One group of Hajj pilgrims complained that the place of residence provided to them in Makkah is seven kilometres away from Haram al Sharif.
A pilgrim from Sargodha said that the building they were told about in the programme is different from the one actually allotted to them.
The pilgrim’s residence is seven kilometres away from Haram al Sharif and the building has only one lift for 200 people, he said.
The director of Hajj operations is also demanding an additional amount of approximately Rs11,000 from the pilgrims for shifting them to Madina.
Following an argument with the pilgrims, the administration closed its office and left.
In 2010, Hajj pilgrims travelling through the government scheme faced immense problems due to lack of accommodations and unwillingness on the part of the administrators to provide any help.
The buildings purchased by the Hajj administrators were five kilometres away from Haram al Sharif, while according to laws, the accommodations should not be more than two kilometres away.
Most of the pilgrims spent nights on footpaths and roads due to the negligence of the Pakistani Hajj administrators. Many were deprived of housing facilities at Mina and paid high rent.
Taliban leader Mullah Omar has warned his militant fighters that they will face penalties according to Shariah law if they are found hurting Afghan civilians.
In an 1,800-word Eidul Azha message, Omar calls on the militants to ensure safety of civilians and said civilian casualties were “painful” for the nation.
A United Nations (UN) report released in September revealed that violent incidents in the Afghan war had increased by nearly 40% over the last year. Two thirds of the activity was focused on the southern and southeastern regions, particularly the Taliban birthplace of Kandahar and its surrounding areas.
Omar also says that all civilian casualties believed to be caused by the Taliban should be reported to superiors so that action can be taken against the accused after an “extensive investigation”.
The statement also asks civilians to “avoid moving in close proximity” to US forces patrolling villages and the countryside to avoid being hit during an insurgent attack.
The figures in the UN report showed that total security incidents averaging 2,108 a month in the first eight months of 2011, up 39% on the same period in 2010.
From June to August, the UN’s mission in Afghanistan documented 971 civilian deaths, with three quarters attributed to insurgent violence and 12 percent blamed on NATO’s US-led forces. The rest could not be attributed.
In an 1,800-word Eidul Azha message, Omar calls on the militants to ensure safety of civilians and said civilian casualties were “painful” for the nation.
The Mujahideen have to take every step to protect the lives and wealth of ordinary people in accordance with their religious responsibility.
Omar also says that all civilian casualties believed to be caused by the Taliban should be reported to superiors so that action can be taken against the accused after an “extensive investigation”.
The statement also asks civilians to “avoid moving in close proximity” to US forces patrolling villages and the countryside to avoid being hit during an insurgent attack.
The figures in the UN report showed that total security incidents averaging 2,108 a month in the first eight months of 2011, up 39% on the same period in 2010.
From June to August, the UN’s mission in Afghanistan documented 971 civilian deaths, with three quarters attributed to insurgent violence and 12 percent blamed on NATO’s US-led forces. The rest could not be attributed.
Three vehicles of a bomb disposal squad were travelling to Zangara check-post from Zahidullah security post when militants ambushed them with rockets and Kalashnikovs in Speena Mella area.
Three security personnel were killed and seven others suffered injuries in the attack. Their names could not be ascertained. The injured were taken to the combined military hospital in Bannu.
Security forces cordoned off the area after the incident and started a search operation.
Speena Mella is located near Zangara where Baitullah Mehsud and his wife were killed in a drone attack on the house of his father-in-law on Aug 5, 2009.
A local government official said hundreds were also injured when the attackers bombed a city police headquarters, three other police stations and six churches in Damaturu late Friday.
"Sixty-three people (are) confirmed dead," the official who asked not to be named said.
A lawyer who visited Damaturu's government hospital Saturday looking for a missing friend said he counted 60 bodies in the morgue, "all brought in yesterday from the attacks."
The lawyer, who asked not to be named, told AFP he found the friend, a policeman, among the corpses.
He said anxious relatives were flocking to the hospital in search of loved ones.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attacks.
A senior local government official in the city, who did not want to be identified because he did not have permission to speak to the media, told AFP that the hospital was full to the brim with wounded.
