Musharraf is responsible for Benazir’s assassination: Bilawal Bhutto

Al Jazeera
December 28, 2017

Islamabad, Dec 28: An impassioned Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has accused former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf of being responsible for his mother Benazir Bhutto's murder.

Speaking at a rally to mark the tenth anniversary of Bhutto's murder in the southern Pakistani town of Garhi Khuda Bux on Wednesday, Bilawal led a crowd of thousands in a chant declaring Musharraf "a murderer".

Benazir Bhutto, who was twice elected as Pakistan's prime minister, was assassinated in a gun and bomb attack shortly after addressing a political rally in the garrison city of Rawalpindi while campaigning for elections in 2007. 

In August, a Pakistani anti-terrorism court exonerated five men accused of involvement in the attack, while convicting and sentencing two senior police officers for willful negligence and tampering with evidence during the investigation into the murder.

The five men, accused of being members of the Pakistan Taliban, known by the acronym TTP, remain in custody pending a prosecution appeal.

Musharraf, who denies any involvement in the murder, was declared a fugitive by the same court for failing to appear during hearings.

He has not been convicted on any charges as of yet.

'We did not get justice'

Flanked by his sisters Bakhtawar and Aseefa, who wiped away tears at points during the speech, Bilawal told the crowd he was disappointed in the court's decision but would continue to fight for the independence of the judiciary.

"The judiciary whose independence you fought for … we did not get justice from it, your esteemed father did not get justice from it, I did not get justice from it."

Speaking to the BBC in an interview released on Wednesday, Musharraf denied any responsibility for the murder but said he could not rule out the involvement of rogue elements within the Pakistani military.

"[It is a] possibility. Yes indeed," he said. "Because the society is polarised on religious lines."

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has succeeded his mother as chairperson of the Pakistan People's Party, which was led for the last several years by Asif Ali Zardari, Benazir's widower.

In the last year, however, Bilawal has stepped up to take more responsibilities, and will be leading the PPP's election campaign for a general parliamentary poll to be held in mid-2018.

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News Network
January 30,2020

Mumbai, Jan 30: The Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (STF) has arrested Dr Kafeel Khan from Mumbai airport for allegedly making inflammatory statements at AMU during protests against the Citizenship Amendments Act (CAA) last month, officials said.

Khan was arrested on Wednesday night with assistance from Mumbai Police at the airport when he arrived in the city to attend anti-CAA protests, an official said.

"Officials of the UP STF arrested Dr Kafeel Khan in a case which was registered at Civil Lines Police Station under section 153 A (promoting enmity between different groups) of IPC. Our police team helped our UP counterparts on their request," said an official from Mumbai Police.

He claimed that Khan had made inflammatory statements on December 12 last year during the protest near Bab e Syed Gate outside the Aligarh Muslim University in front of more than 600 students.

The official also alleged that the Gorakhpur doctor had made objectionable comments against Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

The FIR against Khan mentions that Swaraj India's president Yogendra Yadav was also present during the speech at AMU.

Following the arrest in the case, Khan was taken to the Sahar Police Station and after completing formalities he will be taken to UP on transit remand, the official said.

Khan, a paediatrician, had come to the limelight in 2017 when a controversy broke out after the death of over 60 children in less than a week at the BRD Medical College in Gorakhpur, UP.

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News Network
February 19,2020

Beijing, Feb 19: The death count from China's new coronavirus epidemic jumped to 2,000 on Wednesday after 132 more people died in Hubei province, the hard-hit epicentre of the outbreak.

In its daily update, the province's health commission also reported 1,693 new cases of people infected with the virus.

This brings the total number of cases in mainland China past 74,000.

Most of the cases are in Hubei, where the virus first emerged in December before spiralling into a nationwide epidemic.

Wednesday's jump in the death count was an increase on Tuesday's figures, although the number of new cases reported in Hubei were the lowest for a week.

A study released by Chinese officials claimed most patients have mild cases of the illness.

Outside of hardest-hit Hubei, which has been effectively locked down to try to contain the virus, the number of new cases has been slowing and China's national health authority has said this is a sign the outbreak is under control.

President Xi Jinping, in a phone call with the British prime minister, said China's measures were achieving "visible progress", according to state media Tuesday.

However, the World Health Organization has cautioned that it was too early to tell if the decline would continue.

On Tuesday the director of a hospital in the central Hubei city of Wuhan became the seventh medical worker to succumb to the COVID-19 illness.

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Agencies
March 15,2020

Jakarta, Mar 15: Indonesia's transport minister is in intensive care after testing positive for the novel coronavirus, an official has said, as schools and tourist attractions were ordered to close over the health threat.

Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi was receiving treatment at an army hospital in Jakarta, State Secretary Pratikno said on Saturday.

A hospital spokesman said Sumadi was encountering difficulty breathing but that his condition was improving.

Pratikno said Sumadi was involved in virus mitigation efforts, particularly the evacuation of Indonesians from epicenters of the outbreak, and that President Joko Widodo had called for tests to be carried out on other ministers.

Cases of the virus in Indonesia, the world's fourth most populous country, have jumped from zero two weeks ago to 96, with five deaths, according to government spokesperson Achmad Yurianto.

He also said the virus has spread outside Greater Jakarta to Bandung in West Java, Solo in Central Java, Manado in North Sulawesi, Pontianak in West Kalimantan, as well as holiday havens Yogyakarta and Bali.

Following the increase, the government on Saturday established a task force on COVID-19 mitigation.

Jakarta's Governor Anies Baswedan announced that schools would close for two weeks starting Monday, and ordered the closure of city-owned tourist attractions, such as Ragunan Zoo and Ancol beach.

He emphasized that Jakarta would not be locked down but urged people "to be responsible" and called for social distancing when possible.

Similarly, the administration of Solo, Central Java, Friday announced that schools and tourist attractions would close after a coronavirus patient died in the region.

The World Health Organization has said it is particularly concerned about high-risk nations with weaker health systems, which who may lack the facilities to identify cases.

A day after declaring the coronavirus outbreak to be pandemic this week, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called Indonesia's president Widodo and both agreed to "scale up cooperation."

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