Actress Ushna Shah, known for her roles in various dramas, recently had an unexpected revelation on the set of a Ramzan show. While Ushna Shah was already known she was taken aback when she discovered that television host Nida Yasir was also fluent in the language.
The unexpected moment happened during their time on set, where Ushna witnessed an engaging conversation between Hamza Amin, who is originally from Austria, and Nida Yasir, revealing their shared fluency in German.
Ushna posted a video on her Instagram story from the Ramazan transmission set, showing her husband and the host Nida conversing easily in German, leaving her pleasantly surprised.
The actress captioned the video: “These two speaking in German.”
A Lufthansa plane that took off from Germany had to make an emergency landing in New Delhi’s Indra Gandhi’s airport after an intense fight broke out between a husband and wife.
On November 29, right after the take-off from Munich, a couple started fighting in the plane. Seeing the situation getting worse, pilots informed the control room. It directed the plane to land in Pakistan. On not getting permission, the pilots made an emergency landing in New Delhi and handed over the two passengers to airport security there.
The wife, a native of Thailand, complained that her German husband was threatening her. Passengers as well as the crew also witnessed him shouting and hurling things at his wife while reportedly being drunk.
According to Indian media, the German embassy has been contacted to handle the matter. The police is talking to airline staff to ascertain the sequence of events and check if an FIR needs to be registered.
The wife was travelling on a separate ticket and later asked the airline to continue her journey to Bangkok alone but she too was deboarded.
Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif—who is currently in Kazakhstan—interacted with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Arabic at the sidelines of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) Summit.
In the brief talk, PM Shehbaz said that he is extremely grateful for the country’s help during the flood crisis in Pakistan. To which the Palestinian president said, “Pakistan is our home and Pakistanis are our brothers and sisters”.
The PM also assured Abbas that Pakistan will continue to raise its voice in the support of Palestine.
What a lovely and warm interaction between Pakistan and Palestine in Astana a few moments ago. PM can be heard speaking in Arabic with the President Mahmoud Abbas. #PMShebbazAtCICApic.twitter.com/m7PnYj1l6I
The video is gaining attention, leaving viewers amazed at the Prime Minister’s proficiency in Arabic.
Earlier, The Current reached out to PM’s Focal Person on Digital Media, Muhammad Abubakar Umer, to confirm exactly how many languages can the premier speak.
He said that the premier is fluent in German, Arabic and English along with Punjabi and Urdu. According to him, PM Shehbaz can speak basic level Turkish, Chinese, Russian, Pashtu and Sindhi.
The focal person revealed that PM Shehbaz learned Arabic formally while in exile during former President General Pervez Musharraf’s era. To our surprise, we also got to know that the premier holds a diploma in Arabic.
Exclusive: You will not believe how many languages PM Shehbaz Sharif can speak
PM Shehbaz has been the talk of the town since a video went viral in which he can be heard speaking in German with a family.
In the video, shared by the Government of Pakistan, the PM was talking to a German family in their own language. The family was rescued during floods in Swat. Twitter was stunned at the Premier’s fluency in the language.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif spoke to German tourists during his trip to Swat. Prime Minister has assured stranded individuals will be provided all amenities on priority basis. #HelpThemRisepic.twitter.com/XajPKbTGGq
After the video went viral, social media started speculation that Shehbaz Sharif might know more languages.
According to Abubakar, PM Shehbaz knows a total of ten languages.
“He learned Chinese and Turkish during his tenure as Chief Minister (CM) Punjab from 2013 to 2018 as at the time he had to engage with Chinese and Turkish officials for China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC),” said Abubakar.
He learned German and Russian during the 1970s and 80s for his business dealings. “At the time, he was not in government”, said Abubakar.
Abubakar also revealed that before going to any foreign country PM Shehbaz hires an instructor who informs him about the cultural aspects of the country, how people greet each other and what social norms are appreciated there.
