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David Beckham, a terror target? London, Aug 8: David Beckham's Real Madrid move to Spain may have just put him under the vicious gaze of ETA, the shadowy separatist terrorist group seeking independence from Spain in the form of a separate Basque region. According to a report in People News, the England captain will be placed under armed guard when he arrives back from Real Madrid's tour of the Far East. ETA has over the last 30 years been responsible for kidnapping the relatives of the talented, rich and famous, including Julio Iglesias's father and the children of wealthy industrialists. Vajpayee's fever postpones cabinet meet New Delhi, Aug 8: Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayeee cancelled all his engagements on Friday as he was suffering from viral fever. PMO sources said that since the Prime Minister was ailing from fever, a meeting of the Union Cabinet, scheduled in the evening, was postponed. The Prime Minister was infected with viral fever on Thursday, they added. Cloud burst kills 23 in Manali, Kullu region Shimla, Aug 8: A cloud burst in the hill station of Manali has claimed the lives of 23 people, most of them labourers. Reports reaching here on Friday said the incident had taken place last night near the village of Dhundi, close to the strategically located Rohtang Pass. Superintendant of Police of the Kullu region, Shivinder Thakur, was quoted as saying that the bodies had been recovered from the Kangni nullah, a tributary of the River Beas. Sixteen persons were still missing and the death toll could go up to 40, he said. He said the victims hailed from Bihar and Nepal and were engaged by the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) for construction of a road leading to a tunnel that is to be built through the Rohtang Pass to connect this hill resort to the tribal districts of Lahaul and Spiti. SC orders retrial of Best Bakery case New Delhi, Aug 8: The Supreme Court on Friday ordered the reopening of trial of the 'Best Bakery Case'. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) had demanded the reopening of the case, which involved the killing of 14 Muslims in a bakery by a frenzied mob during the communal riots in the state last year. Earlier, in June a local court had acquitted all the 21 accused in the case, one of them a Muslim, for lack of evidence. A Muslim girl who was an eyewitness during the hearing of the case, said she had not revealed the facts as she feared for life. Main opposition party the Congress lauded the court decision. Hailing the decision, Congressman Salman Khursheed said, "the Supreme Court does not take such steps that easily. It has taken note of the conditions there (Gujarat), the situations under which the investigation was being done there...keeping all that in mind, the Supreme Court has taken this step. It wants to see all that is going to be filed in the High Court. There will be complete check done by the Supreme Court." Meanwhile, BJP activists staged a sit-in protest in Ahmedabad against the Apex Court's decision and the role of the NHRC in the reopening of the case. US to talk to Pak again
on Kashmir, cross-border terrorism (Go
To Top) Washington, Aug 8: The Bush Administration has indicated that it will get in touch with General Musharraf again to emphasize the need for Islamabad to take corrective action on cross-border terrorism and to bilaterally reach an amicable solution with India on the Kashmir dispute. Senior Indian officials on a visit here told ANI that a number of issues had been discussed with their American counterparts, but significantly the focus was on terrorism, Kashmir and Iraq. Defence Secretary Ajay Prasad, who headed the Indian delegation at meetings of the India-U.S. Defence Policy Group, said Washington had been briefed about the ground realities in Kashmir and their reaction was positive. "Yes, there was a discussion. We made a presentation about the current situation to the U.S. side. We particularly highlighted the continued attacks that took place in July, one in Khatra, on the pilgrims that were going to Vaishnodevi and the other one on an army engineering camp at Akhnur," Prasad said. "As far as the U.S. reaction to our presentation was concerned, they have always maintained that they are working with Pakistan in this regard, and even today an assurance was made that, in the weeks to come, there will be further interaction and dialogue with the Pakistani side on this," he added. During his visit, Prasad met U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Under Secretary of State for Defence Policy, Douglas Feith. U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld also dropped in and spoke about the value of closer India-U.S. defence relations. Prasad also met Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard Myers. Rajya Sabha adjourns till Aug 13 (Go To Top) New Delhi, Aug 8: An aggressive opposition forced the Rajya Sabha to adjourn on Friday after the government continued to deny information on crucial defence deal documents to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC). Chairman Bhairon Singh Shekhawat attempted to get the proceedings of the House going for almost 30 minutes, but was eventually forced to order an adjournment till August 13, as Parliament will be in recess on August 11 and 12. Demanding a reply from Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee on the issue, senior Congress Party leader Pranab Mukherjee said that the treasury benches had been clearly told in a Business Advisory Committee meeting that unless the PAC proceedings, including the Central Vigilance Commission report on defence purchases for Operation Vijay, were placed before the House, the opposition would not cooperate with the government. Akshar Dham temple attacker killed in Kashmir (Go To Top) Srinagar, Aug 8: Border Security Force personnel and police killed Manzoor Zahid Choudhary, an alleged commander of the Pakistan-based Lashker-e-Toiba, and the brain behind the attack on the Akshar Dham temple in Gujarat, on Friday. Troops of the BSF's 118 Battalion and the state police, acting on a tip-off, laid the ambush on a track leading to Kesarmulla village in the central Kashmir district of Badgam, a BSF spokesman said. The gun battle lasted for 15 minutes, he said, adding that one AK rifle, three magazines, two hand grenades and one medium size shoulder bag were also recovered. A lap top computer, a Thuriya satellite phone, a digital diary and other incriminating documents were also recovered. The spokesman said the documents recovered from the bag had established that Choudhary had been the brain behind the Akshar Dham temple attack. He