Monday 30 September 2013
PM yet to submit asset details to ECP
Bugti murder case: ATC orders Musharraf to appear in court at every cost
QUETTA: The Anti Terrorism Court (ATC) on Monday ordered former military dictator president Pervez Musharraf to appear in the court on the next hearing in Akbar Bugti murder case.
ATC additional judge Tariq Kasi was hearing Nawab Akbar Bugti murder case. During the hearing the court ordered former president Pervez Musharraf to come to the court at every cost.
The judge while passing his remarks said that if Musharraf did not appear in the court, Adyala Jail superintendent would have to come in the court in this regard.
The court adjourned the hearing till October 22.
Former interior minister Aftab Shairpao was also present in the court.
Later talking to the media, he said that he was staying in Quetta for three days due to non-appointment of judge.
He said that number of flights from Quetta has been decreased, causing tremendous problems for passengers.
He also expressed his reservation over slow speed of rescue services for calamity-hit people in Balochistan.
SC disqualifies PML-N MPA in fake degree case
Bugti murder case: Pervez Musharraf ordered to appear in Pakistan court
A Pakistani anti-terrorism court on Monday issued warrants for former military ruler Pervez Musharraf to appear before it in connection with the Nawab Akbar Bugti murder case.
During the hearing of the case in Quetta, former Interior Minister Aftab Sherpao and former provincial Home Minister Mir Shoaib Nowsherwani appeared in the court, while the officials of Crime Branch presented report relating to the non-availability of Musharraf.
The court then ordered for the production of Musharraf and also issued directives for the concerned jail officials in this regard. Later, the court adjourned the hearing until October 22 and the hearing of bail petitions of Aftab Sherpao and Shoaib Nowsherwani was also put off until then.
Musharraf's lawyers have said he faces security risks and hence the case should be moved out from Quetta. Meanwhile, the All Pakistan Muslim League (APML) of Musharraf protested against the continued detention of the former military dictator terming it "a part of an elaborate political conspiracy contrary to justice and the rule of law."
In a statement, Musharraf's political adviser Chaudry Sarfraz Anjum Kahlon stated that the former president "was being punished for protecting the unity and integrity of Pakistan against violent actors."
"All cases currently registered against Musharraf are politically orientated and devoid of any reality or legal merit. It is a grave injustice that the former president has been incarcerated for near to six months and serious questions are being raised about the validity of the legal process. "Kahlon added "those political forces behind the unjust and illegal detention of Musharraf are inadvertently emboldening extremists, terrorists and foreign backed separatists in Pakistan".
Government Announces Hike in Power Tariff
Ulema urge TTP, government for truce
ISLAMABAD: Prominent Ulema from Deoband school of thought have urged the government and Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) to declare ceasefire in the name of Allah Almighty and his messenger (PBUH).
In a joint statement issued here after a crucial meeting, held under the chair of Maulana Salimullah Khan Monday, the Ulema called upon both the parties to halt armed action until the outcome of peace negotiations.
The Ulema said the country was in civil war situation and some elements wanted to close the doors for peace.
They expressed satisfaction on the decision by the government, military and Taliban about ending civil war through dialogues. They also said that bloodshed was not the solution of any issue.
The meeting was attended among others by Mufti Rafi Usmani, Maulana Mufti Taqi Usmani, Dr Abdul Razaq Sikandar, Maulana Fazl Muhammad, Qari Hanif Jalindhari, Syed Adnan Kakakhel, Maulana Muhammad Hasan, Maulana Mukhtaruddin and Maulana Abdul Baba Shah Mansoor.
Bangladesh protest plans over Nobel laureate's gay rights comments
DHAKA: Bangladesh Islamic groups called Monday for a nationwide protest against Muhammad Yunus over comments in 2012 supporting gay rights, in the latest attack against the Nobel laureate and micro-loan pioneer.
The country's main mosque and an Islamic group with links to the government have launched a campaign against Yunus, whom they say should be prosecuted for supporting homosexuals in this deeply conservative Muslim country.
Hundreds of imams, many of whom are on the government's payroll, are expected to take part in the peaceful street protests on Tuesday, according to organisers, who claim rallies will be held in 600 towns across the country.
“Yunus must apologise for supporting homosexuality or he must be prosecuted for standing against the Quran and Islam,” an organiser, Maolana Moniruzzaman Rabbani, told AFP on Monday.
Rabbani, secretary of a committee that helps run the national mosque in Dhaka, said organisers would distribute 600,000 leaflets outlining Yunus's statement against violence and opposing discrimination against gay people.
