ISLAMABAD: Alarm bells are ringing in Islamabad over a $160 million dollar project to develop a floating Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) terminal adjacent to Karachi.

As the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) starts public hearing on the project from Tuesday, certain officials feel that safety measures for such a project would need to be extra tight. The hearing seeks to give formal approval to Pakistan Gasport Limited (PGL) to set up the LNG terminal.

This multi-million-dollar deal was approved in 2007. Ogra granted a provisional licence to PGL on May 14, 2009, to complete the formalities for importing LNG. The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) also immediately gave its ex-post facto approval to the implementation agreement.

After three years, the project is being launched and Ogra has announced that it will conduct a public hearing today. However, Ogra has advertised the announcement about the hearing in only one English newspaper.  An official said that this could be an attempt to avoid public debate on this sensitive project as the paper in which the advertisement appeared was not widely read in Karachi. He said that many people in Karachi would be unaware that their fate was being decided in Islamabad at a public hearing.

Meanwhile, Shehri-CBE’s report on the project clearly warns that “potential hazards during the passage of LNG tankers along the Phitti Creek, degasification of LNG in the middle of the creek and storage of LPG on the public beach near Chashma, Khasheli, Haji Ayub and Ali Brohi goths have not been carefully investigated.

The proximity of residential, commercial and industrial facilities to the proposed location of the re-gasification plant and [the premises for] LPG storage has been deliberately downplayed in the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) report.

Only minor goths are stated as being within a 13-kilometre radius. However the map shows that the entire Korangi area, a large section of Malir, Jinnah International Airport, DHA Golf Club and a large number of people would fall within 12 kilometres of the proposed LNG terminal.

Experts said that the LNG terminal needs to be established many kilometres away from Karachi’s populated areas and that PGL needs to be obliged to take out comprehensive insurance to cover the extensive cost of any accident and be willing to pay the government for the cost of the added security and precautions that will need to be taken.

According to information available with The Express Tribune Ogra issued a notice to consider PGL’s application to undertake regulated activities related to LNG at Port Qasim, Karachi. This notice states that PGL (the applicant) filed a petition with Ogra on June 8, 2010, under Rule 4 of the Oil & Gas Regulatory Authority (LNG) Rules 2007. In the petition, they applied to undertake the following regulated activities at Port Qasim, Karachi: Construction of an LNG-receiving terminal, construction of an LNG-receiving and re-gasification facility including LNG unloading, marine facility, LNG storage facility, vapourisation and RLNG send-out facility.

Government sources say no discussion in Pakistan has so far taken place in civil society about the negative impact of having an LNG terminal located near Karachi. However, a report will be submitted during Ogra’s public hearing about how LNG plants have caused human fatalities.

A report by Tim Riley Law.com says that LNG is transported overseas to the location through LNG tankers. This is where the major danger lies, the report says. LNG tankers are quite large and a typical LNG tanker holds more than 33 million gallons of LNG, which equals 20 billion gallons of natural gas.

Karachi-based NGO Shehri-Citizens For a Better Environment (CBE), in its report carried by Alexander’s Gas and Oil Connections, has clearly warned that “if PGL’s LNG project is rammed through as per [the] existing arrangement, it has the potential to cause a debacle in Karachi, the size of which will make the Bhopal catastrophe in India or 9/11 tragedy in the US seem insignificant”.

Officials cite the catastrophic explosion at an LNG facility in Algeria in 2004. Initially, it was claimed that the Algerian plant was outdated but later, it was learnt that the plant had undergone modernisation just five years ago by former US vice-president Dick Cheney’s former company Halliburton.

In 2003, an explosion in south-west China was even more disastrous. Another LNG disaster took place long ago in 1944 in Cleveland, US.

But an official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that larger disasters could take place as newer LNG tankers are built to contain 20 times more gas than the volume that burnt in the Cleveland disaster.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 4^th, 2011.

KARACHI: Chairman Central Ruet-e-Hilal Committee Mufti Munibur Rehman has announced that Shawwal moon has not been sighted and Eid-ul Fitr will be celebrated on Saturday.

