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Talking to the media at the State Bank of Pakistan Multan auditorium on Saturday, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said that Pakistan would not accept any US aid that came with conditions that go against Pakistan's interests. He said: "Pakistan is a sovereign country and will not accept conditions that are against its interests and stature". Since the media knows that the Mullen-Holbrooke visit to Islamabad did not go well, the press has given the statement its top headline. This is the first message to Washington after the US official duo had a rather icy reception in Islamabad, with Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi throwing in his riposte to President Obama's reference to a "blank cheque", and what Mr Holbrooke had to say later in New Delhi about India in the context of Afghanistan. If there is a foreign policy red rag for Pakistan, it is India's presence in Afghanistan and what India is doing in Balochistan and the tribal areas and for which the...

UK officials believe foiled attack was planned by Rashid Rauf WASHINGTON: How could Rashid Rauf, a "high value" Al Qaeda target, be plotting terrorist attacks in Britain in April 2009 – as claimed by the British authorities – if he was killed months ago in a famous drone strike in Waziristan, as US officials claimed, in November 2008, the Nesweek magazine is asking. According to one UK expert, some British investigators as well as Rauf's family think that he may have survived. Rauf, a former British resident, was allegedly a central figure in an August 2006 plot to blow up trans-Atlantic airliners. The plot was foiled after Rauf was arrested in Pakistan. But in December 2007, he escaped from custody. US officials suspected 'inside' help and the White House was delighted when a Predator operation supposedly took him out. Soon afterwards, however, Rauf's Pakistani lawyer asked authorities to produce the body which they were apparently unable to do. US officials ...

Fake democrats produce a fake democracy. This is what our westernized Pakistani elite and some of the self-styled 'liberals' in our media don't understand. A Parliament filled with feudal lords who rape the women of the peasants on their lands and operate secret prisons, and then come to the Parliament in expensive shiny cars and jewelry thanks to political parties where another set of feudals run them as family grocery shops—this is no democracy. I prefer a centralized system of governance led by technocrats committed to economic and political reform ruling for 5-10 years, implementing a plan backed by the Pakistani military in the background. Here's how our democrats and 'workers' of democracy filed their statement of assets recently. This information was compiled by the Center for Research and Security Studies in Islamabad. It shows our democrats, all of them, not only lying to the Election Commission about how much money they have but also confident that a...

February 22, 2009 Dan Qayyum | PakistanKaKhudaHafiz.com It seems Baitullah Mehsud has outlived his shelf-life and is of no further use to his American and Indian masters. After receiving a kicking in Bajaur and the implementation of Sharia in Swat, he has now been cornered into South Waziristan with his area of influence having been greatly reduced in recent days. In what seemed like a sign of desperation, he hit out at Kashmiri jihadi groups last week, threatening to eliminate their leaders if they did not join him in fighting the Pakistan army. Accusing them of 'only fighting external enemies such as the US and India', Baitullah Mehsud's 'Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan' (TTP) justified attacking members of these Jihadi outfits by pointing out that these outfits 'do not fight the Pakistan Army' and commit mass murder of innocent Pakistani citizens like the TTP has been doing for a some time now. It is also interesting to note that the Afghan Taleban...

The latest thing in scents next year could be the oldest perfume in the world, made especially for an Ancient Egyptian female pharaoh, according to German scientists who are analyzing residue found in a 3,400-year-old perfume flacon. The German researchers at the Bonn University Egyptian Museum say they will use the analysis to recreate the original perfume which was buried in an exquisite alabaster vessel bearing the royal insignia of Hatshepsut, the most powerful woman ever to rule Egypt before the Ptolemies and the Romans conquered it. The intact perfume jar has remained sealed since it was interred in the Valley of the Kings 1,400 years before Cleopatra. On a hunch, the Bonn Egyptologists recently ran a CAT scan which revealed 3-D images of a residue at the bottom. "No one had ever done that before," says museum curator Michael Hoeveler-Mueller. "We were frankly overjoyed at the findings. And now we are conducting a chemical analysis of the residue in hopes of b...

  Room 450 Dwight D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building   THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. Please be seated.   Before I begin today, let me acknowledge, first of all, Your Excellencies, all the ambassadors who are in attendance. I also want to acknowledge both the civilians and our military personnel that are about to be deployed to the region. And I am very grateful to all of you for your extraordinary work.   I want to acknowledge General David Petraeus, who's here, and has been doing an outstanding job at CENTCOM, and we appreciate him. I want to thank Bruce Reidel -- Bruce is down at the end here -- who has worked extensively on our strategic review. I want to acknowledge Karl Eikenberry, who's here, and is our Ambassador-designate to Afghanistan. And to my national security team, thanks for their outstanding work.   Today, I'm announcing a comprehensive, new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan. And this marks the conclusion of a careful policy review, led by...

Drastic new tactics to prevent school pupils as young as 13 falling into extremism Exclusive by Mark Hughes Crime correspondent Two hundred schoolchildren in Britain, some as young as 13, have been identified as potential terrorists by a police scheme that aims to spot youngsters who are "vulnerable" to Islamic radicalisation. The number was revealed to The Independent by Sir Norman Bettison, the chief constable of West Yorkshire Police and Britain's most senior officer in charge of terror prevention. He said the "Channel project" had intervened in the cases of at least 200 children who were thought to be at risk of extremism, since it began 18 months ago. The number has leapt from 10 children identified by June 2008. The programme, run by the Association of Chief Police Officers, asks teachers, parents and other community figures to be vigilant for signs that may indicate an attraction to extreme views or susceptibility to being "groomed" by radicali...