RECCA-VI will be different from previous ones: MFA

Transcription

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Eye on the News
TUESDAY
.
SEPTEMBER 01
.
2015 -Sunbula 10, 1394 HS
Truthful, Factual and Unbiased
www.afghanistantimes.af
Vol:X Issue No:40 Price: Afs.15
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RECCA-VI will
be different from
previous ones: MFA
The First Vice President Abdul
Rashid Dostum - who has spent
the past few weeks in Faryab, and
more recently in Sar-e-Pul province - said on Monday that plots
against Afghanistan in Sar-e-Pul by
Pakistan's Inter-Services intelligence (ISI) have been foiled after
the Taliban were defeated in Kohistanat district. This comes after
the military operation that Dos-
tum was leading managed to stamp
out insurgents in the area and restore law-and-order. He termed the
retaking of Kohistanat as a big victory and congratulated the people
for it. Dostum called on Kohistanat
residents to unite, and work hard
at maintaining security in the district. He also appealed to the locals to prevent the Taliban from
making a comeback in the area. "All
nefarious ends of ISI will be foiled
slowly slowly. The people of Afghanistan will not let the Taliban
adopt their plans here," Dostum
said. "I congratulate this victory on
all Sar-e-Pul residents including the
youth, elders, religious scholars,
women and those who go to
school."A number of tribal elders in
Sar-e-Pul praised Dostum's efforts
to stabilize the province.
126 school girls, teachers poisoned in Herat
AT News Report
KABUL: As many as 126
schoolgirls, teachers and kindergarten kids on Monday mysteriously fell sick in the city of
Herat prompting officials to
probe whether they were poisoned by the Taliban insurgents.
They were rushed to a nearby
hospital. In the past such inci-
dents have already been occurred
while the Taliban have been
blamed for it. Muhammad Rafiq
Sherzai, spokesman for Herat
provincial hospital, said that they
have admitted 126 student and
teachers of Habibul Mustafa
School.
He said that classrooms might
have been sprayed with toxic material. He added that the girls and
teachers were vomiting and some
of them were unconscious when
admitted to the hospital. He said
that all the admitted people are in
stable health condition. A health
team has been sent to the area for
investigations, Sherzai added.
Herat police spokesman, Abdul
Raouf Ahmadi, confirmed that incident and said that they have
launched a probe into the incident;
however, no arrestment has been
made so far.
AT News Report
KABUL: The National Directorate of Security (NDS) arrested 30
people in connection with devastating terror attacks in Kabul.
A press statement issued by
the NDS said that the operatives
of the spy agency arrested 30 militants of Haqqani network, who
were allegedly involved in recent
suicide truck blast in Shah Shaheed are of Kabul, suicide car blasts
near Hamid Karzai International
Airport and 4th Macroryan as well
as terror attack on parliament. The
militants also wanted to conduct
terror attacks on the Presidential Palace, NDS headquarters, Ministry of
Defense, US embassy, Kabul Police
Headquarters, parliament and
Khatemul Nabieen University, the
statement added. The statement said
that the NDS operatives also recovered two trucks full of explosive materials. It is worth mentioning that
the Taliban militants have recently
intensified their terrorist activities
in different provinces, particularly
Kabul. Militants conducted five terror attacks over the past 20 days in
Kabul only that killed and wounded
over 500 innocent civilians.
This time re gional countries will also reach an agreement
on time ly implementation of the e conomic projects .
sults for Afghanistan and the enAbdul Zuhoor Qayomi
tire region. Mustaghni said that
KABUL: The Ministry of For- the Afghan government has taken
eign Affairs (MoFA) said that the all preparations to host the sumSixth Regional Economic Cooper- mit. MoFA has held several meetation Conferences for Afghanistan ings with representatives of con(RECCA VI) would be different cerned ministries to take their suggestions regarding the conference,
from the previous ones.
Spokesman of the MoFA, he added. He said that high-rankAhmad Shekib Mustaghni, in in- ing officials from 70 countries and
terview with Afghanistan Times representatives of some regional
said that the difference of the and international organizations
RECCA VI conference with the have been invited to attend the
previous ones is that a regional two-day conference. The RECconsensus will be reached on great CA VI conference which is going
economic projects in different ar- to be held on 3rd and 4th of Sepeas including trade, transit, devel- tember will explore ways to enopment of natural resources, re- hance regional economic
gional connectivity and private cooperation.It is worth of mentioning that the first RECCA consector development.
He added, this time regional ference was held in Kabul city in
countries will also reach an agree- 2005, the second in 2006 in New
ment on timely implementation of Delhi, the third in 2009 in Islamabad, the fourth in Istanbul in 2010
the economic projects.
He hoped that the RECCA VI and the fifth was held in Dushanconference will yield fruitful re- be, the capital city of Tajikistan.
65.45
64.45
73.05
72.05
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.
TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 01, 2015
AFGHANISTAN TIMES
H RW w an ts aid do n o rs
TO STRESS ACCOUNTABILITY
KABUL: Millions of dollars have
been spent under the Afghanistan
Peace and Reintegration Program
(APRP), a government peace programme, but many people are not
happy with its outcome as they
say the conflict has further intensified compared to the past.
By joining the APRP, designed, implemented, and executed by Afghans to provide a way
for insurgents to stop fighting and
rejoin their communities with honor and dignity, ex-rebels make the
commitment to renounce violence,
sever all ties with the insurgency
and abide by the Constitution of
Afghanistan. This includes the
acceptance of the government of
Afghanistan s laws on women s
rights. Former president Hamid
Karzai decreed the programme in
compliance with the advice from
the National Peace Advisory Jirga with financial support from the
international community.
Rolled out in all Afghanistan s
provinces, the High Peace Council (HPC), a government entity
tasked with negotiating peace
with insurgents, has been leading
the programme since its launch
five years ago. The 69-member
HPC has peace committees in all
provinces except central Panjsher
province. The peace committees,
which operate under the HPC
head office in Kabul, have 888
members and 142 staff members.
Expenses: Though millions of
dollars have been spent on the
peace process, but information in
this regard has largely been denied
to journalists. According to the
Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU), an independent research organisation based
in Kabul, 782 million US dollars
had been set aside for the reintegration programme. The United
Nations Development Program
(UNDP) writes that donor countries assisting the programme have
been divided into three categories.
The Ministry of Finance and other authorities concerned do not
provide needed information about
the donors in first and third categories, but the Ministry of Finance says the donors in the second category have so far pledged
$130.4 million in assistance with
the programme. Of the $131.7
million channeled through the
UNDP in 2014, so far $109 million has been utilised, according
to the ministry. The UNDP also
writes the second category donors
have assisted the APRP programme with $131.7 million. But
advisor with HPC on foreign relations Mohammad Ismail Qasimyar said the HPC expenses stood
at nearly $3 million a year. He said
funds from donor countries were
being used through various ministries and departments in peace
related projects. Rumours being
circulated among the people and
the media that millions of dollars
had been spent on the council are
completely baseless. The HPC
budgets during the past four or
five years were $2.5m sometimes
$2.6m and $2.8m below $3 million. These budges are less than
received by other departments and
ministries. The funds were used
to arrange gatherings, meetings,
conferences, direct and indirect
contacts. He said claims made regarding huge spending were about
the amounts which had been di-
Afghans
score 3rd
triumph in
a row,
trounce UAE
KABUL: Afghanistan scored their
third triumph in a row by trouncing the United Arab Emirates
(UAE) in their Under-19 Premier
Asia Cup match in Kuala Lumpur
on Monday, an official said.
The six-nation cup features
Afghanistan, Kuwait, Malaysia,
Nepal, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
The winners will qualify for the
Under-19 World Cup scheduled
to take place in Bangladesh in
2016. Afghanistan Cricket Board
spokesman Farid Hotak told Pajhwok Afghan News the UAE
won the toss and elected to bat in
the 50-over encounter. But the
opposition were bundled out for
88 runs in the 31st over. Hotak
said Tariq Khan was the pick of
Afghan bowlers, clinching five
wickets. Ziaur Rahman and Rashid Khan claimed two scalps apiece
to leave the UAE reeling in what
appeared an utterly one-sided
match. The holders, who mauled
Kuwait and Nepal in their previous duels, raced to the target in
the 13th over without losing any
batsman. Tariq was adjudged the
Man of the Match, the spokesman said. With three consecutive
wins under their belt, Afghanistan
are scheduled to take on Saudi
Arabia on Tuesday (tomorrow)
before squaring off against hosts
Malaysia on Sept. 3, Hotak added. (Pajhwok)
rectly given to on-budget line ministries. I will cite a practical example; the US gives $50 million
to the Rural Development Ministry for its development projects
and National Solidarity Program
(NSP). Maybe some of the money was used to provide jobs to
reconciling militants. Gains The
High Peace Council says so far
10,500 militants have joined the
peace process, with nearly onefourth former rebels surrendering
in northwestern Badghis province. The fewer number of militants joined the peace process in
southwestern Nimroz province.
The body says the surrendering
militants have turned in 8101
weapons, all handed over to the
government. More than half of the
weapons were collected in Herat,
Baghlan, Ghor and Nangarhar
provinces. Figures available with
the HPC show most of the reconciling militants joined the peace
process in western and northwestern provinces and the least in
northwest and southern provinces. But the reconciliation of these
fighters with the government has
not helped strengthen the peace
programme instead the conflict has
further intensified. United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) s annual
reports say nearly 47,000 civilians, including women and children, have been killed or wounded during the last five and a half
years. They include 16,954 dead
and 29,744 injured. In 2014, compared to 2010 or the year when
the HPC was created, the number
of civilian casualties has risen by
47 percent. The latest UNAMA
report says 1,592 civilians were
killed and another 3329 injured
during the first half of 2015. During this period, the warring parties have also suffered heavy casualties and even the HPC members were not spared. Former
president and the HPC chairman,
Prof. Burhanuddin Rabbani, was
assassinated in a suicide attacker
who posed as peace emissary at
Rabbani s residence in Kabul in
September, 2011. Months later,
another key member of the HPC,
Arsala Rahmani, was killed in an
attack. Besides these two individuals, the HPC says 33 members
of provincial peace committees
have been killed in 17 provinces.
Some Kabul residents say they are
not satisfied with the HPC
achievement as they cite the increasing casualty toll and growing
insecurity in northern provinces.
One of them, Zarin Khan Adil,
says: Millions of dollars have
been spent on the HPC and thousands of people compensated in
the name of peace, but where is
the peace? He called the HPC as
a symbolic body and its mission
far from reality. We want this
peace body to be dissolved, we
are no way support of the council. Similarly, another resident of
Kabul City, Ismail Totakhel, said
the HPC lacked an organised and
effective strategy to advance the
peace process and it worked like
an opposition team. He urged the
government to dissolve the council. Law and political science teacher at Kabul University Shehla Farid also says the HPC has no gains
and money spent on it has been
wasted. If you ask a common
man about the achievements of
the HPC and particularly if you
ask the war-affected families, they
will clearly say the council has
achieved nothing. She said the reconciliation of the nearly 10,000
militants was not an achievement
because most of them had returned
to the battlefield. She said they
would call it achievement if the
surrendering militants did not return to their comrades. The university teacher said the HPC offices in Kabul and provinces consumed enough budgets despite being inaccessible for people and
without any significant achievement. She also criticised the HPC s
composition and said: Former
government officials and politicians
did not take into consideration the
effectiveness and popularity of
individuals before appointing them
as members of the council. There
is no criterion for the appointment
of HPC members. Shehla Farid
said warlords had been appointed
in the HPC, who saw their survival in prolonging the conflict. On
failure of the peace process, she
accused foreign countries, particularly Pakistan, of being behind the
conflict in Afghanistan and said the
HPC had no comprehensive strategy to follow. Insisting on an effective strategy for peace, she said:
I appeal to the political leaders of
the unity government to dismantle
the High Peace Council as soon as
possible for failing to achieve any
progress. She said the money being given to the HPC should be instead spent on the wellbeing of victims of the conflict. But Mohammad Ismail Qasimyar said the HPC
had many achievements and the
peace process could not succeed
due to foreign interference. He said
Pakistan s spy agencies handled
the insurgents. Those who complain about no achievements think
the peace process is a simple job.
Actually they don t fully understand it. They think we will say
we want peace and Mullah Omar
will say I am coming, no this is not
that simple, it is a complicated job.
Many countries have stakes and
until all these countries in the game
do not fully cooperate with each
other, the problems will remain.
He said those commenting on the
peace process should first understand problems plaguing the process. Qasimyar said the HPC was
created in order to resolve the Afghanistan conflict through dialogue, but the Taliban responded
with violence and killed the HPC
chairman, Burhanuddin Rabbani,
and others.
He said they failed to hold talks
with Taliban s deceased supreme
leader Mullah Omar because he had
been living in Pakistan and the
country s premier spy agency possessed the keys of peace.
About the presence of warlords in the body, he said: Those
who had fought should make peace
as well.
This is what our political and
social structure demands. If our jihadi leaders oppose the peace process, peace cannot be achieved.
Their presence in the council is
necessary and they can resolve
problems. Qasim also disputed
the claim that most of the reconciled militants had returned to the
past, saying a fewer number might
have returned, but those who have
joined the process were happy
with the HPC. (Pajhwok)
KABUL: A leading rights group
on Monday urged Afghanistan s
foreign donors to press the government to address the country s
persistent human rights problems
at a major international meeting
of senior officials.
Human Rights Watch issued
the call in letters to representatives of a dozen donor countries,
who are scheduled to gather in
Kabul on September 5 for the Senior Officials Meeting to discuss
humanitarian and security commitments to the country.
The meeting is a follow-up to
the December 2014 London Conference and the 2012 Tokyo Conference. Phelim Kine, deputy Asia
director at Human Rights Watch,
wrote in the letter: Afghan officials and foreign donors need to
put human rights front-and-center in all discussions of ongoing
and future support for the Afghan
government. The official explained human rights gains since
2001 remained extremely fragile
and had reversed in some areas,
putting at risk the rights of all
Afghans, particularly women and
girls. The watchdog asked the Afghan government and its international donors to strengthen their
support for the protection and
promotion of human rights in the
country through continued emphasis on the Tokyo Mutual Accountability Framework. However, there are indications the Afghan government s Realising SelfReliance paper, presented by
President Ashraf Ghani at the
December 2014 London Confer-
Sh ah Sh ah e e d
bo m bin g victim s pro te s t
de lay in co m pe n s atio n
KABUL: Relatives of the Shah
Shaheed truck bombing victims on
Monday said they were spending
nights in ruined houses and the
government was yet to keep promises of helping them. At least 15
civilians were killed and nearly
500 others wounded in the huge
midnight explosion on August 7.
A market was also destroyed and
hundreds houses in the Kabul
neighbourhood damaged. No
groups have so far claimed responsibility for the attack. Tens
of victims of the incident protested against the government s inability to keep the promises and its
lethargic response to their plight.
One of them, Mohammad Tahir Sultani, told Pajhwok Afghan
News: We do not want food
from the government; instead we
want our homes reconstructed. We
want to live in an honourable
way. He said a bag of flour and
some cooking oil could not resolve
their problems and the government should avoid cheating people. Sultani, who has lost two
members of his family, said it had
been one month but the government was yet to honour its commitment. He warned of blocking
the Karta-i-Naw and Shah Shaheed roads if the government did
not compensate them.
Habibullah, another protestor who lost two sisters and mother in the incident, said food could
be easily found but they faced
problems living in ruined houses.
He also asked the authorities to
take urgent action to construct
their houses.
A week earlier, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Abdullah had
said that a committee had been
constituted to survey the losses
and distribute recompense to the
victims. (Pajhwok)
ence, will be the centerpiece of the
September 5 meeting s agenda. It
noted the document lacked specific goals and measurable benchmarks for progress on human
rights. The group called for focus
on updating and expanding the
Tokyo Framework to include new,
realistic, and measurable human
rights commitments. Donors
should press the Afghan government to ensure greater accountability of state security forces responsible for extrajudicial killings,
torture and other abuses, the organisation continued.
Respect for the basic human
rights of the general population
was a crucial element of counterinsurgency operations, it remarked. Protecting the rights of
women and girls would require the
government to enforce the EVAW
Law.
Similarly, donors were asked
to fund initiatives that helped promote the rights of women and girls,
including earmarking funding to
recruit and retain female police
officers.
The Afghan government and
foreign donors were also urged to
take substantive steps to bolster
the resources and capacity of the
Afghanistan Independent Human
Rights Commission (AIHRC).
Kine said: The Senior Officials Meeting provides the Afghan
government and its international
supporters an important opportunity to recommit to specific,
measurable steps for protecting
the rights of the Afghan people.
(Pajhwok)
Fewest women
hold govt posts in Khost
KHOST CITY: Women are not
given a priority when it comes to
employment in government departments of southeastern Khost
province, civil society activists
say. Official figures show currently 240 women are employed in
government departments in Khost
like health and education and only
six women serve in the military.
While the number of men working in government institutes reaches 7,976. Khost Women s Affairs
Director Dr. Malalai Wali told
Pajhwok Afghan News the fewest number of women in government employment was due to discrimination against the gender.
Men do not like women to hold
high positions in departments
where they work. Men do not
pave the way for women to be
promoted in a department, she
said. She urged ministries to increase job opportunities for women in their provincial departments.
Many women are eligible to
work, but need to be given jobs.
The government should announce
vacancies for females and women
should be given a priority in government employment. A female
civil society activist, Zainab, said
the number of educated women
was on the increase in Khost but
their presence in government departments was on the decline.
She said this situation of the
women was due to government s
negligence which had grown pessimism among educated women
and had reduced their interest in
education. Some women have
such nice ideas which men don t
have. If women are allowed presence in every department and programme, they will not be heartbroken.
The lack of security and cultural restrictions turn out to be
the big hurdles preventing women from jobs and education in
much of Afghanistan.
But Administrative Reforms
Commission head for Khost Haroon Mujahid denied discrimination against women in getting government jobs.
Khost Governor Hakam Khan
Habibi reiterated his resolve to
problems in the appointment of
women to government positions.
Men and women government employees have equal rights.
Women have the right to submit
documents for every vacancy
through open competition. I assure you no discrimination will be
committed against women, Inshah
Allah, the governor said.
The government blamed the
lack of women employees in government departments on cultural
issues and called for people s cooperation with the government in
this regard. (Pajhwok)
An alys ts p u s h
fo r actio n o n n e w
Kabu l Ban k
DACAAR
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Date: August 31, 2015
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4x4 vehicle for DACAAR Main Office in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Some Afghan economic commentators on Sunday urged the government to take the necessary
steps to make the final decision on
the fate of New Kabul Bank.
