Canadians flock to Parliament Hill, site of attack on soldier

 

(Reuters) - Canadians returned to the reopened grounds of their parliament building on Saturday, three days after a homegrown radical rushed in armed with a rifle after killing a soldier in the second domestic attack in a week on the country's military.
The grounds of the hilltop gothic building, whose clock tower is a centerpiece of Ottawa's skyline, attracted scores of visitors, many still stunned by Wednesday's attack, which took place as Prime Minister Stephen Harper was meeting with lawmakers.
The attacks on Monday and Wednesday were the work of Canadian citizens, reportedly recent converts to Islam, who appear to have operated independently, police said.
The first victim, 53-year-old Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent, died when a man ran him over with a car in Quebec, while the second, 24-year-old Corporal Nathan Cirillo, was gunned down while standing a ceremonial watch at a monument to Canada's war dead near Parliament Hill.
Police presence was light at the grounds, which had been closed to the public since Wednesday. The parliament building itself remained closed, but House Speaker Andrew Scheer said it would reopen for tours and visits on Monday.
"The very fact of us being here on this spot means they did not win," said 41-year-old Toronto teacher Franco Ferrari.
He said he had brought his son and his sons friends to Ottawa on Thursday night.
"I wanted them to see this," Ferrari said. "I wanted to show them that we will not be bullied."
The attackers, 32-year-old gunman Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, described as troubled and drug-addicted, and 25-year-old Martin Rouleau, who drove over two soldiers, one of whom survived, both developed their radical views in Canada, police said.
Both men were shot and killed by security officers.
The attacks came as Canada deployed additional planes to the Middle East to take part in a campaign of air strikes against Islamic State militants in Iraq.
Canadian officials vowed on Friday to toughen laws against terrorism, but critics warned against moves that would curtail civil liberties in a country that prides itself on its openness.
The attacks appeared to provoke vandalism at a mosque in Cold Lake, Alberta, more than 3,000 kilometers (1860 miles) west of Ottawa. Windows on a mosque were found smashed on Friday, with the words "Go home" spray-painted on the building.
Liberal Party leader Justin Trudeau on Saturday condemned the incident.
"The vandals who carried out these acts are criminals and cowards," Trudeau said, "and their actions run counter to basic Canadian values."
A crowd of several dozen people assembled in downtown Montreal on Saturday for an impromptu memorial to Cirillo and Vincent, leaving flowers and signing memorial books that had been left in tribute to the slain soldiers.
"What happened this week with the murder of those two military is a turning point in our history," said Louise Beaudry, the 65-year-owner of a translation agency, who attended the Montreal event. "We need to revise the way the security is organized for everybody in the country ... We need to be realistic."
(Writing by Scott Malone; Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson and Lisa Von Ahn) 

Sikh protesters break into Parliament Housev

 

ISLAMABAD: Members of the Senate remained confined to the four walls of the upper house of parliament for three hours on Friday afternoon when Sikh community members broke into the Parliament House premises, unnoticed by the law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
Breaking all security checks and barricades, over 300 Sikh community members entered the premises of the Parliament House, despite the presence of a large contingent of police, to lodge their protest against the desecration of their holy book in Sindh.

Clarifying their position, the deputy commissioner and SSP Islamabad claimed that under an understanding, the district administration and the police had allowed the Sikh community members to hold a peaceful demonstration in front of the Islamabad Press Club but they violated the agreement.

The district administration, the Security Division and operational police passed the buck to each other but security experts pointed the finger at the Security Division and intelligence agencies.

“It was a failure of intelligence agencies first and thenthe Security Division is responsible for the serious negligence,” the officer said. The Parliament House security operators termed it the negligence of the district administration, the Security Division and operational police.

Police sources said about 300 Sikh community members reached Islamabad from Nankana Sahib (Hassan Abdal) on two buses when the police were battling the PTI protesters who were trying to enter the Red Zone.

The Sikh community members parked their buses at the Dhokri Chowk and marched towards the Parliament House and crossed the Serena check-post in the presence of 17 cops. The protesters entered the Red Zone from the Serena Hotel side and marched all the way down to the Parliament House through two kilometres of the Constitution Avenue housing the Diplomatic Enclave, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Prime Minister’s Secretariat, Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation, Election Commission of Pakistan and the Supreme Court of Pakistan and finally entered the Parliament House facing no resistance from the police force.

