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  • Tweets or ‘terrorism’?: Saudi’s jailed online activists

    Tweets or ‘terrorism’?: Saudi’s jailed online activists

    A Saudi court’s decision to sentence fitness influencer Manahel al-Otaibi to 11 years in prison highlights what activists describe as a fierce crackdown on even vaguely critical online speech.

    In the past two years the Saudi judiciary has “convicted and handed down lengthy prison terms on dozens of individuals for their expression on social media”, the human rights groups Amnesty International and ALQST said in a joint statement on Tuesday.

    These cases are generally handled by the Specialised Criminal Court, which was established in 2008 to try suspects accused of terrorism, and Saudi authorities do not often comment on them.

    Here are some of the most high-profile recent examples:

    Nourah al-Qahtani

    A mother-of-five, Qahtani was arrested in July 2021 largely in connection with critical posts on Twitter, since rebranded as X, according to a sentencing document provided by Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), a Washington-based rights group.

    She initially received a prison sentence of six-and-a-half years, however prosecutors appealed for a harsher sentence and got their wish: a 45-year term issued in mid-2022.

    Qahtani’s Twitter account, as identified in the sentencing document, features numerous posts criticising the government and others warning of attempts to arrest those behind public protests, which are not tolerated in Saudi Arabia.

    The court found Qahtani had used Twitter “to challenge the religion and justice” of King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman

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    leaving the page., the kingdom’s 38-year-old de facto ruler, according to the sentencing document.

    It also says she incited “the activities of those who seek to disturb public order and destabilise the security of society and the stability of the state” by “publishing false and malicious tweets”.

    Qahtani did not have a large public profile and it is not clear how her anonymous Twitter account, which has fewer than 600 followers, attracted the attention of Saudi authorities.

    Salma al-Shehab

    A member of Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia’s Shiite minority, Shehab had been studying for a doctorate in Britain and was arrested in January 2021 while visiting on holiday.

    In August 2022 she was sentenced to 34 years behind bars for aiding dissidents seeking to “disrupt public order” in the kingdom by relaying their tweets.

    The mother-of-two, who mostly posted about women’s rights to an account with just a few thousand followers, was also banned from travelling abroad for a further 34 years.

    Both the sentence and travel ban were later reduced to 27 years each, according to Amnesty.

    After Shehab’s sentence was made public, the University of Leeds, where she was studying, said in a statement it was “deeply concerned” and trying to find ways to support her.

    Mohammed al-Ghamdi

    A government critic who denounced alleged corruption and human rights abuses on social media, Mohammed al-Ghamdi was sentenced to death last year.

    The charges include conspiracy against the Saudi leadership, undermining state institutions and supporting terrorist ideology, sources briefed on the details of the verdict said.

    The case against him was at least partly built on posts criticising the government and expressing support for “prisoners of conscience” like the jailed religious clerics Salman al-Awda and Awad al-Qarni, Mohammed’s brother Saeed al-Ghamdi told AFP at the time.

    Mohammed al-Ghamdi, a retired teacher in his 50s, was arrested in June 2022.

    Human Rights Watch said in August 2023 it had seen court documents contending that Ghamdi “targeted the status of the King and the Crown Prince” and that the “magnitude of his actions is amplified by the fact they occurred through a global media platform, necessitating a strict punishment”.

    In an interview with Fox News that aired in September 2023, Prince Mohammed said he disapproved of the judgement and raised the possibility that Ghamdi might be spared death.

    “I’m hoping that in the next phase of trials, the judge there is more experienced. And they might look at it totally different,” Prince Mohammed said.

    Manahel al-Otaibi

    Otaibi, a 29-year-old blogger and fitness instructor, was arrested in November 2022.

    Rights groups contend that law enforcement targeted her for challenging Saudi male guardianship laws and requirements for women to wear the customary body-shrouding abaya robe.

    The Specialised Criminal Court sentenced her to 11 years in prison on January 9, but the sentence was only made public later in a Saudi submission to United Nations special rapporteurs inquiring about the case.

    That document, dated January 24 and seen by AFP on Tuesday, says Otaibi “was convicted of terrorist offences that have no bearing on her exercise of freedom of opinion and expression or her social media posts”.

  • PTI alleges CJP Isa insincere with judicial ‘interference’ issue

    PTI alleges CJP Isa insincere with judicial ‘interference’ issue

    Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) central information secretary Raoof Hasan, on Wednesday, expressed concern over the conduct of Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa during Supreme Court proceedings on the issue of interference by spy agencies in the judiciary.

