Akhtar criticised vested interest groups in Pakistan, particularly the army, the political establishment and the extreme right wing, for blocking peace efforts between the two nations.
Supreme Court judge Sanjay Kishan Kaul on Monday recommended setting up of an 'impartial truth and reconciliation commission' to probe and report on human rights violations by both state and non-state actors in Jammu and Kashmir since the 1980s, saying the 'wounds need healing'.
A Kashmiri Pandit himself, Kaul feels, it is time now for the people to move forward, after more than 30 years of unbridled violence.
Highlights of the judgment pronounced by a five-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court that on Monday unanimously upheld the Centre's decision to abrogate provisions of Article 370 of the Constitution bestowing special status on the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir.
A five-judge bench headed by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud considered the pleas in chambers and dismissed applications for listing of the review petition in open Court.
The minister further said the Sri Lankan government is holding continuous interactions with the Tamil diaspora and people and leaders living in different parts of the world.
'When the Executive can do whatever they want, why bother having an election?'
People must have tolerance for each other's opinion at a time when the tolerance level has gone down internationally, Supreme Court judge Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul said on Friday.
Hard-line Hurriyat Conference chairman Syed Ali Shah Geelani on Monday rejected the Truth and Reconciliation Commission proposed by Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and demanded a United Nations-appointed factfinding mission to probe the unmarked graves in Jammu and Kashmir. "We vehemently reject the Truth and Reconciliation Commission as we do not expect justice from the system which is perpetuating human rights violations in the state," Geelani said.
In the wake of the State Human Rights Commission's findings -- that over 2,000 unidentified bodies are buried in 38 sites in north Kashmir -- Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has said there was a need for a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to find out the truth about what has happened in the Valley in the last 21 years. "There is a need for a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. That commission should be assigned to find answers to the incidents of the last 21 years," he said.
If Saudi Arabia, with just two Muslim holy sites of Mecca and Medina, can create a huge tourism-based ecosystem beyond oil, Ayodhya is sure to become the world's hottest religious tourism site in less than a decade, predicts R Jagannathan.
For the last four years since abrogation of Article 370, Kashmir-based political parties have been struggling to forge an alternate narrative to the one forcibly snatched from them. The BJP is bound to go hammer and tongs at them now that their armoury is reinforced with the Supreme Court judgment, notes Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the veteran commentator on Kashmir affairs.
In an emphatic victory for the Modi government, the Supreme Court on Monday unanimously upheld its decision to abrogate Article 370 of the Constitution that bestowed special status upon the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir, ordered restoration of statehood "at the earliest" and set a September 30, 2024, deadline for holding the assembly elections.
We must heed what the CJI has said. Challenging every judgment of the central government is inviting chaos, asserts Shreekant Sambrani.
Omar Abdullah said that if The Kashmir Files was a commercial movie, no one has an issue, but if the film makers claim that it is based on reality, then the facts are the other way round.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu, South Africa's anti-apartheid icon who won the Nobel Peace Prize for fighting racial discrimination in the country, died on Sunday. He was 90.
Cycling's world governing body has disbanding the Independent Commission which investigated the Lance Armstrong doping scandal in favour of a 'truth and reconciliation process', the UCI said on Monday.
A joint commission can be the biggest Jammu and Kashmir centric confidence building measure by the two countries for the people of the state, says J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah. Mukhtar Ahmad reports.
In this exclusive interview with rediff.com, Geelani outlines why he rejected Abdullah's move. Geelani terms the relative calm in the valley this year as 'the silence of the graves', saying that the sentiments of the Kashmiri people are being suppressed with force.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Monday reiterated his idea of setting up of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to probe all the killings in Jammu and Kashmir in the past 21-years.
'The Khalistanis get bulk of the money from abroad.' 'Where did Amritpal's Mercedes come from, which costs well over Rs 60 lakhs?' 'Where does his fleet of vehicles come from?' 'Local Punjabis can certainly not contribute this kind of money.'
Discover some of the winners of 2022 World Press Photo Contest.
The BJP-led National Democratic Alliance released its manifesto for the February 20 Punjab polls on Saturday, promising a slew of sops for various sections, including 75 per cent reservation in all government jobs for youngsters from the state, an unemployment allowance, 35 per cent reservation for women in government jobs and massive infrastructure development.
Disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong, who cheated his way to seven Tour de France victories from 1999-2005, claims it would have been impossible to win the world's greatest race without doping.
One shocking finding of the investigation was the extent to which sexual violence was committed against detainees, often extremely brutally, by the Sri Lankan security forces, with men as likely to be victims as women.
Here's a glimpse of all that happened around the world last week.
The top two in the 1998 Tour de France - Italian Marco Pantani and Germany's Jan Ullrich - were taking the banned blood booster EPO, a French Senate inquiry into sports doping said on Wednesday.
Mergers are not just about balance sheets or marketing synergies; they are also about those who make the synergies real.
For the anti-apartheid icon, all life and struggle were occasions to be relished with joy, says Shreekant Sambrani
'The National Conference and the Peoples Democratic Party, as recent events suggest, are quite content as New Delhi's collaborators rather than trying to be true representatives of the Kashmiri people,' says Athar Parvaiz.
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