Archives

Path to Everest a garbage site, laments Hillary

          New Delhi, May 20: Sir Edmund Hillary, the first person to climb Mount Everest in 1953 along with Tenzing Norgay, feels that the world's highest mountain peak has become too commercialised. Speaking at a seminar celebrating the golden jubilee of the event here on Tuesday, which was inaugurated by Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, he expressed concern over tonnes of garbage being left at the mountain site. The 50th anniversary of the ascent of the 8850-metre peak falls on May 29. (Contd)

Pakistan curb on Hizbul Mujahideen militant outfit

          Islamabad, May 20: In a significant move to facilitate talks with India, Pakistan has banned the militant group, Hizbul Mujahideen, and said the outfit's leaders, including its chief Syed Salahuddin, have been restricted from entering Pak-occupied Kashmir (POK). Although the outfit has been banned, no restriction has been imposed on the movement of its leaders outside POK but they could not conduct their organisational activities in the country, Interior Minister Faisel Saleh Hayat said. At the same time, Hayat said the POK government has already imposed a ban on the entry of Hizb leaders into the territory, which effectively meant that its militants would not cross over to Jammu and Kashmir at will. He, however, did not say when the outfit was banned.

          Pakistan government has already banned the entry of leaders of Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad into POK. The news of ban on Hizbul Mujahideen followed a series of statements by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee that Pakistan should crack down on the militant groups and destroy their camps to create conducive atmosphere for talks between the two countries. Meanwhile, Hizb leaders claimed that they have not received any orders banning them, and Sardar Qayyum Khan, the leader of Muslim Conference which governed PK, also said that no ban was imposed on Hizbul.

Strike by bank unions, RBI staff to join (Go To Top)

          New Delhi, May 20: The bank unions on Tuesday threatened to go on an indefinite strike, a day ahead of their one-day nationwide strike on Wednesday. "We may be forced to go for indefinite strike if our demands are not met," the convener of United Forum of Bank Unions (Delhi State) VK Gupta told reporters. The All-India Bank Officers Confederation general secretary, Shantha Raju, said discussions would be held with other unions and if they decide to go on an indefinite strike, then the AIBOC would also join. Bank unions are protesting against the changes proposed by the Centre in the Trade Union Act and the Industrial Disputes Act allowing "hire and fire" policy, and in the Banking Regulation Act providing for privatisation and opening up services sector to foreign direct investment. The Reserve Bank employees will take part in the general strike.

Armed man arrested near Parliament (Go To Top)

          New Delhi, May 20: A man carrying an air pistol and two live cartridges was arrested in the vicinity of Parliament House on Tuesday. Rajesh Rathore was caught near Gate No 3 on Raisina Road at about noon, the Deputy Commissioner of Police (New Delhi district) Manoj Lall said. He was taken for joint interrogation by intelligence agencies and police. Preliminary probe has revealed that Rathore hails from Baroda and arrived in Delhi on Tuesday. Married with three children, he is a driver by profession.

Centre-NSCN(IM) talks in Bangkok (Go To Top)

          Kohima, May 20: The Centre and the NSCN(IM) are going to have another round of talks on various issues at Bangkok on Wednesday. According to NSCN(IM) sources, the dialogues would be held between the outfit's leadership and Centre's emissary K Padmanabhaiah who had recently made a statement on disarming the group before any talks took place. Various Naga underground organisations have, meanwhile, laid stress on establishing unity and understanding among themselves for finding a lasting solution to the problem.

Editor held in PF default case (Go To Top)

          Kolkata, May 20: The Managing Editor of English daily Statesman, Ravinder Kumar, was on Tuesday arrested in an alleged provident fund default case and sent to judicial custody till May 27. Kumar was arrested on the basis of a complaint filed by the Provident Fund Commissioner's office for alleged default of Rs 1.35 crore of the PF contributions. Kumar was later produced before Chief Metropolitan Magistrate S C Misra who rejected a bail application moved by a senior official of the newspaper in the absence of a lawyer due to an agitation and sent him to judicial remand till May 27. An Enforcement Branch official said the arrest was made after the newspaper "failed" to clear the PF dues despite "repeated reminders" and the Provident Fund Commissioner (PFC) filed an FIR on May 14.