"The general hospital is full with people who were injured in the attack. If I say there are hundreds injured, it's not an over-estimation. Everywhere is full with the injured," he said, without giving a death toll.
The attackers bombed their targets then took on the security forces in gun battles.
A mason working at the police headquarters in Damaturu at the time of the attack said he saw the bodies of five policemen as he made good his escape after the bomb went off.
"I was plastering a building in the police headquarters when I heard a loud blast. I was thrown to the ground, and the window I had just fixed was blown up from the impact of the blast. I believe I saw five dead men. ... They were men in police uniform," Adamu Mohammed said.
He said he saw several others injured as he scaled a fence to flee the scene.
In a mainly Christian neighbourhood of Damaturu called Jerusalem, six churches were bombed in addition to a police station.
"A police station and a mechanical workshop of the police were attacked. Six churches in the area were also bombed," said resident Edwin Silas, adding: "The whole city is traumatised."
Soldiers and police have mounted checkpoints in parts of the city, searching vehicles and carrying out pat-downs of drivers and passengers.
In the outlying town of Potiskum, a grenade narrowly missed a police station and an ensuing gun battle left at least one policeman dead. The Red Cross official said two had died there.
The convoy came under attack near Razmak town, more than 50 kilometres (31 miles) south of Miranshah, the main town in the North Waziristan district along the Afghan border, officials said.
"The convoy was moving from one area to another when Taliban militants attacked it, killing five soldiers and wounding three others," a security official in Peshawar told AFP.
Another security official in Miranshah confirmed the incident, saying militants were armed with rockets and automatic weapons.
"They also hurled grenades in the attack," the official said.
Troops retaliated immediately with small and heavy weapons but there was no report of Taliban casualties, he added.
Few relationships are as dogged by history as the United States and Pakistan. I am often struck by our shared amnesia - there are select episodes we hold on to, but longer engagements we choose to forget. Fifty years ago today, President Kennedy established the US Agency for International Development (USAID) “to meet our moral obligations in the interdependent community of free nations” and “our economic obligations as a nation no longer dependent upon loans from abroad”.
US assistance to Pakistan preceded President Kennedy’s announcement, yet we are often asked, “What has the United States done for Pakistan?” On the occasion of USAID’s 50th anniversary, I would like to reflect on the many quiet successes America and Pakistan have achieved over more than 50 years of working hand-in-hand.
Pakistanis who doubt that US assistance has borne fruit in Pakistan would be surprised to know that they’ve tasted it. Pakistan’s most popular citrus fruit, the kinoo, comes from California. USAID brought kinoo seeds to Pakistan in the 1960s. Today, we are helping export Pakistan’s sweetest fruit, the mango, in the other direction.
In the 1950s, we brought together the University of Karachi, the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, and the University of Southern California to establish a campus in Karachi to meet the demand for business managers in the bustling port city. USAID sponsored the project and the Institute of Business Administration became Pakistan’s first business school and one of the first outside of North America. IBA is recognised today as one of South Asia’s leading institutions.
In 1965, Dr Norman Borlaug, who later won the Nobel Prize for his contribution to agricultural research, came to Pakistan to introduce his new high-yielding variety of wheat. We worked with the Lyallpur Rotary Club to support a programme that gave individual farmers a bushel of the new generation of seed if, when the harvest came in, they returned the bushel so we could give it to someone else. While modest in scope, this small project brought Lyallpur into the Green Revolution that in turn converted a food
deficit region into an exporter of grains.
In the 1960s and ‘70s, a consortium of US construction firms employing Pakistanis, Americans, Britons, Canadians, Germans, and Irish built the two mighty dams of Tarbela and Mangla with USAID and World Bank financing. Those engineering feats - more complex than anywhere in the world at that time - soon accounted for 70 percent of the country’s power output and made Pakistan a leading provider of clean energy.
In the 1980s, with USAID’s assistance, Pakistan’s private industry founded the Lahore University of Management Sciences. Pakistanis approached us with the idea for the new institution and we agreed to support it with a contribution of $10 million. Today, LUMS incubates the ideas and nurtures the leaders who are critical to Pakistan’s future.
