India far-right party supports Modi for PM

NEW DELHI: A far-right wing Indian party on Sunday publicly threw its support behind opposition Hindu nationalist Narendra Modi for prime minister ahead of next month's general elections.
The firebrand head of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), Raj Thackeray, said he would back Modi, while announcing that his party would also field a handful of candidates for the elections.
"We will support Narendra Modi for the prime minister's post. Modi should become the prime minister of the country," 45-year-old Thackeray told supporters in Mumbai where his party is based.
The MNS, a rival offshoot of the hardline right-wing Shiv Sena, has a record of inciting riots and other violence mainly in its opposition of migrants in western Maharashtra state of which Mumbai is the capital.
Thousands of poor migrants from mostly northern India flock to the financial hub in search of jobs, which the MNS sees as a threat to the local Marathi workforce.
The MNS champions the culture, language and rights of regional Maharathis over so-called "outsiders".
Despite the support, it is unclear whether Thackeray's move will help Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) which is tipped by opinion polls to defeat the ruling Congress party at polls starting on April 7.
According to reports, a BJP leader urged Thackeray days earlier not to field MNS candidates to preserve the BJP's ties with traditional ally Shiv Sena and avoid splitting the vote against Congress in Maharashtra.
After Shiv Sena took power in the Maharashtra government in 1994, it changed the city's name from Bombay to Mumbai to underline the region's Marathi identity in a move that attracted worldwide attention.
Modi, the chief minister of western Gujarat state since 2001, is seen as a pro-business reformer. But his Hindu nationalism and links to deadly anti-Muslim riots in 2002 in his home state have worried religious minorities and defenders of India's officially secular character.

Pakistan supports peaceful, stable Afghanistan: Ishaq Dar

ISLAMABAD: Minister for Finance Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar said Monday that Pakistan supports a peaceful and stable Afghanistan for the economic development and well being of people of the two countries.
Speaking to Ambassador Beth Jones, Principal Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, US Department of State who called on him here, the Finance Minister underscored the importance of a trusting and mutually beneficial relationship saying that the relationship has improved considerably in recent months.
He also expressed the hope that the cooperation in economic and energy sectors will be increased further.
Ishaq Dar informed the Ambassador of Pakistan's contribution in different development projects undertaken in Afghanistan and hoped that these will contribute to socio-economic well being of the people of Afghanistan.
The Finance Minister also briefed the Ambassador on key economic reforms the present government has embarked upon and said that major economic indicators have already started reflecting marked improvements.
The Minister said that when the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz came into power the country as confronted with bigger challenges than in the past.
But the leadership, without wasting any time charted out an economic agenda to deal with these issues.
The Minister said that we have paid Rs.500 billion of circular debt and have added 1700 MW of power into the system. He said that the industrial sector has reacted very positively to the reforms and its performance is way ahead of our expectations.
He added that the government has a very clear roadmap to increase the growth rate to a satisfactory level.
Ambassador Beth Jones briefed the Minister on her meetings with other officials and appreciated the economic performance of Pakistan.
She expressed her satisfaction at the close coordination between the two countries during the recently held strategic dialogue in Washington DC.
She hoped that with the prudent policies of the government, the country will come out of the economic problems.
Ambassador Jones also expressed her sympathies for the loss of precious human lives in today's terrorist attack at the District Court Complex Islamabad.