Blocked from presidency, Suu Kyi to be Myanmar foreign min

Naypyidaw, Mar 22, 2016, (AFP)

Aung San Suu Kyi will be foreign minister in Myanmar's first civilian government for decades, her party said today, giving the democracy champion a formal post despite being blocked from the presidency.

The Nobel laureate has already vowed to rule above the man picked as president, Htin Kyaw, in the government which comes to power next week in the former army-ruled nation.

Suu Kyi was the sole woman and one of only six members of her National League for Democracy party in a cabinet list read out to lawmakers early today by the parliament speaker Mann Win Khaing Than, who did not specify which position she or others would hold.

But NLD spokesman Zaw Myint Maung later confirmed she would lead the foreign ministry and hinted that she would also hold other roles, without specifying which ones.

"She will be the foreign minister, mainly. If she wants to share the duties she has in other ministries with qualified people, she can assign them," he told reporters.

The NLD only named 15 ministers for 18 posts chosen by the civilian government, sparking speculation that Suu Kyi would take on four portfolios -- widely believed to be foreign affairs, education, energy and the president's office.

Oxford-educated Suu Kyi, 70, is the daughter of Myanmar's independence hero and towered over the country's democracy movement as it waged a spirited and non-violent struggle against almost half a century of military rule. But she is blocked from the presidency by the junta-drafted constitution because her two sons are British, as was her late husband.

Myanmar has undergone a stunning political transformation in recent years, blossoming from isolation under the junta to become an increasingly vibrant nation. Its growing political openness was crowned by a historic November election that saw the NLD storm to victory. But the country still faces huge challenges, including the continued might of an army that for years viewed Suu Kyi and her party with deep suspicion.

The NLD has operated under a veil of secrecy since the polls, only revealing its choice of president days before his election by  parliament last week.

Suu Kyi has held several rounds of talks with army chief Min Aung Hlaing since the elections, but was unable to remove the constitutional barrier to her presidency.

The foreign ministry role gives her international clout and a seat at the influential military-dominated Security Council.

"She wants to be at the heart of government. She wants to do it properly and formally and -- this is important to her -- legally," Trevor Wilson, an academic at Australian National University and former ambassador to Myanmar, told AFP.

Under Myanmar's complex political rules, the cabinet role means she will have to forgo her seat in parliament, although her party insisted she would maintain her chairmanship of the NLD.

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Pak hands over 86 Indian fishermen to India at Wagah Border

Lahore, Mar 21, 2016 (PTI)

Pakistan today handed over 86 Indian fishermen to India at the Wagah Border, a day after they were released by the authorities upon completing their one-year sentence for allegedly trespassing into Pakistan's territorial waters.

"We have handed over 86 Indian fishermen to the Indian authorities today after verifying their documents," Rangers official Maj Waheed told PTI.

Pakistan yesterday released 86 Indian fishermen from Malir Jail in Karachi, second time this month that Pakistan released Indian fishermen.

Some 87 Indian fishermen were also released on March 6 and today's release of 86 brings the total to 173.

The fishermen arrived here in the morning by train. The Edhi Foundation arranged buses for them to the Wagah Border.

The fishermen were released after they completed their sentences of one year. Some 377 more Indian prisoners are languishing in the Malir jail out of whom 116 have to complete their sentences while the remaining 261 are undertrials.

All the fishermen hail from Gujarat. One of the freed prisoners Nanu Jeta told Dawn News that he was grateful for the facilities extended to him by the jail staff here.

Both Indian and Pakistani fishermen are often arrested for illegal fishing since the Arabian Sea border is not clearly defined and many boats lack the technology to fix their precise location.

In two incidents last month, Pakistan arrested 108 Indian fishermen and seized a total of 20 boats for what they called was illegally fishing in Pakistan's territorial waters. 

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I was a suicide bomber: Paris suspect

BRUSSELS/PARIS, March2o, 2016, (Reuters):

 The prime surviving suspect for the Nov. 13 Paris attacks planned to blow himself up at a sports stadium with fellow Islamic State militants but changed his mind, he told Belgian investigators on Saturday.

