Tag: PM khan

  • ‘All is settled, new DG ISI notification to be issued this week’: Fawad

    ‘All is settled, new DG ISI notification to be issued this week’: Fawad

    Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry said, “All the matters have been resolved” and announced that the notification of the new director-general (DG) Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency would be issued this week.

    Chaudhry denied speculations that a new summary with names of candidates for the position of ISI chief had been sent to the Prime Minister (PM), reported Dawn.

    While mocking the Opposition, Fawad said, “It [Opposition] is thinking that there are some differences between the government and security institutions but its euphoria is gradually fading.”

    Fawad also invited the Opposition to work collectively with the government but rejected any possibility of holding discussions with its leaders on corruption cases.

    On inflation, Chaudhry said, “We don’t live on another planet. If there is a worldwide increase in the prices of oil, then we will also witness a hike in the prices.”

  • Reham Khan loses defamation case to Zulfi Bukhari, pays £50,000

    Prime Minister Imran Khan’s former wife Reham Khan has lost to former Special Assistant Sayed Zulfi Bukhari in a defamation case and has reportedly paid £50,000 as a contribution towards Bukhari’s costs and damages, reported Murtaza Ali Shah for Geo News.

    In a statement attached with the court order, which she agreed to publish, Reham withdrew all allegations and rendered a full and unconditional apology.

    Khan posted her apology on Twitter, in which she wrote, “On 6 and 7 December 2019, I published a video on my YouTube Channel, my Facebook page, and on my Twitter account in which I asserted that Sayed Zulfikar Abbas Bukhari, more commonly known as Zulfi Bukhari, was involved in a corrupt plan with the Prime Minister of Pakistan to sell or acquire the Roosevelt Hotel in New York at an undervalue for his benefit.”

    “These allegations were false and untrue. Zulfi Bukhari, as I now understand, was not involved in any corrupt plan PM Khan to sell or acquire the Roosevelt,” she added.

    https://twitter.com/RehamKhan1/status/1448797012728688644?s=20

    Reham also posted her apology video on her youtube channel.

    https://youtu.be/_1ecyzzXcmc

    Zulfi, in a tweet, while reacting to Reham’s video said, “TRUTH ALWAYS WINS!”

    In the settlement agreed between the two parties, Reham agreed that she will tweet the apology and clarification and pin it to her Twitter account for at least three consecutive days.

    Reacting to the development, Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry said, “Reham being a liar was proved once again. She is actually a habitual liar.”

  • IHC questions govt’s reluctance over disclosing details of gifts presented to PM Khan

    IHC questions govt’s reluctance over disclosing details of gifts presented to PM Khan

    The Islamabad High Court (IHC) questioned the government over its reluctant attitude to disclose details of the gifts presented to Prime Min­ister (PM) Imran Khan since his appointment in 2018, reports Dawn.

    Prior to this, the Pakistan Information Commission (PIC) had directed the Cabinet Division to “provide the requested information about the gifts received by PM Khan”.

    However, the Cabinet Division argued that the matter did not fall under the Right of Access to Information Act, 2017.

    “What is the harm in making it public if some country has given a necklace as a gift?” asked Justice Mian Gul Hassan Aurangzeb. He said that gifts received by the rulers of a country belonged to the nation and not to them, asking whether public officeholders would even receive those gifts if the public office did not exist.

    Justice Aurangzeb asked: “Why doesn’t the government keep all the gifts in the museum? The government should make details of the gifts in the last 10 years public.”

    He also said that the Centre should inform how many gifts had their valuation done by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR). The government representative at the hearing requested time to respond, after which the court adjourned the hearing.

    Earlier in September, Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry revealed that Arab rulers who presented gifts to PM Khan “did not want their names to be made public”.

    Tosha­khana is a department established in1974 that stores precious gifts given to the rulers, parliamentarians, bureaucrats, and officials heads by the other governments and foreign dignitaries.

    According to Dawn, it has valuables ranging from bulletproof cars, gold-plated souvenirs, expensive paintings, watches, ornaments, rugs and swords.

