Voting began on Wednesday across nine States and Union Territories in the fifth and final phase of Lok Sabha elections, but it wasn't clear even after four rounds whether the Congress-led UPA would get another term or the BJP-steered NDA would return to office after five years.
Over 10.78 crore voters have a say in electing 86 MPs to the 545-member lower house of Parliament in this phase.
The polling exercise began at 0700 hrs across 1.21 lakh booths.
The fifth phase saw polling action move to Tamil Nadu, where 39 seats are up for grabs, even as the battle still rages on in the Hindi heartland of Uttar Pradesh.
Uttar Pradesh, which sends the most number of MPs (80) to Parliament, and Jammu and Kashmir are the only two states to see polling in all the five phases.
Among the key contenders in this round are Congress' P Chidambaram and Md Azharuddin, BJP's Maneka and Varun Gandhi and Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, DMK's T R Baalu, A Raja, Dayanidhi Maran and M K Azhagiri, MDMK's Vaiko, TC chief Mamata Banerjee and SP's Jayaprada.
Congress' Mani Shankar Aiyar, Sajjad Gani Lone of People's Conference, BJP's Vinod Khanna and Navjot Singh Sidhu are others who are prominent among the 1,432 candidates in the fray in this round.
Besides all 39 seats in Tamil Nadu, elections would be held to four seats in Himachal Pradesh, two in Jammu and Kashmir, nine in Punjab, 14 in Uttar Pradesh, 11 in West Bengal, five in Uttarakhand and the lone one seat each in both Chandigarh and Puducherry.
Polling has been completed to 457 Lok Sabha seats since the exercise began on April 16. Results will be out on May 16.
A party or a coalition needs 272 seats in the Lok Sabha to stake claim to form a government.
The Lok Sabha has 545 members, but elections are held to 543 seats as two members are nominated from the Anglo-Indian community.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
LTTE-built bund captured
The Sri Lanka military on Tuesday said it captured an LTTE-built earthen wall-cum-bund in the vicinity of the 3.5-sq. km. new safety zone (NSZ) along the narrow strip on the Mullaithivu coast, opening a possible escape route for civilians trapped in the zone.
The announcement on the breakthrough came amid charges of shelling on a makeshift hospital inside the NSZ. The attack reportedly killed 26 persons and injured 100. The military denied charges of shelling.
A statement by the Defence Ministry said the 59 Division troops stepped up the on-going hostage rescue operation, crossing the LTTE-constructed earth bund-cum-ditch, north of the Wadduvakal causeway.
The Ministry said the troops advanced 300 metres further into LTTE defences after consolidating their positions at the causeway, even as U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon expressed dismay at the killing of hundreds of civilians over the weekend.
“Thousands of Sri Lankans have already died in the past several months due to the conflict, and more still remain in grave danger,” a statement issued by his office said. An estimated 20,000 to 30,000 civilians are being held hostage by the remaining cadres and leaders of the LTTE holed up inside the NSZ. In the last three days, heavy casualties have been reported from the NSZ. The military and the Tigers blame each other for the death of a large number of civilians, including at least 106 children.
The military, which has closed in on the NSZ from all sides, is confident of flushing out the remaining LTTE cadres and leaders, including its chief Velupillai Prabakaran, in the next 24 to 36 hours
The announcement on the breakthrough came amid charges of shelling on a makeshift hospital inside the NSZ. The attack reportedly killed 26 persons and injured 100. The military denied charges of shelling.
A statement by the Defence Ministry said the 59 Division troops stepped up the on-going hostage rescue operation, crossing the LTTE-constructed earth bund-cum-ditch, north of the Wadduvakal causeway.
The Ministry said the troops advanced 300 metres further into LTTE defences after consolidating their positions at the causeway, even as U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon expressed dismay at the killing of hundreds of civilians over the weekend.
“Thousands of Sri Lankans have already died in the past several months due to the conflict, and more still remain in grave danger,” a statement issued by his office said. An estimated 20,000 to 30,000 civilians are being held hostage by the remaining cadres and leaders of the LTTE holed up inside the NSZ. In the last three days, heavy casualties have been reported from the NSZ. The military and the Tigers blame each other for the death of a large number of civilians, including at least 106 children.
The military, which has closed in on the NSZ from all sides, is confident of flushing out the remaining LTTE cadres and leaders, including its chief Velupillai Prabakaran, in the next 24 to 36 hours
An actor, cricketer & debutant in spotlight
The fatigue of the long-drawn elections has hardly affected the poll-time excitement in Uttar Pradesh.
Of the 14 constituencies going to the polls on Wednesday, Rampur and Pilibhit definitely walked away with the cake for the high-strung drama of a typical masala film that was on offer in these constituencies.
The Rampur show, scripted and directed by Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh, has sitting MP Jaya Prada as the lead character and rebel Azam Khan as the villain. Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav appears as a special guest for emotional relief.
But Noor Bano of the Congress and Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are silently inching forward.
In Pilibhit, director-actor-scriptwriter Varun Gandhi is now gleefully projecting himself as the new Gabbar Singh. His main opponent is the richest candidate in the state, Congress’ V.M. Singh, his uncle.
This phase will also decide the fates of Congress’ Jitin Prasad in Dhaurahra, cricket star Azharuddin in Moradabad and also the other Gandhi, Menaka, in Aonla.
Of the main players, Mulayam Singh Yadav, for the first time, was found soft in Rampur. At test also is his decision to embrace Kalyan Singh.
