Islamabad, Aug.30 (ANI): Pakistan People's Party Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari is reportedly under the influence of a small group of close advisers, and they are preventing him from restoring Justice Iftikhar's judiciary, party sources told The News.

According to the paper, the group has now adopted a novel strategy to get rid of unwanted judges.

A top PPP leader said Prime Minister Gilani and all sincere senior leaders are acting as obstacles to Law Minister Farooq Naek's bid to reappoint the deposed judges.

Naek is of the view that the PCO judges in the Supreme Court would have to go back to their respective high courts in order to get back to the November 3, 2007 situation in accordance with the Murree Declaration.

A senior PPP leader told The News it was a wrong perception that Zardari still had fears the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) would be abolished once the deposed judges got restored.

"It will take a maximum of two months for Zardari and others to get acquitted from all the cases and that too through a legal process," senior PPP leaders said.

"I believe some close aides of Zardari have made the restoration of Justice Iftikhar an issue out of personal ego and consistently urge him (Asif Zardari) not to restore him," one of them said.

The senior leader maintained this group wanted to get rid of all the honourable and upright deposed judges in their bid to avoid any future accountability.

Another senior PPP leader, however, denied that the intensifying rift in the PPP could have an effect on the presidential election. He said despite many differences, all party legislators would vote for the party's nominated candidate. (ANI)

Be first to comment this article | Add as favourites (3)

Colombo, Aug.30 (ANI): Sri Lanka's Air Force has begun dropping leaflets urging civilians to leave the country's northern areas, which are presently under the control of the Tamil Tiger rebels.

According to the BBC, the move comes ahead of what is expected to be a fight to the finish in Sri Lanka's protracted civil war.

Aid agencies say 134,000 displaced people are in Kilinochchi District alone, where the rebels have their administrative headquarters. More than half of them have abandoned their homes in the last three months.

The military has advanced rapidly into Tiger territory during that time.

Residents of Kilinochchi confirmed that they had seen a helicopter flying low overhead on Friday night, dropping thousands of leaflets.

The leaflets, written in Tamil, said the rebels were facing huge defeats and urged civilians to save their lives by leaving for government-held territory.

A spokesman for Sri Lanka's Air force, Wing Commander Janaka Nanayakkara, said more leaflets had been scattered in the area. (ANI)

Be first to comment this article | Add as favourites (3)

Srinagar, Aug 30 (ANI): Curfew was relaxed in several parts of the Kashmir Valley on Saturday as normal life remained paralysed in response to the continuing shutdown over the Amarnath land transfer issue.

The curfew had been imposed for 14 hours in Kulgam district and for three hours in Budgam district. It was also clamped in Kulgam and Khudwani towns and eight other districts of the Valley, including Srinagar, Anantnag, Pulwama, Baramulla, Kupwara, Bandipora, Ganderbal and Shopian. In Srinagar, curfew was relaxed in areas falling under 28 police stations of the city for two hours from 11:00 a.m.

Barring areas falling under the five police stations of Khanyar, Rainwari, Nowhatta, M R Gunj and Safakadal, curfew was relaxed from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.

Meanwhile, the talks between the Shri Amarnath Yatra Sangharsh Samiti (SAYSS) and the panel appointed by the Jammu and Kashmir Governor N.N. Vohra, which is headed by SS Bloeria, is being held here today.

On Friday, the fourth round of talks was deferred in view of Bloeria's indisposition. The talks are being held to resolve the Amarnath forest land transfer issue.

The SAYSS has said that it has submitted written demands to the panel and is expecting a "favourable" response.

The group had earlier held three rounds of talks with the panel earlier this month.

The talks have remained inconclusive and according to sources, a five-point agenda had been set for the talks, including the reconstitution of the Amarnath Shrine Board, and clarifying its role and duties.

It also includes an assessment of the total requirement of land by the Shrine Board and working out an arrangement for the use of 100 acres of land at Baltal-Domail by the SASB during the period of yatra.

The Governor's panel includes Vice Chancellor of Jammu University Professor Amitabh Mattoo, former judge of Jammu and Kashmir High Court Justice (Retd) G D Sharma and Principal Secretary to Governor and Chief Executive Officer of Sri Amarnath Shrine Board B B Vyas.

The Samiti's committee consists of Tilak Raj Sharma, Brigadier (Retd) Suchet Singh, Narinder Singh and Pawan Kohli. (ANI)

Be first to comment this article | Add as favourites (3)

Hangzhou (China), Aug.30 (ANI): A British architect has completed the Liangzhu Culture Museum in east China's Zhejiang Province and it will open to the public from October 1.

The museum will contain relics of ancient villages, nobles' tombs with exquisite jade burial artifacts, imperial graveyards, sacrificial altars and large-scale mountain structures in Liangzhu Town marks essential evidence of China's 5,000 years of history," China News quoted Zhang Zhongpei, the ex-curator of the Forbidden City Museum in Beijing, as saying.

The museum, composed of four blocks all with a width of 18 meters but of different heights, emerges as a toy-brick-like sculpture that is visible from a fair distance. The courtyards in each block are a part of a tour route that links the four exhibition halls.

Designed by David Chipperfield, 54, who has also designed the glass-skinned Figge Art Museum in the United States and the award-winning National River and Rowing Museum on the banks of the River Thames in Great Britain, among others, the museum in China to him is "neither shocking nor extravagant".

Deputy curator Guo Qinglin said the museum would house a collection of archaeological findings from the Liangzhu cultural site.

This prehistoric civilization that can trace back 4,000 to 5,300 years ago received its name from the local Liangzhu Town in 1936. (ANI)

Be first to comment this article | Add as favourites (3)