Interior ministry report: Punjab tops list of abduction cases

Tribune
Province also has the most number of incidents of violence against women.

ISLAMABAD: Punjab tops the disturbingly long list of criminal cases of kidnapping for ransom and violence against women in Pakistan.

According to official documents of the interior ministry tabled in the National Assembly by Interior Minister Rehman Malik during question hour about the law and order situation in the country on Wednesday, a total of 2,300 persons were kidnapped for ransom from 2007 to 2010 in the four provinces and 11,789 women were subjected to violence in the last two years between 2009 and 2010. Punjab topped in both categories.

Out of 2,300 cases of kidnapping for ransom in the country, 834 were reported in Punjab. Similarly, out of 11,789 cases of violence against women, 8,433 cases were reported in country’s largest province.

Islamabad, too, witnessed an increase in cases of kidnapping for ransom last year. As compared to 12 cases in 2007, a total of 23 persons were kidnapped in 2010.

In 2007, a total of 449 persons were kidnapped, but in the following year, 2008, the figure went up to 670 – an increase of 221 cases. In 2009, there were 645 cases.

A breakdown of the figures shows that, in 2007, Punjab saw 190 cases of kidnapping for ransom, followed by Sindh’s 134, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) 87, Balochistan 26 and Islamabad with 12 cases.

In 2008, of the 670 cases of kidnapping for ransom Punjab was once again at the top with 248, while Sindh had 217 cases, K-P 150, Balochistan 35 and Islamabad 20. In 2009, a total of 645 cases of kidnapping for ransom were registered, out of which 224 were in Punjab, 188 in Sindh, 180 in K-P, 37 in Balochistan and 16 were in Islamabad. In 2010, 604 cases were reported out of which 192 were in Punjab, 177 in Sindh, 162 in K-P, 50 in Balochistan and 23 were in Islamabad.

SC rejects FIA’s probe report on Haj corruption

Dawn

ISLAMABAD: Hearing a suo motu case regarding the Haj corruption scandal, the Supreme Court (SC) on Thursday rejected the Federal Investigation Agency’s investigation report, television reports said.

The report on the case was presented in the apex court by Attorney General Maulvi Anwarul Haq.

Haq told the court that DG FIA Waseem Ahmed had been removed from the probe into the scam and Javed Bukhari had replaced him as inquiry office.

Chief Justice Iftikhar observed that action should be taken against Waseem Ahmed for spoiling the investigation.

The case’s hearing was then adjourned to January 27.

Taliban chief Mullah Omar treated in Pakistan: Report

Report says Mullah Mohammed Omar was treated for a heart

attackin Pakistan with the help of its intelligence service.

Tribune

WASHINGTON: The reclusive one-eyed chief of the Afghan Taliban Mullah Mohammed Omar was treated for a heart attack in Pakistan with the help of its intelligence service, the Washington Post reported Tuesday.

The spiritual leader of the insurgency, who went deep underground after the 2001 US-led invasion, suffered a heart attack on January 7 and was taken to a hospital near Karachi for several days, the Post said, citing a report by a private intelligence network run by former US security officials.

The network, operating as a private company known as “The Eclipse Group,” said its source was an unnamed physician in the hospital. “While I was not personally in the operating theater… my evaluation based on what I have heard and seeing the patient in the hospital is that Mullah Omar had a cardiac catheter complication resulting in either bleeding or a small cerebral vascular incident, or both,” the physician was quoted as saying.

The doctor added that Omar appeared to have suffered some brain damage and had slurred speech following the operation.

The report said Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency had “rushed him to a hospital in Karachi, where he was given heparin (an anticoagulant) and operated on.” “After 3-4 days of post-operative care in the hospital, he was released to the ISI and ordered to take absolute bed rest when at home for at least several days,” it added.

Official denial

Although Pakistan is officially an ally of the international coalition battling the Taliban in Afghanistan, US officials have long accused the ISI of playing a double game. Pakistan has always strongly denied such charges, and its Washington ambassador Husain Haqqani said the Eclipse report “had no basis whatsoever.”

“Sometimes intelligence tips received by professionals turn out to be wrong. The story about Mullah Omar falls under that category,” he told the Post.

The Post said Eclipse appeared to be “the latest iteration of a shadowy, Pentagon-backed operation that began contracting with former CIA and military operatives to supply intelligence in Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2009.”

The newspaper said it was run by a former chief of the Central Intelligence Agency’s counterterrorism center, a retired diplomat and a former US army Special Forces information operations specialist in Iraq.

Assange to write memoir for $1.5 million: report

The Nation


WikiLeaks founder Julian Asssange has told the British Sunday Times that he will write his memoirs as part of a book deal worth up to 1 million pounds (1.5 million dollars). Mr. Assange, who is currently under a form of house arrest in Britain, says he needs the money to pay his legal bills. The controversial whistleblower has been accused, though not charged, of sexual offences in Sweden. “I dont want to write this book, but I have to,” Mr. Assange said, noting that he had already spent a sizable sum of money on his defence. He denies the allegations against him.