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  • Potato diplomacy: Lavrov gives Kerry ice-breaking gift

    Kerry was in the Black Sea resort of Sochi for high-stakes talks with Lavrov and Russian President Vladimir Putin, on his first visit to Russia in two years.

    Lavrov surprised his guest by presenting Kerry with a basket of ripe red tomatoes and another one full of potatoes, the Russian foreign ministry said.

    “It’s sunny in Sochi today,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Facebook, an apparent reference not only to the blue skies over the city but also the upbeat mood at the talks.

    Potatoes as presents have become a running joke between Kerry and Lavrov, with Kerry presenting his Russian counterpart with two large Idaho potatoes when the two met for talks on Syria in Paris in January, 2014.

    The food baskets carry added resonance given that Moscow has slapped an embargo on US and European produce in response to Western sanctions over the Ukraine crisis.

    In Sochi, the Russian delegation also presented Washington’s top diplomat with a T-shirt commemorating Victory Day, which Russia celebrated on Saturday.

    Kerry for his part gave his hosts a list of Russian newspaper clips which “in his view do not reflect the real potential of wide-ranging Russian-US relations which, in his view, need to be improved,” the Russian foreign ministry said.

    Kerry also gave Lavrov a “dark brown leather writing portfolio similar to what the US Secretary of State carries on all his trips and uses in many of his meetings,” a State of Department spokeswoman told AFP.

    Earlier in the day Kerry and Lavrov laid wreaths at a World War II memorial to mark 70 years since Soviet victory over Nazi Germany.

    Many see the high-profile meeting as a sign that the two Cold-War foes are ready for an improvement in ties after relations collapsed over Russia’s annexation of Crimea last year.

    “A new season is beginning in relations between the United States and Russia,” Russia’s broadsheet Kommersant said. -AFP

  • Iran denies visa to Maulana Fazlur Rahman

    The JUI-F was to tour Iran on a five-day visit, however the Iranian foreign ministry denied him visa on Wednesday.

    Maulana Fazlur Rahman was to attend the Dastarbandi ceremony at a seminary in Zahidan – headquarters of Iran-ruled part of Baluchistan.

    The Iranian authorities did not reveal the reason for not allowing the JUI-F chief to visit the country.

  • Three-decade quest backs physics’ ‘Standard Model’

    Researchers at the world’s biggest particle collider said they had observed an extremely rare event — the decay of the neutral B meson into a pair of muons, the heavy cousins of electrons.

    The results provide further support for the so-called Standard Model, the conceptual framework for the particles and forces that constitute the cosmos, they said in the journal Nature.

    Neutral B mesons are unstable composites of two kinds of particles called quarks, bound by the “strong” force.

    Their decay into muons is predicted under the Standard Model. But getting evidence to confirm the prediction has been a puzzler since the mid-1980s.

    For one thing, neutral B mesons themselves are produced in extreme conditions — in particle colliders or in cosmic-ray interactions, for instance — which makes them hard or very costly to study.

    And the transition into muons only occurs about four times in every billion “decays.”

    Rival teams at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) — the massive underground lab near Geneva that straddles the Franco-Swiss border — worked separately on detecting the elusive event.

    They released individual results in July 2013, but, separately, the data batches fell just short of the demanding threshold of accuracy for claiming a discovery.

    Their combined analysis, now published in the benchmark peer-reviewed science journal, “easily exceeds this requirement,” the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN) said in a statement.

    The paper said the experiments showed that Standard Model, which dates to the 1970s, had cleared another hurdle but others lay ahead.

    “In the course of the past few decades, the Standard Model has passed critical tests derived from experiment, but it does not address some profound questions about the nature of the Universe,” the authors said.

    The framework does not, for instance, explain dark matter, the stuff that composes nearly 85 percent of the mass in the cosmos and is currently only detectable through its gravitational effect on visible matter.

    The quest to understand dark matter is one of the priorities of the current work programme at the LHC, which began last month after a two-year upgrade.

