Muslim World Daily News AUG 12
Syed Yusuf
MOSCOW - At least 15 civilians died overnight as Russian planes
bombarded villages in the region of Shatoi and Itum-Khale, in
southern Chechnya, a Chechen spokesman said Tuesday.
JAKARTA - Nearly 160 members of the embattled Indonesian Democracy
Party (PDI) were still missing since Saturday's violent takeover of
party headquarters which sparked mass riots in Jakarta, a party
official said.
ISLAMABAD - At least 10 people have been killed and 24 injured in a
gunbattle between two rival groups in Lahore, Pakistan's second
largest city, the Associated Press of Pakistan (APP) reported
Tuesday.
RAMALLAH - A Palestinian prisoner was "brain dead" in hospital on
Tuesday after having been tortured at a Palestinian Authority jail
in the West Bank, a human rights group said. Mahmoud Jemayel, 26,
was "pronounced clinically brain dead following a savage beating" by
Palestinian police at Jneid prison in Nablus, said the Land and
Water Establishment (LAWE). "The beating caused massive bleeding in
the brain from a fractured skull and instigated a cardiac arrest,"
the east Jerusalem-based group said. Palestinian prosecutor general
Khaled al-Kidra declined to comment on Jemayel's case and said only,
"I've heard that he has been hospitalized." The prisoner had been
held since December without formal charges in the town of Jericho on
the West Bank. After staging several hunger strikes, he was
transferred to Jneid prison in Nablus. Khader Shkirat, director of
LAWE, visited Jemayel in Ramallah hospital, to where he was
transferred in a coma from hospital in Nablus, and reported
"multiple lacerations all over his body." "He appears to have been
branded with a hot iron instrument ... both hands and his ankles
have been wounded, apparently by wire," Shkirat said. LAWE said it
"cannot find words adequate to describe how horrific it sees this
crime ... The armed forces of the Palestinian Authority have proven
themselves completely outside normal standards of conduct and
capable of the grossest brutality."
JAKARTA - Jakarta's military commander on Tuesday ordered troops to
shoot troublemakers "on the spot" to curb any further unrest, after
the city remained in shock from last weekend's riots.
WASHINGTON - Zionist Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went out of
his way in remarks published Tuesday to praise Egyptian President
Hosni Mubarak, who is in Washington. Netanyahu described Mubarak as
"a wise and responsible leader" and said he and the Egyptian leader
had forged excellent working ties at their first meeting earlier
this month, the Post said. "He definitely wants to broaden the
circle of peace in the Middle East, and in this he will find me a
ready partner," the Zionist leader was quoted as saying. Asked if he
was trying to smooth Mubarak's path with the Zionist occupied US
Congress, Netanyahu replied: "I don't think President Mubarak needs
any assistance ... but it's important for me that people in
Washington and around the world are apprised of the current
situation." Mubarak said in an interview with the Washington Post
last week that he had implored Netanyahu at their Cairo meeting to
give him something to satisfy Arab public opinion. Mubarak said he
told Netanyahu: "If you want me to help you, you should help us.
Give us some material (for) public opinion of the people in this
part of the world."
WASHINGTON - The United States urged the Bosnian government Monday
to decline Iran's 50-million-dollar aid package to help it rebuild.
State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns, in urging Sarajevo to shy
away from Iran said "Our advice is they don't need the money because
they are getting it from us." "We think it's short-sighted because
Iran can't do anything for them," Burns added.
ANKARA - Turkey's Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, under pressure
from the influential military and NATO allies, on Tuesday convinced
his reluctant MPs to back further U.S.-led air patrols over northern
Iraq. The United States on Tuesday welcomed the decision by the
Turkish parliament. "That's a great victory for Turkey and the
United States and the Erbakan government," State Department
spokesman Nicholas Burns said following the parliamentary vote in
Ankara.
JERUSALEM - Large numbers of tribe of Tarabin As-Sana turned out to
protest against the nearby Zionist town of Omer that is beginning
groundwork to expand on land that belongs to them. Zionist Police
arrested 37 Palestinians on Tuesday.
NAIROBI - A southern Sudanese rebel group has warned Canadian and
British oil groups to pull out of an oil venture in southern Sudan
or face the consequences. In a statement issued on Tuesday, Lam
Akol's Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A-United)
stressed that it would not allow the Sudanese government to pump oil
at the southern Sudan's Adar-1 oilfield.
