Interesting Quotes

The ink of the scholar is holier than the blood of the martyr. Muhammad (Peace be upon him)

"So many deeds cry out to be done, And always urgently;
The world rolls on, Time presses.
Ten thousand years are too long, Seize the day, seize the hour!"
~ Mao Tse-Tung 1963.

A hammer shatters glass but forges steel. Old Russian Proverb

The price of apathy towards public affairs is to be ruled by evil men. Plato

Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life. Confucius

If you think education is expensive, try ignorance! Derek Bok

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. Aristotle

The mind is like a parachute - it works only when it is open. Frank Zappa

It is a terrible thing to see and have no vision Helen Keller

It is easy to be tolerant when you do not care Clement F. Rogers

Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration. Thomas Edison

We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons. Anonymous

Down in their hearts, wise men know this truth: the only way to help yourself is to help others. Elbert Hubbard

There are decades when nothing happens, but there are weeks when decades happen Lenin

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it George Santayana

Don’t let the facts get in the way of your imagination. Sam Levenson

If you think you know everything, you are correct. You know everything YOU will. Anonymous

Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work, so most people don't recognize them. Ann Landers

...some birds aren't meant to be caged. Their feathers are just too bright. The Shawshank Redemption (film)

Never bend your head. Always hold it high. Look the world straight in the face (an advice to a 5 year old blind child). Helen Keller

What is now proved was once only imagin'd William Blake

Without an aim, there is no system Edwards Deming

The highest reward for a person's toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it. John Ruskin

A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds. Francis Bacon

The art of living lies not in eliminating but in growing with troubles. Bernard M.Baruch

A failure is a man who has blundered, but is not able to cash in the experience. Elbert Hubbard

There is only one success - to be able to spend your life in your own way. Christopher Morley

When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than my talent for absorbing positive knowledge. Albert Einstein

The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources. Albert Einstein

The only source of knowledge is experience Albert Einstein

The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift. Albert Einstein

I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world. Albert Einstein

We should take care not to make the intellect our god; it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality. Albert Einstein

The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity. Albert Einstein

Reading, after a certain age, diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who read too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking. Albert Einstein

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction. Albert Einstein

Imagination is more important than knowledge. Albert Einstein

Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love. Albert Einstein

I want to know God's thoughts; the rest are details. Albert Einstein

The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax. Albert Einstein

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. Albert Einstein

The only real valuable thing is intuition. Albert Einstein

A person starts to live when he can live outside himself. Albert Einstein

I am convinced that He (God) does not play dice. Albert Einstein

God is subtle but he is not malicious. Albert Einstein

Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character. Albert Einstein

I never think of the future. It comes soon enough. Albert Einstein

The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility. Albert Einstein

Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing. Albert Einstein

Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind. Albert Einstein

Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new. Albert Einstein

Great spirits have often encountered violent opposition from weak minds. Albert Einstein

Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. Albert Einstein

Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen. Albert Einstein

Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one's living at it. Albert Einstein

The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education. Albert Einstein

God does not care about our mathematical difficulties. He integrates empirically. Albert Einstein

The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking. Albert Einstein

Technological progress is like an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal. Albert Einstein

Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding. Albert Einstein

The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible. Albert Einstein

We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them. Albert Einstein

Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school. Albert Einstein

Do not worry about your difficulties in Mathematics. I can assure you mine are still greater. Albert Einstein

Equations are more important to me, because politics is for the present, but an equation is something for eternity. Albert Einstein

If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut. Albert Einstein

Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe. Albert Einstein

As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality. Albert Einstein

Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods. Albert Einstein

I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones. Albert Einstein

In order to form an immaculate member of a flock of sheep one must, above all, be a sheep. Albert Einstein

The fear of death is the most unjustified of all fears, for there's no risk of accident for someone who's dead. Albert Einstein

Too many of us look upon Americans as dollar chasers. This is a cruel libel, even if it is reiterated thoughtlessly by the Americans themselves. Albert Einstein

Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism - how passionately I hate them! Albert Einstein

No, this trick won't work...How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love? Albert Einstein

My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind. Albert Einstein

Yes, we have to divide up our time like that, between our politics and our equations. But to me our equations are far more important, for politics are only a matter of present concern. A mathematical equation stands forever. Albert Einstein

The release of atom power has changed everything except our way of thinking...the solution to this problem lies in the heart of mankind. If only I had known, I should have become a watchmaker. Albert Einstein

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. Albert Einstein

A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeeded be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death. Albert Einstein

The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge. Albert Einstein

Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion. Albert Einstein

You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat. Albert Einstein

One had to cram all this stuff into one's mind for the examinations, whether one liked it or not. This coercion had such a deterring effect on me that, after I had passed the final examination, I found the consideration of any scientific problems distasteful to me for an entire year. Albert Einstein

