whatmore.

Waqar, who was headcoach of the national team in2010 and 2011, ended his con-tract prematurely in Septem-ber, 2012 on personal andhealth grounds. There arealso talks about handingYounis Khan the additionalresponsibility of being theteam’s batting coach besidesplaying in the Test matches.

Talking to APP, AmirSohail said Pakistan team al-ready has a bowling coachMuhammad Akram and tohire another bowler headcoach like Waqar Youniswon’t he suitable for theteam. “The national teamneeds a batting head coach,a person who should be well-known for his batting andcan make the team deliverwith the bat,” he said.

Amir said batting is al-ways been a weakness ofthe national team and it isthe need of the hour to hirea batt ing head coach.“Consistency in team’sbatting is always lacking,”he said.—APP

Alpine skiing:Svindal winsagain in Lake

Louise super-GLAKE LOUISE (Canada)—Aksel Lund Svindal won themen’s alpine World Cup su-per-G at Lake Louise on Sun-day on an Olympic coursethe Norwegian has made hisown.

Svindal clocked 1min28.53sec to beat Austrianduo Matthias Mayer andGeorg Streitberger by 0.24secand 0.38sec respectively.

Svindal notched his 22ndWorld Cup victory, surpass-ing Kjetil Andre Aamodt’sNorwegian record.

“I think it’s cool,” he saidof the record. “It is some-thing to know that my idol isat home and that I beat hisrecord. I will call him later andI will see what he says. I thinkhe must have some mixedfeelings.”

Asked if the venue shouldbe re-named “Lake Lund”Svindal said he’d have noproblem with that, althoughhe noted that the Canadian re-sort was already fondlyknown as “Lake Lindsey” byfans of American LindseyVonn, winner of 14 World Cupraces here.—AFP

AUSTRALIA: Rory McIlroy holds the Australian Open trophy aloft after beating Adam Scott to top spot on the final hole.

MADRID: Athletic Bilbao’s Gaizka Toquero falls over Barcelona’s Martin Montoya during their La Liga match.

BA R C E L O N A —Barcelonalost its second straight gamewithout injured star LionelMessi when Athletic Bilbaohanded the defending Span-ish league champions a 1-0loss Sunday at San Mames.

Forward Iker Muniainscored the winner in the 70thminute after Bilbao’s inces-sant pressure recovered theball and sparked a counter-attack inside Barcelona’shalf.

Neymar was once againtagged to pick up Messi’sgoal-scoring duties, butwhen he wasn’t frustrated byslippery footing Bilbao’s de-fense got the better of him.

Barcelona was left levelon points with AtleticoMadrid and three pointsahead of Real Madrid afterboth title rivals won on Sat-urday.

Barcelona’s first defeat inthe domestic league follow-ing 13 wins and one drawcame five days after it lost 2-1 at 10-man Ajax in the Cham-pions League.

Barcelona hadn’t suf-fered consecutive defeatssince March.

‘’When you lose there arealways doubts and questions

that arise, but one game hadnothing to do with the other,’’Barcelona midfielder AndresIniesta said. ‘’We have tocorrect our mistakes. It’s aloss. That can happen. Weshouldn’t see it any otherway.’’

Gerardo Martino’s teamhas won once and lost twicesince Messi suffered a lefthamstring injury that willlikely keep him out until Janu-ary.

And while Barcelonasputters, Atletico andMadrid keep on churning outwins.

‘’This team isn’t used tolosing two consecutivegames,’’ Martino said.‘’And we came here with theintention of reboundingfrom the first loss, so it’s ashame not to win after wedid enough to deserve it.Until Bilbao scored we werethe better side, controllingthe ball and creatingchances for long stretches.After their goal it was a dif-ferent game.’’

Also on Sunday, Valenciabeat 10-man Osasuna 3-0,Sevilla won 2-1 at Granada,and Rayo Vallecano drew 2-2at Real Betis.

The match was billed asperhaps the toughest test ofthe season for Barcelonacoming off its first setback in21 games and without the in-jured Messi, goalkeeper Vic-tor Valdes, and defendersDani Alves, Carles Puyol andJordi Alba.

And so it proved to be asBilbao stayed undefeated inseven games at its new SanMames Stadium. The victorylifted it into fourth place andin the final ChampionsLeague spot.

Like so many times in pastmeetings between theBasque and Catalan clubs,the pace remained freneticand intense with the ballconstantly changing sidesuntil Bilbao took charge lateas Barcelona faded after fall-ing behind.

‘’I think we played acomplete game from start tofinish. I am very happy tohave done my part to get thewin by scoring the goal,’’said the 20-year-old Muniain,who added that Bilbao wasaided by the fact thatBarcelona had played a gamemidweek and arrived withwearier legs.

Early on, Barcelona

coolly worked its waythrough Bilbao’s pressureand just past the 10-minutemark deployed a number ofone-touch passes in a seriesof attacks that wentunrewarded.

Neymar first had hisstrike palmed over the bar byBilbao goalkeeper GorkaIraizoz in the 12th beforeIniesta spoiled a back-heeledflip by Sergio Busquets byfiring wide.

Then it was Bilbao’s turnand Muniain had a goldenchance to put the hostsahead in the 29th, but hebarely made contact on a de-flected cross that reachedhim with only goalie JosePinto to beat.

