Saudi Arabia Names New Crown Prince
Kashmir’s 'mufti Azam' summons Christian priest to explain alleged conversions
US Seeks Tolerance against Minorities in Islamic Countries
Islam allows to "combine prayers": Valeriya Porokhova
Extremists' threats are nonsense: Kazakhstan's Supreme mufti
UN ends Libya military mandate
Pakistan court issues Musharraf arrest warrant
Pakistan committed to Kashmiris’ right of self-determination: FO
Religious parties oppose MFN status for India
Unguarded deadly weapons threaten Libya and others
Snow blankets quake-hit Turkey as toll passes 500
Baghdad bomb blasts kill 18
3 killed in Syria by security forces
US drones kill top Taliban leaders
Thousands call for Zardari to go
Pak: Husband booked for wife’s murder
Two injured in Landikotal bomb blast
Low-intensity bomb injures 11 in Peshawar
US Afghan ‘kill team’ leader faces court martial
Tunisia’s moderate Islamists win landmark vote
NATO service member killed in Afghanistan
Go after Haqqanis, Hillary tells Pak
Don't have capacity to take action against Haqqani: Pak Army
Not taken into confidence: Pak on Afghan peace process
Pakistan allows terrorists fire on US troops: general
PPP-backed MPA sends open letter to Khawaja Sharif on Qardri’s advocacy
Pak, India urged to ink treaty barring arrests of fishermen
Pakistan values friendly relations with N Korea: Naek
Pak-China joint military exercise next month
Turk quake survivors plead for tents as cold descends
Turkey ends military operation against PKK
Jerusalem: Quartet seeks Israeli-Palestinian peace proposals in 90 days
Putin condemns ‘disgusting’ coverage of Gaddafi death
Iran morphing into a 'military dictatorship'
Syrians call for ‘no- fly’ zone
US soldier goes on trial for Afghan murders
Post-26/11, Pak thought India would attack: Rice
Compiled By New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/saudi-arabia-names-new-crown/d/5782
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Saudi Arabia Names New Crown Prince
Oct 28, 2011,
RIYADH: Saudi state TV says the kingdom has named a new crown prince.
Nayef bin Abdel-Aziz Al Saud, the kingdom's tough-talking interior minister, was named heir to the Saudi throne following the death of the previous crown prince late last week.
Prince Nayef has led crackdowns on Islamic militants but has also shown favor to ultraconservative traditions, such as keeping the ban on women voting.
He is set to assume the throne upon the death of King Abdullah, 87, who is recovering from his third operation to treat back problems in less than a year.
Prince Nayef, 78, was also named prime minister in addition to keeping his job as interior minister.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/middle-east/-Saudi-Arabia-names-new-crown-prince/articleshow/10513462.cms?prtpage=1
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Kashmir’s 'mufti azam' summons Christian priest to explain alleged conversions
Oct 28, 2011,
M Saleem Pandit,
SRINAGAR: Mufti Bashir-ud-din - J&K's official " mufti azam", or head Muslim clergyman - issued fresh summons to a leading Christian priest, CM Khanna, on Friday, asking him to appear before his court to explain his activities of reported conversions of young local boys and girls at his church in Srinagar. Khanna said the mufti was annoyed with him because he had expressed his inability to help the mufti in the admission of a boy to a Christian missionary school.
Talking to TOI, Mufti Azaam Bashir-ud-din said: "Our shariat court had summoned the Christian priest, CM Khanna, to appear personally today at 11am but he failed to appear. Now we have issued fresh summons to him for personal appearance on November 12."
A shariat court has existed in J&K since the early 1960s; Mufti Bashir-ud-din is the judge of the court and the appeal against this court lies in the civil court. Mufti Bashir said that the court was recognized by the state government because of the majority Muslim character of the state. The shariat court, however, has no enforcing agency like police to implement its judgments, he said
Mufti Bashir-ud-din said: "I have received the complaint that the said priest, CM Khanna, is involved in converting young Muslim boys and girls to Christianity. This warrants action as per Islamic law. So we summoned him to appear before the shariat court to explain his position."
The mufti claimed to possess a video cassette purportedly showing Reverend Khanna urging young Kashmiri Muslims to embrace Christianity and asking them to take a dip in a pond inside the church near the cricket stadium in Srinagar.
"I will take all necessary measures in exercise of the powers vested in me by Islamic shariat," the mufti said when asked what course he would take if the priest failed to appear in his court.
"It is a matter of grave concern that Christian missionaries active here should be running an organized and integrated campaign to convert young Kashmiri Muslims to Christianity," he said.
When contacted, CM Khanna said : "I am an officiating priest at the Srinagar church and Mufti Bashir-ud-din last fortnight asked me to help him in getting admission to some boy in a Christian school called Tyndale Biscoe school, but I told him that the school was not under my control and he had better approach the principal of the school. He was annoyed over the issue."