...one of the strongest motives that lead men to art and science is escape from everyday life with its painful crudity and hopeless dreariness, from the fetters of one's own ever-shifting desires. A finely tempered nature longs to escape from the personal life into the world of objective perception and thought. Albert Einstein

He who joyfully marches to music rank and file, has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an action. It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder. Albert Einstein

A human being is a part of a whole, called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest... a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Albert Einstein

Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts. (Sign hanging in Einstein's office at Princeton) Copyright: Kevin Harris 1995 (may be freely distributed with this acknowledgement) Albert Einstein

Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power. Benito Mussolini

Every one minute you spend worrying about failing is just one minute that you have failed to prepare for your success Anonymous

Great and successful persons are always learning Anonymous

High aims form characters and great objects bring out great minds Anonymous

Hope is the dream of a waking man Anonymous

Man without God is nothing. God without man is still God Anonymous

If you didn't learn to save before you finished in high school, a vital part of your education was wasted Anonymous

In prayer you seek to become who you are meant to be Anonymous

It is better to light one small candle than to curse the darkness Anonymous

Love is forgiving because love is for giving Anonymous

Fear is: False Evidence Appearing Real Anonymous

Life is 20 percent what happens to you and 80 percent how you react to it Anonymous

A committee is a group that keeps minutes and loses hours Milton Berle

Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in a well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting "...holy shit...what a ride!" Anonymous

Anger is never without a reason, but seldom a good one. Benjamin Franklin

The graveyards are full of indispensible people Charles de Gaulle

Coming together is a beginning, staying together is progress, and working together is success. Anonymous

Man saying it can't be done should not interupt man doing it? Chinese proverb

The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness, or skill. It will make or break a company ... a church ... a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude ... I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me, and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you ... we are in charge of our Attitudes. Charles Swindoll

I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it. Stephen Leacock

The first myth of management is that it exists. Anonymous

Creativity is an attitude and ability to look at the ordinary and see the extraordinary. DeWitt Jones ~ Everyday Creativity

Circumstances do not make a man, they reveal him Dr. Wayne W.Dyer

The one who would have the worst position in Allah's sight on the Day of Resurrection would be a learned man who did not profit from his learning. Muhammad (Peace be upon him)

People become motivated when you guide them to the source of their own power. Anita Roddick, founder of The Body Shop

Don't let the facts get in the way of your imagination. Anonymous

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends Martin Luther King Jr.

Never underestimate the power of a few committed individuals to change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has. Margaret Mead

Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that something inside of them was superior to circumstance. Bruce Barton

I never wear a watch, because I always know it's now - and now is when you should do it. San Francisco 49ers head coach Steve Mariucci

Nature gave us one tongue and two ears so we could hear twice as much as we speak. Epictetus

If the going seems easy, you are going down the hill. Anonymous

The idea that you can take smart but inexperienced 25-year-olds who never managed anything and turn them into effective managers via two years of classroom training is ludicrous. Henry Mintzberg

The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one. Elbert Hubbard

Control oil and you control nations; control food and you control the people. Henry Kissinger

Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedy. Earnest Benn

Politics is the art of postponing decisions until they are no longer relevant. Henri Queuille

THE GREAT DEBATE

US-Pakistan Top Secret Military Talks Leakage

29-Aug.-2008

The "New York Times" reported as follows on August 28, 2008: "Top US and Pakistani army commanders had a highly unusual secret meeting on board an American aircraft carrier in the Indian Ocean to discuss how to combat the escalating violence along the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. The leading actors in the day long conference were Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Pakistan Army Chief General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani. The meeting had been convened on Tuesday (August 26) by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. While officials of the two allies offered few details on Wednesday about what was decided or even discussed at the meeting - including any new strategies, tactics, weapons or troop deployment- the star-studded list of participants and an extreme secrecy surrounding the talks underscored how gravely the two nations regarded the growing militant threat.".

2.The top secrecy surrounding the talks between Admiral Mullen and Gen. Kayani brings to mind a similar top secret meeting between Gen. Jehangir Karamat, the then Pakistani Chief of the Army Staff (COAS), and Gen. Anthony Zinni, the then chief of the US Central Command, on the tarmac of a Pakistani airport before the US launched Cruise missile strikes against Osama bin Laden and the training camps of Al Qaeda in Afghan territory in August,1998, in retaliation for the Al Qaeda-organised explosions outside the US Embassies in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam.

3. The US had fixed the Cruise missile strikes on a day (August 20,1998) when bin Laden was expected to visit a training camp to meet a group of Al Qaeda volunteers, who had completed the training. Nawaz Sharif was then the Prime Minister of Pakistan. The US did not want his Government to know in advance about the planned Cruise missile attacks lest the information leak to Al Qaeda. At the same time, it was worried that if the Pakistani Army detected the incoming Cruise missiles, it might mistake them for missiles launched by India and this could lead to a war between India and Pakistan.

