The Londoner

Mir Ghazanfar Ali Khan took oath as Governor Gilgit-Baltistan in Gilgit today (Tuesday), the  Radio Pakistan reported.  Chief Judge Supreme Appellate Court Dr. Rana Mohammad Shamim administered the oath. The oath-taking ceremony was attended by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Minister for Kashmir Affairs Barjees Tahir, and Gilgit-Baltistan Chief Minister Hafiz Hafeezur Rehman attended. Mir Ghazanfar Ali, a sitting member of the region’s legislative  assembly  from Hunza  district , had served as the first chief minister of Gilgit-Baltistan, at the time when General (retd) Pervez Musharraf was president.  The decision to appoint him as Governer of Gilgit Baltistan was taken by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. During his visit, the Prime Minister will also meet quake affected people in the region and distribute financial assistance cheques among them. Read the full story here. Home 

By Sikander Hayat 1. India has never accepted Pakistan and whenever any Indian politician or intellectual tries to say anything of the sort, he or she is demonised by the Indian media and society and branded a traitor straight away. Story of Jaswant Singh is not very old and then there was Advani on Pakistan a few years ago. People like Amir Khan & Shah Rukh Khan and whoever does not fit the Hindutwa agenda is told to go to Pakistan.  2. The only country Pakistan has ever fought a war against is India and 1948, 1965, 1971 are examples of this long history of conflict. Siachin Glacier is still hot and many Pakistani & Indian soldiers have lost there lives to cold and hostile action by enemy. Siachin is the prime example of India's hate for Pakistan.  3. According to the formula of British exit from Pakistan & India in 1947, any autonomous Muslim majority areas were to join Pakistan but India forced the Hindu Maharaja Hari Singh of Kashmir to allow Ind...

America is debating how to respond to the terrorist attacks in Paris. Unfortunately, both President Obama’s current policy and other recent proposals lack a strategic vision for the Middle East once the Islamic State, or ISIS, is actually defeated. There are no answers, or only outmoded ones, to the basic question: What comes after the Islamic State?Before transforming Mr. Obama’s ineffective efforts into a vigorous military campaign to destroy the Islamic State, we need a clear view, shared with NATO allies and others, about what will replace it. It is critical to resolve this issue before considering any operational plans. Strategy does not come from the ground up; instead, tactics flow deductively once we’ve defined the ultimate objectives. Read the full story here

Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan, Sun Weidong has said that Gwadar is going to become an economic belt which would be connected with Middle East and Central Asia, bringing a great boost in economy of the region. He was addressing a gathering of media persons, businessmen, tribal elders and politicians, here on Thursday which was organised by Balochistan Economic Forum.  He said: "This year handling of capacity of Gwadar Deep Sea Port has been increased due to joint efforts of Pakistan and China. Gwadar is going to become economic hub of the region which would be connected with Middle East and Central Asia," adding that Gwadar should be connected with other parts of the world.  He said that Chinese companies have been working in different sectors in Pakistan including energy, fuel, establishing power generation plants, science, technology, agriculture and defence. "Chinese companies have been shifting Chinese technology to Pakistan which  would ...

Abdul Quader Mollah, 65, was hanged Thursday night for war crimes committed during Bangladesh's 1971 war of independence against Pakistan. The case has exacerbated the explosive political divide in Bangladesh, an impoverished country of 160 million. Even as violence swept through parts of the country Friday, hundreds of people rejoiced in the streets of the capital, Dhaka, and said justice had been served. In an editorial, Bangladesh's English-language Daily Star newspaper congratulated Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina for trying and executing Mollah "40 long years" after he committed his crimes. Mollah, a leader of the Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami, was the first person to be hanged for war crimes in Bangladesh under an international tribunal established in 2010 to investigate atrocities stemming from the independence war. Following the execution, Jamaat-e-Islami activists on Friday attacked ruling party supporters and minority Hindus in parts of Bangladesh...

MUMBAI, India — India’s economy is showing signs of a gradual recovery as gross domestic product increased at an annual rate of 4.8 percent in the three months that ended in September. The growth surpassed the expectations of analysts , who projected a 4.6 percent rate, and was faster than the 4.4 percent pace seen in the previous quarter, which was the slowest growth in four years. “The Indian economy has bottomed out on growth, and I think we are definitely seeing signs of a mild, moderate recovery — not just the gross domestic product numbers but in the results of individual companies,” said Saugata Bhattacharya, chief economist at Axis Bank . “However, in order to resuscitate growth, the government must improve investment channels, take measures towards fiscal consolidation , decontrol diesel prices and simplify the tax structure.” The pickup in the September quarter was driven primarily by a good monsoon, which helped the agriculture sector expand at a 4.6 percent annual...

