Remembering Nazia Hassan

Thursday marks the death anniversary of Pakistani musician Nazia Hassan, a pop icon who endeared herself to millions across the Indian subcontinent.

Nazia Hassan was one the most popular and influential female singers in South Asia during the 1980’s, and is regarded as a pioneer of Western-style pop music in the region.

Nazia burst on to the scene when she provided vocals for the song ‘Aap Jaisa Koi’ in the Bollywood film Qurbani in 1980, making her hugely popular across India.

She then collaborated with UK-based Indian music producer Biddu, who was then relatively unknown, to produce the album Disco Deewaney in 1981. The album was a huge success, breaking sales records in Pakistan and receiving considerable international acclaim.

She subsequently worked with her brother, Zohaib Hassan, to release four more albums: Star/Boom Boom (1982), Young Tarang (1984), Hotline (1987) and Camera Camera (1992).

The brother-sister duo also made numerous appearances on Pakistan Television (PTV) throughout the 1980s, and jointly hosted the show Music’89.

She was one the first South Asian performers to perform disco-inspired dance music, helping to shake up the then-moribund popular music scene. The new music and attitude that the London-educated singer is credited with paving the path for popular 1990s acts such as the Vital Signs and the Jupiters.

Following the release of her last album Nazia shifted her focus to philanthropic work abroad, and also worked for the United Nations.

The shining light that was Nazia Hassan died in August 13, 2000 in London after a prolonged battle with lung cancer at the young age of 35.

India hit for rising religious violence

An independent U.S. agency on Wednesday criticized the Indian government's "inadequate" response to growing religious hatred, saying attacks and violent riots are on the rise.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) released a harsh assessment of India's ability and interest in protecting Christian and Muslim minorities from organized attacks.

Plenty of laws are in place, the 14-page report noted, but police and government officials often do little to enforce them.

"Although the infrastructure for investigating and prosecuting cases of religiously motivated violence or harassment exists in India, the capacity of the legal system is severely limited and is utilized inconsistently," the USCIRF found.

"These deficiencies have resulted in a culture of impunity that gives members of vulnerable minority communities few assurances of their safety, particularly in areas with a history of communal violence."

The commission said in a statement that it was placing India on its "watch list" for the governments "largely inadequate response in protecting its religious minorities."

The spokesman at the Indian Embassy in Washington said officials are studying the report.

India - a multiethnic, multireligious, multilingual democracy of more than a billion people - is one of the United States' closest allies in Asia.

The country has an independent judiciary, as well as a scrappy and influential press corps that frequently takes on the government, USCIRF officials found. Nongovernmental organizations are free to criticize local and national administrations, and mobilize civil society.

However, the group says, a half-dozen Indian states have passed ordinances that contradict or overturn the national regulations, creating an atmosphere of impunity for the killing and harassment of religious minorities.

USCIRF investigators singled out a violent campaign against Christians in the state of Orissa in eastern India. At least 40 people were killed over a period of weeks, and church properties and thousands of home were attacked. The group estimates that 60,000 people, mostly Christian, fled the violence and sought refuge in the nearby jungle.

"It is extremely disappointing that India, which has a multitude of religious communities, has done so little to protect and bring justice to its religious minorities under siege," commission Chairman Leonard Leo said in the statement.

He said the India chapter of the commission's annual report is being released this week to mark the one-year anniversary of the start of the anti-Christian violence in Orissa.

Kashmir violence raises new security worries for India

A spurt in violence in Kashmir shows militants may have abandoned a strategy of backing peaceful street protests to fight Indian rule, raising fears of sucking in Indian and Pakistani troops to their tense border.

Separatist groups hoped that months of street protests last year could galvanise into a massive anti-India movement, but the demonstrations petered out and New Delhi carried out two rounds of peaceful elections in the state, despite boycott calls.

‘The militant groups do not want the administration to settle down and are using violent tactics now as people in the region are talking peace and even voted in large numbers,’ Naresh Chandra, a former envoy to Washington, said.

‘Pakistan continues to aid militants crossing over from their side and this could raise tension between troops also,’ he said.

A rise in tension could be a blow for the United States, which wants India and Pakistan to resume a peace process, paused after November's Mumbai attacks that killed 166 people, so that Islamabad can focus its security efforts on its Afghan border.

Since July, 30 people have been killed in firefights along a military Line of Control dividing Kashmir between India and Pakistan, and 14 infiltration attempts have been made, double than last year during the same period, Indian officials say.

Two-decade-old separatist violence in Kashmir has fallen since India and Pakistan, which claim the disputed Himalayan region in full, began a peace process in 2004.

Also, state polls held last year in Kashmir saw a turnout of more than 60 per cent, despite a boycott call by separatists.

People also came out to vote during the April/May general election held this year, prompting some separatist leaders to talk about a shift of strategy from backing peaceful protests to adopting violent tactics.