4. Just before the launch of the missiles, Gen. Zinni landed in a Pakistani airport secretly. Only Karamat was informed in advance about his landing. Zinni had requested him to meet him secretly for a discussion on the tarmac of the airport. He also asked Karamat to come alone to the airport without being accompanied by any of his officers. As the two took a stroll on the tarmac, Zinni told Karamat about the impending missile strikes and asked him not to tell Nawaz or anybody else about the strikes. Immediately thereafter, Zinni took off. Shortly thereafter, the missiles were launched from US naval ships.

5. The missiles destroyed only some training camps of the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM) of Pakistan in Afghan territory. Al Qaeda camps had been evacuated from the area targeted by the Cruise missiles. Bin Laden had cancelled his visit to one of the camps. He and his camps escaped the strike.

6. Till today, it has been a mystery as to how bin Laden and his Al Qaeda came to know of the date and time of the strike. Did they get their information from their own sources? Or did Karamat inform his officers and Nawaz in violation of the assurance given by him to Zinni and did any of them leak out? No answer is available to any of these questions.

7. Recently, US military officers have been complaining in their testimonies to the Congressional committees as well as in their briefings of the media that the collusion between Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Taliban has reached such an extent that the Taliban and Al Qaeda had come to know in advance in some cases about planned strikes by US Predator aircraft on the hide-outs of these organizations in Pakistan. While some Predator strikes were successful, many others were not.

8.It is learnt from reliable Afghan sources that the NATO officials based in Afghanistan suspect that the leakages had been taking place not only from the ISI and some sections of the Pakistan Army, but also from some members of the Pakistan Government headed by Prime Minister Yousef Raza Gilani. The US suspicions are particularly focused on the Awami National Party of Afsandyar Wali Khan, and the Jamiat-ul-Islam Pakistan of Maulana Fazlur Rahman It is understood that this matter of leakages of information was raised by President George Bush with Gilani when the latter visited Washington DC in the last week of July, 2008.

9.It is likely that one of the purposes of the top secret meeting between Mullen and Kayani on board a US aircraft-carrier was to discuss how to prevent such leakages.

DID MUSHARRAF TELL NAWAZ ABOUT KARGIL PLANS?

By B. Raman

(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai.)

Did President Pervez Musharraf, who was the Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) under Mr. Nawaz Sharif when he was the Prime Minister before October 12, 1999, inform Mr. Sharif about his plans to send the Army to occupy the Kargil heights? If not, why not? If so, when did he inform him? What was the reaction of Mr. Sharif? Did he concur with Musharraf's action or did he disaprove of his action? What is the truth?

2. These questions have assumed importance in the light of two interviews given by Lt. Gen. (retd) Jamshed Gulzar Kiani on June 2, 2008, to the Geo TV and the "Dawn" of Karachi. Jamshed Gulzar Kiani was a Major-General in the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) at the time of the Kargil conflict and the subsequent coup against Mr. Sharif. The ISI was then headed by Lt. Gen. Ziauddin, a Kashmiri of Punjabi origin from the Engineer Corps. The differences between Musharraf and Nawaz Sharif initially developed shortly after the appointment of Musharraf by Nawaz Sharif as the COAS in October, 1998.

3. These differences were due to Nawaz Sharif's over-ruling Musharraf's objections to the appointment of Ziauddin as the Director-General of the ISI. Ziauddin was a close confidante of Nawaz Sharif and kept him informed of all actions of Musharraf, who stopped inviting him to some of his meetings with the Corps Commanders.

4. Jamshed Gulzar Kiani ingratiated himself with Musharraf by keeping him informed of the activities of Ziauddin. A small coterie of Army officers headed by Lt. Gen. Mohammad Aziz, the then Chief of the General Staff (CGS), staged a coup when Musharraf was returning to Karachi from Colombo on October 12, 1999, and had Nawaz Sharif arrested because he dismissed Musharraf and appointed Ziauddin as the COAS. They prevented Ziauddin from entering the office of the COAS. He was arrested subsequently.

5. A question often debated in senior circles of the Pakistan Army is whether this coterie would have behaved in this manner if Nawaz Sharif had appointed a Punjabi Lt. Gen. from a fighting formation instead of an engineer as the COAS. Those, who held this view, used to argue that the objection of this coterie was not to the dismissal of Musharraf, a Mohajir, who was disliked by many of the Punjabi officers, but to his appointment of Ziauddin as the COAS. It is difficult to know the truth.

6. A month after taking over power as the Chief Executive, Musharraf promoted Jamshed Gulzar Kiani as a Lt. Gen and appointed him a Corps Commander. The two were very close to each other. Musharraf greatly appreciated his action before October 12, 1999, in keeping him informed of the activities of Ziauddin and his links with Nawaz Sharif.