  • ‘Research should be conducted on whether our divorces have increased and its impact,’ says PM Khan

    ‘Research should be conducted on whether our divorces have increased and its impact,’ says PM Khan

    Prime Minister Imran Khan, while addressing the Ashra-e-Rehmat-ul-Lil-Aalamin (PBUH) conference, announced the formation of the Rehmatul-lil-Aalameen Authority.

    According to Dawn, the scholars in the authority would be responsible for researching how best to disseminate lessons from the life of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) to the masses.

    PM said Islam was a religion of peace and humanity and the West did not understand it so the authority would also be tasked with explaining Islam to the world. “When they educate the world about the Prophet’s (PBUH) life, people will understand that Islam is a religion of humanity,” the premier said.

    During PM Khan’s address, he announced that the authority will monitor the media [print and electronic], and be in charge of monitoring the schools’ curriculum and how the course on the Holy Prophet’s (PBUH) biography was being taught.

    Furthermore, he said that the scholars would be responsible for carrying out and promoting research in universities.

    “Research should be conducted on topics such as whether our divorces have increased and what is the impact of this,” he added.

    However, the members of the authority haven’t been revealed yet. PM Khan said, “I will be the patron myself but we have started searching for a person who has written books of tafsir, has great command [over religion] and is a scholar for the chairman. There will be an international advisory board above him on which we will bring the Muslim world’s top scholars — we have looked at many names and are approaching them as well.”

  • Forgiving TTP: Never forget!

    Forgiving TTP: Never forget!

    Prime Minister Imran Khan has said that the government is in talks with some groups of the banned militant outfit, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). In an interview with TRT World, PM Khan said there are different groups that form the TTP and some of them want to talk to our government for peace. “So, we are in talks with them. It’s a reconciliation process.” Before PM’s interview, both President Arif Alvi and Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi had talked about giving amnesty to TTP members if they lay down their arms and follow the Constitution of Pakistan.

    These statements warrant a lot of questions: why did the president, prime minister, and foreign minister disclose such important information in interviews to media outlets and not in parliament? TTP is no ordinary terrorist outfit. The entire country came together after the horrific APS attack in December 2014, in which more than 150 people were martyred – most of them children. All the political forces of Pakistan reached a consensus, after which the National Action Plan (NAP) came about. There was a massive crackdown on TTP and other terrorist outfits. We finally managed to eliminate the TTP in Pakistan. Those from the TTP who survived the crackdown ran away to Afghanistan. At that time, the government in Kabul was not friendly towards Pakistan.

    The state told us that the TTP was supported and funded by India and Afghanistan – when Ehsanullah Ehsan first surrendered to Pakistan, he confirmed in a video that Afghan and Indian intelligence agencies [RAW and NDS] gave funds and other assistance to Pakistani Taliban to fight Pakistan. Last year, after sharing a dossier containing ‘irrefutable proofs’ of Indian funding of terrorism in Pakistan, Shah Mahmood Qureshi said: “The [specific] evidence presented by Pakistan provides a concrete proof of Indian financial and material sponsorship of multiple terrorist organisations, including UN-designated terrorist organisations Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, Balochistan Liberation Army and Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan.”

    What is the reason for Pakistan to hold talks with a RAW and NDS-funded/supported terrorist outfit when we have broken its back in our country? And now that we have a friendly government in Kabul, what is the need to hold talks with an enemy outfit? Should the Afghan Taliban not help reign in the TTP and take action against those who are carrying out attacks against Pakistan from Afghan soil? Or, is it true that the Afghan Taliban and the Pakistani Taliban both have the same ideology, even if the targets of their attacks are different? The people of Pakistan – who have been killed and maimed by the TTP over the years – deserve an answer.

    The government needs to be transparent. This decision cannot be taken just by the government alone. All political parties must have a debate on this issue and the people of Pakistan have to be taken on board as well. We cannot forget what the TTP did to our nation. We lost more than 70,000 lives at their hands. There must be a consensus about the talks and also the government should be transparent about the negotiations. Don’t keep us in the dark, dear government, for we were told that we will never forget their heinous crimes.

