2 police personnel killed in Tor Ghar blast

MANSEHRA: At least two police personnel were killed and eight others injured on Saturday morning in a bomb blast in Tor Ghar district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Geo News reported.

According to sources, the blast took place when a police van was targeted with a bomb in Tor Ghar district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

The remote controlled explosive that was fixed on the roadside destroyed the vehicle partially in which at least two police officials got killed on spot while eight others injured.

DCO Tor Ghar Farid Khan told media that the police van was taking 32 police personnel from Tor Ghar district to the police training center in Abbottabad city when it came under attack in Joghar area of the aforementioned district.

Rescue teams and security forces reached the site and shifted the injured to the nearby hospital.

No group or militant wing has claimed responsibility yet.

PM feared riots over power crisis: WikiLeaks

KARACHI: WikiLeaks has revealed that Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani feared that the electricity shortage in the country could lead to riots as well as political insecurity.

A diplomatic cable sent to Washington by then US Ambassador Anne W. Patterson on November 2, 2009 discussed the meeting between PM Gilani and US Secretary’s Advisor on Energy and the head of the US delegation to the US-Pakistan energy dialogue David Goldwyn.

During the meeting Gilani told Goldwyn the energy shortage along with terrorism and stabilising the economy were the main challenges Pakistan was facing.

Goldwyn conveyed to Gilani that if Pakistan wanted to deal with the energy crisis then the country would have to make difficult decisions.

Kallar Kahar tragedy: Millat Grammar school to open Monday

FAISALABAD: The Millat Grammar whose students perished during the Kallar Kahar tragedy will open on Monday, Geo News reported.

On Friday the school was sealed by district authorities but in a meeting between parents and district officials this decision was reversed.

The school lost 31 of its students in a tragic bus accident during a school trip

Wall St ends worst quarter since 2008 meltdown

NEW YORK: Stocks ended their worst quarter since the depths of the 2008 credit crisis, crippled by Europe's debt debacle, a U.S. credit downgrade and a sputtering global economy.

A steep slide on Friday closed out a fifth month of losses as weak economic data from China sparked fears of a global economic slowdown while investment bank Morgan Stanley plummeted on concerns about its exposure to European banks.

The S&P 500 index has lost more than 14 percent this quarter and over 7 percent in September alone. As of Thursday, Wall Street's deep downturn in the third quarter wiped out $2.2 trillion of the Wiltshire 5000 index -- the broadest measure of U.S. stocks.

"Why is the market so soft and so weak? Because '08 is still fresh in people's memories," said Joseph Mazzella, a senior trader at Knight Capital in Jersey City, New Jersey.

Stocks have been battered by the threat of a slowdown and fears that a Greek debt default could spark a credit shock similar to that caused by Lehman Brothers in September 2008, sending markets into a tailspin.

Fears of a hard landing in the world's second largest economy joined the potent mix troubling investors after China's manufacturing sector shrank for the third month in a row.

HSBC's China flash purchasing managers index showed the longest contractional streak since 2009 in a worrying sign for the world economy, which has looked to China as a rare source of expansion.

"The economic engine that has been driving growth has been China and if that comes undone, it gets scary again," said Mazzella.

Investors will be eyeing China's official PMI, due out on Saturday, which may have edged up again in September. Any disappointment there will be a blow for markets.

Financial shares stumbled with Morgan Stanley, which fell 10.5 percent to $13.51 as investors appeared to react to fear signals in credit markets.

The cost of insuring Morgan Stanley's five-year bonds spiked in recent days to almost three times what it was on June 30. It shares have erased all their gains of the last three year.
The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 240.60 points, or 2.16 percent, to 10,913.38. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index fell 28.98 points, or 2.50 percent, to 1,131.42. The Nasdaq Composite Index lost 65.36 points, or 2.63 percent, to 2,415.40.

Wall Street's "fear gauge," the CBOE volatility index, or VIX, rose more than 10 percent to 42.96, its highest close since mid-August and indicating investors expect more volatility ahead.

