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Politics : Idea Of The Day -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: IQBAL LATIF who wrote (46047)	5/2/2004 5:50:20 AM
From: IQBAL LATIF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 50167

The evil face of nations....'How war on terror becomes a preamble of an open season on lesser nations like Pakistan.' Kontevska said top police officials made up the plan to set up the Pakistanis and kill them, and that the men were brought to Macedonia from neighbouring Bulgaria and then brutally gunned down outside the capital, Skopje. Macedonia admits extra-judicial killing of six Pakistanis SKOPJE: Macedonia has admitted that seven innocent Pakistani and Indian immigrants were deliberately killed as "terrorists" two years ago in a bid to score points with the international community. Former interior minister Ljube Boskovski has been implicated in the affair and charges have been framed against four police officers involved in the killings, officials said. The six Pakistanis and one Indian national, gunned down by Macedonian special forces known as the Lions in March 2002, were initially accused of plotting attacks on Western embassies in Skopje. But Macedonian officials acknowledged on Friday that the slaying of the seven immigrants was set up to show the world the former Yugoslav republic was doing its part in the US-led "war on terror". "Police have concluded that it was staged, a monstrous killing of seven economic migrants," interior ministry spokeswoman Mirjana Kontevska said. "The whole affair was set up to score political points with the international community." Parliament has lifted Boskovski’s immunity and the former minister, a member of the main opposition party VMRO-Democratic Party of Macedonian National Union, is expected to be interrogated over the case. The six Pakistanis, Umar Farooq, Syed Bilal Husain Shah, M Asif Javed, Khalid Iqbal, Aijaz Ahmad and Muhammad Riaz were slain, because of having Qur’aanic verses in their pockets. Their bodies were brought to Pakistan by he Ansar Burney Welfare Trust International on September 9, 2002. They were buried in their native places in Gujrat, Gujranwala and Mandi Bahauddin. Kontevska said that the investigation was continuing and more suspects could be charged. If convicted, they face between 10 years and life in prison. Boskovski’s three top associates, as well as a businessman and two special police commandos, were also accused by police. The police charges are a first step in a legal process likely to lead to an official indictment and a trial. The proceedings against Boskovski were made possible after a parliamentary committee stripped him of the immunity from prosecution he enjoyed as a legislator in the Balkan republic’s assembly. Boskovski’s lawyers claimed Saturday, however, that the entire parliament must vote to strip him of his immunity in order for the decision to become valid. Protesting what his lawyers described as procedural irregularities, Boskovski also refused Saturday to appear before an investigative judge hearing the case. Under Macedonia’s law, that refusal alone could lead to his detention. Boskovski, who was appointed interior minister under a previous nationalist government, was also the police chief during Macedonia’s six-month ethnic conflict in 2001, which erupted after ethnic Albanian rebels took up arms to fight for more rights. Boskovski’s special troops were accused of brutality during the clashes and he was reportedly under investigation by the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands. Kontevska said top police officials made up the plan to set up the Pakistanis and kill them, and that the men were brought to Macedonia from neighbouring Bulgaria and then brutally gunned down outside the capital, Skopje. After the slaying, authorities also displayed uniforms and badges bearing the insignia of the National Liberation Army, the ethnic Albanian rebel force that fought government troops — and alleged that the items were found in the raid. Ethnic Albanian politicians denied any connection to the men and rejected the suggestion that the rebels had links to militant groups planning terrorist attacks. Boskovski used the deaths of the Pakistanis to suggest that the rebels sympathised with militant groups, said Ermira Mehmeti, the spokeswoman for the Democratic Union for Integration, a party led by a former rebel commander. "(Boskovski) presented them as Mujahideen who fought for the NLA in order to prove a link of the NLA with ... al-Qaeda and (Osama) Bin Laden," she said. A US State Department official said on condition of anonymity that the United States had pressed for an inquiry and was pleased there would finally be one. Since breaking away from Yugoslavia in 1991, Macedonia has been eager to win US political and economic support in efforts to join Western organizations. It has staunchly supported the US-led war on terrorism and has sent troops to Iraq.