Bahria Town starts relief operation for IDPs

ISLAMABAD: Bahria Town on Saturday started relief operation for people, internally displaced due to ongoing Zarb-e-Azb operation against militants in North Waziristan.

Three mobile health units and two trucks carrying wheat, ghee, sugar and other groceries have been sent to North Waziristan by Bahria Town.

Head of relief operation Brigadier (R) Tahir Butt said that Bahria Town will establish camps in Bannu for carrying relief operation.

“Initially five trucks full with aid supplies and three mobile hospitals will be sent for internally displaced persons (IDPs). Iftari will be provided to IDPs while two times meal will be given after Ramazan”, said Tahir Butt. He vowed that Bahria Town will continue relief operation till the return of IDPs to their home.

Tahir Butt said that relief activities were being started after taking no objection certificate (NoC) from Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA).

No room for politicking on Model Town incident, says Pervaiz Rashid

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage Senator Pervaiz Rashid on Sunday said there should be no politicking on the Model Town incident which was actually a human tragedy.

Talking to various news channels here, the minister said certain elements were only doing politics on human bodies as they had no other issue. He assured that those involved in the Model Town tragedy would be brought to book at all costs. “The Punjab government had asked its law minister to tender resignation to ensure a free and fair inquiry into the incident,” he added.

The minister questioned if Pervaiz Elahi had asked his brother (Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain), the-then interior minister, to resign after the Lal Masjid incident. He said most of the APC leaders did not believe in law and the Constitution.

“They want disruption and violence to create anarchy in the country. Did they ever demand resignation from Musharraf after the Lal Masjid and May 12 2007 tragedies?”He said there was no harm in reconstitution of the judicial commission probing the Model Town incident if the law permitted but he believed the Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) would still continue to protest as it was their sole objective.

“The government will implement the recommendations of the judicial commission in letter and spirit while a joint investigation team is also working,” he added.To a question about meeting with former president Asif Ali Zardari, he said meetings among politicians and with political leadership were a routine matter. He said Asif Zardari was an ex-president and the head of the country’s largest opposition political party. He, however, added that no formal schedule had been finalised for such a meeting with Zardari.

Pervaiz Rashid said the government was providing all the necessary support to the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) of North Waziristan.He said the government was fully cognizant of the problems of IDPs adding that all required facilities were being provided to the people who had left their homes due to the ongoing North Waziristan operation launched to flush out terrorists.

Model Town tragedy: Sanaullah, Shah granted 4 days to record statements

LAHORE: Former Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah and former Principal Secretary Tauqir Shah appeared before the tribunal formed to probe the Model Town tragedy on Thursday.

Sanullah and Shah requested to be provided four days to record their statements before the inquiry tribunal. The one-member inquiry tribunal headed by Justice Ali Baqir Najafi granted Sanaullah and Shah four days to record their statements.

Justice Najafi said Sanaullah and Shah should record their statements by Monday, adding that they could be summoned again if the need arose.

The inquiry tribunal resumed its probe into the tragedy on Thursday. Sanullah, Shah along with Chief Secretary Punjab and Inspector General Police Punjab appeared before the tribunal.

The former provincial law minister was surrounded by parliamentarians, lawyers and PML-N workers when he arrived to appear before the tribunal.

Karachi: Four bodies recovered from Baldia Town

KARACHI: Four bodies bearing torture marks and hands tied behind their back were recovered from Baldia Town area of Karachi on Monday morning, Geo News reported.

According to police, four blind-folded bodies were found from Rais Goth area of Baldia Town today morning. The bodies had torture marks and bullet wounds while their hands were tied behind their back

The spent shells of 9mm pistol were also recovered near the bodies.

The bodies were shifted to the hospital for medico-legal formalities and identification purpose, however, the identity of the deceased could not be ascertained until the last report was filed.

Public, lawyers beat Gullu Butt at Model Town Katcheri

LAHORE: Gullu Butt, the man caught on camera damaging a number of vehicles outside the Minhaj-ul-Quran International (MQI) Secretariat in Model Town, was tortured by an angry crowd and lawyers at the Model Town Katcheri on Thursday.
Gullu Butt was handcuffed and his face was covered when an angry mob encircled him and tortured him. Only two policemen were escorting him at the time. Lawyers were demanding the authorities to try Gullu Butt under the anti-terrorism act.

