Top News - SC sets aside caretaker govt system

SC sets aside caretaker govt system


The Supreme Court has repealed the 13th Amendment to the constitution that introduced the caretaker government but said the next two general elections could be held under unelected rulers.

It, however, ruled that parliament may amend the charter deleting provisions that require the former chief justices or the judges of the Appellate Division to head the caretaker government.

The majority decision of a seven-member bench of the Appellate Division, headed by chief justice A B M Khairul Haque, was delivered on Tuesday, upon a petition against the High Court judgment that rejected an appeal challenging the 13th amendment.

The Supreme Court order says: "The Constitution (Thirteenth amendment) Act 1996 (Act 1 of 1996) is prospectively declared void and ultra vires the Constitution."

In the short order, the highest constitutional court said: " It is hereby declared: (1)The appeal is allowed by majority without any order as to costs. (2)The Constitution (Thirteenth amendment) Act. 1996(Act 1 of 1996) is prospectively declared void and ultra vires the Constitution.(3)

"The election to the Tenth and the Eleventh Parliament may be held under the provisions of the above mentioned Thirteenth Amendment on the age old principles, namely that which otherwise is not lawful, necessity makes lawful)…

"Parliament, however, in the meantime, is at liberty to bring necessary amendments excluding, the provisions of making the former Chief Justices of Bangladesh or the Judges of the Appellate Division as the head of the Non-Party Care-taker Government.

"The Judgment in detail would follow."

Attorney general Mahbubey Alam told bdnews24.com after the verdict, "The court rescinded the thirteenth amendment. It, however, said the next two general elections might be held under caretaker government for the sake of maintaining peace and law and order and for continuity.

"The court, at the same time, opined not to involve the judiciary in the process."

He later told reporters, "The next two elections can be held under caretaker government, but not beyond those. The constitution has to be amended by this time."

The petitioner's lawyer Advocate M I Faruki, in his reaction, told reporters, "It bodes well for the constitution and the people. We have been able to preserve the constitution.

"Election should ideally be held under the Election Commission, which is the case with our neighbour India," the lawyer added.

"Caretaker government provision in reality is another form of military rule. A number of sections of the constitution get suspended under military rule which we witnessed in Zia's tenure and also in Pakistani rule.

"Likewise, several constitutional sections are suspended during caretaker government," Faruki said.

The 13th amendment carried out in 1996 introduced the caretaker government system in the country.

As per the provision, subsequent governments have been elected in ballots held under such provisional governments after the previous elected governments ran their terms.

The full bench heard the petition from Mar 1 to Apr 6 and the views of Kamal Hossain, T H Khan, Rafique-ul Haque, M Zahir, Mahmudul Islam, Amir-Ul Islam, Roklanuddin Mahmud and Ajmalul Hossain as amici curiae.

The petitioners said in the petition that the caretaker government system goes against the republican character of the state.

In 2004, the High Court declared the caretaker government system legal following a writ petition by advocate Salim Ullah and several other lawyers challenging the legality of the amendment.

Thereafter, the petitioners moved the Appellate Division against the order.

Now, Mohammad Abdul Mannan Khan is treated the petitioner, as Salim Ullah died and another petitioner, Ruhul Quddus was made a High Court judge.

Khan, in his reaction, told reporters, "I am delighted at the verdict."

The full bench heard the petition from Mar 1 to Apr 6.

Although the caretaker government system was introduced in 1996, a similar instrument was already in operation, since the general election in 1990 was held under an interim government after military strongman H M Ershad was deposed.

The then BNP government in 1996 brought the amendment under pressure from the then opposition Awami League.

Questions were raised about the system when the military-backed caretaker government came during the state of emergency after the political crisis in 2006 to rule for nearly two years, well past its mandated term of three months.

During the ongoing parliamentary exercise to review the constitution, recommendations have been made to put a timeframe on the caretaker government.

Prime minister and Awami League president Sheikh Hasina suggested if the caretaker government fails to ensure elections in three months, the previously elected government would do the job.

Of the amici curiae or friends of the court, Ajmalul Hossain spoke against the system while most others spoke for revision of the system.

Several leaders of ruling Awami League were critical of the caretaker provision.

Main opposition BNP has already declared it would wage movement if the system is scrapped.

Microsoft to buy Skype for $8.5 bln

Microsoft to buy Skype for $8.5 bln


Microsoft Corp agreed to buy Internet telephone company Skype for $8.5 billion in cash in its biggest deal ever, as the technology giant seeks to plug a hole in its mobile offerings.

Buying loss-making Skype would have no immediate impact on Microsoft's finances, but would make clear its intention to compete with rivals such as Apple Inc and Google Inc.

