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Nation & States
Hurriyat
group chairman steps down,
urges unification of all factions
What is India News
Service, July 8, 2004, 1700 hrs IST
Moulana Abbas Ansari,
chairman of a faction of Hurriyat Conference, today stepped down as the
head of the separatist conglomerate, and asked founder-chairman of
the undivided Hurriyat, Mirwaiz Omar Farooq, to "re-launch" moves to
unify the
factions.
The conglomerate announced that it would continue "talks with India and Pakistan" for
a lasting solution to the Kashmir issue.
Budget
presented: Finance minister presented the first UPA government
budget on Thurdsday. He reiterated the commitment to 7-8 per cent
growth, and said the focus would be on agriculture and fiscal
consolidation. The government, he said, aimed to provide "growth, stability and
equity".
Budget coverage:
The
Hindustan Times
Rediff
Businessline
3 shot
dead: Three militants including two alleged infiltrators were killed,
and a Pakistani militant was captured alive by security forces in separate encounters in Jammu region today. In two mine blasts, a
teen-age boy was killed and four others were injured.
Pakistan protests:
It has lodged a strong protest with the US State Department over an official memo that singles out Pakistanis and Pakistani-Americans for extra scrutiny at US
airports.
Charge
against US: The US asked Pakistan to send an Australian terror suspect it had arrested to Egypt, where they knew he would be tortured, according to his lawyer and a television report.
Egyptian-born Mamdouh Habib, who is an Australian citizen, was arrested near the Afghanistan border in Pakistan three weeks after the September 11, 2001, terror attacks in the US.
US authorities and Australia allege he trained with Al Qaida, a charge Habib denies. He says he was in Pakistan looking for a school for his children.
Questions
for PM aspirant: Shaukat Aziz, Pakistan's finance minister for more than four years and now nominee for
prime ministership, will be confronted with mounting questions over his track record of managing the country's
economy.
Rescue of
pilgrims: Braving inclement weather, army helicopters on Wednesday evacuated nearly 45 pilgrims, mostly the old and the sick, from the Badrinath shrine, area cut-off from the rest of the country following landslides.
Over 5,000 people are still stranded. Senior police officials are camping
at the landslide site.
Suicide
attack: A woman blew herself up and killed five others in a
suicide bombing attack near the Sri Lankan prime minister's house in
Colombo.
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The woman was being escorted to the Kollupitiya police station right
opposite the US and British diplomatic missions in the capital when
she detonated explosives strapped to her body, police said.
Suspected to have been a member of the LTTE suicide cadre, she was
seen roaming opposite the Hindu Religious Affairs and Northern
Rehabilitation Ministry, located opposite the British and US
embassies on busy Galle Road. She was arrested by the women police
on duty on suspicion. She triggered off a jacket bomb.
Overall:
Hurriyat unification hopes
brightened: The head of an influential faction resigned, urging
the founder of the separatist organisation to bring all leaders
together.
Budget was presented: Finance
minister P Chidambaram presented the first budget of the United
Progressive Alliance.
Pakistan protested US security
checks: It is unhappy with the singling out of Pakistanis and
Pakistani-Americans for extra checks.
Woman blew herself
up: An LTTE woman detonated a
jacket bomb, killing herself and five others, in Colombo.
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