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Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Sri Lankan recounts Israeli ordeal

A Sri Lankan shot by Israeli commandos during last week's deadly raid on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla has recounted the ordeal he had to face at the time of the incident. He is now receiving treatment at a hospital in Istanbul.

"Ahmad Luqman Talib received gunshot injuries in the leg and is now recovering in a hospital in Istanbul," said Nihad Issa, office director for the Representative Office of Sri Lanka to the Palestinian National Authority in Ramallah.

Talib was on the ship along with his wife, Issa said in a statement. He is a nephew of Imtiaz Baker Marker, a former minister and now the co-president of the Sri Lankan Committee for Solidarity with Palestine, Issa said.

Blacking out several times as his captors forced him to drag his broken body up a flight of stairs, pushing and kicking him, the 20-year-old Gold Coast student finally fell through a door. It led to the top deck of the Mavi Marmara, the protest ship on which Israeli commandos killed nine activists during a dawn attack last week.

The trail of blood continued to a ladder, up which Talib (pictured above with his wife Jerry Campbell) hauled himself, to where helicopters were evacuating the injured. But he was given no assistance - despite two gaping gunshot wounds in his right leg.

Talib had found himself at the sharp end of his deferred course at Bond University - international relations.

With demands around the world for an inquiry into the attack on a flotilla that was attempting to break the Israeli siege of Gaza, it seems likely that claims such as these and Israeli counter-claims alleging violence by the protesters, will be tested forensically.

The first draft of Talib's testimony - and that of his young Australian wife and his sister, who were also on the boat - accuses the Israeli forces and elements of the country's security apparatus which handled the deportation of almost 700 arrested activists, of cruel and callous conduct.

With his gangly frame spread on the pink linen of his bed in an Istanbul hospital, the young man told the Herald of the moment when he thought he might not the survive wounds he sustained in the opening minutes of the Israeli assault.

"I looked down and my legs were drowning in blood. I was getting weaker; it was difficult to breathe," he said of a realisation that he was willing himself into a sleep from which he believed he might not wake.

A devout Muslim whose family migrated from Sri Lanka to Australia in 1995, Talib recalled reciting the prayer for those facing death. "I said it quietly - to myself. Then I worried maybe that was not enough, so I said it again - this time out loud."

There is something disconcerting about this trio of young Australians who found themselves at the centre of what they simply call ''the massacre''. Still in their teens or barely out of them, they would be forgiven for being out of their depth when the shooting started.

After what they have been through, Talib and his 21-year-old wife could reasonably opt to cloister themselves in the mundane certainty of life on the Gold Coast; and in the case of Talib's 18-year-old sister Miryam, if she were to lock herself down in the family home in Kuwait.

The family moved on from Australia in 2000. But in 2007 Talib returned to Queensland where he married Campbell, who is almost three months pregnant with their first child.

Instead, all three have emerged from their baptism in international crisis and their tutelage by experienced activists, both on the Free Gaza Flotilla and in Israeli detention, with a steely "bring it on!" attitude.

Despite setting out in the last days of May with an expectation that the flotilla was almost a conventional Mediterranean cruise, they have emerged from "this totally new experience" seemingly fearless in the face of Israeli guns and death.

"It was beautiful," Miryam recalled. "The atmosphere before the massacre was wonderful … There was a great sense of spiritual connection. I had never felt this kind of emotion before."

Miryam, a second-year pharmacy student, and Campbell, in her second year of nursing studies, were assigned to first-aid duties two days before Monday's commando raid. But all three were oblivious to Israeli warnings which put the flotilla on full alert late on Sunday.

Recounting how he was retreating back into the ship after venturing on deck, Talib said: "I saw a man who nearly got shot - I could see the red dot of the laser weapon sights on his knee, but he moved in time.

