Category: Politics

News stories of Politics, for the topics that matter the most to young professionals and college students, political news reported with a different angle.

  • PM Khan, President Alvi and others share messages to mark Ashura

    Prime Minister Imran Khan and President Arif Alvi have shared messages to mark Ashura.

    PM Khan urged the nation not to desist from sacrificing their lives for the supremacy of the principles of truth and justice for what Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) sacrificed his life, Radio Pakistan has reported.

    He further urged people to pay tribute to Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) by supporting truth and justice, besides thwarting every falsehood.

    President Dr Arif Alvi urged the nation to rise above hatred, malice and sectarianism in line with the teachings of Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA).

    He said the nation should prepare for all kinds of sacrifices as a metaphor for determination.

    Other politicians including Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) President Shehbaz Sharif, ministers Fawad Chaudhry and Asad Umar shared messages on the day of Ashura.

  • PM Imran discusses Afghanistan with Germany and UK

    PM Imran discusses Afghanistan with Germany and UK

    Prime Minister Imran Khan Tuesday held discussions with German, Danish, and United Kingdom (UK) leaders regarding the situation in Afghanistan after the Taliban takeover.

    Prime Minister Khan received telephone calls from his British counterpart Boris Johnson and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

    PM Khan stressed that safety and security, as well as protection of the rights of all Afghans, were critically important. PM Khan underlined that an inclusive political settlement was the best way forward.

    Pakistan is reaching out to all Afghan leaders. The international community must also stay engaged, particularly to support the people of Afghanistan economically, added the premier.

    PM Khan highlighted the positive role that Pakistan played in facilitating the evacuation of diplomatic personnel and staff of international organisations and others from Afghanistan.

    He also highlighted the extensive measures taken by Pakistan to contain the Covid-19, noted that the relevant data had been shared with the UK side, and called for the removal of Pakistan from the Red List.

    In conversation with Merkel, the prime minister expressed satisfaction at regular high-level exchanges between Pakistan and Germany. He said Pakistan looked forward to enhancing collaboration with Germany in all areas of mutual interest.

  • We seek no revenge, will respect women’s rights, want free media, says Taliban spokesman

    We seek no revenge, will respect women’s rights, want free media, says Taliban spokesman

    Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid on Tuesday said the group does not seek revenge and has “forgiven everyone”.

    “Will support women’s rights and a free media under Islamic law,” said Mujahid in his first press conference since the insurgent group took over Kabul.

    “The Islamic Emirate is committed to the rights of women within the framework of the Sharia. Our sisters, our women will have the same rights and will be able to benefit from them.”

    “They can have activities in different sectors and areas on the basis of our rules and regulations — in education, health, and other areas,” he said, adding that they will “work with us shoulder-to-shoulder”.

    The Taliban would not seek retribution against former soldiers and members of the western-backed government, he said, insisting that “everyone is forgiven”.

    “Nobody is going to harm you, nobody is going to knock on your doors,” said Mujahid

    Mujahid noted that Afghanistan is at a stage where the country’s men and women are looking to the Taliban with regard to their future.

    “I would like to assure [them] that after consultations that will be completed very soon, we will be witnessing the formation of a strong, Islamic, and inclusive government, InshaAllah,” said Mujahid.

    Mujahid said that the security of embassies is of importance to the Taliban and wants to assure other countries that those areas will have complete security.

    “Your representatives, your embassies, your missions, international organisations, aid agencies, we assure you we will not allow anybody to do anything against you. Your security is ensured. Our forces are there round-the-clock to ensure your security,” he said.

    He said that the Taliban “do not wish to see any kind of chaos” in Kabul.

    “Our plan was to stop at the gates of Kabul after capturing all other provinces,” the spokesman claimed, adding that a “smooth transition” of power was what the group had sought to avoid “trouble, harm, and damages”.

    Mujahid also sought to assure the international community and the regional countries that the Taliban “will not allow the use of Afghan territory against anybody”.

    “We are committed to this pledge. You will not be harmed anywhere from our soil,” he said.

    Mujahid said private media could continue to be free and independent in Afghanistan, adding the Taliban was committed to the media within its cultural framework.

    “Will support women’s rights and a free media under Islamic law,” said Mujahid in his first press conference since the insurgent group took over Kabul.

    “The Islamic Emirate is committed to the rights of women within the framework of the Sharia. Our sisters, our women will have the same rights and will be able to benefit from them.”

    “They can have activities in different sectors and areas on the basis of our rules and regulations — in education, health, and other areas,” he said, adding that they will “work with us shoulder-to-shoulder”.

    The Taliban would not seek retribution against former soldiers and members of the western-backed government, he said, insisting that “everyone is forgiven”.

    “Nobody is going to harm you, nobody is going to knock on your doors,” said Mujahid

    Mujahid noted that Afghanistan is at a stage where the country’s men and women are looking to the Taliban with regard to their future.

