Mush: Pak will not allow UN inspection of N-plants

By: Salman Alvi

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf said his country will not allow United Nations monitors to inspect its nuclear facilities.

“Our nuclear facilities are fully secure and there's no need for inspection by UN experts,” Musharraf was cited by the official APP news agency as saying in an interview with Russia's Izvestia newspaper.

The president said Pakistan’s nuclear capabilities were meant only for deterrence, dismissing speculation about a nuclear confrontation with India as irresponsible.

The Pakistani leader repeated Islamabad's offer to sign a no-war pact with New Delhi, which, he said, “would preclude all use of force in our region.”

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PWP denies electoral alliance with any political party

By: Nabil Raza

ISLAMABAD, August 17: The Central Spokesman of Pak Watan Party has said that their party has not signed any electoral alliance or signed agreement with any political party. In a statement issued from the party’s central secretariat here on Saturday, he said adjustment on some seat has been discussed with Millat Party while other parties are being contacted for electoral understanding that include Pakistan People’s Party Parliamentarian, Muslim League (N), Awami National Party, Tehreek-e-Insaaf, Muslim League (Q), and other parties.

Terming the election schedule announced by the government not understandable web said, he said it seems that taking part in election is commensurate with taking admission in a university or a college. He said it seems that the Election Commission was hesitating in giving election symbols to some parties. He said if desired symbol was not given to them then next line of action of Pak Watan Party would be reviewed.

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Pals flay Israel's plan to expel Arafat

By: Ahmad Hammadi

JERUSALEM: Palestinian officials Saturday have condemned an Israeli television report that claimed the army had a contingency plan to expel Palestinian President Yasser Arafat by force.

“We denounce the mere thinking of such despicable ideas at a time when we are trying to revive the peace process the Israeli government is thinking such ideas,” said Palestinian minister Saeb Erekat.

Without quoting any sources, the report said Friday the plan had been approved in principle by Israeli Premier Ariel Sharon and entailed a raid on Arafat's headquarters in the West Bank town of Ramallah by Special Forces. From his compound, Arafat would be taken to a waiting helicopter and flown nonstop to an Arab country.

According to the TV neighboring Lebanon could be a possible destination.

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Russia to ink $40b economic pact with Iraq

By: Special Reporter

WASHINGTON: The Washington Post reported Saturday Moscow and Baghdad plan to clinch a new five-year economic cooperation agreement worth $40 billion.

Talking to the daily, Russian and Iraqi officials said the pact covers cooperation in various fields including oil, chemical products, electrical energy, irrigation, railroad construction and transport.

“Russia was, is and will be our main partner,” Iraqi ambassador in Moscow Abbas Khalaf said. “What we need from Moscow is moral, political and diplomatic support because Iraq has shown the whole world that it can defend itself. US aggressive statements against Iraq aroused negative reaction in Russia.”

Russia has long been one of Iraq's chief benefactors in the international arena and a major trading partner and military supplier.

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Powell to attend UN Earth Summit instead of Bush

By: Special Reporter

WASHINGTON: US President Bush will not attend the upcoming UN Earth Summit to be held in Johannesburg, South Africa from August 26 until September 4, and will instead dispatch Secretary of State Colin Powell to lead the US delegation, officials said Saturday.

Talking to a foreign news agency, the officials who spoke on condition of anonymity, said a formal White House announcement on the composition of the US delegation was expected shortly, but that Bush had already decided to send Powell in his place.

According to the officials, Powell is expected to attend only the final two days of the summit.

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Bahrain's king on a landmark visit to Iran

By: Sheikh Muhammad Khurasani

TEHRAN, Iran: King of Bahrain Hamad bin Issa Al-Khalifa arrived in Tehran Saturday on a landmark visit at the head of a political and economic delegation.

Iranian vice-president and the head of the Physical Education Organization Mohsen Mehralizadeh welcomed him at the international Mehrabad airport.

This is the first visit to Iran by the head of state of the Persian Gulf monarchy since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The delegation included Foreign Minister Muhammad bin Mubarak Al-Khalifa, Finance Minister Abdullah Saif and Trade and Industry Minister Ali Saleh al-Saleh.

During his two-day stay, Sheikh Hamad will hold talks with President Muhammad Khatami to seek to develop and enhance cordial relations bonding the two Islamic nations. The two leaders would also review the latest regional and international developments.

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2 British soldiers killed in Kabul

By: Rafiullah

KABUL, Afghanistan: Two British troops serving with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan have been killed in the capital, Kabul early Saturday.

According to the commander of the British forces in Kabul, Colonel Simon Levey, two service personnel died of gunshot wounds. He said enemy forces were not involved in the incident that occurred at the city's airport.

Colonel Simon Levey refused to disclose further details about the identity of the victims or circumstances of their death, saying families are being notified, and a probe is under way.

Around 400 British soldiers are based in Kabul as part of the 20-nation ISAF contingent that has maintained peace in the Afghan capital.

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Uncle Scum's 9/11 Campaign

By: Millennium Twain

The North American security state, the US government (Uncle Scum), planned, organized and ran 9-11. No need to "beat-around-the-Bush" as they say, to try to soften the truth, to take us away from the truth.

Start asking the direct questions:

1) How many of those on the WTC Towers death list, are actually leading new lives in new locations now -- with new names and paperwork provided by the FBI, CIA, NSA etc?

2) How do George Bush, the New York bankers, the London & Zurich & Jewish bankers, the corporate oil gangsters, and the aerospace industry justify the killing of tens of thousands of US civilians -- to start THE WAR TO END ALL WARS. To bring all of 'Christendom' into violent confrontation with all of the Middle East.

3) What is the magnitude of the oil wealth they/we will accrue? What is the extent of their/our opium/heroin plantations in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Uzbekistan, and elsewhere? Their/our drug markets in Europe, the Americas, and worldwide?

4) Under the smoke screen of all-out war in Arabia, what wars and fascist campaigns & institutions are they organizing against the citizens of North America, in Latin American, in the Philippines and all of Asia, in Africa, in Polynesia, in Japan -- around their wholly-owned world 'marketplace'?

5) And why -- given their private assertions that they are doing this for the good of all humanity -- are they/we nowhere REDUCING their assault on our forests?

Nowhere replanting the rainforests! Nowhere REDUCING their toxic dumping in the ocean! Nowhere STOPPING the murder of the dolphins and whales and sea! Nowhere OPENING borders to tourism and immigration! Nowhere permitting DIRECT DEMOCRACY, voluntaryist communities without fascist autocracy!

If the Bush League is willing to MURDER or ENSLAVE a whole planet -- "for the GOOD of the people" -- what people are benefiting? Only the ARISTOCRACY??

What environment is benefiting -- only the rats, designer-viral-plagues, and toxic ocean oil-scum-pond?

And where will the covert aristocracy live when we and the biosphere are dead this decade? [In a few giant floating bottles and space stations?]

And what meaning of life to this aristocracy, without a human marketplace -- without living landscapes -- without the wind in their faces to remind them of who they once were? Who they could have been?

Without loving respect of culture, without divine nature (the forests & ocean), without a whole healthy mind and body ... their is no soul, no spirit, no connection to our true nature.

Life cannot be achieved through Co Intel, through the covert, through the security state operating behind opaque steel-glass ...

We can only become ourselves, individually and collectively, by coming forward in truth and respect. Building a marketplace in the light.

A world community, world market, world celebration of un-imaginable joy, color and diversity.

A chorus of seven billion sovereigns, and countless more to come ...

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