‘They (Pakistan-based groups) find things have gone far too peaceful...They don't wish for this prolonged peace and stability,’ Deepak Kapoor, India'a army chief, told reporters this week in New Delhi.

‘Hence you see heightened activity, heightened attempts to try to get as many people in before the winters come, snow falls and passes close,’ Kapoor said.

Last week, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani reiterated Pakistan's stance that resolving issues such as Kashmir was important for regional stability, which Indian experts said was a ploy to keep the Kashmir issue alive.

India and Pakistan have fought three wars since independence from Britain in 1947, two of them over Kashmir.

‘Pakistan is trying to convince the western world that Kashmir is raging and these militants are all freedom fighters fighting to free Kashmir from Indian rule,’ Amulya Ganguli, a defence expert, said.

‘As Pakistan is coming under huge international pressure to act against militants it is opening all pressure points against India and Kashmir is a forefront of that strategy,’ Brahma Chellaney of the Centre for Policy Research said.

Bangladesh to Balochistan

When Pakistan came into being in August 1947, from among five federating provinces, East Pakistan was the most under developed province followed by Balochistan, Sindh and Frontier provinces. Punjab was relatively more developed and prosperous because of well developed communication infrastructure, better literacy and technical skills, fertile land, plentiful water for irrigation and sophisticated canal irrigation system built by the British and hard working lower class. Elite civil service, police and armed forces had majority from Punjab and Urdu speaking Mohajirs. Inequity in development status of smaller provinces vis-Ã -vis Punjab became the chief reason for giving rise to grouses among the former.
East Pakistan was subverted by Indian intelligence agencies from 1948 onwards and Mujibur Rahman became the vehicle to further their ends. India succeeded in its designs because of mishandling by our rulers and failing to attend to some genuine and mostly perceived grievances of Bengalis against the State. Propaganda warfare and subversion of youth by Hindu teachers and professors in schools, colleges and universities was never countered. They were brainwashed into believing that Punjabi dominated central government had turned East Pakistan into its colony and West Pakistan was prospering at their cost. Awami League rejected maximum provincial autonomy and sought confederation during Yahya-Mujib parleys in March 1971. Great majority of people of eastern wing had desired removal of their grievances but had never preferred separation and that too under tutelage of India. Terrorized into submission, they reluctantly flowed with the tide of Awami League stimulated independence movement.
By the time India launched its military instrument on 21 November 1971, Bengali nationalism as well as abhorrence for West Pakistan had peaked. More than half the battle had already been won on psychological operations plane. Small force of West Pakistani 45000 (both army and paramilitary) together with Razakars trying to defend the motherland was hugely outnumbered, isolated, fatigued and demoralized and their weapons and equipment badly worn out. Biharis and pro-Pakistan Bengalis were later on declared as collaborators and ruthlessly massacred and persecuted. Euphoria of Bangladeshis soon transformed into despair since independence did not bring any change in their fortunes. In fact, for first 20 years of their independence their plight became pathetic. Rapid decline in living conditions made them realize that they were tricked and led up the garden path. It sparked unrest and led to massacre of Mujib and his 23 family members in 1974. India has become highly meddlesome in internal affairs of Bangladesh. To ensure its monopoly, India impedes its progress, foments trouble and treats it as its 29th state. There is large segment in Bangladesh that still ruefully recalls old days of united Pakistan with nostalgia and detests India for its unwanted interference and bossy attitude.
After achieving a huge success in 1971, RAW was assigned to carryout subversion in Sindh. Existing grievances between old and new Sindhis were exploited and deep cleavages drawn between two communities giving rise to ethnic based nationalism and regional politics. Tussle between Punjabi and Pathan settlers in Karachi and Urdu speaking Mohajirs was accentuated to create bad blood between various communities. By early 1990, Sindh became a wounded province and ideas of Sindudesh and Urdudesh were planted among nationalists. Military operation against MRD movement in interior Sindh in 1983 duly backed by India and against MQM in 1992 and again in 1995-96 stemmed nationalist fervor to some extent. In the aftermath of 9/11, interests of USA and India colluded in Balochistan. Emphasis therefore shifted from Sindh towards Balochistan. Since early 2002, RAW, CIA, Mossad, MI-6, RAAM are collectively assisting separatist movement in Balochistan. Huge quantity of war munitions and funds are being regularly pumped in.
Christen Fair, a reputed US journalist has exposed Indian covert operations in Pakistan. For Balochistan, Indian consulates in Kandahar and Zahedan are playing a key role. Situation in Balochistan was deliberately worsened by getting three Baloch nationalist leaders killed by Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) in last April since they were on verge of spilling the beans about Brahamdagh led BLA sponsored by foreign agencies. Captured suicide bombers from Dera Bugti made damning revelations of involvement of runaway Brahamdagh Bugti, RAW and RAAM in training terrorists in camps in Afghanistan and launching them in Balochistan against assigned targets. Riasat 25 and 33 detachments were specifically created for fomenting unrest in Pakistan. Commander Raziq Achakzai turned Spin Boldak into forward launching pad for unleashing terrorists and supplying arms and ammunition in Balochistan. Afghan officials facilitate border crossing of RAW agents. Shahgarh-Kishingrah route in Indian Rajasthan is also frequented for same purpose. RAW chief VM Varma and RAAM chief Amanullah Saleh hold frequent meetings in New Delhi and Kabul to coordinate clandestine operations in Pakistan. CIA and Mossad also take part in some of Pakistan-specific meetings. Baloch miscreants are richly paid by foreign agencies and lifestyle of heretofore unknown BLA members belonging to Marri tribe has become opulent. Other shady organizations having no base are on papers only. These include Baloch Republican Army (BRA) representing Bugtis, Lashkar-i-Balochistan, an armed group of Mengals and Baloch Liberation Front (BLF) representing many Baloch tribes. Purpose is to make the world believe that movement is wide based.
A systematic campaign is in progress under patronage of RAW to brainwash Baloch youth, inculcate in them Baloch nationalism and turn them against concept of Pakistan. 20 teachers were sent in 2008 from Balochistan to Afghanistan for receiving training to subvert school/college syllabus in Balochistan as had been done in East Pakistan through Hindu teachers and professors. Pakistan History, social and Islamic studies in particular is being distorted. In many schools in Baloch dominated districts like Mastung, Kalat, Naushki, Sui, Dera Bugti and Kahan, students no more sing national anthem or display Pakistan flag or eulogize services of Quaid-e-Azam. Hatred against Punjabis, army and federal government is inculcated on grounds that they are plundering the resources of Balochistan and thriving on Baloch natural resources.
Pattern of propaganda themes is on lines played by Awami League in East Pakistan. Nawab Bugti is lionized as a Baloch hero and BLA projected as a vehicle struggling for emancipation and independence of Balochistan from the yoke of parasitic Punjabis who have colonised their province. BRA is eulogized for confronting the army. It has claimed responsibility for all acts of terror including target killings of Punjabi settlers. It is holding 21 police officials and 14 laborers as hostages since 30 July and has already killed 12 policemen and threatened to kill remaining abducted persons if arrested Baloch dissidents involved in anti-state activities are not immediately released. Pillions riding masked gunmen belonging to BLA are carrying out target killings of Punjabi settlers and Persian speaking Hazaras. Punjabi settlers have migrated from rural districts and are now moving out from Quetta as well.
PM Gilani showed photos of Brahamdagh meeting Indian officials in Afghanistan and India and RAW officials meeting anti-Pak elements to Manmohan at Sharm-al Sheikh. He was provided clinching evidence of Indian involvement in terrorist attacks on Sri Lanka cricket team on 3 March and on Manawan police academy on 30 March in Lahore rendering Manmohan speechless. Holbrooke and Gen Stanley McChrystal were also apprised of Indian activities. Pakistan should now do away with its harmful policy of appeasement and press India, Afghanistan and USA to hand over Brahamdagh, wind up his clandestine HQ in Kandahar, close Pakistan specific Indian consulates and camps training terrorists in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, socio-politico-economic steps should be undertaken in real earnest to remove genuine grievances of people of Balochistan. Media should play its role to wash away effects of negative propaganda bred into the minds of youth and inculcate in them nationalism and patriotism. A fervent celebration of 14 August Independence Day in Quetta on 10 August was a healthy activity to put to shame few anti-state elements aspiring to declare independence of Balochistan.