Pollsters believe that though Muslims have not yet dumped Mulayam, he is no longer their first choice.
Muslims form 25 per cent of the votes in 11 of the 14 seats going to the polls. In some seats, Muslims hold the veto power with 29 to 45.3 per cent vote share.
Of Mayawati, the pre-first phase perception was that she would end up with 40-45 seats. But by the end of the fourth phase, the projection came down to 20-25 seats.
The Congress party has seemingly benefited from the return of a chunk of Muslim votes, while the BJP is banking on communal turns in several constituencies, adjoining Pilibhit, thanks to Varun Gandhi.
Of the 14 constituencies going to the polls on Wednesday, Rampur and Pilibhit definitely walked away with the cake for the high-strung drama of a typical masala film that was on offer in these constituencies.
The Rampur show, scripted and directed by Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh, has sitting MP Jaya Prada as the lead character and rebel Azam Khan as the villain. Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav appears as a special guest for emotional relief.
But Noor Bano of the Congress and Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are silently inching forward.
In Pilibhit, director-actor-scriptwriter Varun Gandhi is now gleefully projecting himself as the new Gabbar Singh. His main opponent is the richest candidate in the state, Congress’ V.M. Singh, his uncle.
This phase will also decide the fates of Congress’ Jitin Prasad in Dhaurahra, cricket star Azharuddin in Moradabad and also the other Gandhi, Menaka, in Aonla.
Of the main players, Mulayam Singh Yadav, for the first time, was found soft in Rampur. At test also is his decision to embrace Kalyan Singh.
Pollsters believe that though Muslims have not yet dumped Mulayam, he is no longer their first choice.
Muslims form 25 per cent of the votes in 11 of the 14 seats going to the polls. In some seats, Muslims hold the veto power with 29 to 45.3 per cent vote share.
Of Mayawati, the pre-first phase perception was that she would end up with 40-45 seats. But by the end of the fourth phase, the projection came down to 20-25 seats.
The Congress party has seemingly benefited from the return of a chunk of Muslim votes, while the BJP is banking on communal turns in several constituencies, adjoining Pilibhit, thanks to Varun Gandhi.
Final Over: Pinch-hitters slog for allies
It was late in the evening. A heavy-set man hurried past the bank of cameras outside 10, Janpath, home of Congress president Sonia Gandhi (62).
He had his hands up, unsuccessfully covering his face. And he left quietly through the back gate.
It was the JD-S leader and former Karnataka chief minister H.D. Kumaraswamy (49).
He didn’t want it known that he — the son of H.D. Deve Gowda (76), the Third F]ront doyen — had had a meeting with the Congress chief.
Late night, he sought to cover it up by claiming that it was only a “courtesy call’’ and the JD (S) remains part of the Third Front.
With just one phase of polling left, which too will have been wrapped up by Wednesday evening, parties are getting ready for the battle for numbers. None of them realistically hope to make it on its own.
Both the Congress and the BJP have set up their teams of charmers to win friends and allies as soon as results are out. In fact, they have gone to work already — Kumaraswamy’s meeting, for one.
If JD-S bolts, it would be the second desertion from the ranks of the Left-led Third Front — the first was Telangana Rashtra Samiti chief Chandrashekhar Rao (55), who stunned everyone by turning up at a National Democratic Alliance rally in Ludhiana on Sunday.
The NDA has already let it be known that Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, 59 and RSS ideologue S. Gurumurthy are working on AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa (61).
And former BJP president Venkaiah Naidu (59) is marking Chandrababu Naidu (59).
NDA convenor Sharad Yadav (61), told a TV news network on Tuesday, “We are in touch Jayalalithaa and Mayawati (the latter has been assigned to former UP minister Lalji Tandon).” Arun Jaitley (56), is in touch with BSP’s Rajya Sabha member Satish Mishra (56), Mayawati’s confidant.
Former Maharashtra deputy CM Gopinath Munde (59), has opened a channel of communication with Raj Thackeray (40), just in case.
The negotiators are on the job. Sonia is leading from the front. “Leaders of all allies and possible allies are a phone call away for her,” said a party leader. But before Sonia steps in, a core team including key players like Pranab Mukherjee (73), A K Antony (68), Ahmed Patel (59), Ghulam Nabi Azad (60), Kamal Nath (62) and Digvijay Singh (62) would take care of the rough edges while looking for allies.
The Congress has reportedly opened a channel of communication with Nitish though a Bihar MP.
Azad is reportedly working on Tamil Nadu parties. Antony is in touch with other leaders in the south and Digvijay with smaller parties in UP and the Hindi heartland.
He had his hands up, unsuccessfully covering his face. And he left quietly through the back gate.
It was the JD-S leader and former Karnataka chief minister H.D. Kumaraswamy (49).
He didn’t want it known that he — the son of H.D. Deve Gowda (76), the Third F]ront doyen — had had a meeting with the Congress chief.
Late night, he sought to cover it up by claiming that it was only a “courtesy call’’ and the JD (S) remains part of the Third Front.
With just one phase of polling left, which too will have been wrapped up by Wednesday evening, parties are getting ready for the battle for numbers. None of them realistically hope to make it on its own.
Both the Congress and the BJP have set up their teams of charmers to win friends and allies as soon as results are out. In fact, they have gone to work already — Kumaraswamy’s meeting, for one.
