Saraikistan News

PPP VS PML-N
MULTAN,Oct 14th:Khawaja Muhammad Rizwan Alam, media coordinator of Prime Minister has criticised PML-N for conspiring against democracy, saying the judiciary is having a soft corner for the N-league.
Talking to the media on Thursday, PPP Punjab Rizwan Alam said the PML-N leadership was busy in spewing venom against the democratic government, adding that the party leaders , like the one with ëprize bond fameí, Saad Rafique, must be reined in. He said that, in its seminars organised in connection with October 12 military takeover, the PML-N leaders were more vocal against PPP leadership than Pervez Musharraf who had overthrown their elected government on the day.
Talking about the judiciary, he alleged that courts were having soft corner for the PML-N as they were not taking up old cases against Nawaz party, including the famous Asghar Khan case. He also criticized a specific section of media.

ATTACKERS OF ISI OFFICE HELD
MULTAN,Oct 14th:Bahawalpur police have busted a group of Tehrik-Taliban Punjab and arrested Seven culprits who were involved in attacking the ISI (Inter services Intelligence) office in Multan on December 8,2009 and killing 12 persons, kidnapping a retired colonel, murdering five persons in Katcha Khuh, looting a trader and snatching one kg of Gold and 2kg Silver.Regional Police Officer Abid Qadri told newsmen in Bahawalpur on Thursday ,"we have arrested seven member of Tehrik Taliban Punjab from Ahmedpur east when they were plotting to attack the Prime Minister's residence in Multan,"He told that one of the alleged terrirost Prof: Munawar Hussain is Ph.D while mastermind of this gang Abdul Rahim Talha is an expert of manufacturing hand grenades and using modern weapons.Those who were arrested include Muhammad Saleem, Sajjad Ahmed, Hafiz Suleman , Munawar Hussain, Abdul Rahim alias Talha.They were produced before the Anti Terrorism Court Bahawalpur for identification parade and granted three days physical remand.These people were involved in a robbery in Jalalpur and killing of five people in Kachcha Koh.According to the RPO, these people were arrested from Bahawalpur tehsil of Ahmedpur Sharqia after a police encounter.The accused belong to Lashkar-e-Jhangavi Punjab (Qari Imran group).The arrested people include Tehreek-e-Taliban commander Abdur Rehman alias Talha, Muhammed Afzal, Hafiz Salman, Sajjad, Muhammed Saleem, Bilal and Mfti Munawwar Hussain. The search for their two absconding accomplices is underway.Talha is Naib Amir of Tehreek-e-Punjab Punjab Lashkar-e-Jhangavi.
SLIC WORKERS RALLY
MULTAN,Oct 14th: Hundreds of workers of State Life Insurance Corporation organised a rally which began from its regional office and terminated at Multan Press Club as a protest against the deduction from their commission describing it economic assassination of the field workers.They also demanded for shifting of SLIC head quarter to Islamabad from Karachi and replacement of existing chairman.They shouted slogans in favour of their demands. A numbver of female field workers also joined the rally. Participants were carrying placards and banners inscribed with slogans," Stop deduction from their income," Shift SLIC head quarter to Islamabad," Stop economic murder of field workers,"
TB DEATHS
MULTAN,Oct 14th:Ten million people will die of tuberculosis in the next five years if global funding to fight the disease is not increased, the Stop TB Partnership warned on Wednesday.
The Partnership, a coalition of governments, non-profits, companies and international organisations, said 47 billion dollars are needed to save five million lives between now and 2015, including two million women and children.
“We need a plan to stop these completely unnecessary deaths,” said Rifat Atun, chair of the Partnership’s coordinating board, at the launch of the coalition’s 2011-2015 “Global Plan to Stop TB”.
“If we are able to carry out this plan, we will treat 32 million people and save five million lives,” Atun said.
Each year, nine million people contract TB, which hits hardest in the developing world. Most cases occur in Asia (55 percent) and Africa (30 percent), with India and China alone accounting for 35 percent of all cases, the Partnership said. Close to two million people die of the contagious lung infection each year — most from treatable cases, it said. “Tuberculosis is an ancient disease. It should have been eliminated by today,” said Mario Raviglione, director of the World Health Organisation’s Stop TB department. “The pandemic is slowly declining, but far too slowly.”
The Partnership called for renewed efforts to help the most vulnerable patients — the more than one million HIV positive people who contract TB each year and the 400,000 to 500,000 people who develop multi-drug resistant TB.
Half a million HIV positive people die from TB each year, a quarter of all AIDS deaths, said Paul de Lay, deputy executive director of UNAids.
“There is a terrible link between HIV and TB,” he said.
The coalition said 10 billion dollars are needed to fund research to develop a vaccine, new medications and faster and more effective testing. It said its goal by 2015 is to have three new drug regimens and four vaccines in Phase III clinical trials, the final step before drugs go to market. It said funding to fight the disease has lagged in the past five years, adding that it needs to make up a funding shortfall of nine billion dollars from the last five-year cycle amid limited private-sector interest in the disease.
“Pharmaceutical companies don’t invest enough in TB because it’s not a profitable market,” said Christian Lienhardt, senior research advisor for the Partnership. “It’s a poor people’s disease, so TB medication will never be a blockbuster.”
The Partnership said affected countries would not be able to fully fund the fight against TB, and called on international donors in high-income countries to kick in 2.8 billion dollars a year over the next five years to make up the funding gap. Tuberculosis is a contagious bacterial infection that spreads by air. An infected person can spread the disease to about 15 other people per year.