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NEW DELHI: Around 4,000 Chinese including the troops of the People’s Liberation Army of China are in Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK), Army Chief Gen. V K Singh said today amid the unease in the Indian establishment over their presence there.
 
"There are certain construction working teams, a large number is available. Around 3,000 to 4,000 of these people are present including certain people for security purposes. There are certain engineers troops. Now (like) our own engineers are combat engineers. So, in some way they are part of the PLA," he told reporters here.
 
The Army Chief was responding to a query on the presence of Chinese Army troops in the PoK on the sidelines of the 16th Field Marshal K M Cariappa memorial lecture delivered by national security adviser Shivshankar Menon.
 
The statement comes against the backdrop of concerns in India about the presence and engagement of Chinese troops in PoK, which India considers as its own land.
 
IAF Chief N A K Browne had made this clear when he said in an interview that increasing presence of China in PoK warrants India’s "attention".
 
New Delhi has already conveyed its concerns to China over the presence of its troops in PoK and its activities in that region.
 
Last year, there were reports of presence of about 11,000 Chinese troops in Jammu and Kashmir’s Gilgit-Baltistan region held by Pakistan but Beijing said there was no wrong-doing.
 
Recently, a senior Indian Army commander had said that Chinese are mainly engaged in construction activities of highways and dams in PoK as well as the northern areas which are very close to the LoC.

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NEW DELHI: Pacer Shaun Tait gave South Australia huge breakthrough as he removed Virat Kohli in their Champions League Twenty20 match against Royal Challengers at M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore.

In the end, Redbacks bowlers have made a come back as they scalped three quick wickets in the span of 25 runs.

Virat Kohli, who made quick-fire 70 off 36 balls, also added valuable second wicket 100 runs stand with Tillakaratne Dilshan to lead Royal Challengers run chase.

Kohli raced to his fifty in 28 balls with the help of five sixes and two fours while Dilshan reached to his half century in 31 balls.

Redbacks’ Daniel Christian dismissed Chris Gayle to give Royal Challengers huge blow. Gayle smacked three huge sixes in his 26 runs innings that came in 15 balls.

Chasing mammoth 215, RCB’s Tillakaratne Dilshan and Chris Gayle started aggressively as Indian outfit raced to fifty in 4.4 overs.

Earlier, electing to bat, the Australian outfit made a mockery of the hapless RCB bowlers to post the highest total in the tournament. The Redbacks have four points and need a victory to take the top slot.

The last six overs produced 92 runs with Sreenath Aravind being hit for 69 runs in his four over spell. The manner in which the left-arm seamer was hit all over the park may seriously dent his chances of making it to the playing XI against England.

For the Australian side, the "Doctor was on call" as Harris (a qualified medical practitioner) was the star of the innings.

The right hander took charge from the word go with his audacious strokes that stunned the RCB bowlers. His magnificent innings was laced with 17 hits to the fence and two sixes one of which was the one which helped him reach his maiden T20 ton.

Ferguson was equally brilliant at the other end, scoring a 43-ball 70, studded with four boundaries and three sixes.

After losing skipper Michael Klinger (7), Harris joined hands with Ferguson as the second wicket pair stitched a belligerent century partnership of 114 runs coming off only 75 balls.

Harris showed no respect to RCB’s left arm seamer Dirk Nannes, hitting him for four consecutive boundaries taking 18 runs in the process. He was particularly severe on Aravind, creaming 28 runs in two overs.

For RCB, Syed Mohammad and Rajoo Bhatkal claimed a wicket apiece.

Teams:

Royal Challengers Bangalore: TM Dilshan, CH Gayle, MA Agarwal, V Kohli, SS Tiwary, KB Arun Karthik, DL Vettori, RR Bhatkal, J Syed Mohammad, DP Nannes, S Aravind

South Australia Redbacks: M Klinger, DJ Harris, TLW Cooper, CJ Ferguson, CJ Borgas, DT Christian, TP Ludeman, AW O’Brien, NM Lyon, KW Richardson, SW Tait

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LONDON: The Bank of England on Thursday reactivated extraordinary stimulus measures by agreeing to inject £75 billion into British economy caught up in a global slowdown and raging eurozone debt crisis.

Following a two-day policy meeting, the BoE voted in favour of increasing its quantitative easing (QE) policy by £75 billion (86 billion euros, $115 billion) to £275 billion over a four-month period.

Its nine policymakers also decided to keep the BoE’s main interest rate at a record-low 0.50 percent.

The decision to hold interest rates had been widely expected, while many economists had forecast more stimulus measures as the country’s economic recovery falters.

In reaction, the pound hit a 14-month low against the dollar but the London stock market was up 2.30 percent.

"The Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) today voted to maintain the official bank rate paid on commercial bank reserves at 0.5 percent," the BoE said in an official statement.

"The Committee also voted to increase the size of its asset purchase programme, financed by the issuance of central bank reserves, by £75 billion to a total of £275 billion."

