Kashmir.Watch

Category: World

  • UN Resolutions key to peace in Kashmir: Saudia Arabia

    ISLAMABAD: Saudi Arabia expressed its hope on Monday for a peaceful resolution of the Kashmir issue on the basis of UN resolutions to reinforce peace and stability in the region. 
    It also welcomed positive developments in Indo-Pak relations, according to a joint communiqué issued in Islamabad at the end of the visit of Crown Prince Salman, deputy premier and minister of defense.
    The talks in Islamabad showed the desire of two sides to strengthen cooperation in various fields to support Islamic causes and promote global peace and stability, the communique said. The two countries wanted to expand cooperation in investment, trade, energy, infrastructure and agriculture.
    Saudi Arabia and Pakistan also wanted to expand defense cooperation and promote political consultations, the communiqué said. The two sides intend to sign new agreements in labor, work force, investment protection, sports, Islamic affairs and endowments.
    Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia signed on Monday two agreements worth $182 million to aid development projects in Pakistan. Crown Prince Salman and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif witnessed the signing at the PM House in Islamabad.
    Yousef Al-Bassam, vice chairman and managing director of the Saudi Fund for Development, and Nargis Sethi, Pakistan’s secretary for economic affairs, signed the agreements. The first agreement will see Saudi Arabia provide a loan of $57.8 million for the construction of the 106 MW Golen Gol hydropower project on the River Mastuj in Chitral. 
    The second was to finance the import of urea fertilizer worth $125 million from the Saudi Basic Industries Corporation.
    Earlier, the crown prince held talks with Pakistani defense officials to explore areas of cooperation. He had separate meetings with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee Gen. Rashad Mahmood and Army Chief Lt. Gen. Raheel Sharif in Islamabad. 
    Prince Salman had second round of talks with Sharif on Monday. The Pakistan side included adviser to the Prime Minister on National Security Sartaj Aziz, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, Chief Minister of Punjab Mian Shahbaz Sharif, Minister for Science and Technology Zahid Hamid and Minister of Defense Production Rana Tanveer Hussain.
    The crown prince left Pakistan for Japan on Monday night. Visits to India and the Maldives also figure on his itinerary.

  • Iran threatens to send forces into Pakistani territory

    TEHRAN: Tehran’s interior minister has warned Pakistan that Iranian forces may enter Pakistani and Afghan territory to release border guards reported to have been seized by a rebel group.
    .

    Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli’s remarks on state TV come a week after the little-known Jaish al-Adl posted photos on Twitter of five men it claims are border guards it seized near Pakistan.

    He said Iran had asked Pakistan to treat the case “strongly and seriously” or allow Iran to secure the remote region “deep on Afghanistan and Pakistan soil.”

    “Otherwise we do consider it our own right to intervene and create a new security sphere for our safety,” he said.—AP

    Reuters adds: According to Iranian media reports, the guards were seized on February 6 in the Iranian province of Sistan-Balochistan by militants who allegedly took them across the border to Pakistan.

    The area where the kidnappings took place has a history of unrest, with the mainly Sunni Muslim population complaining of discrimination by Iran’s Shia Muslim authorities, a charge Iran denies.

    Iranian security forces have also fought drug traffickers in the region that borders Pakistan and Afghanistan.

    The Iranian armed forces’ deputy chief of staff was quoted as telling the semi-official Fars news agency that Iran would “show tough confrontation in this case.”

    “We will have no soft stand in this case and our neighbouring country … should account for its lack of action,” Major General Hossein Hassani Sa’di told reporters in Tehran on Monday, according to Fars English language website.

    Sa’di said the guards were still alive, and underlined that “political and military measures are underway to set them free”, without elaborating.

    Interior Minister Rahmani-Fazli said an Iranian delegation would visit Pakistan on Monday to secure the guards’ release, state news agency ISNA reported.

    In October, 14 Iranian border guards were killed and three others captured in the same area in an attack that ISNA said was carried out by Jaish al-Adl.—Reuters

  • 200 women troops sent home for being pregnant: MoD won’t impose war zone pregnancy tests due to ‘privacy’ fears

    • Mothers-to-be are banned from serving on the front line
    • 99 were evacuated from Afghanistan and 102 from Iraq under the rules
    • Commanders sent them home as soon as their condition was known
    • Most were conceived before, but a small number became pregnant on tour
    • MoD disapproves of sexual relations between troops 