    The collider comprises a ring-shaped tunnel where proton beams are whizzed around in opposite directions at speeds approaching that of light.

    At four locations in the tunnel, powerful magnets bend the beams, bringing them together so that some of the protons smash together — a brief, intense collision.

    The sub-atomic rubble that results is then analysed to look for novel particles or clues about known ones.

    In 2012, the LHC confirmed the Higgs Boson, the long-sought Standard Model particle that confers mass.

    It earned the 2013 Nobel physics prize for two of the scientists who back in 1964 had theorised the boson’s existence. -AFP

  • Rangers round up 70 suspects in Karachi raids

    The paramilitary force carried out targeted raids in several areas including Sohrab Goth, settlements near Memon Hospital, Macharr, Colony, Janjaal Goth and Kunwari Colony.

    The suspects have been shifted to undisclosed location for interrogation.

    Read here: Karachi bus attack death toll rises to 43, IS pamphlets found

    Pistol-wielding gunmen in Karachi today stormed a bus carrying members of the Ismaili minority, killing at least 43 in the first attack in the country officially claimed by the Islamic State group.

    The IS claims, posted on Twitter, are set to raise fears over the Middle East-based jihadists’ growing influence after they announced in January the creation of a branch in what they called “Khorasan province”, encompassing Afghanistan, Pakistan and parts of surrounding countries.

  • Rao Anwar reinstated as SSP Malir: sources

    Rao Anwar was transferred after he held a press conference alleging Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) for having connections with the Indian intelligence agency RAW.

    In the press briefing, SSP Rao Anwar had claimed that MQM’s Muhammad Anwar, Nadeem Nusrat and MQM chief Altaf Hussain are in contact with Indian intelligence agency Research Analysis Wing. He further said that MQM leaders Farooq Saleem and Hammad Siddiqui issue direction to activists for different criminal activities in Karachi.

    Later, CM Sindh Qaim Ali Shah had taken the notice of his media talks and IG Sindh after investigating the matter transferred Rao Anwar and directed him to report CPO Office.

    According to sources, the decision to reinstate Rao Anwar as SSP Malir is taken in the wake of rising terrorism in Karachi.

  • Yemen truce broadly holds, but reports of violations

    Witnesses in the southwestern city of Abyan said warplanes had hit positions there after the Houthi seized the area following the start late on Tuesday of the ceasefire, which is intended to ward off a humanitarian catastrophe.

    Residents of the southern provinces of Shabwa and Lahj, which have witnessed heavy ground clashes between local militiamen and the Houthis, also reported air strikes overnight.

    At least 35 civilians were killed by the Saudi-led attacks on the cities of Abs and Zabeed in western Yemen on Tuesday, residents said, before the beginning of the ceasefire.

    Seeking to restore exiled President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, an alliance of Gulf Arab nations has since March 26 been bombing Houthi militia and allied army units that control much of Yemen.

    In the bulwark of opposition to the Houthis in the southern city of Aden, the scale of over six weeks of clashes emerged.

    Over 600 people had been killed and 3,000 had been wounded, while 22,000 residents had been displaced since the Houthis first pushed into the city on March 25, local watchdog group, the Aden Centre for Monitoring, said on Wednesday.

    Residents expressed doubts that the break in fighting, which paused round-the-clock gunfire that had defined Aden life in recent weeks, would last.

    “Aden needs a humanitarian truce so badly, given the lack of food, fuel and everything else. But we question the intentions of the Houthis and believe they will take advantage of the truce to take more areas,” resident Hassan al-Jamal said.

    Saudi Arabia and its Sunni Muslim allies believe the Houthis are a proxy for the influence of their arch-rival, Shi’ite Iran, in a regional power struggle that has helped exacerbate sectarian tensions across the Middle East.

    AID AND MEDICINE

    Saudi state television quoted an official source at the Defence Ministry as saying projectiles had fallen on the Najran and Jizan areas on Wednesday morning and that some sniper fire by the Houthis had been detected. There were no casualties.

    “The position adopted by the armed forces was to exercise restraint, abiding by the humanitarian truce approved by the coalition forces,” the television quoted the official as saying.