had sent two Pakistani militants Hafiz and Abdul Hawal to Gujarat from Kashmir. Protests against Pepsi, Coke (Go To Top) New Delhi, Aug 8: Protests broke out in several states against the soft-drink giants Pepsico and Coke on Friday after the startling revelation by a Delhi-based NGO that the bottled drinks contained toxic chemicals. Activists belonging to the Samata Party and the Swadeshi Jagran Manch burnt Coke posters and broke soft drink bottles. They also demanded immediate withdrawal of their products from the Indian market. "The reality has come in the open that both Coke and Pepsi are misleading the country...forcing them to spend money on their products when the poor don't even have an access to clean drinking water," said Jaya Jaitley, a senior leader of Samata party. It may be recalled that party president and Defence Minister George Fernandes had in 1977 led a campaign against Coca-Cola forcing it to shut shop in the country. Meanwhile, several schools in the Capital have ordered canteens to withdraw the products of these two companies. In Amritsar, people took to streets carrying placards and shouting anti-Coca Cola and Pepsi slogans. In Mumbai, people burnt Coke and Pepsi posters demanding the Central government to ban the drinks after recent reports of use of toxic pesticides by them. On Tuesday the Centre for Science and Environment, an NGO dealing with environment-related issues, had said that its tests showed drinks sold by the Indian units of the U.S. soft drink giants contained four toxic chemicals: lindane, DDT, malathion and chlorpyrifos. The two firms have strongly rejected the CSE findings. CPM activists protest against SC order (Go To Top) New Delhi, Aug 8: Hundreds of CPI (M) activists staged a demonstration in front of the Supreme Court here on Friday against its order which said government employees had no right to call strike. Carrying placards with slogans written against the apex court, the demonstrators shouted slogans denouncing the order and demanding its immediate revision. CPI (M) politburo member Brinda Karat told reporters that resorting to a strike against any injustice is a basic right of the labourers and employees of the country. The SC had on Wednesday declared that government employees had no "fundamental, legal, moral or equitable right" to go on strike. Islam encourages violence, say most Americans (Go To Top) Washington, Aug 8: Most Americans believe that Islam is the most likely among all other religions to encourage violence among its followers. Quoting extensively from the survey carried out by the Pew Research Centre (PRC) here, the Daily Times said that the number of Americans holding this view this year has risen to an alarming 44 percent as compared to 25 percent in a survey carried out in March 2002. The 2003 poll included better-educated individuals and those who are more knowledgeable about Islam. And, where white evangelicals once stood out for their belief that Islam is more likely to encourage violence, there are fewer religious differences now. In addition to growing concerns about Islam and violence, the American public believes that most Muslims around the world don't take too kindly to them. In a separate survey conducted from June 4-8 by the PRC, 24 percent said most Muslims around the world hold anti-American views. Another 25 percent claimed that only 50 percent of Muslims were anti-American in their thoughts and reactions. More people generally believe that religion is significant factor for causing wars. According to the Pew research study, in 2002, 41 percent of white mainline Protestants believed that Islam inspires violence. Today, 51 percent of evangelicals and 50 percent of mainline Protestants agree that the Islamic religion is more likely than others to encourage violence. The growth in percentages of people holding this view among White Catholics, Black Protestants and Seculars has also increased to 39, 37and 38 percent respectively as opposed to 24, 24 and 18 percent in the 2002 survey. Pakistan to host South Asian Games 2004 (Go To Top) Islamabad, Aug 8: Pakistan will host the eight-nation South Asian Federation (SAF) Games next year, reversing a decision it made three months ago to scrap the event, federal Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed told reporters on Thursday. According to the News, Pakistan was originally scheduled to hold the games here in October 2001, but had to postpone the event following the September 11 attacks. It was rescheduled for March 2002, but tensions with neighbouring India caused it to be postponed again. Last April, Pakistan decided to cancel the games. The South Asian Sports Federation will fix the dates for the event, Ahmed said. Pakistan, Maldives, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, India and new entrant Afghanistan are to compete in the games that include such sports as athletics, badminton, boxing, football, volleyball, weightlifting, taekwondo, besides karate, kabaddi, table tennis, wrestling, shooting and swimming. Indian soldier killed in Kosovo cremated (Go To Top) New Delhi, Aug 8: An Indian peacekeeping officer who was killed in a sniper attack in Kosovo was cremated here on Friday with full state honours. Satish Chandra Menon (43) was killed in an ambush on his U.N patrol car in northern Kosovo on Sunday. This is reported to be the first death from an attack on the four-year-old force. Menon is survived by his wife and two children aged six and eight. His widow Leela has been granted a monthly pension of 20,000 rupees for the next 17 years, besides monetary benefits to the tune of three million rupees. Menon, who belonged to paramilitary Border Security Force (BSF) had earlier served in Jammu and Kashmir for six years before being posted in Leposovic for a year. A.K Mitra, Additional Director General of the BSF, said, "He was considered one of the best officers. That was the reason why he was selected for the U.N. peacekeeping mission. He spent many years in Kashmir and battled with insurgency in the region." U.N. police in Kosovo has offered a 50,000 Euro reward in their hunt for the killers of Menon. U.N, whose 4450 officers comes from about 50 countries, said a special investigation team had been set up to find the perpetrators. Kosovo was placed under U.N.-led administration in June 1999 after an 11-week NATO bombing campaign to halt Serbian repression of the province's majority Albanians when then president Slobodan Milosevic ruled Yugoslavia. India has been sending its policemen to Kosovo since 1999, when U.N took control. The officers are drawn from Central police organisations and state police departments. .
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