    “I would like to assure [them] that after consultations that will be completed very soon, we will be witnessing the formation of a strong, Islamic, and inclusive government, InshaAllah,” said Mujahid.

    Mujahid said that the security of embassies is of importance to the Taliban and wants to assure other countries that those areas will have complete security.

    “Your representatives, your embassies, your missions, international organisations, aid agencies, we assure you we will not allow anybody to do anything against you. Your security is ensured. Our forces are there round-the-clock to ensure your security,” he said.

    He said that the Taliban “do not wish to see any kind of chaos” in Kabul.

    “Our plan was to stop at the gates of Kabul after capturing all other provinces,” the spokesman claimed, adding that a “smooth transition” of power was what the group had sought to avoid “trouble, harm, and damages”.

    Mujahid also sought to assure the international community and the regional countries that the Taliban “will not allow the use of Afghan territory against anybody”.

    “We are committed to this pledge. You will not be harmed anywhere from our soil,” he said.

    Mujahid said private media could continue to be free and independent in Afghanistan, adding the Taliban was committed to the media within its cultural framework.

  • ‘Pakistan has taken more than its share of responsibility in last many many years’: Hina Rabbani Khar

    ‘Pakistan has taken more than its share of responsibility in last many many years’: Hina Rabbani Khar

    Former Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, while speaking on Microsoft/National Broadcasting Company (MSNBC) political talk show ‘The Mehdi Hasan Show’, said, “1996 and 2021 Pakistan are very different…Please do not judge the Pakistan of 2021 by the role that Pakistan played in 1996.”

    Mehdi, referring to remarks of Prime Minister Imran Khan, said, “PM Khan is right, there is no military solution but do you [Hina Rabbani] think Pakistan is going to help broker the sort of political outcome he talked about. Given your country’s historical role in aiding the Afghan Taliban, providing a safe haven for them on Pakistani soil.”

    “Providing safe haven is very different than not doing kinetic action against a group which seek refuge like millions of other Afghans in Pakistan’s territory,” replied Khar.

    “For a country or a state to choose to go after those who were attacking our own children and policemen and our own soldiers which happened to be Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and many other extremist organisations. So please don’t forget that Pakistan has had an influx of extremist organisations within its own territory that Pakistan had to deal with,” said Khar.

    Khar further added, “For the world to expect to that we would leave all of that and concentrate and go for a full blast military action against the Afghan Taliban clearly did not happen, was not likely to happen. So as far as our responsibility is concerned and our ability to engineer a behavioral change in the Taliban is concerned, I think that is an exaggerated role and has been an exaggerated role — if not the last few decades, at least for the last few years.”

    “TTP, which has butchered our children continues to have links with the Tehrik-e-Taliban Afghanistan (TTA). Now if Pakistan had the type of leverage that the world expects of Pakistan, wouldn’t Pakistan first ensure that TTA and TTP were able to de-link. And TTP was to receive no support from TTA. Pakistan is unable to broker that for itself, do you think Pakistan was able to broker a solution when the United States (US) itself and of course Pakistan encourage whatever role it could possibly,” added Khar.

    Mehdi questioned Khar that Pakistan has strategic geopolitical reasons and supported the Afghan Taliban in Afghanistan. “Are you telling me that you as foreign minister had no knowledge of anyone in your defence establishment, your Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), nobody had contacts with the Afghan Taliban?”

    “For the 20 years that US and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) partners were in Afghanistan, I don’t know a single year where the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) did not have contact with the Afghan Taliban. This is what intelligence agencies do. They maintain those contacts to have intelligence and to protect their sovereign territorial boundaries,” said Khar.

    “The leverage that is expected of Pakistan, Pakistan never had,” added Khar talking about negotiations. “Once a date of exit has been given to the people what leverage can anyone have. What leverage can a country like Pakistan with eight billion dollars in defence spending as opposed to the United States, which has 778 billion dollars of defence spending? Do you expect too much?”

    The anchorperson reiterated that Pakistan needs to take some responsibility for its role in Afghanistan referring to the remarks made by Husain Haqqani for Ambassador to the US and no one was denying what the CIA and United States had done in the region.

    “Pakistan has taken more than its share of the responsibility in the last many many years,” replied Khar.

    Replying to the comments of Haqqani, Khar said, ” If Mr Husain Haqqani was not living in the US and was living in Pakistan, he would know that the Pakistan of 1996 and 2021 are very different. Pakistan has made many mistakes but I am proud to say that Pakistan is perhaps one of the few countries left which has learnt the right lessons of history.”

    “I feel Pakistan is getting out the black and getting into to the white or grey area, many countries are actually receding right now. We are very willing to accept the mistakes we made in the past but what we are saying is please do not judge the Pakistan of 2021 by the role that Pakistan played in 1996,” stressed Khar.