According to these economic
analysts, New Kabul Bank faces a
loss of millions of dollars annually
and based on that, it would better
to sell it or to terminate its operations.
This comes after Integrity
Watch Afghanistan officials said on
Saturday that in the past six years,
the New Kabul Bank has lost $65
million USD.
Meanwhile, officials of the
Ministry of Finance (MoF) have
not commented on the money lost
by the bank, but confirm that the
bank operates at a loss.
"There are several options, sell
the bank to the private sector, ter-
minate it or make it a [completely]
national or state run bank. But before choosing one of the options,
we need to accurately assess all
options," economic analyst Haseebullah Mauhid said.
"We want a solution to the
Kabul Bank issue - whether to
privatize it or keep it as it is now,"
MoF spokesman Ajmal Hamid
Abul Rahimzai said.
Two years back, the government requested the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) sell the
bank to the private sector. But the
bank wasn't sold due to certain
problems.
Kabul Bank, once the country's largest financial institution,
was badly shaken in 2010, when it
faced bankruptcy, after the almost
$1 billion USD scam was uncovered.
Please get the detailed tender documents from website at www.dacaar.org, www.kabultenders.org or DACAAR Main Office in below mentioned address. The offers should reach to
DACAAR before September 20, 2015 at 4:00 P.M. The tender opening meeting will be held at
10:00 A.M on September 21, 2015.
DACAAR Address:
DACAAR Procurement & Stock Unit
DACAAR Main Office , Qalayee Fatullah, Road No. 12, Street No.3, House No. 403, Paykobe
Naswar, Taimani Project, Kabul, Afghanistan.
Email: [email protected]
.
AFGHANISTAN TIMES
KABUL: Chief Executive Office
Dr. Abdullah Abdullah on Monday said Afghanistan would not
ask for Pakistan s help for arranging the second round of talks with
the Taliban. The Afghan government and Taliban held their first
face-to-face talks in Islamabad almost two months back. The second round was expected to take
place on July 31, but cancelled due
to announcement of Mullah Mohammad s death. The demise of
Umar and a string of recent dead-
ly attacks in capital Kabul forced
the Afghan government to come hard
on Pakistan. President Ashraf Ghani
accused Pakistan of allowing militant hideouts on its soil Javed Faisal, deputy spokesman for the CEO,
told reporters efforts were being
made to defuse tension between
Kabul and Islamabad through diplomatic channels. He said Afghanistan had repeatedly asked Pakistan
to be sincere in the fight against terrorism and considered the enemies
of Afghanistan as its own enemies.
He said: Our demands are clear and
there is no ambiguity: Pakistan
should meet our demands to help
restore a friendly relationship between the neighbours. Faisal added Afghanistan would make efforts
for the revival of the second round
of talks and that Kabul would no
longer ask Islamabad to help facilitate dialogue. Earlier, Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani also asked
the Pakistani government to honour
its promises in a positive manner.
(Pajhwok)
Chinese envoy
VISITS KANDAHAR
EMERGENCY
CALLS
Police
100 - 119
Hospitals
FMIC Hospital
Behind Kabul Medical
University:
PUL-I-KHUMRI: Thousands of
students have been left out of
school and hundreds of families
displaced in the Dand-i-Ghori locality of northern Baghlan province due to fighting.
Dand-i-Ghori
located in
the vicinity of the provincial capital Pul-i-Khumri fell to Taliban insurgents last month. Residents complain the clashes have
not only taken away everything
from them, but have kept their
children out of school for the past
two months. More than six
schools in the locality have been
shut. Zar Mohammad, resident of
Qala-i-Khwaja village, said part of
a major school in the area had been
destroyed in a rocket attack. We
don t know whether it was from
Taliban side or government, but
ask why should our children remain out of schools? He told Pajhwok Afghan News his family
along with 18 other households
had moved away from the school
surrounding and to Dahan-i-Ghori
district in extremely bad condition.
Ghulam Qader Rasuli, acting head
of Baghlan education department,
said in the last two months fight-
ing between security forces and
Taliban had been ongoing. As a result, 10 schools have been closed,
according to the official, who said
students at these schools numbered around 6,000, 25 percent of
them with girls. Abdul Qadir
Niazi, deputy governor, said security forces were doing their best
to clear Dand-i-Ghori of insurgents
and bring normalcy to the
locality.He promised schools
would be reopened soon. There
are more than 500 schools in
Baghlan province, where more
than 300,000 students are en-
rolled. Residents complain the insurgents have implanted landmines in some areas of Dand-i-Ghori.
At least 350 families, they said,
had been displaced to Zamankhail,
Hussainkhail and Wazirabad areas
of the provincial capital. Jandullah, resident of Postak area, said
some houses had been damaged
due to fighting and families had to
move out for safety reasons. He
added his own 18-year-old daughter and six-year-old son were injured inside their house. We live
in our friend s house, waiting to
return home soon. (Pajhwok)
Breach of law is unbearable; govt must kick
off e-ID cards issuance immediately: CMSJ
By Farhad Naibkhel
KABUL: Civic Movement of Social Justice (CMSJ) on Monday
lashed at the government for delaying the distribution process of
national electronic ID. The movement called on the government to
kick off the process as soon as
possible. Member of CMSJ Ahmad Zaki while expressing concerns said the government must
not keep the issuance of the e-ID
cards further on hold and if it does
then it is tantamount to breaching
the law. Talking to newsmen here,
Disgruntled
reform panel
members submit
own proposals
KABUL: Two protesting members
of the Electoral Reform Commission have submitted their own set
of suggestions to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), an official said
on Monday. The two, Kawoon
Kakar and Shah Mahmood Miakhail, announced boycotting the
panel s meetings on Saturday over
what they said their other colleagues wanted to allocate 100 of
the Wolesi Jirga s 249 seats to political groups. Javed Faisal, deputy CEO spokesman, told Pajhwok
Afghan News the commission
members presented their suggestions to the CEO on Sunday, when
the two protesting members were
also present and they submitted
their own separate proposals.
Faisal said all the suggestions
would be evaluated by the CEO
and the government would act in
accordance with the law. He said
electoral reforms remained the government s top priority and commended the reform panel s performance during the past one month.
He said the government would try
to plan how to implement these
suggestions and specify a date for
the next parliamentary elections.
Earlier, Ahmad Yusuf Nuristani,
the Independent Election Commission (IEC) chief, had said political
differences and lack of budget led
to the postponement of the parliamentary vote for indefinite time.
Asking the government to keep
political wrangling away from elections, Nuristani said if the Electoral Reform Commission s decisions were not in line with the law,
they wouldn t be acceptable to the
IEC. (Pajhwok)
he said the distribution of the electronic ID cards is a legal and national process, which can help the government in census and running elections transparently. Electronic ID
cards also will lead to decline in
crime rate and security issues, Zaki
said. He said it will also help the
government in preparing fiscal budgets and allocating funds for infrastructure projects. He questioned
why the issuance of e-ID cards
couldn t be started despite the approval of the relevant law by the
Parliament and President? He urged
the National Unity Government
(NUG) to implement the law at
any cost and start the distribution
of electronic ID cards as soon as
possible. Any reason that is causing the delay of the e-ID cards
must legally be addressed and in
no one should be allowed to breach
the law, Zaki said. He said in order to overcome the despondency
and distrust among the general
public regarding the delay, the government must give assign the date
as further delay is becoming perturbing. Another member of CMSJ
Ahmad Shah Stanikzai said that
according to their reports the e-ID
cards authority (office) doesn t face
any technical issues and the office
is fully capable to start the issuance of the cards, in such a situation the delay is irksome. He said
unfortunately some elements have
been trying to turn the matter into
an ethnic issue through TV channels to create challenges for the electronic ID cards distribution authorities. Another member of CMSJ,
Dost Zada said that Afghanistan
has been passing through a critical
situation therefore no one should
be allowed to breach the law and
play with the Constitution.
There must not be any compromise, he said. Dost Zada demanded of the government to start the
issuance of the e-ID cards right
away as it is the demand of the nation therefore the government must
announce the date as further delay
is unbearable. The government had
decided to start the issuance of the
cards on Independence Day which
was marked on September 19, but
because of some inexplicable reasons the issuance was postponed
for an indefinite time.
0202500200-+93793275595
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Pule Bagh-e- Umomi
070263672
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0799-321007
2401352
The Chinese Ambassador to Afghanistan Deng Xijun paid a visit
to southern Kandahar province on
Sunday where he met with local
officials and businessmen and
called for stronger Sino-Afghan
relations. At a meeting with local
officials, businessmen and tribal elders, Deng described Kandahar as
a historic province, saying his twoday visit is aimed at assessing
problems there and finding ways
to help, China's Xinhua reported.
The ambassador said China, besides providing scholarships to
500 Afghan students, would also
help train 3,000 Afghan government employees till 2020 so as to
enhance government efficiency.
Local officials including provincial
governor Hamayun Azizi, in meeting with the ambassador, called for
further Chinese contributions to
the rebuilding and economic development of the country. Kandahar
businessmen also appealed for
help to develop bilateral trade and
economic relations. This comes after Chinese President Xi Jinping
announced in July that he intends
to provide Afghanistan with more
security equipment and training.
China, one of the major economic
powers in the world, has expressed
interest in helping Afghanistan
achieve peace and stability as the
country is worried about separatist
groups in its far western region of
Xinjiang, which borders Afghanistan. "Increasing security cooperation suits both countries' interests.
China will continue to supply Afghanistan with security supplies,
technology, equipment and training
assistance," Xi told President Ashraf
Ghani during a Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in
Ufa city of Russia last month. China has also long pledged to play a
"huge" commercial role in helping
rebuild Afghanistan as the U.S pulls
out troops from the country.
Fear of war in
Kunduz displaces
2,000 more families
He has been buried on the Afghan
side of the border, a former Taliban minister then told a Pakistani
newspaper. A senior member of
Taliban s diplomatic delegation in
Qatar, Mullah Tayeb Agha resigned
last month to protest why Omar s
death had been kept under wraps
for such a long time. On Monday,
the Taliban released a 13-page biography of their new leader Mullah Mansoor in five languages.
They announced Mansoor s ap-
pointment. According to the Taliban, Omar died on April 23, 2013.
However, the militants have said
nothing yet about his ailment. They
argued the news of his death was
kept secret to prevent a possible
negative effect on the fighters
morale. The Taliban Leadership
Council, religious scholars and
Omar s close companions, who
remained with him till his demise,
have pledged allegiance to Mullah
Mansoor, the movement said.
Farah PC members worried about
GROWINGTARGET KILLINGS
FARA CITY: Members of the Provincial Council (PC) on Monday
complained against the increasing
number of mysterious killings in
the capital of western Farah province, asking the government to prevent the loss of precious lives.
Deputy head of the council,
Khair Mohammad Moorzai, told
a gathering that more than 20 persons, including security officials
and common people, had been
mysteriously killed during the past
three months. He said targeted kill-
ings had terrified people and had
deprived them of a free movement.
Another PC member Dadullah Qani
expressed his deep concern over
the hit-and-run attacks in Farah
City and asked intelligence officials
to prevent such incidents. He said
common people had seen the killers, but intelligence operatives had
failed to arrest them and introduce
them to the attorney office.
He demanded the government
take serious notice of the ongoing
killing spree and expose the perpetrators. But police chief Brig.
Gen. Fazal Mohammad Samadyar
rejected figures the PC members
provided for the deaths in target
killings. He said at least nine people had been killed in such attacks
in the past three months.
He said intelligence officials
had been trying to capture target
killers to prevent such actions in
the future. (Pajhwok)
Pashtoonkot. He said after the incident, Fatah went to the site and
killed two old men. A large number of residents carried the victims bodies to the district center,
seeking deterrent punishment for
the perpetrators. However, district chief Abdul Qadir Qadiri said
three supporters of Fatah were
killed in a Taliban ambush while
the civilians were gunned down in
an ensuing fires exchange between
the two sides. Meanwhile, The
Taliban claimed killing three Afghan Local Police (ALP) personnel and woundinga fourth in an
ambush. They said two bikes, two
Kalashnikovs and some ammunition were also seized. On the other hand, the district chief said unknown gunmen kidnapped the son
of an influential individual while
two houses were torched as result
of a dispute between two rival
groups in the Chahartoot area of
the district last night. (Pajhwok)
QALAT: A fierce clash has broken out between two rival Taliban factions over the insurgency
leadership crisis in southern Zabul province, with both the sides
suffering casualties, a public representative said on Monday.
The armed conflict that erupted last night in the Khak Afghan
district involved Taliban fighters
loyal to the group s new leader
Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour and a battlefield commander,
Mansour Dadullah, said Daud
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020 22 22 222
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KUNDUZ: Some 2,000 more
families in northern Kunduz province have been displaced due to
fear of conflict, living in dire conditions. The families have been
displaced over the past week from
Qara-i-Qachi, Kobayee, Kunum,
Hazrat Sultan, Khwaja Ghaltan
and other localities.
Mohammad Yusuf Ayubi,
provincial council head, said the
displaced families lived in relatives houses, rented places or in
the open, waiting for stability to
return to their areas. He told Pajhwok Afghan News the affected
households had to deal with many
challenges, including lack of edibles. He urged the government to
help them out of the situation.
Sahiba, a resident of Kobi village, said the Taliban had warned
them to leave their homes so as
not to be affected by the conflict.
She had to move with six members of her family to a relative s
house without food and clothing.
Khuda-i-Dad, a resident of
Kunum village, said: All villages
of the Kunduz capital have been
evacuated and people have
flocked to Kunduz City. He is a
farmer from Kunum village but has
to pay rent for the house he is
living in in Kunduz City. We re
spending the money we ve got
left. I really hope to return home
soon. Otherwise I have no choice
but to look for some manual job
here. Abdul Salam Hashemi, refugees and repatriation department
head, said a survey of the displaced was ongoing and after being identified, food and other aid
would be distributed to them. As
a result of fighting this year in
Kunduz, more than 18,000 families have been displaced to the
provincial capital. Hashemi said a
third of those families had received aid and returned home.
He said majority of the households that had returned were from
Chardara, Aliabad, Qala-i-Zal and
Imam Sahib and Gor Tepa districts. The newly displaced families complain clashes occur on a
daily basis in their villages and
they are worried about their crops
and houses. But security officials
say they are planning clearing
operations soon in insecure localities. Dasht-i-Archi district and
parts of Chardara have been under Taliban s control for the past
two months. (Pajhwok)
Uprising commander guns down 2 Faryab elders Supporters, opponents of Mullah Mansour
An influential resident, wishing not to be named said commander Fatah was collecting Ushr from farmers clash in Zabul Gulzar, a member of the provin- special forces in Afghanistan in
on Sunday when unidentified gunmen ambushed them and killed three of his supporters in Pashtoonkot.
cial council. He told Pajhwok Af- 2007. So far five fighters had been
MAIMANA: An uprising group
commander killed two elders in
revenge for the death of his supporters in the Pashtunkot district
of northern Faryab province, an
official said on Monday.
An influential resident, wishing not to be named, told Pajhwok Afghan News commander
Fatah was collecting Ushr from
farmers on Sunday when unidentified gunmen ambushed them and
killed three of his supporters in
Ibn-e- Seena
Pul-e-Artan, Kabul
2100359
Kabul Bank
222666, 070285285
Azizi Bank
0799 700900
Pashtany Bank
2102908, 2103868
Mullah Omar died in April 2013, Taliban confirm
On June 29, Afghan government
officials had told media Omar had
died in a hospital in Pakistan s port
city of Karachi. But they gave no
further details of the one-eyed leader s demise. Omar s death was also
verified by Pakistani officials, who
shared the information with the
Afghan government. The Afghan
cabinet discussed the issue following confirmation by Pakistan.
Mullah Omar died two years and
four months ago of tuberculosis.
Indira Gandhi Children
Hospital, Wazir Akbar
Khan, Kabul 2301372
ghan News the clash broke out
after a group of Taliban clerics
failed to reconcile the two sides.
He said Mullah Mansour had
asked Mansour Dadullah to
pledge allegiance to him, but
Dadullah accused the new Taliban
leader of killing the movement s
founder and longtime supreme
leader Mullah Mohammad Omar
and Mullah Dadullah Akhund,
who was the Taliban s senior military commander until he was
killed by British and American
killed and five others wounded
during the ongoing clash between
the rival factions, the public representative said.
Zabul police spokesman
Fawad Askari also confirmed the
clash which he said left some 10
people killed and wounded.
However, the Taliban in a
statement rejected the clash as
propaganda and said there had
been no differences within the
group in the Khak Afghan district.
(Pajhwok)
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020-2203131
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Exchange Rate
Purchase:
One US$ =
63.68Afs
One Pound Sterling=
97.06Afs
One Euro =
69.49Afs
1000 Pak Rs =
604Afs
Sale:
One US$ =
63.88 Afs
One Pound Sterling=
97.86Afs
One Euro=
70.09 Afs
1000 Pak Rs= 612Afs
.
AFGHANISTAN TIMES
Nepal trade
corridor
projects get
Modi's push
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Prime
Minister Nawaz Sharif on Sunday
told US national security adviser
Susan Rice that Pakistan wants a
"meaningful" and "objective" dialogue with India on all outstanding
issues, amid reports that Rice is in
Islamabad on an "emergency visit" in the wake of Indo-Pak border
tensions. In his meeting with Rice,
Sharif, while talking about ties with
India, informed the US delegation
the reasons behind the cancellation
of talks between NSAs of India
and Pakistan, Dawn News reported. Rice arrived in Pakistan on a
day-long visit to exchange views
on various matters and prepare the
agenda for Sharif's visit to the US
in October. A statement by Sharif's
office, that made no direct reference to his comments on ties with
India, said the meeting "focused on
matters of bilateral interest and the
future of Pakistan-US relations."
"The situation in the region also
came under discussion," it said
without giving details. Rice's visit
coincides with an escalation in tension between Pakistan and India
along the LoC. There have been 55
ceasefire violations by Pakistan in
August, and more than 245 during
the year, so far. The White House
has, however, asserted that Rice's
visit .
India pitches for UN reforms, terror fight
Sri Lanka's
august parliamentary election,
seen up close
I arrived in Sri Lanka on August
10, a week before the country’s
August 17 parliamentary election.
