New Delhi, Aug 17 (IANS) Ending weeks of impasse over the the contentious civil nuclear liability bill, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Tuesday indicated its willingness to accept the trebling of compensation in case of an accident to Rs 1,500 crore, a key proposal contained in a panel’s report that will be tabled in parliament Wednesday.
The parliamentary standing committee on science and technology looking into the bill Tuesday finalised its report which recommends raising of the compensation cap from Rs 500 crore, as provided in the earlier draft, to Rs 1,500 crore or “such other enhanced amount notified by the government from time to time,” well-placed sources said.
With a view to fast-tracking the passage of the legislation in the ongoing monsoon session of parliament, the Congress called for forging consensus on the bill, a prerequisite for implementing the landmark India-US civil nuclear deal.
The BJP, which had earlier resisted an any mention of a cap in the proposed legislation, appeared to have settled for the revised amount because of the provision for a further hike through a government notification if required.
The breakthrough came when Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee met top BJP leaders, including L.K. Advani, Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj and her counterpart in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley, in a bid to bridge the differences.
BJP leaders said the suggestions made by the party had been received well and were likely to to be incorporated in the report. The party, however, clarified that it will take a decision on supporting the bill after seeing the fine print of changes in the legislation.
“So far, it is positive,” a senior BJP leader said after the meeting of the standing committee.
“Every issue raised by the members was discussed threadbare and amendments suggested by them are being considered,” T. Subbirami Reddy, the chairman of the standing committee, told reporters outside parliament.
Hinting at an increase in the capping amount, Reddy said: “I cannot divulge much, but I can say that we have incorporated many suggestions in the bill.”
“We had 24 meetings… all are being consulted including trade union leaders. The bill is in the interest of the nation,” he added.
The Left parties, including the CPI-M, the CPI and the Forward Bloc, still have some reservations about the legislation and are likely to oppose it when it is introduced in parliament, which could happen later this week.
The Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill, 2010, was introduced in the budget session of parliament. It was later referred to the standing committee.
The BJP appears to have relented in its opposition to the bill, which it had earlier decried as a sell-out to foreign suppliers. Jaitley said the BJP wants a provision should be made in the bill that it deals only with plants operated by the government or a government company.
“The operators’ liability should be enhanced to a minimum of Rs 1,500 crore or such other enhanced amount to be notified from time to time,” he said.
He said that a similar provision should be made concerning the total liability of an operator as increasing it without such a condition would be a cumbersome process.
“Total liability of the incident to be kept at 300 million SDRs (special drawing rights) or such other enhanced amount to be notified from time to time,” he said.
Jaitley said that supplier’s liability was weak in the bill and the party held that there should be a special provision to refer to the liability on account of transporting defective equipment.
He added that the options for operator vis-a-vis supplier in case of substandard equipment and other latent and patent issues should be strengthened.
The BJP leader said that the bill should contain a statement in the main enactment, as also in the preamble, that all liability under the act shall be “no fault liability” so that cases such as leakages are also treated as proof of negligence.
He said the party did not want the government to close its options and there should not be a direct or indirect reference to any international convention such as the Convention on Supplementary Compensation (CSC).
In a bid to fast-track the legislation, Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari told reporters that the passing of the legislation was imperative for attracting investors into the sector.
“I am sure the opposition parties would have conveyed their reservations and suggestions to the parliamentary standing committee that went into the legislation. It is a must that consensus is achieved soon and the bill passed in parliament,” he added.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is keen to get the legislation passed before US President Barack Obama arrives here in November for talks, during which the two leaders are expected to review the progress on the nuclear deal.
By Arun Kumar
Washington, Aug 17 (IANS) The US has said it would work closely with India in implementing a new law hiking work visa fees that would largely hit Indian firms.
“Well, yes, we are talking to Indian officials about the bill,” US State Department spokesman Phillip Crowley told reporters Monday when asked about the law signed by President Barack Obama Friday ignoring Indian and American corporate concerns.
“Yes, we are talking about the implications. Yes, we are reviewing a suggestion that this bill is not WTO (World Trade Organisation) compliant,” he said.
The legislation proposes to raise the fees on H-1B visas for companies who have more than 50 percent of their employees on such visas for highly skilled professionals. The fees for these visas have been hiked from $320 to $2,320. Similarly, the fee on L visas given to multi-national transferees is hiked from $320 to $2,570.
