Tag: Top News

  • UK asked to speed up Shahzad Akbar’s handover to Pakistan

    UK asked to speed up Shahzad Akbar’s handover to Pakistan

    The government of Pakistan has requested the United Kingdom to speed up the process of extraditing Shahzad Akbar, who served as an Advisor to former PM Imran Khan, to Pakistan, The News reported.

    Shahzad is accused in multiple cases in Pakistan and he fled the country in 2022 shortly after Imran Khan lost his government through a vote of no-confidence.

    On the orders of the Interior Ministry, the FIA contacted Interpol to issue a red warrant to bring Shahzad Akbar to Pakistan.

    However, a year has passed but no major progress could be made in this case.

    The News reported the investigators of the case registered under Sections 420, 468, 471, 385, 396, 389, 500 and 506 of the Pakistan Penal Code had requested Interpol for help in arresting Shahzad Akbar.

  • Kabul to cooperate with Pakistan in probing Bisham terror attack

    Kabul to cooperate with Pakistan in probing Bisham terror attack

    The Foreign Office of Pakistan on Friday stated that Taliban authorities in Afghanistan had assured Pakistan of their cooperation in the investigation into the Bisham suicide attack in which five Chinese nationals and their Pakistani driver were killed.

    “The Afghan side has agreed to examine the findings of the investigation and to work with Pakistan to take the investigation to its logical conclusion,” said the FO spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch in a press briefing.

    This development came after the visit of a high-level delegation led by Interior Secretary Khurram Agha to Kabul.

    China also welcomed the progress in the investigation and urged Pakistani authorities to bring the perpetrators to justice.

    In recent years, tensions between Afghanistan and Pakistan have flared up as Pakistan blames Afghanistan for letting their territory be used by TTP against Pakistan.

  • Heatwave in India kills 33, including election officials

    Heatwave in India kills 33, including election officials

    Thirty-three people, including election officials on duty, died of suspected heatstroke in three major Indian states on Friday, including Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Odisha.

    Fourteen people died in Bihar on Thursday, including 10 people involved in organising the seven-phase national elections that are currently underway. Many election officials are usually required to stand on duty all day, many times outdoors.

    Parts of Bihar are voting in the final round of polling on Saturday as well.

    In Uttar Pradesh, nine election personnel, including security persons, died on Friday, government officials said.

    Ten deaths were reported from the government hospital in Odisha on Thursday, authorities said, prompting government to advise against outdoor activities between 11:00 am and 3:00 pm local time when temperatures heighten.

    Three people died of suspected heatstroke in Jharkhand state, neighbouring Bihar.

    India has been experiencing a record hot summer. A locality of the capital Delhi recorded the country’s highest-ever temperature at 52.9°C this week.

    While temperatures in north-western and central India are expected to fall in the coming days, the prevailing heatwave over eastern India is likely to continue for two days, according to India’s Meteorological Department (IMD), which declares a heatwave when the temperature is 4.5°C to 6.4°C higher than normal.

    The last phase of voting is scheduled to be held on Saturday and votes will be in counted on Tuesday.

    However, the deadly heatwave in the South Asian region is expected to continue until Saturday.

  • When are Eid ul Azha holidays expected?

    When are Eid ul Azha holidays expected?

    The Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) has predicted that there is a high chance of Eidul Adha 2024 to be observed on June 17, Monday.

    The PMD’s Climate Data Processing Centre has predicted that the crescent moon for Zul Hajj will be born on June 6 at 5:38 PM, reports Samaa News.

    Despite the forecasts, the Central Ruet-e-Hilal Committee will make the final decision regarding the moon sighting in the country.

    Holiday schedule

    The official 2024 holiday calendar has earmarked the Eid ul Azha holidays from June 17 to 19.

    However, considering the tendency of most government offices to remain closed on Saturdays and Sundays, the holiday period will effectively commence on June 15.

    A formal notification detailing the revised holidays will be issued by the federal government in the days leading up to Eid ul Azha.

  • Two suspects arrested for murdering babrbershop workers in Gawadar

    Two suspects arrested for murdering babrbershop workers in Gawadar

    Balochistan Home Minister Zia Ullah Langau announced on Friday that two suspects involved in the murder of barbershop workers in Gawadar have been arrested.

    Seven barbershop workers from Punjab were killed when they were sleeping in their apartment near the Gwadar Fish Harbour in the Surbandar area of the coastal town earlier this month. One worker was injured in the incident.

    “I congratulate all our institutions who fulfilled their responsibility and the government’s orders with their efforts, and we have arrested two killers of the Gwadar labourers,” Langau said while addressing a press conference in Quetta.

    The arrested suspects revealed during the investigation that they had been ordered to kill any labourer from Punjab.

    Zia Ullah Langau also stated that millitants targeted innocent citizens, worsening the peace and security situation in Balochistan.

    “Terrorists have nothing to do with our rights. We will go the extra mile for those speaking up for the rights of Balochistan,” Langau added.

  • Marwat says won’t compromise on self-respect, can’t work in PTI

    Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) maverick Sher Afzal Marwat posted on X (formerly Twitter) to complain about the treatment handed out to him by his party and said, “No one should expect me to beg for duties because my self-esteem has been hurt.”