Barcelona looked to hitBilbao on the break, butNeymar slipped several timeswhile trying to dribble andhad to change his shoes inthe 34th.

The new boots still didn’thelp the Brazil striker in the50th when he wasted CescFabregas’ pass by sailing hisshot high, and his frustrationat Carlos Gurpegui’s markingboiled over and soon earnedNeymar a yellow card whenhe retaliated.—AP

ISLAMABAD—Test and one-day captain Misbah-ul-Haqsays Pakistan needs a battingcoach to solve the team’s top-order batting problems at thecrease in internationalmatches. He also urgedcricket fans in the country tobe patient.

Misbah returned homeMonday after leading Paki-stan to its first ever one-dayseries victory against SouthAfrica, a 2-1 win. Pakistan alsodrew the Twenty20 series 1-1.

‘’We have to think a lotabout our batting and (a bat-ting) coach could be benefi-cial,’’ Misbah said.

‘’Batting is a constantproblem for us for the last 2-3years and we have to seri-ously start thinking about it.’’

Despite the top order bats-men struggling against SouthAfrica, rookie all roundersBilawal Bhatti and Anwar Aliemerged as future stars in theseries.

Both Bhatti and Ali shareda productive half-centurystand in Pakistan’s 23-run winin first one-dayer at CapeTown after South Africa re-duced the visitors to 131-7.

Bhatti smashed threefours in fast bowler DaleSteyn’s one over in Pakistan’snarrow 1-run win in the sec-ond ODI at Port Elizabethwhere opening batsman

Misbah calls for patiencefrom Pakistan fans

Ahmad Shehzad also scoreda century.

But Shehzad was out fora duck in the third ODI at Cen-turion and, despite Misbah’sunbeaten 79, Pakistan wasdismissed for 179 and lost the

match by four wickets.“Our batting averages are

nowhere and there’s no consis-tency,” Misbah said.“After scor-ing in one match, we flop in 3-4innings, so I think we have towork hard on this thing.”

After two days of rest athome, Pakistan team will leavefor the United Arab Emirateson Thursday to play threetest, five ODIs and two T20matches against Sri Lanka.

Pakistan will also play aT20 against Afghanistan atSharjah on Dec. 8 before thetour kicks off against Sri Lankawith a T20 at Dubai on Dec.11.

Lanky left-arm fast bowlerMohammad Irfan was notnamed in Pakistan’s Twenty20squad after the he injured hiship muscle during Pakistan’s4-1 loss in the one-day seriesagainst South Africa at theU.A.E. last month. He alsomissed Pakistan’s short tourto South Africa.

Irfan is yet to recover fromthe injury and is also likely tomiss the ODI series againstSri Lanka.

“Without Irfan we werethinking that it will be difficultfor us (in South Africa), butthe way Bilawal Bhatti per-formed, we didn’t feel Irfan’sabsence,” Misbah said.

“The way youngstershave performed, our hopes arehigh from them in future.”

Misbah said after playingin South Africa, where there’slot of bounce on the wickets,it will benefit his team to playagainst Sri Lanka in the U.A.E.

“No doubt Sri Lanka is avery strong team and condi-tions do suit them too, but Ithink our team will play quitewell after competing againstSouth Africa in tough condi-tions,” Misbah said.— AP

Barcelona loses again withoutMessi, 1-0 at Bilbao

AU S T R A L I A—Having ledfor the vast majority of theAustralian Open in his bidto take out the covetedtriple crown of Australianmajors, Adam Scott let it slipon the final hole of the finaltournament in the trifecta.And he was ‘‘gutted’’ aboutit.

With a bogey on the fi-nal hole, Scott’s dream ofwinning all three Australianmajors was dashed. RoryMcIlroy, who had not wonall year, drained the four-metre putt on the 18th atRoyal Sydney to take theStonehaven Cup. The finalputt of the tournament hadfelled Scott, who had led al-most from start to finish. Al-most.

‘‘I’m disappointed tomake an error at the last andopen the door for Rory,’’Scott said afterwards. ‘‘Iwas kind of trying to keep itclosed all day the best Icould. Nothing was goingmy way on the greens to-day.

‘I could have put thisthing away I think early onif the putter was behavinghow it should have, like itdid the rest of the week, but

Golf: Rory McIlroywins Australian Open

I just misjudged into thelast and a player as good asRory is going to take thatopportunity.

‘‘It’s just the way golf is.I’m gutted. I felt like I neverhad a better chance to winthe Aussie Open.’’

He still had it headingup the 18th fairway. Oneshot up, Scott overshot thegreen with his second, thenovershot the hole with hischip. He two-putted but thedamage had been done.

He would have to makedo with second, still a re-markable effort with him al-ready having taked theAustralian Masters andPGA tournaments in recentweeks.

Former Australian Openchampion John Sendenshot a six-under-par roundof 66 to finish third.

Scott , the US Masterswinner, was doing his bestto smile but this will hurt.It was hardly his capitula-tion in last year ’s BritishOpen, having bogeyed thefinal four holes, but Scottst i l l led by four shots –even over a player ofMcIlroy’s talent – headinginto the final day.

“I didn?t want to finishlike that”: Adam Scott

McIlroy put early pres-sure on Scott, turning thecorner at four-under for theround and, while Scott re-sponded, the world No.6saved his best for last. Hesank his final putt, afterScott’s bogey gave him aone-under round of 71.