7. When Jamshed Gulzar Kiani reached the age of superannuation in 2003, Musharraf rewarded his loyalty by appointing him as the Chairman of the Federal Public Services Commission, which post had a fixed tenure of five years under the law. Serious differences developed between the two when Kiani as the Chairman of the Commission did not do the bidding of Musharraf and Mr. Shaukat Aziz, the former Prime Minister, in respect of some appointments and postings of officers. Musharraf asked him to resign. He declined. Musharraf had a bill passed by the National Assembly in September 2006 reducing the tenure from five to three years. He was replaced at the end of three years.

8. A bitter Jamshed Gulzar Kiani, who felt humiliated by the treatment meted out to him by Musharraf despite his loyalty to him when he was Maj. Gen. and Lt. Gen., joined the group of anti-Musharraf officers such as Gen. Mirza Aslam Beg, former COAS who succeeded Zia-ul-Haq, after he died in a plane crash, Lt. Gen. Hamid Gul, former DG of the ISI etc and has been keeping on a campaign against Musharraf.

9.In his interview to the Geo TV, he made various allegations against Musharraf regarding the Kargil episode, Musharraf's post-9/11 co-operation with the US in the so-called war against terrorism and the commando raid into the Lal Masjid of Islamabad in July last year. He stated on follows on the Kargil episode: According to his information, Nawaz Sharif did not know anything about the Kargil episode. He was never thoroughly briefed on the same. He (Kiani) supported the holding of a probe into the Kargil fiasco. He had briefed Nawaz Sharif and told him that it was a very sensitive issue and he could not unveil all the details to him. In a meeting of May 17, 1999, Nawaz gave a green signal to the operation. He assured conditional support to General Musharraf that the Government would back the operation when he successfully moved forward. If unfortunately the same failed, he would not be in a position to support him (Musharraf).

10. In his interview to the "Dawn"on June 2,2008,, Kiani said: Nawaz Sharif, the majority of corps commanders and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) were kept in the dark about the Kargil operation in 1999.Although Nawaz was briefed on the Kargil issue, it was fairly late and the conflict had started by then. “It was not a comprehensive briefing that the chief executive should have been given.”

11. Talking to the media on June 3, 2008, Nawaz Sharif demanded the trial of Musharraf on treason charges for his illegal Nov 3, 2007, steps in imposing a State of Emergency, the Lal Masjid carnage and keeping the nation, military officials and the then political leadership in the dark on the Kargil issue. Nawaz termed Musharraf’s account on the Kargil issue in his book, “In the Line of Fire,” a pack of lies and said the interview of Lt-Gen (retd) Jamshed Gulzar Kiani to Geo TV upheld his stance that he was not informed about the Kargil operation.

12. Nawaz was being clever. Kiani did not tell either Geo TV or the "Dawn" that Nawaz was not informed. He only said that Nawaz was informed later and that too not in a comprehensive manner. At the same time, he added that Nawaz approved the already on-going operation provided it would be successful.

13. Who is telling the truth---- Musharraf in his book in which he claimed that Nawaz was on board or Kiani, who claims that Nawaz was informed in passing after the Pakistan Army had moved into the Kargil heights and that he had not objected to it provided it would succeed or Nawaz, who claims that he like many Corps Commanders was not informed at all?

14. The definitive answer to this question is to be found in the archives of the Research & Analysis Wing (R&AW). In the last week of May,1999, Musharraf had been to Beijing. He was in daily telephonic contact with Lt. Gen. Mohammad Aziz, the CGS, in Rawalpindi from his hotel room in Beijing. All these conversations were intercepted by the R&AW. The Government of Atal Behari Vajpayee decided to release to the media the transcripts of two of these tapes for three reasons. Firstly, the tapes showed that it was the Pakistani Army which had occupied the Kargil heights violating the Line of Control (LOC) and not the Kashmiri Mujahideen as claimed by Musharraf. Secondly, it was the Pakistan Army which had shot down an Indian Air Force plane and asked the Hizbul Mujahideen to claim the responsibility for it. Third, the tapes showed that Musharraf had launched his operation without the knowledge of Nawaz, many of his Corps Commanders, the ISI, the chiefs of the Air Force and Navy and his Foreign Office. He got nervous after the IAF went into action and there were reports of the Indian naval ships moving from the East to the West coast.

15. Worried over the possibility of the conflict spreading outside Kashmir, Musharraf authorised Lt.Gen.Aziz from Beijing to brief other officers about the operation at an inter-ministerial meeting chaired by Nawaz on May 29,1999. At this meeting, as reported by Aziz to Musharraf, there were objections to Musharraf's keeping others in the dark. According to the account of the meeting as given by Aziz to Musharraf in Beijing over telephone, Nawaz defended Musharraf's action in not informing others as due to the demands of operational secrecy. Nawaz claimed that he himself and other Corps Commanders were informed only a week earlier. He made it appear that Musharraf's action was understandable.

