2:31 PM
Islamabad, Feb 4 (ANI): Pakistan Interior Minister Rehman Malik has stressed the need for improving a law to control activities of banned organisations.
The Daily Times quoted Malik, as saying that the delay in approval of an amendment to the Anti-Terrorism Act was the main reason behind banned outfits’ holding rallies across the country.
He was replying to a point of order raised by Sheikh Waqas Akram of Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) and Sahibzada Fazal Karim of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). Malik said that revamping of laws was the solution, but an amendment bill had been lying with the Senate standing committee for the past two years.
Earlier, Akram said that Rehman Malik had lied before the cabinet committee that the provincial government was responsible for the rallies of the Defence Council Pakistan (DCP).
“This is a shame for the interior minister. How can you fight the war against terror, if you are unable to stop rallies of banned outfits in the country?” Akram had said.
Fazal Karim endorsed the view of Waqas Akram and urged the government not to allow banned outfits to hold rallies in the country.
In response, Malik said that these organisations had been rallying by changing their names. He assured the House that action would be taken if any rally was held in the federal capital.
“Revamping of laws is the only solution to the problem and parliament is the authority which can do that,” he added.
Earlier, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani had announced the grant of one additional basic pay to doctors and paramedical staff of government hospitals from January 1 in addition to their existing salaries. (ANI)
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Salman Rushdie's Msg to Imran Khan
@SalmanRushdie 30 yrs ago @ImranKhanPTI was a fan at my 1982 Delhi lecture and 100% secular. Now my work "humiliates" his "faith." Which is the real Imran?
Movie on Sarah Palin to be released soon,..should be a Pakistani scene in it..!!
This new HBO film follows John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign, from
his selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, to
their ultimate defeat in the general election. "Game Change" premieres
on March 10th.
Nawaz Sharif's campaign posters in Punjab during the late 80s and early 90s
Nawaz Sharif's campaign posters in Punjab during the late 80s and early 90s showing him along with Gen.Zia-ul-Haq !
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Twitter CEO says blocking policy over-distilled
DANA POINT: Twitter CEO Dick Costolo sought to calm the global outrage over the company's new country-by-country censorship policy on Monday, complaining in part that the issue is being treated with the same kind of shorthand that has made Twitter popular.
Speaking at the All Things D conference, Costolo repeated the company's justification for the policy change it announced last week: By taking down tweets only in the country where Twitter believes they may have violated local laws, it is making sure the maximum 140-character-long messages are still available to the rest of the world.
Twitter's reasoning has been mostly lost in a barrage of comments — many from Twitter users themselves — that the company is caving into attacks on free speech, especially in countries with repressive regimes.
"It's a super complex issue," Costolo said. "When the news came out, people tried to distill it down to, 'What did they just say?' It's easy to distill it down to 'Twitter is endorsing XYZ.'"
"It takes a while for the scholars and the people who study these matters to weigh in and start to say, 'Wait, this is actually a thoughtful and honest approach to doing this and it's in fact being done in a way that's forward-looking.' So we wait for that to happen," he added.
The complaint about knee-jerk responses to complex issues is somewhat ironic given that the company's meteoric growth has been fueled often by buzz-worthy but flippant comments.
Costolo also emphasized that if Twitter reacts to take-down requests, it will make public the reasons a tweet is being removed. The company already has 45 people who respond to such requests, including those from copyright holders of music or movies in the United States.
He said the policy wouldn't affect its stance toward China or Iran, where the service is already blocked completely.
"I don't think the current environment in China is one in which we think we could operate," he said.
Costolo spoke just days before Facebook is expected to file the paperwork necessary for an initial public offering of stock, a move that is likely to make initial investors and employees in the company rich.
San Francisco-based Twitter also faces the same securities regulations that are forcing Facebook to go public — a rule that says companies with more than $10 million in assets and more than 500 shareholders of a certain class of stock must disclose their financial results and other details.
Twitter, which was founded in 2006, will bump up against the rule "at some point," Costolo said. But he added he would rather spend time building value at the company than dealing with such issues. (AP)
