UNITED NATIONS: The U.N. humanitarian chief issued a desperate appeal Thursday for hundreds of millions of dollars to help 2.4 million Pakistanis who have fled the war against Taliban militants, warning that the U.N. can only sustain its current aid efforts for one month.

Last Friday, the United Nations revised an earlier appeal and urged donors to contribute $543 million to help the displaced Pakistanis through the end of December.

U.N. humanitarian chief John Holmes said so far only $118 million have come in just 21 percent of the amount and “not remotely sufficient.” He noted that the total includes $17 million from the U.N.’s emergency fund.

“We need to scale up this effort very significantly, in line with the scale and the speed of the displacement,” Holmes said. “We cannot sustain the effort we are making at the moment for more than a month without some new and significant resources being contributed by the donors.”

He said the most immediate needs are funds for food, shelter, cooking utensils, water and sanitation facilities and health services.

Holmes spoke to reporters after meeting with representatives from between 80 and 90 countries to appeal for help. He was joined by Pakistan’s U.N. ambassador.

The United Nations hopes that donors will contribute 60-70percent of the $543 million “within a few weeks,” Holmes said.

More than 1.9 million Pakistanis have fled the recent conflict centered on the northwestern Swat Valley in recent weeks, joining more than 500,000 others who have left their homes since last summer, Holmes said.

While about 90 percent of the 2.4 million people who have been displaced are living with family members or in rented accommodation, he said 220,000 are now in 26 camps south of the battle zone 12 of which the U.N. opened in the last few weeks.

Holmes said the U.N. is concerned that the number of Pakistanis fleeing the fighting is increasing and could rise further if fighting worsens in Waziristan.

May 25 marks an epic in the history of Lebanon. Nine years ago on May 25, the flag of victory of Lebanon’s Hezbollah Resistance Movement was hoisted in Lebanon and southern Lebanon was liberated from the occupation of the Usurper State of Israel after 22 years. At that time, the Zionist regime’s army, under the command of Zionist regime’s premier Ehud Barak, unilaterally and hastily pulled out of southern Lebanon and voluntarily admitted to Israel’s failure in Lebanon and in confrontation with Lebanon’s Hezbollah Resistance Movement.
Many pundits believe that the humiliating withdrawal of the Zionist regime from Lebanon’s soil after two decades goes to show the inability and frustration of the Zionist entity’s war machine in confrontation with Lebanese combatants and Hezbollah Resistance Movement. In fact, Hezbollah had turned southern Lebanon into a quagmire for the Zionists. The Zionist regime, for the first time, occupied southern Lebanon in 1978. Meanwhile, the international community reacted to this occupation. The issuance of United Nations Security Council Resolution 425 at that year was due to the Zionist regime’s expansionist policies and forced the Zionists to leave Lebanon’s soil. However, the Usurper State of Israel hatched new conspiracies and stationed a mercenary army, still maintaining its domination on southern Lebanon. Thereafter, in 1982, the Zionist regime’s army launched a wide-scale assault on southern Lebanon, deploying its forces in that region.
The resistance movement announced its existence for the first time in 1982 as the only option and approach for confronting the Usurper State of Israel. During the occupation of Lebanon, United Nations’ muted reaction to Zionist regime’s crimes showed this fact to the Lebanese people that the only way to push Israel’s army from their homeland is anti-Zionist resistance.
The outcome of combats of Lebanese resistance movement after pushing Israel out of Lebanon’s territory in the year 2000, took shape in the victory of Lebanon against the Zionist regime in the 33-Day Lebanon War.
The presence of Lebanon’s Hezbollah Movement in the military and political scenes has turned Lebanon into a powerful country.
Under these circumstances, and on the 9th anniversary of victory of Lebanon’s resistance movement against the Zionist regime’s army, Lebanon prepares itself for the imminent victory of Lebanon’s Hezbollah Movement in that country’s legislative election.

ISLAMABAD: Security forces stormed into the main town in the Swat valley and fought street battles Saturday in a bid to capture the capital of the northwest district from militant control, the military said.