Our group of short-term international election observers would
spend the first few days in Colombo, the capital, before heading
out to the locations from which
we’d be monitoring the election.
Shortly after my arrival in
Colombo, I learned that I would
be in Jaffna on voting day. Having
spent several years working for a
Tamil human rights organization in
Sri Lanka, I’m familiar with Jaffna
and was really looking forward to
heading north.
The country’s Northern Province is not considered a top-tier
travel destination, although the area
is replete with history, culture and
memorable people. One cannot
fully understand Sri Lanka without spending time there.
I got to Jaffna a few days before the election and spent the last
day of the official campaign meeting with a range of people, including most of the key political parties. Things were surprisingly quiet
and virtually everyone I spoke
with had confidence in the electoral process, believing that things
would go smoothly on the day of
the vote.
The night before the election,
I hardly slept. I knew I’d have to
get up early anyway and this was
my first time working as an election observer. I was mostly excited, but I was a little nervous too.
Polls opened at 7 a.m. and so
we arrived at our first polling station at around 6.15 a.m.. (I had a
driver and a translator accompanying me.)
What I witnessed at that first
polling station in Nallur was extremely professional and the senior presiding officer (the person
in charge) clearly explained everything that was happening. A couple other polling stations around
Jaffna town also impressed me.
Towards the end of the day
we headed further away from Jaffna town and, while voting remained
orderly, there were a few problems.
For example, I witnessed a policeman taking an inordinate and unwarranted interest in how many
people had voted. I saw far too
many police personnel at another
polling station. Later on, I saw a
member of the military inside a
polling station (which should never happen). One of the most interesting things I learned on August
17 (based only on my own experience that day) is that when people
who are not supposed to be at a
polling station see an international
election observer, it’s likely that
at least some of those people will
eventually leave the premises.
We left Jaffna shortly after the
vote and got to Colombo a little
before 1.30 a.m.. A debrief held on
August 18 was both routine and
interesting.
The United National Party
(UNP) won the most votes and
captured 106 seats in the 225member parliament. The United
People’s Freedom Alliance
(UPFA) won 95 seats. The Tamil
National Alliance (TNA) secured
16 seats. Recently ousted president Mahinda Rajapaksa is now a
member of parliament and UNP
leader Ranil Wickremesinghe has
been sworn in as prime minister.
Now that the results are in the
focus turns toward the official establishment of a national government, the formation of a cabinet
and the implementation of further
reforms.
Going forward, how much will
be accomplished? What will come
of all the ongoing corruption investigations? Will Tamil issues remain on the back burner? And what
will be Colombo’s strategy for the
upcoming session of the U.N.
Human Rights Council?
For now it doesn’t look like
Rajapaksa will be leaving active
politics anytime soon. Let’s hope
that the country is now able to
move beyond the authoritarianism,
nepotism, corruption and divisive
politics that plagued the former
president’s tenure.
External Affairs Minister Sushma
Swaraj met president-elect of the
UN General Assembly Mogens
Lykketoft on Sunday and conveyed India’s expectations to
achieve “concrete forward movement” on the negotiations regarding the UN Security Council reforms under his presidency.
As reported by The Indian
Express on Sunday, Swaraj
stressed that the UN Security
Council reforms, expected to come
on the upcoming 70th anniversary
of the UN, should reflect current
geopolitical realities and the increasing role of developing nations.
She pushed for “text-based negotiations” in the upcoming United
Nations General Assembly in September. Stressing that no country
could be immune to the threat of
terrorism, especially with the emergence of Islamic State, Sushma also
made a strong pitch for finalisation of the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism
(CCIT) at the UN. “It is important that there should be a collective effort to deal with this menace (terrorism),” Swaraj told the
UN President-elect.
CCIT, a treaty proposed by
India in 1996, aimed to ban terrorists and make it binding for coun-
tries to deny funds and safe haven
to them.
Sushma also congratulated
Lykketoft on his election as President of the 70th Session which is
expected to address important issues, including adoption and implementation of the 2030 Agenda
for Sustainable Development, UN
Security Council Reform, Review
of UN Peacekeeping Operations,
“We are not the ones who fled to
Jeddah after seeking pardon. The
nation very well knows that
Nawaz Sharif holds the ‘honor’ of
applying for pardon.” We accepted the results of the 2013 general
elections for the sake of democracy, although those elections were
“ROs’ elections,” said Zardari,
adding that the recent verdicts from
election tribunals “proved our
point that the PML-N received
outside help and was made to win
the elections.” The former president said at a time when “our innocent citizens are being killed by
indiscriminate shelling in border
villages by the enemy, when Pakistani Army is fighting a decisive
war against terrorists… Nawaz
Sharif, instead of challenging the
real enemy, is targeting Peoples
Party and other political opponents.” Zardari said steps being
taken by the government clearly
indicate that it is dividing the nation in an attempt to save their
natural allies – Taliban and terrorists – and weaken the war against
terror. He said the PPP stands with
the army in the ongoing war
against terrorism. “We salute our
to call on Prime Minister Narendra Modi Monday, said the theme
of his Presidency would be the
‘United Nations at 70 – A New
Commitment to Action’.
Lykketoft was unanimously
elected by the UN General Assembly as President of the 70th Session on June 15. He is scheduled
to assume his new responsibilities
from September 15.
Justice, equality core philosophy
of Bangladesh’s development
journey, FM tells USAID chief
plauded Bangladesh’s “tremendous
progress” in the health sector both in
terms of “quality of services as well as
grass-root level coverage”. The USAID
earlier said Lenhardt came to Dhaka to
see the US-funded projects. During the
meeting with the foreign minister, he also
discussed the new post-2015 sustainable
development goals. Ali said the new goals
would offer “new opportunities to work
together with the USAID in a wide range
of development fields”.
The foreign minister has told the
USAID global chief that “ensuring justice and equality for all” is
the core philosophy of the current
government’s development journey. Acting administrator of the
US’s development arm Alfonso
Lenhardt, who has been visiting
Dhaka since Friday, met Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali at his office on
Sunday. Ali said Bangladesh
“greatly values” the existing bilateral engagements with the US government in all areas. Lenhardt congratulated the government on accomplishing “enviable successes”
in attaining many of the MDG
goals, particularly in the areas of
health and women empowerment,
the foreign ministry said. He also
shared his experience of visiting a
community clinic in a remote village in Bagerhat district. He ap-
Naw az Sharif has reverted to revenge politics of the 90s: Zardari
ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan
People's Party co-chairperson and
former president, Asif Ali Zardari, on Monday said Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has reverted to
revenge politics of the 1990s, referring to the recent arrests of highprofile PPP members.
He said first Qasim Zia and
Senator Bangash's son were arrested, which was followed by Dr
Asim’s arrested by Rangers. Immediately afterwards, warrants for
the arrests of former premier
Yousuf Raza Gilani and Makhdoom Amin Fahim were also issued, he said. In a statement issued from London, Zardari said
bureaucrats in Sindh were being
harassed by the Federal Investigation Agency and the National
Accountability Bureau – pointing
out that the chief secretary of
Sindh is also currently on bail. “All
this unmistakably presents a clear
pattern of political harassment and
revenge,” he said, adding that
Sindh had been immobilised under direct orders from the Prime
Minister House. The PPP co-chair
said it appeared Nawaz Sharif had
not learnt lessons from the past.
Climate Change and Review of the
Tunis Agenda (World Summit on
Information Society).
Swaraj also conveyed to him
that India was already in the process of implementing 11 out of 17
Sustainable Development goals
which also match with government’s flagship programmes such
as Make in India and Beti Bachao.
Lykketoft, who is scheduled
NEW DELHI: With the government focused on strengthening
relations with Nepal and to improve trade and communication,
Prime Minister Narendra Modi
has asked the road transport
ministry to expedite widening
and completion of ongoing
works. Sources said during his
last review meeting on infrastructure, PM Modi had asked the
ministry to see whether multimodal hubs can be developed on
the major stretches, such as
Raxaul along NH-28A.
Officials said that a team is
likely to visit the site soon for a
detailed assessment to develop
such a facility. Raxaul has a railway junction and is well connected by roads. This border
town between India and Nepal
witnesses heavy movement of
cargo and people throughout the
year. It is also the major trade
corridor.
Nepal trade corridor
projects get PM Modi's push
Ministry sources said, the 70km
stretch from Raxaul, on IndoNepal border, to Piprakothi on
the East-West corridor in Bihar
is being widened to two-lanes
with paved shoulder by NHAI
at a cost of Rs 375 crore. This
will be a toll road and the project
is likely to be completed by next
March.
India has a 1,751km long
border with Nepal which is
shared by Uttarakhand, Uttar
Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal and
Sikkim. Since road link between
the two countries is vital for
promotion of trade and tourism,
plans were prepared to develop
all the highways.
While work on Sonbarsa to
Muzaffarnagar has almost completed and tolling has started, the
proposal to widen the JogbaniForbesganj (NH- 57A) has been
delayed as the earlier contract
was terminated in January 2014.
Now the ministry proposes to
develop it with 100 per cent
government funding of Rs 258
crore.
jawans who gave the ultimate sacrifices in this war.” Earlier, following the arrest of former petroleum
minister Dr Asim Hussain and party leader Qasim Zia, PPP had reacted strongly and had out rightly
refuted the allegations leveled
against the office bearers. The PPP
denied the impression it was involved in terror financing, saying
the party had itself suffered huge
losses in the fight against terrorism. “How can you say that PPP
is involved in terror financing?”
The party’s senior vice president
Sherry Rehman said the PPP has
always been on the front-line in
the war against terror. PPP has always respected the judiciary and
will not carry out action that hampers the current democratic setup
in the country, she said. Talking
about the ongoing anti-corruption
drive in Sindh, Rehman clarified
that the “PPP has no objection
whatsoever over the operation and
will create no hurdle in its implementation”. But she said “it looks
like politics of revenge is being carried out with the PPP as the sole
target.” “We will keep alive our tradition of struggle for democracy
and will face every atrocity,” said
the PPP vice president.
NEW DELHI: Thousands have
signed a petition urging protection
for two Indian sisters after a local
council allegedly ordered them
raped and paraded naked as "punishment" after their brother eloped
with a married woman.
Amnesty International said
Sunday more than 122,000 people have joined its online petition
in recent days to protest at the
order by the council of elders or
"khap panchayat" in the northern
state of Uttar Pradesh.
"An unelected all-male village
council (khap panchayat) ordered
that they be raped and paraded
naked, their faces blackened, as
punishment for the actions of their
brother," Amnesty's petition said.
One of the sisters this month
filed a petition in the Supreme
Court seeking protection for her
family after they were forced to
flee their village in Bhagpat district. The family, from the lowest
"untouchable" Dalit caste, was
forced into hiding after the brother
eloped with a woman from the village's dominant Jat caste, according to lawyer Vivek Singh. The
council of Jat elders issued the rape
order against the sisters, aged 23
and 15, in July after Jats falsely
accused the brother of abducting
the married woman, Singh said.
"They were threatened by the Jats
with rape. They wanted to take
revenge for the actions of their
brother," Singh, acting for the 23year-old sister who filed the case,
told AFP. The Supreme Court ordered Uttar Pradesh authorities to
reply to the sister's petition by
September 15. Amnesty called
Sunday for an investigation into
the council's order, saying Dalits
suffered widespread discrimination. But Bhagpat police chief Sharad Sachan said their investigations
had so far uncovered no such rape
threat against the sisters. "We have
investigated the allegations and
found the khap didn't meet over
this issue and the threat wasn't issued to the women," Sachan told
AFP. Village councils and "khap
panchayats" -- separate informal
councils composed of elders -- exert enormous influence over rural
life, particularly in northern India.
Although they carry no legal
weight, khaps can be highly influential and have been blamed for
numerous abuses such as the sanctioning of "honour killings" of couples defying tradition.
Branded "kangaroo courts" by
critics, they have also been known
to hand down public beatings for
perceived crimes.
.
AFGHANISTAN TIMES
News-in-Brief
Ukraine's
parliament
backs draft law
giving east
special status
KIEV : Ukraine's parliament on
Monday voted for constitutional changes to give its eastern regions a special status that
it hopes will blunt their separatist drive, but divisions
among pro-Western lawmakers
suggested they will have a
rougher ride to become law.
At a rowdy session, a total of 265 deputies voted in
favor in the first reading of a
"decentralization" bill, backed
by President Petro Poroshenko's political bloc and his government - 39 more than that
required to go through.
But many coalition allies,
including former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, spoke
against the changes and it is
open to question whether Poroshenko will be able to whip
up the necessary 300 votes for
it to get through a second and
final reading later this year.
Approval of legislation for
special status for parts of Donetsk and Luhansk regions,
which are largely controlled by
Russian-backed separatists, is
a major element of a peace
agreement reached in Minsk,
Belarus, in February. Though
a ceasefire is under pressure
from sporadic shelling and
shooting which government
troops and rebels blame on each
other, Western governments
see the deal as holding out the
best possible prospect for
peace and are urging Ukraine
to abide by the letter of the
Minsk agreement.
Former U.S. Vice President Dick
Cheney has criticized President
Barack Obama and the nuclear deal
with Iran in what has been deemed
one of the harshest statements
made by Republican figures following the agreement.
In an op-ed recently published
in the Wall Street Journal, an excerpt from Cheney’s upcoming
book “Exceptional: Why the world
needs a powerful America,” the
former vice president compares the
Iran nuclear deal to the 1938 Munich pact that led to World War II.
“The Obama agreement will
lead to a nuclear-armed Iran, a nuclear-arms race in the Middle East
and, more than likely, the first use
of a nuclear weapon since Hiroshima and Nagasaki,” he wrote.
Cheney, who has written the
book with his daughter Liz, has
accused Obama not being truthful
Obama and Kerry to
raise global warming issues in Alaska
Secretary of State John Kerry
says history will not look kindly on climate change skeptics
who fail to take action to curb
warming.
Speaking Sunday in Anchorage, Alaska, Kerry says
scientists are overwhelmingly
unified in the conclusion that
humans are contributing to global climate change and that
steps must be taken to reduce
the carbon in the atmosphere.
Kerry and President
Obama will speak Monday at
the State Department's Conference on Global Leadership
in the Arctic. The conference
goal is to raise issues facing the
Arctic and provide foreign ministers and residents a way to
address climate challenges.
Kerry says climate change
skeptics are an increasing minority as people make the connection between warming and
indicators such as increased
wildfires, forests lost to insects
and species moving north.
nal.” Apart from criticizing the
deal, both Cheneys also blamed
Obama for the rise of ISIS after he
“abandoned Iraq, leaving a vacuum that is being tragically and
ominously filled by our enemies.
He is on course to forsake Afghanistan as well.”
White House Press Secretary
Josh Earnest rejected Cheney’s
criticism at a press briefing on Friday, saying that “the same people
making the same arguments against
the Iran deal were the people who
advocated for getting us into the
war of Iraq in 2002 and 2003.”
ISIS destroys part of another Libyan soldiers
in deadly clash
temple in Palmyra
Japan eyes
defense budget
hike to fortify
island chain
facing China
TOKYO : Japan's Ministry
of Defense is seeking a fourth
straight annual military budget
hike to help fortify the country's far-flung island chain in
the East China Sea, close to
ocean territory claimed by
Beijing. In a document submitted to the government on Monday, the ministry asked for a
2.2 percent increase in military
spending to 5.09 trillion yen
($42.38 billion) for the year
starting in April. If approved,
the new defense budget would
be Japan's biggest in 14 years.
China's military budget for
this year rose 10.1 percent to
886.9 billion yuan ($138.37
billion), the second largest in
the world after the United
States. Japan's Defense Ministry will buy AAV7 amphibious assault vehicles made by
BAE Systems , F-35 Stealth
warplanes made by Lockheed
Martin Corp and Osprey tiltrotor transport aircraft from
Boeing Co under the budget
plan, said the document. Other purchases would include
Global Hawk drones made by
Northrop Grumman Corp ,
mobile missile batteries, helicopters and other kit the military wants to defend islanddotted ocean territory stretching 1,400 km (870 miles) from
the Japanese mainland almost
to Taiwan. Money would also
be allocated to building and extending military bases along
the island chain, the document
added. As China's military
power grows, Japan is shifting from defending its northern borders from a diminished
Russian threat with tanks and
heavy armor to deploying a
lighter, more mobile force in
the East China Sea and the
Western Pacific.
about the facts surrounding the
deal, saying that “nearly everything
the president has told us about his
Iranian agreement is false. He has
said it will prevent the Iranians
from acquiring nuclear weapons,
but it will actually facilitate and
legitimize an Iranian nuclear arse-
The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria
(ISIS) group has destroyed part of
an ancient temple in Syria’s
UNESCO-listed Palmyra city, a
monitoring group said on Sunday,
only a week after another temple
nearby was reduced to rubble by
the militants. The militants target-
ed the Temple of Bel, a Roman-era
structure in the central desert city,
the Syrian Observatory for Human
Rights said according to Reuters.
The extent of the damage was
not known, the Observatory said,
citing its contacts on the ground.
A Syrian official in charge of
antiquities said his government has
not been able to determine how
much damage an explosion near the
ancient Temple of Bel caused the
ancient structure in the militantcontrolled city of Palmyra.
Activists, including a Palmyra
resident, said an ISIS bombing ex-
tensively damaged the 2,000-year
old temple Sunday.
The resident described a massive explosion, adding that he saw
pictures of the damage but could
not get near the site.
Maamoun Abdulkarim, the
head of the Antiquities and Museums Department in Damascus,
said that "undoubtedly" a large
explosion took place near the temple, which lies in a sprawling Roman-era complex. But he said the
extent of the damage remains unclear. An ISIS operative told The
Associated Press over Skype on
Monday that the temple had been
destroyed, without elaborating. He
spoke on condition of anonymity
because members of the group are
not allowed to speak to journalists. Last week, ISIS militants blew
up the ancient temple of Baal
Shamin at the famous site. Satellite photos appeared to show it
had been completely destroyed.
Over the past several months,
ISIS have blown up and defaced
historical sites and artifacts across
their sprawling self-proclaimed
"caliphate" stretching across Iraq
and Syria. ISIS took control of
Palmyra in May, located in the
central desert region of the country, sparking worldwide concern
that they would destroy its 2,000
year-old ruins.
ISIS moves
UK pledges
closer to central $769m to
Damascus
revamp
nuclear base
The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria
group (ISIS) battled Syrian rebel
forces in a Damascus neighborhood on Monday, bringing the militant group closer than ever to the
center of the capital, a monitoring
group said.
