Islamic states push UN to condemn Koran burning

GENEVA: Islamic states sought on Wednesday to have the United Nations human rights council condemn a U.S. pastor's suspended plan to burn Korans, saying it was part of a pattern of global anti-Muslim violence.

A resolution submitted by Pakistan for the 57-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) asks the council to speak out against what it dubbed “the recent call by an extremist group to organise a 'Burn a Koran Day'.”

The resolution, which diplomats said was likely to be passed as the OIC and its allies have a majority on the 47-nation body, made no reference to condemnation of the plan by President Barack Obama and other US and foreign leaders.

But it said the project, championed by little-known Florida preacher Terry Jones, was among “instances of intolerance, discrimination, profiling and acts of violence against Muslims occurring in many parts of the world.”

The move came amid increasing efforts by the OIC, which has Russia, China and Asian and African states as allies in the council, to have the UN recognise “Islamophobia” as racism and open to challenge under international law.

It also follows widespread demonstrations around the Muslim world in which a number of anti-US protesters have been killed even after Jones withdrew his proposal to stage the burning on September 11, the ninth anniversary of the hijacking attacks in New York and Washington.

In speeches in Geneva over the past few days, OIC secretary-general Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu of Turkey has also argued that Jones' plan underscored his grouping's long-standing demands for a UN- backed ban on “defamation of religion”.

Western countries and some allies in Latin America oppose both the OIC efforts, arguing that they undermine freedom of expression and freedom to discuss openly religion-based practices that infringe universal human rights.

Last week, a Pakistani-born Canadian Muslim academic, Raheel Raza, told the council, whose members include Libya and Saudi Arabia, that OIC countries systematically abuse the rights of everyone living on their territory, especially women.

European diplomats said they were unlikely to vote against the OIC resolution, as their governments had already condemned the Koran burning idea, but feared it would be used to increase pressure for actions on defamation and “Islamophobia.”

The resolution, together with others yet to be submitted at the council, is likely to be voted on when the body wraps up its current autumn session at the end of next week. -Reuters

England win toss and bat against Pakistan

SOUTHAMPTON, England: England captain Andrew Strauss won the toss and elected to bat againstPakistan in the deciding fifth and final one-day international at the Rose Bowl here on Wednesday.

Strauss’s move meant Pakistan, who had reverse-swing expert Umar Gul in the side, would not be bowling under the floodlights as they’d done in the fourth one-dayer at Lord’s on Monday, where they won by 38 runs to level the series at 2-2 having been 2-0 down.

England made one change with all-rounder Luke Wright replacing left-arm spinner Michael Yardy.

This series, and indeed Pakistan’s tour of Britain, has been overshadowed by ‘fixing’ allegations and the latest flashpoint saw an altercation between England’s Jonathan Trott and Pakistan’s Wahab Riaz before the toss at Lord’s.

Ijaz Butt, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman, fuelled the row by accusing England of losing last week’s third one-day international at The Oval deliberately, sparking threats of legal action by English officials.

Pakistan’s Salman Butt, Mohammad Aamer and Mohammad Asif have all been questioned by British police over an alleged plot to bowl deliberate no-balls during last month’s Test at Lord’s.

Riaz was also interviewed by the British authorities.

All four players have denied any wrongdoing.

This was the final match of the 2010 English cricket season, with England national selector Geoff Miller due to announce the squad for the Ashes tour of Australia on Thursday.

Teams

England: Andrew Strauss (capt), Steven Davies (wkt), Jonathan Trott, Ian Bell, Paul Collingwood, Eoin Morgan, Luke Wright, Tim Bresnan, Stuart Broad, Graeme Swann, James Anderson

Pakistan: Kamran Akmal (wkt), Mohammad Hafeez, Asad Shafiq, Mohammad Yousuf, Fawad Alam, Umar Akmal, Shahid Afridi (capt), Abdul Razzaq, Umar Gul, Saeed Ajmal, Shoaib Akhtar

Umpires: Billy Doctrove (WIS) and Ian Gould (ENG)

TV umpire: Nigel Llong (ENG)

Match referee: Jeff Crowe (NZL)

Pakistan floods hit more than 10,000 schools: UN

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan's flood crisis has damaged more than 10,000 schools, affecting several million pupils and requiring massive investment in a nation struggling with literacy, the UN warned Wednesday.

Torrential rain began falling in northern Pakistan in July and the floods have since moved slowly south, wiping out villages and farmland, and affecting an area roughly the size of England.

“Five to six per cent of all schools have been damaged by the floods. This means that between 1.5 to 2.5 million students have been affected,” Umar Amal, an official with UNESCO, told a news conference.

“That number can rise and it will rise,” he said, unable to estimate how much it would cost to repair the damaged infrastructure.

The United Nations has issued a record two-billion-dollar appeal to cope the disaster, which UN agencies say affected 21 million people and and left 12 million in need of emergency food aid.

Amal said more than 9,780 government schools were damaged - 2,700 fully and 7,000 partially.

The number of private schools affected - a statistic he said was not yet available - would push the figure beyond 10,000, he said.

