Gilani takes Shujaat in confidence over 20th Amendment

PM Gilani in meeting with PML-Q chief Ch.Shujaat Hussain at PM Secretariat in Islamabad.- File Photo by PPI

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on Wednesday took Pakistan Muslim League – Q (PML-Q) chief Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain into confidence about the proposed 20th Constitutional Amendment.

Talking to the PML-Q leader here at the Prime Minister House, Gilani also discussed present political situation in the country.

He said the political alliance with the PML-Q will continue as it would strengthen the democracy and the federation.

The PML-Q chief assured the prime minister that his party would extend full support to the government, as one of the coalition partners they were committed to resolve all important issues of national importance with consultation and consensus.

Minister for Religious Affairs Syed Khursheed Shah and Minister for Kashmir Affairs and Gilgit Baltistan Mian Manzoor Ahmad Wattoo were also present during the meeting.

Taliban deny plan for Saudi talks with Afghan govt

KABUL: The Taliban militia leading a 10-year insurgency in Afghanistan on Wednesday denied that they would soon hold talks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s government in Saudi Arabia.

“There is no truth in these published reports saying that the delegation of the Islamic Emirate would meet with representatives of the Karzai government in Saudi Arabia in the near future,” the Taliban said on their website.

Afghan officials, requesting anonymity, had suggested that the two sides would hold talks in Saudi Arabia separate from planned negotiations in Qatar between the Taliban and the United States.

But it was never clear whether the Taliban, who have so far resisted talks with the Afghan government, or the Saudis, who have conditioned involvement on the Taliban renouncing al Qaeda, would come on board.

Taliban negotiators have begun preliminary discussions with the United States in Qatar on plans for peace talks aimed at ending the decade-long war.

They have also announced plans to set up an office in Doha.

On Wednesday, the Taliban said they had not yet “reached the negotiation phase with the US and its allies”.

“Before there are negotiations there should be a trust-building phase, which has not begun yet,” the statement on its website said.

A day earlier, a government spokesman in Kabul cautioned that no steps had been taken to start talks in Saudi Arabia.

“The Afghan government is very clear on talks — we have always preferred Saudi to Qatar,” Akim Hasher, head of the Government Media and Information Centre, told AFP.

“There is a possibility that the talks will take place in Saudi as well — Qatar is definitely not the only option.” On Monday, an Afghan diplomat based in Riyadh said talks would be held in Saudi Arabia, but stopped short of announcing any date.

A member of the Taliban’s leadership council told AFP on Sunday that “the idea” that the Taliban should have a point of contact in Saudi Arabia was being pushed by the Pakistan and Afghan governments.

Analysts have warned that any move to open a second front in peace talks was being driven by fear in Kabul of being sidelined and could sow confusion in the tentative process of “talking about talks” to end the devastating conflict.

“When you have all these different players trying to open up talks with the Taliban it might look to the Taliban like a deliberate ploy, an attempt to divide and rule or to get some advantage,” said analyst Kate Clark.

Romney wins in Florida, turns sights on Obama

TAMPA: Mitt Romney clobbered Newt Gingrich by 14 percentage points in Florida’s Republican primary vote and moves on to the next state, Nevada, on Wednesday with a fat campaign bankroll and a renewed sense that he is the inevitable challenger to President Barack Obama in November.

Ten days after Gingrich hammered Romney by a similar margin in South Carolina, one of the most conservative American states, the chaotic Republican nominating contest took another dramatic turn in Florida, which awards all of its party delegates to the top vote-getter and gives Romney momentum as the race heads to friendlier states out west.

Florida also will be a key battleground in the general election later this year as a large and diverse state with a history of backing candidates from both the Republican and Democratic parties. Romney and his allies poured roughly $16 million into Florida television advertising for the primary alone.

Romney spoke as though he was the presumptive nominee Tuesday night, declaring himself ready ”to lead this party and our nation.”

”Mr. President, you were elected to lead, you chose to follow, and now it’s time to get out of the way,” he said.

Obama’s campaign issued a fund-raising appeal Wednesday focused on the millions that Romney and his supporters have poured into negative ads.

”That’s ugly, and it tells us a lot about what to expect from Romney if he wins the Republican nomination,” said campaign manager Jim Messina. ”They’re going to try to spend and smear their way to the White House.”

With Obama vulnerable in his bid for a second White House term because of the slow US economic recovery, about half of Florida primary voters said the most important factor for them was a candidate who could defeat the president, according to exit poll results conducted for The Associated Press and television networks.

Not surprisingly, in a state with an unemployment rate hovering around 10 percent, about two-thirds of voters said the economy was their top issue. Nearly nine in 10 said they were falling behind or just keeping up.

Florida was one of the hardest hit states in the collapse of the US housing market that caused a near meltdown of the American financial sector in the final months of the George W. Bush presidency.

