Sunny California is leading the way to tap solar energy. Can sunny Pakistan follow to deal with its crippling energy crisis?
California based
BrightSource Energy, which already has a deal to build a series of huge solar power plants in the Mojave Desert for Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E),…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 27, 2009 at 6:00pm —
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China is a country of 9,600,000 square kilometers in size, with a population of more than 1,200,000,000. Chinese civilization dates back 5000 years ago, and her unique culture and tradition attracts more and more international visitors. The past twenty years have witnessed China as one of the fastest growing countries in the world.
Higher education in China has been well developed. There are over 2000 universities and colleges, with…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 24, 2009 at 7:30pm —
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Not only has the low-budget movie
"Slumdog Millionaire" drawn big crowds in the West and taken in more than $ 100m at the box office, the movie has won eight Oscars last night, including the Academy awards for the Best Picture and the Best Director. The Best Music and Best Song awards went to…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 23, 2009 at 8:26pm —
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Decried by many as "
racist poverty porn" and condemned by Bollywood superstar Amitabh Bachan in his
blog for showing India as "a third world dirty under belly developing nation (sic)", the movie…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 22, 2009 at 4:30pm —
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If Russia was the destination of choice in the 1980s and 1990s for Indian students who could not make it into medical colleges in India, China has now emerged as the hot favourite. Last year, for instance, nearly 3,000 Indian students took admission in medical colleges in China.
Still in its relatively early years, the trend has already hit a minor roadblock. After complaints from several students who went in the earlier batches about…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 21, 2009 at 4:00pm —
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Muzzammil "Mo" Hassan, founder of a Muslim-American TV network, is accused of beheading his wife, Aasiya, last week in Buffalo, New York, days after she filed for divorce, according to
media reports.
The incident has shocked the Muslim-American community…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 19, 2009 at 12:30pm —
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By Paul Harris and Laura Clark
Last updated at 9:27 AM on 31st January 2009
Daily Mail
One ambition was fixed in Ali Moeen Nawazish's mind as he made his way through school in Pakistan. He wanted to win a place at Cambridge.
Sitting seven A-levels might easily have done the trick, even though he had started to study some of the subjects only three days before the exam.
But he was determined to get some good grades. So he sat another three, and three…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 13, 2009 at 9:30pm —
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Suzlon, India's wind power giant, has reported a quarterly loss after years of expansion and profit growth. It was hurt mainly by the ongoing global credit crunch, slowing wind turbine sales, and by rising costs and a provision to do repairs stemming from the widely reported
quality… Continue
Added by Riaz Haq on February 5, 2009 at 6:03pm —
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In spite of America's leadership position in
global competitiveness, the new US administration under President Barack Obama is asking the US Congress to more than double the federal education budget this year, as part of its stimulus package. Some of the new spending will…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 2, 2009 at 3:37pm —
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In the "New Economy", the most important single asset for any nation is the intellectual capital it develops by educating its people well. Investment in education could not be better described than by the words used by the Chinese genius Kuan Chung centuries ago: "If you plan for a year, plant a seed; if for 10 years, plant a tree; if for a 100 years, teach the people. When you sow a seed once, you reap a single harvest; when you teach the people, you will reap a 100 harvests."
Here…
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Added by Riaz Haq on February 1, 2009 at 3:00pm —
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International
math and science test results have consistently shown for over a decade that Asian students from China, Japan, Singapore and Korea perform better than American students. In spite of such results, the US continues to excel in…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 30, 2009 at 3:30pm —
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Months back, there were reports in the papers on the "yoga controversy" in Malaysia. Muslims, it argued, were in danger of being corrupted by elements of Hinduism: the chantings of "Om". While it is to be appreciated that Islam is a strictly monotheist religion and Hinduism is not, and Muslims, by their faith, are required to steer clear of the very spirit of polytheism or atheism in their activities, this is utterly absurd. In 7th century Arabia, Muslims were asked to get rid of curtains…
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Added by Saadia Malik on January 26, 2009 at 6:12am —
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China continued to outperform India as a magnet for US venture capital investments in 2008. This was particularly interesting in a year that saw the venture investors feel the pinch from declining values of their portfolios. It was also a year when a company based in Pakistan became the first to receive US venture funding.
In India, the…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 25, 2009 at 7:30am —
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By
Pervez Hoodbhoy
Rumor has it that the
World Bank is on its way back to Pakistan with a bagful of loans, together with plans for how we must spend the money. A…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 24, 2009 at 1:30pm —
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In response to readers' requests and in recognition of the popularity of Twitter, you can now follow the
tweets from
Haq's Musings anywhere in real time.
If you already have a Twitter account, please check out and subscribe…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 24, 2009 at 9:57am —
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Nine people are reported killed in the
first CIA predator attack in North Waziristan since President Obama took office on Tuesday. There was another strike in South Waziristan but there have been no reports of casualties yet.
These strikes came shortly after Obama met his advisers,…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 23, 2009 at 10:27am —
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The editors of Stanford Daily have criticized the less-than-civil questioning by "enraged Indian nationalist" after President Musharraf's speech at Stanford University last Friday. The Stanford student body clearly did not present itself well. Instead of an intellectual and political discourse worthy of Stanford, they brought dishonor upon a highly…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 20, 2009 at 9:00pm —
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Menlo Park based
oDesk has ranked Philippines and Pakistan as the top two outsourcing destinations in terms of growth, value for money and customer feedback.
oDesk helps its clients with tools, technologies and services to hire and manage remote work teams. Other companies in its category, including…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 16, 2009 at 10:00pm —
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Most people are familiar with the moniker of
Mr. Ten Percent bestowed on Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari. Now meet Mr. Thirty Percent, Ausaf Umar Siddiqui, a
Pakistani-American in Silicon Valley, who is accused of…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 16, 2009 at 4:00pm —
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By Air Marshall (Retd) Ayaz Khan of Pakistan Air Force
Unfortunately India and Pakistan had adversarial relations since sixty years. After the Mumbai carnage Pakistan is under threat of
pre-emptive strikes. The Fourth Indo-Pakistan war could be triggered by another terrorist…
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Added by Riaz Haq on January 15, 2009 at 12:37pm —
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