    More than 200 service women have been sent home from war zones after discovering they were pregnant.
    An astonishing 99 were evacuated from Afghanistan and 102 from Iraq under rules that ban mothers-to-be from serving on the front line.
    Commanders ordered them to return to Britain – sometimes on flights reserved for injured troops – as soon as their condition became known.
    Incredibly, female soldiers are not forced to take a pregnancy test before deploying because top brass believe it would be an invasion of privacy.
    But the Ministry of Defence has faced calls to introduce compulsory tests because it is ‘unacceptable’ that other service personnel are placed at risk of attack while evacuating pregnant women from the front line.
    Pregnancy tests can be bought from High Street chemists for less than £10 and can give a result as soon as seven days after conception. 
    Official MoD figures showed 201 pregnant servicewomen have been evacuated from the conflict in Afghanistan since 2006 and from the war in Iraq between 2003 and 2009. The MoD said it was fewer than one per cent of female soldiers deployed on operations.
    Most of the babies would have been conceived before the mother left the UK but a small number of women may have become pregnant on a tour of duty. The Armed Forces do not have a set-in-stone ‘no-touching’ rule for troops in the war zone.
    But all who serve there are warned that the MoD disapproves of sexual relations between troops and that any inappropriate behaviour would breach guidelines. Those caught having sex usually face a rebuke from their commanding officer or more serious disciplinary action, depending on their rank and position.
    A defence source said: ‘It wouldn’t be the hugest surprise that people get together at base to alleviate boredom and fear. But the vast majority of troops know it is utterly unprofessional and the consequences serious.
    ‘It’s more likely people know they are going to be deployed for a long time so they have sex with their partner before they go and don’t realise they’re pregnant until they get there.’
    Baby born in Camp Bastion+4
    In 2011, Private Kayla Donnelly, then 21, from Penrith in Cumbria, served in Helmand unaware she was seven months pregnant. She conceived before going to Afghanistan as a machine-gunner and thought her weight gain was due to high-calorie Army rations. It was only when she collapsed in Tenerife after her tour  that she realised she was pregnant.
    Pre-deployment guidelines issued to every soldier make clear female troops should not deploy if they are pregnant but at no time are women given a pregnancy test by the MoD.
    Female soldiers are asked whether they are – or suspect they are – pregnant. This is routine so medical staff can ensure the inoculation does not damage an unborn baby.
    At the height of the fighting in Afghanistan, between 500 and 600 women were posted at any one time. About 10,000 have served in Helmand.Servicewomen are barred from infantry battalions, tank regiments, the Royal Marine Commandos and Special Forces. But they go on patrol with combat units and risk firefights while in supporting roles such as medics.
    Tory MP Bob Stewart, a former commander of British troops in Bosnia, said he was against compulsory pregnancy tests. He said: ‘I think you have to be very careful about suddenly ordering people to take intrusive tests. Some get pregnant when they are actually out on operations in theatre so pre-deployment tests would not work with them.’
    But Major General Julian Thompson, the ex-commanding officer of 3 Commando Brigade Royal Marines, said: ‘It would need to be put across sensitively, but this would ensure that they are 100 per cent fit for operations when they deploy.’ An MoD spokesman said: ‘Pregnant servicewomen are returned home to protect the health and safety of the mother and unborn child, not as a punishment.’

  • Human Meat Served at Nigerian Restaurant, 11 Arrested

    The next time you go to a restaurant and order your favourite non-vegetarian dish, you might as well want to check on what it is that is being cooked and served to you.

    In a recent case, 11 men were arrested for allegedly serving human meat in a Nigerian restaurant.

    The grim discovery was made after police officers found two human heads wrapped in cellophane at a hotel’s restaurant. The police had raided the hotel in Anambra in southeast Nigeria on a tip-off.

    Among the 11 arrested is the hotel’s owner.

    Apart from the two human heads, the police also found two AK-47 rifles, 40 rounds of live ammunition and cellophanes from the unnamed hotel.

    “I went to the hotel early this year, after eating, I was told that a lump of meat was being sold at N700 ($4),” a local pastor, who was one of those who tipped off the police, told the Osun Defender. “I was surprised. So, I did not know it was human meat that I ate at such an expensive price.”

  • Taliban shura likely to announce ceasefire in 24 hours

    PESHAWAR: Taliban political shura has decided in principle for ceasefire and the announcement in this regard is expected in next 24 hours, Geo News reported.

    According to sources, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) political shura held a meting on Sunday to deliberate on the government’s demand for ceasefire.

    In the meeting, sources said, the Taliban shura decided to observe ceasefire and the announcement in this regard is expected in next 24 hours.

    The sources further said TTP shura has demanded withdrawal of army from North Waziristan besides release of their non-combatant companions.

  • Syrian girl stoned to death for using Facebook account

    Rakka, Syria: A young girl was stoned to death by sunni-militant groups in Syria for operating Facebook account.Fatoum Al-Jassem was taken to a Sharia court after she was caught using the social networking website, in Rakka, Syria. The Sharia court declared that using a Facebook account amounts to adultery and the girl should be punished by stoning, according to a news report published in Iran’s FARS news agency which quoted a report published in Arabic-language Al-Rai Al-Youm.

    The members of the Al-Qaeda group in Iraq, also known as Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) were behind the incident.

    The ISIS, or Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, is an hardline Islamic group based in Iraq. They have been fighting an active war against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Syria and the government forces in Iraq.

    The group’s ideology is based on extremely strict interpretation of Islam.

    Ironically, the Al-Nusra Front operates a Facebook account of its own.

  • Aid agencies rap Israel for demolishing Palestinian homes

    Aid agencies working in the occupied West Bank have raised the alarm on a spike in Israeli demolition of Palestinian properties, Press TV reports.

