NGO

Egypt
A study has indicated that water quality in the River Nile improved considerably in the months of October and November 2007, giving rise to hopes that drinking water quality for many of Egypt's 80 million people may improve. The quality of Nile water in its main course and in the Rosetta (Rashid) and Damietta (Dimyat) branches showed a 16 percent improvement over the average during the excess discharge period, according to a recent study by Egypt's Nile Research Institute (NRI) which is part of NWRC, the National Water Research Center. (IRIN)
Iran
Permanent members of the U.N. Security Council - as well as Germany - have agreed on the contents of a new draft resolution of fresh sanctions against Iran. The announcement was made by the German foreign minister after talks in Berlin with his counterparts from the U.S., France, the U.K., Russia and China. The U.S. and its European allies want a third set of sanctions over Iran's refusal to suspend uranium enrichment. Iran insists its nuclear program is for energy, not military purposes. (BBC)
Iraq
Up to 25 million land mines, or almost one for every Iraqi, remain buried in thousands of minefields across Iraq and are hampering development of rich oil deposits, officials said on Jan. 23. Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the mines were spread across about 4,000 minefields left across Iraq after the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War, the first Gulf War in 1991 and the 2003 U.S.-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein. Iraqi Environment Minister Nermeen Othman said she had been appointed by the government to lead efforts to clear Iraq of land mines. (Reuters)
Kuwait
Kuwait's only female cabinet minister, Nouria Sbeih, has survived a no-confidence vote in parliament. The education minister was accused of ignoring a sex segregation law at universities and presiding over a drop in educational standards. She denied the allegations and won the confidence vote by 27 to 19. Sbeih has been criticized by conservative and Islamist MPs for refusing to wear a headscarf when she was sworn into the cabinet. Women won the right to vote and run for office in Kuwait in 2005. (BBC)
Palestinian Authority
Tens of thousands of Palestinians have surged into Egypt from the Gaza Strip after masked militants destroyed parts of the border wall. Gazans rushed to buy food, fuel and other supplies that have become scarce because of an Israeli blockade - aimed at stopping rocket attacks from Gaza. Egyptian police took no action to stop people crossing. Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak says he allowed Gazans in to buy food, but Israel urged Egypt to restore security. Meanwhile, U.N. and Palestinian officials in Gaza have said some 760,000 liters of industrial fuel for Gaza's power plant were imported from Israel on Jan. 22, and another 200,000 were delivered on Jan. 23. (BBC)
Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia plans to start its first sovereign wealth fund with about USD 6 billion, channeling surplus crude-oil revenue into investments in foreign companies. "The Ministry of Finance is looking into a new fund," Muhammad al-Jasser, vice governor of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency, said in an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. "It will probably mostly invest in equities." Fueled by record oil prices and rising currency reserves, sovereign funds have ballooned to USD 3.2 trillion in assets. (Bloomberg)
Syria
Syria's economic growth will probably accelerate to at least 6.5 percent this year, driven by infrastructure projects and foreign direct investment, the country's deputy prime minister said. Expansion will quicken from 6.2 percent last year, Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs Abdallah Dardari said in a telephone interview. Foreign direct investment in Syria will increase as much as 4.3 percent to USD 2.4 billion this year as oil-rich Arab nations put money into real estate, banking and tourism, ignoring U.S. sanctions, Dardari sai

Security alert in H-Kashmir ahead of Indian Republic Day

 

NEW DELHI: A massive security alert has been sounded in held Kashmir ahead of Indian Republic Day celebrations.
Additional security forces deployed across the state, especially around vital installations to thwart any possible militant attacks.
The main function of Republic Day would be held at Bakshi Stadium where additional contingents of security forces have been deployed.

Security alert in H-Kashmir ahead of Indian Republic Day

 

NEW DELHI: A massive security alert has been sounded in held Kashmir ahead of Indian Republic Day celebrations.
Additional security forces deployed across the state, especially around vital installations to thwart any possible militant attacks.
The main function of Republic Day would be held at Bakshi Stadium where additional contingents of security forces have been deployed.