"There is a lot of fear that GDP growth is going to slow down, or it's not going to be as fast as consensus estimates assume," said Adam Krejcik, an analyst at Roth Capital in Newport Beach, California. "Generally speaking there is a lot of fear out there, just a crisis of confidence."

Through Thursday, the MSCI All Country World Index had lost about $4.7 trillion in market capitalization. The U.S. benchmark S&P 500 has lost about $1.7 trillion in market cap during the quarter.

Euro zone annual consumer prices unexpectedly rose in September 3.0 percent and followed surprisingly higher inflation in Germany.

In what may be a precursor to the quarterly earnings season, Ingersoll Rand Plc tumbled 12.1 percent to $28.09 after the industrial conglomerate cut its third-quarter and full-year earnings forecast to below market estimates. The Morgan Stanley cyclical index dropped 3.6 percent.

Markets showed little reaction two U.S. economic reports that were stronger than analysts expected.

Business activity in the U.S. Midwest grew more than expected in September, buoyed by new orders and a jump in employment.

The Institute for Supply Management-Chicago business barometer surprisingly rose in September more than economists had forecast.

18 dead in Indonesian plane crash

r 01, 2011
 MEDAN: All 18 people aboard a plane that crashed on Indonesia's Sumatra island were found dead Saturday, an official said, after two days of hampered efforts to reach the remote jungle site.

Hopes that some on board the aircraft might be alive had been raised when a victim's mother reported that her daughter had called her from the plane after the crash Thursday, and aerial photos showed the main cabin largely intact.

But after rescuers finally reached the site, national search and rescue operations head Sunarbowo Sandi announced: "We received a radio response from our team on the ground that all 18 people on the plane had died.

"The passengers were still in their seats."

The turboprop plane owned by Nusantara Buana Air took off from Medan in North Sumatra on Thursday morning heading for the nearby province of Aceh.

But it sent a distress signal soon afterwards and crashed at 1,100 metres (3,600 feet) in the mountainous Bohorok area about 70 kilometres (40 miles) northwest of Medan.

The weather and rough terrain had for two days prevented rescuers from reaching the crash location by foot and by helicopter, forcing three teams travelling by land and several helicopters to return to Medan.

A clear morning Saturday allowed rescuers to finally reach the victims and build an emergency helipad to land near the site and recover the bodies.

But the operation was again halted by late afternoon when bad weather returned.

"We've stopped the recovery because the weather is very bad and there is a thick fog," said Medan air base head Suharyonno.

But after a full day of official accounts that all 18 were dead, a transport ministry official gave a conflicting report that it was too early to be sure.

"We don't yet know if the passengers are dead or injured. Hopefully we will know for sure by this evening," ministry spokesman Freddy Numberi told local news website Detik.com.

A woman named Lita said on live television Saturday that her calls to a passenger named Astuti, who was travelling with her children, were being answered until Friday night.

"I tried to call Astuti, and each time a girl would pick up and say 'Hello, hello'. The last time it was a boy. I think it was her little boy," she said.

As rescue officials said all 18 on board were dead, scores of relatives who had gathered in Bohorok let out cries of despair.

Some passed out and were taken away on stretchers, while others lambasted the government for its slow response.

Reike Andriani, whose relatives on board the aircraft included a 20-month-old baby, said she was angered by the delayed rescue attempts.

"Why did this process take so long? They just kept saying that they would reach there soon, and they kept blaming the weather," she said.

Another woman added: "They just kept saying the weather was bad, the weather was bad. They don't have a proper system."

The Indonesian Transport Association said the rescue teams had followed standard procedures and had done their best given the "impossible" conditions.

"The weather in Bohorok is extreme and unpredictable. There was heavy rain, fog and strong winds," the head of the association's aviation forum Suharto Abdul said.

The incident is the fourth fatal air crash in Indonesia in the past month.

A helicopter chartered by US giant Newmont Mining crashed last Sunday in central Indonesia, killing two people on board.