ISIS militants fought street
battles against Islamist rebels in
Asali, part of the capital's southern Qadam district, after seizing
two streets there over the weekend, the Syrian Observatory for
Human Rights said.
"This is the closest ISIS has
ever been to the heart of Damascus," Observatory head Rami
Abdel Rahman said.
He said the militants had advanced from the adjacent Al-Hajar
Al-Aswad neighbourhood, where
they have been based since July
2014.
A Syrian military official confirmed the clashes and said he was
"very happy that they are fighting."
"But we are ready to react if
they try to advance into government-held territory," the official
told AFP.
According to the Observatory, opposition-held Qadam has
been relatively quiet since a truce
between rebel groups and regime
forces there a year ago.
It said fighting in the district
on Sunday left 15 fighters dead,
but it could not specify how many
were from ISIS and how many
were Islamist rebels.
Abdel Rahman said the "fierce
street battles" had forced civilians
to flee the area.
Since its expulsion from the
Eastern Ghouta suburb of Damascus last year, ISIS has used AlHajar Al-Aswad as a base for attacks on the capital.
From there, it tried to seize the
Yarmuk Palestinian refugee camp
in April, but was pushed back.
That same month, ISIS kidnapped two opposition fighters
from Qadam and beheaded them
in Al-Hajar Al-Aswad.
More than 240,000 people
have been killed in Syria's conflict,
which began with popular antigovernment protests in March
2011 but has evolved into a complex civil war.
The conflict has seen the embattled regime of President Bashar
al-Assad lose swathes of territory
across the country.
In the northwest province of
Idlib, the powerful Army of Conquest alliance edged closer to Fuaa,
one of two remaining regime-held
villages in the province.
The Observatory said the alliance, a collection of Islamist and
militant groups including Al-Qaeda's Syria affiliate, seized the village of Sawaghiya on the southeast edge of Fuaa early Monday
after overnight clashes.
The fighting left nine fighters
from both sides and two civilians
dead. After capturing the majority of Idlib province, the Army of
Conquest surrounded and began
heavily shelling the Shiite Muslim
villages of Fuaa and Kafraya.
This month saw two failed attempts at reaching broad ceasefire
deals including Fuaa, Kafraya, and
the rebel stronghold of Zabadani
in Damascus province.
Britain will spend more than 500
million pounds ($769.5 million)
refurbishing its nuclear submarine
base in Scotland over the next 10
years, finance minister George
Osborne said on Monday.
The Faslane naval base on the
River Clyde, east of Glasgow, is
home to the fleet of four Vanguardclass submarines, one of which is
on patrol at all times, that form
Britain’s ‘Trident’ nuclear deterrent.
The money will be spent on
“ship lifts, sea walls, jetties and
other major projects” and that
work will start in 2017, the government said in a statement.
A decision on replacing the
ageing submarine fleet is due next
year. Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservative government
with Islamists
Four Libyan soldiers were killed
and six wounded in fresh fighting
with Islamist groups in the eastern city of Benghazi on Sunday,
medics and military officials said.
Forces loyal to Libya's internationally recognized government
have been fighting Islamist groups
in the country's second-largest
city Benghazi since last year, part
of a wider struggle since Muammar Qaddafi was overthrown in
2011.
A tank battalion fought with
Islamist brigades which had been
trying to advance in the west of
Benghazi, military officials said.
Fighting raged until late in the
evening. Army forces backed by
armed residents have regained
some areas in Benghazi lost last
year. But critics say their outdated war planes and helicopters
lacking precision guns have damaged parts of the city without
gaining much on the ground.
There was also fighting on
Sunday between army units loyal to the official government and
ISIS outside the city of Derna to
the east of Benghazi. The air
force flew a strike against ISIS
positions outside Derna, said a
military spokesman. Both sides
also clashed with ground forces
in the same area.
ISIS started this month an offensive to try retake Derna after
a rival Islamist group had expelled it in June. Army forces are
based outside Derna but have not
tried to take the city, a militant
hotspot. The fighting on several
fronts highlights the chaos in Libya, where armed groups back
two governments vying for control. The official prime minister
has been based in the east since
the capital, Tripoli, was seized
by a rival group which set up its
own government.
Both sides command loose
coalitions of former anti-Qaddafi rebels which have split along
political, regional and tribal lines.
ISIS has exploited the chaos
by taking over several places, executing foreigners and launching
attacks against embassies in Tripoli.
has said it backs the fleet’s multi-billion pound renewal and intends to base the new submarines at Faslane.
Hungary refugee fence not even fit for animals: France
Deep divisions persist within the
European Union as thousands of
distraught refugees arriving from
war-torn countries, mainly Syria,
continued to head towards Western Europe via the continent's
southern frontiers.
The French foreign minister on
Monday criticised Hungary for its
move to erect a fence on its border
to stop people as Germany and
Britain joined in to call for action
to defend the "dignity" of refugees
ahead of fresh emergency talks on
September 14.
The three Western European
nations have pressed for better
processing of refugees arriving in
southern Europe, as countries
such as Greece, Italy, and Hungary have struggled to cope with the
influx of refugees. Some 300,000
people have crossed this year
alone.
Hungary is part of Europe,
which has values, and we do not
respect those values by putting up
fences that we wouldn't even use
for animals. Laurent Fabius,
French foreign minister
In an interview with French
radio on Sunday, Laurent Fabius,
the French foreign minister, said
the measure was "extremely harsh.
Hungary is part of Europe, which
has values, and we do not respect
those values by putting up fences
that we wouldn't even use for animals". Fabius also called the attitude of "a certain number of European countries, particularly in the
east" who oppose a quota scheme
for the distribution of refugees
across EU member states "scandalous". He did not name the countries targeted by that remark.
EU member states have differed on ways to tackle the escalating refugee crisis in previous
meetings. "Europe needs to stop
being moved and start moving,"
Italian Prime Minister Matteo
Renzi said, calling again for a fairer
distribution of refugees among the
28 member states. Razor-wire
fencing The interior ministers of
France, the UK, and Germany,
stressed the need to set up "hot
spots" in Greece and Italy by the
year's end to ensure refugees are
fingerprinted and registered, allowing authorities to quickly identify
those in need of protection.
Meanwhile, Hungary, the gateway to the EU from Eastern Europe, is hoping to finish erecting a
175km razor-wire fence along its
border with Serbia. Hungary later
on Sunday lashed out at Fabius,
accusing him of "shocking and
groundless judgements".
Peter Szijjarto, Hungary's foreign minister, said that the French
embassy representative would be
summoned over Fabius' remarks.
Hungary has received almost
150,000 migrants so far this year,
50,000 this month alone, mostly
crossing from Serbia.
The vast majority of the migrants entering Hungary, which is
also a member of Europe's passport-free Schengen zone, are bound
for more prosperous EU countries
such as Germany and Sweden. "A
good European is one who keeps
the rules of Europe," Szijjarto said.
Al Jazeera's Andrew Simmons, reporting from Budapest, said hundreds of refugees were now stranded in the capital with nowhere to
go. "Hungary's government is ignoring all criticism of how it's handling this crisis. It stands accused
of stripping away the rights of refugees and it is preparing a raft of
new legislation which could mean
thousands of refugees are sent back
to Serbia. At a park in the centre of
the Serbian capital, Belgrade, more
and more people were arriving by
the hour. They get something to
eat, rest a little and prepare for the
next leg of their journey into Hungary. Many refugees say the journey to Serbia had been relatively
problem free, they do, however,
fear what awaits them at the Hungarian border.
"Other people who went ahead
of us were told by Hungarian officials that if they didn't give a fingerprint, they would be hit and
thrown in jail. Now we are scared
to go to Hungary," said Lokman, a
Syrian refugee.
.
AFGHANISTANTIMES
We a r e a n a t io n a l in st it u t io n a n d n o t t h e v o ice o f a go v t o r a p r iv a t e o r ga n iza t io n
AFGHANISTAN TIMES
Editor: Abdul Saboor Sarir
Afghan refugees again on the run
— This time from Pakistan
Phone No: +93-772364666
E-mail: [email protected]
Email: [email protected]
www.afghanistantimes.af
Photojournalist: M. Sadiq Yusufi
Advisory editorial board
Saduddin Shpoon, Dr. Sharif Fayez, Dr. Sultana Parvanta, Dr. Sharifa Sharif,
Dr. Omar Zakhilwal, Setara Delawari, Ahmad Takal
Graphic-Designers:
Mansoor Faizy and Edriss Akbari
Marketing & Advertising:
Mohammad Parwiz Arian, 0708954626, 0778894038
Mailing address: P.O. Box: 371, Kabul, Afghanistan
Our Bank Accounts: Azizi Bank: 000101100258091 / 000101200895656
Printed at Afghanistan Times Printing Press
The constitution says
Article 39:
Every Afghan shall have the right to travel and settle in any part of the country,
except in areas forbidden by law. Every Afghan shall have the right to travel
outside Afghanistan and return, according to the provisions of the law. The state
shall protect the rights of the citizens of Afghanistan outside the country.
By Frud Bezhan
Susan Rice in Pakistan and
the concerns of Kabul
For Pakistan, Afghanistan is a gadfly. For Afghanistan, Pakistan is a terrorist camp.
For the United States both are allies in the international war on terror. But how the
US treats the two is part of our contemporary history. When the one commits
atrocities and kills Americans in Afghanistan it receives a sweet-scold. Oh no, is
there any sweet-scold anyway? Perhaps not. Then? Yes the carrot is there for
Pakistan but not the stick. Pakistan has had been flooded with American aid so
generously that Islamabad thought it must be more rascal to get more aid. Why the
US is so bounteous on Islamabad after all? Perhaps Washington thinks by giving
more candies to this rascal Islamabad will ameliorate itself, but after all Pakistan is
the experiment of English and the scars of what the English has done to this region
are still being felt by many in the region. Being an experiment of the English, it has an
inherited artifice and dreams about the incomplete mission of the then GB to bring
Afghanistan under its fold. When Afghanistan commits some atrocities, then all of a
sudden the US loses its temper and even thought of using nukes against Afghanistan
for the 9/11 attacks. Even this idea is horrific let alone nuking. And the one who has
been kicking their a** are being rewarded. This is not only ridiculous but extremely
perturbing. Instead of slapping some economic sanctions, punishing Islamabad, the
United States has been showing leniency. If the international community can slap
economic sanctions on Russia why it cannot on Pakistan to teach it a lesson for
rearing the snakes? At last what is the US weakness that makes it so emasculated in
front of its own client state? Now look at the language the US national security
advisor, Susan Rice, used during her official meetings with Pakistan’s top civilian
and military leaderships. She told Pakistani officials the attacks in neighboring Afghanistan by Pakistan-based militants were absolutely unacceptable. This is hilariously funny. She just says this is unacceptable. Pakistan’s officials usually enjoy
such sugary warnings or even the word of unacceptability doesn’t fit the definition
of a warning. Perhaps in lexicology this expression means displeasure, but with no
intention to do anything. Pakistan sheltered Bin Laden. Pakistan has been sheltering
the dreaded Haqqani Network. Pakistan has been providing safe havens to the
Taliban. Pakistan has been providing them travelling documents for international
trips. And yet Islamabad brazenly says it is supporting peace in Afghanistan. And
when Kabul screams and raises its fingers at Islamabad, then Afghanistan becomes
a gadfly. And the US rushes to the scene, dictates Kabul to have patience and bear
some more and gives a sweet-scold to Islamabad. The rascals reiterate they are
supporting peace in Afghanistan and when the US officials fly back home, the play
of chaos and bloodshed is run once again. This is happening since 2001. Before
2001, Pakistan was experimenting and the US was watching the developments
from a far away. When Pakistan’s henchmen, the al-Qaeda and Taliban, set their
teeth in the United States, Washington rushed to Kabul in a mad run instead of
punishing the master. Perhaps the United States is afraid of punishing the master of
the terrorists. This is the real hardest test of Afghanistan’s patience. None must
underestimate the troubles of Afghanistan. They could explode Afghanistan and this
time with its explosion, many other nations will explode.
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KABUL — Only a month ago,
Naimatullah was running a
school for Afghan migrants in
the Pakistani town of Sialkot —
a place he had called home for
over two decades.
But then one night, Pakistani police stormed his home
and ordered his family to leave.
When Naimatullah refused, he
says police beat him up and
detained his younger brother.
The next day, the authorities
leveled his home, located in a
predominately Afghan neighborhood.
Now, Naimatullah finds
himself living in squalor in a
makeshift refugee camp on the
outskirts of the Afghan capital, Kabul. He has no job and
lives off the meager handouts
he receives from the government and foreign aid groups.
“We don’t have shelter,
there’s no work, and there’s no
food,” says Naimatullah, who
lives with his family of six in a
cramped camp in Kabul’s Pul-e
Charkhi district. “Winter is
coming and we don’t have anything to make a fire with. We
face every problem.”
Naimatullah — a stocky,
bearded, middle-aged man —
could not return to his native
village in the northern Afghan
province of Kunduz, the scene
of the Taliban’s bloody summer
offensive. He was forced to
head to Afghanistan’s capital,
where he says he has once
again become a refugee.
Naimatullah is one of tens
of thousands of Afghan refugees to have returned in recent
months claiming to have been
beaten by police, detained, and
evicted from their homes in Pakistan.
Easy Scapegoats
For years, Islamabad has
pushed Afghan refugees to return to their homeland, with little success. But that was before the massacre of more than
150 people, the vast majority of
them students, at a Peshawar
school in December 2014.
Many returning refugees
say they have been made
scapegoats for that attack,
which was claimed by the Pakistani Taliban, a group Islamabad has said operates out of
Afghanistan.
“There were 1,300 Afghan
households in Sialkot,” says
Naimatullah, who came to Kabul with little more than the
clothes on his back. “Within a
day, the authorities got rid of
all the Afghans in the town. I’m
witness to the mass evictions.”
Naimatullah says Afghans
are being forced out of jobs
and homes in urban centers,
while refugee camps are being
raided by Pakistani authorities
making “mass arrests.”
There has been a marked
rise in the number of returning
Afghan refugees in the wake
of the attack. The International
Organization for Migration
(IOM) says that nearly 90,000
undocumented Afghan refugees have been forced to leave
Pakistan since January — six
times the number during the
same period last year.
That is partly attributable to
a December 31 deadline set by
Islamabad for all Afghan refugees to return to their homeland, despite pleas for an ex-
tension from Kabul and the
UNHCR, the UN’s refugee
agency.
But returning refugees are
convinced that the Peshawar
school attack has accelerated
and intensified Pakistani authorities’ efforts.
No Legal Protection
Even Afghans with valid
refugee documents are reportedly being harassed and forced
to leave Pakistan.
One of them is Latifa, a
mother of four who was evicted from her home in Darra
Adam Khel, a town in northwest Pakistan, where she has
resided for nearly 20 years. She
says thousands of Afghans are
fleeing Pakistan in the face of
intimidation and harassment
from authorities.
“They destroyed our
house. “They came and told us
to leave,” says Latifa, who arrived in Kabul several months
ago. “We pleaded with them to
give us more time to move. But
one night they brought bulldozers and destroyed our
home.”
“We managed to save a few
of our possessions, but many
of our belongings were destroyed,” Latifa says as she
clings to one of her children.
“We didn’t have any place to
go, so we came here [to Kabul]. But here we have no house,
no land, nothing.”
Latifa, who is middle-aged,
is a native of eastern Logar
Province. But like many returnees, soaring violence across
Afghanistan has forced her to
seek shelter in the relative safety of Kabul.
The UNHCR says it has re-
Differences among
Taliban leaders
ceived information that registered Afghan refugees have
been rounded up during police
crackdowns since the Peshawar attack. But despite the
UNHCR expressing its concerns to the Pakistani government, recent returnees say the
crackdown has only intensified.
Too Many With Too Little
The United Nations says
there are around 2.5 million Afghan refugees in Pakistan, 1
million of them unregistered,
combining to make up the second-largest refugee population
in the world. Pakistan has been
home to millions of Afghans for
the past three decades, and
more than 3.8 million refugees
have returned home, according
to the UNHCR.
The UNHCR and the Afghan government have pleaded with Islamabad to extend the
year-end deadline it set for the
return of all Afghan refugees
residing in Pakistan. Kabul
says its resources are overstretched and that it cannot
accommodate such a large
number of returnees so quickly. While politicians in Afghanistan and Pakistan haggle over
the issue, the Afghan returnees find themselves as refugees once again — this time in
their own country. “We want
the government to give us shelter, jobs, and tents,” Naimatullah says while comforting his
young child on his lap. “My
children need to go to school.”
(Courtesy: RFERL)
Frud Bezhan covers Afghanistan and the broader
South Asia and Middle East
region.
.
AFGHANISTANTIMES
Turkey with Erdogan is heading to havoc
By Cengiz Aktar
By François Dufour
An emergency situation requires an emergency solution. To stop the shipwrecks
and the drownings in the
Mediterranean (2,500 dead
migrants since January), let’s
put the presumed refugees,
or “would-be refugees” as
described by the British
press, in planes directly to
Europe.
In the last 8 months,
around 3 out of 4 migrants
crossing the Med were asylum seekers. The other
quarter was made up of economic migrants searching
for jobs. For them, it’s another story that I won’t address here.
According to the UNHCR (the UN Refugee agency), in 2015 7 migrants out
of 10 have been asylum
seekers coming principally
from 5 countries: Syria, Afghanistan, Erithrea, Somalia,
Nigeria.
Consequently one migrant out of five on those
death-boats has the right to
come to Europe. More importantly, Europe has a duty
to protect them. The 1951
Geneva convention protects
any “person owing to a wellfounded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race,
religion, nationality, membership of a particular social
group or political opinion”.
Europe also protects (this
principle is called subsidiary
or temporary protection)
those who would take serious risks if they decide to
return to their home country.
Here’s the problem: as
long as they have not received refugee or protected
person status or at the very
least an asylum visa, they
can not present themselves
at airport check-in counters.
Despite the fact that a flight
would be less expensive and
infinitely less risky as demonstrated by the very convincing video made by demographer Hans Rosling
(available on YouTube).
The common sense solution is to grant them refugee or protected person status in situ. To do this, one
must answer two questions:
who grants this status? and
whereabouts could it be
granted in situ?
A first option: a UNHCR
center in Tripoli or elsewhere on the African coast.
With the power to grant refugee/protected person status, on behalf of European
countries.