Perhaps feeling like thebloke who turned the lightson at the party, McIlroyapologised to the crowdswho turned up at RoyalSydney. ‘‘I’m sorry that Ihad to ruin Adam’s triplecrown,’’ he said.

The victor, perhaps feel-ing like he had turned amore significant corner,paid tribute to Scott.

‘‘He’s had a phenom-enal year,’’ McIlroy said.‘‘It’s a real credit to him thathe came down and playedall four weeks. It wouldhave been very easy to skipa couple ... to play four in arow is a credit to him.

‘‘He knew what respon-sibility he had coming downas Masters champion, thefirst Australian to win agreen jacket.

He’s a credit to the game

but he is also a credit tothis country.’’

Scott, whose bogeyscame on the first and lastholes, was doing his best toremain upbeat.

Golf can do this to any-one, even the world No.2,and the player many believe– rankings aside – is thebest .

‘‘Absolutely, it does iton a daily basis to every-one out here,’’ Scott said.‘‘It was going to be a toughday no matter what andRory made his move and Ijust couldn’t knock in theputts you expect to make.‘‘I’ve made them all weekbut slight mis-reads and notquite the right pace, didn’tmatch.

‘‘It’s been a great year.Obviously I didn’t want tofinish like that. If I didn’tplay any good the first fewdays and played great to-day and finished secondI’d be pretty chuffed goinginto Christmas, so that’show I should look at it.

‘‘I’ll get over this to-night and look forward to afew weeks’ rest and getready to go next year.’’—AFP

LONDON—Lindsey Vonn willput off further knee surgeryin the hope of being fit enoughto compete at the Winter Olym-pics.

The Olympic downhillchampion recently re-injuredligaments in the same kneethat was rebuilt following acrash in the World Champi-onships in February.

Vonn, 29, was due to re-turn this weekend but thetraining accident has put herSochi Games prospects indoubt.

“In the end, surgery isgoing to have to happen,”said the American. “I might aswell see how long it holds up.”

Vonn, who partially torethe right anterior cruciate liga-ment in the 20 November fallat Copper Mountain, tookseveral runs down the super-G course at Vail on Sunday.Afterwards, she said her kneefelt “really good”. She willtravel to Lake Louise, Alberta,for downhill training ahead ofnext week’s World Cup event.

“Just trying to ski solid,”she added. “I’m not trying todo race runs. I’m trying tobuild into it. Not push it toohard. But I was still able to beaggressive and confident inwhat I’m doing so that when Iget up to Lake Louise I canhopefully have a good feel-ing right away.”

Vonn, who also won

Lindsey Vonn to delay surgeryfor Sochi Winter Olympics bid

downhill and Super-G gold atthe 2009 World Champion-ships in Val d’Isere, recordedher fifth consecutive

women’s World Cup downhilltitle last year. The WinterOlympics begins in Russia on7 February.—AFP

Bresnan calledinto England

squad forAdelaide test

BRISBANE—Bowling all-rounder Tim Bresnan was

called into the England squadfor the Ashes series on Mon-day and will be available forthe second Test against Aus-tralia in Adelaide this week.

Bresnan, who suffered astress fracture in his backwhich ruled him out of the fi-nal Test of the first Ashes se-ries earlier this year, whichthe hosts won 3-0, travelledto Australia with England’sPerformance Programme.

Having proved his fit-ness, Bresnan’s stock roseas, apart from Stuart Broad,England’s attack disap-pointed in the first Test atBrisbane.—Agencies

Asif, Sajjadsecure 4th

win in IBSFWorld SnookerKARACHI—Reigning WorldChampion Muhammad Asifand Muhammad Sajjad main-tained their dazzling run inthe International Billiards andSnooker Federation (IBSF)World snooker champion-ship in Daugavpils (Latvia)by securing their fourth winin a row on Monday.

Faisalabad-born Asif,staged a superb recovery af-ter dropping the openingframe to down Ismail Turkerof Turkey 4-1.

After losing the firstframe, Asif demonstratedsmart tactical play and cuecontrol to chalk out 19-76,64-11, 88-08, 76-16, and 72-36. Asif carved out thebreak of 51 in the thirdframe.

Muhammad Sajjad, whowas part of Pakistan teamwith Muhammad Asif whichwon the World TeamSnooker in Carlow (Ireland)in the recent past, displayeda brilliant break-building toblanks Darren Paris of Swit-zerland 4-0.

Ace cueist fromSargodha, Sajjad con-structed the break of 93 in thesecond and 115 clearancebreaks of 115 in his terrificvictory. Sajjad won the match74-10, 93-01, 69-17.—APP

ALONG with the usual reasons for losing weight, like fitting into a bikini andimproving health, fitness experts say rais-

ing money for a good cause is another incentivefor people to get in shape. Entering a charityrun in memory of a loved oneor a bicycle ride for a worthycause has pushed many couchpotatoes from their sedentarylifestyle on to the path of fit-ness.

Kelly Flynn, runningcoach for Team In Training, acharity sports endurance pro-gram from the Leukemia &Lymphoma Society, has beenteaching novice runners totackle the Boson Marathonsince 2005. “The peoplewho’ve never run before andhave a motivation, like a lovedone, are the easiest people tocoach,” said Flynn, a 40-year-old Boston-based attorney.“They stick it out. And whenthey cross the finish line,they’ve become running junkies.”