If JD-S bolts, it would be the second desertion from the ranks of the Left-led Third Front — the first was Telangana Rashtra Samiti chief Chandrashekhar Rao (55), who stunned everyone by turning up at a National Democratic Alliance rally in Ludhiana on Sunday.
The NDA has already let it be known that Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, 59 and RSS ideologue S. Gurumurthy are working on AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa (61).
And former BJP president Venkaiah Naidu (59) is marking Chandrababu Naidu (59).
NDA convenor Sharad Yadav (61), told a TV news network on Tuesday, “We are in touch Jayalalithaa and Mayawati (the latter has been assigned to former UP minister Lalji Tandon).” Arun Jaitley (56), is in touch with BSP’s Rajya Sabha member Satish Mishra (56), Mayawati’s confidant.
Former Maharashtra deputy CM Gopinath Munde (59), has opened a channel of communication with Raj Thackeray (40), just in case.
The negotiators are on the job. Sonia is leading from the front. “Leaders of all allies and possible allies are a phone call away for her,” said a party leader. But before Sonia steps in, a core team including key players like Pranab Mukherjee (73), A K Antony (68), Ahmed Patel (59), Ghulam Nabi Azad (60), Kamal Nath (62) and Digvijay Singh (62) would take care of the rough edges while looking for allies.
The Congress has reportedly opened a channel of communication with Nitish though a Bihar MP.
Azad is reportedly working on Tamil Nadu parties. Antony is in touch with other leaders in the south and Digvijay with smaller parties in UP and the Hindi heartland.
Sri Lankan army, Tamil Tigers trade blame over deadly attack
The Sri Lankan military and rebels traded blame Sunday for an artillery attack that reportedly killed hundreds of civilians, with the army accusing the encircled Tamil Tigers of launching the assault to press authorities for a truce and the guerrillas saying the deaths were further evidence of government atrocities.
The attack took place late Saturday and early Sunday, with artillery shells reportedly lobbed into a densely packed area of northern Sri Lanka, resulting in at least 378 civilian deaths, the rebels said.
But the army blamed the rebels, formally known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. "The LTTE fired mortars indiscriminately into this place," army spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara said Sunday. "They fire indiscriminately at civilians because it's the only weapon left them. And they may be forcing doctors to give these kinds of statements."
TamilNet.com, a pro-rebel website, accused the government forces of carrying out the artillery barrage. Citing medical sources, it said the shelling killed at least 378 people and wounded 814.
"More than 2,000 innocent civilians have been killed in the last 24 hours," it said, quoting Selvarajah Pathmanathan, the rebels' foreign relations intermediary and a weapons smuggler wanted by Interpol. This, it said, amounts to "state terrorism and a war crime."
Bitter accusations, propaganda and a lack of credible information have been long-standing features of this war.
The army, citing safety concerns, has severely restricted access into the northern area by news media or humanitarian groups -- both of which it has at times accused of being rebel sympathizers.
The Tigers, accused of numerous human rights violations, have rarely allowed media access to areas they control. The U.S. and European Union have labeled the group as terrorist, while the United Nations has accused it of using civilians as human shields.
On Sunday, the government deported three journalists with Britain's Channel 4 on charges that their stories were "tarnishing the image of the country."
Channel 4 had broadcast a report last week quoting what it said were Tamil aid workers inside a humanitarian camp saying that war-displaced people there were underfed and mistreated and that some women had been sexually abused.
The government called the report Tamil Tiger propaganda, saying that its camps were considered largely up to international standards by U.N. and foreign officials.
The civil war has raged since 1983. The Tigers seek an independent homeland for ethnic Tamils marginalized in Sinhalese-majority Sri Lanka.
After years of relative stalemate, the army recently made dramatic advances and now has the Tigers trapped in a 2-square-mile area on the island's northern coast surrounded by 50,000 troops.
Foreign governments and U.N. agencies have repeatedly asked the government to halt the hostilities so that noncombatants trapped in the sliver of land can reach safety. But the army contends that any halt would allow the rebels to escape or regroup.
As the military endgame nears, a man who once worked closely with Velupillai Prabhakaran, the leader of the Tigers, said the guerrilla chief would never surrender and would soon be "eliminated."
Vinayagamoorthi Muralitharan, also known as Col. Karuna, joined the Tigers when he was 19. He led forces in eastern Sri Lanka until 2004 when he defected to the government side, paving the way for the latest military advances. In March he was appointed Sri Lanka's minister for national integration and reconciliation.
"The LTTE is nearly finished," Karuna said in an interview at his heavily fortified headquarters in Colombo, the capital, where visitors are frisked. "I am No. 1 on the LTTE's hit list. Prabhakaran hates me."
If Prabhakaran dies, the rebels won't appoint another leader, he predicted. "There are no new leaders waiting in the LTTE," Karuna said. "They are finished."
Thileepan Parthipan, a spokesman for the LTTE, who spoke by telephone from what he said was a bunker, agreed that Prabhakaran would never give himself up alive. Tiger leaders are known to carry cyanide capsules.
"He's fighting for his people and is still with us," he said. Reports that the guerrilla leader had fled the conflict zone were army disinformation, he said, adding that people in the area were starving and the international community needed to intervene to prevent a humanitarian disaster.
Parthipan denied that the Tigers were using civilians as human shields. "You should realize, these are our own mothers, brothers, wives," he said. "It's the army that is using our people as human shields."
