Tag: pakistan turkey

  • Shehbaz Sharif to leave today for two-day visit to Turkiye

    Shehbaz Sharif to leave today for two-day visit to Turkiye

    Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif will leave for a two-day visit to Turkiye on Thursday to convey his “heartfelt condolences” over the loss of life in the massive earthquake that struck the country on February 6.

    The Foreign Office has confirmed in a press release that the Prime Minister will meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and offer condolences on the staggering loss of life on behalf of the Pakistani people.

    He will also visit southern Turkey, which took the brunt of the damage of the 7.8 magnitude earthquake and it’s massive aftershocks. The Premier is scheduled to meet earthquake survivors and the rescue and relief teams that Pakistan has sent to aid in the area.

    On Thursday morning Shehbaz Sharif posted a message on Twitter, stating that he will convey a message of solidarity and support for the Turkish people. “True to the spirit of one nation living in two states, we consider their loss as ours.”

    Continuing in another tweet, the Prime Minister wrote, “Natural disasters as the earthquake in Türkiye & Syria are beyond the capacity of any single government to handle. No country, howsoever resourceful, can deal with devastation of this magnitude. It is time the world came forward & extended support to the suffering humanity.”

    The Pakistani government has already sent a 51-memver rescue team to Turkey along with relief goods.

  • Turkish gang exposed for allegedly abducting Pakistani students

    Turkish gang exposed for allegedly abducting Pakistani students

    A gang involved in the abduction of Pakistani students in Turkey has been exposed after a video of the students in the captivity of the alleged abductors has surfaced, Salah Uddin has reported for ARY News.

    The gang allegedly abducts Pakistani students for ransom.

    According to the news report, Noman Altaf, a 17-year-old student from Khanewal, Pakistan, was allegedly kidnapped in Turkey after the gang promised him a better future in Europe and Athens. The gang eventually collected extortion from his family.

    Their modus operandi involved sending videos of abducted students to their families to collect ransom from them.

    In addition, eight other Pakistani students who travelled to Turkey for academic purposes encountered incidents of the same sort. The kidnappers in Turkey are alleged to have also tortured their victims.

  • Wildfires sweep Turkey, Pakistan extends support

    Wildfires sweep Turkey, Pakistan extends support

    Prime Minister Imran Khan and several other politicians have showed solidarity with the Turkish government over the loss of lives in Turkey as wildfires sweep the country.

    PM Khan, in his tweet, stated that Pakistan is ready to offer any help at this difficult time. “We stand with the govt & people of Turkey & share in their sorrow at the tragic loss of life in the wildfires tragedy”, he further added.

    Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly, Shehbaz Sharif, expressed his grief and said, “We send our prayers & best wishes 2 our Turkish brothers & sisters as firefighters are busy putting down fire.”

    Moreover, Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Quershi, tagging Minister of Foreign Affairs of Republic of Turkey stated, “Pakistan extends support to the government of Turkey and to our Turkish brothers and sisters over the loss of lives.”

    In addition to this, PML-N’s MPA Hina Parvez Butt and PTI’s Abdul Aleem Khan have also extended their support.

    Support and help are pouring in from throughout the world as planes from Russia and Ukraine helped battle the flames.

    About 70 wildfires have broken out across 17 provinces on the country’s coasts this week resulted in four deaths and the evacuation of thousands, reports Reuters.

    #PrayforTurkey is the top trending hashtag on Twitter in Pakistan today.

  • Pakistan rushes to Turkey’s support as US declares Armenian killings of 1915 as genocide

    Pakistan rushes to Turkey’s support as US declares Armenian killings of 1915 as genocide

    Pakistan has supported Turkish thesis on the events of 1915 after American President Joe Biden’s declaration that massacre of 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman Turks in World War I was genocide.

    In a phone call with his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi stressed Islamabad’s support for Ankara’s take on the events of 1915, said an official statement.

    Turkey, established in 1923 after the Ottoman empire collapsed, has always denied there was a systematic campaign to annihilate Armenians.

    It says that thousands of Turks and Armenians died in inter-ethnic violence as the empire started to fall apart and fought a Russian invasion of its eastern provinces during the war.

    “We believe that one-sided approaches and political categorisation of historical events could undermine trust and lead to polarisation between nations,” Foreign Office (FO) spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri said in a statement.

    The statement also praised Turkey’s “constructive approach” on the subject including Ankara’s proposal for a joint historical commission to explore the facts.

    Turkish Foreign Ministry thanked Pakistan for its support.

    “Thank you brotherly Pakistan! Long live Turkey-Pakistan friendship!” read a tweet.

    Biden, in his statement, said the American people honour “all those Armenians who perished in the genocide that began 106 years ago.”

    “Over the decades, Armenian immigrants have enriched the United States (US) in countless ways, but they have never forgotten the tragic history,” Biden said.

    “We honour their story. We see that pain. We affirm the history. We do this not to cast blame but to ensure that what happened is never repeated.”

    The largely symbolic move, breaking away from decades of carefully calibrated language from the White House, comes at a time when Ankara and Washington grapple with deep policy disagreements over a host of issues.

    The Turkish government and most of the opposition showed rare unity in their rejection of Biden’s statement.

    Ankara has repeatedly proposed the creation of a joint commission of historians from Turkey and Armenia as well as international experts to tackle the issue.