    PTI demanded that a full court be constituted to hear the matter on a daily basis, and more importantly, that CJP Isa should disassociate himself from the bench.

    Raoof Hasan was accompanied by the former chief minister of Gilgit-Baltistan Khalid Khursheed and PTI advocate Abuzar Salman Niazi.

    The secretary information remarked that the six judges of Islamabad High Court (IHC) asked the CJP for help but the Chief Justice referred it to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.

    He said one should not forget that the PM and operatives of intelligence agencies were among those implicated in the matter.

  • Pakistan squad finalized for England, Ireland tours

    Pakistan squad finalized for England, Ireland tours

    The National Selection Committee has announced the Pakistan 18 member squad for tours of Ireland and England.

    National selectors Wahab Riaz, Muhammad Yousuf, Abdul Razzaq and Bilal Afzal announced the squad.

    Babar Azam (captain), Abrar Ahmed, Azam Khan, Fakhar Zaman, Haris Rauf, Hasan Ali, Iftikhar Ahmed, Imad Wasim, Muhammad Abbas Afridi, Muhammad Amir, Muhammad Rizwan, Muhammad Irfan Khan, Naseem Shah, Saim Ayub, Salman Ali Agha, Shadab Khan, Shaheen Shah Afridi and Usman Khan are included in squad.

    The selection committee has re-included fast bowler Haris Rauf along with Hasan Ali and Salman Ali Agha in the squad while spinner Usama Mir and fast bowler Zaman Khan failed to make thier place.

    Azam Khan, who suffered an injury before the series against New Zealand is now fit, while Muhammad Rizwan is also now fully fit and both players are included in the squad.

    The 15-member squad for the T20 World Cup starting in June in America and West Indies will be announced after the first T20 against England.

    The series against Ireland is from May 10 to 14 while the series against England will be played from May 22 to 30.

  • More war debris in Gaza than Ukraine: UN

    More war debris in Gaza than Ukraine: UN

    Geneva (AFP) – The Gaza Strip is filled with more war debris and rubble than Ukraine, the head of UN demining operations for the narrow Palestinian territory said Wednesday.

    And the danger for clearance work is restricted not just to unexploded ordnance but includes possible exposure to toxic substances such as asbestos.

    The United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS) estimated the amount of debris in Gaza at 37 million tonnes in mid-April, or 300 kilogrammes per square metre.

    “Gaza has more rubble than Ukraine, and to put that in perspective, the Ukrainian front line is 600 miles (nearly 1,000 kilometres) long, and Gaza is 25 miles (40 km) long,” said Mungo Birch, head of the UNMAS programme in the Palestinian territories.

    But the sheer volume of rubble is not the only problem, said UNMAS.

    “This rubble is likely heavily contaminated with UXO (unexploded ordnance), but its clearance will be further complicated by other hazards in the rubble,” Birch told journalists.

    “There’s estimated to be over 800,000 tonnes of asbestos, for instance, alone in the Gaza rubble.” The cancer-causing mineral used in construction requires special precautions when handling.

    Birch said he hoped UNMAS, which works to mitigate the threats posed by all types of explosive ordnance, would become the coordination body for mine action in Gaza.

    It has secured $5 million of funding but needs a further $40 million to continue its work in Gaza over the next 12 months.

    However, “the sector as a whole will need hundreds of millions of US dollars over multiple years in order to make Gaza safe again for the population”, Birch added.

    Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 34,568 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry.

  • ‘Doesn’t feel good that the ideal cricketer Khan is in jail,’ Babar Azam allegedly told Army Chief

    ‘Doesn’t feel good that the ideal cricketer Khan is in jail,’ Babar Azam allegedly told Army Chief

    Senior journalist and Bureau Chief of Dawn News, Iftikhar Shirazi, has claimed that batting maestro Babar Azam, along with fellow cricketers, told the Chief of Army staff of Pakistan (COAS) General Asim Munir during the April 8 iftar dinner that former Prime Minister Imran Khan is our ideal cricketer and national star who won the World Cup for Pakistan. “It doesn’t feel good that he is in jail,” Babar allegedly said.

    COAS Asim Munir invited Pakistan cricket team to an iftar party on April 8 after the training camp of the national cricket team in Kakul.

    Babar himself has neither denied nor confirmed the statement as yet.

  • Indian team likely to play all Champion Trophy matches in one city

    Indian team likely to play all Champion Trophy matches in one city

    It has been proposed by Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to schedule the matches of the Indian team in the same city in the first round of the Champions Trophy. This proposal aims to reduce the travel of the Indian team during their stay in Pakistan, Geo has reported.