Pakistan's Independence day

Washington is Playing a Deeper Game with China

After the tragic events of July 5 in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China, it would be useful to look more closely into the actual role of the US Government’s ”independent“ NGO, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). All indications are that the US Government, once more acting through its “private” Non-Governmental Organization, the NED, is massively intervening into the internal politics of China.

The reasons for Washington’s intervention into Xinjiang affairs seems to have little to do with concerns over alleged human rights abuses by Beijing authorities against Uyghur people. It seems rather to have very much to do with the strategic geopolitical location of Xinjiang on the Eurasian landmass and its strategic importance for China’s future economic and energy cooperation with Russia, Kazakhastan and other Central Asia states of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

The major organization internationally calling for protests in front of Chinese embassies around the world is the Washington, D.C.-based World Uyghur Congress (WUC).

The WUC manages to finance a staff, a very fancy website in English, and has a very close relation to the US Congress-funded NED. According to published reports by the NED itself, the World Uyghur Congress receives $215,000.00 annually from the National Endowment for Democracy for “human rights research and advocacy projects.” The president of the WUC is an exile Uyghur who describes herself as a “laundress turned millionaire,” Rebiya Kadeer, who also serves as president of the Washington D.C.-based Uyghur American Association, another Uyghur human rights organization which receives significant funding from the US Government via the National Endowment for Democracy.