"I felt it slice through my leg - blood was squirting from my right leg and then a second bullet sliced across, just above my knee. I was still standing, but my leg jerked up in the air and froze like that - for a time it was paralysed. With my weight on the good leg I tried to put it down - but it wouldn't move.

"I couldn't believe I had been hit, but that's how it looked - bullets, holes and blood."

Talib tried to find his way down bloodied stairs to the first-aid post. But he collapsed and when others carried him in for treatment, first his sister and then his wife observed that "he seemed to be OK," before they returned to helping those they thought were in greater need.

At this stage two of the dead had already been brought in and Campbell was helping to stabilise a man who had been shot five times - "he had a lot of holes in him, but none of his main arteries had been hit''.

Reconstructing the chaos of the first-aid post, the women told of the screaming; of slipping on blood-soaked floors; of the difficulty identifying colleagues who were yelling for a share of their meagre medical stocks.

Said Campbell: "We had no pain-killers, no instruments to extract bullets. But we had heaps of gauze so we were able to apply pressure bandages to stop or slow the bleeding. The heat was intense - we were sweating as first we had 10 people to treat and then 20."

After the Israelis had taken control, they assembled their hundreds of prisoners first on an open deck and, later in one of the big cabin areas on a lower deck.

Campbell and her sister-in-law accused their captors of failing to feed them and of not allowing the women to give water to male prisoners whose hands were bound with plastic ties. And of seeking to destroy any evidence of their conduct on the ship by removing memory cards from cameras - and by threatening anyone who had concealed data discs. Talib said that he was put into a carry-frame in which some Israeli commandos set about dragging him, feet first, up the stairs to the next deck. He was in great pain and still bleeding, but half-way up he had been tipped from the frame and told by one of the Israelis: "You have one healthy leg - walk up."

Other charges levelled against their captors include: Failing to provide early medical care for the injured. Handcuffing Talib to his hospital bed but removing the cuffs just before he was visited by Australian diplomats. For a time denying him access to a lawyer as they attempted to interrogate him. Destroying the CCTV cameras on the ship to prevent any of their activities being recorded. Parading their prisoners before cameras and a big ''audience'' of security and other workers who laughed as they took ''happy snaps'' of them. Withholding information from Campbell about her husband's whereabouts and condition. Treating the prisoners in ways intended to weaken them emotionally, physically and psychologically. Humiliating the Islamic women prisoners by strip-searching them and mocking their undergarments and bodies. And, in the case of Campbell, calling to their colleagues after her clothes had been removed, to joke at her European features and to mock her as a convert to Islam.

Talib and his wife expect to return to Australia and Miryam to Kuwait in the coming days - but already all three are looking to the future.

Yes, they told the Herald with surprising enthusiasm, all were determined to be on the next slow boat to Gaza. (Courtesy Sydney Morning Herald and Maan News Agency)

Friday, June 25, 2010

The Muslim Ladies' Study Circle is an Organise "“Hollywood night”

..............
.............

Dear Brothers


Our sisters are attempting to have “Hollywood night” & requesting them to dress un islamically

The Muslim Ladies' Study Circle is an Organization that conducts many Islamic activities & is a Standard bearer for the poor & down trodden Muslim ladies assisting them & guiding them etc.

If we permit such an esteemed organization to conduct this “Hollywood night” the consequences will be that evil will spread among other Organizations including Schools etc & our youth will get corrupted.

So I am requesting all Muslims to register their protest by calling these misguided ladies & telling them not to go ahead and to safe guard our Imaan.

Please circulate this email as much as u can before the event which is 29th of June 2010

Fazal Issadeen
 

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Bread prices go up too

The price of a 450g loaf of bread will be increased by Rs. 4 with effect from midnight tonight as a result of the government re-imposing the duty of Rs 10 per kilogram on wheat grain imported into the country, Chairman of the All Ceylon Bakery Owners Association, N.K. Jayawardena said.

