Turkish political leader celebrates Eid with Pakistan flood affectees

The President of the Great Union Party (Büyük Birlik Partisi) of Turkey,  Mr. Yalcin TOPCU, visited Pakistan from 16-19 November 2010 and celebrated   Eid-ul-Adha with the flood affectees at Nowshehra.  He visited the tent camps that were build after the devastating floods.  He witnessed the worst affected areas hit from natural calamity and also felt the colossal lose of life and property at Nowshera.  

Mr. Yalcin handed over the keys of  houses of 5 housing compounds in a ceremony. Provincial Ministers of Khyber Pukhtunkhwa also participated in the event. The new village rebuilt with the Turkish assistance near Nowshehra was named "Muhsin" after the BBP founding Shahid President Muhsin Yaziciolglu.  Mr. Yalcin announced establishment of hospital in addition to building four more housing compounds.

During his visit, the Turkish dignitary distributed fertilizer so that affecteed farmers could grow better crop this season.

Persistent Turkish support for Pakistan flood affectees

ANKARA, Nov 23:  The exceptional support and solidarity of the Turkish people for the flood affectees of Pakistan is continuous. In this connection, the Mamak Anatolian Vocational Religious High School, Ankara, organized a fund-raiser today which was attended by Mayor of Mamak Municipality and senior officials of Pakistan Embassy in Turkey.

Expressing gratitude of the people and Government of Pakistan, Mr. Moin ul Haque, Deputy Head of Mission said the affection and care of the Turkish people for Pakistan has no match around the world. “Our confidence grows when we see such display of solidarity and support of our Turkish brethren,” said Mr. Haque.

He lauded the spirit and zeal of the students and teachers who organized the event. 

Appeal to help Pakistan’s flood affectees

ANKARA, Nov 12: While appreciating the exceptional support and solidarity of the Turkish nation and its leadership, the Embassy of Pakistan in Turkey reiterates its earlier appeal for helping the flood affectees of Pakistan’s worst floods.

“I convey the profound gratitude of the government and people of Pakistan over the very generous and substantial funds raised for Pakistan’s flood affectees,” said Pakistan’s Ambassador to Turkey H.E. Mr. Tariq Azizuddin.

“While the funds and relief assistance provided by our Turkish brethren and other nations are being utilized in a most judicious and transparent manner, millions of the flood victims still needs food and shelter and the winter is approaching fast,” the Ambassador added.

Pakistan Prime Minister’s Flood Relief Fund Account Numbers in Turkey:

US Dollar Account:                3457808/5010

Turkish Lira Account:             3457808/5011

T.C. Ziraat Bankasi A.Ş., Gaziosmanpaşa, Filistin Sok. No. 12, ANKARA

Pakistan’s Cabinet concerned about US support for India’s UNSC membership

Pakistan’s Cabinet concerned about US support for India’s UNSC membership

Reform should be comprehensive, democratic and representative – FM Qureshi

 ANKARA, Nov 12:  The Federal Cabinet of Pakistan chaired by the Prime Minister in its meeting held on November 10 expressed serious concern and strong disappointment over the decision of the United States to support a permanent seat for India on the UN Security Council.

This decision has grave ramifications for the direction and prospects of the system of multilateral cooperation as envisaged by the founding fathers of UN Charter. It also has implications for peace and security and stability in Asia, particularly South Asia.

It is incomprehensible that the US has sought to support India, whose credentials with respect to observing UN Charter principles and international law are at best checkered. This is most explicitly illustrated by India’s disregard of Security Council Resolutions on Jammu and Kashmir and gross and systematic violations of the fundamental human rights of the Kashmiri people.

Any reform of the Council that contradicts the very fundamental principles of the UN Charter including the principle of sovereign equality; of equal rights and self-determination; and the principle of collective security would gravely undermine the system of international relations based on the UN Charter principles.

Pakistan, along with a large number of members of the international community, supports a principled process of reform of the Security Council. The future of UN cannot and must not be premised on considerations of power politics, politics of expediency and bereft of morals and ideals.

As Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said, “Pakistan desires a comprehensive, democratic and representative expansion of the Security Council.”

ENDS

Energy ship sets sail to Pakistan

Karadeniz Powership Kaya Bey on the way to Pakistan

Karadeniz Energy Group launched its third powership to Pakistan last week. The ship, called “Karadeniz Powership Kaya Bey,” is capable of producing 220MW energy and is renowned for being the biggest powership in the world. Aiming to meet the electricity demand of flood-stricken Pakistan, Kaya Bey is the third ship sent to the country. It also contains aid containers prepared for the flood victims.