    There was no immediate confirmation of the accusations by Saudi media.

    The truce is meant to allow in aid and medicine to Yemen, where the United Nations believes 828 civilians, including 182 children, have been killed since March 26. There was no word of any new aid arriving by Wednesday afternoon.

    The scattered reports of incidents would suggest violence at a far lower level than before the truce formally began.

    The Houthi TV channel al-Masira said Saudi ground forces shelled their northern stronghold province of Saada and called the bombings a violation of the ceasefire.

    The Saudi state news agency SPA said King Salman, at a royal court ceremony attended by President Hadi and Yemeni Prime Minister Khaled Bahah, authorized the laying of the foundation stone for a humanitarian relief center.

    The Saudi-owned al-Arabiya channel said the monarch had allocated one billion riyals ($265 million) to the Yemen relief work, in additional to a similar amount he had pledged earlier.

  • Iraq defense ministry says Islamic State’s second in command killed

    “Based on accurate intelligence, an air strike by the coalition forces targeted the second in command of IS, Abu Alaa al-Afari,” the ministry said in a statement on its website.

    Abu Alaa al-Afari, whose real name is Abdul Rahman Mustafa Mohammed, is an ethnic Turkmen from the town of Tel Afar in northwestern Iraq, and is thought to be second in command of Islamic State after self-proclaimed caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

    The Pentagon said it was aware of the reports but could not confirm them.

    Baghdadi was recently reported to have been incapacitated by a coalition airstrike in the same part of Iraq, and Afari was tipped to assume leadership of the organization. The Pentagon in Washington has denied those reports, saying Baghdadi remains capable of directing operations and was not wounded in any strike.

    A coalition of more than 60 countries led by the United States launched a campaign last summer to “degrade and destroy” Islamic State, a militant islamist group that had seized large areas of Iraq and Syria.

    The coalition has been conducting airstrikes against the group in both Iraq and neighboring Syria.

    On its website, the Iraqi defense ministry posted footage of the air strike on the “Martrys Mosque” in the village of al-Iyadhiya near Tel Afar, where Afari was a teacher and well-known preacher, according to a local official who asked to remain anonymous.

    There was no way to independently confirm the defense ministry statement, and the Iraqi government has previously announced the death of Islamic State militants only for them to resurface alive.

  • No sign of missing U.S. aid helicopter after second Nepal quake

    Nepal is still reeling from last month’s devastating quake that killed more than 8,000 people and injured close to 20,000.

    The U.S. helicopter was delivering aid in Dolakha, one of the districts hit hardest by both quakes, on Tuesday when it went missing with six Marines and two Nepali soldiers on board.

    Six Nepali helicopters and about 400 soldiers found no sign of the Marine Corps UH-1Y “Huey” in forested and rugged terrain.

    “There is no positive confirmation of any sighting of the aircraft and we have no communication with them at this moment,” said Marines spokeswoman Captain Cassandra Gesecki. She said there was no evidence to indicate a crash.

    Roads in Dolakha were cracked and littered with large boulders, a Reuters witness said. In Suspa Kshamawati village 80 percent of the houses were completely destroyed.

    Krishna Budhathoki, 40, now lives in his cattle pen. “We want to be able to build a new home before the monsoon, but there’s not enough time to do so now, and how can we build during the rainy season?” he said.

    The Canadian Red Cross pulled a nine-strong medical team out of Tatopani, which is on the road from Kathmandu to Tibet and was close to the epicenter of Tuesday’s earthquake, citing the danger of landslides.

    “When the earthquake happened, big blocks of mountain came down that took away houses,” team leader Cyril Stein told Reuters from Kathmandu. “I heard the top of a mountain collapse while I was on the telephone with my team.”
    The field clinic, which had been treating more than 50 patients a day, was threatened by a mountain block that looked like it might break loose, he said.

    In Dolakha district’s capital, Charikot, other relief and military helicopters brought people wounded when buildings collapsed and landslides struck in outlying hamlets to an open-air clinic where they were treated on bloodied tarpaulins.