Flynn, a soccer and softball player in herteenage years, said it was the death of a highschool friend from lymphoma that inspired herto become a running coach for charity. “I saw aflyer (from Team in Training) and went, on alark,” she said. “His death was my catalyst.”

Team in Training, which is 25 years old,has raised more than $1.4 billion, with morethan 600,000 people from across the countrytaking part in different endurance events to raisemoney for Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.Flynn, whose 200-strong team soon will starttraining for 2014, has helped to train more than800 Boston marathoners and her teams have

raised over $4 million. For Sarah JaneConstantine, a self-described recreationalrunner, marathon running was a bucket-listdream until she started running for charity.“I didn’t think at 39 I was going to start

marathoning,” saidConstantine, a 41-year-oldmanager for a pharmaceuticalcompany in Boston who hasraised money for cancer re-search.

“That’s what I’m mostproud of,” said Constantine,who finds some way to exerciseevery day, from running tostrength training to swimmingwith her daughter. Constantinededicated her first marathon toher stepfather, who died ofmelanoma at 44. Last year itwas for her daughter’s schoolfriend’s mother, who died oflung cancer.

This year she plans torun for the cancer-strickendaughter of her husband’s co-

worker. “You feel helpless,” she said. “I’llbe running for money for research and treat-ment.”

Charity events are a nationwide staple ofFlywheel Sports, a chain of indoor cyclingstudios founded in 2010. New York-based co-founder and creative director Ruth Zukermansaid the fundraising events her company holdsthroughout the year are beneficial for peoplenew to sport, for charities and for her busi-ness. “A lot of people come to these charityrides who’ve never been to us before. Typi-cally some 80 percent of the people are new,”she said. “They come to us to give, they loveit, and they become clients of ours.”

Charity sporting eventsoffer incentives to get fit

Motorists are stuck in a massive traffic jam due to illegal encroachments at Saddar.

Students at their stall during exhibition of industrial and operation models at Jinnah Uni-versity for Women.

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—The annual prizedistribution ceremony of DHATooba High School was held atPN Sabir Hall here today. DrMansoob Hussain Siddiqui, Di-rector General Directorate ofInspections of Private Schoolsand Colleges was the chiefguest of the function.

The students presented anaptitude oriented fabulous tal-ent show on the occasion. Thetheme of the programme wasbased on Quran, Philosophy of

Iqbal and Secrets of Life. Thepresentation included skits, po-ems, a short English play and anexhilarating Urdu play.

Speaking on the occasionMr. Mansoob Hussain said thatthe aim of education is to pro-duce confident, capable and dy-namic individuals who can facethe onslaught of life challengessuccessfully. He said that confi-dence, self reliance and dyna-mism are the basic ingredientsof a sound personality whichmust be inculcated in students.

Mr. Mansoob Hussain said

that education brings transfor-mation and enlightenment inlife. He reiterated that a goodeducational background pro-vides a solid foundation for suc-cess in life and emphasized theneed for developing a sound andefficient education system thatcan produce individuals whocould positively contribute forthe society. He commended thetalented performance of stu-dents and the efforts put up bythe teachers to make theprogramme a success.

Earlier the Principal, Ms.

Prize distribution ceremony

The students of Defence Authority Tooba High School presenting an exhilarating talent showat the Annual Prize Distribution function.

Raheela Jamshed in her wel-come address said that the mainfocus in the school was on in-tellectual and emotional devel-opment of students to makethem responsible and good citi-zens of the society. She alsohighlighted the academic andextra curricular achievementsof the students of the school.

At the end the Chief Guestawarded prizes to the studentswho excelled in various cur-ricular and non-curricular ac-tivities and awarded certificatesof merit to the teachers.

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—Sindh Chief Minis-ter (CM) Syed Qaim Ali Shah hasdirected to the irrigation authori-ties, engineers and experts to givepriority to existing Sukkur Bar-rage and ensure its strengtheningand rehabilitation at any cost andhe termed it as backbone ofeconomy and life line for thepeople of Sindh.

He directed the officers forearly implementation on thescheme of rehabilitation and restrengthening the Sukkur barragewhich has been conceived at itsestimated cost of Rs 30 billionwith the consultation of Nationaland International firms. Thescheme must be implemented asper recommendations of the panelof experts in letter and sprit.

This he directed while presid-ing over meeting to review overthe future planning of SukkurBarrage at the committee roomSindh Secretariat Karachi today.

Leader of opposition in na-tional assembly Syed KhursheedShah, Senior Minister for educa-tion Nisar Ahmed Khuhro, SindhMinister for works and services

Mir Hazar Khan Bijirani, adviserto CM for finance Syed MuradAli Shah, Sindh Chief SecretarySajjad Saleem Hotiyana, Secre-tary to CM Rai Sikandar, Secre-tary Irrigation Babar Afandi, exSecretaries and Irrigation ex-perts, Including ANG Abbasi,Bashir Dahar, Shuja Junejo , exChief Engineer IrrigationKhadim Memon, Irrigation ex-pert Malik Ahmed Khan fromPunjab , Chief Engineer SukkurBarrage Junaid Memon andother attended.