Khanna said that he had not received any summons and the allegations levelled against him were false and concocted. "I am at present out of state," Khanna told TOI on the phone.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Kashmirs-mufti-azam-summons-Christian-priest-to-explain-alleged-conversions/articleshow/10518322.cms?prtpage=1
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US Seeks Tolerance against Minorities in Islamic Countries
Lalit K Jha
Oct 28 2011,
Expressing concern over increasing intolerance against religious minorities in Islamic countries, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said this is the "biggest problems in the world" right now. "On the question of persecution, obviously, what we're seeing is deeply distressing. It's not only against Christians or against Hindus; it's also against different sects of Muslims. "I mean, there are Islamic sects in Afghanistan and Pakistan and elsewhere that are also discriminated against, persecuted and their adherents brutally treated," Clinton told lawmakers at a Congressional hearing yesterday. One of the biggest problems in the world right now is that there needs to be a greater acceptance of religious tolerance. In so many places, there is no history of religious tolerance. And there is a need to search an effective way to solve this, she said in reply to a question. "One of the things that we tried very hard to do is to work with a number of countries, including Muslim-majority countries, the Organisation of Islamic Conference, to begin to change the dialogue from something they wanted to call religious defamation. "This would be a legal rationale for persecuting people who spoke out about their own religion or criticized someone else's, to a broad acceptance that there needs to be an equation between freedom of speech and freedom of religion," Clinton said.
http://ibnlive.in.com/generalnewsfeed/news/us-seeks-tolerance-against-minorities-in-islamic-countries/878575.html
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Islam allows to "combine prayers": Valeriya Porokhova
By Maksim Popov
27.10.2011,
Honorary professor of Cairo University, Islam expert Valeriya Porokhova does not oppose closure of prayer rooms in Kazakhstan's public offices and explains that Islam allows to combine prayers. The best translator of Quran told Tengrinews.kz about Islamic rules and her meeting with the chairman of Kazakhstan Agency for Religion.
"If the question is about administrative, political activities, solving some important state problems, Islam insists that they have to be fully attended to and there is a very serious term in Islam called “combining prayers”. This is when people miss afternoon prayers and do additional ones in the evening,” Valeriya Porokhova said about the regulation of Quran prescribing 5 compulsory prayers.
Valeriya Porokhova's translation of the Islamic holy book became the only version canonized by the Islamic academy Al-Azhar that was studying it for 6 years. Mufti Akhmed Keftaru even announced Valeriya his daughter.
"God sent us the law that covers all the aspects of human life. Of course, if one goes to work at 9 a.m. and finishes at 6 p.m., 2 or 3 prayers have to be done during working hours. It takes time. Not much time, but it is still time,” she said.
Valeria Porokhova believes that a person should not be thinking about anything else and nothing should distract him during prayers. “You have to be fully concentrated on God. You go on a meeting with God, talk to him. But at the same time your head is filled with some serious political, social, financial problems and numbers. Frankly speaking, how can you be unprepared, when going on the most important meeting of your life? You are distracted. The significance of such prayer goes down a lot,” iman Valeriya Porokhova said. “Do not rush to repeat the prayers, until their meaning is in your head,” an active member of Liberal Arts Academy and UN International Informatization Academy cited Quran.
The prayer requires spiritual preparedness, so that it is sincere, Valeriya Porokhova says. But it is barely possible to do it during a serious and eventful work day.
“Speaking of strict limitations of the work day and business activities, as well as difficult trips, Islam allows to combine the day prayers in the evening. I think that from the point of God’s wisdom, combining prayers is also allowed for a work day. This is normal,” she said.
Valeriya Porokhova also told about her meeting with the chairman of Kazakhstan Agency for Religion Kairat Lama Sharif, who made a good impression on her. “He is a very nice person. The most important is that he is very competent in Islam. It is absolutely terrible when ignorant people try to do everything. He is not this type. He is one of those people who know a lot. But he is very humble about his knowledge. This is wonderful. We discussed the agenda only and how the agency will work. I think we will make it. Inshallah,” she said.
Valeriya Porokhova was born in Tsarskoye Selo (Russia), but moved to Damascus in 1985 after marrying a Syrian and adopted Islam. There she started working on translation of Quran. The translation of the meaning of the holy book was controlled by the scientists of Syria and other Arab countries. Famous Islamic experts note, that her translation of Quran is not only accurate, but is also made in poetical form. It is closer to the original than all the previous translations. The translation was finished in 1991 and submitted to the Islamic academy Al-Azhar for review.
http://en.tengrinews.kz/religion/5172/
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Extremists' threats are nonsense: Kazakhstan's Supreme mufti
By Zhuldyz Seisenbekova
27.10.2011,
Chairman of the Spiritual Management of Muslims of Kazakhstan Absattar Hadji Derbissali called Kazakhstan residents to stay calm and to not take the threats of earlier unknown Islamic group Djund Al-Khalifat (Soldiers of Khalifat) seriously, Tengrinews.kz reports. Derbisali added that he hadn't watched the extremists' video-address.
The Supreme Mufti deems the threats unreasonable and empty, considering that Kazakhstan was threatened before the law was adopted. “This is nonsense. There is no need to panic and disturb the people,” Derbissali said and promised to watch the video and give his comments on it. In any case, he asked to not take it seriously.
Earlier Tengrinews.kz English reported that Djund Al-Khalifat uploaded a video threatening Kazakhstan with violence in case the authorities do not cancel the Law on Religion. According to the extremists, the policies pursued by the Kazakhstan authorities are similar to those of Libya and Egypt, where the Arab revolutions took place.
http://en.tengrinews.kz/unrest/5300/
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UN ends Libya military mandate
October 28, 2011
UNITED NATIONS: The UN Security Council on Thursday unanimously voted to end the mandate for international military action in Libya, ending another chapter in the war against Muammer Gaddafi’s regime.