The 73-year-old economist made the statement along with three other Nobel laureates in April 2012 following prosecutions of gay people in Uganda.
“We'll hold a massive rally against Yunus in the capital on October 31,”said Rabbani, who is also secretary general of the Islamic Oikyajote political party, which claims to be allied with the government.
“We have asked all Muslims to be united against Yunus's move to destroy our family and society,” he said.
Homosexuality is outlawed in Bangladesh.
A spokesperson for Yunus declined to comment because of the sensitivity of the issue. He is currently not in Bangladesh.
The campaign is the latest aimed at discrediting and attacking Yunus in Bangladesh. He was sacked in 2011 from Grameen Bank, the micro-credit pioneer he founded, after he angered the current Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina by joining politics briefly.
In September, the government launched tax probes against the anti-poverty campaigner and his seven social business firms, accusing them of evading millions of dollars in taxes.
Rabbani said the protests were being organised “solely in an effort to protect Islam and family”. But an official said the government's Islamic Foundation, which is responsible for religious affairs, was behind the campaign.
The official, who did not want to be named because he works for the Islamic Foundation, said it has ordered imams who are on government payrolls to join the protests.
“Its press has published the booklets and leaflets against Yunus,” he told AFP.
Shamim Afzal, head of the foundation, has denied that his department was behind the campaign or that it supported it.
Yunus set up Grameen Bank in 1983 and made it a global success story in tackling poverty. His efforts to make collateral-free micro loans easily available for Bangladesh's rural poor made him a national hero.
But he appeared to anger Hasina after he called for elections under a caretaker government — a key demand of the opposition
Rafique determined to improve Pakistan Railways
LAHORE: In a press conference at the Railway Headquarters, Federal Minister for Pakistan Railways Khawaja Saad Rafique on Monday stated that a new train would not be launched in the current fiscal year.
The minister added that all controversial contracts would be terminated.
Rafique presented a report pertaining to his 110-day reign as Federal Minister for Pakistan Railways, stating that the 50 per cent decrease in ticket prices had significantly increased the revenue of the Railway Ministry.
He added that three months earlier the Railway Ministry was forced to face a loss of 100million rupees per day, which had now been decreased to 80million.
The minister moreover said that the overall property holdings of the Pakistan Railways had been computerized, and action was being taken against those who had illegally occupied them.
While concluding the press conference, Rafique said the branding of trains and railway stations would be handed over to a multinational company to increase the ministry's earning.
Shebab says no woman involved in mall attack
NAIROBI: Somalia's Al-Shebab militants insisted Monday that no woman joined them in an attack on Nairobi's Westgate shopping mall, dismissing speculation that British 'White Widow' Samantha Lewthwaite took part in the massacre.
“We once again openly declare that no woman was involved at Westgate,”Shebab said on Twitter, reiterating it had a policy of “not employing sisters for such missions”.
“A week after Westgate, the Kenyan government and Western intelligence officials failed to uncover the facts and details of the Westgate Operation,” it added, playing up an apparent lack of information on the attackers and details of how the massacre was planned and carried out.
“The Kenyan govt (government) is still chasing its tail by holding on to the hopeless notion that a woman led the attack,” the group said in another Twitter post.
The four-day bloodbath at the upmarket shopping mall, which Kenyan forces brought to an end on Tuesday, left at least 67 people dead. The Kenyan Red Cross said Monday that 39 more were still missing.
Lewthwaite, a 29-year-old Muslim convert, was married to Germaine Lindsay, one of four suicide bombers who attacked the London transport network in July 2005, killing 52 people.
The mother-of-three has been on the run in East Africa for around two years and is wanted by Kenyan police for alleged involvement in a separate terror plot.
Interpol issued a “red notice” arrest warrant for Lewthwaite on charges of possessing explosives and conspiracy to commit a felony dating back to December 2011.
Kenyan officials have given contradictory statements about whether a British woman may have been involved in the attack.
Turkey to lift ban on Islamic headscarves
ANKARA: Turkey on Monday announced it would lift a ban on women wearing headscarves in most public offices, following other measures critics say are aimed at Islamising the staunchly secular country.
In a major speech to introduce political reforms, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that, with a few exceptions, civil servants would be allowed to wear headscarves after a long-standing ban is overturned.
However, the ban will remain in effect for judges, prosecutors, police and military personnel, he added.
The lifting of the ban was part of major political reforms announced by Erdogan in order to enhance the rights of minority groups including Turkey's 15 million Kurds.
The headscarf controversy reveals the rivalry in Turkey between religious conservatives, who form the bulk of Erdogan's Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP), and secular opponents.
