Newly elected members of the Sindh Assembly took oath today (Saturday) with a lavish lunch, reports Geo.
The dishes include fish, chicken boti, BBQ, puri paratha, chicken korma, roghani naan, tea, and cold drinks.
Apart from this, Kehwa was served to the members after the meal.
@timesofkarachi Various dishes have been prepared for the food and drink of the newly elected members of the Sindh Assembly. Fish, chicken korma for lunch. Mutton Kadhi. Naan and cold drinks are included in the menu. Coffee, tea, coffee will also be served after the meal. #TOKAlert#SindhAssembly#Karachi♬ original sound – Times of Karachi
However, the session started with a delay of 40 minutes under the chairmanship of Speaker Agha Siraj Durrani, with the recitation of the Holy Quran followed by Naat and an oath-taking ceremony.
Agha Siraj Durrani administered oath to the newly elected members of the Sindh Assembly. Among those who took the oath were the nominated Chief Minister of Sindh Murad Ali Shah, Faryal Talpur, Sharjeel Memon, Nasir Hussain Shah, and others. Members of the Sindh Assembly took oath in Urdu, English, and Sindhi.
Out of 168 members of the Sindh Assembly, 114 belong to the Pakistan Peoples Party while 36 members belong to MQM-Pakistan.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has given a meaningful response to US President Joe Biden’s rude remark calling him a son of a b***h.
While addressing an event in California, Biden lashed out at Putin, calling him a “crazy SOB” in a sentence about threats to the world – including “that guy Putin and others”, the risk of nuclear conflict, and the existential threat to humanity from climate change.
When a journalist asked Russian President Putin about the slur, he calmly replied that based on what Biden spoke, it can be said that his opinion about the American president was correct because Biden cannot say that Vladimir, you have done a great job, you have helped us.
Putin added that he can understand the internal politics in America at the moment, and that’s why he wants Biden to become the president again.
Farmers are protesting from India to Europe, separately, for their rights and to register their rebellion with sitting governments against soaring fuel, and fertilizer costs, lower prices of their produce, and restrictive regulations. The protests are shedding light on the very pertinent issues faced by the primary food-producing sector of countries owning big agricultural markets.
Demands of Greek farmers
Farmers in Greece are protesting across the country against rising costs. They are conducting a tractor rally all across the country. Manolis Liakis, a farmer from the southern island of Crete, talked to __ and singled out fuel costs as his biggest problem. He said farmers pay more than three times as much for petrol as shipping companies due to tax disparities. Farmers can’t sell their products “for ridiculously low prices while the consumer buys them at extremely high prices”, he said.
Demands of Polish farmers
In Poland, farmers are blocking roads to stop cheap grain imports crossing the border from Ukraine. They are demanding a “complete embargo” on Ukranian produce. During the protests on Tuesday against competition from imports of cheaper Ukrainian products, farmers in Gorzyczki, southern Poland, unfurled a banner saying “Putin, get Ukraine, Brussels, and our government in order”. Consequently, the farmers were warned by the government against raising the slogans.
Demands of Spanish farmers
Spanish farmers are gathering with hundreds of tractors in tow to protest against the unfair competition from outside the European Union. They want to include production costs in the end product so they don’t end up selling their goods at a loss. Additionally, they want imported products to be subjected to the same conditions that they have to face.
Demands of French farmers
French farmers blocked a milk transport in protest against wholesale prices they say are too low. The farmers’ unions have made it clear they want ironclad assurances that their grievances over produce prices and red tape have been addressed. French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal is trying to negotiate and pacify the raging farmers with the negotiations.
Demands of Czech farmers
In Prague, farmers are on the roads because they feel neglected in the policy-making process. After all, they are not given due attention by the government. “Around 3,000 tractors took to the streets,” The Czech Chamber of Agriculture said in a statement on the nationwide protests. Their demands included an end to restrictions on agricultural production, cutting red tape for farming, and introducing changes to the EU-Ukraine arrangements on farming imports.
Demands of Italian farmers
In Rome, cowbells are clanking with the message that Farmers feed the world, but can’t afford to farm.