The NED was intimately involved in financial support to various organizations behind the Lhasa ”Crimson Revolution“ in March 2008, as well as the Saffron Revolution in Burma/Myanmar and virtually every regime change destabilization in eastern Europe over the past years from Serbia to Georgia to Ukraine to Kyrgystan to Teheran in the aftermath of the recent elections.

Allen Weinstein, who helped draft the legislation establishing NED, was quite candid when he said in a published interview in 1991: "A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA."

The NED is supposedly a private, non-government, non-profit foundation, but it receives a yearly appropriation for its international work from the US Congress. The NED money is channelled through four “core foundations”. These are the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, linked to Obama’s Democratic Party; the International Republican Institute tied to the Republican Party; the American Center for International Labor Solidarity linked to the AFL-CIO US labor federation as well as the US State Department; and the Center for International Private Enterprise linked to the US Chamber of Commerce.

The salient question is what has the NED been actively doing that might have encouraged the unrest in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and what is the Obama Administration policy in terms of supporting or denouncing such NED-financed intervention into sovereign politics of states which Washington deems a target for pressure? The answers must be found soon, but one major step to help clarify Washington policy under the new Obama Administration would be for a full disclosure by the NED, the US State Department and NGO’s linked to the US Government, of their involvement, if at all, in encouraging Uyghur separatism or unrest. Is it mere coincidence that the Uyghur riots take place only days following the historic meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization?

Uyghur exile organizations, China and Geopolitics

On May 18 this year, the US-government’s in-house “private” NGO, the NED, according to the official WUC website, hosted a seminal human rights conference entitled East Turkestan: 60 Years under Communist Chinese Rule, along with a curious NGO with the name, the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisation (UNPO).

The Honorary President and founder of the UNPO is one Erkin Alptekin, an exile Uyghur who founded UNPO while working for the US Information Agency’s official propaganda organization, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty as Director of their Uygur Division and Assistant Director of the Nationalities Services.

Alptekin also founded the World Uyghur Congress at the same time, in 1991, while he was with the US Information Agency. The official mission of the USIA when Alptekin founded the World Uyghur Congress in 1991 was “to understand, inform, and influence foreign publics in promotion of the [USA] national interest…” Alptekin was the first president of WUC, and, according to the official WUC website, is a “close friend of the Dalai Lama.”

Closer examination reveals that UNPO in turn to be an American geopolitical strategist’s dream organization. It was formed, as noted, in 1991 as the Soviet Union was collapsing and most of the land area of Eurasia was in political and economic chaos. Since 2002 its Director General has been Archduke Karl von Habsburg of Austria who lists his (unrecognized by Austria or Hungary) title as “Prince Imperial of Austria and Royal Prince of Hungary.”

Among the UNPO principles is the right to ‘self-determination’ for the 57 diverse population groups who, by some opaque process not made public, have been admitted as official UNPO members with their own distinct flags, with a total population of some 150 million peoples and headquarters in the Hague, Netherlands.

UNPO members range from Kosovo which “joined” when it was fully part of then Yugoslavia in 1991. It includes the “Aboriginals of Australia” who were listed as founding members along with Kosovo. It includes the Buffalo River Dene Nation indians of northern Canada.

The select UNPO members also include Tibet which is listed as a founding member. It also includes other explosive geopolitical areas as the Crimean Tartars, the Greek Minority in Romania, the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria (in Russia), the Democratic Movement of Burma, and the gulf enclave adjacent to Angola and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and which just happens to hold rights to some of the world’s largest offshore oil fields leased to Condi Rice’s old firm, Chevron Oil. Further geopolitical hotspots which have been granted elite recognition by the UNPO membership include the large section of northern Iran which designates itself as Southern Azerbaijan, as well as something that calls itself Iranian Kurdistan.

In April 2008 according to the website of the UNPO, the US Congress’ NED sponsored a “leadership training” seminar for the World Uyghur Congress (WUC) together with the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization. Over 50 Uyghurs from around the world together with prominent academics, government representatives and members of the civil society gathered in Berlin Germany to discuss “Self-Determination under International Law.” What they discussed privately is not known. Rebiya Kadeer gave the keynote address.

The suspicious timing of the Xinjiang riots

The current outbreak of riots and unrest in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang in the northwest part of China, exploded on July 5 local time.

According to the website of the World Uyghur Congress, the “trigger” for the riots was an alleged violent attack on June 26 in China’s southern Guangdong Province at a toy factory where the WUC alleges that Han Chinese workers attacked and beat to death two Uyghur workers for allegedly raping or sexually molesting two Han Chinese women workers in the factory. On July 1, the Munich arm of the WUC issued a worldwide call for protest demonstrations against Chinese embassies and consulates for the alleged Guangdong attack, despite the fact they admitted the details of the incident were unsubstantiated and filled with allegations and dubious reports.

According to a press release they issued, it was that June 26 alleged attack that gave the WUC the grounds to issue their worldwide call to action.