The CM said that there weretwo opinions about the survivalof Sukkur Barrage. He said thatone theory was to have alternateof Sukkur Barrage because ofexpiry of its life time and sec-ond opinion of experts was thatthere was no need of construc-tion of new Sukkur Barrage butwe can re strengthen existingBarrage and make it more viableand beneficial to the people ofSindh up to next 30 to 50 years.

He said that after threadbarediscussion and deliration by theexports of irrigation in the meet-ing he came on the conclusionthat there was no structural threat

to Sukkur Barrage as such thereis no need to conceive anotherschemes for alternative barrageurgently at present. However hedirected the officers, experts thatin the meantime the irrigationdepartment must conduct thestudy with the help of Nationaland International experts for pre-paring feasibility and identifyingof the site for new proposed bar-rage in the replacement of SukkurBarrage but he made it clear thatwe cannot put the rehabilitationwork of existing Barrage on thehold because of concept of alter-nate one. He said that the finalstudy of the experts for havingnew Barrage would be vet andto be got implementation in caseof consensus of all the stakehold-ers on it. This is a very importantand even sensitive issue and wecannot take it in haste.

The CM said that we are con-sidering the re strengthening andrehabilitation of Sukkur barragesince long. He said that ex-presi-dent of Pakistan Asif Ali Zardarihad also visited the Sukkur Bar-rage along with deputy PrimeMinister (PM) of United King-dom (UK) during the last flood

and had asked the UK deputy PMfor their support in this task. Hesaid that UK Deputy PM noddedour request in affirmative.

He said that at present twoimportant issues of Sukkur Bar-rage were being focused in addi-tion to other issues. Which in-clude enhance its discharge ca-pacity from 0.9 million cusec to1.5 million cusec and other toensure proper water feed to itsright bank off taking canals.

He said the he was optimis-tic that these two major issueswould be got resolved under therehabilitation project which to beimplemented very short.

Leader of the opposition innational assembly SyedKhursheed Ahmed Shah ex-pressed his satisfaction over thebriefing made by the Senior irri-gation engineers who served theirrigation department as Secre-tary and Chief Engineers saidthat there were hundred reasonsfor totally depending on existingSukkur Barrage. One reason ofcompletion of life time bySukkur Barrage compel us tohave an affective, plan of alter-nate Barrage in hand.

Qaim urges for earlyrehabilitation of Sukkur Barrage

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—Sindh Chief Min-ister Sindh Syed Qaim Ali Shahhas directed to the works andservices department to ensurecompletion of 47 schemes forthe construction of about 1800kilometer of roads with quali-tative work by Dec 31 , 2013so that people of area couldenjoy the better communicationfacilities.

This he directed while pre-siding over the meeting to reviewover the development works atcommittee room of Sindh Secre-tariat Karachi Monday.

Sindh Minister for Worksand Services Mir Hazar KhanBijarani, Adviser to CM for fi-nance Syed Murad Ali Shah ,Sindh Chief Secretary SajjadSaleem Hotiyana, Additional

Secretary Development ArifAhmed Khan , Secretary toWorks and Services KaziShahid Pervaiz, Secretary to CMRai Sikandar, Secretary FinanceSohail Rajput , planning and de-velopment (P&D) departmentDirector General Syed ImtiazShah attended.

Addressing the meeting theChief Minister directed the of-ficers to give priority to thosedevelopment schemes which areat the verge of completion. Hesaid that Finance department hasalso been directed to release fullfunds against such scheme.

The CM directed the offic-ers also to ensure quality of thework and warned that in caseof sub standard work the officerconcerned would be taken totask. He also directed to the of-ficers of monitoring and evalu-

ation wing of P&D Department& Secretary Works and Ser-vices to go in the field and ex-amine & evaluate the qualityand performance of work ad-ministratively, financially andtechnically and report to himabout their findings.

While taking notice for de-lay in the completion of 134-KM Nawab Shah-Padidan-Ranipur road, he asked the of-ficers to communicate the rail-way authorities for getting theirno objection certificate aboutover head bridges on this roadand get it completed withinshortest possible time for whichan allocation of Rs 268.635 mil-lion has been released.

He directed the officers totake reconstruction of Torri toManjhi bridge road in the handand complete it on priority basis.

CM for completion of 47uplift schemes on priority

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—All Karachi TajirIttehad (AKTI) Pharma and Sur-gical Committee Chairman TariqMumtaz had strongly condemnedthe recent trend of hiking pricesof essential and life saving drugs.The committee had termed theincrease in drug prices were arti-ficial and would lead to retrench-ments in trade activities, unem-ployment and above all theywould be the people at the lowestlevel fo the society to suffer mostdue to skyrocketing prices ofmedicines.

The increases in prices andartificial shortages being createdin market had started inflictingit worst impact on the poor pa-tients of low-income residentialcolonies and spatial settlements.The situation was equally gravein public tertiary care hospitalsas the patients were in a state ofsevere mental agony, saidMumtaz, adding that the effectsof short supplies and sudden in-crease in essential and life sav-ing drugs had grossly affectedthe patients suffering from de-pression, anxiety, epilepsy, fits(children) and cortisone-made

emergency drugs. He said that theprices had been raised by 200percent such as thePhenabarbiton was being sold forRs 1400 while its market pricewas just Rs 300. Conversely,Panadol CF was being sold forRs 300 instead of its regular priceof Rs 170.

