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New Delhi Thursday 23 December 2010 Laurent Gbagbo defies UN, insists he is President of Ivory Coast Prosecutors quiz Ukraine ex-Premier Tymoshenko on misspending Benigno Aquino wont give up Philippines presidency for love

AGE

THE

Asia
Pak arrests 2 top cops in Bhutto murder case
Islamabad, Dec. 22: The Pakistani police on Wednesday arrested two senior police officers for alleged dereliction of duty over the 2007 assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, a prosecutor said. Bhutto was assassinated almost exactly three years ago in a gun and suicide attack after addressing an election campaign rally in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, near the capital Islamabad, on December 27, 2007. In April, a UN panel accused the government of failing to provide Bhutto with adequate protection and said investigations were hampered by intelligence agencies and other officials who impeded an unfettered search for the truth. A Rawalpindi court in
Benazir Bhutto

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7.4 quake in Japan sparks tsunami scare

Tokyo: Scores of villagers on a remote Japanese island chain in the Pacific scrambled for higher ground early on Wednesday after a major 7.4-magnitude offshore quake sparked a tsunami alert. The sea bed tremor struck at 2.19 am, jolting people out of bed as loudspeakers blared across the Ogasawara islands and authorities warned of the risk of a two-metre high local tsunami. The tsunami alert was later downgraded and all warnings were lifted five hours after the quake hit near the islands, some 1,000 km south of Tokyo. No injuries or damage were reported. But about 120 people temporarily evacuated to higher ground on Chichi-shima island. AFP

An American soldier (second from right) watches Iraqi soldiers firing at targets during a training course at a military base close to the Iranian border on Tuesday. The US Army trained about 300 Iraqi soldiers in assault techniques on Tuesday. PHOTO: Reuters

December issued warrants for the arrest of Saud Aziz, who was city police chief at the time of the killing, and Khurram Shahzad, another senior policeman for their failure to protect Bhutto. The pair were arrested at the court on the sidelines of a trial of five alleged Pakistani Taliban militants who have yet to be indicted and are little known detained in the weeks after the assassination. Both of the police officers have been

arrested. The court rejected their application for bail and the judge said this was their duty to carry out the postmortem, special prosecutor Chaudhry Zulfiqar Ali told reporters. He said the officers were also accused of a security breach that failed to protect Bhutto from attack and for taking the controversial decision to hose down the scene of the killing, destroying key evidence. Mr Ali said the police officers would be included in the trial of the five alleged militants. The court has been adjourned until January 7. Both officers are still in service Aziz, 53, in Lahore and Shahzad, 38, in Rawalpindi but will be suspended from duty following their arrests, the prosecutor said. AFP

Nepal bungee jump bridge in ownership row

Kathmandu: Angry protesters have closed a famous bungee jump in Nepal in a dispute over ownership of the bridge from which tourists dive into a narrow gorge while attached to an elastic cord. The Last Resort bungee jump, 160 metres (520 feet) above the raging Bhote Kosi river, boasts one of the longest free-fall bungee dives in the world, but the row has brought the highadrenaline action to a halt. The suspension bridge was purpose-built for bungee jumping in 2000, close to the border with Tibet, by a private company that had scoured the region for the perfect adventure sports location. Locals are allowed to use the bridge to cross the gorge. AFP

61% LEGISLATORS EVADE PAYMENT

Pak Premier does not pay income-tax

SHAFQAT ALI
ISLAMABAD

Pak nod to bill on judge appointments

AGE CORRESPONDENT
ISLAMABAD

4 wives beat Bangladesh man to death

Dhaka: A man in Bangladesh who kept his four wives in the dark about his multiple marriages was beaten to death, allegedly by all of them, a media report said on Wednesday. Yunus Bepari, 46, an autorickshaw driver, went to a village fair last Monday with two wives where he was confronted by his third wife. When the women exchanged information, they found that he had a fourth wife too. The three women learnt that Yunus fourth wife was living in another village. The three women then took him to the residence of his fourth wife at Kabirpur where the four women together beat him up mercilessly, New Age newspaper reported, quoting local villagers. IANS