The admission by Salah Abdeslam came a day after he was shot in the leg and captured during a police raid in Brussels, ending an intensive four-month manhunt.

"He wanted to blow himself up at the Stade de France and ... backed out," said the lead French investigator, Francois Molins,

quoting Abdeslam's statement to a magistrate in Brussels before he was transferred to a secure jail in Bruges.

The gun and bomb attacks on the stadium, bars and a concert hall killed 130 people and marked the deadliest militant assault in Europe since 2004.

Molins told reporters in Paris that people should treat with caution initial statements by the 26-year-old French national. But his capture and apparent urge to talk marked a major breakthrough for investigators after the trail had seemed to go cold.

Abdeslam's lawyer said he admitted being in Paris during the attacks but gave no details. He told reporters his client, born and raised by Moroccan immigrants in Brussels, had cooperated with investigators but would fight extradition to France.

Legal experts said his challenge was unlikely to succeed but would buy him weeks, possibly months, to prepare his defence.

Belgian prosecutors charged Abdeslam and a man arrested with him with "participation in terrorist murder".

Abdeslam's elder brother Brahim, with whom he used to run a bar, was among the suicide bombers. Salah's confession suggested he was the 10th man mentioned in an Islamic State claim of responsibility for the attacks, after which police found one suicide vest abandoned in garbage.

Abdeslam's family, who had urged him to give himself up, said through their lawyer that they had a "sense of relief".

Authorities hope the arrest may help disrupt other militant cells that Belgian Foreign Minister Didier Reynders said were certainly "out there" and planning further violence. French security services stepped up their measures at frontier crossings after a global warning from Interpol that other fugitives might try to move country.

"We've won a battle against the forces of ignorance but the struggle isn't over," Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel said.

The case has raised tensions with France but Michel and French President Francois Hollande, who was in Brussels for an EU summit when Abdeslam was arrested, praised each other's security services. Hollande was attending an international soccer match at the Stade de France when the bombers struck.

FLIGHT RISK

A man using false papers in the names of Amine Choukri and Monir Ahmed Alaaj was also charged with terrorist murder. As Choukri, he was documented by German police in the city of Ulm in October when he was stopped in a car with Abdeslam. French prosecutor Molins said Abdeslam travelled widely to prepare the attacks.

A third man in the house when the pair were arrested was charged with belonging to a terrorist organisation. He and a woman who was present were charged with concealing criminals.

Police had sought Abdeslam since he called two acquaintances in Belgium in a panic, hours after the attacks, to have them collect him and bring him home. Suspected to be as far away as Syria, it seems he was in Brussels all or most of the time.

Failure to complete his mission could have limited his access to any support from Syria-based Islamic State; the chief Belgian investigator on the case said he had instead relied on a network of friends, family and neighbours with whom he had a history of drug trafficking and petty crime.

Security agencies' difficulties in penetrating some Muslim communities, particularly in pursuit of Belgium's unusually high number of citizens fighting in Syria, have been a key factor in the inquiry.

PARIS RELIEF

As Parisians, and families of the victims, voiced relief at the arrest, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said after an emergency cabinet meeting that a trial could answer questions for those who suffered in the attacks.

"Abdeslam will have to answer to French justice for his acts," he said. "It is an important blow to the terrorist organisation Daesh (Islamic State) in Europe."

A trickle of people came to a makeshift memorial in central Paris, near the scene of much of the bloodshed, to pay their respects.

"It's really a relief," said Emilien Bouthillier, who works in the neighbourhood. "I can't wait for Belgium to transfer and return him to France so he can be tried the way he should be."

Friday's armed swoop came after Abdeslam's fingerprints were found at an apartment following a bloody raid on Tuesday in which an Algerian was shot dead and police officers wounded.

Later, local media said, a tip-off and a tapped telephone led police to a mobile phone number used by Abdeslam and, by triangulating the device's location, established where he was.

At his nearby newspaper store, a vendor named Dominique said Abdeslam had been well known and liked in the community: "He was a very nice lad before," he said. "How can things go this far?"