Since the inception of the Fulbright scholarship programme, nearly 3,000 Pakistanis have studied in the United States and close to 1,000 Americans have studied in Pakistan. Today, the US Fulbright program in Pakistan is the largest in the world.
Key to all these successes was that Pakistanis owned them. We may have helped sow the seeds but Pakistanis made sure the flowers blossomed. Aid is a catalyst and its success depends on those who receive it. So today, while we help complete dams in Gomal Zam and Satpara and rehabilitate power plants in Muzaffargarh and Jamshoro, only Pakistanis can put an end to circular debt by paying their bills and holding the system accountable.
While we work to cultivate international markets for Pakistan’s fruit and fashion, only Pakistanis can deliver quality products that can compete. While we pay for road construction in South Waziristan, only Pakistanis can provide the local population with economic opportunities to make use of those roads. While we build schools in Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, only Pakistanis can ensure that qualified teachers show up to teach in them.
As Mohammed Jinnah charged the Constituent Assembly at the country’s founding, “If we want to make this great State of Pakistan happy and prosperous, we should wholly and solely concentrate on the well-being of the people. Work in cooperation and you are bound to succeed.”
I hope that fifty years from now, Pakistan will not be a recipient of assistance but instead will have joined us and other like-minded nations in helping others succeed. Development assistance cannot be a substitute for the change that must come from within Pakistan. But until we get there, LUMS, IBA, and the kinoo stand as symbols of the success Pakistan and the United States can achieve by working together.
The writer is the US ambassador to Pakistan
A bullet-riddled body of a young journalist was found in Khuzdar, about 300-kilometre south of Quetta on Saturday morning.South Punjab News reported The victim was identified as Javed Naseer Rind who worked as a senior sub-editor at local daily in Mastung. Khuzdar police recovered the body near Ghazgi Chowk and shifted it to District Headquarters Hospital Khuzdar. The officers found a slip from the body in which his name was stated as Javed Rind. According to doctors, the body had bullet wound in head and multiple marks of torture. Rind was abducted on September 10 near his resident in Mehmoodabad area of Hub Town in Lasbela District. The relatives filed an FIR at Hub Police Station about the kidnapping of Rind soon after the incident. The Balochistan Union of Journalists has condemned the kidnapping and killing of Rind and demanded government constitute a high level committee to probe the incident.
More than 2.5 million Muslim pilgrims have reached Mount of Arafat, after staying a night at Mina, to perform annual Hajj rites. They will perform Waquf, the main pillar of hajj at Arafat mount where prophet Mohammad (P.B.U.H) had delivered his final hajj sermon.
“Islam is a complete way of life and an unprecedented religion which stresses upon peace, harmony and brotherhood among its followers,” the Mufti said.
He urged Ulema across the world to play their due role in eliminating evils form Muslim societies and propagate true teachings of Islam through media and other modern means.
The Mufti in his sermon said Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) had formed a society which was free of sectarianism, racialism, nationalism and other biased behaviors. It is responsibility of the Muslim ummah to preach virtue and forbid wrong and unlawful conduct, he said.
The Sheikh urged Muslims to respect each other and serve as a guardian of each other’s lives and properties. “Muslims should protect their rights being mutually cooperative.”
He exhorted Muslim rulers to act according to Sharia while dealing with masses. “Muslim governments should not use weapons and forces against their own people but act as per Islamic teaching.”
“Seek the solution through negotiations… unity is the only way to cope with anti-Islam forces,” Sheikh Abdul Aziz Bin Abdullah said while addressing millions of Hajj pilgrims.
“Quran and Sunnah are the sole guidelines for Muslims”, he said, adding that Quran prohibits bloodshed, violence and discrimination.
“It is everyone’s responsibility to strive for peace and justice in Muslim society…you should forge unity or else the enemy will beset you.”
At Arafat plains, Zuhr and Asar prayers will jointly be offered at Masjid-e-Nimra after the hajj sermon. Pilgrims will keep offering prayers the entire day.