On July 5, a Sunday in Xinjiang but still the USA Independence Day, July 4, in Washington, the WUC in Washington claimed that Han Chinese armed soldiers seized any Uyghur they found on the streets and according to official Chinese news reports, widespread riots and burning of cars along the streets of Urumqi broke out resulting over the following three days in over 140 deaths.

China’s official Xinhua News Agency said that protesters from the Uighur Muslim ethnic minority group began attacking ethnic Han pedestrians, burning vehicles and attacking buses with batons and rocks. "They took to the street...carrying knives, wooden batons, bricks and stones," they cited an eyewitness as saying. The French AFP news agency quoted Alim Seytoff, general secretary of the Uighur American Association in Washington, that according to his information, police had begun shooting "indiscriminately" at protesting crowds.

Two different versions of the same events: The Chinese government and pictures of the riots indicate it was Uyghur riot and attacks on Han Chinese residents that resulted in deaths and destruction. French official reports put the blame on Chinese police “shooting indiscriminately.” Significantly, the French AFP report relies on the NED-funded Uyghur American Association of Rebiya Kadeer for its information. The reader should judge if the AFP account might be motivated by a US geopolitical agenda, a deeper game from the Obama Administration towards China’s economic future.

Is it merely coincidence that the riots in Xinjiang by Uyghur organizations broke out only days after the meeting took place in Yakaterinburg, Russia of the member nations of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, as well as Iran as official observer guest, represented by President Ahmadinejad?

Over the past few years, in the face of what is seen as an increasingly hostile and incalculable United States foreign policy, the major nations of Eurasia—China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan have increasingly sought ways of direct and more effective cooperation in economic as well as security areas. In addition, formal Observer status within SCO has been given to Iran, Pakistan, India and Mongolia. The SCO defense ministers are in regular and growing consultation on mutual defense needs, as NATO and the US military command continue provocatively to expand across the region wherever it can.

The Strategic Importance of Xinjiang for Eurasian Energy Infrastructure

There is another reason for the nations of the SCO, a vital national security element, to having peace and stability in China’s Xinjiang region. Some of China’s most important oil and gas pipeline routes pass directly through Xinjiang province. Energy relations between Kazkhstan and China are of enormous strategic importance for both countries, and allow China to become less dependent on oil supply sources that can be cut off by possible US interdiction should relations deteriorate to such a point.

Kazak President Nursultan Nazarbayev paid a State visit in April 2009 to Beijing. The talks concerned deepening economic cooperation, above all in the energy area, where Kazkhastan holds huge reserves of oil and likely as well of natural gas. After the talks in Beijing, Chinese media carried articles with such titles as “"Kazakhstani oil to fill in the Great Chinese pipe."

The Atasu-Alashankou pipeline to be completed in 2009 will provide transportation of transit gas to China via Xinjiang. As well Chinese energy companies are involved in construction of a Zhanazholskiy gas processing plant, Pavlodar electrolyze plant and Moynakskaya hydro electric station in Kazakhstan.
According to the US Government’s Energy Information Administration, Kazakhstan’s Kashagan field is the largest oil field outside the Middle East and the fifth largest in the world in terms of reserves, located off the northern shore of the Caspian Sea, near the city of Atyrau. China has built a 613-mile-long pipeline from Atasu, in northwestern Kazakhstan, to Alashankou at the border of China's Xinjiang region which is exporting Caspian oil to China. PetroChina’s ChinaOil is the exclusive buyer of the crude oil on the Chinese side. The pipeline is a joint venture of CNPC and Kaztransoil of Kazkhstan. Some 85,000 bbl/d of Kazakh crude oil flowed through the pipeline during 2007. China’s CNPC is also involved in other major energy projects with Kazkhstan. They all traverse China’s Xinjiang region.

In 2007 CNPC signed an agreement to invest more than $2 billion to construct a natural gas pipeline from Turkmenistan through Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan to China. That pipeline would start at Gedaim on the border of Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan and extend 1,100 miles through Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan to Khorgos in China's Xinjiang region. Turkmenistan and China have signed a 30-year supply agreement for the gas that would fill the pipeline. CNPC has set up two entities to oversee the Turkmen upstream project and the development of a second pipeline that will cross China from the Xinjiang region to southeast China at a cost of some $7 billion.




As well, Russia and China are discussing major natural gas pipelines from eastern Siberia through Xinjiang into China. Eastern Siberia contains around 135 Trillion cubic feet of proven plus probable natural gas reserves. The Kovykta natural gas field could give China with natural gas in the next decade via a proposed pipeline.

During the current global economic crisis, Kazakhstan received a major credit from China of $10 billion, half of which is for oil and gas sector. The oil pipeline Atasu-Alashankou and the gas pipeline China-Central Asia, are an instrument of strategic 'linkage' of central Asian countries to the economy China. That Eurasian cohesion from Russia to China across Central Asian countries is the geopolitical cohesion Washington most fears. While they would never say so, growing instability in Xinjiang would be an ideal way for Washington to weaken that growing cohesion of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization nation

In kingdom, Saudi prince's coup 'fails'

audi Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the kingdom's former ambassador to the United States, is reportedly under house arrest over a conspiracy against the monarch.