Secularists, particularly those in the army, see the headscarf as a symbol of defiance against the strict separation of state and religion, a basic tenet of modern Turkey.
Erdogan's government was hit by a wave of nationwide unrest in June that threw up the biggest challenge to his decade-plus rule.
Protesters called Erdogan a “dictator”, accusing him of Islamising the predominantly Muslim but staunchly secular country.
Critics say that Erdogan's rule has left Turkish society more polarised than ever, with opponents of the AKP government openly voicing concerns that Turkey is sliding toward conservative Islam.
In 2004, his party attempted to submit a controversial amendment on banning adultery but had to back down amid criticism from opposition parties and women's groups.
Last year, Erdogan provoked outrage when he likened abortion to murder.
Secularists were also alarmed when parliament in 2012 approved his education reform that allowed for religious schools to raise what he described as “a pious generation.”
More recently, Turkey's parliament passed legislation curbing alcohol sales and advertising, the toughest such measures in the republic's history.
This month, an Istanbul court again handed a 10-month suspended jail term to world-renowned Turkish pianist Fazil Say during a retrial over social media posts deemed religiously offensive.
Professor Ilter Turan of the Istanbul-based Bilgi University said that the lifting of the ban on the headscarf was not unusual. “The ban has gradually been melting down throughout the AKP's rule,” he told AFP.
“To a great extent, it has not been applied in some government offices and AKP-led municipalities.”
The headscarf reform is considered as a gesture by Erdogan to his grassroots in the run-up to elections. His party has relaxed the ban at universities.
The country votes in local elections in March, a presidential election in August and parliamentary polls in 2015.
An AKP lawmaker however expressed discontent with the exceptions on the headscarf reform.
“Why shouldn't judges and prosecutors wear headscarves? Can't those who wear headscarves deliver fair verdicts?” AKP's deputy Cengiz Yavilioglu wrote on his Twitter account.
He also wrote that: “The headscarf ban was one of the most serious human rights violations. Despite the exceptions, the lifting of the ban is the return of a major right.”
The Islamic-rooted party insists that the ban flouts freedom of conscience and undermines the right to education.
The move is likely to pave the way for headscarf-wearing lawmakers to enter parliament. In 1999, Merve Kavakci of the now-defunct Islamic Virtue Party, was prevented from taking her parliamentary oath because she wore a headscarf.
Obama tells Netanyahu he will be 'clear eyed' in Iran talks
WASHINGTON: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned on Monday Iran must dismantle its “military nuclear program” as a condition for a diplomatic breakthrough that would head off the prospect of military action.
Netanyahu told President Barack Obama in White House talks that such a step was Israel's “bottom line” as hopes rise of a deal to end the nuclear showdown between Washington, world powers and Tehran.
Obama, meanwhile, promised Netanyahu that the United States would be “clear eyed” in talks with Iran but that it had to “test” prospects for a breakthrough, though reserved the right to take military action against nuclear installations in Iran if diplomacy failed.
Netanyahu warned that Iran was committed to Israel's destruction and that its words and actions should be judged with that in mind.
“The bottom line is that Iran fully dismantles its military nuclear program,” he said after over an hour of talks with Obama in the Oval Office.
Netanyahu also argued that economic sanctions must be kept in force through any diplomatic process with Iran, which will resume next month in Geneva.
“Those pressures must be kept in place,” he said.
“In fact, if Iran continues to advance its nuclear program during negotiations, the sanctions should be strengthened.”
Obama credited the economic sanctions that have hammered Iran's economy with prompting its leaders to try a more serious diplomatic process on the nuclear program, following his telephone call on Friday with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.
“We have to test diplomacy, we have to see if in fact they are serious about their willingness to abide by international norms and international law,”Obama said.
“We enter into these negotiations very clear eyed. They will not be easy.”Obama also made clear that he reserved the right to take military action against Iran.
“We take no options off the table, including military options,” Obama said.
Ulema urge TTP, government for truce
In a joint statement issued here in Islamabad after a crucial meeting, held under the chair of Maulana Salimullah Khan Monday, the Ulema called upon both the parties to halt armed action until the outcome of peace negotiations.
The Ulema said the country was in civil war situation and some elements wanted to close the doors for peace.
They expressed satisfaction on the decision by the government, military and Taliban about ending civil war through dialogues. They also said that bloodshed was not the solution of any issue.
The meeting was attended among others by Mufti Rafi Usmani, Maulana Mufti Taqi Usmani, Dr Abdul Razaq Sikandar, Maulana Fazl Muhammad, Qari Hanif Jalindhari, Syed Adnan Kakakhel, Maulana Muhammad Hasan, Maulana Mukhtaruddin and Maulana Abdul Baba Shah Mansoor.