    A social media user commented under Marwat’s post asking what the PTI leadership is doing in getting Khan out of jail to which Marwat replied, “The party has relieved me of all my responsibilities. Clearly, this has been done under Khan Sahib’s instructions. Now, I have no responsibilities and have decided to spend my time as I please.”

    Marwat seemed to get some closure with an almost emotional response after saying that his self-esteem had been hurt due to the treatment meted out to him by the party leaders.

    He even admitted, “I can be a little unusual and psychotic in certain situations but of all things, self-respect is at the top of my list of priorities. I was once publicly ignored, humiliated, disgraced and disrespected by the very people I fought for.”

    Sher Afzal Marwat concluded by saying that he wouldn’t participate in any party activities until Imran Khan himself asked him to do so.

  • USAID contractor resigns, alleging work on Palestine was censored

    Alexander Smith, a contractor for the US Agency for International Development (USAID), resigned from his private sector position, saying he could no longer perform contract work for the Biden administration after a presentation he was preparing on Gaza’s humanitarian crisis was cancelled.

    Smith claimed that USAID gave him a choice between resigning or dismissal after he attempted to give a presentation on maternal and child mortality among Palestinians, says a report published by The Guardian.

    “I cannot do my job in an environment in which specific people cannot be acknowledged as fully human, or where gender and human rights principles apply to some, but not to others, depending on their race,” Smith wrote in his resignation letter quoted by The Guardian.

    Smith’s resignation adds to a small but growing list of officials working inside or for the US government who have resigned in protest against the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

    On Tuesday, Stacy Gilbert, a career official in the US State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (PRM), told staff she was resigning because she felt the State Department had wrongly concluded that Israel was not preventing the entry of aid into Gaza.

    Earlier this month, Lilly Greenberg Call became the first Jewish-American political official to resign. Call worked in the Department of Interior, but there have been a number of high-profile resignations from officials working on the Middle East and defence.

    Major Harrison Mann tendered his resignation from the Department of Defence Intelligence Agency in May, citing Washington’s support for the war on Gaza.

  • PTI legal team charged under anti-terrorism law for attacking Khawar Maneka

    PTI legal team charged under anti-terrorism law for attacking Khawar Maneka

    The Police on Thursday filed an anti-terror case along with other charges against a group of lawyers who allegedly attacked Khawar Maneka, ex-husband of former First Lady Bushra Bibi, on court premises as he was leaving the site after appearing in the Iddat case, Dawn reported.

    However, an FIR was not lodged by the victim but an inspector of the capital police, Imtiaz Ahmed. The FIR nominated six lawyers and 20 to 25 unknown people, including women.

    As per the FIR, a lawyer threatened and attacked Maneka when he came outside of the courtroom along with other lawyers and as a result he fell down on the ground.

    Meanwhile, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Amir Masood Mughal said the registration of a “false terrorism case” against Imran Khan’s legal team was a conspiracy hatched by the “illegitimate” government.

    He said that police had registered an anti-terror case against the PTI legal team because an “unknown person” slapped Khawar Maneka.

  • Naswar is drug of poor, not forbidden in Sharia: KP Agriculture Minister

    Naswar is drug of poor, not forbidden in Sharia: KP Agriculture Minister

    Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) agriculture minister Major (ret) Sajjad Khattak has said that the provincial government has imposed a tax on tobacco used in Naswar, adding that the usage of Naswar is neither a sin nor a reward.

    The provincial agriculture minister told the provincial assembly that Naswar is the drug of the poor and it is not even forbidden in Sharia.

    Opposition members of the KP assembly, including Sobia Shahid and Ahmad Kundi, tabled a bill demanding more tax on Naswar and cigarettes, as they are luxuries, and that the tax on private schools should be abolished.

    Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Sobia Shahid said that the tax on tobacco exports should be increased, and that it should be abolished in schools and colleges.

  • Pakistan ranks shockingly low in tourism, report reveals

    Pakistan ranks shockingly low in tourism, report reveals

    World Economic Forum (WEF) has released a ranking of countries in the Travel and Tourism Development Index (TTDI) where Pakistan’s ranking is surprisingly low.

    Pakistan has been ranked 101 out of 119 countries, classified as a lower-middle-income economy and is part of the Asia-Pacific regional group.

    The top 30 countries in the TTDI accounted for over 75 percent of the travel and tourism industry GDP in 2022, and 70 percent of GDP growth between 2020 and 2022.

    However, the lower half of the list consisted of African countries.

    Ranking among South Asia

    In South-East Asia, Pakistan ranks slightly above Nepal (105) and Bangladesh (109), but far below India (39) and Sri Lanka (76).

    Ranking among Middle Eastern Countries

    Within the Middle East, the United Arab Emirates topped the rankings at 18, followed by Saudi Arabia (41), Qatar, (53) and Bahrain (18). The United States topped the overall list, followed by Spain, Japan, and France. The remainder of the top ten list comprised Australia, Germany, the United Kingdom, China, Italy, and Switzerland.

    WEF report highlighted challenges being faced within the industry. Global inflation, global conflict, and environmental issues such as wildfires in tourist destinations, have generated additional pressure.

    However, the report predicts that in the coming years, the travel and tourism industry will bear the brunt of geopolitical tensions, macroeconomic uncertainty, and possible challenges brought on by artificial intelligence.

    Whilst developing economies like Pakistan have shown improvement in TTDI scores, many areas still need investment in enabling tourism conditions.