NATO, which carried out the air strikes that played a key role in the downfall of Gaddafi, says it is studying new ways to help the National Transitional Council which had asked for an extension to the mandate. A Security Council resolution ordered the end of the authorisation for a no-fly zone and action to protect civilians from 11:59 pm Libyan time on October 31. Following the vote, NATO’s decision-making body, the North Atlantic Council, is to meet on Friday in Brussels to formally declare an end to its seven-month-old air war.
Security Council Resolution 2016 also eased an international arms embargo so that the NTC can acquire weapons and equipment for its national security. It ended an assets freeze on the Libyan National Oil Corporation and virtually all restrictions on the central bank and other key institutions. It completely ended the ban on international flights by Libyan registered planes. The NTC declared the formal ‘liberation’ of Libya on October 23, three days after the killing of Gaddafi. But interim leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil on Wednesday urged NATO to extend its campaign until the end of the year because of the continuing threat from Gaddafi loyalists.
Security Council resolutions passed in February and March which approved a no-fly zone has caused divisions on the 15-nation body ever since. Russia, China, South Africa, Brazil and India accused NATO of going beyond the mandate with the air strikes against Gaddafi targets. The NATO allies insist they stayed within the ‘all necessary means’ provision laid down to protect civilians.
The resolution also stressed the interim government’s responsibility to protect foreign nationals and African migrants. The Security Council said it looked forward “to a future for Libya based on national reconciliation, justice, respect for human rights and the rule of law.” The interim government has expressed concern about the impact of sanctions on efforts to get the country’s economy moving again. As well as the national oil company, the Security Council lifted sanctions on Zuetina Oil Company. The resolution lifted virtually all restrictions on the Central Bank of Libya, the Libyan Arab Foreign Bank, the Libyan Investment Authority, and the Libyan Africa Investment Portfolio. afp
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_1
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Pakistan court issues Musharraf arrest warrant
Oct. 28, 2011
QUETTA: A Pakistani court on Friday issued an arrest warrant for former president Pervez Musharraf and former prime minister Shaukat Aziz over the killing of a Baloch leader, a lawyer said.
Musharraf was president and Aziz prime minister when the main leader of the rebel movement in southwestern province Balochistan, tribal chieftain Nawab Akbar Bugti, died in a cave hideout during an army raid in August 2006.
Bugti led an armed campaign to press for provincial autonomy and a greater share of profits from Balochistan’s natural resources. The death of the colourful, British-educated chieftain sparked angry protests in the country.
“Today the judicial magistrate in Quetta has issued an arrest warrant for both Musharraf and Shaukat Aziz,” Adnan Kasi, a lawyer representing Bugti’s elder son Jamil, told AFP.
The arrest warrant would be sent to the federal government to take steps to present the accused in court, Kasi said.
For Full Report:
http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/28/pakistan-court-issues-musharraf-arrest-warrant.html
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Pakistan committed to Kashmiris’ right of self-determination: FO
Oct 28 2011,
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan, on Thursday, extending its diplomatic and moral support for the cause of Kashmiri people, said that it was committed to supporting the right of self-determination of the Kashmiri people.
Foreign Office Spokesperson Tehmina Janjua, in her weekly press briefing, said, “Pakistan continues to discuss Kashmir issue with India on every possible occasion, and it also figured in resumed dialogue process between the two countries.”
She said Kashmir issue was also discussed during last meeting of the foreign ministers of Pakistan and India, and it would remain on the agenda in talks with India.
The spokesperson said Pakistan’s policy on Kashmir was very clear and the issue was raised at all important international forums.
he said, “We will also like to express complete solidarity with the Kashmiri people as they observe today, 27 October, as a Black Day.”
The spokesperson said President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani had sent messages to the Turkish leadership, expressing sympathy and solidarity with the Turkish people over loss of lives and damage to property caused by an earthquake in Turkey’s eastern province of Van. Replying to a question, she said Pakistan evaluated the recent visit of US secretary of state to Islamabad positively.
For Full Report:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_15
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Religious parties oppose MFN status for India
Oct 28 2011,
ISLAMABAD: The leadership of leading national religious parties denouncing the government’s likely decision to award Most Favoured Nation (MFN) status to India stated that it would damage the ongoing Kashmir liberation movement.
Talking to Daily Times Sahibzada Haji Fazle Karim, president Jamiat Ulama-e-Pakistan expressed his resentment over the issue stated that granting MFN status to India without solution of Kashmir dispute would be tantamount to betray with 90,000 martyred Kashmiris who shed their blood for liberation of the valley. “We are not against developing bilateral trade ties with India, however, it should not be started before resolving the core issue of Kashmir as well as other long standing issues between the two neighboring rivals,” he maintained.
For Full Report:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_11
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Unguarded deadly weapons threaten Libya and others
Oct 28 2011,
They lie in the ruins of Sirte, the last refuge of Muammar Gaddafi, or are piled unguarded in the nearby desert; devastated in the battle to end the despot’s reign, the city now faces deadly danger from thousands of tonnes of unused munitions.
The most immediate threat comes from hidden caches of small arms, thousands of shells and ready-to-use rockets abandoned when the former Libyan leader fled the city after weeks of fierce resistance, only to be killed on October 20.
In September 1 Street, one of the city’s main arteries, intact 100mm shells lie in the middle of the roadway, while several residents hang around in the nearby ruins.