Reuters first reported about the deal earlier on Tuesday, quoting sources.

Microsoft already has video chat as a function in its Windows Live Messenger service, but it is not available on its Windows Phone 7 software.

Skype also makes versions of its own service which can be used as an application on the iPhone and iPad, Research in Motion's BlackBerry and Android phones. It cannot be used on Microsoft phones.

Osama mission: A Pak-US secret deal

Osama mission: A Pak-US secret deal

The US and Pakistan struck a secret deal almost a decade ago permitting a US operation against Osama bin Laden on Pakistani soil similar to last week's raid that killed the al-Qaeda leader, reports The Guardian.

The deal was struck between the military leader General Pervez Musharraf and President George Bush after Bin Laden escaped US forces in the mountains of Tora Bora in late 2001, according to serving and retired Pakistani and US officials.

Under its terms, Pakistan would allow US forces to conduct a unilateral raid inside Pakistan in search of Bin Laden, his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and the al-Qaeda No3. Afterwards, both sides agreed, Pakistan would vociferously protest the incursion.

"There was an agreement between Bush and Musharraf that if we knew where Osama was, we were going to come and get him," said a former senior US official with knowledge of counterterrorism operations. "The Pakistanis would put up a hue and cry, but they wouldn't stop us."

The deal puts a new complexion on the political storm triggered by Bin Laden's death in Abbottabad, 35 miles north of Islamabad, where a team of US navy Seals assaulted his safe house in the early hours of 2 May.

Pakistani officials have insisted they knew nothing of the raid, with military and civilian leaders issuing a strong rebuke to the US. If the US conducts another such assault, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani warned parliament on Monday, "Pakistan reserves the right to retaliate with full force."

Days earlier, Musharraf, now running an opposition party from exile in London, emerged as one of the most vocal critics of the raid, terming it a "violation of the sovereignty of Pakistan".

But under the terms of the secret deal, while Pakistanis may not have been informed of the assault, they had agreed to it in principle.

A senior Pakistani official said it had been struck under Musharraf and renewed by the army during the "transition to democracy" – a six-month period from February 2008 when Musharraf was still president but a civilian government had been elected.

Referring to the assault on Bin Laden's Abbottabad compound, the official added: "As far as our American friends are concerned, they have just implemented the agreement."

The former US official said the Pakistani protests of the past week were the "public face" of the deal. "We knew they would deny this stuff."

The agreement is consistent with Pakistan's unspoken policy towards CIA drone strikes in the tribal belt, which was revealed by the WikiLeaks US embassy cables last November. In August 2008, Gilani reportedly told a US official: "I don't care if they do it, as long as they get the right people. We'll protest in the National Assembly and then ignore it."

As drone strikes have escalated in the tribal belt over the past year, senior civilian and military officials issued pro forma denunciations even as it became clear the Pakistani military was co-operating with the covert programme.

The former US official said that impetus for the co-operation, much like the Bin Laden deal, was driven by the US. "It didn't come from Musharraf's desire. On the Predators, we made it very clear to them that if they weren't going to prosecute these targets, we were, and there was nothing they could do to stop us taking unilateral action.

"We told them, over and again: 'We'll stop the Predators if you take these targets out yourselves.'"

Despite several attempts to contact his London office, the Guardian has been unable to obtain comment from Musharraf.

Since Bin Laden's death, Pakistan has come under intense US scrutiny, including accusations that elements within Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence helped hide the al-Qaeda leader.

On Sunday, President Barack Obama said Bin Laden must have had "some sort of support network" inside Pakistan.

"We don't know whether there might have been some people inside of government, outside of government, and that's something we have to investigate," Obama said.

Gilani has stood firmly by the ISI, describing it as a "national asset", and said claims that Pakistan was "in cahoots" with al-Qaeda were "disingenuous".

"Allegations of complicity or incompetence are absurd," he said. "We didn't invite Osama bin Laden to Pakistan."

Gilani said the army had launched an investigation into how Bin Laden managed to hide inside Pakistan. Senior generals will give a briefing on the furore to parliament next Friday.

Gilani paid lip-service to the alliance with America and welcomed a forthcoming visit from the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, but pointedly paid tribute to help from China, whom he described as "a source of inspiration for the people of Pakistan".

NATO strikes target Gaddafi compound: witnesses

NATO strikes target Gaddafi compound: witnesses


A number of blasts were heard from apparent NATO missile strikes targeting Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's compound and other sites in Tripoli on Tuesday, witnesses said.

Libyan officials said four children were wounded, two of them seriously, by flying glass caused by blasts from NATO strikes in the Tripoli area overnight.

Officials showed foreign journalists a hospital in the Libyan capital where some windows had been shattered, saying the damage was the result of a NATO strike that toppled a nearby telecommunications tower.