He made the announcement while addressing the media after the Central Ruet-e-Hilal Committee meeting for the sighting of Shawwal moon.

The meeting was held at the Pakistan Meteorological Department Building in Karachi. Zonal and District Ruet-e-Hilal Committees also held meetings in their respective areas.

Saudi Arabia to celebrate Eid on Friday

Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Lebanon are set to celebarte Eid-ul Fitr on Friday. The Supreme Court in Saudi Arabia ruled that since the Shawwal moon was not sighted on Wednesday, Eid would fall on Friday.

Most of the Gulf countries follow the lead of Saudi Arabia to set the day of the Eid feast.

Egypt’s Darul-Ifta, the body that issues Islamic edicts, also announced Thursday to be the end of Ramazan for the country.

Following suit, Lebanon’s Dar al-Fatwa, the country’s highest Sunni authority, likewise said that Eid-ul Fitr would be celebrated in Lebanon on Friday.

GAINESVILLE: The Christian community in Lahore protested against the proposal of a Florida church to burn copies of the Holy Quran.

Hundreds of Christians gathered outside the Lahore Press Club on Thursday and staged a protest against the plan.

They raised slogans against the authorities of the church and burned an effigy of the pastor.

Addressing the protestors, leaders of the Christian community said the Holy Books have descended from God and show the right path to humanity, it is the moral duty of every person to protect the Holy Books and pay respect to them.

The leaders said they will support Muslims in raising their voice for the honour of the Holy Quran.

Church defiant

The Church shrugged off global outrage and vowed to go ahead with a Quran burning ceremony amid growing fears it will ignite a wave of Islamic rage.

Condemnation rained down from top US officials, the military, the Vatican and other religious and world leaders, but the church refused to halt plans to torch the Islamic holy book on Saturday’s anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

“As of this time we have no intention of canceling,” Pastor Terry Jones told a press conference here Wednesday, adding his evangelical church, the Dove World Outreach Center, had received numerous messages of support.

Jones had indicated he was praying for guidance on whether to go ahead with the incendiary event after warnings from US Afghanistan commander General David Petraeus that US and allied troops could be targeted in revenge.

“We understand the general’s concerns and we are still considering it,” Jones said, but swiftly added he had been contacted by a special forces soldier who told him “the people in the field are 100 percent behind us.”

After his press conference Wednesday, Jones reportedly met inside his church with a Florida imam, in a sign that the renegade pastor might be willing to tone down or even cancel his event.

According to the Gainesville Sun, the imam of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, Muhammad Musri, met with Jones for 40 minutes in the pastor’s office.”I told him the world would admire your courage if you come out and say, ‘Because of my devotion to Christ and the Bible, I’m going to do the right thing.’” the Sun quoted Musri as saying.”I strongly believe at the end of the day that he is going to make the right step and call off this event.”

The gun-toting pastor, who has received death threats, says the aim of Saturday’s three-hour evening event is to send a message to religious extremists.

“Our burning of the Quran is to call attention that something’s wrong. And it is possibly time for us in a new way to actually stand up and confront terrorism,” he said. The planned torching of some 200 Qurans — many of which have been donated to the church — comes amid an angry debate over plans to build an Islamic cultural center in New York close to where the World Trade Center once stood.

Many fear if the Quran burning goes ahead it will further raise anti-Islamic sentiment.

Condemnations from Pakistan

President Zardari has condemned the Church’s plans to burn the Holy Quran and said that the activity will trigger a massive reaction from the Muslim world.

Federal Interior Minister Rehman Malik has written a letter to Interpol Secretary General and strongly condemned the planned actions of Pastor Terry Jones to burn copies of the Holy Quran.

In his letter, the Federal Interior Minister said the desecration of the holy book will not be tolerated at any cost.

He urged the Secretary General Interpol to take strong action on the matter and asked Interpol to take up the matter with US officials.

Malik stated that Jones’ actions will be an international crime which will be detrimental to peace internationally. He also stated that the sentiments of Muslims should not be hurt with such vicious actions.

Foreign Office spokesperson Abdul Basit has also assailed the plans of the US church to burn the Holy Quran.

Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States Hussain Haqqani has warned that if Florida Pastor Terry Jones goes ahead with his plans to burn copies of the Quran, it will set off a massive reaction in parts of the Muslim world.

The ambassador asserted that the United States should live up to its high ideals. He added that those who oppose religious extremism and intolerance in the Muslim world should speak up against what he termed a meaningless gesture.

India calls for a media blackout

India called Thursday for the US to take “strong action” to prevent a planned Quran burning ceremony and demanded a media blackout.

Indian Home Minister P Chidambaram, in a strongly worded statement after a cabinet meeting, condemned the “deplorable act” that was “obviously calculated to increase bitterness and strife between religious groups.

“We hope the US authorities will take strong action to prevent such an outrage being committed,” he said.

“While we await the actions of the US authorities we appeal to the media, both print and visual media, to refrain from telecasting visuals or publishing photographs of this deplorable act.”

“We should ignore such people, but there is now an added responsibility for the United States to rein them in,” Syed Ahmed Bukhari, the chief imam in New Delhi’s biggest mosque, told AFP.

“Any such act by the pastor can have serious repercussions against the administration in the US and against American troops in Afghanistan or Iraq,” he said.

The All-India Christian Council also condemned the intention of the Dove World Outreach Center in Florida to burn the Quran on the anniversary of the Al-Qaeda terror network’s attacks on the United States.

“Al-Qaeda does not represent the Islamic faith and this pastor certainly does not represent the teachings of Jesus Christ,” the council’s secretary general John Dayal said in a statement.

World leaders denounce church’s plans

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has denounced the Florida church’s plans as “disgraceful,” and the State Department sought Wednesday to downplay an event likely to be shown on television screens around the world.

“We hope that the world will appreciate that this is the action of a very small fringe group and does not represent the views of the United States or Americans as a whole,” State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said he was deeply disturbed by the plans, with his spokesman releasing a statement saying: “Such actions cannot be condoned by any religion.”

German Chancellor Angela Merkel decried the plans as “abhorrent” at an event honoring a Danish cartoonist whose 2005 drawing of the Prophet Mohammed (pbuh) sparked protests around the world.

Late Wednesday the imam of the mosque to be built near Ground Zero, Feisal Abdul Rauf, told CNN that burning the Quran is “not the right thing to do” because “it’s going to feed into the radicals in the Muslim world. It’s dangerous.”

And former Republican vice presidential candidate and leading conservative Sarah Palin slammed the move as an insensitive provocation “much like building a mosque at Ground Zero,” urging Jones to think again.

“It will feed the fire of caustic rhetoric and appear as nothing more than mean-spirited religious intolerance. Don’t feed that fire,” she wrote on her Facebook page.

Officials in the small university town of Gainesville — reluctantly dragged into the global spotlight — met Wednesday to draw up contingency plans.

City spokesman Bob Woods told AFP that church officials would be violating a ban on open-air burning and would be subject to a 250 dollar fine if they set fire to the books. But there is little they can do to stop the event from going ahead, protected as it is by the First Amendment of the US Constitution, guaranteeing freedom of speech.

Fire authorities turned down an application a few weeks ago from Jones to hold the ceremony, and police cannot intervene until they actually light the Qurans.

Condemnations have also poured in from Kuwait, Malaysia and Indonesia with leaders calling on the US to stop the event from taking place.

Following the accusations of suspected match-fixing hurled at Pakistan’s cricket team, a plethora of explanatory theories have been put forth. Some, like the Pakistan Team Manager Yawar Saeed, discount the view that the cricket team is ‘institutionally corrupt’ whilst the more diehard of enthusiasts have instantly suggested that it is merely an Indian-manufactured conspiracy. Furthermore, some – who have been disillusioned by the team’s objectionable conduct – have resorted to leading a procession of donkeys through the streets of Lahore and pelting them with shoes. Of course, there are some, like Veena Malik (Mohammad Asif’s ex-girlfriend) who have capitalized on this opportunity just to unleash a personal vendetta.

