N Korea progressing on ICBM to strike US: Think-tank

N.Korea progressing on ICBM to strike US. PHOTO: REUTERS.

SEOUL: North Korea is making progress on an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of delivering a first-generation nuclear warhead to the continental United States, a leading US think-tank said Tuesday.

The closely followed 38 North website of the Johns Hopkins University’s US-Korea Institute argued that ICBM mock-ups seen at recent military parades in Pyongyang were “less fake” than originally believed.

Numerous experts had widely ridiculed the models of the North’s road-mobile KN-08 ICBM seen in 2012 and July this year, with at least one respected aerospace engineer labelling them technically preposterous and a “big hoax”.

An analysis posted by 38 North disagreed, saying they were consistent with the ongoing development of a missile with a limited intercontinental ability using only existing North Korean technology.

“Elegant or not,” the mockups suggest an ability to assemble components and technologies to produce missiles with theoretical ranges of 5,500 kilometres to more than 11,000 km.

“Almost all of the configurations examined would be able to deliver a light, first-generation nuclear warhead at least as far as Seattle,” it said.

The analysis was co-written by non-proliferation expert Jeffrey Lewis and aerospace engineer John Schilling.

The authors noted that glaring discrepancies in KN-08 mock-ups displayed in 2012 had largely disappeared by the time of the July parade.

And the new arrangement of welds and rivets was similar to that seen on recovered debris from the North’s Unha-3 carrier, which successfully placed a satellite in orbit in December last year.

In a separate, technical paper published in Science and Global Security, Schilling stressed that the KN-08 was still very much a missile in development.

“The lack of flight testing strongly suggests that operational deployment is still months or years in the future,” the engineer said.

And even with a successful test programme, it would likely be unreliable, limited in mobility and performance, and available only in small numbers, he added.

Lewis and Schilling’s paper referenced recent analysis of satellite imagery indicating that North Korea was upgrading its main missile launch site, possibly to cater to larger, mobile weapons.

South Korea’s Defence Intelligence Agency told parliament on Tuesday that North Korea had conducted five tests of long-range rocket engines this year.

An initial test of the KN-08 could come “at any time”, Schilling said.

Missile delivery has often been cited as the main weakness of the North’s nuclear weapons programme which, after three tests, is believed to be close to mastering the key technology of warhead miniaturisation.

December’s satellite launch caused serious concern, but experts stressed that it lacked the re-entry technology needed to bring an ICBM down onto a target.

Nevertheless, Lewis and Schiller said dismissing the mock-ups paraded in Pyongyang would be dangerous.

“The simplest explanation here is that the (KN-08) is exactly what it appears to be: A developmental road-mobile ICBM of limited capability but still able to threaten the continental United States,” they said

Iran looking for 'content' in new nuclear talks

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Despite the positive atmosphere, substantial differences remain as Iran seeks relief from international sanctions. PHOTO: REUTERS.

TEHRAN: Talks to resolve a protracted row over Iran’s nuclear ambitions resume this week in Geneva, with Tehran’s negotiator saying he hopes to begin discussing the “content” of an accord.

The so-called P5+1 group of major powers will meet with Iran’s nuclear team on Thursday and Friday for the latest round of negotiations revived after the election of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, a reputed moderate who has vowed a new approach.

Both sides hope to build on a meeting last month hailed as “substantive” by all sides, at which the Iranian delegation outlined a new proposal and met bilaterally with its US counterpart for the first time since 2009.

The United States is part of the P5+1, which also includes Britain, China, France, Russia, and Germany.

According to Iranian officials, the proposal- whose details have been kept secret- envisages a first and a last step which Tehran hopes can be implemented within three months and a year, respectively.

Iran’s lead negotiator in Geneva, Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, said Monday that a “negotiation framework” had been agreed.

“Our expectation now is to begin discussions on content and then move towards an agreement on content,” Araqchi told the ISNA news agency.

Despite the positive atmosphere in the talks, conducted in English for the first time, substantial differences remain as Iran seeks relief from crippling international sanctions.

A senior Western diplomat speaking on condition of anonymity said after the last round of talks in Geneva that an immediate solution was not in sight.

“The differences remain very large in terms of what the steps should include,” the source said.