Multiple Car Bombs Wreak Havoc In Baghdad, Killing Dozens
A spate of car bombs exploded during Baghdad 's
morning rush hour Monday, killing at least 47 people and wounding
dozens more. Most of the bombs struck areas with large Shiite
populations; various news agencies are reporting that from nine to 14
separate bombs were detonated.
Many of the car bombs resulted in far more injuries than
deaths. But at least one explosion was especially damaging. According to the
BBC and Reuters, an attack in Baghdad 's
Sadr City
The violence follows an attack Sunday in which a suicide
bombertargeted a mosque south of Baghdad .
The building's roof collapsed in that blast, which killed 47 people.
Punjab sends relief package for quake affectees
It further stated that on the instructions of Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, a delegation of assembly members and senior officers has reached Karachi to review the requirements of the calamity-hit people.
The delegation includes Member Provincial Assembly Asif Mazari, Member Board of Revenue Shumail Khawaja, DG Punjab Disaster Management Authority Capt. Asif. The delegation reviewed relief activities of relief centres set up in Hub, the border area of Balochistan and also met Secretary Excise Qambar Hashti who has been appointed Chief Coordinator by Balochistan government. The delegation also considered a comprehensive plan for the early rehabilitation of the earthquake-hit people.
Member Board of Revenue Shumail Khawaja also contacted Chief Secretary Balochistan Babar Yaqoob Fateh Muhammad on telephone and discussed various matters regarding expediting relief and rehabilitation activities for the calamity-hit people.
Shumail Khawaja assured Chief Secretary that Chief Minister Punjab Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif is anxious for the rehabilitation of calamity-hit people and the people and government of Punjab would spare no effort for the help of Balochi brethren in this hour of distress. He said that on the instructions of Chief Minister Punjab, DG PDMA will stay in the earthquake affected area of Balochistan till the situation improves.
According to the delegation, the Chief Minister Punjab is being informed about the measures for relief and rehabilitation of the earthquake victims on daily basis and the requirements will be fulfilled immediately. It may be mentioned that Punjab Chief Minister has allocated his helicopter for relief activities of earthquake-hit people.
Britain recruiting cyber-warriors
The Ministry of Defence is looking to recruit hundreds of computer experts to help defend Britain’s national security.
The “cyber reservists” would work alongside regular forces in the new Joint Cyber Reserve Unit in a bid to to protect key computer networks and safeguard data. The new capability would be able to “counter-attack in cyber-space and, if necessary, to strike in cyber-space as part of our full-spectrum military capability”, Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservative Party said. The centre-right party kicks off its annual conference on Sunday.
“In response to the growing cyber threat, we are developing a full-spectrum military cyber capability, including a strike capability, to enhance the UK’s range of military capabilities,” the Conservative Defence Secretary Philip Hammond said.
“Increasingly, our defence budget is being invested in high-end capabilities such as cyber and intelligence and surveillance assets to ensure we can keep the country safe.
“The cyber reserves will be an essential part of ensuring we defend our national security in cyber-space.
“This is an exciting opportunity for Internet experts in industry to put their skills to good use for the nation, protecting our vital computer systems and capabilities.”
As well as targeting regular personnel leaving full-time roles and existing reservists with the right skill set, Hammond hopes to attract experts who would not otherwise consider joining up. Recruitment starts in October.
In January, parliament’s defence scrutiny committee warned in a report that the British military’s dependence on information technology meant it could be “fatally compromised” by a cyber-attack.
The committee heard evidence that cyber-attacks could disrupt military communication and information systems, radars and satellites, and leave combat units such as planes or ships dysfunctional.
The MPs expressed concern that the government did not have a back-up plan in the case of a failure of technology, instead focusing on averting such attacks in the first place.
Pak-India dialogue process must continue: PM
To a question, he said the issue of terrorism was not just limited to Pakistan but many other countries were also facing this challenge.
He said Taliban had disowned the bomb blasts in a church in Peshawar and then we have to identify those elements who were behind such attacks.
He stressed the need to expose those who were involved in terrorism and extremism.
Bangladeshi businessmen sign agreements worth $8 mln with Pakistan
ISLAMABAD: Bangladeshi businessmen have signed agreements worth US $8 million with Pakistan to import GFC Fans, Kinnows and Basmati Rice at EXPO 2013.