Unfortunately, the core issue – of the team’s fraudulence – cannot be rectified by tossing rotten tomatoes at innocent donkeys. There must be a more instructive response to this debacle which, in this context, can only be reaped through the ICC Cricket Code of Conduct. This essentially outlines a set of regulations that govern the conduct of ‘professional players in the sport of cricket’ and indicates that the players may be eligible to the following punitive actions in the event of match-fixing:

a)     Fined a percentage of their salary

b)    Banned from a number of matches or

c)     Banned for a number of years or for life.

More significantly, it highlights the serious offences under which these lines of actions can be exercised. These include ‘gambling on matches (betting), failing to perform in a match in return for a benefit, such as money or goods, inducing the player to perform one of the above two actions and failure to report certain incidents relating to match-fixing or gambling’.

What is particularly disturbing is that these sanctions and penalties are as applicable to Pakistan’s cricket team as its reputation for defraud. At this juncture – when the nation is struggling to understand yet another form of corruption – it is important to modify our preconceptions about the people we venerate as our role models.

The fact is, we have grown so accustomed to the celebrity syndrome that we fail to detect the authenticity of those we fanatically idolize. Perhaps that is why ‘serial match-fixers’ (as Veena Malik aptly describes them) are household names and a very superficial response has been shown to this underhanded act of treason.

A seventeen year old high school student with a centuries old man. Pedophilia, anyone?

1. The length: One fine morning Stephanie Meyer woke up from a nightmare and told herself she could write. The product was the Twilight series. Inundated with horrible grammatical errors and overused adjectives the plot (or lack thereof) has been extended over four books. It  is excruciating.

2.Pedophilia: If it isn’t a seventeen year old falling in love with an old vampire, it is a werewolf falling for an infant. The author needs therapy for her convoluted imagination.

3. The hype: The frenzy around the books is inexplicable. What I fail to understand is how and when the human brain stooped so low as to obsess over a trashy piece of literature that is nothing but an assortment of clichéd themes. It is amazing how Twilight fans go rabid over the mere mention of the fact that the books totally suck.

4. The films: As if the books were not enough to torture the masses, some intelligent people thought it’s best to make movies out of them too and exploit teenage minds further

5. The feminism: Meyer has reduced the female lead in the book to a clumsy, irritating, dependent woman whose only purpose in life is to fall irrevocably in love with Edward and become a vampire herself.

6. The superficiality: The author is shamelessly superficial. Stephanie Meyer has created an Adonis so perfect, it surpasses all known standards. She has described and re-described Edward’s perfect features throughout the book

7. Vampire baseball: Seriously?

8. Ideology: The reinvention of vampires as urban, super heroes. With amazing cars and super powers the vampires are ‘vegetarians’ so they won’t suck human blood. Oh, and they sparkle in the sun.Give me a break.

9. Literary Comparisons: The comparison with the Harry Potter series is crazy. Twilight does not even begin to compare with the J K Rowling adventure.

SIALKOT: The former District Police Officer Sialkot, Waqar Chauhan was arrested on Tuesday and is expected to appear in court tomorrow in connection to the Sialkot lynching case.

Five other police officials will also be presented in court along with the former DPO. However, prime accused in the lynching of two brothers, SHO Rana Ilyas, has managed to evade custody along with one other police officer involved in the brutal killing.

Earlier, Justice (retd) Kazim Malik, who was given the task to conduct an inquiry into the lynching stated that the Supreme Court would start its hearing of the case on September 1. Justice Kazim added that statements of 101 people, who were directly or indirectly linked to the case, have been recorded. He added that it would be upto the apex court to decide on whether they want to make the report public or not.

ISLAMABAD: The spot-fixing scandal allegedly involving Pakistan’s cricketers continued to create waves on Monday, with the government scrambling to get involved in the matter. With a three-member team from the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) preparing to fly out to London, Pakistan has officially asked Scotland Yard to allow it to be part of the investigations into the scandal.

“Scotland Yard has been requested to make Pakistan a part of the investigation process,” Foreign Office spokesman Abdul Basit told The Express Tribune.

The request has been made through the Pakistan High Commission in London, the spokesman said. “We are  waiting for their (Scotland Yard) response,” he added.

