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Sunday, February 5, 2012

Manchester United vs Chelsea


There were some numbers to be crunched before this game and the pressure was surely on Manchester United to win it after Manchester City’s victory at Fulham on Saturday. But the way this match was played was reminiscent of the fact why the English Premier League is touted as the best in the world. Chelsea took a healthy 3-0 lead before Wayne Rooney inspired his team to 3-2, scoring two penalties before Javier Hernandez headed in an equaliser from Ryan Giggs’ cross. Javier Hernandez scored a late equaliser as Manchester United staged a stunning three-goal comeback to claim a point in a thrilling 3-3 draw against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge on Sunday. Man United stage incredible comeback to draw 3-3 at Chelsea

Obama's drones targeting rescuers, mourners, children


The civilians who had gone to help rescue victims or were attending funerals were targeted by US drones, an investigation by the Bureau for the Sunday Times revealed. The findings are published just days after President Obama claimed that the drone campaign in Pakistan was a ‘targeted, focused effort’ that ‘has not caused a huge number of civilian casualties.’ Speaking publicly for the first time on the controversial CIA drone strikes, Obama claimed last week they are used strictly to target terrorists, rejecting what he called ‘this perception we’re just sending in a whole bunch of strikes willy-nilly’. ‘Drones have not caused a huge number of civilian casualties’, he told a questioner at an on-line forum. ‘This is a targeted, focused effort at people who are on a list of active terrorists trying to go in and harm Americans’. But research by the Bureau found that since Obama took office three years ago, between 282 and 535 civilians have been credibly reported as killed including more than 60 children. A three month investigation including eye witness reports has found evidence that at least 50 civilians were killed in follow-up strikes when they had gone to help victims. More than 20 civilians have also been attacked in deliberate strikes on funerals and mourners. The tactics have been condemned by leading legal experts. Although the drone attacks were started under the Bush administration in 2004, they have been stepped up enormously under Obama. There have been 260 attacks by unmanned Predators or Reapers in Pakistan by Obama’s administration – averaging one every four days. Because the attacks are carried out by the CIA, no information is given on the numbers killed. Administration officials insist that these covert attacks are legal. John Brennan, the president’s top counterterrorism adviser, argues that the US has the right to unilaterally strike terrorists anywhere in the world, not just what he called ‘hot battlefields’. ‘Because we are engaged in an armed conflict with al-Qaeda, the United States takes the legal position that, in accordance with international law, we have the authority to take action against al-Qaeda and its associated forces,’ he told a conference at Harvard Law School last year. ‘The United States does not view our authority to use military force against al-Qaeda as being restricted solely to”hot” battlefields like Afghanistan.’ But some international law specialists fiercely disagree, arguing that the strikes amount to little more than state-sanctioned extra-judicial executions and questioning how the US government would react if another state such as China or Russia started taking such action against those they declare as enemies.

Pakistan vs England 3rd test (Day 3)