Saad al-Faqih, head of the opposition group Islamic Reform Movement, told Arab-language TV al-Alam that Prince Bandar has been disappeared and the media has published no word from the ex-diplomat's whereabouts since nearly three months ago.

According to al-Faqih, the prince first disappeared in Britain but he returned to the kingdom shortly afterwards.

He added that after Saudi officials discovered that he had provoked 200 agents working for the Saudi security service to stage a coup against King Abdullah, he was put under house arrest.

Al-Faqih said people close to the king had disclosed Bandar's plots and foiled them.

He said Saudi sources believe that intelligence provided by some Arab countries help the Saudi monarch foil Prince Bandar's conspiracy.

Power struggle between members of the Saudi royal family has been common as power is shared among some 200 princes out of the estimated 7000 family members.

Known as Bandar Bush because of his close relations with former US President George W Bush, the prince is son of Crown Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz.

Pakistan Files Criminal Case Against Musharraf

The exiled dictator faces arrest and possible imprisonment if he returns to Pakistan. A high court ruling that Musharraf had violated the constitution could lead to treason chargesFormer President Pervez Musharraf was charged Tuesday with ordering the illegal detention of judges during Pakistan's 2007 political crisis and faces arrest if he returns from exile.

The charge is the latest legal setback for the former military dictator, who lives in London. If convicted, Musharraf could face up to three years in prison. He could post bail if he returns, but analysts doubt he would come back to face the charges.



World A-Z: Pervez Musharraf
Last month, Pakistan's Supreme Court, led by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, concluded that Musharraf had violated the constitution in 2007 when he imposed a national state of emergency and purged the country's courts of 60 judges, including Chaudhry. The chief justice was reinstated in March.

Musharraf's actions were widely seen as an attempt to prevent the Supreme Court from declaring him ineligible to simultaneously hold the posts of president and head of the army. He ordered the detention of those 60 judges at their homes, a move that Islamabad police now say was a crime.

"He is formally charged now," said Hakim Khan, a police official in Islamabad, the capital. "If he comes to Pakistan, he can be arrested."

Experts say the Supreme Court's July 31 ruling that Musharraf had violated the constitution opened the door for possible charges of treason, a crime that could result in the death penalty. In issuing its ruling, the high court left it up to parliament to decide whether to pursue such charges against Musharraf.

Pakistan's two main political parties remain split on whether to build a treason case against the former army chief. President Asif Ali Zardari's Pakistan People's Party has shown scant interest in pursuing the matter, while the opposition Pakistan Muslim League-N party, led by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, wants Musharraf brought to trial.

Pressure has been building in Pakistan to hold Musharraf accountable for his actions during his nine years in power. His rule, which began with a coup that overthrew Sharif, has been widely criticized as a harsh dictatorship characterized by widespread corruption and the rise of the Taliban insurgency.

His actions against judges in 2007 led to a grass-roots movement of lawyers that became crucial in forcing Musharraf to relinquish his role as army chief, and eventually in driving him from office in 2008.

Provinces warned about Sipah-i-Sahaba

The government told the National Assembly on Tuesday it had asked provinces to keep a watch on the banned Sipah-i-Sahaba group, which is accused of fomenting recent violence in the Punjab province’s Jhang and Gojra towns.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik acknowledged there was a lot of truth in concern voiced by an opposition lawmaker from Jhang who said the government must act against the extremist religious group to avoid the kind of situation it had to face in Swat valley of the North West Frontier Province after Taliban rebels were allowed to thrive there.

The minister said it was a fact that Sipah-i-Sahaba had had been involved in terrorist activities in the past and added: ‘The provincial governments have been asked to keep a watch on its activities.’

PML-Q member Sheikh Waqqas Akram said Sipah-i-Sahaba activities were going on in Punjab unchecked by both the provincial and federal goverments and urged the PPP-led ruling coalition: ‘For God’s sake, you take things seriously.’

He said it had taken a struggle of some 15 years at a cost of hundreds of lives to subdue religious extremists in his Jhang district who were known for fomenting sectarian violence, and complained that ‘under a conspiracy these elements have been given an opportunity to make mischief again’, without specifying by whom.

The member said all of some 200 Sipah-i-Sahaba activists arrested in Jhang after a judge took a suo motu notice of the July 21 violence were later released ‘one by one’ and that he learned during a visit to Gojra that members of the same group attacked Christians in Gojra for unproven blasphemy, burning seven of them alive.

‘Don’t leave us at the mercy of these Maulvis,’ Mr Akram said in an appeal to the government.

He expressed his surprise that a leader of the group had been allowed to address the arrested group activists in jail and to go around the country without regard to what he called restrictions for banned organisations.