The government had already announced that it would send a Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) team to London to examine the allegations that some Pakistani cricketers were involved in spot-fixing. The team, which will be headed by by FIA director Altaf Hussain, who will be accompanied by Inam Ghani and Inspector Tahir, have applied for UK visas, and will proceed to London as soon as their documents come through.

Officials said the FIA team will study claims that Muhammad Amir and Muhammad Asif deliberately bowled no-balls during the final Test against England at Lord’s.

Scotland Yard or the Metropolitan Police of London is investigating claims that an undercover reporter paid agent Mazhar Majeed 150,000 pounds in return for exact details relating to the match.

Majeed, 35, was released on bail after being arrested over the weekend on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud bookmakers.

Meanwhile, the National Assembly’s standing committee on sport asked the government to dissolve the current Pakistan cricket setup over a betting-scam which has rocked the cricketing world.

Chairman of the Committee and MQM legislator Iqbal Muhammad Ali told reporters outside the Parliament House after chairing a meeting that committee members would resign en bloc if the team management and Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Ijaz Butt were not removed.

He said that the NA body had asked the government to recall the suspected players and called for initiating criminal proceedings against them.

However, it is not clear yet if the Scotland Yard would allow the suspected players to leave Britain. Sports Secretary Aziz Bilur disclosed that the passports of some of the cricketers had been taken away by the Scotland Yard.

“I am not sure the Scotland Yard would allow the players to leave the country even if the government recalls them,” the sports secretary told reporters after attending the standing committee’s meeting.

During the meeting, the chairman of the committee revealed that, “the new wicket keeper Zulqernain Haider has no a hairline fracture at all as reported by the team’s management… he was only sent back home to support the alleged fixing net.”

“I have his medical report and will share it with the members in the next special meeting,” he said. The legislators unanimously passed a resolution saying that an ad hoc committee should be appointed to look after the affairs of Pakistan cricket.

Iqbal said that the role of  the team’s security officer Col (retd) Najam should also be examined as he failed to contain the disciplinary breaches that took place during the current scam.

“The cricketers were free to move anywhere besides meeting strangers during the ongoing tour… why did he [security officer] fail to fulfill his task – this also needs to be looked in to” he said.

“Criminal proceedings besides exemplary punishment should be given to the players who are involved in the scam” Iqbal demanded.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 31^st, 2010.

SIALKOT: Former Sialkot district police officer Waqar Ahmed Chohan has been placed under house arrest here for 30 days.

He was detained by the Sialkot police on Monday on charges of negligence and for failing to stop the merciless lynching of the teenage brothers on August 15. According to reports, the new DPO is residing in the civil rest house in Sialkot.

The inquiry commission constituted to probe the barbaric incident of lynching of two brothers in Sialkot will submit its report to the Supreme Court (SC) today (Thursday).

Meanwhile, Director General Rescue 1122 Punjab Dr Rizwan Naseer claimed that the rescue centre is not responsible for negligence, as they tried to contact the police but they did not arrive promptly.

While speaking at a press conference in Sialkot, Rizwan Naseer said that the rescue team had put their lives on the line to protect the two brothers who were killed by the mob.

The Director General said that a cleric had brought the two teenagers to his office and were given full protection. He also claimed that the two boys had demanded that they be handed over to the police.

JI, PTI announce demonstrations

Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) has announced that it will observe a countrywide protest to condemn the brutal killings of the two brothers in Sialkot, on Friday. JI Secretary General Liaqat Baloch, in a statement issued on Wednesday, termed the killings of Mueez and Muneeb inhuman, unislamic and a brutal act. He condemned the role of the police and local administration for their complete negligence.

Similarly, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) has announced a daily six-hour long sit-in at Sialkot’s Allama Iqbal Chowk till the arrest of all the accused as a protest against the inhuman lynching of the two innocent brothers by people in the presence of senior police officials.

President PTI (Women’s Wing) Punjab Syeda Saloni Bukhari disclosed this while talking to journalists after consoling the bereaved family in Sialkot. She said that the incident was a reflection on the failure of the incumbent rulers and the system. She assured the family that the accused would be brought to justice. AGENCIES (with additional reporting by Junaid Aftab in Sialkot)

Published in The Express Tribune, August 26^th, 2010