The UN Children's Fund has said over 10 million children have been affected by the flooding, including 2.8 million under five-year-olds.

Education standards are poor in much of Pakistan, particularly in the most impoverished, rural areas worst hit by the floods.

Primary school enrollment is around 57 per cent and government expenditure on education accounts for just 2.1 per cent of Gross Domestic Product.

The overall adult literacy rate is 57 per cent and Pakistan has three years to meet a Millennium Development Goal target of 88 per cent.

But many of the flood-affected areas have far worse rates - for example in rural parts of southwestern province Baluchistan female literacy can be as low as seven percent, Amal said.

“Already before the floods, they were lagging behind... If 9,000 schools are partially damaged and 2,000 schools fully damaged you need a huge investment in education to re-activate it,” he warned.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said a further 5,563 schools are still being used to shelter about 567,000 people displaced in the crisis. – AFP

Pakistan People’s Party has no future, says Pir Pagara

KARACHI: Head of the Pakistan Muslim League - Functional Pir Pagara on Wednesday said that the GHQ was responsible for the splitting up of the Pakistan Muslim League.

Speaking to media representatives after meeting a delegation of the Pakistan Muslim League – Quaid, Pagara said the next prime minister will be from his party.

Replying to a question, he said that he welcomes former president Pervez Musharraf into politics, adding that Musharraf will have to decide whether he will face the courts or not.

Pagara said the Pakistan People’s Party had no future and that it had been “swept away in the floods”.

Pagara predicted that like his maternal grandfather, Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari will one day become the General-Secretary of the Pakistan Muslim League.

US seeks scrutiny of China, Pakistan deal

VIENNA: A senior US official suggested on Wednesday the 46-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) should address Chinese plans to build two new reactors in Pakistan, one of the few countries outside a global anti-nuclear weapons pact.

The comments by Thomas D'Agostino, US Under Secretary for Nuclear Security, came a day after China indicated it may see no need to seek approval from the NSG, some of whose members have voiced qualms about the plan to build two new reactors at Pakistan's Chasma nuclear energy complex.

China joined the 35-year-old NSG, which seeks to ensure nuclear exports are not diverted for military purposes, in 2004.

On Tuesday, Beijing gave its firmest government confirmation yet of plans to build the two new reactors for nuclear-armed Pakistan, saying it was based on a contract in 2003, shortly before it joined the NSG.

The expansion of China's nuclear ties with Pakistan has ruffled Washington, Delhi and other capitals worried about Pakistan's history of spreading nuclear weapons technology covertly, its domestic instability, and the potential exceptions created in international non-proliferation regulations.

To receive nuclear exports, all nations except the five officially recognised atomic weapons states must usually place all nuclear sites under safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN nuclear watchdog, NSG rules say.

NUCLEAR SAFEGUARDS

When the United States sealed its nuclear supply accord with India in 2008, it won a waiver from such NSG rules after contentious talks in which China and some other group members raised misgivings, since New Delhi is outside the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and has a nuclear arsenal.

Pakistan has also shunned the NPT.

Washington and other governments have said China should at least seek a similar waiver for the Pakistan deal.

Asked about the Pakistani reactor plans, D'Agostino told reporters during an IAEA meeting in Vienna he did not want to comment on specifics, but added: “We look to engage with China on these particular issues... my focus is to use the framework of the mechanisms that we have in the Nuclear Suppliers Group...

“We are going to use the Nuclear Suppliers Group to the best of our abilities and use all of the tools that we have in that forum to address specific nuclear arrangements that are made, whether it is with China, Pakistan or a variety of other countries...,” D'Agostino said.

Israel and North Korea are the only other countries outside the 40-year-old Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Asked whether the planned reactors should be under the supervision of the IAEA, D'Agostino said: “I believe in the end that all reactors involved in civil uses should be under IAEA safeguards...”

China's Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday Beijing had invited the IAEA to “exercise safeguards and oversight of this project.”

But a diplomat familiar with IAEA procedures suggested it was up to Pakistan, not China, to ask it to get involved. – Reuters

Commonwealth Games chief rushing to New Delhi

NEW DELHI: The Commonwealth Games chief rushed to New Delhi seeking emergency talks with the prime minister over India’s chaotic preparations, as two world champion competitors withdrew and Englandwarned that problems with the Athletes’ village have left the sporting event on a “knife-edge.”

No national teams have yet pulled out, but Scotland announced Wednesday it would delay its travel to the Indian capital, where the athletes’ village — said to be incomplete and soiled with human excrement — was supposed to open Thursday.

Indian officials insisted that facilities would be ready and immaculate for the Oct. 3 games opening despite wide-ranging concerns about unfinished buildings construction collapses and an outbreak of dengue fever.

The Games, which bring together more than 7,000 athletes from the 71 countries and territories from the former British Empire every four years, was supposed to showcase Indiaas an emerging power in the international community. Instead, it has become a major embarrassment.

The city has had seven years to prepare, though very little work was done until 2008. New Delhi has been a frenzy of activity in recent weeks, as it struggles to meet the deadline — only adding to concern that haste could lead to shortcuts in construction of key facilities.

