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  • Nawaz unhappy after PML-N leaders meet Shehbaz on ‘request’ of establishment

    Nawaz unhappy after PML-N leaders meet Shehbaz on ‘request’ of establishment

    Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif is reportedly upset because of a secret meeting of three senior Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leaders with party president Shehbaz Sharif on the “request” of a senior representative of the establishment.

    According to a local media outlet, Nawaz was reportedly unhappy because he was told that top party leaders Khawaja Asif, Ahsan Iqbal and Rana Tanvir Hussain met Shehbaz while he was in the custody National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on the “request of a senior representative of the establishment”.

    However, PML-N Secretary-General Iqbal dismissed the reports, claiming that they had met their party president after duly informing the former premier.

    While denying that the establishment arranged their meeting, the PML-N leader said they had only requested the accountability body for the meeting.

  • PM likely to appoint brother of Nawaz’s blue-eyed Fawad Hasan Fawad as new special assistant

    PM likely to appoint brother of Nawaz’s blue-eyed Fawad Hasan Fawad as new special assistant

    Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan is likely to appoint the brother of former PM Nawaz Sharif’s blue-eyed Fawad Hasan Fawad as his new special assistant on information and broadcasting, ARY News reported.

    According to reports, Raoof Hasan will be replacing former Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) director general (DG) Lt Gen (r) Asim Bajwa, who stepped down as the premier’s media aide earlier this month.

    Interestingly, Raoof is the brother of former civil servant Fawad who served in BPS-22 grade as the principal secretary to two PMs, namely Nawaz Sharif and Shahid Khaqan Abbasi.

    The former bureaucrat was accused of corruption and misuse of authority by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in the Ashiana Housing scam, which led to his arrest in July 2018.

    He was accused of directing the Punjab Land Development Company (PLDC) management to cancel the contract of Ashiana Iqbal without any inquiry. In February 2019, the Lahore High Court (LHC) had granted Fawad bail but denied the same in another NAB case pertaining to assets beyond means.

    Later, in January 2020, Fawad was set free on the grounds that no illegitimate asset belonging to him had been unearthed by the anti-graft watchdog, no charge had been framed and that there was no nexus between him and any asset, however, he had been arrested at the inquiry stage.

    Fawad was also one of the first to be nabbed as part of the Imran-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government’s accountability drive.

    Raoof, on the other hand, is the founder and chief executive of the Regional Peace Institute.

  • Video shows two cops breaking into Safdar’s hotel room

    A video footage of the arrest of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Capt (r) Muhammad Safdar has surfaced, which shows two Sindh police officials breaking into the lawmaker’s room.

    The footage acquired by Geo News showed that Safdar was detained by the officials of the Sindh police from his hotel room at 6:45am.

    As per the video, two police vans entered the hotel premises at 6:08am and it took the cops approximately 35 minutes to detain the lawmaker from his room on the 15th floor. In the video, a plainclothed man can be seen taking instruction on phone, while another is busy in making a video of the arrested MNA.

    The video was also tweeted by PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz, who is the spouse of Safdar. She wrote that the video reflected that a ‘state above state’ existed in Pakistan.

    Safdar was arrested from his hotel room in the early hours of Monday from his hotel room for raising slogans at the mausoleum of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, and jumping over the grill surrounding the grave. The Sindh government led by the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) had distanced itself from the matter soon after the arrest.

    Afterwards, the Sindh police tweeted that the arrest was lawful, but the tweet was deleted soon after it was put up. But after a few hours, the tweet was updated again, wherein the police said that Safdar was arrested as per law.

    Amid reports that the Sindh Rangers took IGP Mushtaq Mahar hostage to get Safdar arrested, the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) asked army general Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa to launch a institutional probe into the incident. Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari said that every police officer in Sindh, from a station house officer to senior police officers, were wondering who had “surrounded IG Sindh Mushtaq Mahar’s office at 2am on Sunday night”, asking Gen Bajwa to take notice.