In the interview, Karuna sought to paint Prabhakaran as a leader who kept himself out of danger while demanding great sacrifices from his cadres, and someone who failed to read the political situation correctly.
"Prabhakaran made many mistakes" by not seriously pursuing peace negotiations, the burly, mustached former fighter said. "I spent 22 years with him and he never came to the battlefield."
Karuna said it was unsafe for him to travel around the country.
Some analysts and regional diplomats fear Sri Lanka could win the war but lose the peace if its postwar policies prove prejudicial to the marginalized Tamil community, thereby providing fertile ground for a new LTTE-like group.
Karuna, who has been accused of appalling acts of barbarism with both the Tigers and the government, said Prabhakaran must die, not because he holds any remaining sway over the Tamil populace but as punishment for the things he has done.
"He's a very horrible man," Karuna said. "He has to be eliminated."
The attack took place late Saturday and early Sunday, with artillery shells reportedly lobbed into a densely packed area of northern Sri Lanka, resulting in at least 378 civilian deaths, the rebels said.
But the army blamed the rebels, formally known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. "The LTTE fired mortars indiscriminately into this place," army spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara said Sunday. "They fire indiscriminately at civilians because it's the only weapon left them. And they may be forcing doctors to give these kinds of statements."
TamilNet.com, a pro-rebel website, accused the government forces of carrying out the artillery barrage. Citing medical sources, it said the shelling killed at least 378 people and wounded 814.
"More than 2,000 innocent civilians have been killed in the last 24 hours," it said, quoting Selvarajah Pathmanathan, the rebels' foreign relations intermediary and a weapons smuggler wanted by Interpol. This, it said, amounts to "state terrorism and a war crime."
Bitter accusations, propaganda and a lack of credible information have been long-standing features of this war.
The army, citing safety concerns, has severely restricted access into the northern area by news media or humanitarian groups -- both of which it has at times accused of being rebel sympathizers.
The Tigers, accused of numerous human rights violations, have rarely allowed media access to areas they control. The U.S. and European Union have labeled the group as terrorist, while the United Nations has accused it of using civilians as human shields.
On Sunday, the government deported three journalists with Britain's Channel 4 on charges that their stories were "tarnishing the image of the country."
Channel 4 had broadcast a report last week quoting what it said were Tamil aid workers inside a humanitarian camp saying that war-displaced people there were underfed and mistreated and that some women had been sexually abused.
The government called the report Tamil Tiger propaganda, saying that its camps were considered largely up to international standards by U.N. and foreign officials.
The civil war has raged since 1983. The Tigers seek an independent homeland for ethnic Tamils marginalized in Sinhalese-majority Sri Lanka.
After years of relative stalemate, the army recently made dramatic advances and now has the Tigers trapped in a 2-square-mile area on the island's northern coast surrounded by 50,000 troops.
Foreign governments and U.N. agencies have repeatedly asked the government to halt the hostilities so that noncombatants trapped in the sliver of land can reach safety. But the army contends that any halt would allow the rebels to escape or regroup.
As the military endgame nears, a man who once worked closely with Velupillai Prabhakaran, the leader of the Tigers, said the guerrilla chief would never surrender and would soon be "eliminated."
Vinayagamoorthi Muralitharan, also known as Col. Karuna, joined the Tigers when he was 19. He led forces in eastern Sri Lanka until 2004 when he defected to the government side, paving the way for the latest military advances. In March he was appointed Sri Lanka's minister for national integration and reconciliation.
"The LTTE is nearly finished," Karuna said in an interview at his heavily fortified headquarters in Colombo, the capital, where visitors are frisked. "I am No. 1 on the LTTE's hit list. Prabhakaran hates me."
If Prabhakaran dies, the rebels won't appoint another leader, he predicted. "There are no new leaders waiting in the LTTE," Karuna said. "They are finished."
Thileepan Parthipan, a spokesman for the LTTE, who spoke by telephone from what he said was a bunker, agreed that Prabhakaran would never give himself up alive. Tiger leaders are known to carry cyanide capsules.
"He's fighting for his people and is still with us," he said. Reports that the guerrilla leader had fled the conflict zone were army disinformation, he said, adding that people in the area were starving and the international community needed to intervene to prevent a humanitarian disaster.
Parthipan denied that the Tigers were using civilians as human shields. "You should realize, these are our own mothers, brothers, wives," he said. "It's the army that is using our people as human shields."
In the interview, Karuna sought to paint Prabhakaran as a leader who kept himself out of danger while demanding great sacrifices from his cadres, and someone who failed to read the political situation correctly.
"Prabhakaran made many mistakes" by not seriously pursuing peace negotiations, the burly, mustached former fighter said. "I spent 22 years with him and he never came to the battlefield."
Karuna said it was unsafe for him to travel around the country.
Some analysts and regional diplomats fear Sri Lanka could win the war but lose the peace if its postwar policies prove prejudicial to the marginalized Tamil community, thereby providing fertile ground for a new LTTE-like group.
Karuna, who has been accused of appalling acts of barbarism with both the Tigers and the government, said Prabhakaran must die, not because he holds any remaining sway over the Tamil populace but as punishment for the things he has done.
"He's a very horrible man," Karuna said. "He has to be eliminated."
U.S. military, Pakistan carrying out Predator drone missions together
The U.S. military has begun flying armed Predator drones inside Pakistan and has given Pakistani officers significant control over targets, flight routes and decisions to launch attacks under a new joint operation, according to U.S. officials familiar with the program.