US fears a fast Awlaqi death blowback

WASHINGTON: The United States warned its nationals Saturday of "potential for retaliation" after two key Al-Qaeda figures were killed in an air raid in Yemen.

The State department issued a global travel alert to US citizens, a day after Washington confirmed that US-Yemeni citizen Anwar al-Awlaqi, the external operations leader of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), was killed.

"Awlaqi's standing as a preeminent English-language advocate of violence could potentially trigger anti-American acts worldwide to avenge his death," the State Department said in its alert.

"In the past Awlaqi and other members of AQAP have called for attacks against the United States, US citizens and US interests," it added.

Yemen's defense ministry said Awlaqi, an Al-Qaeda leader, was killed Friday morning, while a man wounded in the attack was quoted as saying seven people were killed in the air strike in Marib province, a hotbed of Al-Qaeda activity.

The ministry said among those killed was Pakistani-American Samir Khan.

New York City police commissioner Ray Kelly has described Khan as the publisher of Al-Qaeda's English-language magazine "Inspire."

Kelly said Friday that his force was on alert following the killing in Yemen of Awlaqi, acknowledging the US-born Islamic cleric's sympathizers might seek revenge.

"We know al-Awlaqi had followers in the United States, including New York City, and for that reason we remain alert to the possibility that someone might want to avenge his death," Kelly said in a statement.

More than 2,750 people were killed when the World Trade Center in New York was destroyed in the September 11, 2001 attacks. (AFP)

Pakistan ready to talk on basis of equality: PM

MULTAN: Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said on Saturday that Pakistan was ready to hold talks with everyone for peace and can go to any extent to achieve this objective.

He, however, made it clear that Pakistan will talk on the basis of equality and mutual respect, keeping in view the country’s national interests.

“We will never allow anyone to think ill about Pakistan’s security. “We do not desire war and want peace in the country and beyond. Pakistan can play an important role in peace and we will do it,” Gilani told a gathering in a town some 30 kilometres from Multan where he laid the foundation stone of the 57-kilometre long Multan-Khanewal section of the Multan-Faisalabad Motorway, to be built at an estimated cost of Rs14 billion. The premier said all the country’s political forces stand shoulder to shoulder for Pakistan’s security interests. The prime minister said the successful holding of All Parties Conference (APC) testified the fact that Pakistani nation is united on the issue of country’s security and defence.

Gilani lauded the political leaders, who responded positively to his call and sat together to discuss the issue of Pakistan’s security, while keeping their political differences aside. Gilani said he could have summoned a joint sitting of parliament on the issue but he opted to call an APC so that the political parties, that had boycotted the previous elections, could be represented in this important national moot.

“The APC was aimed at sending a message to the world that on the issue of Pakistan’s security, the whole nation and political forces were united,” he said, and added that the APC proved that the Pakistani nation was “one like a rock” on the issue of country’s security and defence. The premier criticised those extremist elements, who were bringing bad name to Islam.

About assassination of Prof Burhanuddin Rabbani, Gilani said Afghan President Hamid Karzai has some misunderstanding on the issue. “I want to convey to Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who is my brother and friend, and with whom we have good relations, he has some misunderstanding on the assassination of Prof Rabbani,” Gilani said. He said Pakistan is ready to provide any security or intelligence assistance to probe the killing. “They cannot doubt us. Pakistanis are a self-respecting nation. Pakistan neither interferes in anyone’s affairs nor allows anyone’s interference in our affairs,” he stressed.

Prime Minister Gilani felicitated the nation as well as the country’s political forces that it was due to the APC meeting that the US had sent a message that they needed Pakistan and that they could not win the war (against terrorism) without it. “They have also distanced themselves from the statement of Mullen. It is the victory of Pakistani nation, political parties as well as the government’s policy of reconciliation,” he remarked.

The prime minister said southern Punjab had remained backward since the creation of Pakistan and expressed his government’s as well as party’s commitment to create a new province in southern Punjab to remove the sense of deprivation of the people.

Meanwhile, Gilani ordered free treatment of Major (R) Aftab Ahmed Khan Daha, a former PPP MNA from Khanewal.