  • ‘Arab rulers who presented gifts to PM Khan didn’t want their names to be made public’: Fawad

    Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry recently revealed that Arab rulers who presented gifts to the Prime Minister (PM) of Pakistan “did not want their names to be made public”.

    While speaking on Geo News programme ‘Jirga’ with senior journalist Saleem Safi on Sunday, Fawad stated, “Previously, the heads of the government were allowed to take gifts after paying 15 per cent of the actual price.”

    “Vehicles were considered personal gifts, but former president Asif Ali Zardari changed the law for personal interest,” he added while criticising the past governments.

    Talking about the local elections in the country, the minister admitted that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government’s biggest failure was “not holding local body elections” in Pakistan. Moreover, he said that the local bodies, formed by former Chief Minister (CM) Shehbaz Sharif, were not effective and could not be restored on a technical basis.

    He added that PM insisted on having elections but members within the party, including Chief Minister Punjab Usman Buzdar, didn’t agree to it.

    He further said that a review petition against the restoration of the local bodies is being heard in the Supreme Court (SC).

    Chaudhry said that the government has no personal rivalry with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) but the election body directly attacked the PM during the Senate polls.

    Furthermore, he revealed a total of 0.6 million Election Voting Machines (EVM) will be required for the upcoming general elections of 2023.

    Previously, the federal government denied giving out information about the exchange of gifts between the premier and other heads of state. They mentioned in a notice that the matter is reflective of inter-state relations and the disclosure of such information potentially damages the interest of Pakistan in the context of international relations.

  • PM Khan calls on departments to stop funding sports teams, promote regional teams

    PM Khan calls on departments to stop funding sports teams, promote regional teams

    Thousands of players in around 30 different sports disciplines are expected to be unemployed after the federal government issued a notice calling on all government departments, businesses and autonomous bodies to stop funding sports teams, reported Dawn.

    “During a meeting on the overhaul of the sport governance structure in Pakistan held under the chairmanship of the Pakistani Prime Minister on September 1, the Honorable Prime Minister wished to end the funding of departmental sports teams of various organizations / companies / autonomous government bodies. and, instead, these funds can be used for the promotion of regional sports teams,” wrote the additional secretary of the Ministry of Interprovincial Coordination, Mohsin Mushtaq Chandna, in a letter that was received in different departments working under the government. .

    He further asked them to divert funds to regional teams.

    “In order to implement the orientations of the Honorable Prime Minister, you are therefore asked to prepare a practical transition plan to divert funding from departmental teams to regional teams, within two months, which should be implemented. Work within six months of March 1, 2022,” the letter concluded.

    As per Dawn, one of the main features of the national sports policy that the IPC ministry has proposed is to discourage departmental sports.

    A copy of this letter was sent to the Presidents of Pakistan International Airlines, Islamabad, Wapda, Higher Education Commission, Railways, FBR, IGs of Punjab, Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan, Gilgit-Baltistan, Azad Jammu & Kashmir and President National Bank from Pakistan.

    The move came after Prime Minister Imran Khan abolished the departmental cricket configuration, which resulted in thousands of cricketers losing their jobs.

    Although ministries have been asked to divert funds to sponsor the six newly formed provincial cricket associations, instead of spending this amount on their own teams, no ministry has been able to set rules for transferring these funds.

    Pakistan has historically produced athletes who have excelled in their disciplines through the departmental system.

    Read More – Punjab govt announces Rs1 million cash rewards for Arshad, Talha and Shehroz

    An official in one of the departments, who received the letter revealed that it was not possible for them to transfer their funds to the regional teams. Most of the athletes in Pakistan are employed by departments, including javelin thrower Arshad Nadeem and Talha Talib, who impressed with their performances at this year’s Tokyo Olympics. Both represent the department, Wapda.

