The United States has revealed, for the first time, that it wanted a 'safe exit' for former Pakistan military ruler Pervez Musharraf after he was forced to step down from the post of head of state last year. Anne W Patterson, the US ambassador to Pakistan, said that Washington wanted a 'safe exit' and a dignified retirement for the former president, the 'Daily Times' newspaper reported on Sunday.
Pakistan army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani's office turned down a request for a meeting by visiting US Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defence Peter Lavoy, reflecting the strains that have hit ties between the two countries since last year.
President Pervez Musharraf has admitted that he's negotiating with all political outfits in Pakistan, including the parties of former premiers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif.
The working groups set up by the two sides as part of the dialogue could go into session next month around the time of Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar's visit to Washington before the beginning of the UN General Assembly session. However, the resumption of the strategic dialogue next month has been ruled out.
Our top leaders want to see Sharif as the Prime Minister in case our party does badly in the upcoming general elections," the Dawn quoted the ruling party sources as saying in Islamabad.
'Bukhari's case falls into that rare category where the precise determination of the killer as well as the motive can only be guessed vaguely, not determined with certainty,' says Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the distinguished doyen of the Kashmiri media.
New Inter-Services Intelligence chief Lt Gen Zahir-ul-Islam's planned visit to Washington this week has been put off due to unspecified reasons against the backdrop of strains in the United States-Pakistan relations.
India will allow Pakistan to provide legal assistance to Ajmal Kasab, the only surviving Mumbai carnage terrorist arrested, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said on Saturday.
The Pakistan army is running the foreign policy of the country and dictating vital policy decisions as it continued to be in power in the country, Asma Jahangir, the chief of Pakistan's top rights watchdog, has said.
'It is not just the police, but all agencies of governance that are progressively being 'captured' by the forces of Hindutva, led by the central government and by the governments of the states where the BJP has power.'
President Asif Ali Zardari has assured the United States that the Pakistan government will not allow anybody to challenge its writ or run a parallel administration in any part of the country. Zardari gave the assurance to US Special Envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke during a telephonic conversation, the Daily Times reported on Friday.
In rebranding the F-16 into the F-21, Lockheed Martin appears to have accepted what many have warned it for years: That the IAF would never buy a fighter whose very name is associated across India with the Pakistan Air Force which has operated the F-16 since the 1980s.
Pakistan-born Aftab Farook who captained the Italian youth cricket team has been expelled from Italy for allegedly plotting an attack in the name of the Islamic State (IS) group according to media reports.
"I will repeatedly say that my husband is innocent and he never the act alleged by Pakistani police. He is very humble and down to earth and could never snatch the life of any human being," Sarabjit's wife Sukhpreet Kaur told media persons. She said the family was still optimistic about his repatriation and urged President Pratibha Patil, the prime minister and the Union home minister to talk with Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf on the matter.
'The Post's coverage is not an authentic public discourse guided by unbiased Western intellectuals, but a slanted doomsday propaganda orchestrated by Indians and expatriate Indians,' argues Vivek Gumaste.
'It is never a good idea to let the broad population determine policy that is the domain of experts and specialists,' notes Aakar Patel.
As means of transport or metaphor, the romance of trains is unmistakable in Hindi cinema.
Asma Jahangir has stepped down as former Pakistan envoy Husain Haqqani's lawyer in the Memogate scandal, expressing lack of confidence in the country's Supreme Court's judges and the judicial commission formed to probe the issue.
Pakistan will go ahead with the multi-billion-dollar pipeline Iran-Pakistan-India project to carry Iranian gas even if India decides not to join it, President Pervez Musharraf has said.
Unlike Wagah, where India and Pakistan mount an elaborate daily drama of military ritual watched by tourists on both sides, the Demilitarized Zone, which separates North and South Korea is barren and desolate, a terrain bristling with hostility, discovers Nikhil Lakshman.
Refusing to share in the euphoria of ally Bharatiya Janata Party over Prime Minister Narendra Modi's China visit, Shiv Sena on Monday accused the neighbouring country of pursuing a policy of "hugging from the front and stabbing from behind".
'Where children are told soothing bedtime tales, our daily fare were stories of the bloodshed my family had witnessed, scenes, my father said, of the sewers turning red and the overpowering stench of corpses,' remembers Sunil Sethi.
Meanwhile, India has cancelled all visas issued to foreign nationals coming from China as it stepped up efforts to combat the spread of novel coronavirus after 150 passengers were identified with symptoms of the deadly virus and sent to isolation units.
Sharif was sent on exile to Jeddah after he was sentenced for life by an anti-terrorism court in Pakistan for preventing the plane of General Pervez Musharraf from landing before the military coup of October 1999.
India and Pakistan will soon finalise the details of the pipeline that will bring natural gas from Iran, a top Pakistan government official said in Islamabad.
Seeking to play down Home Minister P Chidambaram's remarks that India may snap business and tourist links with Pakistan, Premier Yousuf Raza Gilani on Tuesday said he did not mind such statements as the Indian government was under 'tremendous' public pressure over the Mumbai attack.
"Such material cannot be treated as ample proof," a source in the Foreign Office was quoted as saying by The News daily.The statement of Iman alias Ajmal Kasab does not amount to admissible proof under "any penal code anywhere in the world, including India or Pakistan," it said.
"The request comes a day after Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf said they planned to send nuclear centrifuges to the agency for investigation relating to Iran's nuclear programme," Pakistan Foreign office spokesman Jalil Abbas Jilani was quoted in
PAk's Permanent Representative to the United Nations in Geneva Tehmina Janjua was the leading choice.
Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister He Yafei, who will hold consultations with the top leadership of its 'all weather ally', stressed the need for maintaining peace and stability in South Asia, the Daily Times newspaper reported.Yafei, who met Pakistan Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir on Sunday called on India and Pakistan to work together to defuse the heightened tensions.
The remarks came a month after India's National Defence Advisor M K Narayanan said in Chennai that Sri Lanka should not buy weapons form Pakistan and China.
Public-interest litigators Arundhati Katju and Menaka Guruswamy, who spearheaded a historic legal battle for LGBTQ rights in India, along with Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani are among the Indians who have been named by TIME magazine in its prestigious list of the 100 most influential people in the world. The list also includes Indian-American comedian and TV host Hasan Minhaj.
Gilani, however, said it would take time to normalise relations that had worsened in wake of the Mumbai terror attacks, the News International daily said on Friday.
The meeting between Islam and Petraeus would be a "make or break" affair since it could determine future relations between various organisations in Pakistan and the US, including the General Headquarters and the Pentagon, The News daily quoted diplomatic sources as saying.
The Pakistan government has ordered authorities across the country to maintain "strict vigilance" on visiting Indians.
Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar will visit Kabul on February 1 to boost Pakistan-Afghanistan ties and efforts to engage the Taliban that were affected by the assassination of former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani last year.
Two locals were also identified by the police and are believed to be from one of the villages in south Kashmir. Police were trying to corroborate the evidence from the ground, they said.
The Pakistani Express Tribune said that Ahmed put up the bounty in retaliation of the US reward for the capture of LeT founder Hafiz Saeed.
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari's "private spiritual journey" to India ended with "a tame nudge" from the hosts who asked him to "work more to win their love," the country's media said on Monday, noting that the visit should set the stage for the two sides to tackle contentious issues like the 26/11 probe.
He said that the two sides were engaged in talks on the resolution of bilateral disputes at both the formal and informal level.
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