In the next phase, revered pilgrims will leave for Muzdalifah before Maghrib, where they will jointly offer Maghrib and Isha prayers and collect stones during the night for performing Rami (stoning the Devil).
After the Rami, pilgrims will sacrifice animals followed by getting their heads shaved off. Afterwards, they will take off Ehram (white sheets worn during Hajj) and put on their normal dress.
On Friday, dressed in white, pilgrims poured in Mina’s tent city, around five kilometres east of the holy mosque, in the first phase of hajj pilgrimage after tawaf (circumambulation) of the holy Baitullah al-Haram (Sacred House of Allah) and Sa’ai (Running between the two holy hills).
Addressing a public gathering near London, the former president said that the people in Pakistan seek a third political force, as it is due to the wrong policies by the politicians that Pakistan stands isolated at international level, adding the government failed to run the system properly.
Pakistan is on the verge of destruction and people want to see a third force in power, he added. He claimed that Pakistan made progress during only military rule.
”I will organize my party as well as look forward for entering into alliance with like-minded parties”, he said.
Meanwhile, a man tried to hurl shoe towards former president General (retd.) Pervez Musharraf when he was addressing Kashmiri Community in Luton.
It was the second such attempt on the former Pakistan president. Security personnel promptly caught hold of the man and took him out of the venue. Another man raised slogans against Musharraf.
This is not the first time that an attempt was made to throw a shoe at Musharraf.
In February this year, a man threw a shoe at Musharraf when he was addressing a gathering in Britain. The shoe didn't hit the former military dictator.
General John Allen, commander of the International Security Assistance Force (Isaf), relieved Fuller as deputy commander of the effort to train Afghan security forces after Fuller told Politico that Afghan leaders were "isolated from reality", a US defence official said.
Pentagon spokesman George Little had said on Friday that defence secretary Leon Panetta was aware of the remarks and Fuller had been speaking for himself, not the US defence department.
"The secretary has full trust and confidence in General Allen's judgment with respect to his decision in this case," Little said in response to Allen's decision to relieve Fuller of his duties.
Speaking in a Politico interview that ran on Thursday, Fuller depicted Afghan officials as detached and unappreciative of American sacrifices and financial contributions to Afghanistan after 10 years of war.
The interview painted Fuller as critical of Karzai's recent comments suggesting Afghanistan would side with Pakistan if it went to war with the United States.
"Why don't you just poke me in the eye with a needle! You've got to be kidding me - I'm sorry, we just gave you $11.6bn and now you're telling me, 'I don't really care?'"
The interview quoted Fuller as saying Afghanistan did not recognise the sacrifice in "treasure and blood" the US was making for its security.
In July 2010 Barack Obama fired General Stanley McChrystal, then commander of US and Nato forces in Afghanistan, over remarks he and his aides made in an explosive Rolling Stone magazine article that disparaged the president and other civilian leaders.
While Fuller's job was far less senior than McChrystal's, the training of Afghan security forces has become more and more central to Nato's mission in Afghanistan as foreign forces gradually seek to put Afghan soldiers and police in charge of security.
Afghan security forces are far more numerous than they were and better skilled, but they still have inadequate fighting skills, poor equipment and widespread illiteracy.
While Obama plans to remove the 33,000 extra troops he sent following a 2009 review of Afghan war strategy, security conditions remain troubling. The United Nations says violence is at its worst level since the war began in 2001.
Talking to journalists on the occasion of formal inauguration of the commercial operation of Pakistan's second communication satellite Paksat-1R in Lahore PM said we challenge the rival political parties to try their utmost to topple the government adding, ‘We are primed for that’.
PM Gilani said all the parties are desirous of opposition though they are in the government.
He urged on the rivals not to say anything which may offend anyone.
He said diplomatic channels were being utilized to normalize Pak-US ties added that drone attacks were not being conducted with government’s will.
PM said that he supported the demand for south Punjab as an independent province in accordance with the wishes of the people. The second objective behind the decision was that the province was too big to be controlled by one president.
He said Mian Nawaz Sharif also supported new province in Punjab while name of new province was not a big issue.
