Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf arrested, remanded in custody for two days

April 19, 2013

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Islamabad, Apr 19: Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf was arrested from his farmhouse on Friday in a case relating to sacking of judges, a day after he dramatically fled the court to avoid detention, and remanded to two days in custody, becoming the first ex-army chief to face such action.

Police officials arrested the 69-year-old former military strongman on Friday morning and took him to the court of judicial magistrate Muhammad Abbas Shah.

After hearing arguments by Musharraf's lawyer and the counsel of several persons who have filed petitions against him, the magistrate sent the former army chief on "transit remand" for two days.

The magistrate also directed police to produce Musharraf in an anti-terrorism court in two days as the Islamabad high court had on Thursday directed authorities to charge him under the Anti-Terrorism Act for his actions during the 2007 emergency.

Musharraf can appeal in the Supreme Court against the magistrate's order.

The arrest came a day after the Islamabad high court revoked Musharraf's bail for not cooperating with police officials investigating a case registered against him for detaining 60 judges, including Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, during the emergency.

Footage on television showed Musharraf being led into the magistrate's small and dimly-lit office by dozens of policemen and paramilitary personnel.

Musharraf looked shaken and was wearing a waistcoat over a shalwar-kameez.

He was also seen emerging from the magistrate's office and heading for his car. Musharraf waited in his car for some time as the magistrate initially reserved his decision.

However, he was driven to his farmhouse by his security detail before the magistrate issued the order for his detention shortly after 9.15am.

Officials said Musharraf would be detained at his farmhouse at Chak Shahzad on the outskirts of Islamabad as he faced threats to his life and could not be sent to prison.

Earlier, police officials informed the magistrate that they did not need physical custody of Musharraf and he could be placed in judicial custody.

However, the lawyers of those who had filed petitions against Musharraf for imposing emergency in 2007 and detaining over 60 members of the superior judiciary contended that he should kept in police custody.

They also questioned why Musharraf had not been handcuffed by police after his arrest.

Musharraf's lawyer Qamar Afzal argued that his client should be kept in judicial custody as there were serious threats to his life.

Sources told PTI that authorities had asked for Musharraf to be placed in judicial custody as this would allow the administration of Islamabad to declare his farmhouse at Chak Shahzad a 'sub-jail' and detain him there.

Authorities have been focussing on this measure as officials are not keen on holding Musharraf at a jail due to threats to his life.

However, immediately after Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui revoked his pre-arrest bail on Thursday and ordered police to detain him, Musharraf and his security detail fled from the Islamabad high court complex and drove to his farmhouse.

Musharraf's lawyers could not file an appeal in the Supreme Court on Thursday as they were unable to complete certain formalities before the court closed for the day.

Analysts said Musharraf's arrest could put the judiciary in conflict with the powerful military, which would not like to see a former chief being humiliated or insulted in public.

The analysts further said that if Musharraf was put on trial, members of the current military leadership, including army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, could be dragged into the matter as they were part of Musharraf's inner circle when he clamped emergency rule six years back.

Musharraf has had to grapple with numerous legal problems since he returned to the country last month after nearly four years in self-exile.

Earlier this week, Musharraf was disqualified from contesting next month's general election, effectively ending his ambitions for a political comeback.

Authorities have also barred him from travelling out of Pakistan.

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Agencies
January 6,2020

The Cambridge Analytica scandal is far from over. New explosive details leaked by a whistleblower shows that the extent of the rot is far deeper than previously thought.

An anonymous Twitter account, @HindsightFiles, has started releasing the documents, apparently on behalf of Brittany Kaiser, a former employee of the now defunct British data analytics and consulting company Cambridge Analytica.

"Democracies around the world are being auctioned to the highest bidder. We release the documents that explain how," reads the biography of the @HindsightFiles.

The document will reveal previously unreleased emails, project plans, case studies, negotiations and more spanning over 60 countries.

"Over the past two years I have given evidence to investigators, journalists and academics to analyse what happened at Cambridge Analytica, and how our data was used to influence democracies around the world. In the name of shedding light on these dark practices, I am releasing documents and emails in full for the public good," Kaiser, who worked with Cambridge Analytica from 2014 to 208, was quoted as saying.

"I do this to strengthen the case for data rights and enforcement of our electoral laws online globally. We should all be seeking more ethical digital future for ourselves and our children," added Kaiser who starred in the Oscar-shortlisted Netflix documentary "The Great Hack".

The details released so far includes links to material on the firm's activities in Malaysia, Kenya, Brazil and Iran, an addition to the John Bolton archive.

Over the next months, more than 100,000 documents relating to work in 68 countries are set to be released, according to a report in The Guardian.

More than one and a half year after the Cambridge Analytica scandal first became public, US regulators last month said that the now-defunct British data analytics and consulting company engaged in deceptive practices to harvest personal information from tens of millions of Facebook users for voter profiling and targeting.