During the MoU signing ceremony held at Expo Convention at Karachi the other day said that three Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) have been finalized between Bangladeshi Buyers and Pakistani Companies in the presence of Mrs. Shahida Qaiser, Director Investment /B2B TDAP, Mr. Riazuddin Qureshi DG Board of Investment Sindh and Commercial Attache of Pakistan at Dhaka Ms Farah Farooq.
The GFC Fans has agreed to provide 150,000 fans to Nurul Islam a Bangleshi delegate representing Shuba Enterprises and Z&Z Corporation Bangladesh worth US $ 5 Million for FY 2013-14, says a statement issued by the TDAP here today.
Another major agreement amounting to US $2 million took place between M/s Tasho Entreprises Bangladesh and M/S Roshan Enterprises Pakistan for export of kinnow to Bangladesh from November this year.
M/S Tasho Enterprises who is the biggest importer of fresh fruits, vegetables, dry fruit, dates and other food items visiting Pakistan as a delegate from Bangladesh has also got a purchase order of Basmati Rice from MATCO Rice worth almost half a million dollars.
Earlier during the day, in a meeting held with Secretary TDAP, Mrs. Rabia Javery Agha the Bangladeshi delegation informed her about the Pakistani products as are having huge demand like ladies fabric and designer wear lawns, footwear, pharmaceutical raw material and medicines, spices, marble and the emerging market of mini trucks.
On the existing trade volume between Bangladesh and Pakistan which is not very impressive it was shared by the delegation that due to certain barriers to trade like restrains on business visas which the entrepreneurs from both the sides recurrently face, non-Signing of FTA between the two countries and lack of implementation of regional agreement the South Asian Free Trade Agreement in its true spirit by the two countries that the progress on increasing trade relations and business remain slow.
While talking to media, Commercial Attache of Pakistan in Bangladesh informed that a 20 member delegation has arrived this year to attend the EXPO 2013 with leading importers of food, sports, surgical goods, food processing and textile raw material, machinery and plants some of whom are already importing goods from Pakistan.
Whereas, this year three buyers from other potential areas are also attending expo like marble, chain super stores/retail outlets and pharmaceutical.
She emphasized the need for more active interaction and linkages between the Chambers, Trade bodies and Associations of both the countries in promoting mutual commercial interest of both countries.
Israeli President Peres: All options open on Iran
AMSTERDAM: Israeli President Shimon Peres says ''all options'' are being kept open in forcing Iran to give up its nuclear program, which Iran says is for peaceful purposes but Israel and others believe is aimed at building nuclear arms.
He said the economic sanctions against Iran now have not dissuaded the country from enriching uranium or building long-range missiles, although it may have affected Tehran's public statements.
Peres said it would be better if sanctions did stop Iran from being ''a centre of terror, but all options are otherwise being kept.''
''The Syrians were forced this time by an agreement between the United States and Russia to give up their chemical arsenal,'' he said. ''They didn't do it before the world threatened them with the military option.''
Peres spoke at the Peace Palace in The Hague after meeting with judges at the International Court of Justice, sometimes called the World Court, on Monday. The ICJ ruled in 2004 in a nonbinding advisory opinion that Israel's security barrier violated international law. Israel rejected the opinion.
Asked whether Israel would be willing to join the Organization for the Prohibition for Chemical Weapons as Syria is now doing, Peres said his government, which is widely believed to possess chemical weapons, ''will consider'' it.
Israel has signed but not ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention, which forbids the production, stockpiling or use of chemical weapons and automatically leads to membership in the OPCW.
After Syria's agreement last week to join the organization, only Israel, Egypt, North Korea, Burma, Angola and South Sudan are not members.
On Friday, the U.N. Security Council ordered the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to help Syria destroy its chemical weapons by mid-2014. Inspectors from the OPCW were leaving the Netherlands on Monday for Syria to begin the process.
Asked what he thought of the speech by Iran's new President Hassan Rouhani to the United Nations last week in which Rouhani argued Iran's nuclear program is purely civilian, Peres told reporters it contradicted a speech the Iranian leader gave just two days earlier to Iran's Revolutionary Guard. In that, Rouhani vowed to continue building long-range missiles.
Peres said those missiles could have no purpose other than to carry nuclear warheads, so the two speeches were contradictory.
''I hope that the facts will justify the hopes of many that we will see a different Iran, but finally we can judge only by the acts and by the deeds,'' he said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is due to meet with President Barack Obama later Monday in Washington and discuss relations with Iran.
Vietnam economy sees dollarisation decline
HA NOI: The prevalence of US dollars in the Vietnamese economy had decreased significantly since the end of 2011 and the exchange rates had been stabilised, according to a State Bank of Vietnam statement.
