News and Analysis

Daily Summary News & Analysis              (Details also available on www.cssnewspaper2.blogspot.com)

US urged to avoid verbal assaults, finger-pointing

ISLAMABAD: In what is seen here as a serious attempt to repair the dent in relations caused by serious allegations emanating from Washington, America’s special envoy Marc Grossman said here after wide-ranging talks. (Details)

US to continue pressure on Pakistan for positive role: Clinton

WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has reiterated that US would continue to mount heavy pressure on Pakistan for positive role in war on terror, Geo News reported. (Details)
Govt announces relaxation in CNG loadshedding

ISLAMABAD: While warning the country that the shortage of gas would get severe this summer, the government on Friday announced reduction in the loadshedding of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG). (Details)

Hina Khar to represent Pakistan at world’s biggest business forum

ISLAMABAD: Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar will be among the handful of those distinguished women participants, who will speak at one of the world's biggest meeting of the private sector and heads of the government scheduled in Perth, Australia later (Details)

Judiciary checks arbitrary exercise of power, says CJ

ISLAMABAD: Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry said on Thursday that judiciary as an institution could never be independent unless individual judges remained impartial. (Details)

Only religious parties can stop America, says Fazl

QUETTA: Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-F (JUI-F) Chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman on Thursday said the coalition of religious parties was the need of the hour and its only them that can stop US from its ‘nefarious designs’ (Details)

Reuters: US not sincere about Afghan peace: Haqqanis

ISLAMABAD: The United States was not sincere about peace in Afghanistan when it signalled it would remain open to exploring a settlement that includes the Haqqani (Details)

Business- Guardian: BP to expand North Shttp://cssnewspaper2.blogspot.com/2011/10/very-important-guardian-how-barack.htmlea oilfields

• Cameron backs £4bn plan for 'new Atlantic frontier'  • Greenpeace warns of oil spills and rising emissions.      BP faced fresh condemnation from environmentalists on Thursday after it got the go- (Details)

AlJazeera: Gaddafi 'being tracked by satellite'

Libya's National Transitional Council says that Muammar Gaddafi, the country's toppled leader, is in the southern desert region of the country, and that it is only a matter of time before he is captured. (Details)

The Guardian: Dominique Strauss-Kahn attempted rape inquiry dropped

Prosecutors say they have evidence ex-IMF chief sexually assaulted young French writer, but he will not face charges (Details)

UK’s Liam Fox faces fresh questions on Sri Lanka links

Defence secretary, UK,  accused of running 'maverick foreign policy' in Sri Lankan Development Trust dealings involving Adam Werritty (Details)

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IMP- Guardian: How Barack Obama went from cool to cold

Barack Obama's measured approach won him the White House. So why do supporters think he lacks the 'fierce urgency of now'? (Details)

The selfish state By Cyril Almeida

CRISES erupt, the government fire-fights, things settle back down: we’ve seen it a million times before, right? At least that’s what logic traced on the historical record suggests. It’s always been the same, always will be the same. The unofficial motto of Pakistan is, onwards to the next crisis. And yet, it’s hard to shake off the feeling that maybe, just maybe, something different is (Details)

Aiders and abettors by Kamran Shafi

The Deep State is not alone in its enterprise of trying to fool all of the people all of the time for its own ends: it is aided and abetted by various and varied ‘elites’, most of whom have either occupied positions of high authority in government; are media ‘stars’ (Details)

The pact of Hudaibya By Nilofar Ahmed

SOME time after the migration of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) and his followers to Madina, the Makkans banned the entry of the believers in Makkah, even for the purposes of Haj or umrah. (Details)

IMP: Democracy’s failure? By S. Akbar Zaidi

THE new conventional wisdom is that democracy has failed in Pakistan. Yet again. It seems so obvious to everyone that this is now the overwhelming, unquestioned, uncontested consensus. (Details)

IMP: Crisis in ties with Afghanistan By Khalid Aziz 

RECENTLY, President Hamid Karzai signed a strategic partnership agreement with India in New Delhi. Among other things, it provides for the training of Afghan army officers in India.  (Details)

The Economist: A Swedish October surprise

LIBERIANS have voted in the first domestically run poll since the end of a bloody civil war in 2003. Queues snaked around schools and churches converted into polling  (Details)

Punjab most violent province for women: Report - Tribune

Punjab is the most violent province in Pakistan, or so the data collected by Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in 70 districts across the country suggests.(Details)

10th October 2011: CSS News and Analysis Current Affairs

CSS Summary: News and Analysis

Egypt forces clash with Copt protesters, 24 dead

CAIRO: A curfew was imposed overnight in Egypt’s capital after 24 people, mostly Coptic Christians, died in clashes with security forces in the deadliest violence since President Hosni Mubarak’s fall.