16. A careful examination of the tapes as released by the Vajpayee Government would indicate the following:

• Musharraf launched the operation without taking the clearance of Nawaz and without the knowledge of most of the senior officers.
• When the Indian Army hit back and the IAF went into action, he lost his nerve and informed firstly Nawaz and then other senior officers and the Foreign Office.
• Instead of rebuking Musharraf for launching the operation without his clearance and asking him to stop it, Nawaz went along with it hoping that the operation would succeed. When it did not, he flew to the US and sought the US assistance in bringing the fighting to a halt.

17. It is clear that neither Musharraf nor Nawaz nor Kiani is telling the whole truth. Each is telling only a part of the truth which, they think, would serve their purpose.

Exposing Nawaz Sharif’s corruption

The following is an excellent programme exposing some of the corruption conducted by Nawaz Sharif by the host of DM Digital, Farhan Aslam, who also used to work for ARY Digital a few years ago.

The report has been divided into six segments. I will offer a short summary of the discussion, followed by the clips themselves.

Brief summary

Nawaz Sharif’s only agenda was to make money. In order to achieve this goal, he formed/changed laws and policies for his personal benefit and expanded his business empire by misusing his authority as Prime Minister.

Interestingly enough and ironically, the PPP played a major role in exposing the corruption of Nawaz Sharif and his family. The Jamaat-e-Islami had also levelled a number of corruption allegations upon Nawaz Sharif. As we know, later Sharif and his cronies also played a role in exposing the corruption of Benazir Bhutto and her PPP. In other words, both Sharif and Bhutto have been busy over the years actively accusing each other of committing corruption.

Nawaz Sharif is widely acknowledged to be a highly incompetent person, with a mediocre I.Q. level. The brain behind him was that of his late “Abba Jee” (‘daddy’) - the mastermind and the main decision maker behind the scene.

In order to consolidate and attain more power, N. Sharif attacked every individual and institutions he felt could get in the way challenge his authority. In order to get rid of the then Chief Justice Sajjad Ali Shah, who was despised by Sharif, the later created divisions among the judges to make life difficult for the Chief Justice. A group of judges refused to acknowledge Shah as the Chief Justice and things got so bad that a number of junior judges put hurdles in the way of the Chief Justice in order to make it difficult for him to carry out his duties. Eventually, Sharif ordered his thugs to attack the Supreme Court in order to prevent the Chief Justice from giving a ruling against him.

The police did nothing to stop Sharif’s thugs as they attacked and entered the Supreme Court. The judges inside the building barely managed to escape. The thugs, led by Sajjad Naseem and Mushtaq Tahir, Nawaz Sharif’s political secretaries, entered the court chanting anti-Sajjad slogans and destroyed the furniture.

Next, consider Nawaz Sharif’s relationship with the press and media. Two examples will suffice. On 8th May 1999, Najam Sethi, a prominent journalist of Pakistan, was arrested by the police on the orders of Sharif. Sethi has committed the crime of annoying Nawaz Sharif by writing a critical essay against him. The police broke into Sethi’s house at around 2 am and beat him up in his bedroom in front of his wife, after which he was transported off to a secret location. The police trashed Sethi’s house, broke the furniture and beat him up quite bad. Sethi was only released after a lot of international pressure had built up against Sharif. Sharif also demanded the Jang Group to get rid of all the journalists who were critical of him. To achieve this goal, Sharif and his cronies used a variety of legal and illegal means to pressure the Jang Group into compliance.

There is probably no institution in Pakistan which Nawaz Sharif did not aggressively confront in order make them comply to his wishes. Besides picking on a fight with the President, the Judiciary and the already restricted/limited media, Sharif also decided to have a confrontation with the army, the only viable institution left in Pakistan. Chief of Army Staff, General Jehangir Karamat, and Nawaz Sharif had a conflict over an issue pertaining to the national security council and both entered into a heated discussion, after which Gen. Karamat had to offer his resignation. Jehangir Karamat thus became the first Chief of Army Staff in the history of Pakistan to have left the army in this prematurely in this manner.

One by one all challenges and potential obstacles were removed from the way by Nawaz Sharif. Ghulam Ishaq Khan, Farooq Leghari, Sajjad Ali Shah, and Jehangir Karamat, as well as others, were all removed from the scene by Sharif.

After the removal of Jehangir Karamat, Sharif appointed Pervaiz Musharraf as the Chief of Army Staff. Some analysts at the time said that Sharif made this decision thinking that Pervaiz Musharraf was an Urdu speaker and did not belong to a Punjabi army family, thus very unlikely to be a threat to Sharif!

Things became sour between Sharif and Musharraf during the Kargil episode. Later, once a relative of Sharif was removed from the army by Musharraf, that was the final nail in the coffin. Sharif then decided to take his revenge and replace Gen. Musharraf with a fellow of his liking who would be controllable (the head of the I.S.I. at the time).

Farhan Aslam also comments upon the ill-advised economic decisions of Sharif which made Pakistan’s situation from bad to worse. Moreover, he comments upon the Sharif family’s personal business empire and how it grew exponentially through questionable means.