The decline of dollarisation (the habit of using US dollars in daily activities and trades between local people and firms) was seen in the narrowing ratio of foreign currency deposits against total money supply.
The figure fell from 30 per cent in 1990, to 15.8 per cent by the end of 2011, most recently dropping to 12 per cent by the end of last month.
The central bank also pointed out that credit in Vietnamese dong had surged significantly, while credit in US dollars had plummeted. In the first eight months of the year, credit in dong rose by 10.4 per cent while credit in dollars fell by 11.55 per cent.
The central bank has also taken measures this year to stabilise exchange rates and the foreign exchange market, helping to raise the country's forex reserves, support the implementation of monetary policy and control inflation.
A number of key measures have indicated the central bank's effectiveness in achieving these aims. For example, the central bank said at the start of the year it would continue to keep exchange rates stable within the two to three per cent fluctuation band to improve market sentiment, drive exchange rate expectations and reinforce the people's confidence in the domestic currency.
The SBV upgraded the average inter-bank exchange rate by one per cent from 20,828 dong/US$ to 21,036 dong on June 28, while cutting interest rates for US dollar deposits to encourage people to hold their dong and reduce foreign currency holdings.
The central bank has also maintained flexible dollar bid prices to encourage banks to sell foreign currency to the SBV.
Due to the synchronous and drastic measures, the forex market and the exchange rate held firm in the first eight months this year, as many of the other targets were also met.
VIB deputy director Le Quang Trung forecast the exchange rate would likely be adjusted up one per cent before the end of the year to support exports.
However, with the possible rise, the exchange rate would stay within the two to three per cent fluctuation band targeted by the central bank.
Trung said dollar demand often rose at the end of the year when businesses import demands were high, adding that the central bank's continuous gold imports to supply the domestic market could also cause dollar demand to rise.
Trung recommended that businesses, especially major exporters, should sign insurance contracts to negate risks related to exchange rate losses.
Director of the Bank for Investment and Development of Viet Nam's Transaction Centre No3 Can Van Luc also anticipated that dollar demand at the end of the year would surge significantly, but said the change would come in ‘small waves', causing little impact on the forex market.
Qaeda militants seize army HQ in Yemen port city
ADEN: Al-Qaeda militants seized army headquarters in Yemeni port city Mukalla Monday, killing two soldiers and taking many more hostage, in their second major assault in 10 days, military officials said.
Militants from Al-Qaeda-linked Ansar al-Sharia stormed the seaside base after a suicide bomber rammed a car into the entrance, a military official said.
The militants, who were dressed in special forces uniforms and drew up in four military vehicles, then took much of the garrison hostage, the official said.
The commander of the army's second military region, General Muhsen Hasan, thought initially to have been captured, was outside the building at the time of the attack, another official said.
“He is now in another military base in Mukalla, drawing up plans with other officers to recapture the building,” the official said.
Army reinforcements have been deployed to the area and have engaged the militants, a third official, warning that militants would “pay a heavy price” for the spectacular attack.
“Army troops and security forces have cordoned off the entire area,” he said.
Mukalla is capital of Yemen's southeastern province of Hadramawt and a major port city.
It is the second major assault on the Yemeni army by Al-Qaeda in 10 days.
On September 20, suspected Al-Qaeda fighters killed at least 56 soldiers and police in coordinated dawn attacks in Shabwa province further west.
That was the deadliest day for the Yemeni security forces since the army recaptured a string of southern towns from the jihadists in a major offensive last year.
Washington regards Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula as the global jihadist network's most dangerous affiliate and has stepped up its drone strikes against the group in recent weeks.
The man with Assad’s ear
Khaled Mahjoub, a Syrian-American businessman, went to school with the president’s brother and is very close to the family. What does he think about the outcome of the troubles in Syria?
WHEN Khaled Mahjoub talks, he doesn’t take his eyes off you. He is, in this sense, an interrogator (of which more later) but he is also a man who has great influence with Bashar al-Assad. He went to school with his brother Basel, he knows the family well, and today he communicates directly with the President of Syria. He may not be his “right hand” — that might be the role of Asma, the President’s wife — but I suspect he would like to be. He talks passionately of environmentally sustainable houses and a new economy for the world, yet he adulates Bashar al-Assad. Mr Mahjoub, I can only conclude, is a weird mixture of Gordon Brown and Albert Speer.
