Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Terror strikes cricket
Sri Lanka players fired on in Lahore, seven injured; WC in South Asia uncertain
WISH IT NEVER HAPPENED: (Clockwise from L) A grim-faced Pakistan captain Younis Khan is having a look at the bullet-hit bus that was carrying the Sri Lankan crickete team to the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore; Bangladesh skipper Mohammad Ashraful sticks black badges to his Gazi Tank teammates during a Premier League match against Victoria at the Fatullah Cricket Stadium yesterday. The Bangladeshi players wore black badges in protest against the heinous terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore where five players and assistant coach (clockwise from top left) Ajantha Mendis, captain Mahela Jayawardene, Kumar Sangakkara, Paul Farbrace, Thilan Samaraweera and Tharanga Paranavitana were injured. The audacious attack on Sri Lanka's cricket team in Pakistan on Tuesday rocked the South Asian heartland of the sport and prompted an immediate review of arrangements for the 2011 World Cup.
The showpiece tournament is due to be jointly hosted by India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, the four cricket-obsessed Test nations that make up the sport's financial nerve centre.
"Quite clearly, this event puts a great question mark over the ability of Pakistan to host cricket World Cup matches," International Cricket Council (ICC) president David Morgan told the BBC.
"Things will have to change dramatically in Pakistan in my opinion if any of the games are to be staged there," Morgan said.
With international cricket in Pakistan effectively suspended for the foreseeable future, the other three World Cup host nations will be hard pushed to make a convincing case that they can offer sufficient security guarantees.
India, which generates an estimated 70 per cent of cricket's worldwide revenues, had its security credentials shredded by the Mumbai attacks last November which coincided with a tour by the England team.
One of the main targets of the attacks, when gunmen killed 165 people, was the Taj Mahal Hotel, where the England players had stayed on arrival.
Sri Lanka is struggling to finish off a long-running conflict with Tamil Tiger rebels while Bangladesh is recovering from a mutiny in the armed forces that turned part of the capital Dhaka into a battleground last week.
Seven Sri Lankan cricketers were injured when gunmen opened fire on their bus as it headed to the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore for the third day's play in the second Test against Pakistan.
Before the Lahore attacks, the ICC and administrators in the four host countries were banking on the fact the World Cup was still two years away.
But the world governing body hardened its stance on Tuesday with ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat warning there will be "some serious repercussions" for Pakistan in the next 48 hours.
"In the next day or two we will have to make some serious decisions and we will," Lorgat told the Indian news channel Times Now.
"There obviously have been breaches and the security has not been good enough. There will be some serious repercussions from this."
Of the 15 World Cup venues that had been identified, eight are in India, four in Pakistan, two in Sri Lanka and one in Bangladesh.
Bangladesh is to host the opening ceremony on February 19, 2011 while the final will be played in India and the two semifinals shared by Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
Australia and New Zealand are already on standby if South Asia is unable to organise the tournament.
Popular television cricket commentator Harsha Bhogle said the uncertainty worried him.
"I feel sorry for cricket lovers in Pakistan, but the attacks have shown it is not a place for international matches right now," Bhogle told AFP.
"I can't say what will happen in the future, but I know teams will think twice before coming to play in the region."
The attacks came even after the Pakistan government provided what it said was "fool-proof" and "presidential-style" security to the visiting cricketers.
Sri Lanka had agreed to the tour after India pulled out of a scheduled Test visit to Pakistan earlier this year following worsening relations between the two nations over the Mumbai attacks.
The split tour -- Sri Lanka played a one-day series in Pakistan last month without incident before returning for the Tests -- was organised even as other teams were refusing to visit the troubled nation.
World champions Australia led the boycott call, later joined by England, South Africa and New Zealand, forcing the ICC to shift the Champions Trophy out of Pakistan.
That eight-nation tournament, the second biggest after the World Cup, was due to be held in September last year, but will now take place this October at a venue yet to be decided.
Australia's uncompromising stance also forced their one-day series against Pakistan starting next month to be shifted to the United Arab Emirates.