Iran, Syria must end interference in Lebanon: Bush

 

SHARM EL-SHEIKH: US Presidnet, George Bush, has said Syria and Iran must end their "interference" in Lebanese politics, as he ended his Middle East tour.
"It's important to encourage the holding of immediate and unconditional presidential elections according to the Lebanese constitution," Bush said on Wednesday in Egypt's Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
"And to make it clear to Syria, Iran and their allies they must end their interference and efforts to undermine the process," he said.
Bush arrived in Egypt from Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, and headed straight into talks with Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian president, on a three-hour visit.
In a press conference, Bush said Iraq's government "isn't perfect" but "progress" was being made on political reconciliation.
He called for Arab leaders to get behind Fouad Siniora, Lebanon's prime minister, and said that "nations in the neighbourhood" were willing to help Israelis and Palestinians reach a peace deal.
Mubarak endorsed US hopes for an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan concluding before the end of 2008, and said he will work hand-in-hand with the US and other nations.
Bush urged greater political openness in Egypt, but did not directly criticise the Egyptian government for what the US has previously noted as a lack of political freedoms.
"I'm absolutely confident that people in the Middle East are working on building a society based on justice," Bush said.

Strained ties haunt Bush visit to Egypt

 

CAIRO, Egypt - Egypt was meant to be a test case for President Bush's push for greater democracy in the Middle East. But stalled reforms and bitterness over the jailing of hundreds of dissidents are haunting his visit here Wednesday.

Activists say the U.S. democracy push has taken a back seat to politics. They blame Washington for easing its pressure on Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to win his support on key regional issues such as Iraq and the Israeli-Arab peace process.

At the same time, the Egyptian government has bristled over what it considers American interference, and ties between the longtime allies have cooled.

 

In a speech on democracy Sunday, Bush made no mention of Egypt except for what was widely seen as an implicit criticism of the country's crackdown on political opponents.

"You cannot build trust when you hold an election where opposition candidates find themselves harassed or in prison," Bush said in the United Arab Emirates. "And you cannot stand up a modern and confident nation when you do not allow people to voice their legitimate criticisms."

Across the Gulf, ruling families have shown little sign of easing their monopoly on power, and Bush was left to praise the few small reforms that have taken place. He pointed to municipal elections in Saudi Arabia, as well as votes in Bahrain, Kuwait and the UAE.

The speech reflected what appears to be warmer U.S. ties with Arab Gulf nations than with Egypt. Notably, Bush spent two days in Saudi Arabia this week, but will stop in Egypt for only several hours to meet Mubarak in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheik.

Kenya opposition poised for mass protests

 

The opposition was boosted Tuesday by the election of their candidate for parliament speaker, but Odinga's supporters promised to continue protesting until President Mwai Kibaki and his government acknowledge that his re-election was flawed.

Though braced for violence, Nairobi was mostly calm Wednesday with no sign of large crowds gathering by midday, though police fired tear gas and live rounds to quickly disperse a hundred young men in the Kibera slum.

Hurled tear gas
In the coastal city of Mombasa, police hurled tear gas and used batons to beat back several groups of protesters several-hundred strong on the outskirts of the city. In the western town of Kisumu, about 1,000 rowdy young men were on the streets carrying a coffin with Kibaki's name on it. Protesters there threw rocks at security forces and one bloodied demonstrator was wounded, though it was not clear how.

The western city of Eldoret was also quiet, though protesters there erected several makeshift roadblocks on the outskirts of town. On one, a dead dog was draped over a pile of rocks with a sign that said "Kibaki Death."

"We are going to keep up the pressure from every legal angle and through all peaceful means until the government agrees to acknowledge that the election results were false and that a solution must found to the political crisis," Odinga spokesman Salim Lone told The Associated Press.

"The rallies will show the government that the people of Kenya will not allow the theft of the election to stand."

Foreign and local election observers have said the vote count in the Dec. 27 presidential election was deeply flawed. And although the electoral chief pronounced Kibaki the victor, he later said he had been pressured to release the results and did not know who won.

Kenya's image marred
The postelection violence, in which more than 600 people have been killed and a quarter of a million displaced, has marred Kenya's image as a stable democratic oasis in a war-ravaged region and damaged its tourist-dependent economy. It has also aggravated long-simmering ethnic tensions and tribal conflicts over land ownership.