Demands of Indian farmers
In India, massive protests have broken out over minimum crop price guarantees which were promised nearly a year ago but not implemented by the government. Thousands of Indian farmers riding tractors attempted to resume their push towards New Delhi. They were attacked by the police claiming the life of young farmer Shubhkaran Singh and injuring 25 others. Farm unions are demanding a law to set a minimum price on all crops, expanding a government scheme that already exists for staples, including rice and wheat. They have also demanded other concessions, including the waiving of loans and universal pensions for farmers aged 60 and above.
Concerns of Canadian Farmers
In Canada, there are fewer environmental regulations but farmers feel a disconnect with the central government whose main mandate is based on the environment. They have been pushing forward all kinds of policies about fertilizer reduction and disallowing certain pesticides. The green policies and higher costs have instead of favouring them making farmers feel ignored. Experts say the consumers feel that lower output prices and higher input prices are just a way for the government to tell them that do whatever they want but in a cleaner and environmentally friendly way.
Conclusion
Protesting farmers are trying to divert attention to the most neglected yet important sector of a country which is the food-producing sector which is the backbone of both the society and the economy of the country yet remains ignored by the political class for their vested interests.
A woman and a man were shot dead, allegedly by the woman’s father and brother in the Kolai Pallas area of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Kohistan district in an act of ‘honour’ killing, reports Dawn.
The police reached Bar Paro in Kolai Pallas and found two bodies lying in a pool of blood. The deceased were identified as Ubaidullah of Ghato, Sherakot, and Baloo Bibi of Bar Paro, who were allegedly shot dead by her father Angeel and brother Muhammad Islam.
As per the FIR, the two suspects fled the scene after committing the crime, following which the police launched an investigation.
In November, a girl was killed allegedly by her father on the orders of a jirga in the Barsharyal area after social media pictures showed her and her friend in the company of two unrelated boys in their village, an act considered taboo in the area. The other girl was rescued by the police.
A similar incident had been reported a decade ago where five women cheering for a dancing boy in the video were allegedly killed, along with the boy’s four brothers, on the orders of a local jirga. The alleged killings captured international attention, and then-Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry took suo motu notice of the incident.
A Utah mother-of-six who doled out parenting advice on a popular YouTube channel has been sentenced to prison for abusing her children, holding two of them in conditions prosecutors likened to concentration camps.
Ruby Franke, 42, pleaded guilty in December to four counts of aggravated child abuse and was sentenced on Tuesday to one-to-15 years in prison on each charge.
Franke’s business partner Jodi Hildebrandt, 54, whom she described as her “mentor,” received the same sentence.
Beginning in 2015, Franke ran a since-deleted YouTube channel called “8 Passengers” which provided parenting advice. She would later feature on a YouTube channel run by Hildebrandt after separating from her husband.
Utah prosecutor Eric Clarke said Franke and Hildebrandt held two of the children, then aged nine and 11, in a “concentration camp-like setting.”
“The children were regularly denied food, water, beds to sleep in, and virtually all forms of entertainment,” Clarke said. “They were isolated from others, and were hidden when people came to visit the house.
“They were also forced to do manual labor outdoors in the extreme summer heat, at times without shoes or socks,” the prosecutor said. “Both children had extensive physical injuries from the abuse that required hospitalization.”
Clarke also said the children were emotionally abused, “to the extent that each believed, to some degree, that they deserved what was being done to them.
Eventually, the older one “had the courage” to run away and ask a neighbor to call the police, Clarke said, adding “Heaven knows how much longer they could have survived in that situation.”
Franke apologized for her actions at her sentencing hearing before Judge John Walton.
“I was led to believe that this world was an evil place filled with cops who control, hospitals that injure, government agencies that brainwash, church leaders who lie and lust, husbands who refuse to protect and children who need abuse,” she said.
She said her paranoia “culminated into criminal activity for which I stand before you today ready to take accountability.”
Franke and Hildebrandt will serve a minimum of four years in prison but their exact prison terms will be decided by the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole.
Jaspreet Kaur, a Sikh woman of Indian origin currently residing in Germany, has married a man from Sialkot, Pakistan, after embracing Islam on the hands of senior parliamentarian Hafiz Sahibzada Hamid Raza at Jamia Hanfia in Sialkot.
Kaur was given the Muslim name Zainab after she married Ali Arsalan.
The administrators of Jamia Hanfia said the bride’s parents were Indian nationals but they lived in Germany. Zainab also resides in Munich. Her father’s name is Singara Singh, a resident of Ludhiana.