Indian officials and the US-India Business Council, representing 300 top US firms doing business with India, have warned that the new “discriminatory” law could hurt burgeoning India-US economic ties.
A summary of the bill named Indian firms like Wipro, Tata, Infosys and Satyam, which fly thousands of employees each year to the US to work as technicians and engineers.
The supporters of the bill have said a handful of foreign firms were exploiting the US visa rules to improperly import workers to the country.
“I’m not aware that we’ve reached any final judgement, but we’re not sure that necessarily any WTO issues are triggered,” Crowley said, referring to reports that the new law may go against the world body’s rules of international trade against protectionism.
“But as we work to administer this law which the Congress passed and the president signed, we will try to understand fully the potential impact it has on individuals and companies in India,” he said.
Asked if the US was also talking with the Congress as suggested by him a day before it was signed by Obama, Crowley indicated that stage was over.
“Well, Congress has passed the law and the president signed it,” he said. “Now we’re trying to understand its potential implications and we’ll work closely with India as we implement it.”
(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
Washington, Aug 16 (IANS) US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has said he will quit his job next year.
Gates said that by 2011 it will be known whether the strategy the administration is implementing is working in Afghanistan, and “it seems like somewhere there in 2011 is a logical opportunity to hand off”, Xinhua reported.
“This is not the kind of job you want to fill in the spring of an election year,” Gates said in an interview published by Foreign Policy magazine.
He noted it will be “a mistake to wait until January 2012″, when the election year starts, as the administration “might have trouble getting the kind of person they want if there’s a possibility that they might only be in the job for a year”.
“Who knows what the election situation will look like,” Gates said, noting that’s why he thinks “sometime in 2011 sounds pretty good” for leaving his job.
“I think the toughest thing in public life is knowing when to dance off the stage. And to leave when people say, ‘I wish you weren’t leaving so soon,’ instead of ‘How the hell do we get that guy out of there?’” he said.
Managing “two separate wars for every day I’ve been on the job is very wearing,” he added.
“There’s a certain point at which you just run out of energy.”
Gates, the 22nd secretary of defence, said if he stay until January 2011, he will have been in the job longer than all but four of his predecessors. Those four are Robert McNamara, Donald Rumsfeld, Cap Weinberger, and Charles Wilson.
He said if there are no concrete signs of progress with the recent US troop surge in Afghanistan, then he will recommend a change of course for Obama’s year-end Afghan strategy review.
“We’re just not going to plunge ahead with exactly the same strategy if it’s clear it’s not working.”
Washington, Aug 16 (IANS) The US corporate world has slammed the Congressional cap on H-1B visas and asked the government to allow markets to determine the number of skilled foreign workers, including those from India, eligible to work in the country.
“America’s greatness rests in its institutions and its historic openness to new people and innovations. Closing the door to highly educated individuals seeking opportunity and who aid the competitiveness of US companies will weaken, not strengthen, our country and will diminish the competitiveness of American employers,” a latest report said.
“The best policy for the US is one that sides with freedom and innovation, not restriction. It is a policy where the H-1B cap is either eliminated or set high enough that we can let the market decide on the number of new skilled foreign nationals who work in America each year,” the report said.
The report titled “Regaining America’s Competitive Advantage: Making our Immigration System Work” has been jointly prepared by US Chamber of Commerce, the top representative body of the American businesses, and American Council on International Personnel, an eminent think-tank.
President Barack Obama Friday signed into law a ‘Border Security Bill’ proposing a hike in H-1B visa fees which is expected to badly hurt Indian IT firms with operations in the US.
“The best policy would ease the way for employers to sponsor high skilled individuals for green cards by exempting from labour certification and current employment-based immigrant quotas many who now languish in 6 to 20 year queues,” the report said.
“Allowing top talent who graduate from US universities to gain a green card directly will help US employers retain the world’s leading future innovators. Keeping the door open for high skilled foreign nationals strengthens America. As is often the case, freedom, not restriction, is the right choice,” it said.
Washington, Aug 16 (IANS) US President Barack Obama has clarified that his defence of Muslims’ right to build an Islamic complex near New York’s Ground Zero site of 9/11 attack was not an endorsement of the controversial proposal that has drawn flak from both Republicans and Democrats.