    Subsequently, the military’s media wing tweeted that Gen Bajwa has ordered a probe into the episode. According to a statement shared by the ISPR, Gen Bajwa directed the Karachi Corps commander to “immediately inquire into the circumstances to determine the facts and report back as soon as possible”

  • ‘Inconvenience is highly regretted’: IBA cancels Dr Atif Mian’s lecture on economy

    The Institute of Business Administration (IBA), one of the best business schools in Pakistan, has cancelled a talk by top economist Atif R Mian on Pakistan’s poor economic growth without any plausible cause.

    In a tweet, the IBA wrote: “Dr Atif R. Mian’s lecture “Why has economic growth fallen behind in Pakistan?” scheduled on November 5, 2020 has been cancelled. Inconvenience is highly regretted.” There was no further explanation by the school on why the lecture was cancelled. Dr Mian has yet to comment on the development.

    Observers say that the economist was disinvited from the lecture probably because of his affiliation with the minority Ahmadiyya community. However, this is not the first time Atif Mian, who teaches at ivy league Princeton, has faced discrimination due to his faith.

    He was appointed by Prime Minister Imran Khan in the Economic Advisory Council after the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). However, the post was short-lived after the government came under fire for appointing an Ahmadi to the economic body. It subsequently backtracked and sacked Atif Mian from the advisory council, much to the chagrin of progressive quarters.

    Dr Atif is John H. Laporte, Jr. Class of 1967 Professor of Economics, Public Policy and Finance at Princeton University, and director of the Julis-Rabinowitz Center for Public Policy and Finance at the Woodrow Wilson School. He is the first and only person of Pakistani origins to have been named on the IMF’s list of ‘top 25 brightest young economists.’  

    The 39-year-old has dedicated his time to studying the connections between finance and the macro economy. An expert on international debt markets, his latest book, House of Debt, builds on data to describe how debt precipitated the ‘Great Recession’. He is often the go-to economist for the world media on the subject.

  • Saudi Arabia backstabbing Pakistan at FATF?

    Saudi Arabia backstabbing Pakistan at FATF?

    Foreign Office (FO) spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri has rejected “false media reports” regarding Saudi Arabia’s role in the assessment of Pakistan’s Financial Action Task Force (FATF) action plan.

    According to a press release, FO categorically rejected the story circulating on a segment of the media as false and baseless.

    Earlier in the day, Azhar Mashwani, Punjab chief minister’s focal person for digital media, tweeted that reports of Saudi Arabia voting against Pakistan at FATF were fake and that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs would issue a statement on this.

    “Pakistan and Saudi Arabia enjoy strong fraternal ties and the two countries have always cooperated with each other on all matters of bilateral, regional and international importance,” said the statement by the FO spokesperson.

    “Pakistan greatly values its relations with the brotherly Saudi Arabia and firmly rejects such malicious propaganda.”

    The statements come after renowned journalist, Sabir Shakir, claimed that Saudi Arabia had voted against Pakistan in the virtual plenary of the FATF.

    He had asserted that Saudi Arabia lobbied to woo the support of other Muslim countries including Turkey to move Pakistan into the blacklist of the global financial watchdog.

    FATF:

    According to Dawn, a virtual meeting of the FATF, from October 21-23, will decide if Pakistan should be excluded from its ‘grey list’, based on a review of Islamabad’s performance to meet global commitments and standards on fight against money laundering and terror financing (ML&TF).

    The FATF plenary was earlier scheduled in June but Islamabad got an unexpected breather after the global watchdog against financial crimes temporarily postponed all mutual evaluations and follow-up deadlines in the wake of grave health risk following COVID-19 pandemic. The Paris-based agency also put a general pause in the review process, thus giving additional four months to Pakistan to meet the requirements.

    The plenary had formally placed Pakistan in the grey list in June 2018 due to “strategic deficiencies” in anti-money laundering/combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) after a push from India supported by the United States (US), the United Kingdom (UK) and some European countries.

    The FATF will examine if the country had demonstrated remedial actions and sanctions applied in cases of AML/CFT violations, relating to terrorist financing (TF) risk management and TFS (terror financing sanctions) obligations.