A second option: a Euro-
pean union embassy, with
the same power, in a few
safe countries (which have
flights to at least one European country): Algeria? Tunisia? Morocco? Sudan?
Djibouti? Kenya? Lebanon?
Countries that are safer than
the ones the “boat-people”
are fleeing from: Erithrea,
Syria (for half of them, in
2015). But also: Somalia,
Nigeria, Afghanistan, Iraq...
And this must be all be
accomplished with great expediency as demanded by
this emergency situation.
Bear in mind that very few
future refugees are currently
requesting an asylum visa
from say, a French Consulate in Africa -authorizing
them to seek asylum or protection in France especially
as the French agency for
refugees (l’OFPRA) can
take between 3 months to 2
years to resolve application
requests.
Both options (via the
UNHCR or via a European
embassy) then require the
repartition of the total number of refugees amongst the
28 EU countries.
Two main criteria could
be used: population and
wealth (GNP per inhabitant)
and of course the foreign
languages spoken by the refugees.
Another advantage of
this on the spot solution: it reduces the large number of
rejected asylum seekers in
Europe who stay on illegally
(around 3 out of 4) and who
live in poverty.
For the past 10 years I
have interviewed African
youths, both boys and girls,
on the island of Lampedusa
(Italy).
During their journey, theoretically “from the African
inferno to the European eldorado”, they all have been
robbed, assaulted, exploited,
some of them tortured, others raped. Without mentioning all those who have
drowned.
Why did they take such
chances? Abdi, 15, and Sihan, 17, left a situation of total
chaos in Somalia. Mohamed, an 18-year-old boy from
Erithrea, refused to be
chain-ganged for life into the
dictator’s army. Just like
Abel, 16 and Rubel, 17. Gift,
18, from Nigeria, fled Boko
Haram. Cynthia, a Nigerian
an 18 year-old orphan, was
sold by her uncle.
After hearing their stories, I always say to myself:
in their shoes, I too I would
have fled towards the Mediterranean.
Right after Turkey's June 7 parliamentary elections, I forecast
the following: "Change will not
come easily to Turkey. The ruling AKP doesn't have enough
seats to form a government on
its own as it runs the risk of
losing a potential vote of confidence. Coalitions won't be
easy either under [President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan's omnipresence. Despite his nowdevastated dream to become an
executive president, he arguably could be tempted to leave
his mark on any upcoming political deal to save his future."
Almost three months later,
we have reached the point
where Turkey, under Erdogan's
stewardship, is sailing in uncharted waters. The beleaguered president has been
widely criticised for allegedly
doing everything possible to
hold onto power.
As is the custom in every
democracy, Erdogan has given
the task to form a government
to the chairperson of the Justice and Development Party
(AKP), the winner of the June
7 elections. The chairperson is
the caretaker Prime Minister
Ahmet Davutoglu. But the process was unusually slow, indicating Erdogan's reluctance to
form a coalition government.
Short of sufficient seats to
form a single party government,
the AKP has started to sound
out the other two parties, the
Republican People's Party (CH)
and Nationalist Action Party
(MHP) - but not the Kurdishmajority People's Democratic
Party (HDP) - for a coalition
government.
To be fair, HDP had already
declared their unwillingness to
join a coalition with AKP, but
curiously accepted to be in the
interim government that will
see the country towards elections.
The negotiations took
place under Erdogan's close
watch. He and his close aides
did not refrain from torpedoing
any coalition through continuous public remarks, whereby
they openly called for snap
elections.
Naturally, the negotiations
failed. None of the consulted
parties dared to join any government which would be seen
to be under Erdogan's direct
control, wary that they may be
punished by their voters sooner
or later.
Davutoglu's mandate finally expired, but the president abstained from handing over the
mandate to the next in line, the
chairperson of the second biggest party in parliament: the
CHP's Kemal Kilicdaroglu.
Although the odds of Kilicdaroglu forming a coalition
government were slim, the president didn't want to take the
slightest risk to be perceived even for a short while - as having lost control.
This move was as unconstitutional as many of Er-
dogan's other shenanigans
since his election as president
in August 2014.
It is highly doubtful that
Turks are ready for more violence. This is evident in the extraordinarily calm way Turkish
citizens have responded to
what was perceived as Erdogan's invitation to violence,
cherishing the armed forces
that eradicate Kurdish fighters
or celebrating the idea of martyrdom.
Let's recall how during the
parliamentary election campaign he openly took the AKP's
side, asking for 400 MPs for the
party when he was supposed
to maintain a neutral position.
Now, he is preparing to hold
public rallies once again in support of AKP at the snap elections.
The latest breach of the
constitution came at the beginning of the week when he announced the date of the snap
elections - which is the task of
the Supreme Electoral Board
(YSK).
The president has made it
clear that he is not ashamed of
his behaviour: "You can either
accept it or not, but the way
the country is governed has
changed. Now is the time for
this actual situation to be legalised and be defined in a new
constitution."
He also belittles the election
results, and in particular, HDP's
win, which was - for many observers - the only good news
to come out of those elections.
HDP, after all, is a party which
has managed to become a political institution appealing not
only to Kurds, but also to many
Turkish citizens.
Erdogan is closely watching any government formation
because, one would assume, he
is concerned about keeping the
"sensitive" records of the past
13 years away from the public,
or more significantly, the judi-
ETTER TO THE EDITOR
Afghan women’s rights
Afghan women have bear the brunt of violence and many other challenges during the past decades. However, they have been supported at a high
extent during the past decade of change in the country. A report by the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission has revealed that
violence against women in Afghanistan has raised in first six months of this year. The report said that around 3,000 cases of violence against
women have been reported in the commission this year. The mostly cases include killing, physical and psychological torture, and forced
marriages.
The report has blamed judicial organs of the country for failing to punish perpetrators.
According to reports by local media outlets, recently a teenage girl committed suicide in northern Sar-i-Pul province.
The girl committed suicide as her family wanted her to marry a man but the girl was not ready to do so therefore her family forced her to
do so.
The government and women affairs-related organs should leave no stone unturned in overcoming violence against
women in the country. Those who commit violence against women should be punished severely.
Media outlets should broadcast programs that raise peoples’ awareness on women rights.
NasimaAhmadi, Khairkhana, Kabul
Letter to editor will be edited for policy, content and clarity. All letters must have the writer’s
name and address. You may send your letters to: [email protected]
Disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed in the articles are those of the author(s)
and do not reflect the views or opinions of the Afghanistan Times.
ciary. Towards this aim, members of the newly formed interim government have been carefully handpicked.
At the end of the day, for
Erdogan, an election is valid
and its results legitimate only
if his party has won. Indeed,
Turkey is now headed towards
endless electioneering until the
party of the powerful ruler wins.
Unless, of course, the snap
elections are annulled by evoking the state of war, as stipulated in the Article 78 of the Constitution. Taking power back
So, Erdogan has decided to
make sure that AKP will regain
the majority it lost in the June
elections. One way or another,
he is trying to remain in power
to ensure his political and personal future.
To reach that goal, he'll
shun no avenue, including the
most deadly and chaotic ones.
He is doing so by resorting to
what Turkish rulers know best
(ie, attempting to resolve conflicts by violence and war instead of peaceful conflict resolution).
As he cannot wage a war
against a foreign country, like
Syria for instance, he simply rekindles the dormant, yet timeless, conflict with the Kurds.
RELATED: Erdogan stumblesThis is how the Erdogan
administration has now resorted to a war against the Kurdish
political movement as a whole
and its armed branch, the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), to
recapture the nationalist votes
so as to regain the majority in
the parliament.
The method is the bombing
of PKK encampments on the
Iraqi side of the border, declaring large chunks of Kurdish
populated territory as a sort of
"military security zone", and
arresting many Kurdish politicians.
The ceasefire, which was in
place since early 2013, but not
supported by any viable
peace-building initiative, disappeared within hours. This desperate strategy seems to be
leading nowhere.
It is highly doubtful that
Turkish citizens are ready for
more violence. This is evident
in the extraordinarily calm way
they have responded to what
was perceived as Erdogan's invitation to violence, which he
has done by publicly praising
the armed forces that attacked
Kurdish fighters or celebrating
the idea of martyrdom.
Turkish citizens seem to
have enjoyed the peaceful environment arising from the mutual ceasefire between the Turkish armed forces and the PKK.
But before Erdogan's
dreams fail (no pollster predicts
any major change in the votes
of the AKP) global financial
markets are already dumping
assets of emerging economies,
such as Turkey. They have had
plenty of reasons to sell Turkish assets and currency, which
appear vulnerable in the face
of the growing instability triggered by the political, as well
as the military, challenges.
These challenges should
be read together with the failure of Turkey's policies vis-avis the Middle East, particularly Syria, and the international
community's growing suspicions regarding an informal
Turkey-ISIL (Islamic State of
Iraq and the Levant) axis.
This, despite Ankara's recent move to join the anti-ISIL
coalition by allowing its allies
to use the Incirlik airbase, and
despite the deadly attack in
Suruc, killing 34 pro-Kurdish
young activists, which was attributed to ISIL.
Indeed, many in Turkey and
abroad suspect Ankara of using the fight against ISIL as a
cover to fight Kurds in the region and to fight the Syrian regime.
Since the Gezi Park protests
of the summer of 2013 and the
corruption charges against the
AKP, Erdogan has become an
anxious man trying to ensure
his future at all costs.
Ill-advised by a cohort of
sycophants, he is increasingly
insulated from reality. He has
become a sort of "untouchable" and "unaccountable"
man, making decisions that put
both the country and the region
at risk. This is good for no one;
it means chaos for Turkey and
more instability for an already
insecure region. In sum, Erdogan is now part of the problem and no more part of any
solution.
Cengiz Aktar is senior
scholar at Istanbul Policy Center. A former director at the United Nations, he is one of the leading advocates of Turkey's integration into the EU.
The views expressed in this
article are the author's own and
do not necessarily reflect Al
Jazeera's editorial policy.
Malaysia's democracy is in
worse shape than we thought
By Anneliese Mcauliffe
The human sea of yellow swarming though the streets of Kuala
Lumpur on the weekend looked,
at first glance, like an overwhelming show of people power directed against a government and a
prime minister deeply imperilled
by political and financial scandals.
But the rally, smaller in number than hoped for and lacking a
representative ethnic mix, served
only to show that democracy in
Malaysia is more troubled than
many previously thought.
A splintered opposition failed
to mobilise supporters on the
scale hoped for and those who did
turn up - and without a doubt,
there were tens of thousands of
them - were predominantly from
the minority ethnic Chinese and
Indian communities. Inside Story
- Will the protests in Malaysia
gain momentum? That these
groups have legitimate concerns
is a valid reason to protest. But to
the large ethnic Malay support
base of the beleaguered Prime
Minister Najib Razak, this was a
startling show of opposition towards the status quo and the rule
of the Barisan Nasional coalition.
This, of course, is exactly what
Najib was hoping for. Malay culture under threat? The paucity of
Malay protesters played directly
into Najib's hands, strengthening
his core Malay support base with
a mass visual display claiming that
ethnic Malay heritage and culture
are under threat. The prime minister, who was not in Kuala Lumpur during the protest, deemed the
protesters "shallow and poor in
their patriotism and love for their
motherland". Malaysia's ethnic
groups, and thus Malaysia itself,
are looking more and more divided. Also read: The $700 million
question - can Malaysia's PM survive. The timing of the rally, which
was the fourth held by the Bersih
civil society group that campaigns
for free and fair elections, is also
no coincidence.
On Monday, Malaysia will
celebrate Merdeka Day, the annual celebration marking its independence from Britain in 1957.
Public dissatisfaction has been
brewing in Malaysia for the past
months as the economy slows and
political scandals escalate.
For those taking part in the
rally, this patriotic holiday is a
chance to look back at the past and
focus on what kind of Malaysia
people want for the future. For the
government that has been the sole
holder of power since independence, however, patriotism means
a chance to display their Malay
identity and reinforce the nationalist narrative that surrounds independence celebrations.
Public dissatisfaction has been
brewing in Malaysia for the past
months as the economy slows and
political scandals escalate.
The street protests come amid
allegations of Najib's mismanagement of the debt-laden 1Malaysia
Development fund (1MDB), a faltering economy with a plunging
currency, and allegations of impropriety over a 2.6 billion Malaysian ringgit ($700m) "donation"
deposited into Najib's personal
bank accounts. Najib denies allegations that he used public money
for personal gain. Colourful symbol In the lead-up to the protest,
the government used almost every
lever available to deter protesters.
They ruled the rallies illegal, saying correct permissions had not
been sought, banned internet sites
that mentioned the protest, and
even tried to ban the yellow shirts
that were to become the colourful
symbol of the protest. These
heavy-handed scare tactics may
have served to keep some protesters away. But the rally's failure to
mobilise a crowd representative of
Malaysia's ethnic groups highlighted the widening religious and ethnic polarity in Malaysian politics,
as well as the weakness of opposition groups plagued by infighting and disagreements over the
place of religion in multiethnic
Malaysia. Protesters at the end of
their 34-hour anti-government rally in Kuala Lumpur [AFP] In the
past, Bersih rallies could count on
numbers mobilised by opposition
parties for a good turnout. The Pan
Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS),
with one million members nationwide, is no longer part of the opposition after a fallout with former
opposition allies, who represent
mainly ethnic Chinese and Indian
interests. Perhaps the best result
in the aftermath of the Bersih 4.0
rally is to instil in the ruling
UMNO leadership a sense that the
prime minister is no longer electable. But the UMNO party leadership conference, the forum that
could vote him out as leader, has
been delayed for 18 months.
.
AFGHANISTANTIMES
Facing sanctions and stigma, Iranian Americans are pushing
for the nuclear deal to survive Congress' September vote.
New York, United States - For
Mahmoud Reza Banki, an Iranian-American businessman, the
fruits of a nuclear deal between
Tehran, Washington and others
could not come soon enough.
Banki spent 22 months behind
bars for carrying out what he
thought was a routine money
transfer from his family in Iran to
his US bank. He blames hot-headed prosecutors and US sanctions
that were imposed on Iran amid
decades of enmity between the two
countries. "I was caught in the
crosshairs of international politics
that had nothing to do with me,"
said Banki, 39, a former McKinsey & Co consultant who eventually saw his most serious convictions quashed by an appeals court.
"I was nowhere close to being
a decision-maker in those policies,
yet they impacted my life in the
most severe way," Banki said.
Second class citizens? About
one million Iranian Americans live
in the United States. More than
80 percent have close family in
Iran, according to a Zogby Research Services poll from May.
Many complain of red tape,
shuttered bank accounts, threats
of prosecution, travel dangers and
hassles when visiting Iran.
Some 43 percent say they have
faced discrimination in the US. In
an extreme example from 2012,
overeager Apple store staff mistakenly barred Iranian-American
shoppers from buying iPads and
iPhones. "There are restrictions on
Iranian Americans that make them
akin to second class citizens,"
Banki told Al Jazeera.
They are watching whether the
US Congress will accept the deal
struck last month between Iran, the
US and five other world powers
that would impose new curbs on
Tehran's nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief.
RELATED: Lobbying US
Congress on Iran Next month, politicians will vote on a "resolution
of disapproval" brought by US
Republicans to nix the pact. Twothirds of Iranian Americans support the deal. Many also want
Washington to ease the US' unilateral trade embargo and make
everyday life easier for them.
"The community here is exhausted with US-Iran tensions
these past 36 years and all the complications it has created for their
lives," Hadi Ghaemi, an Iranian
American who runs the International Campaign for Human Rights
in Iran, told Al Jazeera.
"They want a normalisation of
relations; they see this deal as an
opportunity to move in that direction." Washington's trade embargo began in 1995 and prohibits
US citizens from supplying goods,
services or technology to Iran or
its government. Family remittances are exempt, but even these are
difficult because direct US-Iran
bank transfers are impossible.
Banki was arrested after relatives moved $3.4m to his US bank
account. Likewise, many Iranian
Americans struggle to settle the
estates of deceased parents in Iran;
and students at US colleges have a
hard time getting money from back
home to pay tuition fees.
Without regular banks, they
often turn to hawala, a traditional
and honour-based banking network in the Middle East. Transactions are usually above board, but
the system is prey to money-launderers and funders of terrorism.
"It's a desperate situation
where people are trying to get
money out of Iran to the US with
limited channels in which to do so.
It's a perfect storm," Erich Ferrari,
sanctions expert with Ferrari &
Associates, told Al Jazeera.
The historic nuclear deal
signed last month focuses on global sanctions and does not significantly alter the US' unilateral embargo - but it does offer a glimmer
of hope for Iranian Americans who
need to transfer money.
The deal will eventually lift
some global restrictions on dealing
with several major Iranian banks,
opening ways for European or
Gulf banks to act as intermediaries for cash transfers between relatives in the US and Iran. "It won't
happen on day one but down the
Iranians in the US have faced discrimination and financial restrictions, but many see better times ahead [EPA]
road we should see greater ability
for people to divest from Iran,"
Ferrari added. Moving money is
not the only issue. Even if the deal
is rolled out, much of the US' trade
embargo will hold firm. Iranian
Americans, together with all US
citizens, will remain barred from
trading or investing in Iran, a US
treasury department spokesman
told Al Jazeera. For me, the most
important part of the phrase 'Iranian American' is 'American'.
Reza Banki, Iranian-American
businessman
There will be some new exemptions, including exports of airline parts that are much needed to
repair Iran's rickety fleet. Almost
40 percent of Iranian Americans
visit Iran at least every three years.
"When Iranian Americans travel to Iran, they won't have to worry that their life is in danger because of the very unsafe planes,"
'Running from death': Refugees
pack streets of Turkey
Thousands of Syrians wait in Turkey's coastal city of Izmir to make the hazardous boat trip to Europe.
Jamal Abdi, policy director for the
National Iranian American Council, told Al Jazeera. But when they
reach the Islamic Republic, they
will still lack a local US embassy
for backup. The Swiss embassy in
Tehran houses staff who help
Americans in Iran, but the US state
department describes its services
as "limited" . Morad Ghorban, a
spokesman for the Public Affairs
Alliance of Iranian Americans,
called for the opening of a lowlevel US consular hub in Tehran.
"If an Iranian American loses
their passport or security card,
they don't have any outpost to go
to," Ghorban told Al Jazeera.
US President Barack Obama
has not ruled out opening a US
embassy in Tehran, but it is not a
priority. "I never say never, but I
think these things have to go in
steps," he told a US radio station
late last year.