  • ‘If Taliban fail to form inclusive govt, Afghanistan could enter into civil war’: PM Khan

    Prime Minister Imran Khan, while giving an interview to BBC, said that it was likely that Afghanistan could descend into a civil war if the Taliban fail to form an inclusive government.

    “If they do not include all the factions, sooner or later they will have a civil war,” said PM Khan. “That would mean an unstable, chaotic Afghanistan and an ideal place for terrorists. That is a worry.”

    Speaking on women and their education, PM Khan stated that the girls of Afghanistan would soon be able to attend schools. He said preventing women from acquiring education in Afghanistan would be un-Islamic.

    “If anyone has any idea of what our religion was, it was a liberation of women, and so whenever the idea that women should not get educated, it’s just not Islamic. It might have been some rural culture in Afghanistan but it has nothing to do with religion,” said PM Khan.

    “The statements they have made since they assumed power, I mean it’s very encouraging,” said the premier. “They have said they will give education to women and allow them to work. They have said they will give amnesty. The soil will not be used for terrorism by anyone.”

    PM Khan reiterated that the statements made by the Taliban were encouraging but where they go from here is unknown to all.

    “What they [Taliban] do from now onwards, we can only hope to persuade them and encourage them, incentivise them in that direction. But you know sitting today, what happens, where they will go, I’m afraid, I don’t know,” says PM Khan.

    “Afghan are strong people, their women are very strong, give them time and they will assert their rights,” said the premier.

  • US right-wing journalist praises PM Khan for saving Afghan’s lives

    US right-wing journalist praises PM Khan for saving Afghan’s lives

    A right-wing television presenter, Glenn Beck has thanked Prime Minister Imran Khan in a series of tweets for his support in getting Afghans out from the war-torn country.

    Beck, who has a charity organisation called Mercury One, has been assisting with evacuations from Afghanistan since the Taliban’s takeover, revealed that Pakistan’s leadership helped with the release and departure of three flights.

    In a tweet, he stated that, “We reached out and asked numerous leaders in political and civil society around the world for help. The silence was shocking as was the outpouring of help on a humanitarian basis. We received an immediate response to our requests from PM Imran Khan of Pakistan who then acted on his willingness to assist.”

    “Pakistan has once again proven to be a valued partner in all seasons for the United States, despite recent criticisms from some sections of US media,” he added.

    While stressing that the US should recognize Pakistan’s assistance at this point, he tweeted, “We will not forget this support that has enabled America and its allies to make good on their promises to those who helped them without pause or reflection.”

    “Let no one fool you, the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) female athletes are out because of you and Imran Khan”, he concluded in his last tweet.

    Earlier, there were reports that six chartered planes by Beck’s charity were seeking to evacuate at least 1,000 people, including more than 100 Americans. During his efforts, his supporters praised him for doing “more for Americans than all of Biden’s supporters combined.” 

    According to the statement made by Pakistan Foreign Office in early September, 12,000 people had been evacuated from Afghanistan with the help of Pakistan.

    Beck is one of the most controversial media figures in the US and quite well-known among conservative circles. 

  • ‘Justice is necessary to uplift the common person’: PM Khan

    ‘Justice is necessary to uplift the common person’: PM Khan

    Addressing a ceremony at the groundbreaking of the Islamabad District Courts’ building on Tuesday, Prime Minister Imran Khan said, “Justice is necessary to uplift the common person.”

    “If you want to uplift the common person […] then it is necessary to provide them justice as well and a society becomes free when it gets justice,” said PM Khan.

    PM Khan attributed Pakistan’s decline to a lack of rule of law.

    “Whatever banana republics are there aren’t because of lack of resources but because of the rule of power instead of rule of law,” he said, adding that “two Pakistans” were created in the country with different treatment between the people.

    “The biggest injustice Gen Musharraf did to the country was giving NRO,” the premier said, adding that Musharraf didn’t have a right to give NRO to the powerful because the looted money was not his but the nation’s.

    “Only a society that upholds the rule of law is prosperous,” Prime Minister Imran Khan said.

    “I was saying 25 years ago that the country can only progress when the courts are free,” he added.