On Tuesday, lawmakers chose Kenneth Marende, a 52-year-old lawyer and opposition supporter, to be the new speaker of the National Assembly in a narrow 105-101 vote over a Kibaki loyalist.

The election marked the first parliament session since the controversial Dec. 27 vote. It also brought Kibaki and Odinga into the same room for the first time since then, but the two rivals studiously ignored each other.

Marende's victory buoyed the opposition. While the speaker cannot directly block Kibaki's legislative agenda, he can slow it with his rulings and allow motions against the president's policies to be debated.

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Kenyan neighbors, divided by tribe

Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan had been expected in the capital Tuesday night on a mediation mission, but the visit was postponed for several days after he fell ill with flu, his Geneva office said.

In an interview published Wednesday in the Kenyan Daily Nation newspaper, U.S. Ambassador Michael Ranneberger said it was not possible to say who won last month's vote because it was "not transparent." According to official results, Kibaki beat Odinga by 230,000 votes out of around 10 million ballots cast.

"But our analysis that the vote was extremely close highlights the need for political accommodation between two sides," Ranneberger said.

NAIROBI, Kenya - Police fired tear gas to disperse protesters in several Kenyan cities Wednesday at the start of three days of opposition rallies that threatened to plunge the nation's streets back into postelection violence.

Opposition leader Raila Odinga, whose supporters believe he was robbed of the presidency through vote rigging in last month's election, called the rallies in 42 locations nationwide, despite a government ban.

Similar rallies earlier this month degenerated into violence in the capital and other cities, with security forces beating back mobs of angry youths with water cannons, tear gas and live bullets, as homes in the capital's slums burned.

Japan working on central Tokyo missile shield: official

TOKYO: Japan on Tuesday carried out studies to deploy a missile defence shield in central Tokyo, officials said Tuesday, amid concern that the capital is at risk from North Korea.
The defence ministry conducted investigations on Monday and Tuesday into two locations for US-developed Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) surface-to-air interceptors, a defence spokesman said.
Two PAC-3 units were installed in suburban Tokyo last March, as Japan's relations remained tense with nuclear-armed North Korea.
"We took surveys of buildings, which would be obstacles for the PAC-3, and conducted technical tests on communications," the spokesman said.

One reported dead in Beirut blast

BEIRUT: At least one person was reported killed and 10 others injured in a car blast on a seafront road in a northern suburb of Beirut on Tuesday.
"There was a blast inside a car between the Dawra and Qarantina area and we have reports of injuries," a security official, who did not want to be named said while talking to a French news agency.
Local television said one person was killed in the blast along a seafront road, and television pictures showed smoke billowing into the skies over the capital. The cause was not immediately known.
Lebanon has been rocked by a string of bombings, most of which have targeted prominent anti-Syrian politicians.

Indian PM proposes nuclear energy cooperation with China

BEIJING: With a controversial nuclear deal with the United States now in limbo, India held out the possibility Tuesday of civilian nuclear cooperation with China.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, on the last day of a visit to China, said the world's two most populous nations who have a decades long history of mistrust should work together to develop their nuclear energy programmes.
"India seeks international cooperation in the field of civilian nuclear energy, including with China," Singh said, noting such cooperation could help the two countries meet their skyrocketing energy needs.
"The rapid growth of India and China will lead to expanding demand for energy. We have no choice but to widen our options for energy availability and develop viable strategies for energy security," he said in a speech at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
He did not go into further details.

Rice arrives in Baghdad for talks with Iraqi leaders

BAGHDAD: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has arrived in Baghdad for talks with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.
Rice flew from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where she was accompanying President George W. Bush on his Middle East tour. Her trip was announced in the Saudi capital as Bush was holding talks with Saudi officials.
"President Bush and Secretary Rice decided this would be a good opportunity for the secretary to go to Baghdad to meet with Iraqi officials to build on progress made and to encourage additional political reconciliation and legislative action,'' National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said.
He said Rice, who began talks with al-Maliki in his office, would return to Riyadh Tuesday night.

