For US Iraq war would end in 2011: Obama

WASHINGTON

WASHINGTON: For America, the war in Iraq would end in 2011 when it would pull out all its troops from the country, US President Barack Obama said on Tuesday.

"We will remove all our troops from Iraq by the end of 2011. For America, the Iraq war will end," Obama said in his address to the Veterans of Foreign Wars Convention in Phoenix, Arizona. The United States will begin removing its combat brigades from Iraq later this year.

"In Iraq, after more than six years, we took an important step forward in June. We transferred control of all cities and towns to Iraq's security forces," he said.

"The transition to full Iraqi responsibility for their own security is now underway. This progress is a testament to all those who have served in Iraq, both uniformed and civilian. And our nation owes these Americans -- and all who have given their lives -- a profound debt of gratitude," he said, amidst applause.

The US President said, "Now, as Iraqis take control of their destiny, they will be tested and targeted. Those who seek to sow sectarian division will attempt more senseless bombings and more killing of innocents."

"As we move forward, the Iraqi people must know that the US will keep its commitments. The American people must know that we will move forward with our strategy," Obama said.

By moving forward in Iraq, the US is able to refocus on the war against al Qaeda and its extremist allies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, he asserted.

TOI

Hakimullah Mehsud calls media, says he is alive

ISLAMABAD

ISLAMABAD: Two days after reports emerged that he had been killed in a shootout with a rival, Taliban commander Hakimullah Mehsud on Monday contacted media organisations to say that he was "alive".

Hakimullah, one of several top Taliban commanders considered as contenders for leading the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan following the reported death of Baitullah Mehsud, telephoned Pakistani and foreign media organisations to deny reports of his death in fighting with rival Wali-ur-Rehman.

Talking to Geo News channel, Hakimullah said no scuffle had occurred between him and Rehman. He said he was "safe, hale and hearty".

He also claimed that Baitullah was alive despite the contention of the Pakistan and US governments that they are now certain the Taliban chief was killed in a Predator drone attack in South Waziristan on August 5.

Hakimullah said if Interior Minister Rehman Malik could not present any evidence regarding the killing of Baitullah, he would "table proofs to deny the reports regarding his death".

He said the Pakistani Taliban remained united despite the government's claims that there was infighting among militant factions.

TOI

Myanmar's Suu Kyi gets 18 months under house arrest

YANGON

YANGON: Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi was on Tuesday ordered to stay under house arrest for 18 months after a prison court convicted the Nobel laureate at the end of her internationally condemned trial.

The court at Yangon's Insein jail sentenced her to three years imprisonment and hard labour for breaching the terms of her house arrest following an incident in which a US man swam to her lakeside residence in May.

The head of the ruling junta signed a special order commuting the sentence and allowing the frail 64-year-old to serve out just a year and half under house arrest, home affairs minister General Maung Oo said outside the court.

The ruling means that she will still be in detention during multi-party elections promised by the iron-fisted military regime next year. Her party won a landslide victory in the country's last democratic polls.

American John Yettaw, 54, the man who swam to her house, was sentenced to a total of seven years hard labour and imprisonment on three separate charges but it was not clear if the terms would run consecutively or concurrently.

Security forces sealed off the area around the notorious jail and the ruling junta allowed diplomats from all foreign embassies in Yangon and local journalists to attend the hearing, officials and witnesses said.

Suu Kyi has already been in detention for 14 of the past 20 years since Myanmar's ruling military junta refused to recognise her National League for Democracy's landslide victory in elections in 1990.

It was not clear whether she would serve the new period in detention at her crumbling lakeside villa or at another location.

State-run newspapers carried a commentary on Tuesday that warned Suu Kyi's supporters not to cause trouble and told foreign countries not to meddle in Myanmar's affairs.

"The people who favour democracy do not want to see riots and protests that can harm their goal," said the version in the government mouthpiece New Light of Myanmar.

"Nevertheless, some persons who do not want national interest are resorting to a variety of means to disrupt the national goal, taking full advantage of the trial against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi."