Dec. 22: Pakistan Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani is among majority of Pakistani parliamentarians who do not pay any income tax, documentary record at the election commission of Pakistan suggest. The list includes Mr Gilani and four chief minister who either did not pay the income tax at all or only submitted a partly amount. The ECP record says that 61 per cent of the legislators in the Senate, the National Assembly and the provincial assemblies do not pay income tax at all. It says, among the rest of the 39 per cent only 9 per cent pay more than Rs 100000 or more. The income tax details raise many eyebrows as most of the politicians are multi-millionaires and billionaires. Of 1,170 legislators of the Senate, National Assembly and the four provincial Assemblies, 707 have confirmed through their sworn affidavits to the election commission in 2008 having paid no income tax. Of the remaining 463, only 109 paid Rs100,000 or more. Balochistan Assembly has had the biggest number of non-taxpayers (78 per cent)

Dec. 22: The Pakistan Parliament on Wednesday unanimously passed the 19th Constitutional Amendment Bill which mainly relates to streamlining the procedure for appointment of judges to the superior courts. The amendment passed by the National Assembly has been prepared in the light of the Supreme Court direc-

tions on the petitions challenging certain clauses of the 18th Amendment Act, 2010. The apex court, in its directions, had referred the matter pertaining to appointment of judges in the superior courts under Article 175A of the Constitution. The Parliamentary Committee on Constitutional Reforms (PCCR) started its in-camera deliberations on November 1, 2010 and held seven meetings and came up

The 19th Constitutional Amendment Bill mainly relates to streamlining the procedure for appointment of judges to the superior courts
with 26 amendments in Articles 68, 81, 175A, 182, 213 and 246 of the Constitution. All the seven clauses of the amended bill were unani-

mously approved by National Assembly. Earlier, chairman of Parliamentary Committee on Constitutional Reforms and Senator Mian Raza Rabbani tabled the bill in the Assembly. PCCR chairman Senator Mian Raza Rabbani said that unanimity of views on the 19th Amendment after the 18th Amendment would send a strong signal that Pakistans democracy and institutions are coming of age. He said it would also

send the signal that the political system is maturing and democratic institutions are gaining strength. I feel pride in saying that the report like the 18th Amendment is a unanimous document, he added. He pointed that the year 2010 would also be historic in view of the fact that following the 18th Amendment, all the political parties had also reached a consensus on another amendment in the Constitution.

Yousaf Raza Gilani

followed by Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa 77 per cent, Sindh Assembly 74 per cent, Punjab Assembly 57 per cent, National Assembly 53 per cent and Senate 48 per cent. Starting from the National Assembly, a House of 342 members that passes the finance bill each year deciding increase or decrease in taxes, there are as many as 181 members who did not pay tax, that means 53 per cent are tax evaders. Of the remaining 161 who said they did pay, only 43 (12 per cent) were those who deposited Rs 100000 or more. Although Rs 100,000 is not a big amount in terms of income tax, it sounds significant compared to others. It has already been reported that the leader of the house, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and his 25 Cabinet members do not pay income tax.

South Korea holds huge drill after North attack

HYUNG-JIN KIM
SEOUL

Sailors work on their ships next to the South Korean Navys floating base near Yeonpyeong Island, South Korea, on Wednesday. PHOTO: AP

Dec. 22: South Korea vowed on Wednesday to completely punish North Korea if it attacks again, and mobilised hundreds of troops, tanks and helicopters for a massive military exercise prompted by high tensions on the peninsula. The firing drills planned for Thursday near the Koreas heavily armed land border signalled that South Korea is willing to risk further escalating tensions with North Korea, which shelled a southern island off the western coast on November 23 and stirred up a war-like atmosphere. The attack, which killed four people, was portrayed

by Pyongyang as a retaliation for southern military exercises on Yeonpyeong island that day. South Korea has conducted 47 similar military drills this year, and it scheduled one more exercise for Thursday in response to the North Korean attack. Thursdays drill will be the biggest-ever wintertime joint firing exercise that South Koreas Army and Air Force have staged, an Army statement said. We will completely punish the enemy if it provokes us again like the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island, Brig. Gen. Ju Eun-sik, chief of the Armys 1st armoured brigade, said separately. South Korean forces are on high alert. AP

Butcher of Swat was striking deal when killed China replaces

Islamabad, Dec. 22: Notorious as the Butcher of Swat in the Pakistani military circles for his merciless nature, Al Qaeda commander Bin Yameen (also known as Ibn-e-Amin) was ready to strike a ceasefire deal with the Pakistani security forces to divert fighting to neighbouring Afghanistan when he was killed last week in an attack by US drone aircraft. Yameen, the chief of operations in northwest Pakistans Awat Valley and the chief of the Tora Bora Brigade, one of the six brigades in Al Qaedas Shadow Army called a meeting of other insurgent commanders but his movement was tracked by American intelligence. His aim was to broaden operations in the Khyber district as well as in the Afghan province of Nangarhar to close down the Nato supply route. Bin Yameens death has indicated a strange dimension in the South Asian war on terror theatre where American drones have successfully eliminated the big