    Israeli authorities have ordered the demolition of two houses in the al-Tur neighborhood in East al-Quds (Jerusalem).

    The order would make eight family members, including two children and one disabled girl, homeless.

    “I left my home in the morning to go shopping. When I was out, I received a phone call from a friend. She told me my house was being demolished. We had received no warning and my children were inside. By the time I got back it was too late,” a Palestinian woman told Press TV.

    The woman added that the family had been paying monthly charges to the authorities for the house and they had received no warning ahead of the demolition.

    The family now sleeps in tents provided by the British Red Cross.

    On February 6, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said Israel demolished 390 Palestinian homes in the West Bank’s Jordan Valley in 2013, which resulted in the displacement of nearly 600 Palestinians.

    It noted that the numbers have doubled in comparison with the year before.

    Rights groups say Tel Aviv’s demolitions are aimed at grabbing more land for construction of illegal settlements on Palestinian lands and launching military projects in the occupied territories.

    Israel’s persistent settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank has created a major obstacle against efforts made to establish peace in the Middle East.

    The Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank are illegal under the Geneva Conventions, which forbid construction on occupied lands.

  • U.S. will meet same fate as Soviet, says Taliban

    KABUL: The Taliban called on Afghans to expel the United States from Afghanistan on Saturday just as they said Afghan mujahideen fighters had done to Soviet forces 25 years ago to the day.
    In a statement issued on the 25th anniversary of the final Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, a national holiday for Afghans, the Taliban sought to conne

    t the steady departure of U.S. and NATO troops ahead of a year-end deadline to the end of the decade-long Soviet occupation.

    “Today America is facing the same fate as the former Soviets and trying to escape from our country,” the Taliban said in a statement emailed to reporters by Qari Yousef Ahmadi, a spokesman for the group.
    “The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is calling on its people to deal with today’s invaders the same they did with the yesterday’s invaders,” he said, using the name the Taliban government used during its repressive 1996-2001 rule.
    In line with the so-called Geneva accords, a last convoy of Soviet soldiers crossed a bridge connecting northern Afghanistan with the then-Soviet Union on February 15, 1989.
    “We want to remind the Americans that we did not accept invaders with their sweet and nice slogans in the past. We eliminated them from the world map. God willing, your destiny will be the same,” the statement said.
    While U.S. and NATO forces in recent years have pushed Taliban militants out of many areas of their southern homeland, they appear to be dug in across remote areas along the rugged Afghanistan- Pakistan border and insurgent violence continues.
    The United Nations said last week that civilian deaths rose in 2013 as fighting intensifies between Taliban militants and government forces that are taking over from foreign troops.
    Uncertainty about whether a modest force of foreign troops will stay beyond a year-end deadline continues due to Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s refusal to sign a security deal with the United States that would permit some troops to stay.

  • Iran Majlis speaker urges unity among Muslims

    Tehran: In an address to the executive committee of the Parliamentary Union of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) Member States in Tehran on Friday, Larijani said the meeting should contribute to more solidarity, progress and justice among Muslim nations.

    He pointed to the challenges facing Muslim nations and said the Union can act as a center to pursue the demands of the member states.

    “Today, waves of sowing discord in Islamic countries have led to many problems and the killing of many Muslims,” Larijani said, adding that the Islamic inter-parliamentary union can play a major role in addressing such woes and preventing rifts among Islamic nations.

    Larijani also warned against the terrorist activities of extremist Takfiri groups in the region and said such moves have given rise to problems in Muslim countries.

    The 9th meeting of the Parliamentary Union of the OIC Member States, which started on Friday, is scheduled to continue until February 19.

    The union is composed of the parliaments of the OIC member states.

    Hossein Sheikholeslam, Larijani’s adviser on international affairs, said earlier that the participation of 47 countries in the conference had been finalized and 15 other countries had also expressed readiness to attend the event as observers.

    He added that representatives from Syria, Egypt, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Sudan, Tajikistan, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, the UAE, Iraq, Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Morocco and Jordan will be present in the meeting.

  • Afghan, Pakistani and Turkish leaders meet for new round of trilateral summit

    ANKARA: Turkey on Thursday hosts leaders of Afghanistan and Pakistan at a trilateral summit in the Turkish capital of Ankara, seeking further cooperation on security in Afghanistan.
    Pakistani Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif, Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Turkish President Abdullah Gul will also discuss security cooperation and economic development partnership in the region.
    The summit, whose theme is “Sustainable Peace in the Heart of Asia,” is taking place against the backdrop of political transition in Afghanistan, including presidential and provincial council elections in April and the withdrawal of NATO forces by end of year.
    On the sidelines of the two-day summit, the Turkish president will be meeting with the Pakistani prime minister and his Afghan counterpart, while foreign ministers, military officials and businessmen from the three countries will meet in separate sessions.
    The first trilateral summit was held in 2007 to present a platform for cooperation on security, economy, education, inter- parliamentary cooperation aiming to promote dialogue and trust particularly between Afghanistan and Pakistan through Turkey as a facilitator.