The project was begun in recent weeks to bolster Pakistan's ability and willingness to disrupt the militant groups that are posing a growing threat to the government in Islamabad and fueling violence in Afghanistan.
For the U.S. military, the missions represent a broad new role in searching for Islamic militants in Pakistan. For years, that task has been the domain of the CIA, which has flown its own fleet of Predators over the South Asian nation.
Under the new partnership, U.S. military drones will be allowed for the first time to venture beyond the borders of Afghanistan under the direction of Pakistani military officials, who are working with American counterparts at a command center in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.
U.S. officials said the program was aimed at getting Pakistan -- which has frequently protested airstrikes in its territory as a violation of sovereignty -- more directly and deeply engaged in the Predator program.
"This is about building trust," said a senior U.S. military official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the program has not been publicly acknowledged. "This is about giving them capabilities they do not currently have to help them defeat this radical extreme element that is in their country."
The Pakistanis, however, have yet to use the drones to shoot at suspected militants and are grappling with a cumbersome military chain of command as well as ambivalence over using U.S. equipment to fire on their own people.
The program marks a significant departure from how the war against Taliban insurgents has been fought for most of the last seven years. The heavy U.S. military presence in Afghanistan has been largely powerless to pursue militants who routinely escape across the border into Pakistan.
But the initiative carries serious risks for Pakistan, which is struggling to balance a desire for more control over the drones with a deep reluctance to become complicit in U.S.-operated Predator strikes on its own people.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, on a visit to Washington last week, reiterated his nation's request for its own fleet of Predators. U.S. officials have all but ruled that out, and they described the new, jointly operated flights as an effective compromise.
Pakistani officials did not deny the existence of the new program, saying Tuesday that they were working with U.S. officials to better utilize the American technology. In a statement, Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's ambassador to Washington, said the nation remained concerned that the "unilateral" CIA drone strikes violated its sovereignty.
"Pakistan has not been averse to using every available means in tracking down Al Qaeda and other terrorists," Haqqani said. "We have been working with the U.S. side to find ways in which the U.S. technological advantage matches up with our desire to uphold our sovereignty within our borders."
CIA Predators flown covertly in Pakistan continue to focus on the United States' principal target, Al Qaeda. The military drones, meanwhile, are intended to undermine the militant networks that have moved closer to Islamabad, the capital, in recent weeks.
Over the last month, officials said, the United States has offered Pakistan control over multiple flights involving both Predator and more heavily armed Reaper drones.
Pakistan declined an offer to use the drones for its recent military offensives in the Swat Valley and Buner areas, and poor weather has caused other sorties to be scrapped. But the senior U.S. military official said at least two missions had been flown in recent weeks under Pakistani direction.
So far the missions have not involved the firing of any missiles, and some U.S. officials have expressed frustration that the Pakistanis have not used the Predator capabilities more aggressively. Officials said Pakistan was given the authority to order strikes during the jointly operated flights as long as there was U.S. agreement on the targets.
"It is their decision," a senior military officer said. "We are trying to put them in the chain, so they control the whole thing, save the hardware."
The program may be one result of U.S. military efforts to cultivate closer ties with Pakistan. Over the last year, Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has made repeated trips to Islamabad to push for greater Pakistani cooperation.
The program also is part of a broader overhaul of the U.S. military approach in the region. Army Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, named this week to become the new top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, expanded the use of Predators while in Iraq and is expected to do the same in his new post.
The missions are being controlled from the jointly operated command center in Jalalabad. The center contains a "fusion cell" that merges information gathered from American surveillance with human intelligence collected by Pakistani and Afghanistan forces.
Debates between Pakistanis and Americans have taken place within the center over whether potential targets are Taliban leaders or Pakistani tribesmen with only loose ties to extremist groups. Nonetheless, U.S. officials said most Pakistani officers in the command center understood the militant threat and were anxious to move aggressively.
However, the Pakistanis' superiors have had more reservations and have equivocated when asked for permission to fire on suspected militants. U.S. officers said those Pakistani officials may not have understood that any delay could allow targeted individuals to slip away.
In response, Pakistanis have repeatedly emphasized to U.S. military officers that they are reluctant to fire missiles at their own citizens.
"They have asked us to try and understand what it is like to be a military that is now required to go against its own people," said the senior military officer. "I do not think we always have the right perspective of how difficult it is."
The Pakistani reluctance may also reflect ambivalence in Islamabad over the CIA's Predator program. The intelligence agency is in the midst of a campaign of strikes on Al Qaeda operatives in Pakistan's tribal frontier.
The most recent CIA strike came Tuesday, reportedly killing eight people in the South Waziristan region of Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas Since August, the agency has carried out at least 55 strikes, compared with 10 reported attacks in 2006 and 2007 combined.
Despite Pakistan's frequent complaints about the strikes, U.S. officials have said the missions are authorized by the Pakistani government. CIA officials credit Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency, or ISI, with providing on-the-ground information that often leads to Predator strikes. In turn, the CIA has shared sensitive imagery and intercepts with Pakistani counterparts.
Despite that arrangement, U.S. officials avoided offering Pakistan greater control over the CIA drones, in part because of concerns about giving Pakistan direct access to a sensitive and secret intelligence operation. At times, U.S. intelligence officials have voiced suspicions that elements of the ISI, which has long-standing relationships with Taliban leaders, have warned targets in advance of U.S. strikes.
