LARKANA: Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani on Friday condemned the flogging of a girl in Swat and ordered an inquiry into the incident.Talking to journalists here, Gilani said Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Shaheed and Zulikar Ali Bhutto were the champions of the rights of women and minorities, adding that the government will bring legislation in the parliament for the rights of women. About the situation in Swat and tribal areas, the prime minister said the government was following a three-pronged strategy i.e. dialogue, development and deterrence.He said the military option is not a permanent solution and is used as deterrence only when the writ of the government is challenged.The Prime Minister said Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had a mission for the country’s development and socio-economic progress of masses, which was also promoted and forwarded by Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Shaheed through her vision. He termed the Charter of Democracy (CoD), signed between Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Shaheed and PML (N) chief Mian Nawaz Sharif, a blueprint providing the country a way forward for development. The Prime Minister said Nizam-e-Adl Regulations were in vogue when Swat was a princely state, adding, in 1994 Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Shaheed had also approved these regulations. To a question about restoration of government in Punjab and the PPP’s participation, the Prime Minister said the party would decide whether to sit in government or in the opposition. The Prime Minister said the government believes in the politics of reconciliation and the PPP and PML (N) were in unison on the view not to destabilize each other’s government. He said the focus should be on national issues such as unemployment, poverty and law and order.
BAGHDAD: Nearly 500 U.S. Army combat engineers who specialize in clearing roads of explosives started shifting to southern Afghanistan."We are probably going to be the beginning of the influx you are going to see to Afghanistan," Lt. Col. Kevin Landers, commander of the Fort Carson, Colo.-based 4th Engineer Battalion, said as crews packed crates and cleaned vehicles for the flight to Kandahar.Obama has ordered 17,000 more U.S. soldiers and Marines to Afghanistan to bolster the 38,000 American troops already battling the resurgent Taliban."We are going to take this footprint out of Iraq," said Landers, whose battalion received word of its reassignment last month just after taking command of clearing roads in Baghdad of bombs and debris.
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