Speaking to reporters during a family vacation visit to Panama City, Florida, Obama reiterated the stand he took Friday night at a White House iftar dinner observing the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. “In this country we treat everybody equally and in accordance with the law, regardless of race, regardless of religion,” Obama was quoted as saying in various media reports.
But he went on to explain that he was not endorsing the construction of the Islamic centre.
“I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there,” he said. “I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding.”
Obama’s speech Friday brought down an avalanche of criticism from the right.
Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin mocked Obama from her Twitter feed Saturday, saying: “We all know that they have the right to do it, but should they? This is not above your pay grade.”
She also compared building the facility to building a Serbian church on the Srebrenica killing fields.
But Obama’s remarks also upset many of his fellow Democrats, who fear Obama taking a stand on the issue of building a mosque so close to the spot where thousands of Americans lost their lives September 11, 2001, could further alienate swing voters in the November mid-term elections.
A CNN poll this month found that 68 percent of those surveyed oppose the idea; among independents, 70 percent were against it.
White House officials said the president’s comments Saturday were not at odds with what he had said the night before – and they insisted they should not be seen as Obama backing down because of political pressure. He was merely clarifying his position, they said.
The Cordoba House, as the 15-story Islamic complex is known, is planned for a site two blocks from Ground Zero where a damaged building now stands. After months of debate, New York officials have now cleared the project for construction.
Washington, Aug 16(ANI): Commander of United States-led NATO forces in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus, has said that Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden is “far buried” in the remote mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
“I don’t think anyone knows where Osama bin Laden is. The fact that it took him four weeks to get a congratulatory message out, or a message of condolence in, say, in the course of the last year or so when we’ve seen these, indicates, literally, how far buried he is probably in the very, very most remote and mountainous regions, The Daily Times quoted Petraeus, as saying.
Despite the difficulty in locating him, Petraeus said that capturing him remains a key task for the Obama administration.
“I think he remains an iconic figure, and I think capturing or killing Osama bin Laden is still a very, very important task for all of those who are engaged in counter terrorism around the world,” Petraeus said.
He further defended the US’ support for flood-hit Pakistan, and praised Islamabad for its efforts to crack down on terrorist sanctuaries.
He said that Pakistan had targeted the Taliban leadership over the past 18 months in the Swat Valley, “but there are areas that they have not dealt with, and North Waziristan is certainly one of those.” (ANI)
New Delhi, Aug 16 (IANS) Over a month after the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) debuted on Twitter, the response from denizens of the fast-growing social networking site has generally been welcoming, although tinged with some surprise that the stodgy Government of India was finally waking up to the power and reach of new media.
MEA’s public diplomacy division created its Twitter account, indiandiplomacy, on July 8. It has since written 94 tweets – some of them being links to press releases and speeches and others being interactions with the tweeting crowd.
By Aug 14, there were 1,972 people who had linked up to the MEA website, purely through word of mouth and media reports.
A recent press release on Indian aid to Pakistan – the note was sent out through Twitter – was circulated widely in twitterland, including among the Pakistani ‘tweeple’.
“Perhaps for the first time Twitter is having such an a/c (account) from any Govt. Of India dept. We the people feel honoured,” Kaushik Dutta, an insurance executive, tweeted in appreciation of ‘indiandiplomacy’ July 11.
Similarly, Swamitra Singh from Kanpur gave his own welcome. “I heard about you via news. Now I am so happy that government is doing something for us.”
There was however a bit of confusion on how MEA will use this account. “Does this mean I can send grievances to you and it will actually be sorted out?” asked Faisal from Mangalore.
There was an immediate response from the ministry official manning the Twitter account. “We may not be able to sort out grievances but we will certainly bring it to the attention of those dealing with the subject,” said ‘indiandiplomacy’.
Besides, some users were interested in knowing how Indian diplomats, known for their verbal skills, will adapt to the minimalism of Twitter.
“How will govt babus talk in 140 chractors. Used to writing 14000 page documents,” asked a Twitter user with the handle ‘iArifsyed’. The MEA’s reply: “We should not be prejudged.”
Several foreign governments, notably those of the US and Britain, use social media like Twitter and Flickr to reach out to younger people and have got encouraging response.
US President Barack Obama’s splash in the Gulf of Mexico was first put on White House Flickr page to give the messsage to Americans and the rest of the world that the BP oil spill-hit Gulf Coast is open for business..