Swat
Al Qaeda commander Bin Yameen was ready to strike a ceasefire deal with the Pakistani security forces to divert fighting to neighbouring Afghanistan when he was killed
number of the vertical command of Al Qaeda and its affiliated group leaders, but

To participate in South Africa fest, circumcise

Durban: Believe it or not, men are allowed to take part in a South Africa harvest festival only if they are circumcised. This is an effort to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS. The annual first fruit ceremony involves a bull that is beaten to death in a sacrificial ritual. This year some 10,000 males participated and all of them were circumcised. The men came from the KwaZulu-Natal region. This years event marks 20 years since the ceremony was revived by King Goodwill Zwelithini and one year since male medical circumcision was introduced in the province, government news agency BuaNews reported. IANS

has developed a new situation in which thousands of freshly trained men have split in to small cliques, after the killings of their commanders. This is the most little known aspect behind the much boasted American drone strike successes in the AfPak war theatre. A recently trained group of the surviving total 400 Swat militants under Bin Yameen in the Khyber Agency are likely to face the similar fate. They are oblivious of their commanders intention to strike a ceasefire

deal with Pakistan, which would have diversified strategies in the region making it difficult to figure out by the international intelligence cartel operating in the region. The development has occurred when Pakistan reluctantly agreed to the military operations in the North Waziristan. So far it is only for a limited surgical strike in the town of Mir Ali, which is bastion of the third and downwards level of Al Qaeda and affiliated groups. By arrangement with AKI

senior diplomat
Beijing, Dec. 22: China has replaced a top diplomat amid a trend toward greater assertiveness in handling territorial disputes and participating in global organisations. Vice-foreign minister Zhang Zhijun took over recently as the ministrys Communist Party secretary, state media reported on Wednesday, likely putting him in line to eventually take over from foreign minister Yang Jiechi. Mr Yang was accused of being caught off guard when US secretary of state Hillary Clinton announced at a security conference in Vietnam in 2010 that Washington considered the peaceful resolution of South China Sea disputes as part of the American national interest. Mr Zhang, 57, had served almost his entire career in the partys international liaison department, a type of shadow foreign ministry focusing on contacts with foreign political parties, until he became deputy to Mr Yang in 2009. The foreign ministry did

Tibetan Mastiff dog sold for $2 million

K.J.M. VARMA
BEIJING

Vice-foreign minister Zhang Zhijun took over recently as the ministrys Communist Party secretary, state media reported on Wednesday, likely putting him in line to eventually take over from foreign minister Yang Jiechi
not respond to a request for comment. That party background may mean he has more of a say in policymaking than his predecessor, as China increasingly abandons its former low-key approach to dealing with the outside world. The countrys rising economic clout amid the global economic downturn that has battered traditional powers such as the United States has emboldened Chinese leaders to demand a bigger say in global affairs such as climate change and at international organisations. AP

Dec. 22: The Chinese peoples fascination with an enduring Tibetan symbol the Mastiff dog has touched a new high as a local businessman bought a puppy of the ancient breed for a whopping $2 million, the highest ever price for one. The Mastiff puppy, which is less than one-year old, was bought by a buyer from

Dalian in Chinas Liaoning province, state-run Peoples Daily said in a brief report. It fetched the heavy price of $2 million as it was rated as the best quality purebred, the report said. The popularity of Tibetan Mastiff, considered the most ancient and rarest canine animal reared in the extreme cold zones in Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, is growing, especially among the wealthy Chinese. The dog with heavy fluffy hair was being

used as a guardian of herds, flocks and monasteries and palaces. It was currently listed as one of the famous breeds. As it is fetching heavy sums, the breeders

have gone high-tech advertising the dogs over Internet through well-made videos. In November, a black Mastiff hit the global headlines when a Chinese dog enthusiast bought the mountain dog for $ 3 million. The buyer identified by the same newspaper as Jing from Hebei created a buzz in the media here by arranging a big red carpet welcome for the dog when it arrived at the local railway station from Tibetan Qinghai

province. The dog was taken to its home in a big convoy of luxury cars. Dogs in general considered a delicacy in China in the past are fast becoming part of the milieu of both wealthy and middle class families in the country. Their popularity has gone to such an extent that Shanghai, Chinas biggest city, has come up with a one dog policy, stipulating that families are permitted to have only one dog. PTI