Mercedes-Benz sales dropped significantly in the second quarter due to supply issues and lockdowns in China because of coronavirus, according to the German automaker.
From April to June, the auto manufacturer delivered 490,000 passenger cars, a 16 per cent decrease from the same period in 2017.
Sales for its Cars division fell by 16 per cent for a total of 998,000 deliveries in the first half of 2022.
China, the largest single market, saw the biggest decline in second-quarter sales, falling by 25 per cent to 163,700 vehicles, according to the automaker.
Sales in the Asia-Pacific region decreased by 20 per cent, primarily as a result of lockdown measures, while sales in Europe fell by 10 per cent and in North America by 3 per cent during the quarter.
Mercedes-Benz is still expecting mildly higher sales in 2022 than in 2021, according to a spokesperson. Sales director Britta Seeger stated that “customer demand remains high” despite worries about rising inflation.
Seeger revealed that popular luxury models include the Maybach and the EQ model series of electric vehicles.
According to the German manufacturer, 100,000 units of the more affordable Mercedes-Benz Vans were sold globally in the second quarter, just below the same period last year.
Holger Ziegeler, a German diplomat in Karachi, has been accused of sexually harassing attendees and groping a woman at an event in Karachi. The event took place on November 13 last year and was co-funded by the German Consulate.
“At the 2nd ScrapFest Pakistan event on November 13th/ 2021 at a privately hired venue; a woman attending was sexually harassed by one of the senior staff members from the German Consulate in Karachi,” wrote Urvah Khan in an Instagram post. She was the main organiser of the event.
“Since my last post on this incident, the German Federal Foreign Office’s unit responsible for investigating all allegations of sexual misconduct has directly contacted me. I have provided them with the video and text evidence I mentioned was in my possession,” wrote Urvah in a separate Instagram post.
Talking exclusively to The Current, Urvah Khan said that she organised the event ScrapFest, which promotes women and people from the LGBT community. The second event was co-funded by the German Consulate and Holger Ziegeler was German Consul General in Karachi.
The event took place on November 13, 2021, and Urvah officially issued a statement on April 22, 2022. Three days after issuing a statement, she contacted the German Foreign Office.
“It took a bit of time to make the statement because I needed time to speak to a victim and to convince the witnesses to come forward. We had a text message. After we found the video evidence and had collected the statements of the victims, I knew we had everything we needed.”
Regarding the status of the investigation, she said the German Foreign Office in Berlin is investigating the matter. “They are interviewing the witnesses and the victim. We are waiting to find out what is going to happen.”
Urvah further added that the woman who was groped by Holger Ziegeler reached out to her with the allegations the same night, and recorded her statement the next morning. “I brought it up with Holger. At first he was willing to apologise. The victim asked for a written apology as she was traumatised and did not want to see his face. He later retracted his apology and said that he did not harass her and this was a terrorist attack on his legacy.”
He also pressurised Urvah to get rid of the evidence.
Urvah said that when the German Consulate in Karachi was informed, they messaged her to take her Instagram posts down.
“They did not support me or try to investigate, which is one of the reasons I reached out to the German Foreign Office in Berlin.”
“A woman came by the stage where he groped her buttocks, then grabbed her hand.”
Urvah added that apart from the victim who was groped, Holger’s behaviour throughout the night was unacceptable and disrespectful towards many of the attendees. Many of them came forward as witnesses about how uncomfortable they felt.
“In terms of other attendees, he would try to go closer to them. A few of the witnesses said that they saw him trying to touch women on their body parts, on their stomachs, on their backs.”
“There was another witness who said that he was standing in front of him while he kept touching his friend’s back. She kept putting his hand back to where it was supposed to be,” added Urvah.
Asked why she chose to speak to an international publication, VICE, instead of a local one regarding the case, Urvah said, “Because he is a foreign diplomat, he had diplomatic immunity so that is why I was worried about PEMRA coming after an article or news item like this, and shutting it down. This is why I wanted the first article to be published in an international publication so PEMRA could not touch it.”