New Persian rugs One section
of the nuclear deal has got Omri
Schwartz excited. The manager of
Nazmiyal Collection, a New York
Persian rug emporium, noted that
Iran persuaded the US to allow
imports of "Iranian-origin carpets"
under the nuclear deal after years
in which the items have been contraband. "I think we're going to
see a rush and an influx of inventory coming into the US, where people will be able to buy them again.
As far as new rugs are concerned,
we might see a drop in price,"
Schwartz told Al Jazeera. RELATED: Iran's positive role in the Middle East Many Iranian Americans
hope the deal will be implemented
and will kick-start a rapprochement between two countries that
have derided each other as the
"Great Satan" and a member of an
"Axis of Evil" since Iran's religious
revolution of 1979.
Ghorban is upbeat about the
deal and improved US-Iran relations. Iran nuclear deal: How both
sides are telling the story
"It will create opportunities
for more people-to-people exchanges between the US and Iran.
Ultimately, Iran's gradual opening
up will see the US change from
being an enemy to a source of inspiration. Once that happens, sanctions will be irrelevant," he told Al
Jazeera.
He is not alone. This month, a
group of Iranian-American luminaries and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs voiced support for the deal ,
saying it could help people from
the two countries "connect" and
"create a brighter future".
Their letter was signed by investors and key players in such
technology firms as Facebook,
Twitter and YouTube. It was published in The New York Times, as
Europeans and Asians visited Iran
to scope out opportunities for
post-deal trade.
But the deal still has plenty of
critics in the US and has yet to
make it through Congress. Even if
it succeeds and allays fears over
Iran's nuclear programme, some
analysts doubt a wider US-Iran
detente will happen.
In any case, it would come too
late for Banki, who still struggles
to get a job three years after his
conviction was overturned.
"I hope at some point Iranian
Americans are treated like every
other American," Banki said.
"For me, the most important
part of the phrase 'Iranian American' is 'American'. We are a small
part of the immigrant movement
that has helped make America
great."
Follow James Reinl on Twitter: @jamesreinl Al Jazeera
Yellow protesters unafraid calling
for Malaysian PM’s resignation
Despite threat of military deployment, tens of thousands of Malaysians rally over alleged corruption and economic woes.
Hotels, restaurants, alleys and parks in the Turkish neighbourhood of Basmane have filled with
refugees [Lorena Rios/Al Jazeera]
Izmir, Turkey - Izmir, Turkey's
third-largest city, lures travellers
with its 4,000 years of history and
pristine beaches. But in the city
centre, in the neighbourhood of
Basmane, the hundreds of people
camping in the streets are drawn
to the Aegean Sea for vastly different reasons. They are refugees,
most fleeing the wars in Syria and
Iraq, trying to cross to Greece and
find refuge in Europe. Greece has
seen a big influx of refugees from
Turkey, including more than
50,000 in July alone. Turkey's
proximity to Greece makes cities
like Izmir hotspots for refugees,
who are often told that the gates
to Europe lie just 40 minutes
away. Hotels and restaurants in
Basmane, once filled with tourists,
are now crammed with refugees as are alleys, bus stops and parks.
Never in our lives have we thought
of leaving Syria, but now we must
go. Khaled, 51, fled Damascus in
2012 after the Syrian army besieged
his house. Three years later, the
end of the civil war is nowhere in
sight, and Khaled now lives on
society's fringes, struggling to
make a living. Lying on a blanket
in a playground in Basmane,
Khaled - whose name, along with
those of other refugees interviewed
for this story, has been changed to
protect his identity - and his family of seven say they are waiting
for smugglers to take them to
Greece. "Camps are too bad nowadays," he told Al Jazeera.
Turkey, which has an opendoor policy for Syrian refugees, is
currently hosting two million of
them - about 45 percent of all refugees from the country.
"All Syrians staying here
would go back to Syria if the war
ended now," Khaled said. "Never
in our lives have we thought of leaving Syria, but now we must go."
In Damascus, Khaled had a
three-bedroom house, a job at the
airport scheduling aircraft arrivals,
$300,000 worth of property and
even a summer house. But, he explained, "the army took everything
and sold it in the market".
At first, life in the camp in
Suleiman Shah, near the Turkish
town of Akcakale, was good compared to the situation in Syria.
"The government gave us food,
tents to stay in the camp and food
cards," he said. But today, "there
are a lot of Syrians, and there is no
place [in the camps]".
Ahmed, 38, fled Syria in 2013
from Deir Az Zor with his wife
and four children. Khaled and
Ahmed have partnered up for the
perilous journey ahead. "The children haven't studied in four years,
and the war may go on for 10
more," Ahmed told Al Jazeera. He
said education is important to him
- his oldest child is nine years old but there are no actual schools in
the camp and dozens of students
for each teacher. Unable to work
and striving to make ends meet on
stipends of just 85 Turkish lira
($30) a month for each person in
the camp, both Ahmad and Khaled
left in search of work. "A lot of
people work for nothing," said
Khaled. "Doctors and engineers
work in construction." Syrian refugees are not granted special work
permits in Turkey, therefore, many
work illegally and earn lower wages
than their Turkish counterparts.
"Women work, even the children
work," he said. "Life is too expensive. If we want to live, all of us
need to work." Inside Story Chaos in Kos: Greece on the frontline of refugee crisis According to
the men, most Syrian refugees
work in construction. "Most
people work for nothing," said
Ahmed. "Turkish people made 80
lira ($27) and they gave us 20
($6.80)... We are going to Europe,
and wherever we arrive, we will
stay. We just want to go out far
away from here."
RELATED: Turkey denies
border guards shot Syrian civilians
The boat to Greece will cost
the men $1,100 a person. Children
under five are allowed to board for
free."We only have money to reach
Greece. Afterwards, we don't
know what we'll do," said Khaled.
The men estimate that their journey to Europe - with their final
destination unknown - will cost
another $3,000 for each person.
"When I arrive to Europe, I will
work it out... We may die on the
way, but we don't have a choice."
The families attempted to
cross the sea once before but were
caught by authorities before climbing into a boat. They spent a night
at a police station, where they were
processed and told to leave Turkey. At least 7,000 refugees are
currently stranded on the Greek
island of Kos, and hundreds more
- mostly Syrians, but also Afghans
and Iraqis - are waiting to follow.
Earlier this month, about 2,500
refugees were locked inside a stadium in Kos without access to
water. But for many, the perils of
the journey are balanced by the
prospect of a future in Europe.
Summer is the prime season
for refugees to risk their lives, taking inflatable dinghies across the
Mediterranean. But Khaled and
Ahmed do not fear capsizing as
much as the possibility that the
coastguard patrolling the sea may
send them back to Turkey.
So far, Turkey has spent over
$5bn on humanitarian aid for Syrian refugees, allowing many men,
women and children to reach
safety. But even so, many are finding that life in Turkey is not easy.
"We were running from death, and
we are finding death here," Khaled
said. Al Jazeera
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - Ignoring orders not to demonstrate and
defying a ban on yellow T-shirts,
thousands of protesters slept
overnight in Independence Square
demanding the prime minister's
resignation.
The mass protest - organised
by a coalition of non-governmental organisations known as Bersih,
or "Clean" - planned the two-day
rally in the wake of damaging corruption allegations involving Prime
Minister Najib Abdul Razak.
Bersih's demands include free
and fair elections and a right to
demonstrate, which had been denied with the refusal of a protest
permit.
A previous Bersih rally in 2012
had been dispersed by police with
tear gas and chemically laced water fired from vehicle-mounted
cannons.
On Sunday, there was a strong
police presence behind barricades
surrounding Independence Square.
However, police officials said no
crackdown would occur as long as
there was no attempt to breach the
barriers. As of Sunday afternoon,
no major clashes with police had
occurred. Just after midnight, Ong
- who only wanted to give one
name - along with two friends
stretched out thin paper bags they
had brought along and rested their
heads on the street curb. When
asked by Al Jazeera why he had
decided to spend the night on the
street Ong said, "To save my country, to have our voices heard."
Protesters stayed overnight to
'make their voices heard' [Jarni
Blakkarly/Al Jazeera]
The $700 million question
The two-day demonstration
was called more than a month ago
following a story published in the
Wall Street Journal that said $700m
had been transferred into Najib's
private bank account. The revelation was one in a long list of scandals surrounding the government,
but the first to directly involve the
prime minister. Najib initially denied the allegations, but later admitted the money had been transferred into his account ahead of the
2013 election. The money was
described as a donation from an
unnamed Middle Eastern country.
The government played down the
rally on Sunday with communications director Abdul Rahman Dahlan noting the Najib administration
"is still standing". Abdul also told
Al Jazeera an investigation into the
$700m is under way, and the government is examining ways to tackle the rising cost of living and the
plummeting Malaysian ringgit.
The timing of the SaturdaySunday demonstration was symbolic with Malaysia's Indepen-
Y e llo w T-s h ir t s w e r e b a n n e d u n d e r t h e P r in t in g Pr e s s a n d Pu b lica t io n s
Ac t [ J a r n i Bla k k a r ly / A l Ja z e e r a ]
dence Day on Monday. Organisers said protesters would disperse
after midnight.
Malaysia has not had a change
of government since independence
from Great Britain in 1957. This
year's Independence Day marks
the country's 58th year under the
rule of Najib's United Malays National Organisation (UMNO).
Authorities spent last week
trying to dissuade protesters from
holding a rally, which was declared
"illegal". There were also threats
about the possible deployment of
the military. On the eve of the demonstration, the government
blocked access to four websites
related to the protests. However,
it was the decision to add yellow
T-shirts with "Bersih" on them to
the list of prohibited items under
the Printing Press and Publications
Act - effectively making them illegal - that irked the public the most.
Yellow is the colour of the Bersih
movement. On Saturday, the rally
was scheduled for 2pm but crowds
started gathering in downtown
Kuala Lumpur as early as 10am. It
soon became clear the government's
fear tactics hadn't worked. Protesters took to the streets despite
government threats to voice their
dissatisfaction [Jarni Blakkarly/Al
Jazeera] Activist Adam Adli, recently sentenced to a year in prison for political expression under
the controversial Sedition Act, told
Al Jazeera the mass turnout
showed Malaysians refused to be
intimidated. "Tomorrow Najib
may still be in power, but at least
we have done something. We came
out and voiced our dissatisfaction.
We have defended our rights to dissent," said Adli, whose case is under appeal.
Despite the prime minister's
denial of wrongdoing and promises to reform political campaign financing, Najib has remained under
sustained pressure from the opposition and critics within his own
party. UMNO had its worst-ever
showing at the last general election in 2013, losing the popular
vote to the opposition coalition,
but holding onto power because
of gerrymandered seats.
To counter the growing discontent within the party, last month,
in the space of 24 hours, Najib
sacked the deputy prime minister,
the attorney general, and four cabinet ministers who had voiced issues with his leadership. Energy
grew as crowds began to swell in
the scorching sun on Saturday.
People packed narrow streets with
speeches given by activists and
opposition politicians amid enthusiastic chants of "Najib Resign" and
"Power to the people". Police
said 29,000 people gathered on Saturday, while rally organisers said
200,000 turned out. Independent
news site Malaysiakini estimated
the crowd at 100,000. While many
of the people there voiced their
concerns about corruption, the falling ringgit, rising costs of living,
and the government's racial rhetoric were also raised. Former P
rime Minister Mahathir Mohamad showed up at the rally on Sunday and reiterated his call for Najib to step aside. Wan Azizah Wan
Ismail also attended the protest.
She is the wife of jailed opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, who
was sentenced to three years in
prison on sodomy charges in April.
Anwar has maintained the allegations were politically motivated.
Bersih chairwoman Maria Chin
Abdullah told the rally a motion
of no-confidence in the prime minister should be presented when
parliament reconvenes in October.
Activists and opposition politicians gave speeches against corruption and limits on freedom of
speech [Jarni Blakkarly/Al
Jazeera] Malaysia: The $700 million scandal
As night fell, a small number
of Muslim protesters held a group
prayer. One of the main criticisms
of the Bersih movement has been
its failure to attract equal levels of
support across Malaysia's ethnic
and religious divide.
The vast majority of rally-goers were Chinese Malaysian or
Indian Malaysian with Malays,
the country's largest ethnic group,
largely under-represented.
Dzulkefly Ahmad, a Malay
politician from the new opposition party Gerakan Harapan Baru,
told Al Jazeera ethnicity is not a
major factor in the demonstrations.
"I don't think it's fair to say
the Bersih movement is Chinese
dominated. It's no longer about ethnicity now, the consciousness cuts
across race and religious adherence.
I think it's very flawed and misplaced to conclude that the movement is dominated by anyone,"
Dzulkefly said.
Organisers had asked people
to come prepared with sleeping
bags to stay on the street overnight.
"I don't want to see any of you
sleeping in a hotel. I want to see
you sleeping here," one organiser
told the cheering crowd after the
end of speeches at midnight.
Follow Jarni Blakkarly on Twitter: @JarniBlakkarly
Al Jazeera
.
AFGHANISTANTIMES
Rowhani: Foreign
investors in Iran
must share benefits
The Italian energy company Eni
SpA announced Sunday it has discovered a “supergiant” natural gas
field off Egypt, describing it as the
“largest-ever” found in the Mediterranean Sea.
The news came a day after Eni
CEO Claudio Descalzi met in Cairo
with Egyptian President AbdelFattah el-Sissi, the Egyptian leader’s office said.
Eni said the discovery - made
in its Zohr prospect “in the deep
waters of Egypt” - could hold a
potential 30 trillion cubic feet of
gas over an area of 100 square kilometers (38.6 square miles).
“Zohr is the largest gas discovery ever made in Egypt and in
the Mediterranean Sea and could
become one of the world’s largest
natural gas finds,” Eni said in a
statement. “The discovery, after
its full development, will be able
to ensure satisfying Egypt’s natural gas demand for decades.”
Descalzi was quoted by Eni
as saying that the discovery reconfirms that “Egypt still has great
potential” energy-wise. He said
“important synergies with the existing infrastructures can be exploited, allowing us a fast production startup.”
Eni has been in Egypt since
1954 through its subsidiary IEOC.
The recent tumbling of global stock
markets across the world due to
devaluation of the Chinese yuan
has raised fears of another global
recession. It has been estimated
that around $5 trillion has been
wiped off global equity markets
since. On Monday 24 – popularly
termed as the ‘Black Monday’ –
global stock market indexes witnessed an almost vertical fall, the
Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE)100 Index also headed south when
it went down by 4.1% or 1,419.4
points. Selling by foreign investors
who hold about $7 billion in investment and panic selling by
small local investors brought the
market down. Reason behind stock
market crisis Being the second largest economy, China’s weakening
economic fundamentals sent ripples throughout the world, leading
to a significant shake-up in investor confidence. China has a large
It’s the main hydrocarbon producer in Egypt, with a daily equity production of 200,000 barrels of oil equivalent, the company said.
import base standing at $1.96 trillion and the prospects of slowing
growth in China is viewed with
much stress by commodity exporting countries. It has consequently
also led to a decline in commodity
prices.
Moreover, following China’s
devaluation of the yuan, the
world’s emerging economies are
also letting their currencies slide in
a quest to remain competitive. As
a case in point, the South African
rand and the Indonesian rupee have
slid to historic lows against the
dollar.
Following this doomsday scenario, Beijing reacted by injecting
$101 billion through cutting interest rates and lowering the amount
of reserves the banks must hold
for the second time in two months.
Some analysts have likened this
current phase to that of the Dow
Jones crash in 1929 which led to
the Great Depression while some
consider the current phase to be
similar to the Asian Financial Crisis of the late 90s. I present the
viewpoint that the effect on the
rest of the world would be controlled — at least in the short run
and present some reasons to justify my stance. After the onset of
the global financial crisis of 2008,
there has been a huge volume of
research which has analysed the
role of ‘systemically important financial institutions’ in propagating shocks to the economy. One of
the key facets of these institutions
was their ‘interconnectedness’ or
within country and cross-border
financial linkages through cross
border financial flows, payment
systems etc.
In the globalised world of today, interconnectedness has gained
importance in transmitting shocks
to other financial institutions and
U K e co n o m y s tro n g
m o m e n tu m co n tin u e s
The suite of PMIs should indicate
that the momentum of U.K. economic activity remains strong but
with differing performance by sector. Of the three sectors, manufacturing looks the most vulnerable
to changes in global economic
trends. There seems to be a slowdown in world trade which should
be felt in export orders. "Domestic demand remains firm but the
external factor should lead to a
minor fall in the manufacturing
PMI from 51.9 to 51.5. The over-
all result in construction sector
should be dominated by the rising
housing sector and so we expect
an increase from 57.1 to 57.7",
says Societe Generale. The services PMI is volatile on a month to
month basis dipping from 58.5 in
June to 57.4 in July. A bounce is
expected to 58.3 in August and the
overall composite PMI is likely to
rise slightly from the July reading
of 56.6, adds SocGen. © EconoTimes 2015. All rights reserved.
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through this service is the intellectual property of EconoTimes or
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EconoTimes nor its third party
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errors, omissions or delays in content, or for any actions taken in
reliance thereon.
even economies. However, in the
case of China, the country has
barred foreign investment in mainland stocks and roughly 80% of
the trading in the stock exchange is
by Chinese companies and individuals. This is unlike the global
financial crisis when investors
from all over the world had bought
into the US-subprime.
Secondly, after the Asian Financial crisis and the global financial crisis of 2008, Asian economies have a far stronger capacity
to weather such shocks. There has
also been a focus on more effective regulation and financial systems are better managed and robust. Moreover, fixed exchange rate
regimes which were followed by
many nations during the Asian financial crisis during the 1990s are
absent now and are replaced by
flexible exchange rates. Asian nations are also aided by a healthy
In Japan, foreigners
INCREASINGLY FILL
WORKFORCE GAPS
Responding to labor shortage, nation that once shunned
non-Japanese workers is overcoming its resistance
TOKYO: Non-Japanese are taking a bigger role in powering Japan’s economy as a labor shortage
impels the country to overcome
its long-standing resistance to foreign workers. With hundreds of
thousands of jobs going unfilled,
businesses from noodle shops to
Sin gap o re ’s s h rin kin g
e co n o m y w o rs e n s ban k
ris k as lo an s s lu m p
Slumping property and oil prices
have dragged a gauge of
Singaporean banks’ loan quality to
the worst in six years, inflating
their borrowing costs.