  • ‘I will marry four of you in one day’: Afghan women relate stories of horror as Taliban take over

    Terrifying stories of mistreatment of women in Afghanistan are being discussed on social media and are also being reported by news outlets ever since the Taliban started gaining control of Afghanistan two months ago.

    “When I heard that the Taliban had reached Kabul, I felt I was going to be a slave. They can play with my life any way they want.”

    A female university student in Afghanistan while talking to The Guardian expressed her feelings of fear and hopelessness after the Taliban took over Afghanistan.

    “Early on Sunday morning I was heading to university for a class when a group of women came running out from the women’s dormitory. I asked what had happened and one of them told me the police were evacuating them because the Taliban had arrived in Kabul, and they will beat women who do not have a burqa,” she said while sharing her experience on the day the Taliban entered Kabul.

    “We all wanted to get home, but we couldn’t use public transport. The drivers would not let us in their cars because they did not want to take responsibility for transporting a woman. It was even worse for the women from the dormitory, who are from outside Kabul and were scared and confused about where they should go.” she added.

    The men standing outside the university said: “Go and put on your chadari [burqa],” One called out, “It is your last days of being out on the streets.” Another said, “I will marry four of you in one day.”

    The Afghan student further shared, “I loved doing my nails. Today, as I was on my way home, I glanced at the beauty salon where I used to go for manicures. The shop front, which had been decorated with beautiful pictures of girls, had been whitewashed overnight.”

    “Now it looks like I have to burn everything I achieved in 24 years of my life. Having any ID card or awards from the American University is risky now; even if we keep them, we are not able to use them. There are no jobs for us in Afghanistan.”

    “Then today, when I heard that the Taliban had reached Kabul, I felt I was going to be a slave. They can play with my life any way they want.”

    “Or identity is being destroyed and nothing has been done by us to deserve this.”

    Women, specially female journalists are fearing for their life after the recent developments in the country.

    “For many years, I worked as a journalist … to raise the voice of Afghans, especially Afghan women, but now our identity is being destroyed and nothing has been done by us to deserve this,” Aaisha a prominent news anchor and political talk show host, said while speaking to The Guardian.

    “In the last 24 hours, our lives have changed and we have been confined to our homes, and death threatens us at every moment.”

    The homes of two female journalists were visited by Taliban fighters on Sunday, leaving both women “severely shaken psychologically,” CNN has reported.

    Taliban fighters are ‘going door-to-door and forcibly marrying girls as young as 12 and forcing them into sex slavery as they seize vast swathes of the Afghanistan from government forces,’ reported the Daily Mail on August 13.

    However, Taliban’s spokesperson Suhail Shaheen has refuted the claims.

  • ‘Don’t want women to be victims, they should be in govt’: Taliban

    ‘Don’t want women to be victims, they should be in govt’: Taliban

    The Taliban declared an “amnesty” across Afghanistan and urged women to join its government, reported Al-Jazeera.

    “A general amnesty has been declared for all, so you should start your routine life with full confidence,” said a statement from the Taliban. 

    Enamullah Samangani, a member of the Taliban’s cultural commission, said, “The Islamic Emirate doesn’t want women to be victims, they should be in government structure according to Shariah law.”

    Enamullah’s statement represents the first comments on governance from a federal level across the country.

    Enamullah further added, “The structure of government is not fully clear, but based on experience, there should be a fully Islamic leadership and all sides should join.”

    Samangani remained vague on other details, however, implying people already knew the rules of the Islamic law the Taliban expected them to follow.

    “Our people are Muslims and we are not here to force them to Islam,” he said.

    Meanwhile, United States (US) President Joe Biden blamed the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan on Afghan political leaders who fled the country and the unwillingness of the US-trained Afghan army to fight the militant group.

    In his speech, Biden said that the US troops could not defend a nation whose leaders “gave up and fled”, as did Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.

    “I stand squarely behind my decision. After 20 years, I have learned the hard way that there was never a good time to withdraw US forces,” Biden said in a televised address from the White House.

  • ‘Shameful’: Fawad Chaudhry condemns vandalism of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s statue

    Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry has condemned the vandalism of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s statue at the Lahore Fort.

    “Shameful this bunch of illiterates are really dangerous for Pakistan image in the world,” tweeted Chaudhry.

    Punjab Police tweeted that the culprit has been arrested.

    A video went viral on social media in which the statue of Maharaja Ranjit Singh was being vandalised by a man.

    https://twitter.com/AU_Qasmi/status/1427516195331354707

    Have a look at how people on social media are reacting to the video:

    https://twitter.com/gigglypundit/status/1427536453446348828

    Last year in December, police arrested a teenager for vandalising a statue of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, who ruled Punjab in the 19th century. The statue was installed in front of the Haveli of Rani Jindan at the Lahore Fort. This is the third time that Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s statue has been vandalised.