Romney, who had failed to draw much above a quarter of the vote in three previous primary and caucus contests in smaller states, won almost half the votes in Florida’s four-person race. That damages Gingrich’s contention that the voters who oppose Romney outnumber those who favor him.

Returns from 100 per cent of Florida’s precincts showed Romney with 46 per cent of the vote to 32 per cent for Gingrich. Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum had 13 per cent, and Texas congressman Ron Paul 7 per cent. Neither mounted a substantial effort in the state and campaigned Tuesday in western states with upcoming caucuses.

Florida’s winner-take-all primary was worth 50 delegates to the Republican National Convention in late August in Tampa, Florida. That gave Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, a total of 87, to 26 for Gingrich, 14 for Santorum and four for Paul, with 1,144 required to clinch the nomination.

Gingrich, a former speaker of the House of Representatives, said most states have yet to vote. The sign on his podium read ”46 States to go.”

”We are going to contest everyplace,” he said.

The candidates were converging Wednesday on Nevada, which holds its caucuses on Saturday. Romney won Nevada’s caucuses after losing in Florida in 2008, and a substantial Mormon population there could propel him to victory again this time.

Romney dropped out of the presidential race four years ago when Sen. John McCain became the clear favorite among Republicans. His focus on the economy this time could play well in a state with the highest unemployment rate in the US.

”The path ahead is looking very good,” Romney told NBC’s ”Today” show on Wednesday.

The nomination battle so far this year has been defined by an unusually large series of 18 debates, typicallya strong point for Gingrich. But he faltered in Florida as Romney hired a new debate coach and went on the attack. And no debates are planned for three weeks, hurting candidates with little funding who relied on the free national exposure. The candidates next debate in Arizona on Feb. 22.

While the debates have tended to galvanize support for the candidates, massive negative advertising has proved a major factor. Romney’s campaign raised $24 million in the final months of 2011, dwarfing his competitors. He has $20 million to fight the primary battle and has had staff and volunteerson the ground in upcoming states for months as he’s prepared for a drawn-out fight.

Romney and Restore our Future, an outside group supporting him, outspent Gingrich and his outside organization, by about $15.5 million to $3.3 million, an advantage of nearly 5-1.

WTO approves two-year trade waiver for Pakistan

GENEVA: The World Trade Organization approved a waiver on Wednesday allowing 75 Pakistani products duty free access to European markets for two years to help textile exports after devastating floods in 2010, a trade diplomat said.

Pakistan trade officials said the deal was expected to significantly increase textile exports.

The deal faced delays over objections raised by countries such as Argentina, Brazil, India, Bangladesh and Indonesia. To allay their opposition to the waiver, the list includes 20 products with tariff rate quotas that will be applied instead of full liberalisation.

Bangladesh, which also relies heavily on textile exports, relented as it viewed the circumstances for the agreement as exceptional.

The waiver needs to be ratified at the general council meeting of the WTO on February 14 and 15 and if approved will apply until the end of 2013.

Four UK men admit London Stock Exchange bomb plot

LONDON: Four British men fueled by the words of a US-born Muslim cleric pleaded guilty Wednesday to involvement in an al-Qaida inspired plot to spread terror and cause economic damage by bombing the London Stock Exchange at Christmastime.

Five other defendants pleaded guilty to lesser terrorism charges.

The nine men, from several parts of the country, were brought together through radical groups and nurtured plans to attack the stock exchange and other high-profile targets. Unbeknownst to them, British authorities learned of the plot and put them under surveillance.

They were arrested in raids in December 2010 and all initially denied the charges against them.

But on Wednesday, as their trial was due to start, four of the defendants pleaded guilty at Woolwich Crown Court to involvement in the Stock Exchange plan, and the five others to preparing or assisting planned terror attacks.

Mohammed Chowdhury, 21; Shah Rahman, 28; Gurukanth Desai, 30; and Abdul Miah, 25, all admitted preparing for acts of terrorism by planning to plant an improvised explosive device in the toilets of the London Stock Exchange.

Prosecution lawyer Andrew Edis accepted that the men had not planned to kill anyone.

”Their intention was to cause terror and economic harm and disruption,” he said. ”But their chosen method meant there was a risk people would be maimed or killed.”

Chowdhury, from London, was described by prosecutors as the ”lynchpin” of the plot. His lawyer, Christopher Blaxland, said Chowdhury admitted planning to plant the bomb, ”with the obvious attendant risk but without any intention to cause death or even injury but with the intention to terrorize, damage property and to cause economic damage.”

The other five defendants admitted attending planning meetings, fundraising for terrorism or possessing copies of the al-Qaida magazine, Inspire, which contained a feature headlined ”Make A Bomb In The Kitchen Of Your Mom.”

Prosecutors said they had not made any bombs or set dates for the attacks.

They said the men were not members of al-Qaida but had been inspired by the terror network and the sermons of its Yemen-based, American-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who was killed last year in a US drone strike.