Guy Marot, a Red Cross explosives expert, said the main danger comes from unexploded ordinance: “I expected worse, but many of the munitions have (already) been used. There is, nonetheless, an enormous amount of work to do.” “We are spreading the message ‘don’t touch’,” the explosives, he added, but “there will inevitably be victims among people who will move the munitions.” The US government has released 40 million dollars and sent dozens of experts to the country, including some who are ready to get down to work in the city centre. But in the long-term, the military bases scattered around Gaddafi’s last bastion threaten the stability of the whole Sahel region: unbelievable quantities of weapons, including the latest, lethal generation of missile, lying unguarded — enough to start several inter-African wars.
For Full Report:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg4_7
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Snow blankets quake-hit Turkey as toll passes 500
Oct 28 2011,
Snow blanketed eastern Turkey Thursday, complicating rescue efforts and bringing more misery for the thousands left homeless by a devastating earthquake as the death toll surged past 500.
Ninety-one hours after disaster struck in the eastern province of Van, rescuers pulled a 19-year-old from the rubble in the town of Ercis but the prospects of finding more people alive were fading fast.
After the government acknowledged failings in the initial rescue efforts, help from abroad was beginning to arrive, including an aid plane from Israel.
But in a sign of the disillusionment with the help they had received so far, some families who had been staying in tents began returning to their homes despite warnings that they were still at risk of collapse from aftershocks.
Many families have been forced to sleep in overcrowded tents or even out in the open around fires as the temperatures drop to below freezing.
In its latest damage assessment bulletin, the prime minister’s emergency unit said that 523 people were now known to have died after the 7.2 magnitude quake struck. A further 1,650 had been injured in the disaster, it added.
For Full Report:
http://newagebd.com/newspaper1/international/38342.html
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Baghdad bomb blasts kill 18
Oct 28 2011,
Twin bomb blasts have killed 18 people in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, officials say.
The first blast occurred in Ur, a mainly Shia district of northern Baghdad. The second went off as rescuers were evacuating the wounded.
At least 36 people are said to have been injured, reports BBC.
There has been a resurgence in militant attacks in Baghdad in recent weeks. The last US troops are preparing to leave Iraq by the end of the year.
After Thursday's attacks, eyewitness Ahmed Jalil, 27, told the Associated Press news agency: "I stood outside my shop and saw burning cars and dead bodies on the ground."
No group has said it carried out the bombings.
Official have blamed al-Qaeda for recent violence - which includes a string of car and roadside attacks that killed at least 28 people in Baghdad on 12 October.
Despite the upsurge, violence across Iraq is much reduced since a peak in 2006-2007.
Yesterday's attacks are also the deadliest to hit Iraq since US President Barack Obama announced on October 21 that all US soldiers will depart the country by the end of 2011.
The US had engaged in protracted and ultimately failed negotiations with Iraq about a post-2011 US military training mission here, reports AFP.
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/print_news.php?nid=208306
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3 killed in Syria by security forces
Oct 28 2011,
Syrian security forces and snipers Thursday killed three people, including a teenager, in the central region of Homs and the southern province of Daraa, two hotbeds of dissent, activists said.
‘A 15-year-old minor was killed and three people were wounded by security forces during raids,’ in the town of Dael, near the southern city of Daraa, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a statement.
More than 5,000 people on Wednesday demonstrated in Dael calling for the fall of the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, the Observatory said, adding that 23 people were arrested in the town.
Further north, two civilians were killed in the region of Homs, one shot by sniper fire, the other by security forces, the Britain-based watchdog said.
The Local Coordination Committees, an activist network spurring protests on the ground, said security forces entered several towns to the east of Damascus looking for people ‘on the basis of lists.’
State television, meanwhile, broadcast images of a huge pro-Assad rally in the coastal city of Latakia, saying the rally showed people’s support for Assad’s reform programme and their rejection of foreign interference.
Assad on Wednesday received a a delegation of Arab League ministers led by Qatar, which announced that a new meeting would take place on Sunday in a bid to find a political solution to the crisis.
The Arab League’s visit, which sought to mediate between the regime and the opposition, coincided with a new wave of violence that left at least 27 people, including 11 military, dead in Syria, activists said.
http://newagebd.com/newspaper1/international/38340.html
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US drones kill top Taliban leaders
Oct 28 2011,
A US drone strike killed the brother and a close relative of a Pakistani Taliban commander in the badlands of South Waziristan along the Afghan border yesterday, officials said.
Four militants were killed when four missiles slammed into a pick-up truck travelling through Azam Warsak, 20 kilometres west of Wana, Pakistanis told AFP.
"Nazir's younger brother Omar Wazir has been killed, it has been confirmed by a Pakistani security official. told AFP.
Residents and security officials in the region described the 27-year-old as the operational head for the Nazir group.
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/print_news.php?nid=208300
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Thousands call for Zardari to go
Oct. 28, 2011
LAHORE: Thousands of supporters of Pakistan’s main opposition party took to the streets in a protest rally on Friday, dancing to drums and shouting for President Asif Ali Zardari to step down.
The Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) was expected to draw large crowds at the rally in its political heartland, the city of Lahore where it controls the Punjab provincial government despite being in opposition at a national level.
Party faithful have been called to denounce government corruption, widespread power cuts, inflation and the poor standing of living, demanding early elections before the government’s five-year mandate expires in 2013.
As the crowd gathered force, groups of PML-N followers danced to a drum as party singers praising leader Nawaz Sharif were blasted out at top volume.
Participants were served free drinks as slogans of “Go Zardari, go” echoed everywhere. “The time has come to shunt out Zardari,” activists shouted.