Also on Thursday, the European Central Bank held its key interest rate at 1.5 percent, shrugging off speculation it could cut borrowing costs to help combat the region’s sovereign debt debacle.

The Bank of England announcement came one day after official data showed the British economy had flatlined over the past nine months and that the 2008/2009 recession was worse than previously thought.

The BoE on Thursday said that Britain’s recovery was being endangered by a flat world economy and the vicious eurozone debt crisis that has sparked massive EU/IMF bailouts for Greece, Ireland and Portugal.

"The pace of global expansion has slackened, especially in the United Kingdom’s main export markets," the British central bank said.

"Vulnerabilities associated with the indebtedness of some euro-area sovereigns and banks have resulted in severe strains in bank funding markets and financial markets more generally. These tensions in the world economy threaten the UK recovery."

The BoE’s key interest rate has stood at 0.50 percent since March 2009, when the bank also decided to begin pumping new cash into the economy under quantitative easing -- which is more commonly referred to as "printing money".

Under QE, a central bank pumps out new cash by purchasing assets such as government and corporate bonds in a bid to encourage lending and in turn boost economic activity.

The Bank of England had injected a total of £200 billion into the economy between March 2009 and January 2010.

Howard Archer, chief European economist at the IHS Global Insight consultancy, said the BoE had good reasons for not cutting its key interest rate to below 0.50 percent in a bid to boost growth.

"It is notable that even at the height of the 2008/9 recession, the MPC was reluctant to take interest rates below 0.50 percent, partly because of the negative repercussions that this could have on the profitability of banks and on their capacity to lend," he said.

"There are also serious doubts about just how much benefit even lower interest rates would have."

Some experts claim that while QE can help to kick-start an economy, it also threatens to fuel inflation, which in the long run can actually hinder growth.

With British annual inflation currently at 4.5 percent -- far above the BoE’s 2.0 percent target -- the bank faces a tricky balancing act.

Britain’s economy almost ground to a halt in the second quarter slowed by weak consumer spending and industrial output, revised data showed on Wednesday.

Gross domestic product (GDP) -- the combined value of all services and goods produced in the economy -- grew by just 0.1 percent in the three months to June, meaning that it flatlined over the past nine months.

Britain hauled itself out of a deep recession in the third quarter of 2009, but its recovery has also been severely constrained by the impact of collapsing consumer confidence and painful state austerity cuts.

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BANGALORE: Kannada film actor Darshan was on Friday granted conditional bail by the Karnataka high court. Darshan was under judicial custody for allegedly assaulting and threatening to kill his wife Vijayalakshmi.

The Karnataka high court asked Darshan and his wife Vijaylakshmi to appear before it on October 13.

The Kannada film actor had been booked under sections 307 (attempt to murder), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 498A (husband or relative of husband of a woman subjecting her to cruelty) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). He had also been booked under section 27 of the arms act.

Earlier, a sessions court had rejected Darshan’s bail plea on grounds that the actor was influential and could bring pressure on the complainant (his wife,Vijaylakshmi), witnesses and tamper with evidence.

Vijayalakshmi had appeared before the magisterial court earlier seeking to withdraw her complaint, but the court did not accept it and rejected Darshan’s bail plea on the ground that the crime committed under IPC section 307 (attempt to murder) did not fall under its jurisdiction.

She had told the court that she sustained head injuries during a fall in the bathroom. This ran contrary to her allegations in a police complaint on September 8 that Darshan had assaulted her and threatened her with a revolver.
WASHINGTON: US president Barack Obama on Thursday lit into Pakistan, virtually accusing the military of consorting with terrorists, of manufacting threats from India , and creating an environment that threatened the whole region, including the people of Pakistan.

At a short-notice White House press conference, Obama prefaced his stinging critique of Pakistan’s regional policy by acknowledging the country’s importance and some cooperation it has provided so far. But he did not mince words in speaking about the country’s two-faced military who are now regarded in some circles as terrorists in uniform.

"There is no doubt that there’s some connections the Pakistani military and intelligence services have with certain individuals that we find troubling," Obama said, endorsing the view of just-retired joint chiefs of staff Mike Mullen. "I think they (Pakistan ) have hedged their bets in terms of what Afghanistan would look like and part of hedging their bets is having interactions with some of the unsavory characters who they think might end up regaining power in Afghanistan after coalition forces have left," he added.

Pakistan, he said, saw its "security interest threatened by an independent Afghanistan , in part because they think it will ally itself to India and Pakistan still considers India their mortal enemy," and "part of what we want to do is actually get Pakistan to realize that a peaceful approach towards India would be in everybody’s interests" .

Pakistan itself faced pressing problems such as poverty, illiteracy , a lack of development and weak civil institutions, "and in that environment, you’ve seen extremism grow, you’ve seen militancy that threatens the Pakistani government and Pakistani people as well." "Trying to get that reorientation is something we continue to work on," Obama said, adding, "It is not easy."