He said leaders of Pakistan Peoples Party have declared their property assets.
On a query, the prime minister said giving India MFN status was taken in wrong perception, adding that the government wants trade with India as with other nations in the world and chambers of both countries working regarding it.
Gilani said he would announce “Vision 2030” in few days and all decision were being made in national interest.
Meanwhile Paksat-1R was launched on August 12 from Xichang Satellite Launch Centre of China.
It was moved to its designated position at 38 degree East in the geo-stationary orbit to replace the existing satellite Paksat-1.It has 32 transponders with three communication antennas to cover whole of Pakistan and 75 other countries across Asia‚ East Africa and part of Western Europe.
It has a useful life span of 15 years.
Addressing to gathering, the Prime Minister said that this achievement was a milestone in country’s space development programme.
He said this project reflects four-season and friendly relationship with brotherly country China, adding that both countries would continue cooperation with each other.
The Prime Minister said the government would provide every possible sources to SPARCO to enhance space technology.
He said space technology should be used to improve life of a common man specially in remote areas of the country added that this technology could help in agriculture and aggregation system.
The debt swap will, however, result in an additional fiscal deficit of 1.8 per cent of GDP (gross domestic product) during the current financial year, over and above the targeted normal budget deficit of 4 per cent of GDP.
Finance secretary Dr Waqar Masood Khan told journalists at a briefing that the additional fiscal deficit would not be treated as normal deficit because this was a one-time measure, although he hinted another round of similar adjustments going forward before resolution of the circular debt and power crisis.
An official said that despite parking of huge circular debt in the public domain, the government will have to increase electricity tariff by about 14 per cent or else another Rs76 billion of additional circular debt would re-emerge during the current financial year over and above the budgeted subsidy.
Dr Waqar said the circular debt taken over by the government comprised Rs313 billion in power sector loans and the Rs78 billion federal debt in commodity operations.
“The debt was already there but was not shown in books,” the finance secretary said, adding that the government had to take this bitter pill because it was a hindrance in fresh lending.
He said the power sector term finance certificates (TFCs) which carried an exorbitant interest cost of 200 basis points above the Karachi Inter Bank Offered Rate (Kibor) had now been brought into the mainstream lending instruments of Pakistan Investment Bonds (PIBs) and T-Bills.
All banks, led by National Bank of Pakistan, will now purchase PIBs and T-Bills on a 50:50 per cent basis.
The 5-year PIBs will be available to the banking consortium at an average interest rate of two previous auctions while one-year T-Bills will be traded at 11.82 per cent interest rate.
The secretary said the transaction had been completed in consultation with the IMF.
He said the economic team would like the IMF to issue a clean health certificate to Pakistan economy that would help Islamabad secure loans in the form of fast disbursing project loans from the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.
He said the government was already in contact with the two lending institutions to lend about $2 billion ($1 billion each) to Pakistan’s power sector, after clearance of bad debts.
The fresh loans will be available only after Islamabad agreed to a set of power sector reforms because such World Bank loans are based on performance indicators. He clarified that Pakistan neither required a fresh IMF loan nor it had asked for one because of comfortable balance of payment position despite scheduled repayment of $1.2 billion during the current year.
He said the power sector debt was owing to its losses, uncollected bills and non-payments by provincial governments and Karachi Electric Supply Company.
PAKISTAN RAILWAYS: In reply to a question, the finance secretary said there were innumerable challenges in the Pakistan Railways despite its great revenue potential. He said the railway was a commercial entity whose annual revenue stood at Rs28 billion three years ago, but had now dropped to Rs14 billion and its liabilities had accumulated to Rs48 billion because the freight operation, the main source of revenue, was paralysed with operational bogies drastically coming down to 50 from 400.
According to report on civilian efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan that was sent to congressional offices, the Congress backed off from its 2009 promise to triple non-military aid to Pakistan over five years.
It said, however, that the Obama administration intended for assistance to Islamabad to continue and wants to focus on ‘signature’ projects in Pakistan. US officials are currently looking to select a major new infrastructure project “that would both contribute to power generation and water management” in Pakistan, it said.