The interior minister said although two religious teachers had led processions from two Sipah-i-Sahaba mosques that engaged in Gojra violence, but said ‘we must wait for a report of inquiry being conducted by a high court judge’.

He acknowledged that under the existing rules and regulations the provincial governments were ‘supposed to monitor’ the banned groups, whose present number he put at 29.

A PML-N member from Multan district, Rana Mahmood-ul-Hassan, called for a joint action by the Punjab and Sindh police to check what he called heavily armed outlaws who he said kidnapped some 150 people for ransom, including 37 from his district, over the past few months.

PPP chief whip and Labour and Manpower Minister Khurshid Ahmed Shah said the ruling coalition would ask the interior ministry and the two provincial governments to take notice of the situation in which the member said the kidnappers would seek refuge in Sindh when pursued by the Punjab police and cross back into Punjab when chased by Sindh police.

SHAH OFFERS MINISTRY FOR PROBE: Earlier, Mr Shah and some other members of the house voiced concern about what they saw as unsubstantiated media reports about alleged corruption in government institutions, which the minister and another PPP members said were aimed to undermine parliament and the present democratic government.

Mr Shah offered the performance of the Employees Old Age Benefit Institution (EOBI) under his ministry to be probed by a house committee as he rejected corruption allegations in a press report against which he said he reserved the right to go to court.

The minister said there was a deliberate campaign to undermine parliament by what he called ‘exploiting’ corruption charges and said he would like such a probe committee to be headed by an opposition member and call those making the allegations to appear before it to provide a proof.

PML-N chief whip Sheikh Aftab Ahmed appeared sharing the minister’s concern but said efforts to undermine parliament would continue unless violators of the Constitution like former military president Pervez Musharraf were put in the dock.

PML-Q’s Riaz Hussain Pirzada said such allegations would continue to come until cognizance was taken of important happenings of the past for which he said a commission should be set up.

PPP information secretary Fauzia Wahab complained of what she called a campaign to vilify the country’s political leadership by ‘some anchors’ of private television channels that she did not specify, and said the practice of ‘levelling allegations without proof’ must stop.

APATHY TO CLEAN WATER?

Many eyebrows were raised as Minister for Special Initiatives Lal Mohammad Khan alleged lack of cooperation from provincial governments, particularly those of Sindh and the NWFP, in implementing a federal government programme to provide clean drinking water throughout the country.

‘The provincial governments are not taking interest,’ he said in response to an opposition call-attention notice, adding that the NWFP and Sindh had ‘totally failed’ before calling for the establishment of a Federal Clean Drinking Water Authority to take direct charge of the implementation of the projects in all the provinces and Azad Kashmir.

Speaker Fehmida Mirza, who chaired her first sitting of the present session on return from a foreign visit, shared the minister’s concern about what he called waste of huge funds put at the disposal of provincial government and promised to set up a house committee to look into the matter after her suggestion was endorsed by federal ministers Raja Pervez Ashraf (Water and Power) and Naveed Qamar (Privatisation and Petroleum and Natural Resources).

ALL WOMEN’S BILLS: On what was the second private members’ day of the current session, four private bills were introduced as the government did not oppose them --- all moved by women members, though two with male co-authors, to be studied by standing committees concerned before being taken up by the house for consideration.

One bill authored by Mrs Khalida Mansoor sought to remove difficulties faced by women civil servants by amending the Civil Servants Act of 1973 while another moved by Mrs Yasmeen Rehman with four other co-sponsors seeks to check misuse of job quota for disabled ‘special persons’ in government departments and to extend facilities like exempting them from standing in queues by providing them disability cards.

A Banking Companies (Amendment) Bill introduced by Begum Ishrat Ashraf --- with three other sponsors --- sought to remove what she called problems created by different forms and rules made by the banking companies and to lower interest rates.

A bill from Dr Attiya Inayatull seeks to amend the Child Marriage Restraint Act of 1929.