Lenders have placed 2.3 percent of their loan books in a “special mention” category that signals
potential weakness, the highest
since 2009. The extra yield investors demand to hold DBS Group
Holdings Ltd. 2019 dollar notes
over Treasuries surged to a record
87 basis points last month. Similar measures for United Overseas
Bank Ltd. and Oversea-Chinese
Banking Corp. are the highest in at
least six months.
While Singapore’s banks are
among the best capitalized in the
world, loan recovery is suffering
after government curbs drove
home sales to a six-year low in
2014, oil prices slumped and
Southeast Asian economies faltered. The city’s gross domestic
product shrank an annualized 4.6
percent in the three months
through June, as bank lending fell
for three straight months starting
February in the longest tumble
since 2009.
“You could see higher
nonperforming loans and higher
credit costs for the banks” because
of the oil and property sectors, said
Matthew Phan, a Singapore-based
analyst at CreditSights Inc.
Lending Stresses
Soured debt at DBS backed by
property increased 39.7 percent
from last year to S$524 million
($375 million) at the end of June.
Non-performing real-estate loans
rose to 1 percent of all lending at
UOB as of June 30 from 0.8. Oil
and gas loans are under some
stress, which will continue, Samuel
Nag Tsien, chief executive officer
of OCBC, said July 31.
The trends may hurt lenders’
profitability, according to Eugene
Tarzimanov, senior credit officer
at Moody’s Investors Service in
Singapore. “Banks make good returns if they are growing or margins are widening,” he said. “In
Singapore, both conditions are not
there.” A call and an e-mail to the
corporate communications officers
of DBS and UOB were not answered. An OCBC spokesperson
referred to the comments made by
the bank’s chief executive officer
during the analyst call for company
views on exposure to oil and property.
Government Response
Since 2009, Singapore moved
to stem a surge in the property
market that was fueling discontent
in the city-state. The measures included taxes as high as 15 percent
of the purchase price for foreigners.
Moody’s also cited the
government’s guiding housing
prices lower without sparking
sharper slides in changing its outlook on Singapore’s bank system
to stable from negative last month.
While the credit assessor expects
a “mild deterioration in books,” the
relatively low exposure to commodities including oil should prevent major problems, Tarzimanov
said.
Banks and builders face an
economy that shrank the most
since 2012 last quarter. Singapore
slashed the upper end of its growth
forecast for 2015 to 2 percent from
4 percent, the trade ministry said
in a statement Tuesday.
The city had the weakest-performing luxury residential market
in the world for the sixth consecutive quarter at the end of June, according to consulting firm Knight
Frank LLP.
Office rents posted the first
decrease in more than two years
and residential prices have fallen
for seven quarters in the longest
run of declines since 2002.
While Singapore’s lenders mitigate risks by securing loans, their
exposure to the property industry represents about 40 percent of
all lending, according to Fitch Ratings.
“We believe the overall health
of the Singapore economy is highly
correlated with the property market,” said Elaine Koh, a director in
the financial institutions unit of
Fitch in Singapore. “A severe and
extended market correction would
likely hit the banks’ asset quality
through a number of channels.”
balance of foreign exchange reserves which was largely absent
during the 90s.Lastly, analysts
have also claimed that almost every recession since the Second
World War has been preceded by a
sharp rise in oil prices, which in
the past year have more than
halved. Although I have taken the
viewpoint of an optimist, this does
not exclude the possibility of a crisis like situation developing in the
future. The stock market nosedive
could affect the Chinese economy
and hence, impact the rest of the
world through its sheer size.
Commodity exporting countries would be worst affected as
China imports iron ore, coal and
copper and falling commodity prices could result in recessionary
trends in those economies. China
would have to take serious steps
in order to avert any crisis-like situation in the future.
auto-parts factories are squeezing
every existing channel to get help.
“Japanese businesses need
workers and the number of Japanese college graduates keeps decreasing,” said Toshihiro Menju, a
managing director at the Japan
Center for International Exchange,
who supports increased immigration as an answer to the nation’s
sluggish economy. “That gap will
continue to rise.” Many Asians
come to Japan as students who are
allowed to work nearly 30 hours a
week. Others qualify as technical
trainees under an internship program that aims to teach them skills
they can bring back home. That
program has been criticized by the
U.S. and international organizations as an avenue for cheap labor
that lacks effective oversight or
protections. Japan has described
it as a philanthropic effort and said
it would step up oversight. Still
other foreigners work without
proper visas. In 2014, there were
some 788,000 legal foreign workers in Japan, up 15% over a twoyear period to about 1.4% of the
legal workforce, according to the
Ministry of Labor. Anh Mai Thi,
28 years old, arrived in Tokyo in
late 2012 from her hometown near
Hanoi, spurred by an interest in
the Japanese language. Back home,
Ms. Thi studied economics and
worked for a company that sought
to expand Internet coverage in rural areas. Now, she works two
part-time jobs—as a cashier at a
supermarket and greeting customers at a ramen shop—to make ends
meet while attending vocational
school at night. “You have to work
a part-time job to live in Japan,”
she said. Economists see Japan’s
aging and declining population as
one of the biggest challenges to
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s quest
to get the country growing again.
Unemployment is near the lowest
level in decades as open positions
go unfilled. Yet many Japanese are
reluctant to take manual-labor jobs
at the wages available. Anh Mai
Thi, who came to Tokyo from her
hometown near Hanoi, Vietnam.
She now works two jobs while attending ocational school at night.
ENLARGE “I think foreign workers can be the golden egg that will
produce,” said Mr. Menju, the immigra ion advocate. Others say Japan already has enough foreign
workers. Some cite difficulties
with integration and concerns that
Japanese workers could lose out
from an influx of foreigners willing
to accept lower pay. Takaaki Mitsuhashi, an economic analyst who
has written books opposing immigration, said Japan is on course
to improve productivity and increase wages. “If foreigners came
in to make up for the shortage of
workers, there would be less need
to increase productivity and our
economic growth would be lost,”
he said.
Jaenudin Jaen of Bekasi, Indonesia, feels the increased demand
for labor at his job assembling car
filters in Hamamatsu, in a region
that is home to Yamaha motorcycles and Suzuki cars. The factory
of 120 workers includes people
from Brazil and the Philippines,
he said.
Would-be foreign investors in Iran
should be prepared to share the
benefits of their deals, the country's president said, indicating Tehran will impose tough terms that
could clash with U.S. regulations
even after sanctions are lifted.
Business delegations from
around the world have flocked to
Tehran since the July 14 nuclear
agreement, which could see international sanctions lifted in early
2016 and open Iran, an energy exporter with a large middle class, to
world markets.
But President Hassan
Rowhani on Saturday suggested
foreign investors will be welcome
only if they work with a local partner, hire local workers and transfer technology, in some of the most
explicit comments to date about
the obligations businesses are likely to face.
"If foreign companies or countries think they can take control of
a market of 80 million people, they
are mistaken, and we must not allow it," Rowhani said at a news
conference broadcast on state television on Saturday.
"Our policy is that you bring
your investment and technology
to the country and partner with
Iranians, and then a part of the Iranian and regional markets will be
within reach of us both and there
will be employment for our
youth."
specific contract terms it will
impose on foreign investors. Oil
Minister Bijan Zanganeh on Monday said a new model oil contract
would be completed in September
and introduced at a London conference in December.
Rowhani's comments echo
those of Reza Norouzzadeh, the
chairman of the Industrial Development and Renovation Organization, who earlier this month said
companies were "only welcome to
Iran's economy through joint investment".
Such requirements are typical
in developing economies, but companies could get into trouble in Iran
if they accidentally partner with
an entity under non-nuclear sanctions or share technology with
potential military applications,
experts said.
What progress has
India's economy made
in th e p as t five ye ars ?
"You'll find the airport has changed
dramatically, you'll be able to book
a taxi using an app on your phone,
and you'll see a real spring in the
step of many people in India now
- people are charged with optimism," one Indian businessman
said when I asked what had
changed in the five years I'd been
away from a city that, in many
ways, had been my second home.
Mumbai - or Bombay - has
always held a mythical place in my
family's history. It was here that
my migrant Sindhi grandparents
first came to, after they fled postpartition Pakistan, in search for a
better life for their children. And it
was to Mumbai that I came in 2006
to report for the BBC on the fastgrowing economy. The India that I
saw then was in the midst of an
unprecedented boom. Growth
rates were soaring, the outsourcing sector had helped to lift the
monthly salaries of young Indians
to levels their parents wouldn't
have seen in a year, and Indian companies such as Tata were going global, buying up assets abroad. One
of the places I reported from frequently was the Bombay Stock
Exchange. The main share index,
the Sensex, hit a record 10,000
points within the first few months
of my arrival. When it reached
20,000 points in 2007 newspaper
headlines at the time shrieked that
India had finally hit the major
league, as foreign funds rushed to
invest in fast-growing companies.
Today when I visited the exchange,
the Sensex had closed just under
28,000 points - respectable but
hardly dazzling. The mood at the
chai-walla today is bullish The
topic of conversation for investors
hanging out at the local chai-walla
outside the Bombay Stock Exchange was very much the financial turmoil that has infected world
markets of late. The optimism of
many of them took me by surprise.
"I think India will be able to withstand this and come out of it even
better," said 26-year-old Preeti, a
self-proclaimed avid investor. "My
father has always told us to buy
when the markets are down, and
that's what I'm doing." "When
there's a sale at the supermarket,
what do you do?" asked one mutual fund trader. "You rush to buy
your rice and cooking oil don't
you? Well that's what you should
be doing now - India's stock markets won't be down for long." 2009
sweet spot That's a refrain I've
heard over and over in my time
here in Mumbai over the last couple of days - and not just with regards to the stock market. "India's
economy isn't immune to the slowdown in China, but is more resilient than some of the other countries in the region," India's central
bank governor Raghuram Rajan told
me. "Based on what I've seen so far
there's no strong reason to believe
we're on the verge of another crisis." Prime Minister Singh was
riding the crest of a wave following
his election victory in 2009 When I
left Mumbai in 2009 to take on a
posting in Jakarta for the BBC, India was still in what many said was
a sweet spot. The Congress-led
coalition had just been voted back
in for a second term because of
strong economic growth, defying
expectations of an electoral loss.
But a series of corruption scandals
and increasing disenchantment with
that government saw Manmohan
Singh - the man once known as the
father of Indian reform for his
dream budget in 1991 that opened
up the doors to the Indian economy - replaced last year by the populist pro-business politician from
Gujarat, Narendra Modi. Now
though there are concerns about
how quickly the new prime minister can deliver on some of his economic promises.Critics have said
essential economic reforms - such
as making it easier for businesses
to buy land to build factories on failed to pass through the last parliamentary session because of political opposition. But some businessmen appear to be willing to give
Mr Modi another chance. One is
Leo Puri, the managing director of
UTI Asset Management: "I think
the process of reforms in India is
one of incremental steps instead of
big bangs. "I think there was a dramatic expectation of how much the
new government would be able to
achieve. Even in the 1991 reforms,
they happened incrementally and
over time before they started to
have an effect." As a result, after
growing by only 0.8% in 1991-92,
India's economy grew by 5.1% in
1992-93. It is true that economic
growth in India is starting to pick
up. The government says economic growth is 7% but is aiming for
higher growth of 8%. If it achieves
that, it could grow faster than China - at a time when the world is
looking for a new driver of global
growth. But it is also true that some
parts of the real economy have yet
to feel that growth. Some economists question India's growth figures, saying that economic indicators like credit and capital growth
have yet to show similar gains. And
many Indians say they're not feeling the effects of that growth in their
wages or bank accounts.
.
AFGHANISTANTIMES
Kanye West
says he's
running for
US presidency
in 2020
Shah Rukh Khan’s
‘Dilwale’ wraps up
its shoot in Iceland
One of the most anticipated films
this year, Shah Rukh Khan and
Kajol's Dilwale's shoot has finally
been wrapped up in Iceland, reported IANS. Directed by Rohit
Shetty, who has previously
worked with SRK in Chennai Express, the film will reunite BTown's most beloved jori after a
gap of five years. Shah Rukh
posted a tweet about culmination
of the shoot: Also starring Varun
Dhawan, Kriti Sanon, Vinod
Khanna, Kabir Bedi, Johny Lever
and Varun (Choocha) Sharma, the
film has been dubbed as a ''wholesome entertainer'' by the director.
Shah Rukh and Kajol, who were last
seen in Karan Johar's My Name Is
Khan, will also be dancing together,
and their steps have been choreographed by none other than their
old companion, Farah Khan.
Dilwale kicked off filming earlier this
year in March and is slated to hit
the screens on December 25.
Bollywood actor and former beauty queen Dia Mirza, who looks as
charming in traditional wear as in
western outfits, is concerned
about how a large part of today’s
generation finds western outfits
‘cool’. She hopes they support
home-grown creations for the betterment of Indian textile and handloom.
The actor-producer was in
Mumbai to attend designer Anita
Dongre’s show for her new label
Grassroot – a brand that pays tribute to the glorious craftsmanship
of India at the ongoing Lakme
Fashion Week winter-festive 2015.
“A large part of our generation
today is of the opinion that if we
are in western garments, we are
cool, and if we are not in a western
garment, it’s not cool. I think we
need to change that,” said Dia, who
herself looked stunning in an elegant traditional outfit designer by
Dongre. Read: Hand-in-hand: Shahid and Mira walk the runway at
LFW 2015
Often, it is seen that when
Bollywood actors flaunt Indian
wear at international red carpet
events, they receive brickbats for
not choosing something appropriate.
Stressing on how actor Nandita Das looked “amazing” in a sari
that she wore at the Cannes International Film Festival earlier this
year, Dia said: “This really is a
time for the fashion bloggers in our
country to think about what their
prerogative of ‘cool’ is. I think
when Nandita Das was at Cannes,
she looked amazing with her exquisite clothes, but in that sense,
everybody is open for their own
opinion.”
Mirza appreciated her contemporary Nandita Das’ traditional look at the Cannes Film Festival.
PHOTO: FILE
Nevertheless, she believes that traditional textiles and handloom are ‘fashionable, cool and beautiful’.
Bollywood breakthrough: Momal Sheikh Eva Mendes sparks
to play Pakistani girl in Anand Rai's next engagement rumours
News broke over the weekend that
actress Momal Sheikh, daughter of
industry veteran Javed Sheikh, has
bagged a role in a Bollywood film,
which is Tanu Weds Manu director Aanad L Rai’s next. The actress
confirms the news to Dawn.com:
"Yes, I have been cast in the movie,
which is a rom-com. I play a Pakistani girl in the film." Momal will
be joined by Javed Sheikh in the
film's cast, who had been roped in
earlier. "[The director/producer]
were looking for an actress for a
really long time," Momal reveals,
"Baba [Javed Sheikh] had given
them a few names of good actresses,
but none of them were able to commit to the project for various reasons. When they came to know
about me, they asked Baba, but he
suggested that I wasn't ready because I had just had my baby. But
they approached me anyway, and
the director talked to me about
Tanu Weds Manu's success, and I
read the script, which I found to be
really good." The film, the title of
which is yet to be revealed, also
stars Abhay Deol and Diana Penty.
The shoot will begin in late September, and Momal is flying out in
Aamir Khan
reminisces about
Andaz Apna Apna
in style
It has been 21 years since Andaz
Apna Apna released, but it still
holds a special place in Aamir's
heart. Aamir was recently spotted
wearing a Red T-shirt with Shakti
Kapoor's face embossed on it.
The T-Shirt read 'Release Go
Go', referring to Shakti Kapoor's
character 'Crime Master Go Go'
from Rajkumar Santoshi's Film
Andaz Apna Apna. Aamir wore the
T-Shirt revisiting the film with a
touch of humor.
The film that released in April,
1994 had been shelved for nearly
3 years. Packed work schedule of
the films cast led to the delay of
the film.
It was Aamir who brought the
cast of the film which includes
Salman Khan, Karishma Kapoor,
Raveena Tandon, Paresh Rawal
and Shakti Kapoor together under
one roof with Producer Rajkumar
Santoshi.
It was then that the Andaz
Apna Apna Team decided to take
time off and complete shooting for
the film. The film went on to being
nominated in four categories at the
40th Filmfare Awards for the Best
Film (Vinay Kumar Sinha), Best
Director (Rajkumar Santoshi),
Best Actor (Aamir Khan) and Best
Comedian (Shakti Kapoor).
Over the years, Andaz Apna
Apna has become a cult classic
making it one of the most cherished films of Aamir Khan's career.
a few days for the first look photography and other initial promotion tasks. Given the furore surrounding Phantom, isn't Momal
nervous about how her debut will
be perceived in Pakistan? "Well,
I'd be generally nervous working
anywhere internationally, because
I'm taking Pakistan's image with me.
But I'm confident that the work that
I'm doing is positive and will make
my people proud," she said.
Actress Eva Mendes has added
fuel to rumours of her getting engaged to actor boyfriend Ryan
Gosling. The piece of jewellery
she wore on her right hand was a
giant emerald ring. She was first
spotted wearing the bling on July
25 when promoting cosmetics giant Estee Lauder's new Dimensions Skincare line at a mall in
Florida, reports aceshowbiz.com.
The 41-year-old has been flashing
the speculated engagement ring in
photographs she shared on photo-
sharing website Instagram. Neither
Mendes nor Gosling has addressed
the engagement rumours. The actress' representative also has not
yet made any comment on the matter. Mendes and Gosling first met
in the fall of 2011 on the set of
their drama film "The Place Beyond
the Pines". Despite their headlinemaking romance, the couple has
been acting very private about their
personal life. In September 2014,
they welcomed their first child together, daughter Esmeralda Amada.
Are Arjun Rampal and
The Transporter: Refueled’
Jessia
to have four hot femme fatales! Mehr
getting divorced?
The original 'Transporter' series
starring Jason Statham have
mostly focused on tough male characters, but the reboot version 'The
Transporter: Refueled' starring the
dashing Ed Skrein, who plays the
enigmatic mercenary Frank Martin, will have not one, but four badass femme fatales!
Elaborating on the same, director Camille Delamarre said, `Besides having a new Transporter and
lots of sexy elements, Refueled
gives the audience a complex story
full of new developments. We've
got four incredibly good- looking
female characters who give the
Transporter a hard time throughout the film.` The four sexy femme
fatales are Anna (Loan Chabanol),
a Russian prostitute, Maria
(Tatiana Pajkovic), who plays
Anna's confederate, Chinese actress Wenxia Yu, winner of the
2012 Miss World pageant, who
plays a Chinese sex-worker and
Noemie Lenoir, who plays the villainous Maissa, gangster Yuri's
prostitute-turned-business-associate.