Technical discussions were held last week in Vienna at the level of experts to prepare for the political meeting this week.

Ali Vaez, the senior Iran analyst for the International Crisis Group, told AFP that more such meetings are necessary “to narrow the gap and hammer out a mutually acceptable agreement”.

Iran hopes to bring about the lifting of sanctions, while Western powers and Israel are seeking to curb its uranium enrichment programme, which they say is aimed at developing a nuclear weapon, allegations vehemently denied by Tehran.

In an interview with Israel’s Channel 10 News this weekend, lead US negotiator Wendy Sherman defined “progress” as stopping the nuclear programme from advancing further while negotiators try to reach a comprehensive agreement.

She said Washington was prepared to offer “very limited, temporary, reversible sanctions relief” while maintaining the “fundamental architecture of the oil and banking sanctions- which we will need for a comprehensive agreement, not for a first step”.

Khamenei says negotiators are not ‘compromisers’

Vaez meanwhile cautioned that negotiators still have a long way to go in resolving the decade-long dispute, pointing out that each side will have to hold its hardliners in check.

“Although the P5+1 has- for the first time- agreed to define the broad contours of an end-game, spelling it out will be groundbreaking and will require more discussion with Iran and within the P5+1,” he said.

The meeting this week will be the second such gathering since Rouhani took office in August with a pledge to resolve the nuclear issue and lift the sanctions through constructive engagement.

However the conduct of his nuclear team, overseen by Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, has come under fire from hardliners at home wary of compromise on what Iran sees as its right to nuclear enrichment.

But the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final word on all major policy issues in the Islamic republic, including the nuclear dossier, threw his weight behind the nuclear team on Sunday.

“No one should see our negotiating team as compromisers,” Khamenei said, adding that they needed national support in their “difficult mission”.

But he also said a breakthrough in the talks was unlikely.

“I do not think the negotiations will produce the results expected by Iran,” he said, adding that he is “not optimistic” about the negotiations.

Should the talks fail to deliver, it could strengthen sceptics in the US Congress and Israel, as well as hardliners in Iran, all of whom have pushed for a more confrontational approach.

“Both the US and Iran have been able to successfully push back against their respective hardliners, but this will only increase the price of potential failure,” Vaez said.

NATO urges Pakistan to keep supply routes open

"“The security of Afghanistan and Pakistan is inter-linked. There can’t be security in the one country without security in the other,” says Rasmussen. PHOTO: REUTERS

BRUSSELS: Nato chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen urged Pakistan on Monday to keep open supply lines to Nato forces in Afghanistan despite anger over a US drone strike that killed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) chief Hakimullah Mehsud.

“I feel confident that the Pakistani authorities will maintain open supply routes and transit routes because it is in Pakistan’s own interest to contribute positively to stability and security in the region,” Rasmussen told a news conference.

Pakistan is the main route to supply US troops in landlocked Afghanistan with everything from food and drinking water to fuel. Any closure could be a serious disruption as US and other Western forces prepare to withdraw most of their troops from Afghanistan by the end of next year.

Pakistani cooperation is also seen as vital in trying to bring peace to Afghanistan, in particular in nudging the Afghan Taliban into talks with the Kabul government.

Rasmussen declined to comment on the drone strike that killed Hakimullah but appeared to lend support to US actions, saying ‘terrorism constitutes a threat to the whole region’.

He said he believed the Pakistani authorities, including the government and the military, realised that it was in Islamabad’s interest to ensure peace and stability in Afghanistan. “The security of Afghanistan and Pakistan is inter-linked. There can’t be security in the one country without security in the other,” he added.

Meanwhile, the US Secretary of State John Kerry defended on Monday the drone strike that killed Hakimullah but added that Washington was sensitive to any Pakistani concerns. Agencies

India blasts off in race to Mars with low-cost mission

In this file picture taken on September 11, 2013, scientists and engineers work on a Mars Orbiter vehicle at the Indian Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) satellite centre in Bangalore. PHOTO: AFP

NEW DELHI: India launched its first rocket to Mars on Tuesday, aiming to put a satellite in orbit around the red planet at a lower cost than previous missions and potentially positioning the emerging Asian nation as a budget player in the global space race.

The Mars Orbiter Mission blasted off from the southeastern coast with the satellite scheduled to start orbiting Mars by September, searching for methane and signs of minerals.