Fire at Iraq oil refinery injures four

BASRA: A blast at an oil refinery in the Iraqi city of Basra triggered a fire which injured four people on Tuesday, an oil ministry official said, but production was not affected.
The ministry blamed an overflying coalition forces helicopter for igniting gas particles in the air and causing the blast in the southern port city, but the US military denied the claim.
Talking to a French news agency, Spokesman Assim Jihad said that the explosion occurred at a gas production unit at the refinery in Basra, the second biggest city in Iraq whose port handles 80 percent of all the country's oil exports.
The blast sparked a fire which was brought under control within two hours by emergency services at the refinery and civil defence units, Jihad said, adding that four people suffered slight burn injuries.
Oil Minister Hussein Shahristani has blamed an overflying coalition forces helicopter for the explosion, according to Jihad. But US military spokesman Patrick Evans denied the claim by saying, "Our initial reporting indicates that there was a small fire, which has been contained."
"The cause of the fire is currently under investigation, but I can say that the fire was definitely not caused by a coalition overflight."
The ministry has frequently raised the dangers of helicopters overflying oil facilities in the oil-rich Basra region, where many flammable gas particles are in the air, Jihad said.

Syria should use its influence to end Lebanon crisis: Saudi Arab

 

RIYADH: Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal has urged Syria to convince its Lebanon allies to accept the Arab initiative aimed at settling the presidential crisis.
Al-Faisal, talking to reporters in Riyadh, also expressed the belief that success of the Arab initiative is "still possible."
"Syria is required to convince those who listen to its word in Lebanon of the solution that it had endorsed."
He said "hope persists" that the various factions in Lebanon would approve implementation of the Arab initiative.
"Syria should invest its influence in Lebanon to convince those who listen to its word of the solution adopted by the Arab League."
"Syria is required to invest this influence in the interest of Lebanon's independence and sovereignty."

Bush urges OPEC to increase oil output-In Saudi Arabia, president says high prices could cause U.S. slowdown

 

“It’s not going to matter to me one way or another,” Bush said. If the Iranians hit a U.S. ship, “there are going to be serious consequences,” he said.

U.S. officials claim Iranian speedboats swarmed three Navy warships in the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway that is the only entry and exit to the Persian Gulf. They said U.S. Navy commanders were considering firing warning shots, before the retreat of the five Iranian speedboats, which the Pentagon said were operated by the elite Revolutionary Guards.

Iran has denied that its boats threatened the U.S. vessels, saying the incident was a normal occurrence, and accused Washington of fabricating video and audio it released. Iran’s government has released its own video, which appeared to be shot from a small boat bobbing at least 100 yards from the American warships.

Pain of rising oil prices
The president spoke to reporters before meeting late Tuesday with Saudi King Abdullah, whose country holds the world’s largest supply of oil. Bush said U.S. consumers are feeling the pain of rising oil prices, which topped $100 a barrel this month.

“When consumers have less purchasing power, it could cause the economy to slow down,” Bush said. “I hope OPEC nations put more supply on the market,” he added. “It would be helpful.”

At the same time, he noted that the higher prices are guided by supply and demand, and that there is little excess capacity in the marketplace.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries next meets Feb. 1 in Vienna, Austria, to consider increasing output. OPEC oil accounts for about 40 percent of the world’s needs, and OPEC ministers often follow the lead of the Saudis when discussing whether to increase production to take the pressure off rising prices. The Saudis’ views carry great weight because Saudi Arabia is responsible for almost one-third of the cartel’s total output.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, traveling with Bush in the Mideast, slipped away from the Saudi capital at 6:40 a.m. Tuesday for an unscheduled visit to Baghdad for talks with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Bush said he had been encouraged by signs of progress in Baghdad and decided that she could “help push the momentum by her very presence.”

She congratulated the prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, on the passage of legislation reinstating former Saddam Hussein loyalists to government jobs and pushing for progress on other benchmark laws. At a Baghdad news conference, she said political progress has moved along “quite remarkably,” citing a new law that allows thousands of former members of Saddam Hussein’s Baath party to reclaim government jobs or pensions.

Rice added that the Iraqi parliament’s approval of that U.S.-sought law Saturday was a first step and showed that last year’s increase of U.S. troops in the country was paying dividends.