When this correspondent contacted SSP Operations Mohammad Ali Naikokara for comments, he said the operational police were engaged with the PTI’s violent protest near Nadra when the Sikh community members entered the Red Zone and marched towards the Parliament House. He said though it was the responsibility of the Security Division, the operational police could intercept the rally but they were engaged with the PTI rally.

Meanwhile, Senate Chairman Syed Nayyer Hussain Bukhari and Acting Speaker National Assembly Murtaza Javed Abbasi took notice of the Sikh community’s protest and sought a report from the Ministry of Interior and IGP Islamabad on the security lapse.

When the protesting Sikhs entered the Parliament House premises, Opposition Leader in the Senate Aitzaz Ahsan and PPP’s Parliamentary Leader in the Senate Mian Raza Rabbani, along with the opposition parties, were addressing a press conference. Seeing the protesters entering the premises, they stopped their press conference and moved into the Parliament House.

The protesters declared that multiple incidents of desecration of their holy book had taken place in different areas of the Sindh province during the last few weeks. They refused to leave the premises until the prime minister and interior minister assured them of an early arrest of culprits. They also called for protection in Sindh and other towns of Pakistan.

Later, after negotiations with the local administration, the Sikh protesters agreed to end their protest.Meanwhile, sources in the National Assembly told this reporter that SP Security, Islamabad, appeared before the acting speaker after the incident and told him that the police did not opt for baton charge as a sign of respect to the minorities. However, sources said Murtaza Javed Abbasi did not agree with the SP and told him that it was the third incidence of breach of the Parliament House’s security.

Meanwhile, IGP Aftab Cheema suspended SP Habibullah Khan Niazi, three DSPs, Khalid Virk, Safeer Hussain and Fida Satti, and two SHOs Sattar Shah (Bhara Kahu) and Abdur Rehman, making them scapegoats.

Gas supply to PM Secretariat, Parliament House, others cut

 

ISLAMABAD: Gas supply to the Prime Minister’s Secretariat, Parliament House, Parliament Lodges, Federal Shariat Court, Governor House, Murree, and other government departments was suspended for not clearing their dues, a private news channel reported on Monday.
According to the Sui Northern officials, Rs7.7 million dues are outstanding against the Parliament Lodges while the PM Secretariat is a gas defaulter of Rs4.7 million.Surprisingly, the Parliament House has to pay a sum of Rs1.3 million to gas regulators against its outstanding dues and the Federal Shariat Court owes Rs224,000 to gas utilities.The Governor House, Murree, has also been included in the list of gas defaulters as bills amounting to Rs188,000 are pending against it.

Pemra should be under parliament instead of executive

 

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage on Wednesday decided to form a task force, comprising legal experts to review 64 laws related to the media in the country.
With reference to the recommendations by the Media Commission, appointed by the Supreme Court in 2013, the Standing Committee agreed to the actions and proposals and adopted the resolution as follows:

* In the age of independence of media, globalization, IT and information, it is important to have a specific role of the Ministry of Information for policy setting, to facilitate media development with freedom and accountability.

* Review of the existing 64 laws on media is critical. New laws are equally required, specifically for advertising regulation, convergence, cross media ownership negative impacts, and self-regulation. The Standing Committee will be having special meetings with legal experts on this critical subject soon and will be appointing a Media Laws Review Task Force with a six-month mandate to examine 64 laws and to propose amendments as well as new laws where required.

* Make Pemra truly autonomous and accountable to parliament and not to the executive. Thus a change in mode of appointment of chairperson and its members along the lines of the ECP is recommended.

* The existence of a Ministry of Information is important. However, its restructuring is critical. The ministry and bodies, under the purview of the ministry, have assured the committee that their restructuring plans would be presented within one month to the committee.

* Ministry of Information and IT can be merged due to new areas of convergence. A new name for the ministry to be Ministry for Public Information, Media and National Heritage.

* Create a single new integrated regulatory body by merging Pemra, PTA including cinema on the lines of OFCOM in the UK. In the cinema sector, there is a need to ensure inter-provincial harmony in the implementation of censorship rules in the provinces. All foreign films to be censored by the federal government. Provincial censor boards should include federal representation.

* Policy to ensure minimal time for Pakistani content on TV and radio to be strengthened.