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10 simultaneous terror attack feared in London: report

London, Mar 20, 2016, (PTI)

Security agencies in the UK have been alerted to prepare for up to 10 simultaneous terror attacks in London as they fear repetition of Paris-style attack here by terrorists returning from Syria, according to a media report today.
A minister familiar with the proposals said: "We used to plan for three simultaneous attacks but Paris has shown that you need to be ready for more than that. We are ready if someone tries with seven, eight, nine, ten".

The National Crime Agency has been ordered to make a crackdown on firearms a priority amid fears of a Paris-style attack by terrorists returning from Syria, the Sunday Times reported.

Army regiments outside London are also on standby to help the The Special Air Services (SAS) and Metropolitan police in the event of a multiple target attack.

The army's counter terrorist bomb disposal unit is also building a team at Didcot barracks in Oxfordshire to combat a chemical or biological "dirty bomb".

A recent SAS training exercise involved tackling improvised explosive devices laced with weapons of mass destruction.

Extremists in Britain's jails face a security clampdown amid concerns about a terrorist atrocity.

Officials fear terrorist prisoners will attempt to film an attack against non-Muslim prison guards and post it online using smuggled mobile phones.

The moves come as it was claimed Belgian police deliberately shot Salah Abdeslam, 26, who played a key role in Paris attacks in November, in the knee during a raid in Brussels on Friday as punishment for an earlier assault on their colleagues.

"It was a little present for wounding police officers," an investigation source said.

Abdeslam told Belgian investigators he was supposed to blow himself up in Paris but backed out at the last moment.  

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Istanbul suicide attack kills 4, wounds 20: Governor

Istanbul, Mar 19, 2016 (AFP)

A suicide bombing rocked a major shopping street in Istanbul today, killing four people and wounding 20 others just six days after a deadly attack in Ankara, Turkish authorities said.
The attack took place on Istiklal Caddesi, a pedestrian street that was relatively quiet this morning but is usually thronged with shoppers, strollers and buskers later in the day.

"This is a suicide attack, a terrorist attack," Istanbul governor Vasip Sahin told reporters at the scene, saying the bomber was also killed.

Three of the wounded were in serious condition, he said.

The bomb exploded near a shopping mall, but Sahin said the intended target was a local authority building in the Beyoglu neighbourhood, where Istiklal Caddesi is situated.

The street, which adjoins Taksim Square in the European part of the city, was evacuated after the attack, an AFP journalist at the scene said. Armed police sealed off the area while a police helicopter hovered overhead.

CCTV footage published online by Dogan news agency appeared to show the moment of the blast with a fireball erupting near a handful of passersby, sending them rushing for cover.

Television images showed several ambulances ferrying the injured to hospital.

Turkey, which has been rocked by five major bombings since July, had been on high alert for further attacks ahead of Kurdish New Year celebrations on Monday.

A Kurdish rebel group, the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAK), claimed responsibility for an attack on March 13 on a busy transport hub in Ankara that killed 35 people.

TAK, which also claimed a similar car bombing in Ankara in mid February that killed 29 people, has ties to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) against which the Turkish army is waging a major military campaign.

A court in Ankara yesterday evening remanded five people in custody on suspicion of links to last week's attack in the capital which was carried out by a 24-year-old female student named by TAK as Seher Cagla Demir.

In a statement, TAK said the bombing aimed to avenge Kurds killed during a ongoing military offensive against the PKK in the majority Kurdish southeast and said it had not meant to target civilians.

Yesterday, Turkish airforce planes continued to bomb PKK hideouts in mountains across the border in northern Iraq, an army statement said.

During the week, the US embassy in Ankara had issued a warning to its citizens in Turkey to exercise caution ahead of the Kurdish Nevruz (New Year) celebrations, which have been a flashpoint for pro-Kurdish demonstrations in the past.

The Islamic State jihadist group was blamed for three other large-scale attacks in recent months, including a suicide attack in January in Istanbul in which 12 German tourists were killed and an attack on a peace rally in Ankara in October that claimed 103 lives.

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