Petitions refilled in Pak SC against JuD chief Hafiz Saeed’s release

October 1st, 2009 WASHINGTON - Once coveted by Indian techies, more than one fourth of the H-1B visas for skilled professionals are yet to be grabbed, with the US job market still to pick up as it recovers from its deepest recession in decades. By Sep 25 only about 46,700 of the H-1B visas in the general category were filled up against a Congressional mandated cap of 65,000, according to the latest update by US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

September 24th, 2009 NEW YORK - In a startling volte face, Pakistan admitted Thursday that Hafiz Saeed, the alleged mastermind of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks had not been arrested as had previously been thought, saying this would take time. At the same time, Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik said that the prosecution of Saeed, the founder of terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), should not be made a precondition for resuming the sub-continental dialogue process that India froze in the wake of the Nov 26-29, 2008 Mumbai carnage that claimed the lives of over 170 people, including 26 foreigners.

September 24th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) chief Hafeez Mohammad Saeed's lawyer, A K Dogar, has filed a petition in a court seeking Saeed's release from house arrest. Saeed, the alleged Mumbai terror attacks mastermind and chief of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) was placed under house arrest four days ago.

July 17th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - The Pakistan Punjab government is ready to pursue the detention case of Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed provided the federal government presents it with more fresh evidence against the 26/11 prime accused. Punjab Advocate General Raza Farooq informed a three-member Supreme Court bench that it could take back its application to withdraw their petition against the Lahore High Court's (LHC) verdict setting Saeed and his close aide Colonel (retired) Nazir Ahmed free if the federal government provides fresh evidence against both.

July 15th, 2009 Sharm-el-SHEIKH - Foreign Secretaries of India and Pakistan - Shiv Shankar Menon and Salman Basheer - burnt the midnight oil on Tuesday to try to work out some kind of framework to lay the ground for the resumption of talks between the two countries. Mandated by their respective Prime Ministers' - Dr.

July 14th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - The government in Pakistan's Punjab province has decided to disassociate itself from the Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed case and filed a plea for its withdrawal. On Monday, the provincial government informed the Supreme Court that it has challenged the release of Saeed due to certain "confidential evidence" against him.

July 6th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Pakistan has indicated that it was attaching immense importance in its meeting with India on the sidelines of Non-Aligned Movement summit in the resort of Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, and is looking to make an all out effort to address New Delhi's concerns. Foreign secretaries' of the two countries are to hold talks on the sidelines of the July 14-15 summit.

June 13th, 2009 LAHORE - The Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) chief Hafiz Saeed, who himself has apparently been involved in a number terrorist attacks, has condemned Friday's suicide attacks on a mosque in Lahore in which Pakistan's top religious scholar, Dr Sarfraz Naeemi Al-Azhari was killed. In an apparent bid to gain public sympathy and represent himself as a humanitarian leader, Saeed denounced the terrorist attack, terming it as an 'inhumane' and 'un-Islamic' act.

June 4th, 2009 LAHORE - Pakistan's former Human Rights Minister Ansar Burney has termed the house arrest and subsequent release of the Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed as a 'drama'. Burney said Saeed was never arrested, as he was living in his own house and was free to meet whosoever he wanted.

June 4th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Pakistan's Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira has said the arrest or release of an individual should not affect ties with India. Kaira was referring to the release of Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed.

June 3rd, 2009 ISLAMABAD - The US Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke has said that the Lahore High Court's verdict to release Jaamat-ud Daawa (JuD) chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed has disturbed the United States. "His release has disturbed us all," The News quoted Holbrooke, as saying.

June 2nd, 2009 LAHORE - Immediately after his release from house arrest on Tuesday, the Mumbai terror attacks' mastermind Hafiz Saeed has said that Pak forces should be brought back from the Swat region, as there was no need to fight. Geo TV quoted Saeed as saying that he neither supports the suicide attacks nor does he accept the Swat Operation.

June 2nd, 2009 LAHORE - The Pakistan Government's reservations about producing evidence against the Mumbai terror attacks' mastermind Hafiz Saeed may have been the reason behind the Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief's release from house arrest. The Lahore High Court has ordered Saeed's release due to lack of evidence, but it is pertinent to note that Pakistan's Attorney General Sardar Latif Khosa had just days ago told the Lahore High Court that the government had enough 'material' to prove Saeed's involvement in terror activities, but it couldn't produce it in the court keeping in mind the 'national security'.

March 28th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and deposed Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif have filed a petition in the Supreme Court pleading to the apex court to make them parties in the disqualification revision petitions' hearings. Advocates Abid Hassan Manto and Khawaja Haris filed the petition on behalf of the leaders, and also urged the court to declare the earlier ex-party decision as obsolete.

January 10th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Pakistan has extended by two months the house arrest of Hafiz Mohammed Saeed, the founder chief of banned terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) which is blamed by India for the Mumbai terror attacks. Saeed was detained in December after the United Nations declared Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), a frontal organisation of the LeT, as a terrorist group.