Disillusionment is high with the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) that swept to power in February 2008, two months after Zardari’s wife, ex-prime minister Benazir Bhutto, was assassinated.
Lahore, with a population of eight million, is Pakistan’s second biggest city and the capital of the most populous province Punjab, which commands the greatest number of seats in the national parliament.
For Full Report:
http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/28/hundreds-call-for-zardari-to-go.html
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Pak: Husband booked for wife’s murder
Oct 28 2011,
KARACHI: The death of a lady doctor, Najia Hussain has now been declared as a murder while the Airport police have booked her husband Dr Ghulam Murtaza. SHO Noor Muhammad Wasan on Thursday said that the case appeared to be of suicide but the heirs of Dr Hussain informed police that it was a murder. Reacting on their complaint, police with the assistance of their other colleagues recovered the body, which was being transported in an ambulance, from Bhit Shah. He said the accused Dr Murtaza escaped from the scene as he was traveling in another car. staff report
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg12_9
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Two injured in Landikotal bomb blast
Oct 28 2011,
LANDIKOTAL: At least two persons including a Levy personnel sustained slight injuries in a remote controlled bomb blast. A powerful remote controlled bomb blast occurred near Landikotal hospital here on Thursday morning when the newly recruited Levy personnel were on routine patrolling near Landikotal Bazaar, city’s administrative sources said. The target was the patrolling party of the levy personnel, a Khasadar official told. The two injured were rushed to the nearby hospital. staff report
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_9
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Low-intensity bomb injures 11 in Peshawar
Oct 28 2011,
PESHAWAR: A low-intensity blast rocked a commercial market in old city on Thursday, leaving 11 people injured, a police official said. The blast in Rampura bazaar is the second in Peshawar in as many days following Peshawar police chief Imtiaz Altaf’s claim on Wednesday that law and order situation had improved in the city. “It was an improvised explosive device concealed in a cooking oil canister,” Bomb Disposal Squad chief Shafqat Malik told reporters. “The wounded persons were rushed to the nearby Lady Reading Hospital for treatment,” said Rescue Service 1122. According to doctors at emergency ward, condition of few wounded persons is bit serious. “Rampura bazaar is a busy wholesale market. The blast could have caused more damages if the bomb had gone off during peak hours,” according to vendor Salman, who survived the explosion. staff report
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_10
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US Afghan ‘kill team’ leader faces court martial
Oct 28 2011,
The Pentagon has admitted the allegations and photographs are embarrassing for the US military, but has stressed that such behaviour is an “aberration” for a force of nearly 100,000 deployed in Afghanistan. — Photo by AP
JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Washington: The alleged ringleader of a rogue US army unit charged with killing Afghan civilians for fun faces a court martial Friday, 18 months after the slayings.
Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs’s week-long military trial comes after guilty verdicts were handed down as part of plea deals with three other members of the so-called “kill team”.
The previous court hearings exposed grisly evidence about soldiers taking fingers from the bodies as trophies and posing with corpses, evoking memories of abuse at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison on Iraq.
Gibbs faces three charges of premeditated murder as well as a string of accusations of assault, making threats, “conduct prejudicial to good order and discipline,” and impeding an investigation.
For Full Report:
http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/28/us-afghan-kill-team-leader-faces-court-martial.html
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Tunisia’s moderate Islamists win landmark vote
Oct 28 2011,
Ennahda has also vowed to wary Tunisians that democratic liberties such as gender equality will be respected in line with Muslim Tunisia's strong secular tradition. - Reuters photo
TUNIS: Tunisia’s moderate Islamist party Ennahda, banned for decades, emerged the official victor in the nation’s first free elections, taking 41.47 percent of the vote and 90 of 217 seats in an assembly that will write a new constitution, the electoral commission announced.
The Thursday announcement of final results in the landmark vote capped an ebullient period for this small North African country, which inspired the Arab Spring as it moves toward democracy after more than a half-century under one-party systems.
However, protests linked to the party placing fourth in Sunday’s voting erupted in and around Sidi Bouzid, the town where the uprising that drove this North African nation’s strongman from power.
The leader of Areedha Chaabiya, or Popular Petition party, Hachemi Hamdi, announced on national television that he was withdrawing the 19 seats his party won after the electoral commission invalidated six of its lists.
The results carried other surprises, like the second place, and 30 seats, won by the Congress for the Republic party, founded in 2001 by noted human rights activist Moncef Marzouki, a doctor who had lived in exile in Paris.
The third-placed party was the center-left Ettakatol, or the Democratic Forum for Labor and Freedoms, led by Mustapha Ben Jaafar, also a doctor. It won 21 seats in the constituent assembly.
For Full Report:
ttp://www.dawn.com/2011/10/28/tunisias-moderate-islamists-win-landmark-vote.html
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Nato service member killed in Afghanistan
Oct 28 2011,
Nato says one of its soldiers has been killed in a roadside bombing. - File Photo
Nato service member was killed Friday in a roadside bombing in the same restive southern Afghan province where the US-led alliance, a day earlier, repelled a coordinated Taliban attack on a US-run civilian and military base.
The service member died as a result of an improvised explosive device in Kandahar province, the Taliban’s traditional stronghold, Nato said in a statement that did not provide additional details.
The death raises to 480 the number of coalition forces killed in Afghanistan so far this year.
Separately, the US-led alliance said its troops, in tandem with Afghan police, were able to repel a Taliban attack on the camp in Kandahar that is home to Nato troops, including Americans, and a provincial reconstruction team.