According to Kaiser, the Facebook data scandal was part of a much bigger global operation designed to manipulate people in collaboration with governments, intelligence agencies, commercial companies and political campaigns.

The unpublished documents contain material that suggests the firm collaborated with a political party in Ukraine in 2017 even while under investigation as part of Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election, said The Guardian report.

"There are emails between these major Trump donors discussing ways of obscuring the source of their donations through a series of different financial vehicles. These documents expose the entire dark money machinery behind US politics," Kaiser was quoted as saying.

Similar tactics were deployed in other countries that Cambridge Analytica operated in, including Britain, she claimed.

The files released by Kaiser suggest that Cambridge Analytica offered to help United Malays National Organisation (Umno), the party of Malaysia's Former Prime Minister Najib Razak, to influence the voting of 40 parliamentary constituencies in the 14th General Election (GE14) in 2013.

Umno, according to the leaks, requested the company to prepare a proposal to regain 13 seats, The South China Morning Post reported on Saturday.

In 2018, Razak claimed that he had never engaged Cambridge Analytica in any way.

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Agecnies
July 13,2020

Moscow, Jul 13: Russia has become the first nation to complete clinical trials of a COVID-19 vaccine on humans. Chief researcher Elena Smolyarchuk, who heads the Center for Clinical Research on Medications at Sechenov University, told Russian news agency TASS on Sunday that the human trials for the vaccine have been completed at the university and the volunteers will be discharged soon.

"The research has been completed and it proved that the vaccine is safe. The volunteers will be discharged on July 15 and July 20," Smolyarchuk was quoted as saying in the report.

Though the results have been favourable with respect to the medication’s effectiveness, no further information was provided on when this vaccine would enter commercial production stage.

Russia had allowed clinical trials of two forms of a potential COVID-19 vaccine developed by the Gamaleya National Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology on June 18.

The first vaccine, in the form of a solution for intramuscular administration, was carried out at the Burdenko Military Hospital.

Another vaccine, in the form of a powder for the preparation of a solution for intramuscular administration, was carried out at Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University.

The first stage of research on the vaccine at Sechenov University involved a group of 18 volunteers and the second group involved 20 volunteers.

After vaccination, all volunteers were expected to remain in isolation in a hospital for 28 days.

Earlier, results of the COVID-19 vaccine tests performed on a group of volunteers in Russia showed that they were developing immunity to the coronavirus.

"The data obtained by the Gamalei National Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology, proves that volunteers of the first and second groups are forming an immune response after injections of the vaccine against the coronavirus," according to an earlier statement from the Russian Defense Ministry.

Russia has reported 719,449 cases and 11,188 deaths to date.

There are at least 21 vaccines currently under key trials, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).

The overall number of global COVID-19 cases crossed 12.9 million, while the deaths have increased to more than 5,69,000, according to Johns Hopkins University in the US.

As of Monday morning, the total number of cases stood at 1,29,10,357, while the fatalities rose to 5,69,128.

The US accounted for the world's highest number of infections at over 33 lakh. Brazil came in the second place with over 18 lakh infections. India is third worst affected with over 8.7 lakh people reported to have COVID-19.

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News Network
June 30,2020

Washington, Jun 30: Indian-American Medha Raj has been named by Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden as his digital chief of staff, a key role in his election campaigns which are entirely going virtual due to the Covid-19 pandemic in the US.

In this capacity, Raj will work across all facets of the digital department to streamline and coordinate how to maximise the impact of its digital outputs, the Biden campaign said.

“Excited to share that I've joined Joe Biden's campaign as the Digital Chief of Staff. 130 days to the election and we're not going to waste a minute!” she said on LinkedIn.

Raj comes from Pete Buttigieg's campaign, who has now endorsed Biden.

The news was first reported by CNN, which the news channel said is part of the efforts of the Biden campaign to adapt to an almost entirely virtual campaign trail brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

The US is the hardest-hit country by the coronavirus pandemic, with more than 2.64 million official cases and over 128,000 deaths.

According to CNN, Clarke Humphrey, who previously worked on Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, will act as the Biden campaign's new deputy digital director for the grassroots fundraising.

Jose Nunez is the campaign's new digital organising director.

He is from the Kamala Harris' campaign. Christian Tom is the new director of digital partnerships. Over the past few months, Biden has been relying more and more on digital campaigning and raising funds virtually.

A graduate in international politics from Georgetown University, Raj has earned her MBA from Stanford University.

Biden, 77, is challenging the 74-year-old Republican incumbent President Donald Trump in the November 3 presidential elections.

Former US vice president Biden would formally accept his Democratic presidential nomination at the party’s scaled back convention in Wisconsin’s Milwaukee city on August 20.

In view of the coronavirus pandemic, the Democratic National Convention Committee (DNCC) on Wednesday announced its convention plan to broadcast from Milwaukee and across the nation to reach out to all Americans.

According to some of the latest opinion polls, Biden is leading by more than eight percentage points over Trump.

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