TTPs treasure Financial Trail of terror leads straight to Indian RAW agents

A bloody feud that followed Baitullah Mehsud’s death involving about three-dozen best-trained Taliban fighters early on Wednesday morning was actually a battle among various Taliban warlords to control Rs 2 billion Taliban funds and ownership of arms and ammunition worth about Rs 1 billion by grabbing the ‘Emarat’ (the leadership) of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), according to senior security officials and knowledgeable Taliban sources.
Such was the charisma and awe of 35-year-old, five feet two inches tall Baitullah Mehsud that none of his associates ever dared to challenge his leadership till an American missile strike blew his body apart on the first floor of the house of his second wife in South Waziristan last week.
An intelligence official said: “For about four years, some 3,500 trained fighters and dozens of suicide bombers blindly followed Baitullah as he was the centre of gravity of terrorism in Pakistan.” The battle for the control of the Rs 3 billion Taliban treasure erupted within two days of Baitullah’s death, when two of his most trusted lieutenants, Hakimullah Mehsud and Waliur Rehman, claimed succession in an emergency meeting in Sararogha, where an armed clash left Hakimullah Mehsud dead, along with 40 Taliban fighters, on Saturday evening, a security official said.
An official account of this incident said Waliur Rehman got seriously wounded, while Qari Hussain, who ran the Taliban’s suicide operations directly under Baitullah Mehsud, was also wounded with bullet injuries on both legs in the same incident.
Hakimullah Mehsud, Waliur Rehman and Qari Hussain were claimant to the ‘Emarat’ of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, that comes with a grip on funds of billions of rupees, huge cache of weapons and thousands of trained fighters and a close affinity with al-Qaeda and its leader Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri, who had chosen Baitullah Mehsud to lead the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan.
“There is a constant flow of tens of millions of dollars from foreign enemy sources that keeps the Taliban machine rolling,” a senior security official said, adding: “Over the years Baitullah had built a cash reserve of about Rs 2 billion in addition to large cache of sophisticated weapons, ammunition and latest communication equipment.”
Intelligence officials believe money for the Pakistani Taliban was either buried in various caves in the tribal areas or it was stashed in various bank accounts in Pakistan and in some Gulf states.
Baitullah Mehsud’s coffers expanded so much last year that he sent one of his cousins to Dubai for cash investment in various real estate projects; subsequently millions of dollars were remitted for adventurous business proposals in Gulf states.
“It was not theft, Baitullah just wanted to bolster Taliban reserves because of growing expenses,” said a Karachi-based Mehsud tribesman, who had associated with Baitullah in the past. Narrating another incident, the same source said when a renowned Taliban commander informed Baitullah about huge monetary offers he was receiving from Pakistani officials to surrender, Baitullah’s answer to this man was: “Money is not with the government of Pakistan. Money is with me, tell me how much you want.” Officials concede Baitullah’s money power was such that it was difficult for them to buy his key commanders, as he conveniently outbid them in case of a couple of important commanders.
A senior police official in Peshawar said Baitullah was convinced by al-Qaeda and Pakistan’s foreign enemies that South Waziristan would soon emerge as an independent “Islamic Emirate” and he would be declared as its first Amir.
Intelligence accounts speak of smooth flow of cash to Baitullah from enemy agents, posing as wealthy and highly motivated Arab Muslims, who had established direct connection with the reclusive Taliban commander.
The Taliban sources close to Baitullah Mehsud say a strong cash flow was his most crucial need because his top priority remained an uninterrupted payment of monthly salaries to the families of each of his fighters. Baitullah was supervising a smooth system of cash deliveries ranging from Rs10,000 to Rs20,000 at the doorsteps of his fighters all across Pakistan. Sustenance allowance reached the families of those killed in action.
“Cash pipelines emanating from RAW and Afghan secret services headquarters were terminating in Baitullah-ran accounts, besides cash and weapons infusion,” intelligence officials believed. They estimate Baitullah was paying about Rs600 million in salaries for his fighters every year.
While intelligence agencies see a direct hand of Indian and Afghan secret agencies in financing terror outfits in Pakistan, US officials have consistently accused wealthy individuals in unnamed Gulf countries of providing finances to the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Pakistani and Taliban sources say Maulana Ikramuddin, the man who gave his young daughter to Baitullah Mehsud in marriage last year, was the custodian of some of the key financial secrets of Baitullah Mehsud. Ikramuddin was not at home when the US missile struck his residence, killing Baitullah and about 40 of his bodyguards.
Intelligence officials watched with keen interest that when Hakimullah Mehsud and Waliur Rehman groups clashed in Sararogha, each one of them tried to kidnap Ikramuddin, who was there to arrange a negotiated succession agreement under his umbrella. Ikramuddin, an official source said, was taken away by injured Waliur Rehman.
While foreign cash inflows remained an important source of the Taliban funding, irrefutable evidence showed that Baitullah also ran strong syndicate of select Mehsud tribesmen in Karachi and some Jihadi elements of southern Punjab who were assigned to provide cash injection through bank robberies and kidnappings for ransom.
In one incident two years ago, two private security guards, both Mehsud tribesmen and close associates of Baitullah Mehsud, looted Rs140 million from a foreign exchange company in Karachi. The investigation led the trail to Baitullah Mehsud, who was later approached by a delegation of top Islamic scholars of Karachi for the return of the money. Baitullah obliged the Ulema by returning Rs16.5 million from the looted Rs140 million. The matter is in full knowledge of JUI chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman, who had organised the Scholars’ meeting with Baitullah Mehsud.
Several important cases of kidnappings for ransom in Karachi and Lahore over the last two years and a majority of kidnappings for ransom cases reported in Peshawar in the past two years were settled when the Taliban or their contacts were paid huge ransoms. After Baitullah, battle on for Taliban treasure. Moin Ansari