Critics had accused the junta of using the charges as an excuse to keep her locked up for the elections due in 2010, particularly as they were lodged just days before the latest period of her house arrest was due to expire.

The military has ruled the impoverished nation with an iron fist since 1962.

Her lawyers argued during the trial that she could not be held responsible for Yettaw's actions, and that the legal framework for her initial detention at her house was under a 1975 law that has been superseded by later constitutions.

Suu Kyi told the court that she did not report the American to the authorities for humanitarian reasons. The junta says she gave food, shelter and assistance to Yettaw, who has diabetes.

Yettaw, a Mormon whose teenage son died two years ago in a motorbike crash, had testified that he swam to her house after receiving a "message from God" that he must protect Suu Kyi against a terrorist plot to assassinate her.

Yettaw got three years for breaching security laws, three years for immigration violations and one year for a municipal charge of illegal swimming.

The case has drawn international outrage at Myanmar's military regime, which is already under stiff US and European Union sanctions. Diplomats said that the EU was set to impose further restrictions in the case of a guilty verdict.

But the reclusive Than Shwe has resisted all calls for Suu Kyi's release, and he snubbed UN chief Ban Ki-moon's requests to visit the opposition leader in jail when Ban visited Myanmar in July.

Ban is set to meet a 14-nation advisory group on Myanmar that includes the United States, Britain, Russia and China next month on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.

Democratic US Senator Jim Webb is due to visit Myanmar later this month -- the first US lawmaker to visit the country in more than 10 years.

TOI

Bhutan to step up vigil at its border with India

Thimphu,

Thimphu, Aug 6 (PTI) Bhutan has dismissed the reports of presence of permanent camps of the Indian militant groups on its territory but said it can't rule out occasional incursions by the terrorists in the country.

"There are unconfirmed reports of ULFA training camps along the Indo-Bhutan border but not within Bhutan," said Joint Secretary of Law and Order Bureau Karma T Namgyal, who was part of the Bhutanese delegation that held parleys with an Indian team at the Seventh Border Coordination Development Meeting here.

The Indian officials said ULFA and NDFB militants, based in Assam, are regrouping and may try to enter Bhutan to set up camps.

"We were told that these groups are regrouping and planning to come back. We need to be more vigilant.

"...there are no permanent camps in Bhutan, but we can't rule out occasional temporary incursions," Namgyal said.

2 women vie for Afghan presidency

Kabu

Kabul, Aug 6 (AP) In a country where most women leave home only under the cover of a burqa, Shahla Atta wears bright pink nail polish, highlights her eyes with glitter and wants to be Afghanistan's next president.

Atta, 42, is one of two women among more than 30 candidates vying for the presidency, an uphill and even dangerous undertaking. Neither has much chance of unseating President Hamid Karzai in the August 20 vote. But just the fact that they are running open campaigns, plastering photos of their uncovered faces around Kabul, is an accomplishment in itself.

Many Afghans, especially in rural areas, believe that a woman should not show her face to non-family members.

"It is difficult for a woman even to invite some people over for tea and tell them about her ideas," said Shinkai Kharokhel, a female lawmaker in Kabul

Hiroshima calls for nuke-free world by 2020

Hiroshima

Hiroshima, Aug 6 (AFP) The Japanese city of Hiroshima today marked the 64th anniversary of the world's first atomic attack as its mayor called for the total abolition of nuclear weapons in the coming decade.

Some 50,000 people, including atomic bomb survivors as well as Prime Minister Taro Aso and representatives from more than 50 nations, gathered at a memorial to the dead.

Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba praised US President Barack Obama for his anti-nuclear views as he delivered a speech at the memorial, within sight of the A-bomb dome, a former exhibition hall burned to a skeleton by the bomb's intense heat.

The mayor noted Obama said in an address that as the only nuclear power to have used an atomic weapon, the United States has "a moral responsibility to act" to realise a nuclear-free world.