We're safe: Sangakkara
The brother of Sri Lanka's legendary spinner Muttiah Muralidaran has a look of concern etched on his face as he makes an urgent phone call from Colombo on Tuesday.Photo: AFPSri Lanka vice-captain Kumar Sangakkara said on Tuesday the entire touring squad was safe after gunmen opened fire on the team convoy in the Pakistani city of Lahore.
"There are a few injuries, but everyone is safe and all the players are out of danger," Sangakkara told the Indian news channel CNN-IBN from Lahore.
"We are shocked, but apart from that everyone is OK."
Sri Lankan officials said seven players and an assistant coach were hurt during the attack which took place when the team was making its way to the Gaddafi stadium for the third day's play in the second Test against Pakistan.
Thilan Samaraweera and Tharanga Paranavitana were briefly hospitalised, while skipper Mahela Jayawardene, Sangakkara, Ajantha Mendis, Thilina Thushara and Suranga Lokumal received minor injuries, mainly shrapnel wounds, Sri Lankan sports minister Gamini Lokuge said in Colombo.
The team's assistant coach, Paul Farbrace, a British national, was also hurt, officials said.
"I had shrapnel injuries in my shoulder, but they have all been removed and I'm OK now," said Sangakkara, 31.
"Thilan has a shrapnel wound in his leg, but he is fine. Paranavitana had shrapnel in his chest, but thank God it was not very deep and just on the surface.
"Ajantha had shrapnel in his neck and scalp, but he too has had medical attention and is fine.
"It's very unfortunate that this has happened. I don't regret coming here to play cricket because that's what we have been doing all our lives.
"That is our profession. But all we want to do now is to go back home to our families, get back home and be safe," he said.
Skipper Jayawardene said the bus came under attack as they were driving to the stadium.
"The gunmen targeted the wheels of the bus first and then the bus," Jayawardene told the Cricinfo website. "We all dived to the floor to take cover."
The entire touring squad was air-lifted by helicopter from the Gaddafi stadium to an airbase from where they were due to fly home later on Tuesday.
Lanka shocked, angry
Pakistan regret; Imran slams lax security
Cricket-obsessed Sri Lanka reeled in shock and anger Tuesday at the attack on its national team as it toured Pakistan in place of an Indian squad that had backed out because of security worries.
President Mahinda Rajapakse condemned the attack and sent Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama to Lahore to oversee the evacuation of the team -- seven of whom were wounded when gunmen fired on the team's bus in Lahore.
"I condemn this cowardly terrorist attack," Rajapakse said in a message sent from Nepal, where he cut short an official visit.
The president stressed that the team had gone to Pakistan as "ambassadors of goodwill." He arranged a charter aircraft to bring back the team from Lahore later in the night.
Meanwhile, Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani telephoned Sri Lanka's president Tuesday to express his profound regret over an attack on the country's cricket team, calling it a "conspiracy".
Gilani spoke to President Mahinda Rajapakse and "expressed his profound regrets over this unfortunate incident," said a statement from the Pakistani prime minister's office.
"The incident was a well planned conspiracy meant to create terror and isolate Pakistan's cricket," the statement added.
Gilani expressed his gratitude to the Sri Lankan team for visiting Pakistan at a time when most other squads refused to come and said the nation would always "hold Sri Lanka in high esteem for this friendly gesture."
"This incident happened despite the fact that Pakistan had provided maximum security to the Sri Lankan cricket team," he said.
"Our security agencies are in the process of investigating the incident and the Sri Lankan government would be kept posted of their findings," he said.
However, former Pakistan cricket captain Imran Khan blamed lax security for Tuesday's gun and grenade attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team, saying officials must be held to account for the incident.
"First of all I apologise to the Sri Lankan team for they toured Pakistan despite huge pressure. I strongly condemn the security provided to the Sri Lankan team because it was ten times less than what is given to Interior ministry adviser Rehman Malik," Khan told AFP.
"Sri Lankans were assured of top-level security but there was lax security and I think from the governor of Punjab to police officials, all must be made accountable -- how the gunmen openly shot at a high-profile team," added Khan, who is the head of his Tehrik-e-Insaaf (Movement for Justice) party.
Eight people were killed and seven Sri Lankan cricketers wounded in Lahore when gunmen armed with rockets, grenades and automatic weapons attacked a convoy taking the team to the Gaddafi stadium to play Pakistan.
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