England, chasing a big 324-run target, closed the third day at 36-0 in the third and final Test against Pakistan at Dubai Stadium here on Sunday. Andrew Strauss (19) and Alastair Cook (15) were at the crease when the stumps were drawn. They need another 288 runs for a win with all ten wickets intact. Pakistan, leading the series 2-0, made 365 in their second innings. England were left to fight hard to save defeat and with it the humiliation of a first-ever series whitewash at the hands of Pakistan in the third and final Test at Dubai Stadium here on Sunday. Needing to chase their second best achieved target in all Tests of 324, England finished the third day at 36-0, with openers Andrew Strauss (19) and Alastair Cook (15) playing out the tricky 20 overs on an eased out pitch. They still need another 288 runs with all ten wickets intact in the last two days. England’s most successful chase to win a Test was the 332 they made against Australia in Melbourne in 1929. Azhar Ali hit a career-best 157 and Younis Khan’s 127 in Pakistan’s second innings total of 365. Pakistan could have got Cook’s wicket had Taufiq Umar not dropped an easy catch in the third slip off paceman Umar Gul when the England opener had made just four. It will need an extraordinary effort from the England batsmen who lost the first Test here by ten wickets and the second by 72 runs in Abu Dhabi after their batting flopped against Pakistani spinners Saeed Ajmal and Abdul Rehman. Both Pakistan spinners will test the England batting once again after Monty Panesar claimed 5-124 to finally bowl out rivals in their second innings on a pitch that saw 16 wickets fall on the first day. Pakistan were bowled out for 99 in their first innings and can become the first team to win a Test after being bowled out for under 100 since England, dismissed for 76 in the first innings, beat South Africa by 53 runs at Leeds in 1907. Ali said Pakistan can win the match. “We are 100 percent confident of a win,” said Ali. “But having said that we have to take ten wickets and for that we look to our spinners who have done really well in the series.” But spinner Graeme Swann hoped England can achieve the target. “It could have been a tricky few overs for the openers but they played out and hopefully it’s a good chase tomorrow,” said Swann who praised Panesar for derailing the opponents. Pakistan were well placed at 331-4 before losing their last seven wickets for a mere 34 runs following good bowling from Panesar and Swann, who finished with 3-101. Pakistan owed their total to a brilliant career-best knock by Ali and Younis’s brilliance. Together they added 216 for the third wicket in a frustrating stand which almost plunged England into submission. Ali became the ninth wicket to fall, when he gave a bat-pad catch to Cook at short-leg off Swann. He hit ten boundaries and six during his long stay at the crease which was seven minutes short of nine hours. Ali’s previous best first class score was the 153 he made for Khan Research Laboratory against Sui Gas in Rawalpindi in 2009 while his best Test score of 100 came against Sri Lanka at the same venue in October last year. Dropped on 84 by Swann in the slips off James Anderson, 26-year-old Ali hit Panesar for two boundaries in successive overs to reach the three-figure mark. Resuming at 222-2, Pakistan lost Younis to a leg-before dismissal to Stuart Broad. Younis challenged Australian umpire Steve Davis’s decision but on review he had to leave the field. Younis hit 12 boundaries and a six during his 221-ball knock. Pakistan were 295-3 at lunch but lost cluster of wickets to Panesar, who trapped Misbah (31) and Asad Shafiq (five) to check Pakistan’s progress. Panesar then bowled Adnan Akmal (nought) to further make inroads into Pakistan batting. From the other end Swann had Abdul Rehman (one) and Ajmal ((one) in successive overs and then wrapped up the innings by claiming Ali and Umar Gul (four).

Six dead in attack on Afghan police building


Six police officers were killed Sunday in a car bomb attack on their headquarters in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, a bastion of Taliban militancy, a local government official said. The blast, which happened in the car park, wounded 16 others -- six police and 10 civilians -- provincial government spokesman Zulmai Ayobi told AFP. 

Pakistan vs England 3rd test (Day 2)

Pakistan were 222-2 in their second innings at close on the second day of the third and final Test against England played at Dubai Stadium here on Saturday, taking an overall lead of 180 runs. Younis Khan, who notched his 20th Test hundred, was unbeaten on 115 and with him Azhar Ali was 75 not out. The two have added 194 runs for the unfinished third wicket stand. England were bowled out for 141 in reply to Pakistan s 99. Experienced batsman Younis Khan proved his class with a superb hundred to put Pakistan in a good position on the second day of the third and final Test against England played here on Saturday. The 34-year-old right-hander scored an unbeaten 115 to repair the Pakistan innings after early wobbles with youngster Azhar Ali (75 not out) through an unbroken third wicket stand of 194 to take their team to 222-2 at close. Pakistan, who conceded a 42-run lead in the first innings after England made 141, now lead by 180 runs with eight wickets intact. So in command were the duo that England’s bowlers, who wrecked Pakistan for 99 in the first innings, looked helpless and it seemed as if the match was not played on the same pitch on which 16 wickets fell on the first day. Younis, who had only 66 runs in the last four innings, notched his 20th Test hundred – the first from either side in the series – with a sweep shot off left-arm spinner Monty Panesar for two, reaching the milestone off 166-balls. Younis has so far hit 11 boundaries and a six. Ali, who often praised Younis’s support for youngsters, batted with caution during his 14th half-century. He has so far hit 11 boundaries and six. Before the two came together, Pakistan had lost openers Taufiq Umar (six) and Mohammad Hafeez (21) in another disastrous start, leaving them at 30-2 at lunch and in danger of another collapse. But after lunch, Younis opened up once England captain Andrew Strauss introduced Jonathan Trott, smashing the occasional bowler to square-leg boundary to bring up Pakistan’s 100. He then heaved Graeme Swann for another boundary and in the next over hit Trott for his sixth boundary to complete a well deserved half-century, his 26th in all Tests. They took Pakistan to 120-2 at tea and continued to dominate even after England took the second new ball at 216-2. Earlier Abdul Rehman took 5-40 – his second five-wicket haul after a career-best 6-25 in Pakistan’s 72-run win in the second Test in Abu Dhabi. Pakistan won the first Test by ten wickets, also in Dubai. Paceman James Anderson again gave England an early breakthrough, forcing an edge off Umar which Strauss held in front of his knees in the slips. Hafeez, who hit a six off Monty Panesar, fell leg-before to the left-armer in his next over, leaving Pakistan in trouble at 28-2. Captain Strauss top-scored with 56 for England before he was stumped by wicketkeeper Adnan Akmal off Rehman. Strauss hit five boundaries during his laborious 150-ball stay at the crease. Resuming at 104-6, England lost nightwatchman Anderson in the first over of the day when he missed a sharp turning delivery from Rehman and was bowled. Two overs later, Rehman’s spin partner Saeed Ajmal trapped Stuart Broad (four) and after Strauss’s fall wrapped up the innings when Swann (16) holed out in the deep. Ajmal finished with 3-59.. Pakistan lead the series 2-0.