During his first visit to Kabul since his election for a third term in May this year, Mr Sharif on Saturday met with Afghanistan’s President Karzai , and assured the leader that “Pakistan would continue to extend all possible facilitation for the Afghan peace process”. He said the release of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar , the former Taliban number two, freed from years of detention last September, would help to jumpstart peace negotiations with the Taliban. Afghanistan considers that Pakistan holds significant influence over the Taliban, who are believed to launch attacks from bases in the country.  Read the full story here.  HOME 

KARACHI :  A conglomerate of two leading Chinese construction companies , China Railway Engineering Corporation and Sinotec , has offered to construct the Gwadar-Khunjrab Rail Link at an estimated cost of Rs250 billion. This cost includes Rs160 billion for infrastructure and Rs90 billion for locomotives on electric traction. This investment is designed on a four-year, soft-loan term basis. The offer was made to Minister for Railways Khwaja Sa’ad Rafique on behalf of the consortium in a detailed presentation carried out by Song Shuan Ping. The loan can be treated as a professional loan, commercial loan or a grant and will be payable in seven years. Pointing out the strategic importance of Gwadar-Khunjrab Rail Link, Ping listed a number of benefits which could be availed once the project was operational. “The main aim of the link is to connect the Central Asian Republics with the Pakistan Railways Network ,” said Ping. “This will immensely improve trade relations between C...

India has drawn inspiration from the wall coming up on the West Bank and the Berlin Wall that symbolised Cold War to plan a 10-metre high embankment along the 198-km stretch of international border that separates Jammu from Pakistan , reported Indian media on Saturday. The security wall is being erected to keep ‘infiltrators’ out, claimed the media. The wall will be higher and wider than both the Berlin Wall and the serpentine barrier that Tel Aviv is creating. It will be 135 feet wide and pass through 118 villages in the districts of Jammu (72), Kathua (17) and Samba (29). Although there is no official estimate yet on the total cost, the Indian home ministry will fund the project, which will be handled by the Indian Border Security Force . The project spells revival of an idea mooted a few years ago after an attack on the police and army by two armed men. Instead of brick and mortar that went into the making of the walls in Berlin and Israel , the proposed embankment will u...

Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif travels to Kabul on Saturday to hold "in-depth" consultations with Afghan President Hamid Karzai on how to promote bilateral relations and Afghan peace efforts.  This will be Mr. Sharif's first official visit to Afghanistan since his election after May's parliamentary polls.  A foreign ministry statement issued Friday in Islamabad says the Pakistani leader will also hold talks with members of the Afghan High Peace Council tasked with persuading the Taliban to end violence and join a sputtering political reconciliation process.  Read the full story here.  HOME 

By Sikander Hayat  Lyari is one of the eighteen constituent towns of the city of Karachi , in the province of Sindh, Pakistan . It is the smallest town by area in the city but also the most densely populated town. It is bordered by the towns of SITE Town to the north across the Lyari River , Jamshed and Saddar to the east, and Kemari to the west across the main harbour of Karachi . This town is infamous for its gangs and continuous violence among those gang to control the turf in the city. Drugs & arms smuggling are the main reasons why gangs fight to the bitter end to control the profits. Many police operations have been conducted in this area but the issues still linger as these operations are not followed up by the economic development. Infrastructure in Lyari is creaking under the pressure of population and poverty is rampant. Pakistan Peoples Party has been the political party of choice for the people of Lyari for many years but the party has not delivered the bett...

By Sikander Hayat  Finally Iran has agreed to conditions set by the West to freeze the uranium enrichment at a level which is below the weapons grade. There will be full international inspection of Iran’s nuclear plants and if Iran goes back on any of the pledges that it has made to the international community, all sanctions will come into action again. This is wise move by Iran but this is not the final agreement and just an initial understanding. Iran also need to stop harassing its neighbours by supporting Shia groups in these countries. It also has to stop trying to export the shia revolution to other countries. Only once these conditions are met, Iran can become a full member of the international community. International community also needs to help Iran to move towards full democracy and loosen the hold of Mullahs on Iranian nation. A democratic Iran will be a less of a danger for the neighbourhood than the current regime in Tehran. If the West had not conspired ag...

The Khalistan movement is a political secessionist movement which seeks to create a separate Sikh country , called Khalistan in the state of Punjab currently under Indian rule . The Punjab region has been the traditional homeland of the Sikhs. Before its conquest by the British it had been ruled by the Sikhs for 82 years, the Sikhs ruled over the entire Punjab from 1767 to 1799, till their confederacy was unified into the Sikh Empire by Maharajah Ranjeet Singh . However, the region also has a substantial number of Hindus and Muslims. Following India's independence in 1947, The Punjabi Suba Movement led by the Akali Dal aimed at creation of a Punjabi-majority state (Suba) in the Punjab region of India in the 1950s. Concerned that creating a Punjabi-majority state would effectively mean creating a Sikh-majority state , the Indian government initially rejected the demand. After a series of protests, violent clampdowns on the Sikhs, and the Indo-Pak war of 1965 the Government...