Nato said one Afghan interpreter was killed in the attack that began at 2:30 p.m.
Thursday, while one American civilian contractor and two Afghan security guards were injured. In addition, five Nato service members were slightly wounded, the alliance said.
The attack began as the Taliban launched an assault from a compound across from the camp, firing rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire, Nato said.
Coalition forces returned fire while Afghan police, led by Kandahar provincial Police Chief Gen. Abdul Razzaq who was at the base at the time of the attack for a meeting, began clearing the compound.
For Full Report:
http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/28/nato-service-member-killed-in-afghanistan.html
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Go after Haqqanis, Hillary tells Pak
Oct 28, 2011,
WASHINGTON: The US has asked Pakistan to squeeze the dangerous Haqqani network, secretary of state Hillary Clinton said on Thursday as she underlined it has been made clear to Islamabad that trying to distinguish between "good and bad terrorists" is self-defeating and dangerous.
"Our commanders on the ground are concerned about the ability of insurgents to conduct attacks from safe havens in Pakistan," Clinton told members of the powerful house of representatives' committee on foreign affairs during a Congressional hearing on Pakistan and Afghanistan . Testifying before Congress after a trip to the region, Clinton said she delivered a "frank" message to Pakistan that it was urgent to act against the extremist Haqqani network, blamed for anti-US attacks in Afghanistan.
"So in Islamabad last week, general Dempsey, director Petraeus and I delivered a single, unified message. We urged Pakistan's civilian and military leadership to join us in squeezing the Haqqani Network from both sides of the border and in closing the safe havens," she said.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/Go-after-Haqqanis-Hillary-tells-Pak/articleshow/10514157.cms?prtpage=1
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Don't have capacity to take action against Haqqani: Pak Army
Oct 28 2011,
Washington : The Pakistani military has told the Pentagon that it does not have the capacity to take action against the Haqqani network, a US military General based in Afghanistan has said.
"The Pakistanis have said to me that they simply don't have the capacity at this time to take on that insurgent network at this point within their borders," Lieutenant General Curtis Scaparrotti told Pentagon reporters in a video conference from Kabul.
Scaparrotti is the Commander of International Security Assistance Force Joint Command, and Deputy Commander, US Forces.
"We are obviously working with them to determine how best to have an impact inside of that sanctuary. We work very hard on our side to affect them in terms of interdiction, their cache and the movement cross border," he said.
"And as you probably know, we are having a greater success on the Afghan side, greater success this year in terms of interdiction. And our focus operations have had a good effect on that network as well," the US general said.
http://www.indianexpress.com/story-print/866571/
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Not taken into confidence: Pak on Afghan peace process
October 28, 2011
The Pakistan Army has said that the country has not been taken into confidence on the reconciliation process in Afghanistan or being informed about the objectives of the peace plan in the neighbouring nation. The army's stand on the Afghan reconciliation process was outlined by chief
military spokesman Maj Gen Athar Abbas, who told BBC Urdu that Pakistan can help in the peace process if it is taken into confidence.
"We have not yet been included in any decision for a reconciliation roadmap," Abbas said.
Pakistan was not given any information about who is included in the reconciliation process, he said.
A fundamental decision to take the Afghan peace process forward had been made and the role of the stakeholders should be determined, including the role of Pakistan, Abbas said.
"We will then be in a position to tell which group we can bring to the negotiating table," he said.
For Full Report:
http://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/pakistan/Not-taken-into-confidence-Pak-on-Afghan-peace-process/Article1-762061.aspx
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Pakistan allows terrorists fire on US troops: general
Oct 28 2011,
WASHINGTON: Pakistani forces are allowing terrorists to launch rocket and mortar attacks on US troops across the border in Afghanistan and may be collaborating with the militants, a US general said on Thursday.
The rocket fire targeting American forces often originates within sight of border posts manned by Pakistan’s Frontier Corps, said Lieutenant General Curtis Scaparrotti, deputy commander of the NATO-led force in Afghanistan. “In some locations from time to time you will see what just appears to us to be a collaboration... or at a minimum a looking the other way when terrorists conducted rocket or mortar fire in what we believe to be (within) visual sight of one of their (Pakistan military) posts,” Scaparrotti told reporters via video link from Kabul.
Soldiers from the Pakistani Frontier Corps are locally recruited and not as highly trained as regular army units, he said. The cross-border attacks have increased dramatically in eastern Paktika province in recent months, with rocket and other fire four times higher than in previous years. “We talk very bluntly with our Pakistani counterparts about this,” Scaparotti said.
For Full Report:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_5
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PPP-backed MPA sends open letter to Khawaja Sharif on Qardri’s advocacy
Oct 28 2011,
Staff Report
LAHORE: The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) backed member provincial assembly (MPA) on a minority seat, Pervez Rafiq, in an open letter has asked three questions to former chief justice of the Lahore High Court (LHC), Khawaja Muhammad Sharif, as to why he had engaged himself in Mumtaz Qadri’s case.
He wrote this letter on Thursday as an MPA cum a patriotic Pakistani and forwarded it to all the heads of political parties, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, Chief Justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, chief justices of all four provincial high courts, the Senate chairman, the National Assembly speaker, federal minister for law, governors and chief ministers of all four provinces, Human Rights Commission of Pakistan chairman and other civil society organisations.