The director general of the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), Major General Athar Abbas told a news conference that parts of Mingora had already been cleared and that 17 militants, including an important commander of Matta Usman, were killed during the most recent fighting of Pakistan’s northwest offensive. He said another important commander; Khursheed Qasai has been arrested from Watta Kali area.

The ground assault on Mingora, a city with an estimated population of around 300,000 — of whom many have fled — marks the most crucial part of the military’s blistering offensive against militants in the scenic valley.

Mingora has effectively been under militant control for weeks and — as the administrative and business hub of the entire district — its capture is essential for the military to be able to declare ultimate victory in Swat.

“Today the most important phase of operation Rah-e-Rast, the clearance of Mingora, has commenced,” Abbas said.

“In the last 24 hours, security forces have entered Mingora; 17 miscreants-terrorists, including important miscreant commander were killed,” he said.

The military reported intense exchanges of fire and said one would-be suicide bomber was shot dead and that another “suicide vehicle” rigged with explosives had been destroyed.

Troops had been slowly tightening their encirclement of the city for days and Abbas said that militant supplies had been cut off.

Secretary General of Lebanon’s legendry anti-terrorist Movement, Hezbollah, Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah, on the 61st anniversary of the occupation of Palestine by the Zionists, said that the Zionist regime is a cancer and the cause of all wars and crises in the Middle East, while emphasizing all Arab and Muslim countries’ support for the Palestinian people. On the catastrophic occupation anniversary, known among the Palestinians as the Day of Nakba (The Catastrophe Day), Nasrallah emphasized that such a criminal regime can never be recognized as a legitimate government. On the forthcoming military maneuvers of the Zionist regime, he said the Zionist regime has decided to strengthen its warmongering policies as per admitted by the regime’s war minister who had said the games were steps towards war. The Hezbollah Secretary General warned against a new war by Israel in the region, calling on all people and Lebanese officials to be on high alert vis-à-vis the plots hatched by the Zionist illegal regime. Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah reiterated that despite the entire plots hatched by the enemies, the brave Palestinian nation will resist, as ever before, under the most intolerable conditions, continuing its victorious Intifadha movement under such conditions that everyone expected them to surrender. He added, the objective behind the establishment of such a regime at the heart of the Islamic countries was sowing the seeds of wars and crises in the region, while shedding light on the usurper regime’s merciless massacres of the defenseless and innocent people in the region. Nasrallah underlined that the Resistance is in its high level of readiness to thwart the Zionist threats, a matter understood well by the Zionists. The Zionist regime has always put in jeopardy the security and stability of the region while moving in line with its warmongering nature. The regime wanted in fact to impose its will on the regional countries by creating a general panic through its brutalities in practice along with its military show-offs. In line with the same policies, the Hezbollah Secretary General said, the Zionists have resorted to any kind of inhuman measure to make the Palestinians to surrender and yield to their wills. However, with a quick contemplation over the Resistance status and conditions, one could easily understand that the people in Palestine and Lebanon are fully aware of the Zionist plots, while keeping the Resistance bastion highly impenetrable coupled with military and spiritual capabilities. By the way, considering the Zionists’ defeats in the 33-day war against Lebanon in summer of 2006 and the recent 22-day attack on Gaza, Israeli usurper state will get to nowhere but mere failure.

Pakistan and Iran will finalize the $7.4 billion gas pipeline project in a few days, a senior government official said on Tuesday. Talking to IRNA, Managing Director of Pakistan Inter-State Gas System and special envoy on IPI project, Hasan Nawab said that a high-level delegation led by Advisor to Prime Minister on Petroleum Dr Asim Hussain is scheduled to visit Iran on May 22 to hold talks on gas pipeline project with Iranian officials.
He said that the delegation will be staying in Tehran for three days and will give final touches to the IPI agreement.
“The obstacles in the project have been removed and we want to finalize the project in this visit”, he said. “Every thing is settled only the final document has to be signed”, Hasan Nawab added.
He said that Pakistan is very keen on the project as it will open more avenues of peace between Iran and Pakistan.