DMK ex-minister murdered outside his house (Go To Top)

          Madurai, May 20: T Kiruttinan, former DMK minister, was stabbed to death near his house here on Tuesday. The crime was committed when he was returning from morning walk. Kiruttinan was found lying in a pool of blood. Family members took him to a private hospital where he was declared dead. An ex-minister and two-time MP, Kiruttinan represented his party both in the Rajya Sabha and Lok sabha. A zonal-in-charge of Sivaganga and Madurai districts, he reportedly had discussions on the DMK's organisational elections till late on Monday night.

18 students die in Hanoi boat mishap (Go To Top)

          Hanoi, May 20: Eighteen teenagers were drowned while on their way home from school when their overloaded boat sank a few metres from a river bank in central Vietnam, official sources said Tuesday. The bodies of the students, 10 girls and eight boys aged 13 to 14, were all recovered after Monday's incident, said an official in Quang Nam province, 800 km south of Hanoi. The victims were among 38 students who crammed into the boat to go home after class, he said. The 20 others either swam to safety or were rescued by villagers. An initial police investigation showed that the boat may have capsized during strong winds and heavy rain, the official added.

58 feared dead in China coalmine mishaps (Go To Top)

          Beijing, May 20: Fifty-eight miners were feared dead in two separate coalmine accidents in north China, official sources said Tuesday. The State Administration for Work Safety said 33 miners were missing after a flood at the Fudong coalmine in Shanxi province and another 25 were feared dead after a gas explosion at the Yongtai mine, also in Shanxi. The blast at the illegal mine occurred at 7 am Tuesday in Anze county. Another 33 workers were feared dead in Jinzhong city after a flood. The rescue operation is going on, said a spokeswoman, adding there is a chance of survivors.

Karzai threat to step down (Go To Top)

          Kabul, May 20: President Hamid Karzai has threatened to step down if Afghanistan's border provinces failed to hand over customs duties estimated to be worth millions of dollars to the cash-strapped central government. In a speech broadcast on television Sunday night, Karzai said that if within the next two or three months Afghanistan's revenue and administration did not improve, he would call a loya jirga, which elected him last year, and quit, reports the Nation. "Every day the people of Afghanistan lose hope and trust in the government, every day new questions rise in their minds and these questions and hopelessness should change to hopes and success," he said. The president said some provinces were wealthy from duty on trade with neighbouring countries, while the treasury lay bare and the majority of Afghans lived in poverty.

Path to Everest a garbage site, laments Hillary (Go To Top)

          (Contd) "With an enormous increase in expedition, Everest is becoming littered with empty oxygen bottles and other rubbish. Commercial climbing has developed with many inexperienced enthusiasts being conducted by guides with over dozens of aluminium ladders and thousands of metres of fixed rope," he said on Tuesday (May 20). Over the years, many mountaineers have remarked that there are too many inexperienced climbers on guided expeditions, and the mountain has become a place of record-book stunts - the youngest, the oldest, the first ski descent and the first to snowboard from the summit. Officials say an estimated minimum of 290 tonnes and a maximum of 1,115 tonnes of garbage have been left in the area. For years, the slopes of the world's highest peak, which locals call Chomolungma or Mother Goddess of the World, were littered with heaps of oxygen bottles, food packets, tents, batteries and other climbing paraphernalia left behind by mountaineers.

           A clean-up is due this year when nine US climbers and nine Nepali sherpas have planned to haul 1,000 kg of paper, cylinders and other rubbish down from a camp at 6,300 metres, which is the most frequented after the base camp. A total of 1,201 people from 63 countries have climbed Mount Everest so far and hundreds have turned back without reaching the roof of the world.