“The big issue is that he thought because he co-funded the event through the German Consulate, he could behave in this manner and could get away with it,” said Urvah. “I think it’s important if we all talk about what he did and I think it’s important to have a conversation.”
Talking exclusively to The Current, Dr Mehrub Moiz Awan, said, “I was hosting this event for a fee as requested by Urvah and a lot of my fans came specially for me.”
While narrating what happened at the event, Mehrub said, “The white man was visibly drunk or at least tipsy and interrupted me a few times during my jokes as well. I had especially made a point to crack jokes at white people and white privilege and our own audience was loving them. He tried to be a little handsy with me as well but as I’m a Pakistani transwoman, I know how to handle such guys very well.”
“Later I found out that a female left very upset because she was groped by the same guy. The dude actually sent Urvah a text as well that I saw with my own eyes. It said something like who’s this girl, she’s good. I want her number,” added Mehrub.
Disclaimer: The Current is not responsible for the statements mentioned in the story.
A 60-year-old German man allegedly received 90 Covid shots in order to issue fake vaccination cards for those people who do not want to get the vaccines themselves, reports The Guardian.
A man residing in Magdeburg, whose name was not publicly released due to the privacy policy of the country, has received up to 90 vaccine shots from vaccination centres for several months until he was arrested by the police on Sunday.
The police did not detain the suspect but he is being investigated for issuing vaccination cards without authorisation and document forgery. When he went to the vaccination centre at Eilenburg, a town in Saxony state for a second time in a row, the police caught him.
The police also confiscated several blank vaccination cards from him and initiated an interrogation for the criminal offence.
There are no reported impacts of around 90 shots of vaccines on a man’s health until now. The vaccines that he received were from different brands.
After being forced shut due to the coronavirus pandemic, a zoo in northern Germany is facing so much financial pressure it may end up feeding its animals to each other in a worst-case scenario.
According to reports, Neumünster zoo, in Schleswig-Holstein, has been closed since March 15. The zoo relies entirely on donations and entry fees to feed some 700 animals which include arctic foxes, maned wolves, seals and Germany’s biggest polar bear Vitus. It has not yet received any emergency aid promised by the federal government.
Zoo director Verena Kaspari told the media, “If — and this is really the worst, worst case — if I run out of money to buy food, or if it should happen that my food supplier can no longer deliver due to new restrictions, I would slaughter animals to feed the other animals.”
“We currently have funds that would bring us by around mid-May,” she added.
As part of Kaspari’s worst-case-scenario plan, goats and deer would be killed first and the polar bear Vitus — which stands nearly 12 feet tall — would be the last animal to go. She assured that none of the animals slaughtered would be an endangered species.
On March 31, the association representing 56 major zoos in Germany, including Neumünster, called on the government to release $100 million to save the industry.
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for animal rights organisation People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), Yvonne Würz, told DW that “population management” was “nothing new for zoos.”
“Zoos are funded through and live from tiny baby animals. When there is not enough space for the animals they are often killed for food [for other animals],” said Würz.
She explained that some zoos are transparent about the numbers of animals they kill each year. The European Association of Zoos and Aquaria estimates between 3,000 and 5,000 animals are killed in European zoos each year.
One of the most authoritative dictionaries of the German language Duden Dictionary recently included ‘Insha Allah’ (If Allah wills it) into the dictionary.
The new entry is spelled as inschallah in the Duden dictionary, though as of now it is unclear whether the word will appear in the Duden’s digital version or published in a physical copy.
The Duden is considered to be the most widely used dictionary of the German language. It has long been the prescriptive handbook for German grammar as well as spelling. The Duden dictionary has been issued since 1880 and is now in its 27th edition.
The word ‘Insha’Allah‘ was included after the Turkish word ‘oha’ was added into the dictionary. Oha is used as an expression of surprise that is quite similar to the English word “whoa”.