For Full Report:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_22
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Pak, India urged to ink treaty barring arrests of fishermen
Oct 28 2011,
By Haris Hanif
KARACHI: The governments of Pakistan and India were urged to formulate a treaty that could bar both sides from arresting fishermen for violating sea perimeters.
The demand was made in a joint press conference addressed by Justice (r) Nasir Aslam Zahid, former federal minister Syed Iqbal Haider, chairman Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum (PFF) Muhammad Ali Shah and joint director Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research (PILER) Zulfikar Shah here at the Karachi Press Club on Thursday.
They proposed the declaration of 50 nautical miles of both sides as a buffer zone and issuance of identity cards to small-scale fishermen to refrain from arrests at the hands of watchdogs.
Justice Zahid said, “There are 252 Indian fishermen in Pakistani prisons of whom 128 have completed their sentence.” He demanded of the government of Pakistan to immediately release them.
PFF chief said no arrested fishermen had so far been proven guilty of any charge except for crossing the border. He said the struggle to restrict both countries from arresting innocent fishermen had been going on since 1988, however, both counties did not take any step to stop the practice that caused nuisance for poor fishermen.
He said that for the last three years the confiscation of boats had continued with 512 boats going under the custody of India and 250 of Pakistan. For more than four decades both Pakistan and India have been imposing severe hardships on fisherfolk on the pretext of cross-border violations in the open sea, he added.
Former federal minister said fishermen were unaware of sea boarders, which was why they violated the limits. Commenting on visa matter of both countries, he said, “More visa issuance is made viable the more peace and development will be witnessed by the two countries.”
For Full Report:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_20
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Pakistan values friendly relations with N Korea: Naek
Oct 28 2011,
Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan enjoys friendly relations with Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), said Senate Chairman Farooq H Naek.
Talking to Korean Ambassador Ro Kyong Chol who called on Naek at Parliament House here on Thursday. The chairman said that Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto laid the foundation of friendly relationship between Pakistan and Korea, which consolidate with the passage of time. The chairman said that we are grateful to the government of Korea for its valuable support to Pakistan’s candidature for non-permanent seat at UN Security Council for the term 2012 – 2013. He also appreciated DPRK’s historical support on Kashmir issue in the United Nations. On the occasion, the Chairman emphasized the need to focus on enhanced Parliamentary exchanges and expand these relations into the people to people contacts, cultural and economic fields and hoped that the two countries will be able to increase bilateral economic and commercial cooperation through the enhanced exchange of trade and business delegations.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_16
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Pak-China joint military exercise next month
Oct 28 2011,
RAWALPINDI: Pak-China Joint Military Exercise YOUYI-IV will be held in mid-November in Pakistan, says a press release issued by ISPR on Thursday. The joint exercise, spread over a period of two weeks, is aimed at mutual exchange of experience and information through a comprehensive training programme in real time. Exercise will encompass techniques and procedures involved in Low Intensity Conflict Operations (LIC) environment. This joint interaction in form of military exercise aims at sharing and enhancing expertise of both the armies in countering terrorism. Exercise YOUYI which literally translates “Friendship” between two countries started in 2004. The Pakistan Army was the first foreign army to conduct any exercise on Chinese soil. So far three exercises have been conducted, including two in China and one in Pakistan. These exercises were mandated to boost existing professional relationship between the two friendly armies. Pakistan and China enjoy extremely close and brotherly relations since their inception, which have matured and strengthened over the years. app
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg7_4
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Turk quake survivors plead for tents as cold descends
Oct 28 2011,
ERCIS: Survivors of eastern Turkey’s earthquake pleaded for more tents on Thursday, fearing death from cold after a tremor that killed at least 523 and left thousands sleeping in the open.
Some blamed the ruling AK party for a slow response and accused officials of handing aid to supporters, after standing in long queues only to be told there were no tents left. Others said profiteers were hoarding tents and reselling them. “Everyone is getting sick and wet. We have been waiting in line for four days like this and still nothing. It gets to our turn and they say they have run out,” said Fetih Zengin, 38, an estate agent whose house was badly damaged in Ercis, a town of 100,000 that was hardest hit by Sunday’s 7.2 magnitude quake. “We slept under a piece of plastic erected on some wood boards we found. We have 10 children in our family, they are getting sick. Everyone needs a tent, snow is coming. It’s a disaster.” Ergun Ozmen, 37, was carrying loaves of bread after queuing for food. “People are taking 10 tents and selling them. It’s a disgrace. I slept in the municipal park all night in the rain. My shoes are filled with water. I only registered to get a tent this morning as I have been busy buring the dead,” he said.
For Full Report:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg4_2
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Turkey ends military operation against PKK
Oct 28 2011,
ISTANBUL: Turkey’s defence minister said Thursday a major operation launched against Kurdish rebels in retaliation for an attack that killed 24 soldiers had ended, Anatolia news agency reported.
“Other than our normal routine struggle against terror, the operation in Kazan valley that was started after the Cukurca attack is over. But our normal struggle against terror is ongoing,” Anatolia quoted Defense Minister Ismet Yilmaz as saying.
The army last week announced that they initiated an extensive ground operation supported with air strikes “in five different spots” both inside the country in southeast Turkey and across the Iraqi border. It was not immediately clear from the minister’s remarks whether operations had ended all five spots. The operations involved 22 battalions, but the army did not specify the number of troops dispatched to Iraq.