U.S. officials also cited a reluctance to take CIA drones away from their efforts to track and kill senior Al Qaeda figures, and stressed that the military drones would pursue a different set of targets, mainly Taliban-linked fighters.
The use of Defense Department drones presents disadvantages to Pakistan. The military's unmanned aircraft program, for example, is not shrouded in the same level of secrecy as the CIA's, eroding Pakistan's already attenuated ability to continue to deny involvement.
"If it's true that Pakistan is actually controlling some of these drones, that undermines the concerns [they express] about the attacks," said Seth Jones, a counter-terrorism expert at Rand Corp. who frequently travels to the region.
Pakistan's permission is crucial to Predator operations, representing an added incentive for U.S. officials to share control of the aircraft.
"The key is you've got to have the approval of the host government," said Scott Silliman, a former Air Force lawyer who is now a law professor at Duke University. "If you do not, you cross over the line of invading the territorial sovereignty of another country."
The project was begun in recent weeks to bolster Pakistan's ability and willingness to disrupt the militant groups that are posing a growing threat to the government in Islamabad and fueling violence in Afghanistan.
For the U.S. military, the missions represent a broad new role in searching for Islamic militants in Pakistan. For years, that task has been the domain of the CIA, which has flown its own fleet of Predators over the South Asian nation.
Under the new partnership, U.S. military drones will be allowed for the first time to venture beyond the borders of Afghanistan under the direction of Pakistani military officials, who are working with American counterparts at a command center in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.
U.S. officials said the program was aimed at getting Pakistan -- which has frequently protested airstrikes in its territory as a violation of sovereignty -- more directly and deeply engaged in the Predator program.
"This is about building trust," said a senior U.S. military official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the program has not been publicly acknowledged. "This is about giving them capabilities they do not currently have to help them defeat this radical extreme element that is in their country."
The Pakistanis, however, have yet to use the drones to shoot at suspected militants and are grappling with a cumbersome military chain of command as well as ambivalence over using U.S. equipment to fire on their own people.
The program marks a significant departure from how the war against Taliban insurgents has been fought for most of the last seven years. The heavy U.S. military presence in Afghanistan has been largely powerless to pursue militants who routinely escape across the border into Pakistan.
But the initiative carries serious risks for Pakistan, which is struggling to balance a desire for more control over the drones with a deep reluctance to become complicit in U.S.-operated Predator strikes on its own people.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, on a visit to Washington last week, reiterated his nation's request for its own fleet of Predators. U.S. officials have all but ruled that out, and they described the new, jointly operated flights as an effective compromise.
Pakistani officials did not deny the existence of the new program, saying Tuesday that they were working with U.S. officials to better utilize the American technology. In a statement, Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's ambassador to Washington, said the nation remained concerned that the "unilateral" CIA drone strikes violated its sovereignty.
"Pakistan has not been averse to using every available means in tracking down Al Qaeda and other terrorists," Haqqani said. "We have been working with the U.S. side to find ways in which the U.S. technological advantage matches up with our desire to uphold our sovereignty within our borders."
CIA Predators flown covertly in Pakistan continue to focus on the United States' principal target, Al Qaeda. The military drones, meanwhile, are intended to undermine the militant networks that have moved closer to Islamabad, the capital, in recent weeks.
Over the last month, officials said, the United States has offered Pakistan control over multiple flights involving both Predator and more heavily armed Reaper drones.
Pakistan declined an offer to use the drones for its recent military offensives in the Swat Valley and Buner areas, and poor weather has caused other sorties to be scrapped. But the senior U.S. military official said at least two missions had been flown in recent weeks under Pakistani direction.
So far the missions have not involved the firing of any missiles, and some U.S. officials have expressed frustration that the Pakistanis have not used the Predator capabilities more aggressively. Officials said Pakistan was given the authority to order strikes during the jointly operated flights as long as there was U.S. agreement on the targets.
"It is their decision," a senior military officer said. "We are trying to put them in the chain, so they control the whole thing, save the hardware."
The program may be one result of U.S. military efforts to cultivate closer ties with Pakistan. Over the last year, Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has made repeated trips to Islamabad to push for greater Pakistani cooperation.
The program also is part of a broader overhaul of the U.S. military approach in the region. Army Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, named this week to become the new top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, expanded the use of Predators while in Iraq and is expected to do the same in his new post.
The missions are being controlled from the jointly operated command center in Jalalabad. The center contains a "fusion cell" that merges information gathered from American surveillance with human intelligence collected by Pakistani and Afghanistan forces.
Debates between Pakistanis and Americans have taken place within the center over whether potential targets are Taliban leaders or Pakistani tribesmen with only loose ties to extremist groups. Nonetheless, U.S. officials said most Pakistani officers in the command center understood the militant threat and were anxious to move aggressively.
However, the Pakistanis' superiors have had more reservations and have equivocated when asked for permission to fire on suspected militants. U.S. officers said those Pakistani officials may not have understood that any delay could allow targeted individuals to slip away.
In response, Pakistanis have repeatedly emphasized to U.S. military officers that they are reluctant to fire missiles at their own citizens.
"They have asked us to try and understand what it is like to be a military that is now required to go against its own people," said the senior military officer. "I do not think we always have the right perspective of how difficult it is."
The Pakistani reluctance may also reflect ambivalence in Islamabad over the CIA's Predator program. The intelligence agency is in the midst of a campaign of strikes on Al Qaeda operatives in Pakistan's tribal frontier.