Civilian deaths in Afghan war hit record high


Last year was the deadliest on record for civilians in the Afghan war, with 3,021 killed as insurgents ratcheted up violence with suicide attacks and roadside bombs, the United Nations said Saturday. Taliban-affiliated militants were responsible for more than three-quarters of the civilian deaths in 2011, the fifth year in a row in which the death toll went up, the U.N. said. The figures were a grim testament to the violence the Taliban and allied Islamist militants can still unleash in Afghanistan, even as NATO begins to map out plans for international troops to draw down and give Afghan security forces the main responsibility for fighting insurgents by the end of 2014. "A decade after the war began, the human cost of it is still rising," said Georgette Gagnon, director for human rights for the U.N. mission in Afghanistan. The number of civilian deaths was up 8 percent over the previous year. Deaths in suicide bombings jumped dramatically to 450, an 80 percent increase over the previous year. While the number of suicide attacks remained about the same, they killed more civilians. On Dec. 6, a bomber detonated his explosives-filled vest at the entrance of a mosque in Kabul, the capital, killing 56 worshippers during the Shiite Muslim rituals of Ashoura. It was the single deadliest suicide attack since 2008. The single biggest killer of civilians remained the ever-more-powerful roadside bombs planted by insurgents. The homemade explosives, which can be triggered by a footstep or a vehicle and are often rigged with enough explosives to destroy a tank, killed 967 people nearly a third of the total. The 130,000-strong coalition force led by the U.S. says it has been hitting the Taliban hard, seizing their one-time strongholds while expanding and training the Afghan army and police to take over primary responsibility for waging the decade-old war. Still, insurgent attacks are killing more and more civilians, according to a detailed annual U.N. report. The increased presence of security forces managed to reduce civilian casualties in the troubled southern provinces of Helmand and Kandahar, but the U.N. said insurgents simply pulled back and focused instead on areas along the country s border with Pakistan, relying more on roadside bombs and suicide attacks in places like bazaars, schoolyards, footpaths, and bus stations. "The tactics have changed," said Jan Kubis, the U.N. Secretary-General s special representative to Afghanistan. "The anti-government forces being squeezed in certain areas ... move to some other areas and again use these inhuman, undiscriminating weapons like human-activated explosive devices and suicide attacks." He pointed out that the Taliban itself banned the use of land mines as "un-Islamic and anti-human" in a 1998 proclamation issued while the hard-line movement ruled Afghanistan with their harsh interpretation of Islamic law. The U.N. report said there is little difference between mines and the buried homemade bombs used by the Taliban. The majority of improvised explosives have about 9 pounds (20 kilograms) of explosives and are triggered by pressure plates rigged to explode when a person steps on it or a vehicle passes over. "These are basically land mines," Kubis said of the roadside bombs. "So why is this  inhuman and un-Islamic  weapon being increasingly used?" The sheer number of roadside bombs that insurgents planted last year overwhelmed security forces  improved ability to detect and neutralize them. An average of 23 roadside bombs per day were either detonated or discovered and defused last year twice the daily average in 2010, the U.N. report said. Actual explosions increased by 6 percent. The report s toll of 3,021 civilians dead in violence related to the war and 4,507 more wounded made 2011 the deadliest year for Afghan civilians recorded by the U.N. since it started keeping a detailed count of civilian casualties five years ago. Last year s figure was roughly double the number from 2007. The U.N. attributed 77 percent of the deaths to insurgent attacks and 14 percent to actions by international and Afghan troops. Nine percent of cases were classified as having an unknown cause. The number of civilian deaths caused by insurgents was up 14 percent over 2010, the U.N. said, while those caused by security forces went down 4 percent. Last year was also the second-deadliest year of the decade-long war for international forces in Afghanistan, with at least 544 NATO troops killed. The coalition has been in Afghanistan since the aftermath of the 2001 American-backed intervention to topple the Taliban, which followed the hard-line Islamist regime s refusal to hand over al-Qaida terrorist chief Osama bin Laden, who sponsored the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the U.S. While the total number of civilian deaths caused by international and Afghan forces dropped, the number of civilians killed by air strikes targeting insurgents rose to 187 in 2011, accounting for nearly half the deaths attributed to forces supporting the government. The number of civilians killed during controversial, coalition-led night raids on homes dropped to 63 in 2011, down 22 percent from the previous year, the U.N. said. The U.N. noted a shift in where the violence affecting civilians was centered. In 2010, the provinces with the highest numbers of civilian casualties were the southern Taliban strongholds of Helmand and Kandahar, where an increased number of U.S. troops pushed to take back territory from insurgents. While those two provinces still had the most deaths in 2011, their numbers dropped, while civilian deaths went sharply up in southeastern provinces including Khost and Paktika, and the eastern provinces of Kunar and Nangarhar. All those areas lie along Afghanistan s volatile border with Pakistan, where many of the Taliban s leaders and the al-Qaida-allied Haqqani network are believed to be based. Insurgents also intensified an assassination campaign against people associated with the Afghan government. The U.N. report documented 495 targeted killings in 2011, including provincial and district officials, peace council members and pro-government tribal elders. Assassinations were up 3 percent from the previous year and up 160 percent from 2009. Among the highest profile assassination victims last year was former President Burhanuddin Rabbani, head of the high peace council charged with seeking talks with the Taliban. He was killed by a suicide bomber claiming to carry a message from the insurgents.