    The FATF will also judge if competent authorities were cooperating and taking action to identify and taking enforcement action against illegal money or value transfer services (MVTS) and had proven implementation of cross-border currency and bearer negotiable instruments (BNI) controls at all ports of entry, including applying effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions.

  • Throwback to when press claimed Imran Khan and Rekha were getting married

    There was a time when it was speculated that then cricketer Imran Khan and one of the finest actresses of Indian cinema, Rekha, were soon to get married, a 1985 newspaper clipping making the rounds on social media has revealed.

    “Pakistan’s ace fast bowler Imran Khan and India’s screen glamour girl Rekha are to be married soon,” read a report in The Star citing an Indian film journal.

    It further said, “According to the journal’s report, Imran Khan stayed almost the whole of April in Bombay. During this period, he and Rekha were seen enjoying each other’s company on the sea beach, the residence of Premi Shivar Godraj and at night clubs.”

    The journal attributed a statement to Rekha’s mother in which she opined that the man best suited as life partner to her daughter could not be other than Irman Khan.

    “She had gone to Delhi and consulted a najoomi [astrologer] if Imran could be an ideal suiter to her daughter. No one knows what the najoomi had said but Rekha’s mother was convinced that Imran could be a welcome addition to her family.”

    According to a piece carried by Dawn in 2013, people linked Imran Khan to Bollywood actress Zeenat Aman and Rekha who seemed more eastern for the country’s most eligible bachelor instead of his former wife Jemima Goldsmith.

    “After all, it was Rekha who had termed Raj Babbar as ‘side se dekho to bilkul Imran Khan’ in Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s Jhooti, right?”

    Nonetheless, Imran and Jemima tied the knot in 1995 and they stayed together for nine years, during which he fathered two sons with her. The fairytale marriage may have ended but Imran is still on friendly terms with the mother of his children, who constantly supports his views on social media.

    After Jemima and his second wife, journalist Reham Khan, now-Prime Minister (PM) of Pakistan Imran is currently married to Bushra Bibi.

  • ‘Social networks are amplifiers for idiots’

    ‘Social networks are amplifiers for idiots’

    Former Google chief executive officer (CEO) Eric Schmidt has said that social networks are amplifiers for idiots.

    According to Bloomberg, he said: “The context of social networks serving as amplifiers for idiots and crazy people is not what we intended.”

    The United States (US) government antitrust lawsuit filed against Google on Tuesday was disturbing, and the excesses of social media are likely to result in greater regulation of internet platforms in the coming years, he added.

    Schmidt personally controlled YouTube for many years. He then stayed on as Google’s CEO until 2011 and was Alphabet’s executive chairman until early 2018.

    Google’s YouTube has tried to decrease the spread of misinformation and lies about COVID-19 and US politics over the last year, with mixed results. Facebook and Twitter have also been under fire in recent years for allowing racist and discriminatory messages to spread online.

  • Newlyweds Umair Jaswal, Sana Javed grateful for love, prayers

    Newlyweds Umair Jaswal, Sana Javed grateful for love, prayers

    Singer Umair Jaswal and actor Sana Javed, who recently got married in a private ceremony, are grateful to everyone who sent the couple love and prayers to bless their union.

    Sammi Singer shared a picture of the love birds in which he thanked everyone for the kind wishes: “Thank you so very much for all the warmth, love, and the heartfelt blessings. We are blessed to have so many loved ones around us. Means the world to us, we wish we could thank each and every single one of you individually,” Jaswal said, asking people to remember them in prayers.

    The couple officially announced the news of their wedding through a picture on their Instagram accounts with twin captions, “Alhamdulillah”

    https://www.instagram.com/p/CGks6wMBFXQ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
    https://www.instagram.com/p/CGks6wJHXBu/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

    Their picture went viral and this news spread like fire in the forest on social media since then in-numerous messages of prayers, love and wishes from friends, family and fans were sent to the newly wed ‘Jorri’.

