Pak citizens oblivious while Musharraf is endorsed, Sharif debarred

Abhishek Behl


Political events unfolding in Pakistan have raised adrenalin in most parts of the world but the average Pakistani on the streets is oblivious of the hype created by chasm between the army and Pakistan politicians.



PEOPLE FEEL that this is a just a war of interests between Military and political mafia of the country, who wants to serve their own selfish ends. Battle is not between dictatorship and democracy but for owning Pakistan and using, rather misusing her resources like a personal fiefdom, feels an average Pakistan citizen.
Striking a despondent note on the future, Abdul Sattar, an electrical engineer, living in Karachi, says, “Forget about democracy in Pakistan. It is basically feudal-cum-military society ruling at the top, either one of them will be owning us and any one point of time.”
Not ready to discuss the political situation, Sattar told merinews that future of Pakistan was decided in America and an average Pakistani had no role to play in the entire game.
“We are still a colony and decisions are made in Riyadh, Dubai, London and Washington,” he said, echoing the views of large number of citizens on the streets.
Interacting with Pakistanis it becomes clear that they want to break from the extremes imposed by religious fundamentalists as well the military rule.
Sandwiched between the devil and the deep sea, Adnan, a software professional from Karachi, said, “People are fed up with the military rule of Musharraf. They want democracy but they are helpless.” He added that Pak president had outlived his utility and was more of a burden to the country.
Accusing Musharraf of diluting the concept of Jehad, which was one of the most fundamental precepts of Islam, Adnan opined that Pakistanis do not like the blind modernism promoted by him.
“We want to live peacefully and are least concerned with politics of the country,” he added.
From what is emerging it becomes clear that people are resigned to their fate and though angry at the treatment meted out to Sharif are obviously not in love with ‘Mian Sahib’, as Sharif is popularly called.
Identified more with Punjab than with other areas of Pakistan, Sharif’s arrest and subsequent deportation has not caused much stir outside Punjab.
A resident of Lahore, Mohd Imran Zafar, Network engineer, said that situation was quite normal.
“Yahan par sab kuch normal hai aur traffic bhi aam dinon ki tarah hi chal raha hai (everything is normal here and the traffic on the roads too is normal)”, he told this scribe over the phone from Lahore. He however said that there was lot of support for former Pakistan premier and people want that he should come back.
Instead of talking about their political future, if you talk to Pakistanis they prefer discussing Indian heroines particularly Ashwarya and Kareena. This became evident when, Abdul Sattar, the electrical engineer from Karachi said “Forget about democracy in Pakistan tell me how is Aishwarya Rai and how is her marriage with Abhishek?”
Adding somewhat wistfully, “Yeah, the situation in Pakistan is really sad and depressing but actresses from India give us the high.”
Meanwhile, ignorant of what majority of Pakistan wants, the military government in Pakistan barred the former Prime Minister from participating in the ensuing elections saying that he had already been convicted in a case.
On the contrary the Federal Cabinet which met under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz endorsed the re-election of President Musharraf, to ensure the stability, security and growth of Pakistan.

Pakistan tense, Nawaz Sharief deported to Saudi Arabia

Abhishek Behl


Pakistan witnessed high drama today as a defiant Nawaz Sharief reached Pakistan to challenge the military might of Musharraf regime. A tension full day came to a close when Mian Sahib was deported to Saudi Arabia.



EVEN AS THE Pakistan president tried to defuse the explosive situation by deporting Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) president Nawaz Sharief to Jeddah, the mood in the country is volatile.
The former Premier had reached Jeddah on Monday evening. He was taken to an undisclosed location in Saudi Arabia under heavy security.

In Pakistan, a virtual martial law was imposed in Punjab, considered to be the bastion of the Sharief clan.
Thousands of PML-N activists were put behind bars by the Army regime including central as well as provincial leadership across the country.
Eyewitnesses said that all roads leading to Islamabad were closed and heavy containers were stationed at bridges to stop the movement of vehicles in the city.

http://merinews.com/catFull.jsp?articleID=126194

Indian websites hacked: Swiss hacker offers free solution

Abhishek Behl

The man, who hacked the email addresses and websites of Indian embassies and government sites throughout the world has offered to fix the problem in five minutes and that too free of cost.



DAN EGARSTAD, a Swiss, who runs the site derangedsecurity.com during an exclusive interview with merinews.com said that hacking the emails and sites was a two minute job for him and he would rectify the same if different governments contact him.

“I am a security expert and I was just doing a simple experiment, when I hit upon this discovery, wherein I could break into the websites and email addresses of a majority of Indian Embassies located in foreign countries,” he said, adding that this could prove to be major security risk as very sensitive data is handled by some of these organisations.

When asked if he had tried to contact Indian government, Dan replied in negative, saying that his experience with private companies and governments has been extremely bad. “I tried to contact a private company but they behaved very badly with me and threatened to take legal action against me” said the security maverick.

The reason behind first hacking and the posting the email addresses and passwords of these establishments on his website, he said was only to create awareness among the governments and administrators regarding internet security.

“What is surprising is the attitude of the establishments which do not care about the security of their internet platforms. No one has cared to contact me and ask the fix for this problem,” said the Swiss citizen while talking to Merinews.

Asserting that he was an ethical hacker and had no axe to grind, Dan Egerstad said that if the governments and companies can call for a fix of the problem fee of cost, “I won’t charge them any money,” he reiterated.

How easy it is to break into a site or someone’s email address becomes clear, when he says, “I can teach a person with basic security knowledge to break into a website or email address within 5 minutes,” he however, refused to teach the same to this correspondent, when asked to do so.

Ready to help anyone and everyone in this regard, Dan said “If the authorities have not yet figured to plug the holes then they can contact me and I am ready to help.” He further revealed that despite the security breach a number of websites and their administrators had not responded so far. “They are still having the same password and have not made any changes which is not very professional and is quite irresponsible,” he added.

The Indian sites which have been hacked include Indian embassy in Sweden, Defence Research Development Organization, Indian Embassy in USA, Indian Embassy in Germany, Indian Embassy in Finland and a number of other important websites and emails belonging to different countries and users.