Cuba has in the past been a good friend to Pakistan, and many who suffered in the earthquake of 2005 will remember the Cuban medical teams who gave unstintingly of their services – staying long after others had packed up and gone back whence they came. As a part of post-quake support Cuba, through the Higher Education Commission, offered 1,000 scholarships to students who wanted to train as doctors. The course which was supposed to last six years in fact lasts seven and leads to a qualification recognised by the WHO as appropriate for a paramedic but not a fully-qualified … Continue reading Pakistan and Cuban students should unite

Masood Hasan Perhaps the only thing worse than being an Ahmedi in modern-day Islamic Pakistan is to be a bakra, particularly the black variety. If a report emanating from Islamabad is to be believed, they are having the devil’s own luck – no not the Ahmedis; their goose is as good as cooked – but the four-legged black goats. It seems that there is a cycle of procurement, blessing and deletion that is working far better with bakras than it is with the under siege government of President Zardari. According to this report, the village of Saidpur which I thought … Continue reading Killer Terrorist Goats!

Ghazi Salahuddin On Friday, President Asif Ali Zardari signed the Women Protection Bill into law. This law, passed by the Senate and National Assembly about a week ago, relates to harassment of women at workplaces. It amends both the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and the Criminal Procedure Code (CPC) to enhance punishment for the crime to three years in prison and a fine of up to Rs500,000. Considering the overall status of women in our society, particularly of the women of the under-privileged sections, the Protection against Harassment of Women at Workplace Bill 2009 may be seen either as being … Continue reading The Slave Girl, The Mullah and The President!

Aakar Patel In 480 BC, Persia’s emperor Xerxes attacked and defeated Greece. He bridged the Hellespont, the slim neck between Europe and Asia now called the Dardanelles, and marched his army of Iraqis, Iranians, Egyptians and Indians across to Macedonia and then south into Greece. Most Greek states on his path surrendered to him. Sparta lost one skirmish against his army and then refused to fight. The people of Athens abandoned their city to Xerxes and fled to an island in the south called Salamis. Xerxes had invaded in anger, after Athens interfered militarily in one of his colonies on … Continue reading Herodotus, and the Parsis at Thermopylae

by Michael E. Salla, Ph.D Captain Kirk completed Starfleet Academy before having the credentials to command the USS Enterprise. Part of his fictional Academy training involved Kirk learning all the diplomatic skills necessary for contact and communication with extraterrestrial life. Rather than popular science fiction, there is reason to believe that a secret military equivalent to Starfleet Academy exists. British Hacker Gary MacKinnon claims that he found on Pentagon computers evidence of “fleet to fleet” transfers and a list of “non-terrestrial officers”. MacKinnon recently lost a long extradiction battle and will soon face trial in the U.S. for hacking into … Continue reading Diplomatic training for extraterrestrial contact is more than Science Fiction