Link: http://musharrafsupporters.wordpress.com/2007/12/10/exposing-nawaz-sharifs-corruption/

VideoLink:
http://www.truveo.com/PMLN-Nawaz-Sharifs-corruption-A-Shocking-Report/id/3726545569

Criminal charges and allegations against ZARDARI

In 1990, Zardari was arrested on charges of blackmail, based on allegations that he attached a bomb to a Pakistani businessman, Murtaza Bukhari, and forced him to withdraw money from his bank account.^[1] However, the charges were dropped when he was released from prison in 1993 when his wife's Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) took power and forced the charges out.^{[citation needed]}

He was kept in custody from 1997 to 2004 on charges ranging from corruption to murder. He was granted bail and released in November 2004 when a judge released Zardari under great pressure. However, he was re-arrested on 21 December 2004 after his failure to attend a hearing in a murder trial in Karachi.

Corruption

Zardari and Benazir Bhutto denied corruption allegations; however, in August 2004, Zardari finally admitted owning a £4.35m estate in Surrey, England (including a 20-room mansion and two farms on 365 acres, or 1.5 km², of land), which the Pakistani authorities allege was bought with the proceeds of corruption.^[2] Legal proceedings brought by the then Government of Pakistan against Zardari to recover the sale proceeds of the property are continuing before the High Court of Justice of England and Wales. In October 2006, the court dismissed Zardari's application to halt the proceedings on the basis that it did not have jurisdiction to hear the case As of late 2007, Zardari is seeking permission to appeal that decision.

French, Polish, Spanish, and Swiss documents have fuelled the charges of corruption against Bhutto and her husband. They faced a number of legal proceedings, including a charge of laundering money through Swiss banks. Though never convicted, her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, spent eight years in prison on similar corruption charges. After being released on bail in 2004, Zardari suggested that his time in prison involved torture; human rights groups have supported his claim that his rights were violated.^[3]

A 1998 New York Times investigative report^[4] claims that Pakistani investigators have documents that uncover a network of bank accounts, all linked to the family's lawyer in Switzerland, with Asif Zardari as the principal shareholder. According to the article, documents released by the French authorities indicated that Zardari offered exclusive rights to Dassault, a French aircraft manufacturer, to replace the air force's fighter jets in exchange for a 5% commission to be paid to a Swiss corporation controlled by Zardari. The article also said a Dubai company received an exclusive license to import gold into Pakistan for which Asif Zardari received payments of more than $10 million into his Dubai-based Citibank accounts. The owner of the company denied that he had made payments to Zardari and claims the documents were forged.

Bhutto maintained that the charges levelled against her and her husband were purely political.^[5][6] An Auditor General of Pakistan (AGP) report supports Bhutto's claim. It presents information suggesting that Benazir Bhutto was ousted from power in 1990 as a result of a witch hunt approved by then-president Ghulam Ishaq Khan. The AGP report says Khan illegally paid legal advisers 28 million rupees to file 19 corruption cases against Bhutto and her husband in 1990-92.^[7]

Yet the assets held by Bhutto and her husband continue to be scrutinized and speculated about. The prosecutors have alleged that their Swiss bank accounts contain £740 million.^[8] Zardari also bought a neo-Tudor mansion and estate worth over £4 million in Surrey, England, UK.^[9][10] The Pakistani investigations have tied other overseas properties to Zardari's family. These include a $2.5 million manor in Normandy owned by Zardari's parents, who had modest assets at the time of his marriage.^[4] Bhutto denied holding substantive overseas assets.

Switzerland

On July 23, 1998, the Swiss Government handed over documents to the government of Pakistan which relate to corruption allegations against Benazir Bhutto and her husband.^[11] The documents included a formal charge of money laundering by Swiss authorities against Zardari. The Pakistani government had been conducting a wide-ranging inquiry to account for more than $13.7 million frozen by Swiss authorities in 1997 that was allegedly stashed in banks by Bhutto and her husband. The Pakistani government recently filed criminal charges against Bhutto in an effort to track down an estimated $1.5 billion she and her husband are alleged to have received in a variety of criminal enterprises.^[12] The documents suggest that the money Zardari was alleged to have laundered was accessible to Benazir Bhutto and had been used to buy a diamond necklace for over $175,000.^[13] The PPP has responded by flatly denying the charges, suggesting that Swiss authorities have been misled by false evidence provided by the Government of Pakistan.