ZAMBOANGA - More than 30,000 Christians held rallies in three key
southern Philippine cities on Tuesday to protest a proposed peace
deal with Muslims.
TEL AVIV - The war criminal Infrastructure Minister Ariel Sharon
announced Tuesday the construction of a new town on the edge of the
West Bank as he called for a return to the days of expansionist
Zionism. "The government must return to authentic Zionism. I hope
the government's position on construction and development of Jewish
population areas will be expressed in its policy on the ground," he
said. "It does not matter whether it takes the form of kibbutzim,
moshavim (collective farms) or settlements of another form."
Sharon's reference to "settlements of another form" hinted that he
plans to use his newly-created ministry to boost Zionist settlements
on the West Bank.
SANAA - Yasser Arafat said Zionists' closure of the territories was
costing the Palestinian economy "between six and seven million
dollars a day." "Nearly 120,000 workers are unemployed" because of
the closure, Arafat told a press conference on Monday in Sanaa.
"What we have lost because of the blockade far exceeds financial aid
we have received and which has been promised to us," Arafat said.
CAIRO - Security experts from 15 Arab countries closed a two-day
session to draw up a draft strategy on terrorism to be approved by
the 22 interior ministers of the Arab League during their next
council meeting in January. Sudan was absent from the meeting
although it had expressed its intention to attend. A spokesman for
the Sudanese embassy in Cairo, Abdel Azim Awad, said Egyptian
authorities had refused to provide entry visas to the Sudanese
delegation, the Arab daily Al-Hayat reported on Tuesday. Among the
nations who did attend were Iraq and Libya.
GROZNY - Chechens on Tuesday accused Russian secret services of
being behind an assassination attempt on their chief-of-staff and
top military negotiator, Aslan Maskhadov. "For the Chechen side it
is absolutely obvious that the Federal Security Service (FSB) was
directly involved in the attack on Maskhadov," spokesman, Movladi
Udugov said. Maskhadov's assassination attempt took place on the
same day Russia and the Group of Seven nations began a meeting in
Paris to seek practical measures to combat terrorism.
ISLAMABAD - Sultan Mahmood Chaudhry was sworn in as prime minister
of the Pakistan-controlled Azad Kashmir in Muzafarabad on Tuesday.
Chaudhry's People's Party, which is affiliated to the ruling party
of Pakistan, won 31 of the 48 seats in the June 30 elections to the
territory's legislative assembly, sweeping off the long ruling
Muslim Conference party.
DHAKA - American drug convict Eliadah McCord was freed from a 30-
year jail sentence on Tuesday after the Bangladeshi president
granted her clemency, police said. They said McCord was handed over
to the U.S. embassy in Dhaka and she would fly home on Tuesday night
with U.S. Congressman Bill Richardson.
SARAJEVO - Sarajevo officially celebrated on Tuesday the third
anniversary of the completion of what was once one of its biggest
war-time secrets, the Sarajevo tunnel. The narrow one metre wide,
800-metre long tunnel helped Sarajevans survive the Bosnian Serb
siege of the city by allowing in food, supplies and soldiers. Ibrica
Fazlic, one of those who worked on the tunnel, said: "After four
months and four days working, on July 30, 1993, at 8:50 p.m., the
two teams building the tunnel joined up. We know what that meant for
Sarajevo. "The tunnel played a decisive role in numerous battles,"
Fazlic said. "It allowed the wounded and the sick to be taken out to
be treated and the majority of people in Sarajevo to feed
themselves." The decision to build the tunnel, from a front-line
suburb in western Sarajevo to Muslim-held territory on the far side
of the UN-controlled airport, was taken in 1992 when the Serbs were
holding the capital under a tight siege and shooting at people
crossing the airport. "It was damp," said Kocani, recalling his
experiences in the subterranean escape route. "When it rained you
were up to your knees in mud. You had to walk bent double."
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Matthew J Smith
This has been known for several days Syed! Where have you
and your sources been??? Wakey wakey!!!
And why does the biggest Muslim country in the world (Indonesia)
get just six lines and Palestine, which has only about 2 million
people in it, get 23, with massive detail? Are the Arabs any
more important than the 200 million who have to live under the
brutal and corrupt Suharto?
Mat
Mat