Ativan prices were increasedfrom Rs 150 to Rs 500 and Migrilwas sold for Rs 70 instead of Rs20. Decadron injection that wasavailable for Rs 390 was sold forRs 800 but still it was greatly outof stock at the wholesale and re-tail shops.

AKTI Pharma committeecondemns drug price hike

Deadline forremoval of

illegal sinagesIRFAN ALIGI

KARACHI—Sindh Minister forInformation and local govern-ment Sharjeel Enam Memonhad directed the Karachi metro-politan Corporation (KMC) Ad-ministrator Rauf AkhtarFarooqui to ensure complete re-moval of sinages and billboardthat were being displayed innook and cranny of the city inviolation to existing rules andregulations.

The Minister further soughtcomposite report on marriagehalls that were constructed onamenity plots, parks and play-grounds and those that wereconstructed unlawfully, so thatnecessary legal action againstsuch commercial premises beinitiated.

the Minister said that certainfacilities for the people were ei-ther destroyed or had been sup-pressed under heavy corruptionsuch as illegal charged car park-ing and water hydrants.

The Minister passed theseorders while chairing a high levelmeeting of the KMC and KarachiWater and Sewerage Board(KW&SB) officials. The meet-ing was attended by Sindh Sec-retary Local GovernmentMuhammad Jawaid Hanif Khan,KMC Administrator andKW&SB managing directorQutbuddin Shaikh.

Registrationprocess for 8000private schools

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—Private schoolManagement Association(PSMA) Chairman Sharaf UzZaman said that there were 17,000 private schools in Karachi ofwhich 50 percent were not regis-tered with the Directorate of Pri-vate School, Sindh. The situationhad led to deprivation of attain-ing the benefits of electricity tar-iff under the residential categoryfor which the PSMA had foughta long battle in bureaucracy andin courts.

Zaman said that the nationalElectric Power Regulatory Au-thority (NEPRA) and KarachiElectric Supply Company hadplayed their roles for alleviatingthe agony of the owners and ad-ministrators of private schools forconsidering their right for pay-ing the electricity bills under theresidential tariff plans while theyhad been paying the bills as com-mercial entities in past.

However, the NEPRA andthe KESC had imposed a condi-tion that only those schools thatwould make a show of genuineletter of registration to the powerdistribution company would beheld eligible for paying the elec-tricity bills under the residentialcategory.

Henceforth, it was the un-avoidable responsibility of theDirectorate of Private Schools toopen the registration so that the50 percent of unregistered privateschools could also benefit fromthe facility.

ALONG with the usual reasons for losing weight, like fitting into a bikini andimproving health, fitness experts say

raising money for a good cause is another in-centive for people to get in shape. Entering acharity run in memory of aloved one or a bicycle ride fora worthy cause has pushedmany couch potatoes fromtheir sedentary lifestyle on tothe path of fitness.

Kelly Flynn, runningcoach for Team In Training, acharity sports endurance pro-gram from the Leukemia &Lymphoma Society, has beenteaching novice runners totackle the Boson Marathonsince 2005. “The peoplewho’ve never run before andhave a motivation, like a lovedone, are the easiest people tocoach,” said Flynn, a 40-year-old Boston-based attorney.“They stick it out. And whenthey cross the finish line,they’ve become running junkies.”

Flynn, a soccer and softball player in herteenage years, said it was the death of a highschool friend from lymphoma that inspired herto become a running coach for charity. “I saw aflyer (from Team in Training) and went, on alark,” she said. “His death was my catalyst.”

Team in Training, which is 25 years old,has raised more than $1.4 billion, with morethan 600,000 people from across the countrytaking part in different endurance events to raisemoney for Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.Flynn, whose 200-strong team soon will starttraining for 2014, has helped to train more than800 Boston marathoners and her teams have

raised over $4 million. For Sarah JaneConstantine, a self-described recreational run-ner, marathon running was a bucket-list dreamuntil she started running for charity. “I didn’tthink at 39 I was going to start marathoning,”

said Constantine, a 41-year-oldmanager for a pharmaceuticalcompany in Boston who hasraised money for cancer re-search.

“That’s what I’m mostproud of,” said Constantine,who finds some way to exer-cise every day, from running tostrength training to swimmingwith her daughter. Constantinededicated her first marathon toher stepfather, who died ofmelanoma at 44. Last year itwas for her daughter’s schoolfriend’s mother, who died oflung cancer.

This year she plans torun for the cancer-strickendaughter of her husband’s co-worker. “You feel helpless,”

she said. “I’ll be running for money for re-search and treatment.”

Charity events are a nationwide stapleof Flywheel Sports, a chain of indoor cyclingstudios founded in 2010. New York-basedco-founder and creative director RuthZukerman said the fundraising events hercompany holds throughout the year are ben-eficial for people new to sport, for charitiesand for her business.

“A lot of people come to these charity rideswho’ve never been to us before. Typicallysome 80 percent of the people are new,” shesaid. “They come to us to give, they love it,and they become clients of ours.”

Charity sporting eventsoffer incentives to get fit

Federal Minister for Science and Technology, Zahid Hamid being briefed by Director Gen-eral Pakistan Council of Scientific and Industrial Research regarding various projects.