On August 6, 2003, Swiss magistrates found Bhutto and her husband guilty of money laundering.^[14] They were given six-month suspended jail terms, fined $50,000 each and were ordered to pay $11 million to the Pakistani government. The six-year trial concluded that Bhutto and Zardari deposited in Swiss accounts $10 million given to them by a Swiss company in exchange for a contract in Pakistan. The couple said they would appeal. The Pakistani investigators say Zardari opened a Citibank account in Geneva in 1995 through which they say he passed some $40 million of the $100 million he received in payoffs from foreign companies doing business in Pakistan.^[15] In October 2007, Daniel Zappelli, chief prosecutor of the canton of Geneva, said he received the conclusions of a money laundering investigation against former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on October 29, but it was unclear whether there would be any further legal action against her in Switzerland.^[16]

A Swiss investigating magistrate has amassed enough evidence, including the purchase of a diamond necklace, to indict Pakistan's former Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto and husband on money-laundering charges tied to contracts with two Geneva-based companies. The magistrate, Daniel Devaud, decided not to bring the charges against Ms. Bhutto in Switzerland, but rather to ask Pakistani authorities to indict her. The Geneva magistrate has been conducting a wide-ranging inquiry seeking to account for more than $13.7 million frozen by Swiss authorities in 2006.

The money was allegedly stashed in Swiss banks.^[17] The public proceedings were required to be dropped against Bhutto due to her death; however, the proceedings are still continuing against Zardari as of late December 2007.

Poland

The Polish Government has given Pakistan 500 pages of documentation relating to corruption allegations against Benazir Bhutto and her husband. These charges are in regard to the purchase of 8,000 tractors in a 1997 deal.^[19][20] According to Pakistani officials, the Polish papers contain details of illegal commissions paid by the tractor company in return for agreeing to their contract.^[21] It was alleged that the arrangement "skimmed" Rs 103 mn rupees ($2 million) in kickbacks.^[22] "The documentary evidence received from Poland confirms the scheme of kickbacks laid out by Asif Zardari and Benazir Bhutto in the name of (the) launching of Awami tractor scheme", APP said. Bhutto and Asif Ali Zardari allegedly received a 7.15% commission on the purchase through their front men, Jens Schlegelmilch and Didier Plantin of Dargal S.A., who received about $1.969 million for supplying 5,900 Ursus tractors.^[23]

[edit] France

Potentially the most lucrative deal alleged in the documents involved the effort by Dassault Aviation, a French military contractor. French authorities indicated in 1998 that Bhutto's husband, Zardari, offered exclusive rights to Dassault to replace the air force's fighter jets in exchange for a five percent commission to be paid to a corporation in Switzerland controlled by Zardari.^[24]

At the time, French corruption laws forbade bribery of French officials but permitted payoffs to foreign officials, and even made the payoffs tax-deductible in France. However, France changed this law in 2000.^[25]

[edit] Helicopter scandal

In 1998-1999, an enquiry was conducted by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the Parliament to investigate the matter regarding the purchase of the helicopter. The case involves defrauding substantive sum of $2.168 million and $1.1 million public money. The record shows that the case was not pursued properly nor diligently. FIR No 1 of 1998 was registered with Federal Investigation Agency State Bank Circle Rawalpindi on the complaint of Cabinet Division. Thorough investigation was conducted by the committee headed by Chaudhry Muhammad Barjees Tahir and two other members, namely Faridullah Jamali and Jamshaid Ali Shah. During this investigation the committee Chairman Barjees Tahir summoned both the former President Farooq Leghari and former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto along with others, and they were investigated. The case received extensive media coverage both inside and outside Pakistan. The recommendations of the committee, obtained from the file, are as under:

6.1: FIR may be lodged against (1) Malik Allah Yar Khan of Kalabagh (2) Zia Pervez Hussain (3) Dr M.A. Khan and criminal proceedings be instituted against them defrauding the government.

6.2: The amount of $2.168 million be recovered from Malik Allah Yar Khan, Zia Pervez Hussain and Dr M.A. Khan by attaching their properties etc in Pakistan or abroad for this purpose. FIA may be directed to take steps to recover this money through Interpol, if necessary. Any banker or foreign national involved in this fraud may also be taken to task by the Federal Investigation Agency.

6.3: As Benazir Bhutto, she is clearly responsible for this loss to exchequer as major decisions in respect of this contract were taken with her approval or direction and passed on to Cabinet Division through former PS PM (Ahmad Sadiq). FIR may be registered against her for causing loss to state by misuse of her authority as PM, and criminal proceedings be initiated.

6.4: Farooq Leghari knows that his name has visibly come up in this case. He has tried to plead innocent. It is unimaginable that those operating in this scandal could have easy access to the top bureaucrats like Cabinet Secretary, Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister and even to the Prime Minister herself without the backing and active support of the President. FIR against him must also be registered and criminal proceedings initiated.

6.5: As for the senior civil servants involved in the case, Ahmad Sadiq former PS PM, Humayun Faiz Rasul and Sahibzada Imtiaz former Cabinet Secretary, no action can be taken against them at this stage as they already stand retired/superannuated.

The case was further referred to the National Accountability Bureau in 2000-02 but no action was taken.