The most recent CIA strike came Tuesday, reportedly killing eight people in the South Waziristan region of Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas Since August, the agency has carried out at least 55 strikes, compared with 10 reported attacks in 2006 and 2007 combined.
Despite Pakistan's frequent complaints about the strikes, U.S. officials have said the missions are authorized by the Pakistani government. CIA officials credit Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency, or ISI, with providing on-the-ground information that often leads to Predator strikes. In turn, the CIA has shared sensitive imagery and intercepts with Pakistani counterparts.
Despite that arrangement, U.S. officials avoided offering Pakistan greater control over the CIA drones, in part because of concerns about giving Pakistan direct access to a sensitive and secret intelligence operation. At times, U.S. intelligence officials have voiced suspicions that elements of the ISI, which has long-standing relationships with Taliban leaders, have warned targets in advance of U.S. strikes.
U.S. officials also cited a reluctance to take CIA drones away from their efforts to track and kill senior Al Qaeda figures, and stressed that the military drones would pursue a different set of targets, mainly Taliban-linked fighters.
The use of Defense Department drones presents disadvantages to Pakistan. The military's unmanned aircraft program, for example, is not shrouded in the same level of secrecy as the CIA's, eroding Pakistan's already attenuated ability to continue to deny involvement.
"If it's true that Pakistan is actually controlling some of these drones, that undermines the concerns [they express] about the attacks," said Seth Jones, a counter-terrorism expert at Rand Corp. who frequently travels to the region.
Pakistan's permission is crucial to Predator operations, representing an added incentive for U.S. officials to share control of the aircraft.
"The key is you've got to have the approval of the host government," said Scott Silliman, a former Air Force lawyer who is now a law professor at Duke University. "If you do not, you cross over the line of invading the territorial sovereignty of another country."
Records Show Billions Withdrawn Before Madoff Arrest
About $12 billion was pulled out of accounts at Bernard L. Madoff’s firm in 2008, according to several people briefed on an analysis of Mr. Madoff’s business records.
About $6 billion, or half, was taken out in just the three months before the financier was arrested in December and charged with operating an extensive Ponzi scheme, these people said.
Those figures offer a bit of hope for Mr. Madoff’s thousands of defrauded customers. Under federal law, the trustee overseeing the Madoff bankruptcy can sue to retrieve that money from the investors who withdrew it.
Indeed, the trustee, Irving H. Picard of Baker & Hostetler, filed two lawsuits on Tuesday seeking the return of a total of $6.1 billion, which he estimated had been withdrawn over the last decade.
One case seeks the return of $5.1 billion from various trust funds and partnerships run by Jeffry M. Picower, a prominent Palm Beach, Fla., investor whose charitable foundation was considered one of the notable victims of Mr. Madoff’s fraud.
Mr. Picard also sued to recover $1 billion withdrawn last year by Harley International, a hedge fund based in the Cayman Islands and administered by a unit of the Dutch bank Fortis.
Both lawsuits were filed in Federal Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan. And both assert that the defendants, as professional investors, should have realized that their profits were too high and too consistent — and Mr. Madoff’s paperwork and procedures were too sloppy — to be legitimate.
But the complaint against Mr. Picower goes further, accusing him of participating in a web of transparently false transactions with Mr. Madoff that were aimed at compensating him for “perpetuating the Ponzi scheme” at the expense of other investors.
In 1999, for example, one of Mr. Picower’s accounts posted an annual profit of more than 950 percent, the suit said. That account was one of two that reported annual returns from 1996 to 1999 ranging from 120 percent to more than 550 percent, the suit said.
In other accounts, backdated transactions generated billions of dollars of fictional year-end losses and one account grew by 30 percent in just two weeks in 2006 — thanks to trades that purportedly occurred months before the account was even opened.
A lawyer for Mr. Picower and his wife, Barbara, who was also named as a defendant, denied the allegations.
“Mr. and Mrs. Picower considered themselves friends of the Madoffs for over 35 years,” said the lawyer, William D. Zabel of Schulte Roth & Zabel. “They were totally shocked by his fraud and were in no way complicit in it.”
Mr. Zabel added: “They lost billions in personal assets, and most dear to them, all of the assets of their esteemed foundation.” The Picower Foundation closed its doors after Mr. Madoff’s arrest.
According to people familiar with the analysis of Mr. Madoff’s cash records, most of the $12 billion that flowed out of his fraudulent money-management operation last year was withdrawn by various “feeder funds,” which had raised cash from investors and pooled it to invest with Mr. Madoff.
Several of those feeder funds have already been the targets of lawsuits by Mr. Picard, who is searching for assets to be shared among customers who lost what they believed to be almost $65 billion in the Ponzi scheme.
It is not clear where the cash taken out of the Madoff accounts is located, or how much of it can be recovered through litigation.
In the lawsuit seeking to recover more than $1 billion withdrawn by Harley International, Mr. Picard asserts that the fund should have detected the fraud before investing more than $2 billion of its clients’ money.
According to that complaint, Harley International made 14 transfers out of its Madoff account over the last six years, including $425 million that was withdrawn three months before the Ponzi scheme became public.
A spokeswoman for Harley International, Jamie Moss, did not return calls seeking comment.
In the complaint, Mr. Picard said Harley International, which invested client money with Mr. Madoff since at least 1996, received “unrealistically high and consistent annual returns” of about 13.5 percent. That outpaced the swings in the stock index on which Mr. Madoff had apparently based his trading strategy.
