Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan fight opium smuggling

KABUL: Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan on Monday agreed to bolster regional cooperation to combat drug smuggling at a time when the cultivation of illicit opium poppy is increasing. Afghanistan provides about 90 per cent of the world’s opium, the raw ingredient used to make heroin, and the UN and Afghan government have long tried to wean the country off the lucrative crop. Money from the sale of opium is also used to fuel the insurgency, helping to buy weapons and equipment for the Taliban. The largest areas of opium poppy cultivation are in the violent south of the country, where it can be hard to make money on legal crops and where criminal networks exist to buy and sell the poppy crop. “Despite a decade of initiatives...

Read more »

Posted in: INTERNATIONAL

Egyptians begin voting in first post-Mubarak poll

CAIRO: Voting has begun in Egypt’s first parliamentary elections since the ouster nine month ago of longtime authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak. The vote is a milestone many Egyptians hope will usher in a democratic age after decades of dictatorship. But the ballot has already has been marred by turmoil in the streets, and the population is sharply polarized and confused over the nation’s direction. Still, the vote promises to be the fairest and cleanest election in Egypt in the living memory. Voters stood in long lines Monday outside some polling centers in Cairo well before they opened at 8 am local time, a rare sign of interest in political participation after decades of apathy. Mubarak was ousted in a popular uprising...

Read more »

Posted in: INTERNATIONAL

Eleven dead, 33 missing in Indonesia bridge collapse

TENGGARONG: The death toll from a bridge collapse in Indonesian Borneo which hurled dozens of vehicles into a murky river has risen to 11; officials said Monday as authorities probed the cause of the disaster. More than 30 people are believed to be missing after the 720-metre-long bridge – built to resemble San Francisco’s Golden Gate – over the Mahakam River collapsed on Saturday. “The number of people killed were 11,” East Kalimantan province’s search and rescue agency head Harmoni Adi told reporters. National Disaster Management Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, who earlier put the toll at 10, said that bodies were washing up on the river banks. “Thirty-nine people have been injured and based on reports by the community,...

Read more »

Posted in: INTERNATIONAL

China says “deeply shocked” over Nato attack on Pakistani soldiers

BEIJING: China’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday it was “deeply shocked” about a Nato cross-border air attack that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers and urged respect for Pakistan’s independence and sovereignty. “China is deeply shocked by these events, and expresses strong concern for the victims and profound condolences to Pakistan,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said in a statement on the ministry’s website. “China believes that Pakistan’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity should be respected and the incident should be thoroughly investigated and be handled properly,” he said. Pakistan has reacted with fury over the Nato cross-border air attack that could undermine the US effort to wind up the war in Afghanistan. Nato...

Read more »

Posted in: INTERNATIONAL

Two US senators call for tough line with Pakistan

WASHINGTON: Senior lawmakers suggested Sunday that the US take a harder line with Pakistan, after Islamabad retaliated for Nato’s deadly misfire by closing parts of its border with Afghanistan and demanding the US vacate a drone base. The comments by Sens. Jon Kyl, an Arizona Republican, and Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, show how strained Pakistan’s relationship with the US, and Congress specifically, has become in recent months. Lawmakers approve billions of dollars in military and civilian aid for Pakistan with the expectation that its government will help target al-Qaida operatives and push Afghan militants toward peace talks . ”There’s a lot of diplomacy that has to occur and it has to be tough diplomacy in the sense...

Read more »

Posted in: INTERNATIONAL