[edit] Western Asia

In the largest single payment investigators have uncovered, a gold bullion dealer in Western Asia was alleged to have deposited at least $10 million into one of Zardari's accounts after the Bhutto government gave him a monopoly on gold imports that sustained Pakistan's jewellery industry. The money was allegedly deposited into Zardari's Citibank account in Dubai. Pakistan's Arabian Sea coast, stretching from Karachi to the border with Iran, has long been a gold smugglers' haven. Until the beginning of Bhutto's second term, the trade, running into hundreds of millions of dollars a year, was unregulated, with slivers of gold called biscuits, and larger weights in bullion, carried on planes and boats that travel between the Persian Gulf and the largely unguarded Pakistani coast.

Shortly after Bhutto returned as Prime Minister in 1993, a Pakistani bullion trader in Dubai, Abdul Razzak Yaqoob, proposed a deal: in return for the exclusive right to import gold, Razzak would help the government regularize the trade. In November 1994, Pakistan's Commerce Ministry wrote to Razzak informing him that he had been granted a license that made him, for at least the next two years, Pakistan's sole authorized gold importer. In an interview in his office in Dubai, Razzak acknowledged that he had used the license to import more than $500 million in gold into Pakistan, and that he had travelled to Islamabad several times to meet with Bhutto and Zardari. But he denied that there had been any corruption or secret deals. "I have not paid a single cent to Zardari," he said. Razzak claims that someone in Pakistan who wished to destroy his reputation had contrived to have his company wrongly identified as the depositor. "Somebody in the bank has cooperated with my enemies to make false documents," he said.^[

Fatima Bhutto, Benazir Bhutto's niece, and others have publicly accused Bhutto of complicity in the killing of her brother Murtaza Bhutto in 1996 by uniformed police officers while she was Prime Minister.

Hidden Truths about Asif Zardari

Hidden Truths about ASIF ALI ZARDARI:

Asif Ali Zardari [A Shia Muslim] was born on 21^st July 1956 in Nawabshah and was grown up in Karachi. He is the son of Mr. Hakim Ali Zardari, as well as the chief of Zardari Tribe. He did most of his schooling at St Patrick’s, he joined Cadet College Petaro [CCP] in 1963 [Ayub House] and passed his intermediate in 1965. He is a graduate, but I don’t know in which subject he has done his graduation. He married Late Benazir Bhutto on 18^th December 1987, and has three children, Bilawal, Bakhtawar and Asifa.

HIDDEN TRUTHS:

Everybody knows that he is the husband of late Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto, everybody knows that he is the son of famous industrialist Mr. Hakim Ali Zardari, everybody knows that he is the father of new PPPP’s chairperson Mr. Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, Everybody knows that he is the Co-chairman of Peoples Party, but what I am going to tell you, nobody knows except few.

His Stubborn Nature:

When he was studying in Cadet College Petaro (CCP), he insisted his father to open a cinema hall in College for the entertainment of cadets, as there was no other source of entertainment.

A Film Actor:

Very few people know that Asif Zardari has worked in a Super Hit URDU Film called “Salgirah” (Golden Jubilee) in 1969, he played the childhood role of chocolaty hero Late Waheed Murad. The film was produced by Naima Hassan, directed by Qamar Zaidi, lyrics by Shevan Rizvi and Music by Nashaad. Two songs of the movie sung by Late Madam Noor Jehan became very famous (1- Le aayi phir kahan per, kismat hume kahan se, 2- Meri zindagi hai naghma, meri zindagi tarana).A Playboy: The young Zardari’s main claim to fame was that he has a private disco at home that lead to the development of his reputation as a “Playboy”.

Mr. Ten Percent -10%:

He spent several years in jail on charges of corruption and was labelled “Mr. 10%” by the media and other Pakistani figures because of the alleged 10% extortion he forced on people during the PPP governments.

A Brave Person(For Girls):

A close friend of Asif Ali Zardari, recounts an incident in the 1980s when he (Asif) was still a polo-playing and horse-riding bachelor: “We were on a cross-country ride in Karachi when one of our company, the daughter of a German diplomat, fell into a bog with her horse, there were 40 of us, we all stood around stunned except for this one man, Asif Ali Zardari, who jumped in and pulled out the girl and then the horse as well, During all this time, he could have drowned at any time himself.”

Fall Guy:

When he married Late Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto, he became “the designated fall guy”, a close family friend says, “Zardari knew this and accepted it, “the friend adds, “He walked into the marriage knowing it would always be about her, and never about him.”

Illegal Relationships:

Scandals of more than seventy (70) Pakistani Politicians are exposed in a famous book “Bazar-e-Husn se Parliament tak” written by a young journalist “Zaheer Ahmed Baber”, Asif Zardari is one of that 70 politicians. In this book Asif Zardari’s name has been taken with several showbiz ladies like Reema, Saima, Madiha Shah, Resham, Neeli, Andleeb, Hina, Laila and Marvi.

His Illness’s:He suffers from diabetes and a spinal ailment which prevents him from moving around without the help of a walking stick. [stick not seen since Benazir’s assassination].