Prima had earlier raised its flour prices by Rs.10.50 a kilo due to the government withdrawing the tax concessions. Consequently a kilo of Prima flour had been raised from Rs. 63 to Rs. 73.50.

The price of a packet of 400g powdered milk was also increased last week by Rs. 19 and a kilo pack by Rs. 48

Monday, June 21, 2010

Minister apologizes to Tamils

Government Minister and General Secretary of the Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) Patali Champika Ranawaka apologized to the Tamil community in Jaffna this morning for the burning down of the Jaffna library several years ago by members of his community.
The Minister, who expressed these views after handing over some books at the library, seemed to be referring to the Sinhalese community and was looking at mending fences between the Tamils and Sinhalese with the end of the war.
Newly appointed JHU leader the Venerable Omalpe Sobitha thero and several other JHU members were also present.

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Lankan gays want rights

Sri Lanka’s gay community today demanded equal rights and urged the authorities to emulate India which had last year lifted restrictions on the gay community in New Delhi.


Executive Director of Equal Grounds, Rozanne Flemar Caldera, speaking at a fashion show in Colombo this evening organized by Sri Lanka’s gay community said that people must be treated equally be they gay or straight.

Equal Grounds represents the gay community in Sri Lanka and the fashion show held at the Galadari hotel saw both gay and straight people taking to the stage to portray equality. Several prominent personalities, diplomats and others attended the event. (ER)

Thursday, June 17, 2010

Controversy surrounds the transfer of a solider who saluted the wife of General Sarath Fonseka

By Jamila Najmuddin




Controversy surrounds the transfer of a solider who saluted the wife of General Sarath Fonseka, Anoma Fonseka when she visited Parliament Grounds last week with the military denying reports that the soldier was transferred over the salute.

On the facebook page of General Sarath Fonseka, it is alleged that the solider who saluted Anoma Fonseka while she visited the Grounds to pay respect to the military tomb, was transferred by the Defence Ministry after it grabbed their attention when a photograph showing the solider’s salute was captured and highlighted in the local media.

It is alleged that the salute had angered top Defence Ministry officials due to which the soldier was immediately assigned to another district.

However Military Spokesperson Major General Prasad Samarasingha, while confirming to Daily Mirror online that the solider had been transferred, said that it was a part of a routine army transfer and had no connection with the salute.

“We are least bothered about the salute and not once have we checked the story. In the army, soliders get transferred as it is a part of their routine. Whoever these people are, who say that the solider was transferred because of the salute, have a very low mentality,” Major General Samarasingha said.

The Military Spokesperson added that the allegations on the General’s facebook page were just a ‘publicity gimmick’ and reiterated that the solider had only faced a routine change.

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

How do I set a custom background for Google?

Are you bored with same old Google home page ? Do you want to add background image to Google home page that looks like Bing?

Google just made there home page just like its tough competitor Bing.You just want to know how to make this Google tweak, right?

1. Go to the Google home page and you can see on the bottom left corner where it says "Change background image" Click on it...

2. You can find different images, including those you can grab from your own computer, those from your Picasa album or even from a large set of photos that are already available.

3. Here I have just uploaded a Wallpaper made for Geekyard.com and set it as Google Home page background images.

4. Now my Google Home page looking cool.

Sunday, June 13, 2010

Scholarship for Vocational Training Courses

Applications are called for the above from students under 25 years of age who have enrolled or plan to enrol in vocational courses in recognized institutes in Sri Lanka.

Qualifications & Eligibility:

-Three passes in A/L and not qualified for university entrance.

-Only entry and intermediate level professional courses will be supported by SSFB

-If the course is for a period less than 3 months or if 50% of the course will be completed by the 1st October 2010 the Scholarship should not be applied for,


Interested students should write to the following address with a self-addressed & stamped envelope for application forms or apply online by logging on to http://ssfbonline.com/

SSFB .
DARUL IMAN
77 DEMATAGODA ROAD
COLOMBO 9

Only limited students will be considered based on the selection criteria set by SSFB. Closing Date for receipt of completed application forms: 15th June 2010. Any application received after the closing date will not be entertained .