Trading records indicate that the Madoff firm, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, made at least 148 stock trades in Harley International’s account in the last decade at prices that did not match the trading range for those stocks on the dates the trades supposedly occurred.
Mr. Picard claims those trades should have raised red flags for “any investment professional managing the account.”
The Harley lawsuit is similar to one Mr. Picard has filed recently against J. Ezra Merkin, the New York financier who lost over $2 billion investing with Mr. Madoff.
The lawsuit against Mr. Picower mirrors similar allegations Mr. Picard made in a complaint against Stanley Chais, an investment manager and prominent Los Angeles philanthropist. Both investors have said they intend to fight the lawsuits.
Mr. Picard has raised about $1 billion in assets for Mr. Madoff’s victims, but the lawsuits filed in the last two weeks could push that number much higher.
Mr. Madoff pleaded guilty on March 12 to running the biggest Ponzi scheme in history. He is scheduled to be sentenced next month and faces 150 years in prison.
About $6 billion, or half, was taken out in just the three months before the financier was arrested in December and charged with operating an extensive Ponzi scheme, these people said.
Those figures offer a bit of hope for Mr. Madoff’s thousands of defrauded customers. Under federal law, the trustee overseeing the Madoff bankruptcy can sue to retrieve that money from the investors who withdrew it.
Indeed, the trustee, Irving H. Picard of Baker & Hostetler, filed two lawsuits on Tuesday seeking the return of a total of $6.1 billion, which he estimated had been withdrawn over the last decade.
One case seeks the return of $5.1 billion from various trust funds and partnerships run by Jeffry M. Picower, a prominent Palm Beach, Fla., investor whose charitable foundation was considered one of the notable victims of Mr. Madoff’s fraud.
Mr. Picard also sued to recover $1 billion withdrawn last year by Harley International, a hedge fund based in the Cayman Islands and administered by a unit of the Dutch bank Fortis.
Both lawsuits were filed in Federal Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan. And both assert that the defendants, as professional investors, should have realized that their profits were too high and too consistent — and Mr. Madoff’s paperwork and procedures were too sloppy — to be legitimate.
But the complaint against Mr. Picower goes further, accusing him of participating in a web of transparently false transactions with Mr. Madoff that were aimed at compensating him for “perpetuating the Ponzi scheme” at the expense of other investors.
In 1999, for example, one of Mr. Picower’s accounts posted an annual profit of more than 950 percent, the suit said. That account was one of two that reported annual returns from 1996 to 1999 ranging from 120 percent to more than 550 percent, the suit said.
In other accounts, backdated transactions generated billions of dollars of fictional year-end losses and one account grew by 30 percent in just two weeks in 2006 — thanks to trades that purportedly occurred months before the account was even opened.
A lawyer for Mr. Picower and his wife, Barbara, who was also named as a defendant, denied the allegations.
“Mr. and Mrs. Picower considered themselves friends of the Madoffs for over 35 years,” said the lawyer, William D. Zabel of Schulte Roth & Zabel. “They were totally shocked by his fraud and were in no way complicit in it.”
Mr. Zabel added: “They lost billions in personal assets, and most dear to them, all of the assets of their esteemed foundation.” The Picower Foundation closed its doors after Mr. Madoff’s arrest.
According to people familiar with the analysis of Mr. Madoff’s cash records, most of the $12 billion that flowed out of his fraudulent money-management operation last year was withdrawn by various “feeder funds,” which had raised cash from investors and pooled it to invest with Mr. Madoff.
Several of those feeder funds have already been the targets of lawsuits by Mr. Picard, who is searching for assets to be shared among customers who lost what they believed to be almost $65 billion in the Ponzi scheme.
It is not clear where the cash taken out of the Madoff accounts is located, or how much of it can be recovered through litigation.
In the lawsuit seeking to recover more than $1 billion withdrawn by Harley International, Mr. Picard asserts that the fund should have detected the fraud before investing more than $2 billion of its clients’ money.
According to that complaint, Harley International made 14 transfers out of its Madoff account over the last six years, including $425 million that was withdrawn three months before the Ponzi scheme became public.
A spokeswoman for Harley International, Jamie Moss, did not return calls seeking comment.
In the complaint, Mr. Picard said Harley International, which invested client money with Mr. Madoff since at least 1996, received “unrealistically high and consistent annual returns” of about 13.5 percent. That outpaced the swings in the stock index on which Mr. Madoff had apparently based his trading strategy.
Trading records indicate that the Madoff firm, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, made at least 148 stock trades in Harley International’s account in the last decade at prices that did not match the trading range for those stocks on the dates the trades supposedly occurred.
Mr. Picard claims those trades should have raised red flags for “any investment professional managing the account.”
The Harley lawsuit is similar to one Mr. Picard has filed recently against J. Ezra Merkin, the New York financier who lost over $2 billion investing with Mr. Madoff.
The lawsuit against Mr. Picower mirrors similar allegations Mr. Picard made in a complaint against Stanley Chais, an investment manager and prominent Los Angeles philanthropist. Both investors have said they intend to fight the lawsuits.
Mr. Picard has raised about $1 billion in assets for Mr. Madoff’s victims, but the lawsuits filed in the last two weeks could push that number much higher.
Mr. Madoff pleaded guilty on March 12 to running the biggest Ponzi scheme in history. He is scheduled to be sentenced next month and faces 150 years in prison.
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