Edis said the nine defendants ”were implementing the published strategy of AQAP” _ al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula.

The suspects, then aged between 20 and 30, were arrested in London, Cardiff and Stoke-on-Trent in central England, in what police called the biggest anti-terror raid for two years.

Prosecutors said they plotted to send mail bombs to various targets in the run-up to Christmas 2010 and had discussed launching a ”Mumbai-style” atrocity _ referring to the bomb blasts that killed 166 people in India’s financial center in 2008.

The nine defendants were accused of agreeing on targets, discussing materials and methods, and researching files ”containing practical instruction for a terrorist attack.”

The men held planning meetings, researched bomb-making and scouted out locations including Parliament, Westminster Abbey and the London Eye Ferris wheel _ not knowing that they were under police surveillance and their homes and cars had been bugged.

A handwritten target list found at one of the defendant’s homes listed the names and addresses of London Mayor Boris Johnson, two rabbis, the American Embassy and the Stock Exchange.

The men, who had Bangladeshi and Pakistani backgrounds, also were overheard discussing how to make a pipe bomb, and talked about traveling abroad for terror training.

The four suspects from Stoke-on-Trent discussed leaving homemade bombs in the toilets of their city’s pubs _ but noted that as Muslims they would not be able to go into the pubs to plant them.

The defendants will be sentenced next week, but the judge has already told Chowdhury he will receive 13 1/2 years and Rahman 12 years. Each will also receive five years on probation. They are likely to serve half that time before being eligible for parole.

When police swooped on the suspects in three cities in the early morning of Dec. 20, 2010, they said it was the most significant anti-terror raid for two years.

London has been targeted several times by violent Islamists affiliated with or inspired by al-Qaida.

In July 2005, four suicide bombers killed 52 commuters on three London subway trains and a bus. A year later, US and British intelligence officials thwarted one of the largest plots yet _ a plan to explode bombs on nearly a dozen trans-Atlantic airliners.

Al-Awlaki, who was killed in September, is thought to have orchestrated an unsuccessful October 2010 plot to send mail bombs on planes from Yemen to the US hidden in the toner cartridges of computer printers.

Jailed cricketer Mohammad Amir released

LONDON: A person with knowledge of the situation says Mohammad Amir, one of three Pakistani cricketers jailed in England for spot-fixing, has been released.

The person says the 19-year-old fast bowler was released from a young offenders’ institution in Weymouth, southwest England, on Wednesday halfway through his six-month sentence because of good behavior.

The person spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the case publicly.

Former Pakistan captain Salman Butt and bowler Mohammad Asif are still serving their sentences after being convicted of fixing part of a test against England in August 2010.

Amir pleaded guilty before the trial at London’s Southwark Crown Court last year.

PCC is damaging genuine journalism, Lebedev tells MPs

The press in Britain is under-regulated but over-legislated, damaging genuine investigative journalism but allowing scandals like phone hacking to go undetected, the proprietor of The Independent told Parliament yesterday.

Giving evidence to a joint committee of MPs and peers Evgeny Lebedev, chairman of Independent Print Ltd, called for the Press Complaints Commission to be fundamentally reformed to restore public confidence in newspapers.

But he also criticised Britain's draconian libel laws for stifling important investigative journalism in the wider public interest. "The Press Complaints Commission has not worked," he told the Joint Committee on Privacy and Injunctions.

"[The industry] is under-regulated because the PCC is not independent, it is not transparent and it is not understandable to the public how it works. It hasn't managed to hold those responsible for phone hacking to account.

"[But] there is too much legislation that prevents newspapers from carrying out investigative journalism. We have got a few cases in our newspaper at the moment that are legitimate investigative cases that we cannot progress with because of the libel laws in this country."

Mr Lebedev said he believed a new press complaints body should have the power to fine newspapers and in certain circumstances even force papers to take out advertisements in rival publications to apologise. "I definitely believe that the new regulator should be a signal of change. It will be very important for it to be independent of the industry.

"There needs to be a feeling from the public – whose trust we're trying to regain – that it is genuinely independent. It needs to be transparent so people can understand how it is set up, how the code of conduct works, who sits on the board, and how they are selected."

Mr Lebedev said being brought up in Russia "where there was no press freedom whatsoever" had made him acutely aware of how important a vibrant and free press was to democracy.

Chris Blackhurst, editor of The Independent, told the committee that he believed any body that replaced the PCC should have a far smaller role for editors. "I think there is recognition among editors, including myself, that the PCC as it is currently set up is not fit for purpose," he said.

"I think that's regrettable but it's a reflection of the fact that the public has lost faith and we as editors can't ignore that. There is a recognition that the PCC is too much under the influence of serving editors and one way to restore trust would be to have a newly constituted PCC where the majority of people taking decisions were lay members who are not serving editors."