Two police officers, who were escorting Butt, failed to protect him from the wrath of the angry mob and lawyers.Ironically, the policemen asked him “to lie down” to save his skin amid continuous pounding by kicks and fists. After being savagely assaulted by the public, the police personnel present on the occasion tried to take control of the situation. The scuffle left Gullu Butt unconscious. He was immediately shifted to hospital by the police in a rickshaw.

Later, a heavy contingent of police was deployed on the court premises and the police again produced Gullu before a judicial magistrate and sought his physical remand. However, a senior police officer told the court that the club he used to damage vehicles had already been recovered, so there was no need of a physical remand.

As this, the judge sent Gullu to jail on 14-day judicial remand.Police on Tuesday carried out an anti-encroachment drive to remove the barriers outside the MQI Secretariat and Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) chief Tahirul Qadri’s Lahore residence during which nine persons lost their lives.

Gullu Butt was arrested for vandalism after TV news cameras caught him damaging a number of vehicles outside the MQI Secretariat in Model Town in the presence of police on Tuesday.Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif issued orders for his arrest after watching the vandalism done by Butt captured in the news footage. The man was later identified as Gullu Butt alias Sher-i-Lahore, known to be a police tout in Model Town.

Fighters gain ground in battle for north Iraq town

BAGHDAD: Militants gained ground on Monday in a battle for a strategic enclave in northern Iraq that provides a corridor to Syria, officials and residents said.

Security forces insisted they had repelled an assault on Tal Afar, a Turkman-majority town in Nineveh province, but multiple officials and a resident said militants had entered it, with one saying they were in control.

"Armed groups managed to take control of Tal Afar," a Nineveh provincial government official told, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"They clashed with security forces and (tribal fighters), who had to withdraw from the town."

Resident Mohammed Khalil said militants had taken several districts but not the entire town, and added that families were fleeing to nearby Sinjar between Tal Afar and the Syrian border.

The local official responsible for the town and surrounding areas, Abdulal Abbas, declined to say whether it was now in militant control, but said Tal Afar was dealing with "martyrs, wounded, chaos and refugees".

Abbas said 200,000 people -- nearly half the area´s population -- had fled, and asked for international assistance.

Tal Afar, a major Shiite-majority town in otherwise Sunni Arab and Kurdish-dominated Nineveh province, had briefly held off a militant offensive that saw fighters led by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group take control of vast swathes of territory of north and north-central Iraq in a matter of days.

The town has provided a crucial bulwark against militant-controlled territory on either side of Iraq´s border with Syria.

Interior ministry spokesman Brigadier General Saad Maan, however, insisted that militants had not encroached on the town, proclaiming that fighters "do not control one metre (yard) of Tal Afar".

Royal couple visit wildfire-affected Aussie town

SYDNEY: Britain´s Prince William and his wife, Kate, visited a town ravaged by wildfires in the mountains west of Sydney on Thursday, as they continue their Down Under tour.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge stopped in the Blue Mountains town of Winmalee to meet with firefighters and locals affected by wildfires that swept through the region last year, destroying more than 200 homes.

William and Kate also visited a Girl Guides hall, where they planted a tree, and later took in the sweeping views of the mountains.

"Here we are five months down the track after we lost our house and for them to come out now, it makes us feel like we haven´t been forgotten," said Adrian Harrison, whose house was destroyed in the fires.

The royal couple is on a three-week tour of New Zealand and Australia. Their itinerary includes seeing local wildlife at Sydney´s harbor side zoo and traveling to Uluru, the iconic red sandstone monolith in the Outback. (AP)

 

Woman pays $200 bill with coins, town says no more

ERIE: A Pennsylvania township is asking residents to keep the change.

Officials in Millcreek Township, along with its water and sewer authorities, have adopted a policy limiting how much change they'll accept from residents paying sewer bills and other fees.

David Sterrett, executive director of the authorities, tells the Erie Times-News that officials came up with the policy after a woman showed up last month with a shoebox full of nickels, dimes and quarters to pay a $200 sewer bill.

Sterrett says it took four employees an hour to count, sort and put the money into paper sleeves.

The new policy limits residents to using $10 in unrolled coins or $20 in rolled coins when paying bills.

Accused killed, policeman injured in Orangi Town

KARACHI: An accused was killed while a policeman sustained injuries in an encounter that took place in Orangi Town area of the metropolis.

According to SP Orangi Town Malik Ehsan, the encounter took place as the accused opened fire at a joint check post of the police and the rangers near Kati Pahari, leaving a policeman injured.

Both the police and the rangers retaliated and shot dead one accused, SP added.