*Accounting, Ayurvedic, Journalism, Electronics, A/C or Refrigeration, Mechanical, Engineering, Nursing, Surveying, English Teaching, Montessori Courses, Carpentry, Plantation, Tailoring, Islamic Banking or any other vocational training.

Jazakallah

Friday, June 11, 2010

Iraqi merger forms new Shia bloc, the National Alliance


Iraq's two main Shia groups, which performed strongly in recent elections, have merged to form the biggest alliance in the new parliament.

The bloc, to be called the National Alliance, brings together the prime minister's coalition with other Shia factions, including followers of radical cleric Moqtada Sadr.

It will be just short of an absolute majority in parliament but well ahead of the rival secular-Sunni bloc.

The new parliament opens on Monday.

After weeks of negotiations, the two Shia coalitions announced they were forming one bloc, and said they had notified the acting speaker of parliament.

Constitution unclear

The new alliance is made up of outgoing Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's State of Law coalition - which came runner-up in the March election - and the third-placed Iraqi National Alliance, along with other Shia factions.

Together, they will command just four seats short of an absolute majority, well ahead of the 91 seats held by Iyad Allawi's secular-Sunni bloc, although it came out first in the elections, with a narrow two-seat lead.

Karim Yaqoubi, an INA member, said the Kurdish Alliance would join the new Shia grouping to give them a majority.

The BBC's Jim Muir in Baghdad says that both the Shia and secular-Sunni blocs will now be claiming the right to be asked to form a government. The constitution is unclear on the issue.

In any case, our correspondent says, the Shia bloc has not yet decided who it wants to nominate as prime minister. So the betting is that the first session of parliament will be declared open, and suspended indefinitely until a power-sharing deal is hammered out.

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Kissing ends up in court

Police in two Sri Lankan towns have detained nearly 200 young couples they accuse of indecent behaviour and will produce most of them before a court on Friday, the BBC reported.

Locals complained the young lovers were kissing, cuddling or simply holding hands, reports say.

In the central town of Kurunegala about 350 youngsters have been detained and reprimanded in the past two weeks.

Police have gone further in another town - Matara in the south - where 22 allegedly offending couples are to appear before a magistrate on Friday.

Police in Kurunegala say ordinary townsfolk have been getting increasingly annoyed and embarrassed by what they feel is indecent behaviour by hundreds of young people.

The town is a major centre of students and reports say lots of them have been hanging around in public parks and bus stands.

In rural and provincial Sri Lanka kissing and cuddling in public is seen as unacceptable - however much the capital city may be racing towards Westernisation, says the BBC's Charles Haviland in Colombo.

In Kurunegala many of the girls involved are said to be school students aged only about 15.

The police say this is why they have conducted a sweep and detained 350 offending youngsters, later taking them to their parents with a warning that if there is a repeat they may face tougher measures.

In the southern town of Matara, police detained 22 couples on a beach before releasing them on bail to appear in court on Friday. (BBC)

Simple Solutions to Common Windows Problems


Fix Windows Problems with Free Tools
Q1. I am trying to delete a file from my desktop but the computer won’t let me do that. Instead, it throws me an error message saying that the file /folder is in use by another program or user.

A: You can either reboot your computer in Safe mode to delete that file or, if you want something more simple, get Unlocker. It’s a free utility that will let you close all the processes that have possibly locked the file and once they are closed, you can then safely delete the file.

Q2. I am trying to play a video file on my computer but the media player says that I am missing certain codecs.

A: You can use a tool like Video Inspector to determine which audio and video codecs are required to play the video file on your computer. Alternatively, you can download a codec package like the K-Lite Pack that will let you play virtually any audio and video format on your computer.

Q3. I am running out of disk space on my Windows computer. How can I remove all the unnecessary files from the computer and recover some disk space?