He puffs on one of his massive cigars (he has a factory that makes them in Latakia and the cigars are also eco-friendly) and he doesn’t stop talking. He wants a “Marshall Plan” for the rebuilding of Syria — the invocation of the US rebuilding of post-war Europe is merely symbolic, I am relieved to hear — and he talks, on and on and on, about the “Salafi-Wahhabi petrodollar”. Syria is now fighting this very threat, the same awful combination that sent 19 hijackers to attack America on 11 September 2001.
There may be truth in some of this. But many believe cynically — and their contention also bears the merit of truth — that Mr Mahjoub is President Assad’s point man in the West, his role to persuade its leaders and journalists that the Syrian regime is the only secular government left in the Middle East and that its enemies will strike at Europe if they win in Syria. It’s no disadvantage that the 57-year-old has been a US citizen since 1993.
“There is something that’s forgotten since the Salafi-Wahhabi petrodollar attack on the US on 9/11 — the dimension of ideology versus ideology,” he says. “You need to have Syria’s moderate Sufi ideology — you need to have Syria on your side to fight the Salafi-Wahhabi mosques in Europe. This is not a luxury, it’s a necessity. It’s a must. The only one to have this idea is Syria, which is working within UN Security Council Resolution 1373.”
I’m not entirely sure that Syria is locked into Sufism, the ascetic, gentle, almost mystical Muslim sect which is so opposed to the Islamist ideology. But we must note that the 28 September 2001 UN Security Council resolution calls on all states “to refrain from organising, instigating, assisting or participating in terrorist acts in another state”.
This is shrewd stuff. Who has been arming and encouraging the armed uprising against the Assad regime? Why, Turkey, Qatar and Salafist Saudi Arabia, of course. And are they not, in the words of 1373, “knowingly financing, planning and inciting terrorist acts”? Yet, there is another side to the president’s friend that suddenly emerged at a dinner in Damascus which I joined with one of his close friends, a lawyer whom I know personally. It was one of those moments that was as revealing as it was frightening.
“Earlier this year, you interviewed some prisoners in the military prison and one of them was a French-Algerian who was caught fighting for the rebels,” Mr Mahjoub said. “He told you he was confused, that he regretted coming here. But he was lying to you. I went to see him. He was lying. He is an out-and-out Islamist. He is a terrorist.” And then Mr Mahjoub described exactly where I was sitting during the interview — which appeared in The Independent on Sunday earlier this year — and knew exactly the moment when I asked the prison governor to leave the room before questioning the bearded inmate. Mr Mahjoub had been to see this prisoner, to cross-question him about what he told me.
So he must also — and he must forgive me if my suspicions naturally lead me to this conclusion — be a prison interrogator, reporting back directly to the President of Syria. That was the moment it occurred to me that Mr Mahjoub could be a very dangerous man. I tried to reason with him, to tell him that the prisoner’s divorced wife in Marseilles wants him home with her and their children, that she wrote me a most beautiful and moving letter asking for help. “Wrong!” boomed Mr Mahjoub. No, he was wrong, I said. And he shook his head with impatience.
But let’s return to his Marshall Plan. “Everybody promises money after destruction,” he says. “Everyone promised Haiti, they promised to rebuild Iraq. But the promise wasn’t fulfilled to Haiti. Iraq did not rebuild. It was a lie. Waiting for the donors is not going to help. Rebuilding requires coherent multi- programmes. It’s not sufficient just to reconstruct buildings. You have to start with the human being before you start rebuilding walls. When I talk about the Marshall Plan, I’m not talking about rebuilding. That’s a failure — like the ‘war on terror’. What will make Syria different is a different Marshall Plan.
“So who’s going to pay? By law, and respecting and enforcing international law, there are three countries which did not respect UNSC 1373: Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. These countries — which were supporting, directly or indirectly, Al Qaeda and its affiliates to come to Syria and destroy the socio-economic fabric of Syria — they have to pay for what they have destroyed.
“The last thing they will pay for is the infrastructure. They must pay for the rebuilding of the socioeconomic fabric which is the immune system of Syrian moderate Sufism. The Emir of Qatar, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and Prime Minister Erdogan of Turkey are going to be the General Marshalls. They will pay because the law must be imposed on them.”
And Khaled Mahjoub is off again on his favourite subject. Why don’t the Muslims in Europe integrate with the countries they live in? How come that even in the most generous and humane country in Europe — Sweden — they have problems with their Muslims? Europe doesn’t understand that subsidies will not create an integrated Muslim society. Muslims in the West should be given loans. “There is in these countries no fundamental equilibrium between rights and duties. People don’t recognise the ‘duty’ bit. President Assad is the best ‘change agent’. He is the only one who can keep Syria as a state and not be systematised” — I think Mr Mahjoub meant “sectarianised” — “like Iraq. The army and the old government institutions must be kept in place.”