In report on Pakistan and Afghanistan, the State Department said civilian aid to Pakistan dropped from $1.5 billion to $1.1 billion this year. The administration said how much is provided next year is uncertain but the administration is committed to “robust, multi-year civilian assistance.”
The US has been frustrated with Pakistan’s willingness to crack down on the Haqqani network, considered a major threat to US troops in Afghanistan. The State Department report said Congress had slipped on its 2009 promise to triple non-military aid to Pakistan over five years. The appropriations reached the promised level of $1.5 billion in 2010, but last year amounted to only $1.1 billion, the document said.
US civilian aid to Afghanistan has peaked, the State Department said in new report, declaring the United States would spend less on development assistance there as it withdraws troops from the country.
“We have reached the high water mark of our civilian funding levels” for Afghanistan, the department said in status report on civilian efforts.
US economic and humanitarian aid to Afghanistan has fallen from $4.1 billion in 2010 to $2.5 billion this year, the report by the office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan said.
Special Correspondent adds: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said that disengaging civilian assistance in Pakistan and Afghanistan would undermine the national security interests and the military and political efforts of the United States.
“As US commanders on the ground will attest, it is critical to our broader strategy that civilian assistance continue in both Afghanistan and Pakistan, she said while delivering her remarks on the release of Status Report: Afghanistan and Pakistan Civilian Engagement here Friday.
Clinton claimed that the civilian surge in Afghanistan and Pakistan that President Barack Obama launched in 2009 to accompany the military surge in Afghanistan had helped advance US goals of defeating Qaeda, reversing the Taliban’s momentum in key areas, and bolstering the economy and civil society of both countries.
“As US troops begin a phased drawdown in Afghanistan as part of the larger plan for transition, our civilian initiatives in both Afghanistan and Pakistan are assuming new importance,” she added.
“We will continue supporting an Afghan-led peace process that meets our red-lines. This won’t be easy, but reconciliation is still possible and is the best hope for peace and stability in Afghanistan and the region,” Clinton said.
“We will continue to build capacity and opportunity in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and across the region, because lasting stability and security go hand in hand with greater economic opportunity,” she added.
“The report provides a thorough review of our civilian efforts, identifies significant challenges and areas of progress, and outlines the way forward. It places the work of our diplomats, development experts, and other civilian specialists within the framework of the fight, talk, build strategy,” she said. “We will continue the fight, as coalition and Afghan forces increase the pressure on the Taliban, the Haqqani network, and other insurgents.”
Clinton added that In Afghanistan, “build” means supporting Afghans in laying the foundation for sustainable economic growth in the run-up to 2014, while also shifting from short-term stabilization projects to long-term development programs. In Pakistan, it means leveraging the resources provided by the landmark Kerry-Lugar-Berman legislation to address major economic challenges that threaten Pakistan’s stability, Clinton remarked.
And across the wider region, it means pursuing a broader, long-term vision for regional economic integration – a New Silk Road – that will lower trade barriers, create jobs, and reinforce political stability, maintained.
“Our civilian efforts were never designed to solve all of Afghanistan’s development challenges or to completely turn around Pakistan’s economy. But they do aim to give Afghans and Pakistanis a stake in their countries’ futures and undercut the appeal of insurgency. This strategy is rooted in a lesson we have learned over and over again, all over the world – lasting stability and security go hand in hand with economic opportunity. People need a realistic hope for a better life, a job, and a chance to provide for their family. It recognizes the vital role of women and civil society in building more stable and prosperous countries – and in achieving lasting peace and reconciliation. And it puts accountability and transparency at the heart of all our efforts.”
The top American diplomat underscored to sceptical legislators on the Capitol Hill that “as our commanders on the ground will attest, it is critical to our broader strategy that civilian assistance continue in both Afghanistan and Pakistan.”
Prosecution lawyers said the indictments on the suspects were of varying natures.
Subsequently, the hearing was adjourned to November 19.
Benazir Bhutto was killed in a gun and suicide bomb attack after an election rally in Rawalpindi on December 27, 2007, weeks after she returned to Pakistan after years in self-imposed exile.