A: There are three things you can do here:

■Open the Run box and type “cleanmgr” to open the built-in Disk Cleanup utility. It will remove all the temp files and the unnecessary system files that you no longer need.
■Use WinDirStat to determine where all your disk space has gone. Sometimes files are hidden in sub-directories that you can safely move to other drives or even delete them permanently (more options).
■Use Duplicate Cleaner to identify and delete all the duplicate files on your hard drives. You can move the duplicates to the recycle bin or, if you want to play safe, to any another folder from where they can be easily recovered.
Q4. My computer takes lot of time to boot-up. I checked the “start-up” folder in the Windows start menu and there aren’t any applications out there.

A: Type “msconfig” in the Run box to open the “System Configuration” tool and then switch to the “Start-up” tab. Disable all the programs that you don’t need to run during start-up. If you are a power user, you may also switch to the “Services” tab and disable all the unnecessary services.

Autoruns is another excellent utility that shows you what programs are configured to run during system bootup or login.

Q5. I am trying to uninstall a program from my computer but the standard add-remove programs is not letting me through.

A: You can use the free Revo Uninstaller utility to remove every single trace of any program from your computer. Revo can also remove entries from the Windows Registry that may have been left by previous un-installation routines.

Q6. My Windows crashed with a “Blue Screen.” Why?

A: You really need to get in touch with a geek to debug the cryptic Blue Screen errors (aka “Blue Screen of Death”) but if you are lucky, a free utility called BlueScreenView can provide vital clues. Blue Screen View will scan the Windows dump files to determine the device drivers that possibly caused the crash.

Q7. It takes ages to copy files in Windows from one folder to another. The situation is marginally better in Windows 7 (over Vista) but still, is there a way to copy files faster?

A: You can use an external file copying utility like TeraCopy or even RichCopy – they’ll not only copy /move files across drives faster but you can also resume broken file transfers (similiar to FTP operations).

Q8. I think I deleted a file by mistake. Can I recover it?

A: Recuva is a free software that will scan your hard drives, USB stick and other external drives for any deleted files that it can possibly recover. It may not work in all cases especially when you securely deleted a file.

Q9. Every time I copy something new to the Windows clipboard, the previous content gets erased. Can I make it permanent?

A: You can use Ditto, a free utility that sort-of adds memory to your Windows Clipboard. You can copy anything to the clipboard and it will stay there as long as you want.

Q10. How do I protect files and folders on my computer?

A: While there are free tools like Hide Folder that let you easily protect files and folders with a password, use TrueCrypt if you want a more secure solution. The obvious downside with a program like TrueCrypt is that if you forget the password, it is nearly impossible to retrieve the protected files.

Singh, Mahinda discuss IDPs


NEW DELHI - Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Wednesday discussed with Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa India’s concerns on the plight of displaced Tamils and pressed for a political settlement of the decades-old ethnic issue in the island country.

The two leaders also discussed a host of bilateral and global issues, including an expansion of economic ties and increased cooperation in areas of development and counter-terrorism, said official sources.

Rajapaksa began his state visit to India with a ceremonial reception accorded to him at the forecourt of the Rashtrapati Bhavan, the presidential palace.

External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna called on the visiting Sri Lankan leader and discussed issues relating to rehabilitation of nearly 300,000 war displaced Tamils and political resettlement plan for Tamil and Muslim minorities in the island country.

Rajapaksa arrived in India on a four-day visit Tuesday evening, his first trip to New Delhi since being re-elected Sri Lanka’s president in January this year.

Over a year after the Sri Lankan troops militarily crushed the insurgency led by Tamil Tigers, around 80,000 displaced Tamils continue to live in relief camps.

Although the Sri Lankan government had promised to resettle all 300,000 war displaced within six months of defeating the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the Sri Lankan government has now set August as the deadline for closure of relief camps housing the refugees. (IANS)