The Syrian tragedy, he says, may last another two years, but the “war with terror” will take decades. “We’re going to have to adapt to a new situation where the big cities will be saved but there will be continuous attacks and war in the suburbs.” Once more, I am troubled by Mr Mahjoub. The elite will be safe in the city centre, it seems, but the poor will be traumatised in the wreckage around it. He talks about “the new urbanism”, which I find rather frightening.
Then he turns to the August 21 sarin gas attack. What about the rebels who were caught by the Turks carrying sarin gas weapons, he asks. “They captured three or four of 11 men involved, one was a Syrian, another a Turk, a third a Libyan. Why don’t you look up the indictment of the attorney general for Adana? They captured two kilos of sarin grenades. The indictment talks of the sarin coming from Libya.”
I promise to try to obtain a copy of the Adana indictment, if it exists in printed form, but Mr Mahjoub is talking now of the “environmentally sustainable houses” he builds — and which he will build, I suppose, in an environmentally sustainable Syria with all that Turkish, Qatari and Saudi cash. After which, I guess, Syria will purge the fundamentalism from Europe’s mosques and emerge as the West’s best secular friend in the Middle East, led — no doubt — by his close friend Bashar al-Assad.
Shanghai opens free trade zone
SHANGHAI: China's Commerce Minister Gao Hucheng said the zone is set to become a pilot project for economic reform and a role model in efforts to upgrade the Chinese economy.
Dai Haibo, deputy secretary-general of the Shanghai municipal government and vice-director of the zone's management committee, said the guiding principle is to shift the overriding role of the government from administrative to supervisory.
Enterprises will no longer need to seek government approval for many of the things they want to do in the zone.
In three years, the country will build on the experience gleaned from the Shanghai free trade zone, and further reform targets may be set, Dai said.
These include, in certain areas, no administrative approval required for company registration, no restrictions in equity ratios and limited disclosure requirements.
The cornerstones are the reform of power structures and government transparency, with positive changes in policy coordination, information tracking and effect evaluation.
A case in point is the treatment of foreign investors as nationals in economic sectors that are not specifically restricted, said Liu Yajun, director of the department of foreign investment administration with the Ministry of Commerce.
To encourage and simplify foreign investment, an Internet-based registration system will be introduced for enterprises whose business portfolios do not fall in the restricted areas, Liu said.
That would effectively shorten the registration period from the current 29 days to a minimum of four days, Dai said.
A fast-track channel has also been established to lure financial institutions with strong profitability and risk-control capabilities to enter the zone, said Liao Min of the Shanghai branch of the China Banking Regulatory Commission.
He confirmed that banking regulators will adjust loan-to-deposit ratios and other regulatory requirements for banks operating in the area.
A series of customs clearance and supervision policies have been initiated to offer more complete, convenient and transparent foreign trade services, said Zhang Wansheng, director of the General Administration of Customs' processing trade and bonded system department.
For instance, companies can have their cargo transported into warehouses before they declare customs, said Zhang, adding that a unified information monitoring system will be set up to supervise entrants.
The government vowed to enhance the efficiency of customs administration, improving the speed and ease with which imports and exports can clear customs and the quality and range of services national customs authorities provide, according to Liu Deping, director of the border check department of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine.
"To facilitate easier trade, authorities have lowered the threshold for inspection and quarantine to avoid rigorous inspections and customs assessments and therefore reduce companies' costs," said Liu.
He noted that 18 directives, including the launch of an information sharing platform and an early warning system, are being rolled out to relieve administrative burdens for companies.
"The waiver or less restricted export product examinations will save companies time and money spent renting warehouses," said Zhao Pei'en, a certified public accountant in Shanghai, adding that such reform spells a "substantial bonus" for a wide range of industries.
This will simplify the registration process in setting up a business, said Liu Jun, China chief representative of Northern Melbourne Institute, one of Australia's leading vocational training institutes.
"In our case, the new framework saves us time and efforts to turn to the Ministry of Education each time we wish to get our programmes approved," said Liu, who was cheered by the fact that joint venture educational and job-training institutions are included in the 18 sectors open to foreign investment.
Liu said he is seeing a decentralised government structure, and hopes that the zone encapsulates all the functions companies need to get businesses going.
China's economic and social development requires more intense reforms, as unnecessary government intervention in the private sector has resulted in abuses of power, said Sun Lijian, vice-dean of the School of Economics at Fudan University.
"I think the zone is imperative in carrying out bolder experiments in relaxing the control of the public sector and making the government leaner and efficient," Sun said.
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