To be released by RelativityB4U, this action extravaganza,
which will be out in four languages
viz. English, Hindi, Tamil and
Telugu, is slated to hit screens on
September .
Zac Efron shoots without lines
Actor Zac Efron, who features as
a disc jockey (DJ) in romantic comedy "We Are Your Friends", shared
that he did not have real lines during the shoot in California State
University, Northridge but the
shoot was fun.
`Shooting at California State
University, Northridge (CSUN)
was a lot of fun. I didn't have any
real lines and most of the extras
had no lines so they weren't really
able to speak back to us, but it
was great to watch everyone's interactions with all the girls," Efron
said in a statement.
"My character was supposed
to be a little more reserved, which
I was happy about, 'cause I don't
know how they do what they do.
They were hilarious,` he added.
For an early scene, Efron spent an
entire day among a group of extras, while the cameras caught them
running up and down the steps of
the library of California State University Northridge, handing out
fliers under a sun that blazed over
100 degrees.
The 27-year-old, who rose to
fame after the "High School Musical" series, will be featuring as a
23-year-old DJ Cole in the film.
Actor Arjun Rampal has been on a continuous media trial over rumours
of a rocky relationship with his wife Mehr Jessia. But the actor prefers
not to react. Arjun and Mehr, who have been married for over 15 years,
have been caught in the midst of divorce rumours, and while Arjun has
slammed the media over it in the past, he now seems unaffacted. "I don't
have any views as I feel people have more views than me," Arjun told
IANS here when asked about his views on the rumours related to his
personal life. Arjun married Mehr, a supermodel of her time, in 1998.
Together, they have two daughters. Arjun walked the runway for European brand Buggati shoes, that's making its India foray through e-commerce platform Jabong. Arjun unveiled the collection on the ramp in a
classic pair of Bugatti shoes with his name inscribed on them. He was
even seen walking around the venue with Mehr; they both posed for
shutterbugs; and later even took a seat next to each other for designer
Monisha Jaising's show, the last presentation of the fourth day of the
fashion gala on Saturday.
Mercurial rapper Kanye West
used the MTV Video Music
Awards in Los Angeles to announce a run for the White House
in 2020 after winning a career
achievement award.
Cheered by his biggest fan,
pregnant wife and reality star Kim
Kardashian in a lace-up olive dress
that left little to the imagination,
he was greeted by an extended
standing ovation.
“I have decided in 2020 to run
for president,” he bellowed into
the microphone at the end of a rambling address in which he also appeared to confess to smoking marijuana before taking the stage.
“I will die for the art, for what
I believe in and I ain’t always gonna be polite,” he said. The hip hop
star joked that people would think
he smoked “something” before
stepping out for the evening.
Read: I’m completely boring.
I gotta take North to tap class and
gym class: Kanye West
“The answer is yes. I rolled
up a little something. I got the answer,” he said. “We’re the millenials bro.”
“This is a new mentality, we’re
not going to control our kids with
brands. We’re not going to teach
low self-esteem and hate to our
kids. We’re gonna teach our kids
that they can be something,” he
said.
MTV’s Video Vanguard lifetime achievement award has previously been given to artists including Madonna, Michael Jackson and Beyonce.
“Trump you have my vote but
now Kanye West,” shouted shock
pop diva Miley Cyrus, the host
of Sunday’s night show.
The 38-year-old boundarypushing rapper also won best Video With a Social Message for “One
Man Can Change the World” with
Big Sean and John Legend.
Otherwise the night saw pop
superstar Taylor Swift take an early lead, winning two of her whopping 10 nominations and burying
the hatchet with rapper Nicki Minaj.
Read: Kim Kardashian dismisses naming son South
Swift won Best Pop Video and
Best Female Video for her hit
“Blank Space,” beating Beyonce
in both categories and former foe
Minaj in the second.
But if Minaj hugged and made
up with Swift, then Minaj called
out host Cyrus for telling The New
York Times in a recent interview
that Minaj was “not too kind” and
“not very polite.”
“This bitch that had a lot to
say about me the other day in the
press,” she said on stage, after
thanking her pastor for winning
Best Hip Hop Video for “Anaconda.”
Cyrus, who made MTV award
history two years ago by twerking on stage with Robin Thicke in
a flesh-colored bikini and cavorting around with a foam finger kept
her response civil.
“We’re all in the industry, we
all do interviews, and we all know
how they manipulate” what we
say, she said.
In a surprise start to the awards
show, Swift joined a resplendent
Minaj, festooned in a red tribalstyle headdress, at the end of her
opening set when they broke into
Swift’s hit record “Bad Blood” and
embraced.
They hit the headlines last
month when Minaj’s “Anaconda”
was passed over for a Video of the
Year nomination.
Minaj blamed the slight on
bias against full-figured black women, saying the music industry preferred “very slim” women.
The very slim Swift, who is
Sunday’s most nominated star, responded to Minaj that “I’ve done
nothing but love and support you”
and invited her to share the stage if
she wins for her video “Bad
Blood.”
Nearly two days later, Swift
backtracked and apologized. Minaj said she wished that Swift had
spoken out on portrayals of African American women.
Weekend Mircale: Phantom witnesses some hopes at BO
Espionage drama "Phantom",
based on the post-26/11 Mumbai
terror attack, has minted Rs.21.24 lease on Friday. The Kabir Khan
crore in just two days of its re- directorial, which stars Saif Ali Khan
and Katrina Kaif, collected Rs.8.46
crore on its opening day. It witnessed a 51 percent growth on the
day of Rakshan Bandhan on Saturday, earning Rs.12.78 crore, taking
the total to Rs.21.24 crore, said a
statement from the production
house. With no big release alongside,
`Phantom` is expected to witness
growth over the weekend due to the
buzz around the movie. `Phantom`,
which revolves around global terrorism, is an adaptation of the novel
"Mumbai Avengers". At least 166
people were killed when terrorists
from Pakistan sneaked into Mumbai in November 2008 and went on
a killing spree.
.
AFGHANISTANTIMES
N o e xcu s e s
fo r n o t w in n in g
W o rld T2 0 in
In d ia: W arn e r
NEW YORK: Maria Sharapova,
winner of five grand slam events,
has pulled out of the US Open tennis championships due to a leg injury, the Russian said on Sunday.
Sharapova, 28, has not played
a match since losing to Serena Williams in the Wimbledon semi-finals in July and withdrew from
hardcourt tournaments in Toronto
and Cincinnati in August, citing a
right leg strain. “Unfortunately, I
will not be able to compete in this
year's US Open,” she tweeted. “I
have done everything possible to
be ready but it was just not enough
time. To all my amazing fans, I will
be back in the Asian swing in a few
weeks and look forward to finishing the year healthy and strong.”
It marks the second time in three
years that the 2006 champion has
withdrawn from the year's last
grand slam event. Her absence robs
the US Open of some star power
and a possible marquee showdown. Sharapova, who has won
each of the four grand slam tournaments during her career, was seeded
to meet top-seeded American world
number one Serena Williams in the
semi-finals. The 33-year-old Williams is campaigning to win a fourth
US Open title in a row that would
give her a rare grand slam sweep of
the year's four majors. The Russian,
Day
dominates to
win Barclays
J a m ie
Va rd y,
J o n jo
Sh e lve y
in clu d e d
in
En gla n d
s qu ad
Jamie Vardy and Jonjo Shelvey
have been included in the England
squad for the upcoming European
Qualifiers against San Marino and
Switzerland. Manager Roy Hodgson delayed naming the squad until after the weekend fixtures but
has included Leicester forward
Vardy and Swansea midfielder
Shelvey after impressive starts to
their respective Premier League
campaigns.
England travel to face San
Marino on September 5 before
hosting Switzerland at Wembley
three days later. Hodgson's side
have a 100 per cent record in Group
E and enjoy a six-point lead at the
top of the table. Victory in both
upcoming games will clinch qualification for the finals in France next
summer. Vardy, 28, came off the
bench to make his international
debut in England's 0-0 draw against
the Republic of Ireland in June.
Swansea City's Jonjo Shelvey has
been named in the England squad
Wwansea City's Jonjo Shelvey has
been named in the England squad
His inclusion in the national squad
however, has not proven much of an
obstacle to the big-serving Williams,
who has beaten Sharapova in 18 of
their 20 career meetings and has not
lost to her in 11 years. The US Tennis Association said on Sunday that
Russian Daria Kasatkina is the lucky
loser who will replace Sharapova in
the main draw.
comes on the back of being handed a
"substantial" fine by Leicester, after which Vardy issued a public apology following claims of a racial slur
in a casino.Midfielder Shelvey made
his international debut in the 5-0
home win over San Marino on October 2012, but has not played for
the Three Lions since.Hodgson
said: "On this occasion we are obviously missing some players from the
June matches. However this is compensated by the fact we have players who weren't available over the
summer. "Jonjo Shelvey gets anoth-
er chance as he has been very impressive since the start of the season whilst Ryan Mason has been
unlucky with us - he picked up an
injury the last time he was in the
England squad. "This latest squad
shows we are working a good number of players with a claim to be
England regulars and secure a place
in Euro 2016. "Before that there are
two matches we must focus on. The
players must keep going, play well
and look to win every match. I don't
want any let up and we want to
win both these games."
Jason Day continued his red-hot
form and secured his third win in
four starts with a dominant sixshot victory at The Barclays.
Making his first appearance since
PGA Championship victory, the
world No 3 never moved from the
top of the leaderboard as he closed
a birdie-filled 62 at Plainfield Country Club, to finish well clear of
nearest challenger Henrik Stenson
and move top of the FedExCup
standings. "I never expected to
come out and play the way I did
today," Day told Sky Sports 4. "It
has been an amazing year for me
and the work and dedication I've
put in over the years feels like it's
finally paying off. I've had been a
whirlwind summer.
"I never really got the chance last
week to sit down and go through
what happened at the PGA, but
to be able to come here and finish
the way I did and leading by that
much is something I've never had
before." Heading in to the final
round tied for the lead with
Sangmoon Bae, Day followed birdies at the second and fourth with a
10-foot gain at the seventh to
quickly build a three-shot lead over
the chasing pack.
Charline chasing
Fro o m e s e co n d
AS D U MOU LIN W IN S Curragh Euros
A resurgent Chris Froome finished
second and moved up to eighth
overall as Tom Dumoulin took the
lead of the Vuelta a Espana by winning a pulsating ninth stage.
All of the race favourites
played out a remarkable battle on
the steep, 4km final climb to the
summit finish at Cumbre del Sol,
attacking each other multiple times
before Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin)
finally broke clear in the last 50m
to beat Froome (Team Sky) by two
seconds and third-placed Joaquim
Rodriguez (Katusha) by five seconds. The Dutchman collected 10
bonus seconds for the win and
moves from second place to the
top of the general classification, 57
seconds ahead second-placed Rodriguez and 59 seconds ahead of
third-placed Esteban Chaves (Or-
ica-GreenEdge), the previous race
leader who was dropped earlier in
the climb. Chris Froome was initially dropped on the final climb
but recovered emphatically to finish second Chris Froome was initially dropped on the final climb
but recovered emphatically to finish second Froome, who picked up
six bonus seconds, is now 1min
18sec off the lead and, significantly, has reduced his deficit to his
red jersey rivals Nairo Quintana
(Movistar) and Alejandro Valverde (Movistar), who both finished
18 seconds down on the Briton in
sixth and seventh on the day.
Froome was initially dropped at
the bottom of the climb but later
caught back up with the group of
race favourites and then looked to
have won the stage when he at-
tacked with 200m remaining and
took a lone lead. However, an aggressive Dumoulin attacked for the
fourth time with about 120m to go
and overtook Froome to claim a
win that suggests that, despite being a time-trial specialist, he has
the climbing form to sustain a challenge for overall victory. Dumoulin attacked multiple times as he
replaced Esteban Chaves (left) in
the race lead
Dumoulin attacked multiple
times as he replaced Esteban
Chaves (left) in the race lead
Froome said at the finish line:
"I'm gutted. I thought I had it for a
second there, but Dumoulin has
shown incredible form in this race.
Hats off to him. He is a young rider with a bright future ahead of
him.
The Coolmore Fastnet Rock Matron Stakes at Leopardstown is the
likely next objective for Marco
Botti's globe-trotting filly Euro
Charline. The four-year-old could
only manage fourth place when recently defending her crown in the
Beverly D Stakes at Arlington in
Chicago, with underfoot conditions and the way the race was run
considered viable excuses for the
out well, either, as she made the
running and set good fractions. "I
think she could definitely have finished closer if things had gone her
way on the day. "Now we are considering the Matron Stakes in Ireland, as long as the ground is to her
liking."
Euro Charline could be joined
on the trip across the Irish Sea by
stable companion Tac De
slightly below-par effort. Botti is
keen to head to Ireland on September 12, providing the ground is
on the quick side. Bet nowBet £5
get £20 free He said: "I'm really
pleased with the way she came
home as she had quite a tough race
on soft ground. "The ground went
against her and the race did not pan
Boistron. The eight-year-old grey
was a late defector from the
Lonsdale Cup at York, with the
Irish St Leger at the Curragh now
an option.
"I just felt the ground at York
was not soft enough for him, so
we decided to take him out," said
Botti.
LONDON: Australia will not use
Indian conditions as an excuse if
they fail to win the World T20 in
the subcontinent next year, opening batsman David Warner has said.
Australia have never won the
tournament despite being a power
in Tests and the one-day game, but
will hope to break the drought in
March and April next year.
Australia have traditionally
struggled in the subcontinent,
where bone-dry pitches have
shown up many of their batsmen's
vulnerability against quality spin
bowling. “I think going to India,
there's no excuse for conditions,”
Warner told reporters in Cardiff.
“All the players have played there
before (and) played IPL (Indian
Premier League) there. Whatever
team is selected, that will be the
right team for those conditions and
I really do think this could be one
of our best chances to win the
Twenty20 World Cup.
“We've probably played more
(in India) than we have at home in
the Twenty20 format.” Australia
play England in a one-off match in
Cardiff on Monday, with Steven
Smith taking the reins in the absence of injured regular skipper
Aaron Finch.
Compared to the surfeit of
ODI matches -- world champions
Australia will play five against England in coming weeks -- T20
matches are rare in the international calendar, giving teams limited chances to experiment before
next year's showpiece. “It's quite
challenging for us to go into a group
and go 'here you go, play this tournament'. This is big,” Warner said
of the Cardiff game. “You have to
work out what your chemistry is
in the format itself.” Australia have
underlined their intent by flying in
legspinner Cameron Boyce for the
match alone. All other members of
the T20 team are in the one-day
squad. Captain Smith backed the
26-year-old Queenslander to hit
the ground running.
“As a legspinner you've really
got to read the batsmen quite well.
I think he does that,” he said. “I
think he knows when someone is
going to step down at him and try
hit him for six and when they're
going to sit back.
“I think he adjusts his length
and his pace quite well so I'm looking forward to seeing him bowl out
here. “It's going to be quite tough
conditions I reckon with probably
a pretty good wicket and short
straight boundaries so he's going
to have to adapt.”
Le o San ta
Cru z d e fe ats
Abn e r Mare s to
re m ain u n be ate n
Leo Santa Cruz maintained his
unbeaten record with an impressive majority decision victory over
fellow Mexican featherweight
Abner Mares.
Santa Cruz (31-0-1) survived
a night of furious exchanges and
eventually controlled several
rounds with his superior jab and
reach, overcoming Mares' heavy
pressure. Mares (29-2-1) did admirable work inside and survived
numerous big shots, but ultimately
couldn't land a decisive blow.
A raucous crowd at Staples
Center favored Santa Cruz over
Mares, but just barely. Both fighters were born in Mexico and grew
up in the Los Angeles area, attracting a large turnout for local bragging rights.
Bet nowBet £5 get £20 free
Two judges scored the fight
117-111 for Santa Cruz, while
Max DeLuca had a 114-114 draw.
"My dad told me that we
could beat him by boxing," Santa
Cruz said about his father and
trainer, Jose. "We want to be aggressive, but tonight we had to box
him, too. And that's how we got it
done."
In just his second 126-pound
fight, Santa Cruz landed sharper
and bigger punches during long
stretches of the bout, which was
mostly action-packed from the
opening bell.
The crowd of 13,109 was
worked into a furore by an entertaining undercard, and the fighters
responded to that energy by basically running straight at each other
and throwing haymakers.
They took only occasional
breaks in that pace during the frenetic first half of the fight, even
after both were cut during a clash
of heads in the third.
"I think I made a mistake in
my strategy," Mares said. "I came
out strong, and my corner was tell-
ing me to slow down. I wanted to
go as fast as I could."
Once the initial frenzy wore
off, Santa Cruz began to control
the bout with a sharp jab from his
superior reach. Mares fought to get
inside for a chance to throw uppercuts, but Santa Cruz usually
maintained distance and used his
left hook to punish Mares, who
had blood trickling down his cheek.
Mares had a cut near his right
eye in the late rounds, but he kept
throwing shots to Santa Cruz's
body. Santa Cruz calmly kept
peppering Mares' face, and he
pushed into the 12th round with
the same discipline and precision.
Los Angeles boxing fans had
eagerly anticipated this matchup
for several years. Both Santa Cruz
and Mares were born in Mexico
and raised in the Los Angeles area
before rising to the top of the
lighter-weight classes with impressive pro careers.
Santa Cruz, who grew up in
the nearby Lincoln Heights
neighbourhood, became a rising
star as a fixture on the undercards
of major fights. His career slowed
in recent years with a series of
matchups against second-tier contenders for his WBC 122-pound
title, but he moved up in weight
last May on the MayweatherPacquiao undercard.
Mares won titles in three
weight classes during an impressive two-year span, but his
progress was interrupted by a stunning first-round knockout loss to
Jhonny Gonzalez in 2013. After
11 months off, he has returned with
three straight wins.
Mares campaigned for this
matchup in the media for quite a
while, and Santa Cruz agreed to
the fight through boxing guru Al
Haymon, who manages both fighters under the Premier Boxing
Champions banner.
TUESDAY
.
SEPTEMBER 01
.
2015-Sunbula 10, 1394 H.S
Vol:X Issue No:40 Price: Afs.15

RECCA-VI will be different from previous ones: MFA

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