By Arun Kumar
Washington, Aug 15 (IANS) President Barack Obama has clarified that his defence of Muslims’ right to build an Islamic complex near New York’s Ground Zero site of 9/11 attack, was not an endorsement of the controversial proposal.
Speaking to reporters during a family vacation visit to Panama City, Florida, Obama reiterated the stand he took Friday night at a White House iftar dinner observing the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
“In this country we treat everybody equally and in accordance with the law, regardless of race, regardless of religion,” Obama was quoted as saying in various media reports.
But he went on to explain that he was not endorsing the construction of the Islamic centre.
“I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there,” he said. “I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding.”
Obama’s speech Friday brought down an avalanche of criticism from the right.
Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin mocked Obama from her Twitter feed Saturday, saying: “We all know that they have the right to do it, but should they? This is not above your pay grade.”
She also compared building the facility to building a Serbian church on the Srebrenica killing fields.
But Obama’s remarks also upset many of his fellow Democrats, who fear Obama taking a stand on the issue of building a mosque so close to the spot where thousands of Americans lost their lives September 11, 2001, could further alienate swing voters in the November mid-term elections.
A CNN poll this month found that 68 percent of those surveyed oppose the idea; among independents, 70 percent were against it.
White House officials said the president’s comments Saturday were not at odds with what he had said the night before-and they insisted they should not be seen as Obama backing down because of political pressure. He was merely clarifying his position, they said.
The Cordoba House, as the 15-story Islamic complex is known, is planned for a site two blocks from Ground Zero where a damaged building now stands. After months of debate, New York officials have now cleared the project for construction.
(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
Washington, Aug 15 (IANS) Capturing or killing Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden is still a priority for the US, General David Petraeus, commander of the US and NATO-led forces in Afghanistan, says.
Bin Laden “remains an iconic figure and I think capturing or killing is still a very, very important task for all of those who are engaged in counter-terrorism around the world”, Xinhua reported Sunday quoting Petraeus as saying on NBC’s “Meet the Press” programme.
He said bin Laden is probably in an extremely remote mountainous area between Afghanistan and Pakistan, and it took him several weeks to send out “a congratulatory message out or a message of condolence”.
In the same interview, Petraeus also said the timetable of US troops’ withdrawal from Afghanistan will be driven by situation on the ground.
“Certainly, I am aware of the context within which I offer that advice,” Petraeus said, “But that just informs the advice; it doesn’t drive it. The situation on the ground drives it.”
US President Barack Obama has set July 2011 as a deadline to begin withdrawing troops. Petraeus said the challenge now is to demonstrate signs of progress.
Petraeus, who previously served as head of the US Central Command, assumed command of US Forces in Afghanistan and the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan last month.
London, Aug 15 (IANS) British Sports Minister Hugh Robertson says the England cricket team will be discouraged from playing Zimbabawe until its board severs ties with the Robert Mugabe regime.
Robertson said that cricket relationships between the two countries are not possible with Peter Chingoka as the president of Zimbabwe Cricket. Chingoka is a key aide of Mugabe.
“The problem is simple. Zimbabwe cricket is headed by a man who sits on the European Union banned list and he sits on that list for good reasons. As long as he is in charge of Zimbabwe Cricket it is extremely difficult for them to be fully integrated into the global cricketing community.
“Officially, government advice remains we discourage teams from playing. England will be discouraged from travelling over there and it is difficult for them to come here while their chairman remains on the banned list. It is very difficult to welcome a team here if the chairman cannot get a visa to enter this country,” The Daily Telegraph quoted Robertson as saying.
This stance of the coalition government is very similar to that taken by former prime minister Gordon Brown during the last days of the Labour government.
Chingoka he is denied entry into Britain and this has forced the International Cricket Council (ICC) to move its annual general meeting in June to Singapore. The Zimbabwe team voluntarily pulled out of the 2009 World Twenty20 once it became clear they too would not be given British visas.
But in the last six months, there have been several changes in Zimbabwe Cricket. England coach Andy Flower has urged the MCC’s world cricket committee to send a fact-finding mission there and his brother Grant is now involved in the national set up.
Andy’s predecessor as Zimbabwe captain Alistair Campbell was appointed chairman of selectors last October and stated the board’s aim to resume playing Test cricket within two years. Former England batsman and Surrey coach Alan Butcher is now Zimbabwe’s coach.