Russia, China veto Syria resolution at UNSC


Russia and China have vetoed a Security Council resolution backing an Arab League peace plan that calls for Syrian President Bashar Assad to step down. The other 13 council members, including the U.S., France and Britain, voted Saturday in favor of the resolution aimed at stopping the ongoing violence in Syria.  However reacting to double veto, US ambassador Susan Rice called the block "shameful." She said the veto showed how Russia and China aimed to "sell out the Syrian people and shield a craven tyrant." Arab nations also condemned the move. "I would like to express our great regret and disappointment" at the veto, said Morocco s UN ambassador Mohammed Loulichki, whose country is the Arab member of the 15-member council and played a key role in the drawing up the resolution. Western ambassadors highlighted the concessions made to Russia in weeks of negotiations on the draft text. References to sanctions by the Arab League and calls for Assad to stand down were taken out. Britain is "appalled," said its UN envoy Mark Lyall Grant. "It is a sad day for this council, a sad day for Syrians, a sad day for the friends of democracy," said France s UN ambassador Gerard Araud. "History has now compounded our shame since today is the anniversary of the Hama massacre and the day after another heinous massacre in Homs," added Araud, referring to a 1982 massacre in the Syrian city of Hama that killed tens of thousands. Assad s father, Hafez, ruled the country at the time. "Father and son are killing; it would seem to be hereditary in Damascus," he said. The vote took place as Syrian forces pummeled the city of Homs with mortar and artillery fire that activists say killed more than 200 people in one of the bloodiest episodes of the uprising against Assad s regime. On the other hand, Information Minister Adnan Mahmud accused Syrian rebels of shelling the protest hub of Homs to swing a UN Security Council vote in their favour. "The reports on some satellite channels that the Syrian army shelled neighbourhoods in Homs are fabricated and unfounded," Mahmud said in a statement to AFP. He charged that "armed terrorist groups, incited by the Istanbul council (opposition Syrian National Council)" carried out the assault on Homs and other areas "to swing the vote" at the Security Council. The U.N. says more than 5,400 people have been killed over almost 11 months in a Syrian government crackdown on civilian protests. The Security Council has now only agreed one statement, which has a lower standing, on the Syrian crisis since protests erupted in March last year. India and South Africa which abstained in the October vote, backed the latest resolution. Pakistan was also among council members to back the resolution.