Bush said he would not go to Iraq while traveling in the region. There had been widespread speculation he would make a visit.

Focus on Israeli-Palestinian peace process
One of the primary objectives of trip is to build support for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. He said that Abdullah asked him why he was optimistic about securing an agreement before his White House term ends in January 2009.

“Part of my mission was to make clear why talks failed in the past. There wasn’t participation by the neighbors,” Bush said, referring to Arab countries that have kept an arm’s length from the negotiations.

Bush said he was convinced that the Arab leaders want to see the creation of a Palestinian state in a peace agreement with Israel. “They definitely want it to happen,” he said, “and they questioned the seriousness of the United States to remain involved in what has been a long and frustrating process.”

“They want to see a deal done,” he said. “The issue frustrates them.”

Bush spoke to the group of reporters while sitting in a chair under a gold and crystal chandelier in an ornate room of the kingdom’s guest palace. Bush said he has faced persistent questions during his trip about a new U.S. intelligence estimate that said Iran had abandoned its nuclear weapons program in 2003. That conclusion contradicted Bush’s claim that Iran was pursuing nuclear weapons and raised questions in the Mideast about U.S. intentions toward Iran.

The president said he made clear that the new finding was a judgment by independent intelligence agencies and that “all options are on the table for dealing with Iran.” At the same time, he said he has told leaders he wants a diplomatic solution.

Tensions flared anew with the confrontation last week in the Gulf. Bush said it would be up to the captains of the American ships to determine if their vessels are in jeopardy from Iranian boats.

“These are judgment calls and there are clear rules of engagement,” he said. Still, he told the Iranians: “They better be careful. If they hit one of our ships there are going to be serious consequences.”

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - President Bush urged OPEC nations on Tuesday to put more oil on the world market and warned that soaring prices could cause an economic slowdown in the United States.

“High energy prices can damage consuming economies,” the president told a small group of reporters traveling with him in the Mideast.

In a stern warning to Iran days after a Jan. 6 confrontation with U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf, Bush put Tehran on notice that it needs to be careful. The president said it would not matter to him whether an attack against an American vessel resulted from an order by the government in Iran or a rash decision by an Iranian boat captain.

Attack seen as setback for the U.N. in Darfur-Incident points to peacekeepers' lack of resources, critics say

UNITED NATIONS - A U.N.-African Union peacekeeping force faced the first major challenge to its authority in Darfur, Sudan, this week, enduring more than 10 minutes of hostile fire from Sudanese forces without responding with a single shot.

The assault Tuesday evening against a clearly marked supply convoy of more than 20 trucks and armored personnel vehicles left a Sudanese driver critically wounded and prompted a formal protest from U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. It also gave the U.N.-backed force a humiliating defeat during the critical first weeks of its mission in Darfur.

The United Nations' chief peacekeeping official, Jean-Marie Guehenno, vowed to "repel" future attacks against U.N. and African Union personnel. But other U.N. officials said the force's Nigerian commander, Gen. Martin Luther Agwai, lacks the firepower to respond forcefully to a larger and better-equipped Sudanese military.

The incident marked a setback to U.S.-backed efforts to end nearly five years of violence in Darfur through the deployment of more than 26,000 peacekeepers, mostly Africans. The mission replaced 7,000 African Union peacekeepers who had largely retreated to their barracks amid armed attacks.

So far the new force has about 9,000 peacekeepers, most of whom are African Union troops who simply replaced their green berets with blue U.N. berets.

The United States, the United Nations and other key powers had reason to believe an attack such as Tuesday's was coming. In September, an armed group assaulted an African Union base, killing 10 soldiers near the town of Haskanita. Since then, U.N. leaders have warned of the risk of failure from entering the Darfur conflict without adequate resources to repel an attack. But requests for vital equipment -- including 24 transport and attack helicopters -- have gone unanswered.

"If in this particular situation we had helicopters capable of flying at night and quickly reinforcing a convoy under attack, of course we would have been in a completely different situation," Guehenno said. "We would have been in a position to deter."

