How India is isolating Pakistan within Saarc

How India is isolating Pakistan within Saarc

The terrorist attack at an army administrative base in Uri in Jammu and Kashmir on Sunday, which killed 17 soldiers, has reduced the political space for Prime Minister Narendra Modi to travel to Islamabad in November to attend the Saarc Summit. But, in recent months, New Delhi has shown uncharacteristic efficiency to reach out to Saarc members, other than Pakistan.

As part of the Modi government’s “neighbourhood first” policy, India has hosted or will be hosting the heads of states or governments of the six South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc) members.

Alongside its Saarc outreach, the PM has raised the issue of terror havens in Pakistan and its export of terror at international platforms, most recently at the G20 Summit in China and the East Asia Summit in Laos. The Indian side, led by Vice-President M Hamid Ansari, raised Pakistan’s complicity in protecting outfits at the ongoing Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit in Venezuela.

While the PM will skip this year’s United Nations General Assembly, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj is set to raise the involvement of terror outfits based in Pakistan in carrying out attacks on Indian soil — Pathankot last year and Uri now. She is also likely to tell the world how Pakistani government bombs its own people in Balochistan.(more)

Also Read: 17 soldiers killed, 23 injured in cross-LoC strike on Uri camp.

6 killed, 20 injured in two bomb attacks in Turkey

Six persons, including two police officers, were killed and 20 others were injured in two bomb attacks in Turkey's Sirnak province on Monday, local media reported.

In the first attack, the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) militants placed explosives under manhole cover and detonated it with remote control while a police vehicle was passing, killing four and injuring 19 people, Xinhua news agency reported.

Two police officers were killed and one other was injured in the second attack by the PKK members in Van province. The bomb was detonated with remote control targeting an armoured police car.Read More

Indian worker in Australia tells court his pro-ISIS post was 'sarcastic'

Indian worker in Australia tells court his pro-ISIS post was 'sarcastic'

An Indian-origin aviation worker in Australia who was sacked last year for posting pro-Islamic State messages on Facebook has told a court that his comments were "sarcastic".

Nirmal Singh was facing the 'Fair Work Commission' to argue that his dismissal was 'unfair' by his previous employer Aerocare and was seeking $7,000 in lost wages.

The Commission heard Singh had written "We All Support ISIS" above a shared post from HT (Hizb ut-Tahrir) Australia about the shooting of police account Curtis Cheng by Islamic youth Farhad Khalil Mohammad Jabar in Sydney.

There were five posts in total that concerned Aerocare, two of which included pictures of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.

Under cross-examination by solicitor Stephen Hughes for Aerocare, Singh said he made the posts on Facebook under a different name and believed he was conversing with a "secret group".(more)

Taliban supremo Mansour killed in US drone attack in Pakistan

Afghan Taliban supremo Mullah Akhtar Mansour was killed in a rare US drone strike deep inside Pakistan, Afghanistan announced today, inflicting a body blow to the insurgents and a removing a major "threat" to the fragile peace process in war-torn Afghanistan.

Mansour and another militant were targeted in a precision air strike by multiple unmanned drones operated by US Special Operations forces yesterday as the duo rode in a vehicle in a remote area near Ahmad Wal town in the restive Baluchistan province close to the Afghan border, US officials said.

The drone strike, which US officials said was authorised by President Barack Obama, showed America was ready to target the Taliban leadership in Pakistan, which Afghanistan has repeatedly accused of sheltering the militants.

Afghanistan's main spy agency said Mansour, said to be in his early 50s, was killed in a US drone attack inside Pakistan.

"Mansour was being closely monitored for a while... Until he was targeted along with other fighters aboard a vehicle... in Balochistan," the National Directorate of Security said in a brief statement today.Read more.

EgyptAir hijacker arrested; all hostages free

An Egyptian man who hijacked an EgyptAir flight to Cyprus was arrested on Tuesday after hours of negotiations during which most passengers were freed and the last of the seven on board escaped.
The Cyprus foreign ministry announced the arrest of the hijacker, who had taken charge of the Airbus 320 when it was on its way from Alexandria to Cairo saying he was armed with explosives. The plane was flown to Larnaca in southern Cyprus.
Larnaca airport, on the south coast of Cyprus, and officials opened negotiations with the man, who was identified as Seif El Din Mustafa. The man was mistakenly named earlier as Ibrahim Samaha, a passenger.
Hours after the plane landed in Larnaca, Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades said the hijacking was not linked to terrorism. Officials said the man appeared to be in love with a woman living in Cyprus.
BBC said Flight 181 carried 56 passengers -- 30 Egyptians and 26 foreigners -- and six crew members. Soon after it reached Cyprus, all but seven passengers and crew were let off.
EgyptAirHijack : They quickly boarded buses to reach the terminal. EgyptAir said a special plane will bring them back to Egypt.
The foreigners on board included eight Americans, four Britons and four Dutch citizens, two Belgians and two Greeks, a French national, an Italian and a Syrian. Three other foreigners could not be identified.
Before the hijack drama ended, President Anastasiades said Cyprus was doing all it could to ensure the safe release of the passengers and crew.
Asked if the hijacker was motivated by love, he laughed and said: "Always there is a woman involved."
An unidentified civil aviation official in Cyprus was quoted by the media as saying that the man handed negotiators an envelope which he asked to be given to a woman in Cyprus.
Earlier, Egypt's civil aviation minister Sherif Fathy said the seven still on board the jet included the pilot, the co-pilot, a female stewardess, a security officer and three passengers whose nationalities were not revealed.
Fathy said negotiations with the hijacker were continuing but it was not clear whether the man indeed had explosives or was lying.
The Egyptian aviation ministry had earlier said the hijacker had threatened to detonate an explosives belt, forcing the captain to divert the flight to Cyprus.