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Common man mustbe benefited by the researchmade in our research institu-tions. These benefits would havea better trickledown effect to thecommon man if the research iscommercialized.

This was stated by FederalMinister for Science and Tech-nology Mr. Zahid Hamid whilevisiting Pakistan Council of Sci-ence and Industrial ResearchLaboratories (PCSIR) hereMonday.

The Minister said that theremust be collaboration of re-search and development institu-tions with our Industry and Uni-versities which would improvethe quality of our products and

resultantly export would in-crease. He also said that researchwould be made according to therequirement of our industry andmarket so that it can contributeinstantly. Answering a question,the Minister said, ink pad forelection process is being preparedby PCSIR and we will meet thetarget in time.

The Minister also chaired ameeting at STEDEC and PCSIR.He emphasized on the partici-pants that they should work vig-orously for scientific research inthe country.

Earlier Federal SecretaryScience & Technology KamranAli Qureshi participated as ChiefGuest at the occasion of consul-tative Workshop on NationalQuality Policy organized by the

PCSIR Laboratories in a localhotel. While addressing the par-ticipants of the workshop he saideconomic prosperity key ele-ments of the government’s poli-cies and there is a need to orga-nize all the efforts at nationallevel to revitalize economic ac-tivities that will ultimately re-sult in improvement of the qual-ity of life and the priority of thegovernment is the revival ofeconomy through maximizingour exports.

He said by the developmentof new technologies, standard-ization and technical regulationshave become extremely com-plex at international level. So,the development of a new com-prehensive national qualitypolicy is the basic need to en-

Call for extending benefit of research to common manhance the export of our country.

Such quality policy requiresthe coordination between thestandardization and technicalregulations dealing with sub-jects of science and technology,trade, industrial development,environmental management,health and many more. Mr.Qureshi further said that an ef-fective national quality policyneeds to be developed with in-puts from all stakeholders.

UNIDO International Ex-pert on Quality policy Mr. Mar-tin Kellermann, Chief TechnicalAdvisor, UNIDO, Mr. BrunoValanzuolo and Joint TechnicalAdvisor, Ministry of Science &Technology Mr. MasroorAhmad Qureshi also addressedthe workshop.

President Markazi Jamiat Ahle Hadith Pakistan, Sajid Mir leading a protest against US drone strikes at Bhatti Chowk.

Policemen standing alert outside the Punjab Assembly building during the session.

SALIM AHMED

LAHORE—Punjab Chief Minis-ter Muhammad Shahbaz Sharifhas said that shortage of electric-ity is the biggest problem of thecountry and government is tak-ing measures on emergent basisfor resolving this problem.

He said that revolutionarymeasures are being taken for thewelfare of the masses which in-clude issuing Khidmat Card andsetting up of Punjab Rozgar Bankfor providing job opportunities tothe youth. He said credit goes tothe present government that thatno corruption scandal has cometo the fore during its five monthstenure.

He said that people will feelrelief during the next two and halfyears due to the measures takenby the government and the ele-ments involved in price hike,hoarding and profiteering will bebehind the bars.

Talking to a private TV chan-nel, the Chief Minister said thatPakistan is rich in resources butit is looking for aid and it is needof the hour that indigenous re-

sources should be developed forachieving self-sufficiency.

He said that maladministra-tion will have to be eliminatedand national responsibility willhave to be discharged in everysector. He said it is lamentablethat Nandipur power project re-mained pending for two and ahalf years during the tenure ofthe former rulers which was acriminal negligence.

However, he said, presentgovernment immediately aftercoming into power revived thisproject and 98 percent of its ma-chinery has reached Nandipur.He said that work is being car-ried out speedily on this projectand its first turbine will start op-erating from the beginning of thenext year due to which 100 to150MW electricity will be addedto the national grid.

He said that he is adheringto his promise regarding ac-countability as indiscriminateaction should be taken againstthose who have looted nationalresources. He said that no scan-dal has surfaced during the lastfive months of the present gov-

ernment which is a big achieve-ment.

He said that the present lead-ership served the masses duringits last tenure and even greatersteps will be taken for the wel-fare and betterment of the peoplein future. He said that metro busproject was completed and onelakh 40 thousand people are ben-efiting from this system.

He said that Khidmat Cardis being launched which will ben-efit 13 lakh families while inter-est free loans will be provided tothe educated youth throughPunjab Rozgar Bank for settingup their business. He said thatagreements have been signedwith several countries to copewith energy problem and theseprojects include hydle, solar,coal, biogas and biomassprojects.

The Chief Minister said thatPTI on the one hand is protest-ing against drone attacks whileon the other hand it is receivingforeign aid which is a contradic-tion.

He said that PML-N leader-ship renounced such foreign aid

in May, 2011, two and a halfyears ago which was at the costof the blood of innocent Paki-stanis and it is still adhering toits decision.

He said that friendship withAmerica is possible without aid.He said that present leadershiptolerates criticism and also seekguidance from it.

He said that the elements in-volved in plundering of nationalresources deserve no leniencyand the government launched in-discriminate action against gasand electricity thieves first timein national history. He said thatdue to the measures taken by thegovernment people will feel re-lief from price hike during nexttwo and a half years.