  • Pakistan reacts to Indian claims of civil war in Karachi with memes

    Pakistan reacts to Indian claims of civil war in Karachi with memes

    With Indians being brutally trolled by the entire world for sensationalising the rebellion of Sindh police officials with civil war claims, Twitter is flooding with memes depicting the war that not just Indian media but also prominent citizens are claiming is going on in the southeastern province of Pakistan.

    Amid the controversy surrounding Sindh police following Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Captain (r) Safdar’s arrest in Karachi, India on Wednesday once again lost it as it claimed that clashes were taking place between the army and the provincial police as a civil war erupted in the port city.

    READ: ‘IG was kidnapped’: Hamid Mir takes a dig at Kamran Khan for contesting his claim

    According to reports now retracted by multiple Indian media outlets, Karachi is burning with shootouts between civil and military bodies after the army took over the provincial metropolis and the control of all police stations as well as government buildings.

    This time, however, it wasn’t just Indian media that made baseless claims, cracking people up on this side of the border…

    “10 police officers of Sindh police martyred during their line of duty of saving people of Karachi from atrocities of army [sic],” prominent Indian lawyer Prashant Patel Umrao claimed.

    https://twitter.com/ippatel/status/1318743674105233408

    He went on to say that the United States (US) Navy may enter Karachi port soon, drawing strong reactions from Twitterati, and not just those from Pakistan.

    While many resorted to reacting strongly to Indian claims, such as deputy director of the Asia Program and senior associate for South Asia at the Wilson Center, Michael Kugelman, who said that Indian disinformation accounts were exploiting Pakistan’s current political crisis, some chose to give their peers a good laugh.

    Here are some of the memes that’ll make your day:

    https://twitter.com/iKarachiwala/status/1319013537826639873

    https://twitter.com/haris1khan/status/1318924695752802304
    https://twitter.com/ThisMyHandle/status/1318888540718178313

    https://twitter.com/umerbinajmal/status/1318987098066718725

    Have something to add to this story? Let The Current know in the comments…

  • Australian special forces killed Afghan prisoner to make room on plane: US marine

    Australian special forces killed Afghan prisoner to make room on plane: US marine

    A United States Marine Corps (USMC) helicopter crew chief accused Australian special forces of killing a hog-tied Afghan prisoner after being told he would not fit on the US aircraft coming to pick them up.

    The marine told ABC Investigations he was a door gunner providing aerial covering fire for the Australian soldiers of the 2nd Commando Regiment during a night raid in mid-2012. The operation took place north of the HMLA-469 base at Camp Bastion in Afghanistan’s Helmand Province.

    It was part of a wider joint Australian special forces-US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) campaign targeting illicit drug operations that were financing the Taliban insurgency. “We had done the drug raid, the Aussies actually did a pretty impressive job, wrangling all the prisoners up,” Josh said.

    “We just watched them tackle and hogtie these guys and we knew their hands were tied behind their backs.”

    He says the commandos then called up the US aircraft to pick them and about seven prisoners up. He says the Americans only had room on the aircraft for six. “And the pilot said, ‘That’s too many people, we can’t carry that many passengers.’ And you just heard this silence and then we heard a pop. And then they said, ‘OK, we have six prisoners’.

    “So it was pretty apparent to everybody involved in that mission that they had just killed a prisoner that we had just watched them catch and hogtie,” he said.

    Josh says neither he nor any of his crew spoke about what had just happened.

    “We were all being recorded on our comms,” he said.

    “All of us were pretty aware of what we just witnessed, and kind of didn’t want to be involved in whatever came next.”

    Josh says he later discussed the incident with his crewmates after returning to Camp Bastion.

    “This was the first time we saw something we couldn’t morally justify, because we knew somebody was already cuffed up, ready to go, taken prisoner and we just witnessed them kill a prisoner,” he said.

    “This isn’t like a heat of the moment call where you’re trying to make a decision. It was a very deliberate decision to break the rules of war.

    “I think that was the first thing that happened that didn’t quite sit right with us, where we were like, ‘OK, there’s no excuse, there’s no ambiguity, there’s no going around this one’.”