“This is our modest beginning for our interplanetary mission,” said Deviprasad Karnik, spokesman for the state-run Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

Only the United States, Europe, and Russia have sent probes that have orbited or landed on Mars. Probes to Mars have a high failure rate and a success will be a boost for national pride, especially after a similar mission by China failed to leave Earth’s orbit in 2011.

India’s ties with its neighbour are marked as much by competition as cooperation. Government scientists deny any space race, but analysts say India has stepped up its programme because of concerns about China’s civilian and military space technology.

The probe’s 4.5 billion rupee price tag is a fraction of the cost of NASA’s MAVEN mission, also due to launch in November. Analysts say India could capture more of the $304 billion global space market with its low-cost technology.

The Mars mission is considerably cheaper than some of India’s more lavish spending schemes, including a $340 million plan to build the world’s largest statue in the state of Gujarat, including surrounding infrastructure.

Even so, it has drawn criticism in a country suffering from high levels of poverty, malnutrition and power shortages and experiencing its worst slowdown in growth in ten years.

India has long argued that technology developed in its space programme has practical applications to everyday life.

“For a country like India, it’s not a luxury, it’s a necessity,” said Susmita Mohanty, co-founder and chief executive of Earth2Orbit, India’s first private space start-up. She argued that satellites have broad applications from television broadcasting to disaster management.

India’s space programme began 50 years ago and developed rapidly after Western powers imposed sanctions in response to a nuclear weapons test in 1974, spurring scientists to build advanced rocket technology. Five years ago, its Chandrayaan probe landed on the moon and found evidence of water.

The relative prowess in space contrasts with poor results developing fighter jets by India’s state-run companies.

The Mars Orbiter Mission plans to search for methane in the Martian atmosphere, the chemical strongly tied to life on Earth. Recent measurements made by NASA’s rover, Curiosity, show only trace amounts of it on Mars.

India’s mission will also study Martian surface features and mineral composition.

Gas utilities: Plan to privatise gas distributors may be put on back burner

Officials believe that the plan to privatise may be put on hold until the completion of the study. PHOTO: FILE

ISLAMABAD: The government is likely to put privatisation of gas transmission and distribution companies on the back burner until the division of these into small units after a study by an international consultant.

According to sources, the government has decided to “unbundle” gas utilities – Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) and Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC) – into small companies based on recommendations of an international consultant.

The previous Pakistan Peoples Party-led coalition government had also tried to push ahead with the plan, but could not implement it. Now, a summary will be tabled in upcoming meeting of the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) for hiring an international consultant to undertake a study and introduce best practices in SNGPL and SSGC, which may be funded by multilateral or bilateral donors.

Sources said the government was looking for funds from the Asian Development Bank, World Bank and US Agency for International Development (USAID).

Officials believe that the plan to privatise may be put on hold until the completion of the study.

“The government may not privatise gas distribution companies, but their small units followed by the division may be privatised,” an official said. A new tariff structure would also be introduced for the gas companies, he said.

The government is of the view that after the start of gas imports under the liquefied natural gas (LNG) project and Iran-Pakistan and Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipelines, it will be compelled to introduce a new tariff structure based on weighted average prices of domestic and imported gas.

The summary prepared for the ECC argued that the creation of small gas companies and establishment of a gas market had assumed immense and immediate importance as LNG imports and pipeline projects could not be dealt with in the current regulatory environment.

A committee constituted by the previous government had proposed appointment of an independent consultant for the unbundling of natural gas transmission and distribution companies.

The consultant will set a new pricing mechanism for sale of natural gas to various sectors keeping in view the cost of imported gas and also a mechanism for determination of separate transmission and distribution tariffs considering the international efficiency standards for new entities including benchmarks for unaccounted-for-gas (UFG).

The committee proposed that gas losses should be set at the level of 2004-05, arguing that such losses were outside the control of the gas companies.

Oil margins

Separately, the ECC was expected to once again allow dealers and oil marketing companies to pocket billions from petroleum product consumers by keeping unchanged an interim increase in margins, sources said.

The ECC will discuss a summary for giving an extension of 10 more weeks as a study to evaluate the margins has not yet been completed.