The woman came to Pakistan on January 16 for a pilgrimage. She has been issued a single-entry visa valid till April 15, reported the Express Tribune. She holds an Indian passport obtained in Germany. She married Ali, a resident of Sialkot, after falling in love abroad.
Express Tribune has reported that Ali had invited her to Pakistan.
The administrators said more than 200 non-Muslims have embraced Islam at the hands of Sahibzada Hamid Raza and his father.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that if urgent measures are not taken, more than half of the world’s countries may face a measles outbreak by the end of the year.
During a press conference in Geneva, WHO said that many countries have not been vaccinating against measles this year.“What we are worried about is this year, 2024, we’ve got these big gaps in our immunisation programmes and if we don’t fill them really quickly with the vaccine, measles will just jump into that gap,” stated Natasha Crowcroft, a senior technical adviser on Measles and Rubella.
She called for urgent action to protect children, saying there was a “lack of commitment” by governments given competing issues like economic crises and conflict.
According to data from the World Health Organization, last year measles cases worldwide increased by 79 percent.
Death rates are higher in poorer countries due to weaker health systems, Crowcroft said, adding that outbreaks and deaths were also a risk for middle and high-income countries.
Paris, France – Consumer watchdog Foodwatch said it was filing a legal complaint Wednesday against food giant Nestle and another group over them allegedly fraudulently treating water for their top mineral water brands.
A government probe reported by media last month said about 30 percent of mineral water sold in France had undergone purification treatment only meant to be used on tap water.
Foodwatch said it was lodging its complaint with a Paris court against Nestle Waters, behind brands such as Perrier and Vittel, and the Sources Alma group, which also owns several water labels.
“This is a massive fraud for which Nestle Waters, the Sources Alma group and the French government must answer,” the European watchdog said.
“Nobody, not even a multinational like Nestle, is above the law,” Foodwatch spokeswoman Ingrid Kragl said.
The NGO claimed Nestle Waters and Sources Alma had “illegally processed their bottled waters and then sold them without informing consumers”.
French law, based on a European Union directive, forbids such purification of mineral water, which is supposed to be of naturally high quality before bottling.
French prosecutors last month said they had opened an investigation into suspected fraud by Nestle Waters after a complaint by France’s ARS health regulator.
They spoke after Le Monde and Radio France reported that a government investigation had concluded in 2022 that “almost 30 percent of commercial brands undergo non-compliant treatments”.
Nestle Waters said it put some top brands, such as Perrier and Vittel, through ultraviolet light and active carbon filters “to guarantee food safety”, and had informed French authorities about this in 2021.
A government source told AFP that authorities had found “no health risk” linked to the bottled water.
Foodwatch said it had also written to the European Commission, denouncing “the complacency of France, which… should have alerted European authorities and the other member states importing these waters”.
Pneumonia endemic is still spreading in Punjab despite the weather warming up, with 13 children dying of the respiratory illness in the previous 24 hours, reports Geo News.
The heartbreaking death toll includes two children from Lahore, three from Faisalabad, and two from Bahawalpur, highlighting the widespread impact of the illness across various regions. Additionally, two children in Sheikhupura, and one each in Gujranwala, Multan, and Rawalpindi succumbed to the disease.
In the last 24 hours, 304 more cases of pneumonia have been reported in Punjab. According to the data of the health department, 29, 603 children have been infected with pneumonia so far this year, out of which 405 lost their lives.
The Punjab Health Department has issued a plea to parents, urging them to ensure that children complete the immunization course offered free of cost. Immunization remains one of the most effective preventive measures against pneumonia and other infectious diseases, offering vital protection to vulnerable children.
A UC Chairman was killed as a result of firing between two groups over the issue of children in Bhitaiabad, Karachi.
The incident followed a fight among children in Bhataiabad Street No. 19, during which people from two groups fired at each other, as a result of which one person was killed and six people were injured, reports Geo News.
According to the police, the deceased person was identified as Sabir Magsi, chairman of UC-9 from Pakistan Peoples Party.
As soon as the incident was reported, a heavy contingent of police and rescue personnel reached the spot and shifted the injured to the hospital.
Counselor Shaukat Nazir told the media that the victim was a businessman and had left behind a widow and two children. “The victim was with me sometime before the incident and was killed by a bullet in the neck,” he said.
Shaukat Nazir further elaborated that the incident took place during a children’s fight. He asserted that the administration will take legal action after the burial.