    The helicopters alternated between evacuating people and searching for the Marines’ “Huey”, which lost radio contact after crew members were heard talking about fuel problems.

    A Pentagon spokesman said he had nothing to verify reports that the helicopter had been found and that the aerial search would resume on Thursday.

    SEARCH DELAYS RESCUE EFFORTS

    Bala Nanda Sharma, a retired Nepali army general, visited the army base in Charikot and discussed the search for the missing U.S. helicopter.

    “If it just landed in that forest, it would be lost. Only helicopter pilots who have the eye will be able to find it. This terrain is very beautiful, but very difficult,” he said, gesturing towards a hillside.

    Nepal Home Ministry official Laxmi Prasad Dahal said he feared the search was diverting resources from relief and rescue operations.

    “The work of sending relief and rescuing the injured people to hospitals has been delayed due to this,” he told Reuters.

    A police official in Kathmandu said 80 people had died and 2,376 were injured in Tuesday’s quake, which also killed 17 people in neighboring India. Charikot, 75 km (45 miles) east of Kathmandu, was one of the hardest-hit areas.

    Most of the reported deaths were in towns and villages which, like Charikot, were only just starting to recover from last month’s quake.

    Tuesday’s quake and subsequent aftershocks forced many panic-stricken Nepalis to spend yet another night outdoors in makeshift tents and relief camps.

    “It looks like a graveyard here,” said Aula Bahadur Ale, the assistant administrator of Dolakha.

    “Even those houses that have not been flattened have developed cracks. People are too afraid to go into them. We are still feeling the aftershocks that makes people terrified.”

    The April quake damaged or destroyed hundreds of thousands of buildings, including ancient temples, and triggered an avalanche on Mount Everest that killed 18 climbers and cut short the climbing season on the world’s tallest peak.

    The tremors have left areas of Nepal perilously unstable, leading to fears of more landslides, especially when seasonal monsoon rains begin to fall in the coming weeks.

  • PM orders arrest of Karachi bus attackers

    Pistol-wielding gunmen in Karachi stormed a bus carrying members of the Ismaili minority, killing at least 43 in the first attack in the country officially claimed by the Islamic State group.

    The PM arrived in Karachi this evening to chair a high-level meeting of law and order in the wake of dastardly attack. Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif, Director General ISI Lt. Gen. Rizwan Akhtar, Defence Minister Khawaja Asif, Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah, Governor Sindh Dr. Ishratul Ibad, DG Rangers Sindh, Corps Commander, Secretary Interior, MQM leader Dr. Farooq Sattar and other high-ups were also present.

    The absence of Interior Minister Chaudhary Nisar Ali Khan came as a surprise to everyone, however no official word was released in this connection.

    Speaking on the occasion, the prime minister directed to apprehend the culprits involved the killing of bus passengers at the earliest.

    He ordered speeding up operation in Karachi and a decisive action against terrorists in the city.

    Read here: Karachi bus attack death toll rises to 43, IS pamphlets found

    He also directed the law enforcing agencies to keep a close eye on anti-state and anti-social elements who are bent upon blocking peace, progress and prosperity in the country.

    The Prime Minister expressed deep sorrow and grief over the firing incident in which innocent people were targeted.

    The PM expressed annoyance over police performance and called for better intelligence sharing to avert such incidents in future.

    He said security institutions must cooperate with each other to bring peace in the country.

  • Imran to arrive Karachi to console families of bus attack victims

    Talking to media here, Imran Khan said that he condemns the brutal attack on a bus carrying Ismailiites in Karachi in strongest of words.

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    Read: LIVE UPDATES: Karachi bus attack death toll rises to 43, IS pamphlets found

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    “We stand with the families of the victims of Karachi bus attack and I will myself go to the megapolis to extend sympathies to the bereaved relatives,” he told.

    Khan said that we consumed the ‘bitter pill’ of military courts only to have peace in the country and this nation seeks elimination of all terrorists from the soil.