Brussels Attacks: From Beirut to Ankara, a tale of differing social media outrage

Nearly 34 people were killed in a terrorist attack on a national capital. Explosions rocked the city, leaving several people injured too.
Brussels Attacks:This may immediately make you think about the deadly attacks on Brussels, the capital city of Belgium, which saw explosions at the airport and a busy metro station on Tuesday.
However, the same piece of information can also be linked to another terror attack — explosions at Ankara — the Turkish capital — on March 13, 2016. As per media reports, the toll has risen to 36 now. In fact, this was a second such incident in Turkey in a span of one month, killing many people. In another attack on February 18, 2016, 28 people were killed and 61 injured in a car bomb explosion in Ankara. A vehicle, laden with explosives, targeted a convoy of buses carrying military personnel that were stopped at traffic lights, this ABC news report states.
Read more from our specialcoverage on "BRUSSELS"

• Blast at Brussels Metro station

Hours after the Brussels attacks took place, the world and social media reached out to the nation. Leaders across the world, ranging from US President Barack Obama, French President Francois Hollande to British PM David Cameron expressed their condolences. Read More.

26/11 attacks planned one year in advance, reveals Headley

Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist-turned-approver David Coleman Headley revealed in a Special Court that the dastardly 26/11 attacks in Mumbai was planned out over a year in advance by various groups and agencies of Pakistan, here on Tuesday.

Continuing his deposition via videoconferencing before Special Judge G. A. Sanap for the second consecutive day from a US jail, Headley said that in 2006, ISI official Major Pasha and LeT functionary Sajid Mir and others met to discuss plans to set up a business for (him) Headley in Mumbai.

Modi will realise Hindus' dream of Ram temple: Togadia

VHP leader Praveen Togadia on Sunday expressed hope that Prime Minister Narendra Modi would ensure a grand Ram Mandir is built in Ayodhaya as decided by the BJP national executive and promised in the Lok Sabha elections.

Togadia, the executive international president of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), told reporters here that a grand temple of Lord Ram would be built at the place where Babri mosque was demolished on December 6, 1992.

"In the national executive meet of the BJP, a promise was made to build Ram temple on the lines of Gujarat's Somnath temple by passing a law in parliament. I trust Narendra Modi," Togadia said.

"I trust that fulfilling the promise made in the party's resolution and promised during elections, he would realise the dream of millions of Hindus for building a temple dedicated to Lord Ram," he added.

Giving a call to all Hindus to stay prepared to construct a grand Ram Mandir, he said the holy men should stay ready to follow direction.

"Lord Ram's temple will be built, just as Sardar Patel had built Somnath temple, meaning by making a legislation in parliament," the VHP leader said.

"They have orchestrated many riots and many others have been planned. RSS should be declared a terrorist organisation," Khan said here.

Hitting back at Khan, BJP secretary Shrikant Sharma said when Prime Ministers like Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi could not harm RSS, and then people like him were of little worth. "It's just an effort to create communal tension, appease a section of people and cover up the failures of the Uttar Pradesh government," he said.

He said Khan, Samajwadi Party and Congress suffered from "RSS-phobia" and their rants against it have made no difference to the "nationalist" organisation. PTI

RSS works to integrate country and attach people to their culture, Sharma claimed, adding that Khan and his party represented "fissiparous" forces which believed in thepolitics of appeasement.

On the Ram Mandir issue, Khan said, "We want to assure BJP and RSS that if Babri Masjid is built at the same place (in Ayodhya) all the Muslims of India will leave no stone unturned for the BJP to come back to power".

BJP MP Sakshi Maharaj ruled out construction of a masjid at the disputed site.

"No power in the world can build a masjid there. The entire world may raise chants of Babri, Babri. A temple was there, temple is there and a temple will be there always," he told reporters.

Khan had earlier sparked a row by accusing Jama Masjid's Shahi Imam Syed Ahmed Bukhari of being hand-in-glove with Hindu outfits which were "silent" on his son's marriage to a Hindu though they were vociferously raising the issue of "love jihad".

The UP minister had described Bukhari as an RSS agent, a charge dismissed by Bukhari.