    According to sources, the PCB has sent the initial draft schedule of the Champions Trophy to the International Cricket Council (ICC) on which the ICC will now take feedback from other countries.

    ICC Champions Trophy 2025 is scheduled to be held in Pakistan in February in three venues- Karachi, Lahore and Rawalpindi.

  • US Federal Reserve holds interest rates steady for sixth consecutive meeting

    US Federal Reserve holds interest rates steady for sixth consecutive meeting

    The US Federal Reserve has once again left interest rates unchanged, maintaining its current rate at 5.25 per cent to 5.5 per cent.

    This marks the sixth consecutive meeting where the central bank has opted to hold steady, reflecting a cautious approach amid persistent inflation concerns.

    In a statement released by the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) on Wednesday, the central bank acknowledged that while inflation has eased over the past year, it remains elevated.

    “In recent months, there has been a lack of further progress towards the Committee’s 2 per cent inflation objective,” the FOMC noted.

    The Committee indicated that it does not plan to reduce the target range until it has greater confidence that inflation is consistently trending towards the 2 per cent goal.

    This stance has kept interest rates at a 23-year high since July last year, suggesting the Federal Reserve’s focus on managing inflation risks.

    The decision to leave rates unchanged aligned with market expectations, which had largely anticipated a rate pause.

    In a related development, the Federal Reserve announced that it would slow its pace of quantitative tightening starting June 1.

    The Fed will reduce the cap on Treasury securities rolling off its balance sheet to $25 billion per month, down from the previous cap of $60 billion. However, the pace of runoff for mortgage-backed securities will remain at $35 billion per month.

    The FOMC’s decision did not significantly alter market expectations for the trajectory of interest rates in 2024.

    The market remains divided on whether a rate cut will occur by September, with about 50/50 odds. As of now, only one rate cut is fully priced in for the entire year.

    It’s worth noting that at the beginning of 2024, the market had priced in an 80 per cent chance of a rate cut starting in March, with a total of six cuts projected throughout the year.

    This shift in expectations underscores the uncertainty surrounding the Federal Reserve’s future policy decisions as it navigates the ongoing challenges of inflation and economic stability.

  • April was Bitcoin’s worst month since late 2022 as investors took profits

    April was Bitcoin’s worst month since late 2022 as investors took profits

    Bitcoin experienced a significant downturn for the third day in a row on Wednesday, capping off its worst monthly performance in April since late 2022.

    This downward trend comes as investors shifted their focus away from cryptocurrencies in anticipation of the Federal Reserve’s upcoming interest rate decision.

    The world’s most traded cryptocurrency fell nearly 16 per cent throughout April as investors cashed in their gains from a recent rally.

    Bitcoin had reached record highs, topping $70,000, but the recent slide has taken the price to $57,055, a 4.7 per cent drop and its lowest point since late February.

    Ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap, also saw a decline, falling 3.6 per cent to $2,857, its weakest level since February.

    The sharp downturn has pushed bitcoin into bear market territory, with its current price sitting 22 per cent below its March peak of $73,803.

    Despite this, Bitcoin has still achieved a 35 per cent increase so far in 2024 and has doubled its value compared to the same time last year.

    This surge in value was largely driven by significant investments in newly launched exchange-traded funds (ETFs) at the beginning of the year.

    According to Matteo Greco, a research analyst at Fineqia, the recent decline in bitcoin’s price is due to profit-taking by investors who entered the market during the downturns of 2022 and 2023.

    Additionally, ETF investors, who saw their shares appreciate significantly in early 2024, also contributed to the sell-off as they locked in profits.

    Looking at the broader economic landscape, the Federal Reserve is not expected to change interest rates later this week.

    However, a growing consensus among investors suggests that the central bank may refrain from cutting rates altogether in 2024.

    This uncertainty has cast a shadow over interest rate-sensitive assets, including cryptocurrencies, emerging market stocks, bonds, and even commodities. Investors are adjusting their portfolios accordingly.

    The 10 largest U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs have seen their biggest weekly outflow since their inception earlier this year, highlighting the impact of shifting investor sentiment on the cryptocurrency market.

    As the market reacts to both macroeconomic factors and investor behavior, the coming days will be crucial in determining whether this downtrend continues or stabilizes.

  • Avicenna College case: PMDC to initiate probe into girl’s death

    The Avicenna Medical College continues to spiral deeper into controversy with Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) taking notice of the death of a female student, and launching a probe into the matter, reports Dawn.