Source:  Hurriyet Daily News & Economic Review, 9th November 2010

Pak-Turkey Relations “Extraordinary” - Envoy

ANKARA, Nov 5: Pakistan-Turkey relations are of extraordinary nature and a huge reservoir of emotions and goodwill of the two countries is making them further stronger. Pakistan’s Ambassador to Turkey H.E. Mr. Tariq Azizuddin said this while briefing a visiting delegation of officers of Senior Management Course of the National Management College who are currently on a study tour of Turkey.
The Ambassador informed that efforts are being made by both Pakistan and Turkey to translate the excellent brotherly relations into good economic ties. In this direction, current annual volume of bilateral trade shall be enhanced from existing US$ 780 million to US$ 2 billion by the year 2012, he added.
“Improving communication links between the two countries are also being explored,” said Mr. Azizuddin. As the initiative of the President of Pakistan, improving rail link between Pakistan and Turkey through Iran is also pursued. He informed that a truck caravan of Economic Cooperation Organization member countries recently completed its journey from Islamabad to Istanbul that highlights the viability of road transport in the region.
ENDS

'Turkish Town' to rise in devastated Pakistan - Hurriyet Daily News and Economic Review

'Turkish Town' to rise in devastated Pakistan - Hurriyet Daily News and Economic Review

Pakistan grateful to Turkish nation for historic support – Pak Envoy

ANKARA, October 31: The support provided by the people and leadership of Turkey for mitigating the sufferings of food affectees of Pakistan is unprecedented and the people and Government of Pakistan will never forget this historic support. Pakistan’s Ambassador to Turkey, H.E. Mr. Tariq Azizuddin said this at a fund-raiser (Meena Bazar) organized by Türkiye-Pakistan Gönül Köprüsü Platformu at Ankara on Saturday.

Türkiye-Pakistan Gönül Köprüsü Platformu is an umbrella organization of Turkish NGOs working for the flood affectees of Pakistan.
The Ambassador commended that Turkey was the first country which had started building pre-fabricated home villages for the affectees in disaster hit cities including Nowshera and Muzaffargarh.
“Our friendship is deep rooted in history and culture,” said Mr. Tariq Azizuddin. “Turkey is always at the forefront of international efforts whenever Pakistan was hit by a disaster. Other nations and countries have also provided assistance, but the spirit and dedication of Turkish people has no parallel,” he added.
President of the Platform Mr. Burhan Kayaturk who is also President of the Turkish-Pakistan Friendship Association, and Mr. Osman Arslan, Secretary General of the Platform also addressed the gathering.
A music concert by famous Turkish artist Hasan Sağındık was also part of the grand show. A documentary highlighting the scale of flood disaster was also shown to the audience.
ENDS

Recalling the Black Day of Kashmir

 Recalling the Black Day of Kashmir   By Momin Iftikhar

October 27, each year, is remembered as the Black Day across the length and breadth of Pakistan and the entire State of Jammu and Kashmir for the reason that on this inauspicious day the Indian occupational forces landed in Srinagar that started a chain reaction of events, which has continued to haunt the subcontinent to this very day.

On this day, in 1947, the festering tragedy of Kashmir was born; an act of aggression that has consigned the prospects of normalising the Indo-Pak relations to the realm of perpetual animosity, which has already led to two wars, in addition to the Kargil skirmishes of 1999.

Even when the partition of India and Pakistan had been formalised and announced on August 14, the princely State of Jammu and Kashmir - ruled by Maharaja Hari Singh - remained in a state of limbo. It was one of the 584 princely states, which - with the lapse of paramountcy of the British Crown in August - had to make the choice of acceding either to India or Pakistan. Kashmir’s predominantly Muslim population, their contiguity to Pakistan and the layout of major communication infrastructure made its accession to Pakistan a natural corollary of the unfolding events. However, given Nehru’s pathological fixation over Kashmir, strengthened by Lord Mountbatten’s machinations, this was not to be.

The invasion of Kashmir was on the cards, even as the boundary between India and Pakistan was being carved out through an award by Sir Cyril Radcliffe. When the Boundary Award was announced its most controversial decision dealt with the awarding of the Gurdaspur district to India, despite its Muslim majority and contiguity to the Pakistani territory. It is now certain that Nehru by manipulating his intimate contacts with Lord Mountbatten contrived through the Boundary Award to provide a land route to India for its ultimate occupation of Kashmir. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph on February 1992, Radcliffe’s Secretary, Christopher Beaumont, confirmed that the Boundary Award was manipulated by Mountbatten at the behest of Nehru. Developing the Gurdaspur access enabled India to effectively link up with the Kashmir Valley through a land route and be able to support large-scale operations in the State of Jammu and Kashmir.

Nehru now sought two politico-military objectives: First, to force the Maharaja to sign an instrument of accession and secondly to wrest Kashmir by force. The plan envisaged that if the situation threatened to spiral out of control, legal niceties could be set aside and troop landing could proceed regardless of other factors. As it was, the landing of the Indian forces in Srinagar on October 27, 1947, took place without the signing of any instrument of accession. On that fateful day, the State of Jammu and Kashmir existed in the same constitutional limbo of insecure independence that it had enjoyed since the partition of India, following the lapse of the British paramountcy.

