Asia Pacific News

By STAFF Writer December 15, 2011 Illegal alcohol killed over hundred people in the Indian state of West Bengal. Late Tuesday poor manual workers, hawkers, rickshaw pullers and laborers began falling ill after drinking adulterated batch of bootleg liquor in Mongrahat town of Diamond Harbour, 31 miles south of Kolkata city. All the 100 dead drank "country liquor" at different makeshift bars which sold the same brand from illicit distillery of Diamond Harbour. Many more are hospitalised for treatment, but the death toll may rise further. Alcoholism is a significant problem in the country in urban as well as rural India . Liquor poisoning is frequent in the country. At least 130 people died in 2009 in state of Gujarat in similar incident. Police have arrested four people so far and ten illegal liquor shops have been demolished, said official. It is also reported that angry locals have destroyed the blamed distillery. In the town one litre of such liquor costs ju...

Published: December 8, 2009 President Obama has articulated a reasonably comprehensive strategy for Afghanistan, but there is no chance of defeating the Taliban and Al Qaeda unless Pakistan’s leaders stop temporizing (and in some cases collaborating) and get fully into the fight. After the Sept. 11 attacks, former President George W. Bush tried to buy off Pakistan’s military leaders who pocketed billions of dollars in American aid and continued to shelter the Taliban. Mr. Obama must demand more while finding ways to bolster the country’s weak civilian leadership and soothe anti-American furies. In a world of difficult strategic and diplomatic challenges, this may well be Mr. Obama’s toughest. In his speech last week, Mr. Obama laid down a marker for Islamabad, declaring “we cannot tolerate a safe haven for terrorists whose location is known and whose intentions are clear.” In private, administration officials have been even more explicit, warning Pakistani leaders that if they don’t ac...

From EDITOR’s Desk Pandit Bhimsen Joshi (February 4, 1922 - January 24, 2011) INDIA NEWS – It is said music is the language of God. In this worldly life it sounds no metaphysics when we hear something that literally transforms our spirit, albeit for a moment, takes us to another world, which is absolutely non material. A legendary figure in the music world, Pandit Bhimsen Joshi whose magical voice spellbound people at large, left the company of ordinary mortals and created a void that perhaps impossible to fill. Pandit Bhimsen Joshi renowned as a Hindustani classical music maestro, even who didn’t understand the raag , also mesmerized by his awesome voice that made him a legendary figure amidst music aficionados. The legendary figure was known in the whole world for his khyal gayaki whose absence certainly fall upon an uncomfortable silence among devotees of classical music. He had been sick for long time, suffering from gastrointestinal bleeding and bilateral pneumonia and ...

By STAFF Reporter August 11, 2011 The economies of China, India, Indonesia and Philippines face maximum risk due to natural disasters, reveals a report released by Maplecroft, an analysis and mapping company. The firm mentions these emerging economies lack the combating capacity from the disaster caused naturally and also from its impact. It adds, Japan and US are also highly exposed to such natural hazards, but they are well equipped to combat with the impacts. In its Natural Hazards Risk Atlas 2011, Maplecroft lists 196 countries across the world that are exposed to natural disasters such as tsunamis, earthquakes, floods, drought and tropical cyclones. According to the atlas, USA ranks on the top followed by Japan, China and Taiwan. These four countries are categorized as "extreme risk" and titled as absolute economic exposure to natural hazards. The remaining five countries in the top ten list are India, Philippines, Turkey, Indonesia and Italy respectively. T...

By STAFF Writer December 15, 2011 Illegal alcohol killed over hundred people in the Indian state of West Bengal. Late Tuesday poor manual workers, hawkers, rickshaw pullers and laborers began falling ill after drinking adulterated batch of bootleg liquor in Mongrahat town of Diamond Harbour, 31 miles south of Kolkata city. All the 100 dead drank "country liquor" at different makeshift bars which sold the same brand from illicit distillery of Diamond Harbour. Many more are hospitalised for treatment, but the death toll may rise further. Alcoholism is a significant problem in the country in urban as well as rural India . Liquor poisoning is frequent in the country. At least 130 people died in 2009 in state of Gujarat in similar incident. Police have arrested four people so far and ten illegal liquor shops have been demolished, said official. It is also reported that angry locals have destroyed the blamed distillery. In the town one litre of such liquor costs ju...

From EDITOR’s Desk Pandit Bhimsen Joshi (February 4, 1922 - January 24, 2011) INDIA NEWS – It is said music is the language of God. In this worldly life it sounds no metaphysics when we hear something that literally transforms our spirit, albeit for a moment, takes us to another world, which is absolutely non material. A legendary figure in the music world, Pandit Bhimsen Joshi whose magical voice spellbound people at large, left the company of ordinary mortals and created a void that perhaps impossible to fill. Pandit Bhimsen Joshi renowned as a Hindustani classical music maestro, even who didn’t understand the raag , also mesmerized by his awesome voice that made him a legendary figure amidst music aficionados. The legendary figure was known in the whole world for his khyal gayaki whose absence certainly fall upon an uncomfortable silence among devotees of classical music. He had been sick for long time, suffering from gastrointestinal bleeding and bilateral pneumonia and ...

By STAFF REPORTER October 17, 2011 In the first eight months of this year the trade between Thailand and Cambodia went up by 8%. Thai Embassy in Phnom Penh said yesterday the trade between went up to $1.93 billion. The export of Cambodia to Thailand was 125.6 million dollars, which is 17% lower compared to the same period last year, whereas the export of Thailand to Cambodia went up by 10% to 1.8 billion dollars. Director of Thai embassy's Foreign Trade Promotion Office, Jiranan Wongmongkol said trade between the two countries is seeing better recovery since August when the Pheu Thai Party came to power led by Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra. She added, "We project that through restoring good relations between the two nations, the bilateral trade will grow around 20 percent this year." Director of statistics department at Cambodia's Ministry of Commerce, Kong Putheara also said that Cambodian and Thai trade would re-grow well henceforth after it slow...

Incest Story In Haryana Just a few days back India gloriously celebrated its 64th Independence Day but the oxymoron of Indian freedom runs in Indian villages. Nowadays one of the most noted sarcasms is quite in style in national news channels. The noise is quite audible, and annoyance level is also comfortably high. The subject is the most tempting one to mankind – sex. Haryana, a state in India known for flourishing industrialism and affluent farmers, seems living in the medieval period. The self-proclaimed Haryana’s Khaps are the sham ‘kings’ of the villages. Their “moral judgments” can even make shy to the epitomes of immorality. They do all sort of things – to solve personal problems of family, to give judgment of any conflict, and above all their profound knowledge in ancient gotras, caste system etc. is mind-boggling. A recent example is about a law graduate and resident of Karora village Seema whose brother had been killed for marrying a woman from the same got...

From EDITOR's Desk August 13, 2011 17 years later, the story continues with a simple photograph of a sea green eyed girl when a casual photography by McCurry turned out to be one of those captivating portrait that sear the heart and ran on the cover of National Geographic magazine in June 1985. The shy girl was among hordes of refugees at the refugee camp in Pakistan. The anger of those haunted eyes was apparent, which swept away the photography fraternity and not least the whole world, but after 17 years nobody actually remember her, even her name. The year is 2011 when a team from National Geography Television & Films brought McCurry to Pakistan to search the immortal face. They searched around Nasir Bagh where the refugee camp still stands lonely among multitude. After showing her photographs to number of people, they came to know the girl in the picture returned to Afghanistan and now lived in the mountains near Tora Bora. So, they decided to hunt the girl. ...