Commanders of the operation in Kazan valley, including the chief of the general staff Necdet Ozel, are returning from the region, Yilmaz told reporters in Ankara. afp
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg4_5
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Jerusalem: Quartet seeks Israeli-Palestinian peace proposals in 90 days
Oct 28 2011,
JERUSALEM: Talks between envoys of the international peacemaking Quartet and Israeli and Palestinian officials in Jerusalem ended with a pledge to introduce “comprehensive proposals” but no deal on new peace talks.
In a statement released late on Wednesday, the peacemaking group, which comprises the United States, United Nations, European Union and Russia, said its envoys had met separately with both sides in a bid to kickstart long-stalled negotiations.
Last month, the Quartet called for talks to begin by October 23, a deadline that has already passed, with the goal of reaching a deal within a year.
But Israel and the Palestinians interpreted the call differently, with Israel saying the Quartet sought talks without preconditions and the Palestinians saying the group supported their demand for a freeze to settlement construction.
The talks on Wednesday did not include any Israeli-Palestinian interaction, and ended with both sides expressing “their readiness to engage with the Quartet,” the group’s statement said.
For Full Report:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\10\28\story_28-10-2011_pg4_4
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Putin condemns ‘ disgusting’ coverage of Gaddafi death
Oct 28, 2011,
By Dadan Upadhyay in Moscow
IN his first comments since the death of Muammar Gaddafi, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has condemned the “ disgusting” manner in which TV channels and media outlets around the world covered the killing of the ousted Libyan leader by rebels of the National Transitional Council.
Putin had remained conspicuously silent over the death of the Libyan leader, viewed by Moscow as a “ friend” until the start of the war and an ally who purchased Russian arms worth billions of dollars and gave access to Libya’s lucrative oil fields to Russian oil giants Gazprom and LukOil.
“ Nearly the entire Gaddafi family was killed. His body was shown on all world TV channels. It is impossible to look at it without disgust!” Putin said on Wednesday at an election meeting of the Coordination Council of the All- Russian People’s Front. “ The man was all covered in blood, still alive, and he was being finished off,” he said.
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov called for an investigation into Gaddafi’s murky death last week.
For Full Report:
http://epaper.mailtoday.in/epaperhome.aspx?issue=28102011
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Iran morphing into a 'military dictatorship'
Oct 28 2011,
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Wednesday that Iran was "morphing into a military dictatorship," and a power struggle was underway that could lead to major changes in its political system.
"It's been a little confusing because we're not quite sure who makes decisions any more inside of Iran, which I think is an unfortunate sign and kind of goes along with the ascendancy of greater military power," she told the BBC's Persian-language channel.
"I think Iran unfortunately is morphing into a military dictatorship."
Clinton made the same point in an interview with Voice of America, adding that she had heard that Iran's political system would be changed "so there wouldn't even be an elected president."
For Full Report:
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/print_news.php?nid=208305
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Syrians call for ‘no- fly’ zone
28 October 2011,
“Despite the siege, the proliferation of checkpoints and the encirclement of mosques, people staged a mass demonstration in Kafr Nabl,” a town in Idlib, near the border with Turkey, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Demonstrators in the northwestern town marched “in support of besieged cities” and demanded “the imposition of a no-fly zone,” the Britain-based watchdog said, adding security forces also opened “heavy fire” and arrested “five people” there.
That call was echoed in the flashpoint central city of Homs, the focus of military raids in recent weeks, where demonstrators came out in “most of the city’s neighbourhoods,” the Observatory said.
In the besieged neighbourhood of Bab al-Sebaa, one person was killed by sniper fire outside the mosque of Marjeh and another civilian was shot dead by a sniper in the same area while he was “standing on his balcony” at dawn, it added.
For Full Report:
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle09.asp?xfile=data/middleeast/2011/October/middleeast_October585.xml§ion=middleeast
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US soldier goes on trial for Afghan murders
28 October 2011
TACOMA, Wash - A U.S. Army sergeant is due to go on trial on Friday charged with murdering unarmed civilians and taking body parts for war trophies as ringleader of a rogue platoon that terrorized villagers in Afghanistan.
The court-martial of Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs, 26, marks the climax of an 18-month investigation of the most egregious case of atrocities U.S. military personnel are accused of committing during a decade of war in Afghanistan.
Pentagon officials have said the misconduct exposed by the case, which began as a probe into hashish use within Gibbs’ unit, had damaged America’s image around the globe.
Published photographs showing two fellow soldiers posing with the bloodied corpse of an Afghan boy they had just killed have drawn comparisons to the inflammatory Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal in Iraq in 2004.
Gibbs, from Billings, Montana, is charged with three counts of premeditated murder, as well as cutting fingers off dead bodies and beating a fellow soldier who had alerted superiors to widespread drug abuse within their unit.
For Full Report:
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/displayarticle.asp?xfile=data/international/2011/October/international_October1172.xml§ion=international&col=
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Post-26/11, Pak thought India would attack: Rice
Oct 28 2011,
Washington : Tough talking by the then External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, following the 26/11 Mumbai attacks, rattled Pakistan so much that it pressed the panic button and called everyone from the Chinese to the Americans saying that India has decided to go to war.
At one point, the then Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice also panicked temporarily after she could not get Mukherjee on line even after repeated attempts.
"The Pakistanis say the Indians have warned them that they've decided to go to war," a White House aide anxiously called Rice.
For Full Report:
http://www.indianexpress.com/story-print/866566/
URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/saudi-arabia-names-new-crown/d/5782