As October progressed, the public unrest and communal strife paralysed the Maharaja’s administration. There was a rebellion in the state forces, which revolted against Hari Singh’s authority. More so, they were also joined by some pathan tribesmen voluntarily. The Indians started a propaganda campaign to un-nerve the Maharaja by projecting this local threat as a systematic invasion by the tribesmen from Pakistan along the Jhelum Valley Road.

As the situation in Jammu and Kashmir deteriorated, Lord Mountbatten, as Governor General of India, called a meeting of the Defence Committee to assess the situation on October 25. The committee, under his chairmanship decided to immediately send V. P. Menon, along with senior army and air force commanders to land in Srinagar the same day, reconnoitre the ground situation and advise the Maharaja to abandon Srinagar for the safety of Jammu across the Banihal pass.

Mountbatten also ordered the British Commander of the Indian forces to assemble a fleet of 10 transport aircraft for an airlift operation after 48 hours for landing troops in Srinagar. Menon’s visit of October 25 so unnerved the Maharaja that he packed all his valuables and left for Jammu by road in the morning of October 26, without signing any instrument of accession. Mountbatten chaired another meeting of the Defence Committee on October 26 and ordered the landing of the first battalion of the Sikh regiment in Srinagar on October 27, even though no evidence exists of any instrument of accession having been secured thus far. On the same day, at about 0900 hours, the Sikh regiment was airlifted from Gurgaon and landed at the deserted Srinagar Airport.

The State of Pakistan, struggling to find its feet in its infancy, was stunned by the Indian aggression. So on October 27, Quaid-i-Azam asked General Douglas Gracey, acting Commander in Chief, to send the Pakistani troops to Kashmir. But the General refused, saying that he would need the approval of Field Marshal Claude Auchinleck, who held supreme command over the Indian and Pakistani forces.

Auchinleck flew to Lahore on October 28 with the line that sending the Pakistan army into Kashmir would amount to a formal declaration of war and that if Pakistan went to war he would withdraw all the British officers serving in the Pak Army. It was many months after that Pakistan was able to respond militarily in Kashmir, and when the ceasefire occurred on January 1, 1949, the Kashmir issue stood internationalised, by no one other than Nehru, who himself sought to take the matter to the United Nations for resolution and promised to hold a plebiscite in Kashmir.

Thus, in the context of the Indo Pak relations, October 27 truly stands out as a ‘Black Day’, constituting the tragic benchmark that sealed all prospects of peace and prosperity in the subcontinent. Such a monumental crime, however, has extracted from India its price in flesh and blood. Sixty-three years might have passed since the aggression, yet the Indian Held Kashmir has known no peace and the demand for Azadi - loud and strong - is making it impossible for the Indian leadership and its puppets in Kashmir to know any peace.

The writer is a freelance columnist.

http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/Opinions/Columns/27-Oct-2010/Recalling-the-Black-Day-of-Kashmir

Turkish government would consider the proposal of Currency Swap Agreement - Erdogan

Islamabad: October 13, 2010:  Turkish Prime Minister Mr. Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on President Asif Ali Zardari at Aiwan-e-Sadr today.

Briefing media Spokesperson to the President Mr. Farhatullah Babar said that the President, during the meeting, reiterated the proposal of upgradation of railway line between the two countries and urged the Turkish Prime Minister to seriously consider the proposal. He said that Pakistan was eager to further enhance mutual cooperation between the two countries for taking maximum advantage of the existing potential of the two countries and to fully translate their equation into a strategic partnership. He said that railway line upgradation project between the two countries was one such step for not only speedy transportation of the cargo but would also open new vistas of opportunities for the people and would contribute towards economic development. The President said that there was a need to urgently evaluate similar projects so that the next step that involves raising finances could be vigorously pursued.

In this context the President also suggested a currency swap agreement between the two countries to facilitate business, trade and commerce.

Mr. Babar said that the President also felicitated Turkish Prime Minister on the vote for a series of democratic measures in the recently held referendum. He hailed the verdict on reform package as a triumph of democracy and democratic processes and recalled recent democratic reform in the shape of 18th Constitutional Amendment in Pakistan.

The President also appreciated Turkish Government’s generous assistance, both in cash and kind, for providing relief to flood-hit people of Pakistan and also its pledge to actively participate in reconstruction and rehabilitation activities for the flood affected people. He said that the Government and people of Pakistan greatly value sensitivity and the support of the Turkish people and government at this hour of distress.

The President said that both the countries need to aim at increasing their trade and investments equations and further cooperate especially in transport, telecommunications, manufacturing, tourism and other industries.

Discussing regional situation, the President said that Turkey has an important role to play for not only bringing in socio-economic development in the region but also for the stability of the region. He said that regional issues can be best addressed by regional powers and finding indigenous solutions.

Prime Minister Erdogan thanked the President for the warm welcome and said that Turkey would continue to support Pakistan and its people at every critical occasion and would actively participate in the reconstruction and rehabilitation phase for the flood affectees.  He said that the Turkish government would consider the proposal of Currency Swap Agreement.