On Tuesday, a 90-meter (yard) pedestrian bridge collapsed at the main stadium, injuring 27 construction workers, five critically. On Wednesday, part of a drop ceiling at the weightlifting venue collapsed, officials said.

Compounding concerns over the readiness of the games facilities are security fears after the Sunday shooting of two tourists outside one of the city’s top attractions. An Islamic militant group took responsibility for the shooting.

Commonwealth Games Federation President Mike Fennell is due to arrive in New Delhi on Thursday, and has requested a meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, federation chief executive Mike Hooper told The Associated Press.

Hooper said the problems with the games preparations had prompted Fennell to rush toNew Delhi far earlier than planned. His emergency trip “emphasizes that this is an important issue and we obviously need to engage at the highest level to get it fixed,” Hooper said.

International sports officials have called the games village unfinished, dirty, hobbled by numerous infrastructure problems and even “unsafe and unfit for human habitation.”

“It’s just filthy. ... It hasn’t been cleaned,” said Hooper.

In addition to shoddy conditions inside and outside the buildings, there also are problems with plumbing, wiring, furnishings, Internet access and cell phone coverage. Hooper also confirmed reports of excrement found in the village.

“I’ve never come across this before,” Hooper said of the last-minute preparations. “It’s very frustrating to see the delays and the fact that we’ve had to come right down to the wire.”

“We’ve been complaining about the delivery of the venues for nearly two years, and the constant delays,” he said.

Andrew Foster, the chairman of Commonwealth Games England, said Wednesday “the next 24 to 48 hours is the critical time” to determine whether the standards of the athletes’ village can be raised.

Foster told the BBC that “the safety of the athletes has to be our primary concern, but equally, we cannot just respond to that alone, we have to evaluate the whole thing together and that is what we are doing.”

He said “it’s a situation that hangs on a knife-edge.”

The Indian media blasted its officials for the turmoil — “C’wealth Games India’s Shame,” The Times of India newspaper said Tuesday in a page-one headline.

But officials continued to downplay the problems, a position that international sports officials say defies reality.

“We are absolutely prepared,” Cabinet Secretary K. M. Chandrasekhar, told CNN-IBN television Wednesday.

Speaking of the state of the athletes’ village, Urban Development Minister Jaipal Reddy told CNN-IBN: “Athletes and guests should not bother about such small matters,” and insisted it would be immaculate when the events begin.

Referring to the collapsed pedestrian bridge, New Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit told reporters: “The accident is not as big as being made out to be.” Dikshit is the equivalent of the city’s mayor.

The cost of hosting the games — which the government initially pegged at less than $100 million in 2003 — has skyrocketed, with estimates ranging from $3 billion to more than $10 billion.

Scotland’s team, the first batch of which was set to leave Thursday, delayed its departure for the games, saying it wants to give organizers time to prepare accommodation and solve the growing number of problems. Commonwealth Games Scotland chairman Michael Cavanagh said that would be put off for “a few days.”

Australian discus world champion Dani Samuels and England’s world champion triple jumper Phillips Idowu both withdrew from the games Tuesday.

Idowu said in a Twitter message that: “I can’t afford to risk my safety in the slightest. Sorry people, but I have children to think about. My safety is more important to them than a medal.”

Australia’s 1990 Commonwealth Games gold medalist, Jane Flemming, said Samuels’ withdrawal could spark a flood of other athletes to make the same choice.

“It would not surprise me if we now see a whole flux of withdrawals,” she told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.–AP

Another protester dies in unrest in Srinagar

SRINAGAR: One more young man wounded during protests against Indian rule died Wednesday as thousands of troops enforced a rigid curfew for the 10th straight day in the troubled Indian-administered Kashmir, police said.

There were no fresh street protests, a rare breather in almost daily protests.

However, the 20-year-old protester wounded in a street battle with government forces on Sept. 13 died in hospital in the main city of Srinagar, a police officer said on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to talk to reporters.

Kashmir has been rocked by deadly civil unrest since early June, with at least 107 people killed in protests and clashes with government forces - mostly teenage boys and young men in their 20s.

Human rights group Amnesty International has urged Indian authorities to investigate the killings and stop using lethal force against the demonstrators.

Last Friday, the government deployed the army for crowd control as protests by Kashmiris escalated in the region.

Thousands of armed troops enforced the round-the-clock curfew in Srinagar and other major towns in Kashmir on Wednesday. They put up razor wire and iron barricades and asked people to stay in their homes in announcements over loudspeakers fitted to their armored vehicles.

People were allowed to stock up on food and other items during a brief relaxation in the curfew on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, nearly 40 lawmakers from major Indian national parties concluded a three-day visit to the region on Wednesday.

Led by Indian Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram, the delegation came from New Delhi to find ways to address long-standing demands of Kashmiri Muslims for self-rule or a merger with a predominantly Muslim Pakistan.

Kashmiri separatist leaders met some of the lawmakers on Monday, but they dismissed the visit as grandstanding by the Indian government. – AP