    On the other hand, University of Health Sciences (UHS) has taken up the serious complaints of students about imposition of heavy fines, harassment, torture and physical punishments. It has directed all the affiliated public and private sector medical colleges of Punjab to establish ‘Students Counselling Cells (SCCs)’, to be constituted of senior faculty members, including teachers from the psychiatry departments, besides the students themselves to address the issues of harassment of any kind and other such complaints. It declared the setting up of cells mandatory to prevent incidents like the one that recently surfaced at the Avicenna Medical College in Lahore.

    The decision was made in a meeting chaired by UHS Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Ahsan Waheed Rathore, exclusively called after the mysterious death of a girl student, Mahnoor Nadeem, of the Avicenna Medical College, followed by a protest by its students.

    The students had alleged that the girl had died due to mental stress she had to suffer in the ‘toxic environment’ created by the college management. They condemned the college’s owner and the faculty for imposing heavy fines, ranging from Rs50,000 to Rs100,000, and strict punishments and humiliation.

    “It is our duty to ensure the holistic well-being of our students, particularly in light of the demanding nature of professional education in the medical and dental fields,” reads a letter issued by the Vice Chancellor to all the 12 public and 44 private medical institutes of Punjab. The letter was addressed to the principals of the medical colleges.

    “I am writing to emphasize the importance of paying special attention to the psychological well-being of our students. The rigors of professional education can often take a toll on their mental health, and it is imperative that we provide them with the necessary support and guidance to navigate through these challenges successfully,” reads the letter.

    The UHS VC urged the principals to consider establishing a dedicated students counselling cell at their institutions.


    Answer within 72 hours

    Additionally, the Avicenna Medical College has been directed to give its point of view within 72 hours so that responsibility could be ascertained.
    “The PMDC, as the apex regulatory body for medical and dental education in Pakistan, is deeply saddened by the loss of a promising medical student and extends its heartfelt condolences to the family and loved ones affected by this unfortunate incident.

    “In line with its commitment to upholding the highest standards of professionalism, ethics, and patient care, the PMDC has initiated a thorough investigation to ascertain the facts surrounding the incident,” the statement issued by the council stated.

    PMDC President Prof Dr Rizwan Taj stated, “We are deeply concerned about the circumstances leading to the untimely demise of a medical student and are committed to ensuring that justice is served. The welfare and well-being of students are of paramount importance to us, and any form of misconduct or mistreatment will not be tolerated.”

    He also added that Mahnoor’s family will be welcomed to reach the council to file the complaint.

    The PMDC will also collaborate with relevant authorities and stakeholders to implement measures aimed at preventing similar incidents in the future.

  • India’s ‘Don’t guess the age’ is the trend we want to see in Pakistan

    India’s ‘Don’t guess the age’ is the trend we want to see in Pakistan

    ‘Don’t guess the age’ is a new trend seen on Indian Twitter, and it has caught our eye. We sure want to see it in Pakistan.

    We despise the very common age-shaming in our desi culture, it is high time that we start embracing that age is just a number. It’s not creases on the face but the coolness of the spirit that matters the most.

    It all started with activist Viji Venkatesh posting an uber-cool and stylish picture of hers on X that prompted people to appreciate their own age and the coolness that comes with it.

    She captioned it, “Don’t guess the age, I’m 72 and killing it. #nofilterneeded”

    Her friends and other X users started posting pictures of themselves. Author Rana Safvi posted a picture with the caption, “Don’t guess the age, I’m 67 and trying to emulate dear Viji as far as the coolness quotient is concerned.” She also stressed it by adding #nofilterneeded

    Filmmaker and human rights activist Onir posted a picture of him smiling at an event and reiterated the point of no filter needed with the caption, “Don’t guess the age, I am 55.”

    The thread kept on expanding as an academician Latika posted a picture of hers playing basketball with the caption, “Don’t guess the age, I am 53 and some more.”

    Climate activist Natasha Ramaratham embraced the #nofilterneeded trend by posting a picture of her carrying a poster and telling the world that she is 52.

    AI product designer Subbakrishna Rao joined the trend, posted a picture of him receiving an award and smiling ear-to-ear. His caption was “53 and rocking it”.

    Sandeep Roy posted a picture of him holding the camera and quipped in the caption, “Don’t guess the age, but 56 in a few months. Mom would have sworn it was “Bao ki teo” (old bong joke)”.

    Humans grow, evolve, change and this should be considered an absolutely normal thing. While physicality isn’t in anyone’s control the spirit is very instinctual. We hope to see people embracing this in our own society.