* Public, regular, structured dialogue of government and regulatory bodies with all stakeholders relevant to electronic media is necessary. Similar regular structured dialogue with non-media stakeholders i.e civil society, is extremely important.

* Judiciary should conduct expeditious and conclusive disposal of the large number of stay orders, obtained by TV and radio against Pemra as at present even non-licensed TV channels are operating freely.

* Actual compliance should be ensured by media of their own codes and transparency by appointing internal ombudsman and compliance coordinators to respond to complaints and concerns of citizens.

* Temporarily freeze (except community licenses) issuance of licenses for new TV channels as cable TV distribution capacity is already saturated and until transition to digital technology.

* Ensure effective actions by government authorities to prevent smuggling and sale of DTH set top boxes.

* Ensure licenses are issued for valid, eligible community radio stations and community TV channels with safeguards.

* PTV, PBC, APP should be transformed into genuine public service entities which are even handed and fair for them to be consistent with Article 19. New system should be introduced for appointment of chairman, CEO and board of directors. Government should look into options for restructuring the ownership of PTV, PBC and APP to make their ownership more broad-based and public service oriented.

* A new law is required within which self-regulation by media, can be conducted in a transparent and accountable manner, so that self-interest doesn’t substitute self-regulation in media.

* The funding for Press Council to be equitably shared by media proprietors (such as APNS) and other segments in order for it to be independent. Alleged corrupt practices indulged into by media and government should be investigated and discouraged.

* There is a need for more effective practice of existing codes by media themselves.

* Strict effective action is needed by Pemra and Press Council to prevent excesses by media against public figures, thereby preventing unfair defamation or ridicule of public figures. Strict action needs to be taken by the Council of complaints appointed by Pemra which could include parliamentarians to prevent unfair defamation.

* Forensic audits should be conducted to determine whether corruptions occurred in award of advertising contracts by NAB, FIA, etc.

* There is a need to rationalise the principles on the basis of which advertising rates are determined for placement of govt advertising in print and electronic media so as to end the discrepancies. Government should propose single transparent policy for awarding advertisement.

* There is a need to reform the system by which advertisements of federal and provincial governments are placed by restructuring the Audit Bureau of Circulation and inducting reputed firms from private sector to make ABC credible; and by other methods such as possible decentralization.

* ECP is urged to implement recommendation of Media Commission to ensure transparency in use of funds for advertising in the forthcoming local government elections. Pemra should facilitate preparation of options for new revenue model for TV channels to reduce existing 100% dependence on advertising.

* More effective regulatory actions are required to reduce imbalanced interruptions, disruptions, intrusions of advertising on TV and radio.

* Secret funds have been abolished. Second list will be presented to the committee and to the public after audit or as per SC instructions.

* It is considered opinion of the committee that Pemra has not satisfactorily addressed the concerns raised by the Media Commission Report regarding: the restructuring of Pemra, autonomy of Pemra from executive, Direct Parliamentary Purview & Oversight of Pemra, review of the Pemra Act 2002 (Amended 2007) and Private Monopolies in Media created as a result of the Amended Pemra Act 2007.

Unfortunately without addressing these core issues, it is difficult to conceive that PEMRA will be able to respond to the challenges it faces as an independent media regulator. It is therefore recommended that the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting should undertake an immediate examination of these concerns, with a clear deadline in mind, to suggest the best ways and means to implement the recommendations of the Media Commission.

* Ministry of Information has committed itself to help improve security for journalists and media. However, it has not presented any coherent plan so far. It needs to present an overview of its security plan, which it has designed after its consultations with the various media organisations. Ministry also needs to give action plan on the Committee of Information recommendations on the same.

* The existing reliance on an predominantly big cities audience measurement system to determine TV ratings should be replaced with new alternative options which accurately reflect the countries demographic realities.

* As per commitment made by PBA to the media commission, the actual rates charged by PBA members should be placed on the Internet and transparency ensured on the assets, income, expenses of media proprietors and senior journalists including TV anchors.

MNAs Parveen Masood Bhatti, Arifa Khalid Pervez, Marriyum Aurangzeb, Imran Zafar Leghari, Belum Hasnain, Murad Saeed, Dr Muhammad Azhar Khan Jadoon, Saman Sultana Jafri and Naeema Kishwer also attended the meeting.