The previous government had given the interim relief for three months, but the dealers and OMCs continued to charge higher margins as work on the study is yet to come to an end.

Honing skills: USAID to spend $34m on Training for Pakistan project

The project will also facilitate the formation of an USAID alumni association of training participants for a discourse on country’s development issues and experience sharing. PHOTO: FILE

ISLAMABAD: The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has dedicated $33.9 million to continue the Training for Pakistan Project, which is being implemented by World Learning.

The project is designed to offer education opportunities to more than 6,000 Pakistani professionals over the next four years, says a statement issued by USAID here today.

The Project will support Pakistan’s development priorities in the key sectors of energy, economic growth, agriculture, health, and education by making these capacity building opportunities available locally, regionally, or internationally for Pakistani professionals and decision-makers.

This project stems out of US’s policy to focus on people-to-people engagement with Pakistan specially highlighted in the Enhanced Partnership with Pakistan Act.

The USAID Training for Pakistan Project will provide a full range of training services including needs assessments, training program design and implementation, participant recruitment and selection, technical assistance, and monitoring and evaluation.

“This partnership with USAID will allow World Learning to empower Pakistani individuals and organisations to become more engaged stakeholders in their country’s development,” World Learning President and CEO, Donald Steinberg said.

“The programme will help equip Pakistan’s future leaders with the skills they need to advance peace, democracy and development,” he added.

The project will also facilitate the formation of an USAID alumni association of training participants for a discourse on country’s development issues and experience sharing.

After completing training programmes, the alumni will also have an opportunity to apply for small grants to fund development projects inspired by their training courses. The project will extend follow-on post-training support.

Madrid ready to step up Suarez chase

The Spanish giants have expressed an informal interest in the Liverpool striker although a January swoop is unlikely due to both financial reasons & the Reds' reluctance to sell

By Wayne Veysey

Real Madrid are in pole position to sign Luis Suarez - but will have to wait until the end of the season to land the Liverpool striker.

Goal has learned that the Spanish giants have expressed an informal interest in the Uruguayan as they make long-term plans to reinforce their front line.

However, a January move is almost out of the question due to Madrid's lack of funds and Liverpool's reluctance to sell their prized asset mid-season.

Nevertheless, Madrid are ready to make Suarez one of their primary targets for next summer, when the forward will have only two years remaining on his Anfield contract.

Karim Benzema is the only senior centre-forward at the Santiago Bernabeu following the July sale of Gonzalo Higuain, and the club's priority is to reinforce the position at the end of the season.

Liverpool are privately adamant they will resist any bids for the striker in the January window but accept they have a fight on their hands to hold on to the 26-year-old in the long term.

The Merseysiders rejected a bid of €47 million plus €1 for Suarez from Arsenal last summer after the Gunners had been led to believe the offer would be enough to trigger a release clause in the contract signed by the player in 2012.

Suarez, who was one of 23 players shortlisted last week for the Fifa Ballon d'Or, claimed in a recent interview to be unaware of any interest from Madrid but it is understood intermediaries representing the Spanish club have outlined their intention to make a move for the player next year.

The Uruguayan spoke frequently of his interest in a move last summer, most specifically to Madrid. However, the nine-time European Cup winners did not make a formal bid and used most of their transfer budget to sign Gareth Bale for a world-record €100m from Tottenham.

Despite offloading Mesut Ozil to Arsenal for €50m and Higuain to Napoli for an initial €37m, Madrid are unlikely to have the funds to bid the £53m-plus it would take to prise Suarez from Liverpool in January.

A concerted attempt to capture the striker, who has been in sensational form since returning from a 10-match ban, is likely to be put on hold until the end of the season.

The Liverpool hierarchy know they will be in a stronger position to hold on to Suarez if they secure a top-four Premier League finish and qualify for next season's Champions League.

Should the Merseysiders miss out on a Champions League place once again, it is unlikely they would stand in Suarez's way if a huge offer was made from a club who are not considered direct rivals.

Liverpool are adamant that they will not sell the striker at any point to Arsenal, who remain in the market for a marquee centre-forward. The Gunners have now set their sights on alternative targets, including Fernando Llorente and Stephan El Shaarawy.

It would be considered more palatable for Liverpool supporters if Suarez was sold overseas, especially to a club of Madrid's prestige and history.