Sudan imposes hurdles
Sudan, meanwhile, has imposed technical hurdles for the mission, including the recent rejection of a unit of Nordic engineers, according to U.N. officials. The Sudanese authorities continue to haggle over the force's right to wear the U.N. blue helmets, recruit non-African troops and travel in Darfur without government approval.

Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, has accused the Sudanese government of "dragging its feet" in an attempt to ensure that the U.N.-backed force remains incapable of protecting civilians in Darfur.

But Khalilzad also conceded that inadequately equipping the force has placed the credibility of the United Nations and its political patrons, including the United States, at stake. "We need to take stock of this and consider steps that incentivize the government of Sudan to cooperate," he said.

Former Algerian diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi conducted a major review of U.N. peacekeeping in 2000, in which he concluded that peacekeepers should not enter war zones without consent from key belligerents or without a political settlement that the United Nations could implement. Where the United Nations does serve, he added, it must equip its troops to respond to armed "spoilers."

Those lessons have yielded some success in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Congo and Haiti, where the United Nations recovered from setbacks by engaging in offensive military operations to put down challenges from rebels and armed gangs.

Ill-prepared force faces live battle zone
But in Darfur, an ill-prepared peacekeeping force has entered a live battle zone involving combatants from the Sudanese army, neighboring Chad and a major Darfurian rebel group. Guehenno said: "There is a combination of factors that may lead to the greatest risk to the United Nations since the 1990s. We have a war ongoing, maybe low intensity, but a war ongoing, especially in West Darfur."

Sudan's U.N. ambassador, Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamad, initially denied that Sudan played a role in the attack, saying it was carried out by the Chadian government and local Darfurian rebels. "There is a big lie here," he said. "We have no relationship at all whatever with that attack."

But U.N. officials said a Sudanese commander has admitted that his force fired on the U.N. convoy. Sudan's Defense Ministry acknowledged Thursday that its troops carried out the attack, but it said the U.N.-backed force shared responsibility for the "mistake" because it had failed to alert Sudanese authorities that it was traveling in the area. The United Nations maintains that it provided adequate notice.

India and China pledge to strengthen trade, military ties

BEIJING: China and India pledged Monday to strengthen trade and military links and seek a solution to a border row, as India's prime minister sought to cement a rapid improvement in ties with a landmark visit.
The friendly atmosphere was tempered, however, by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's call for China to make concessions to reduce a growing two-way trade imbalance.
The Indian leader said he and his host Premier Wen Jiabao signed a broad agreement to push an often testy relationship to a new level of cooperation.
The pact lifts the target for bilateral trade -- which soared to 38.7 billion dollars last year -- to 60 billion dollars by 2010, and pledges a renewed effort to solve a Himalayan border dispute.
It also commits the two sides to another joint military exercise this year, following their first-ever exercise late last year, and to pursue a possible regional trade agreement, said Singh, who arrived on Sunday.
Singh called the document "an important milestone in the evolution of our relations." "The profound changes taking place in the world today present both our countries with a historic opportunity to work together towards a 21st century that is conducive to peace and development," he told reporters.
"It reflects not only our common perceptions but also our desire to purposefully cooperate in the future."

Norwegian FM arrives today

ISLAMABAD: Norwegian Foreign Minister Janos Guhrstore is arriving in Islamabad today (Sunday) on a two-day official visit and will leave for Afghanistan on Monday.

The Foreign Office spokesman while confirming the visit said that the visiting dignitary would be meeting caretaker Prime Minister Muhammadmian Soomro and Foreign Minister Inamul Haq but there is no confirmed report about his meeting with the president.

“Yes, it is an official visit and bilateral discussions as well as economic and political cooperation will be discussed. There is a sizeable number of Pakistanis in Norway,” the spokesman said.

The Norwegian foreign minister, who has a very tight schedule, will be taking time out to meet PPP leaders and offer his and his government’s condolences on the tragic assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

Janos Guhrstore was in Pakistan last year also. But what most Pakistanis remember is the visit of Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg to the earthquake-affected areas of Azad Kashmir. Images are still fresh in the minds of the Kashmiris as the shoeless prime minister sat down on the floor, with children who had survived and attempted to strike up conversations with them.