Meanwhile, Secretary Information Dr Nazir Saeed informed the National Assembly’s Standing Committee that on the issue of access to information, the government adopted a private member bill, which was approved by the Senate. However, the Pakistan Broadcasters Association (PBA) and some other stakeholders wanted to give their input in the proposed law. Now, he said, the bill had been sent to the cabinet, and then it would be sent to the Senate again for approval.

He said on the directives of the prime minister, the ministry was working on restructuring of public sector autonomous organisations and a ministerial committee headed by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar was also constituted to look into the matter.

Senior journalists Hamid Mir and Absar Alam said media houses and senior journalists should be bound to declare their income and assets through the Federal Board of Revenue. They also urged the committee to issue directives for the release of second report about recipients of secret funds form the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.

It was said the second list carrying the names of those media persons who received funds from secret funds would be made public soon after completion of the audit.

Minister for Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage Pervaiz Rashid said he had no objection to making public all lists related to release of secret funds.

Judiciary, army not interfering in parliament affairs

ISLAMABAD: Speaker National Assembly Ayaz Sadiq, addressing a press conference here on Tuesday, said that all the institutions were working under their constitutional ambit.

No institution, including the judiciary and army, was interfering in the constitutional ambit of any other institution, he said while announcing the declaration at the end of the 17th Speakers Conference.

The three-day conference was attended by the chairman and deputy chairman of the Senate, speakers and deputy speakers of provincial assemblies and speakers of legislative assemblies of Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan.

Sadiq said there was a consensus among all the speakers that they would neither support the dictatorship nor become part of suspension of the Constitution in future.The National Assembly speaker said the legislation process will be made more effective to protect the rights of women, children and minorities.

He said the Parliament House will be converted to solar system by the end of the current year and will become the first green parliament in the world.He said the speakers conference had demanded of the federal government and all the provincial governments to ask ministers to give a policy statement in the National Assembly before addressing a news conference to enhance the image of the House.

He said the speakers conference also reviewed the idea of establishing a separate TV channel of parliament.The Islamabad Declaration issued after the conference says parliament will be made a sovereign institution in accordance with the vision of Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah. “The Quaid has declared that parliament is a sovereign body,” the Islamabad Declaration stated.

Glowing tributes were paid to those who sacrificed their lives for strengthening the democracy in the country. The declaration also paid rich tributes to members of the armed forces, civil institutions and politicians who have embraced martyrdom in terrorism related incidents and sectarian violence across the country.

Parliament is supreme: defence minister

 

ISLAMABAD: Two senior federal ministers, Khawaja Muhammad Asif and Senator Pervaiz Rasheed, on Tuesday strongly defended parliament in the National Assembly, saying that the people of Pakistan had not lost confidence in parliament and they fully supported the democratic system.
During a discussion on a motion on the formation of a committee to investigate the allegations against parliamentarians of not paying taxes, the two strongly objected to the use of the words ‘black sheep’ by Asad Umar of the PTI for those not paying taxes and said that parliament, being the supreme institution, enjoys full support of the public. Speaker Ayaz Sadiq later expunged the words ‘black sheep’ from the proceedings.

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said the active participation of the people in the 2013 general elections clearly showed that the people had full confidence in the system and wanted democracy to flourish in the country.

He said all institutions come up in the defence of their people, and the parliamentarians should not belittle their own institution. “We should be open for accountability but this should be done under a certain framework, which does not degrade the sanctity of the institution,” he said.

Khawaja Asif said the parliamentarians themselves should not undermine the dignity of the House and its members and words like ‘black sheep’ should not be used by any member. ‘There should also be some principles and rules regarding the verbal war,” he said.

He said parliament was the supreme institution of the country and they had to strengthen it. “Our own colleagues let us down whenever the democratic system is attacked,” he said, adding that through speeches no such impression should be given that parliament was not supreme.

Minister for Information and said the people respected the parliamentarians despite misperceptions created by the undemocratic forces. “The impression that the people have lost confidence in Parliament is wrong and such impression often comes from the undemocratic forces,” he said.

He said the people have rendered great sacrifices for the supremacy of the Constitution and for strengthening democracy. “There is no difference between the people of Pakistan and the members of Parliament,” he added. The minister said the government’s view is the same as reflected in the army chief’s statement.