More then 200 people were injured in fighting that erupted during a protest by Copts on Sunday, prompting a curfew in central Cairo, said official statements broadcast on public television. (Read More)

Ex-naval chief Bokhari named to head NAB

ISLAMABAD: President Asif Ali Zardari named on Sunday Admiral (retd) Agha Fasih Bokhari, former chief of Pakistan Navy, as chairman of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to fill the office lying vacant for several months and make the country’s premier accountability organisation functional. (Read More)

Kurram groups sign accord to open key highway

Parachinar: After about three years, rival factions again signed a peace agreement here on Sunday to restore peace in Kurram Agency after the government promised to provide security on the main highway in the region.

Under the accord which was first signed in Murree in October 2008, the Thall-Parachinar road would be made safe for travel for local people and internally displaced people would be rehabilitated in their areas. (Read More)

Asian shares rise after France-Germany agreement

HONG KONG: Asian shares began Monday on a high after France and Germany said they had agreed a plan to support Europe's banks, while US jobs data also provided some lift.
However dealers remained cautious after Wall Street finished last week with a loss and Fitch downgraded the debt ratings of Italy and Spain.
Hong Kong gained 0.66 percent in the first few minutes, Sydney gained 1.20 percent, Seoul was 1.10 percent higher and Shanghai, (Read More)

Anti-Gadhafi fighters make gains in Sirte

SIRTE: Libya’s revolutionary forces seized a convention center Sunday that had served as a key base for fighters loyal to Moammar Gadhafi in the fugitive leader’s hometown, as they squeezed remaining regime loyalists in the besieged coastal city.

The inability to take Sirte, the most important remaining stronghold of Gadhafi supporters, more than six weeks after anti-Gadhafi fighters seized the capital has stalled efforts by Libya’s new leaders to set a timeline for elections and move forward with a transition to (Read More)

Euro lifted in Asia by France-Germany plan

SINGAPORE: The euro rose above $1.34 in Asia on Monday after France and Germany vowed swift action to shore up Europe's struggling banks, analysts said.
The single European unit bought $1.3450 in the morning compared with $1.3375 in New York late Friday, while it sat at 103.20 yen from 103.10 yen. 
The greenback traded at 76.75 yen from 76.73 yen.
The euro fell below $1.34 late (Read More)

Nuclear disarmament and the youth: View from India - Dawn Blog

President Obama’s Prague speech, in which he laid the foundations of a renewed quest for a world free of nuclear weapons, was greeted around the world with both awe and skepticism. Analysts all around the world dissected his words, ruminated over his intent and commented on his vision, I found the speech intriguing for completely different reasons. When President Obama said that the goal of nuclear (ReadMore)

China factor in Afghanistan

THE signing of the India-Afghanistan Strategic Partnership last week reaffirmed the establishment’s narratives about Pakistan’s real concerns across its western border: it’s not about militancy or instability, but about Indian hegemony.

The timing of the pact (Read More)

Pemra protects the sacred cows

Irfan Husain

ACCORDING to a news report in the Guardian covering the recently concluded annual Conservative Party conference in Manchester, Prime Minister David Cameron bumped into the newspaper’s political cartoonist, Steve Bell. At this chance encounter, the British PM asked: “Steve, when are you taking the condom off my head?”

This seemingly bizarre query was in reference to (Read More)

Is circular debt the real issue?

By Salman Khalid and Kamal Munir 

PAKISTAN has been facing a series of power crises over roughly the last two decades. However, since 2007, the situation has deteriorated rapidly.

As a result of severe electricity shortage, industry, commerce and agriculture have all taken serious hits with the country’s growth prospects dimming significantly. At the same time, residential consumers have had to endure over eight-to-12-hour blackouts in major cities. The situation is even worse in rural (Read More)

Terrorized Silence

by Baber Sattar

If you are an “aashiq-e-Rasool” (devotee of the Prophet), should you be able to get away with murder? Can we, as a society, justify the cold-blooded murder of Salmaan Taseer by Mumtaz Qadri, merely because this killer believed he was discharging a divine duty? Can a citizen be allowed to execute another summarily in pursuit of a self-defined higher ideal of ‘justice’ not recognised by law, and can such logic be inducted as a valid justification for murder? Isn’t that the story of all psychopaths who pose a threat to society? Must we become apologists for vigilantism and crimes perpetrated in the name of religion (Read More)