Replying to a question aboutincrease in power tariff he saidthat the consumers using up to200 units are being given a sub-sidy of 155 billion rupees whilethose consuming from 200 to300 units are being given a sub-sidy of 8.5 billion rupees. Hesaid that the present governmenthas also paid circular debt of 500billion rupees.

Punjab Rozgar Bank to providejob opportunities to youth

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Punjab Chief Minis-ter Shahbaz Sharif has said tex-tile industry is backbone of na-tional economy and country’sexports can be increased by pro-moting this industry.

He said that former rulersignored this important sector ofthe economy during their fiveyears’ tenure due to which irrepa-rable loss was caused to textileindustry. The Chief Minister saidthat due to timely and effectivesteps of present government, tex-tile sector is improving.

He disclosed that Punjabgovernment is setting up Gar-ments City over 13 thousand acre

land near Kala Shah KakuMotorway for the benefit of in-dustrialists. He said that fundshave been provided for purchas-ing land for the establishment ofGarments City. He said that alloptions would be considered forsupplying gas to textile industryduring winter.

He expressed these viewswhile talking to a representativedelegation of industrialists heretoday.

Federal Petroleum MinisterShahid Khaqan Abbasi, MNAPervaiz Malik, Provincial Indus-try Minister Muhammad Shafiq,Vice Chairman Punjab Invest-ment Board, MD Sui NorthernGas Pipelines Limited, office-

bearers of APTMA Ahsan Tanvir,Gohar Ijaz, Shahzad Ali Khan,Syed Ali Ahsan as well as office-bearers of Pakistan Textile Ex-porters Association and PakistanTextile Processing Industry werealso present on the occasion.Matters relating to supplying gasto textile industry during winterwere discussed in the meeting.

Talking to industrialists,Chief Minister MuhammadShahbaz Sharif said that nationaleconomy can be strengthenedand new job opportunities cre-ated by promoting industry. Hesaid that PML-N government ispursuing a solid strategy for pro-moting trade, economic and in-dustrial activities.

Garments city over 13thousand acre land

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Punjab Food Minis-ter and Chairman Price ControlCommittee Bilal Yaseen has saidthat, as a result of timely stepstaken by the Punjab government,a marked reduction of prices ineveryday use items have beenregistered, from 30 percent upto40 percent.

He said the process of offi-cial coordination between differ-ent provinces would be furtherstrengthened to streamline supplyof vegetables and fruits, so that

price hike can be controlled ef-fectively, through the improve-ment of supply of everydayitems. He said work on long termprojects have also been initiated,for future, aimed at ensuringready availability of fruits, veg-etables and eatables to the gen-eral public.

The Food Minister was pre-siding over a high level meetingof Price Control Cabinet Com-mittee at Civil Secretariat, heretoday, during which ProvincialMinister for Industries & TradeCh. Muhammad Shafiq, Minis-

ter Agriculture Dr. FarrukhJaved, Additional Chief Secre-tary Punjab and secretaries ofother departments were alsopresent.

Bilal Yaseen said that, on thedirective of Punjab Chief Minis-ter, three-day convenience ba-zaars are being held in all dis-tricts, thrice a week, where citi-zens are being made availablevegetables, fruits, meat and attaat fixed rates. The meeting wasinformed daily products, poultryand beef is being exported, astheir supply is in excess.

30-40pc cut in prices of dailyuse items witnessed

Zubair apprisesdiplomats of PM’sincentive package

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Various embassiesand high commissions are tak-ing keen interest in the incentivepackage recently announced bythe Prime Minister NawazSharif.

In this regard many diplo-mats contacted President FPCCIZubair Ahmed Malik to knowfull details of the package andreaction of the business commu-nity.

Talking to the diplomats, theFPCCI chief said that the incen-tives and amnesties will an-nounced by the governmenthave a very positive impact onthe economy which was strug-gling since long.

He said that business ac-tivities were passive whichwas resulting in inflation andunemployment but now thesituation is taking a positiveturn.

Economy cannot be revivedunless business community issafe and happy and the relax-ations and amnesties announcedby the PM would certainly boostconfidence of the business com-munity, he told diplomats.

LHC disposes ofRussian

woman’s petitionLAHORE—The Lahore HighCourt Monday disposed of a pe-tition filed by a Russian womanfor the custody of her minordaughter from Pakistani husbandafter compromise between theparties.

The single bench comprisingJustice Sheikh Najam ul Hassanwas hearing the petition filed byIvanova Evgneia Victorvna, aRussian national, for custody ofher minor daughter, UmairaAhmad. As proceedings started,the petitioner Russian nationalalong her husband AhmadNaseem appeared before thecourt and informed that they hadreached a settlement after resolv-ing their differences. Accordingto deal, Ivanova along minorchild would go to Russia and thenJapan where Ahmad Naseemwould join them, they added.

The court disposed of thepetition in the light of statementgiven by the parties. The courtalso ordered to release the pass-port of petitioner.

The petitioner through herpetition submitted that she mar-ried to a Pakistani national,Ahmad Naseem, a resident ofGujranawala, in Japan about sixyears ago. Almost 2-years afterthe marriage, she gave birth to agirl baby who was named UmairaAhmad, she added.

On last hearing, the court hadtemporarily handed over the cus-tody of the minor to the peti-tioner-mother.—APP