  • Ash­raf Ghani fled the country with four cars and a helicopter full of cash: Russia

    Ash­raf Ghani fled the country with four cars and a helicopter full of cash: Russia

    The Russian embassy in Kabul alleged on Monday that Afghan President Ashraf Ghani had fled the country with four cars and a helicopter full of cash and had to leave some money behind as it would not all fit in, Russia’s state news agency RIA Novosti reported.

    Russia has said it will retain a diplomatic presence in Kabul and hopes to develop ties with the Taliban even as it says it is in no rush to recognise them as the country’s rulers and will closely observe their behaviour.

    “As for the collapse of the (outgoing) regime, it is most eloquently characterised by the way Ghani fled Afghanistan,” Nikita Ishchenko, a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Kabul, was quoted as saying by RIA.

    “Four cars were full of money, they tried to stuff another part of the money into a helicopter, but not all of it fit. And some of the money was left lying on the tarmac,” he was quoted as saying.

    Ischenko, the Russian embassy spokesman, confirmed his comments to Reuters.

    President Vladimir Putin’s special representative on Afghanistan Zamir Kabulov said earlier it was unclear how much money the fleeing government would leave behind.

    “I hope the government that has fled did not take all the money from the state budget. It will be the bedrock of the budget if something is left,” Kabulov told Moscow’s Ekho Moskvy radio station.

    President Ashraf Ghani on Sunday fled Afghanistan as the Taliban entered Kabul, amidst severe criticism from his opponents, saying that now is not the time for him to leave his country as the dreaded Taliban come back to rule once more.

    Ashraf left a note for his countrymen on social media, stating, “The Taliban have made it to remove me, they are here to attack all Kabul and the people of Kabul. In order to avoid the bleeding flood, I thought it was best to get out.”

    “Taliban have won the judgement of swords and guns and now they are responsible for protecting the countrymen’s honour, wealth and self-esteem. Didn’t they win the legitimacy of hearts,” wrote Ashraf Ghani.

  • ‘Cannot defend a nation whose leaders gave up and fled’: US President

    ‘Cannot defend a nation whose leaders gave up and fled’: US President

    United States (US) President Joe Biden blamed the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan on Afghan political leaders who fled the country and the unwillingness of the US-trained Afghan army to fight the militant group.

    In his speech, Biden said that the US troops could not defend a nation whose leaders “gave up and fled”, as did Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.

    “I stand squarely behind my decision. After 20 years, I have learned the hard way that there was never a good time to withdraw US forces,” Biden said in a televised address from the White House.

    While Biden said he took responsibility for the fate of the US mission, he lashed out at the former Afghan government and military commanders who were put in place, organised, and supported by Washington over the last 20 years.

    Instead of standing up to the advancing Taliban — a highly experienced guerrilla force but more lightly armed than the US-supplied Afghan army — the government fled.

    “We gave them every chance to determine their own future. We could not provide them with the will to fight for that future,” Biden said, adding he could no longer ask US soldiers to risk their lives in the country, 20 years on.

    “Our mission in Afghanistan was never supposed to have been nation-building. It was never supposed to be creating a unified, centralised democracy.”

    “American troops cannot and should not be fighting in a war and dying in a war that Afghan forces are not willing to fight for themselves,” said the US president.

    “We gave them every chance to determine their own future. We could not provide them was the will to fight for their future,” added Biden.

    “If Afganistan is unable to mount any real resistance at the Taliban now, there is no chance that one more year, five more years or 20 more years the US military boots on the ground would have made any difference,” said Biden.

    Biden said that the political leaders were unable to stand for their own people. He said that the leaders were unable to negotiate for the future of their people when the chips were down.

    Biden acknowledged that the Taliban’s speed in retaking the country was unexpected.

    “The truth is: This did unfold more quickly than we anticipated. So what’s happened? Afghanistan’s political leaders gave up and fled the country. The Afghan military gave up, sometimes without trying to fight,” Biden said.

    “Our true strategic competitors, China and Russia, would love nothing more than the United States to continue to funnel billions of dollars in resources and attention into stabilizing Afghanistan indefinitely,” he said.

    Biden said he was “left again to ask of those who argue that we should stay: how many more generations of America’s daughters and sons would you have me send to fight Afghans — Afghanistan’s civil war — when Afghan troops will not?”

    “I will not repeat the mistakes we made in the past,” said Biden.

    President Ashraf Ghani of Afghanistan fled the country as the Taliban entered Kabul, amidst severe criticism from his opponents, saying that now is not the time for him to leave his country as the dreaded Taliban come back to rule once more.

    The Taliban declared that the war in Afghanistan was over after its fighters swept into the capital, Kabul, and President Ashraf Ghani fled the country on Sunday.