The journalists were also taken to a government building housing the high commission for children that had been completely destroyed. The old colonial building had been damaged before in what officials said was a NATO strike on April 30.

No other information was immediately available, but the Tripoli blasts occurred against a backdrop of a stalemate in the rebel war to unseat Gaddafi and the resulting dilemma for Western powers over whether to offer covert aid to the rebels.

Few details were immediately available, but the blasts occurred against a backdrop of a stalemate in the rebel war to unseat Gaddafi and the resulting dilemma for Western powers over whether to offer covert aid to the rebel cause.

On Monday, rebels said NATO bombed government arms depots four times during the day about 30 km (20 miles) southeast of Zintan, a town in the Western Mountains region where conflict is escalating.

"The site has some 72 underground hangars made of reinforced concrete. We don't know how many were destroyed. But each time the aircraft struck we heard multiple explosions," a rebel spokesman, who gave his name as Abdulrahman, said by telephone.

Another rebel spokesman said the planes also struck around Tamina and Chantine, east of Misrata, where besieged rebels are clinging on in the last city they control in western Libya.

Gaddafi's forces have launched a ferocious assault on Misrata and hundreds have been killed in weeks of fighting.

Opposition newspaper Brnieq said Libyan rebels were leading an uprising in the suburbs of Tripoli after being supplied with light weapons by defecting security service officers.

The report on the newspaper's website could not be independently verified. A Reuters reporter said he could not hear any gunfire and a government official denied the report.

Two months into a conflict linked to this year's uprisings in other Arab countries, rebels hold Benghazi and towns in the east while the government controls the capital and other cities.

The government says most Libyans support Gaddafi, the rebels are armed criminals and al Qaeda militants, and NATO's intervention is an act of colonial aggression by Western powers intent on stealing the country's oil.

Libyan state television reinforced that view, saying NATO warships bombed "military and civilian targets" in Misrata and in the adjacent town of Zlitan on Monday.

WESTERN DILEMMA

The military deadlock confronts allies including the United States, Britain and France with a choice over whether to exploit loopholes in the sanctions regime they engineered in February and March to help the rebels, analysts and UN diplomats said.

Another option would be to circumvent the sanctions secretly but both courses risk angering Russia and China. They wield U.N. Security Council vetoes and are increasingly critical of NATO's operations under a resolution aimed at protecting civilians.

The rebels face a government with superior firepower and resources but they reported a financial breakthrough on Monday, selling oil worth $100 million paid for through a Qatari bank in US dollars.

A rebel military commander said his fighters killed 57 troops and destroyed 17 military vehicles during a major battle west of the insurgent-held city of Ajdabiya on Monday.

The commander, whose statement could not be immediately verified, also told Al-Jazeera television two rebels were killed in the fighting, halfway between Ajdabiya and the strategic oil port of Brega where Gaddafi forces are entrenched.

Given the rebels' failure to achieve their main target of toppling Gaddafi, the war is focused on Misrata, Zintan and a Libyan border crossing near the Tunisian town of Dehiba.

Two rebel spokesmen in Misrata spoke of intense fighting in the city and at its strategically important airport.

Rebels were trying to extinguish fires at a fuel storage depot bombarded by the government on Friday.

A ship chartered by the International Committee of the Red Cross arrived in Misrata, bringing medical supplies, spare parts to repair water and electrical systems and baby food.

The war has killed thousands and caused extensive suffering, not least for tens of thousands of economic migrants from sub-Saharan Africa forced to flee overland or by boat.

Dozens have died trying to reach Italy and the migration creates not only the possibility of a humanitarian crisis but also poses a political headache for NATO and the European Union.

Top News ISI chief leaves for Washington

ISI chief leaves for Washington

Pakistan's spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) chief Lt Gen Shuja Pasha on Friday left for Washington to explain Pakistan's position on the presence of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in the country before he was killed in a May 2 US raid, reports Pakistan-based newspaper Dawn.

Gen Pasha set off on the critical mission for putting an end to misgivings about Pakistan in the US a day after army's top brass conceded intelligence failure in detecting Laden's presence in the vicinity of the elite military training institute, and ordered an investigation.

Meanwhile, The Daily Beast, a sister website of Newsweek, said the most likely candidate to be the fall guy was Lt Gen Ahmad Shuja Pasha, the director general of the country's spy agency, the ISI directorate.

In a last ditch effort to control the damage and to assure the US that the ISI was not harboring bin Laden and was unaware of his presence in Pakistan, Pasha reportedly flew to Washington on Friday.

But some high-level sources who refused to be quoted or named say his resignation is only a matter of time.