Pakistan News

NOBODY knows precisely how the pieces of the Middle East jigsaw will fall into place over the coming hours and days and whether some sanity comes into play or Israel’s naked aggression against Iran sucks in the US, potentially spreading across the entire Gulf. Donald Trump says he will decide within the next two weeks whether the US will throw in its full military might behind Israel. Who’ll believe him? Remember he was suggesting no hostilities were likely to break out till the round of indirect talks in Oman between the US and Iran on ‘Sunday’ (a week ago) and Israel struck by stealth a couple of days earlier on Friday, killing the top tier of the Iranian military leadership and nuclear scientists mostly with their spouses and children in their Tehran flats. Wielding influence and policy control over the US is one thing, but it is impossible Israel would have attacked Iran without the knowledge and approval of President Trump. So, Tehran must ask itself if his stance was part of ...

India will never restore the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) with Islamabad, and the water flowing to Pakistan will be diverted for internal use, Home Minister Amit Shah said in an interview with Times of India on Saturday. Delhi unilaterally suspended its participation in the 1960 IWT , which governs the usage of the Indus river system, on April 23, shortly after 26 civilians were killed in India-held Kashmir. Delhi, without evidence, blamed Islamabad for the attack. The latter has denied the allegations and called for a neutral probe. The accord remains dormant despite a ceasefire agreed upon by the two nuclear-armed neighbours last month following their worst fighting in decades. Earlier in the month, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned India’s unilateral suspension of the IWT, describing it as a “blatant violation and act of water aggression”, and warned that Pakistan would give a befitting response in line with decisions made at the National Security Committee (NSC) meeting hel...

SUKKUR: Shikarpur sessions judge on Friday summoned head muharrars along with FIR registers to the court and had them lodge cases against a DSP, three SHOs and IT in-charge of district police on charges of committing house robberies. The court had ordered registration of cases against the police officials after receiving complaints from public but the police stations concerned had been dragging their feet over the FIRs for over a month. Finally, the judge took the extraordinary step to have the cases filed in his presence. Shikarpur SSP and his PRO did not respond to Dawn’s queries when this reporter contacted them to get their comment. A case was lodged on Ms Irshad Lehar’s complaint against Khanpur DSP Rana Nasrullah, Khanpur SHO Tufail Ahmadani, New Faujdari SHO Akhtar Abro, District Police IT Branch In-charge Saifullah Chandio, head constable Abdullah Shah and others under sections 395, 365, 427, 454, 148, 149, and 220 of the PPC on charges of committing house robbery. Head m...

KARACHI: The Supreme Court (SC) has restrained the authorities concerned from raising any structure apart from a jogging track on the premises of an amenity plot / park located in the Defence Housing Authority (DHA). The apex court also said that the people must not be deprived of the park’s utility, subject to a nominal entrance fee meant for its maintenance. A two-judge bench comprising Justice Mohammad Shafi Siddiqui and Justice Salahuddin Panhwar was hearing a civil petition filed against an order of the Sindh High Court (SHC) at the SC’s Karachi Registry. It also allowed a request by the counsel for the respondents to transfer the matter to the principal seat at Islamabad after seeking the approval of the chief justice of Pakistan, as the lawyer submitted that, since the injunctive order had been passed, the interests of the respondents were at stake. Bench rules ordinary people should not be deprived of park’s utility Citing DHA, Cantonment Board Clifton (CBC), M/s Opti...

CHITRAL: Shandur Polo Festival will start from Friday (today) in the highest polo ground of the world and it will continue for three days with matches between the teams of Chitral and Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) being the major event. The tourists will also enjoy cultural and musical evenings while fireworks and enthralling musical concerts will be arranged at night time. Arranged by the district administrations of Lower and Upper Chitral districts with the financial assistance of KP Culture and Tourism Authority, the event has been included in the calendar of events of the province. Tourists have started arriving here to proceed to the venue which is 156 kilometres from the city with travel time of five to six hours while a great number of vehicles is seen on Chitral-Booni Road leading to Shandur. The polo ground has been renovated and arrangements made for water and power supply, power generators, telephone, transport, media coverage,security and provision of other facilities. The...

LOS ANGELES — Xander Bogaerts homered among his four hits and scored three runs, and the San Diego Padres beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 5-3 on Thursday night to avoid a four-game sweep. Rookie Ryan Bergert gave up three hits in 4 2/3 scoreless innings in his fourth career start, and Adrian Morejon (4-3) followed with four consecutive outs. Jake Cronenworth had three hits. After Dodgers right-hander Jack Little — making his major league debut — hit Fernando Tatis Jr. with a pitch in the ninth inning, both benches emptied behind home plate but no punches were thrown. Dodgers manager Dave Roberts and Padres manager Mike Shildt were ejected. Padres reliever Robert Suarez hit Shohei Ohtani with a pitch in the bottom of the ninth and was ejected. Tatis and Ohtani were each hit by pitches twice in the series. Right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto (6-6) gave up three runs and seven hits over 6 1/3 innings as Los Angeles snapped a five-game winning streak. Bogaerts gave the Padres a 1-0 lead i...

Syed Baqir Ali Jafferi, 61, waited a decade. He had decided that 2025 would be the year he would do it; his younger brother’s sudden demise had further compelled him. His visa had arrived, and the bookings were complete. But then Israel attacked Iran. Jafferi, a resident of Karachi, like many others, was to embark on a pilgrimage to Iraq in Muharram, beginning June 27. The journey holds a deep spiritual place in the hearts of Shias across the world. In fact, Karbala hosts the largest gathering in the world on Ashura (Muharram 10) and Arbaeen (Safar 20). From Pakistan, a majority of pilgrims take the land route to Karbala via Iran, which is also home to key Shia religious sites in Mashhad and Kumbh. Others take the plane. Jafferi was among the latter. “All of his preparations were complete and only the tickets were to be booked, which he had planned to do on the first day of Muharram,” his niece told Dawn.com . “He was seeing this as his final trip because he can’t travel a lot due t...

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ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) has pushed the families of several of its most dedicated Central Secretariat staff members to the verge of starvation. Well-placed sources said PTI had neither reversed the 50pc salary cuts imposed on Central Secretariat staff since October last year, nor had it cleared overdue dues despite repeated promises, leaving the employees in deep distress. The affected staffers said the party leadership broke its promise by neither restoring reduced salaries nor releasing any of the withheld half-pay despite nine months having passed. They said the leadership’s callousness was evident in dismissing several loyal employees who endured detention and torture, instead of recognising their sacrifices. Sources said that while the party leadership continued to enjoy all perks and privileges, they were unwilling to spend a single penny on the party, only doing so when their leader Imran Khan was present to witness it. They lamented that PTI lawmakers, ...

VANCOUVER — Coach Jesse Marsch downplayed suggestions ahead of the start of the Concacaf Gold Cup that Canada was the odds-on favourite to win the competition.  He’s right to be cautious about the hype surrounding a Canadian men’s team that has shown promise in several major tournaments in the aftermath of its appearance at the 2022 FIFA World Cup but has fallen short of going all the way.  At the same time, there’s no denying this is a quality Canadian outfit that ranks among the truly elite nations in Concacaf. Honduras discovered this to its peril on Tuesday night in a humiliating 6-0 loss to Canada before a crowd of 24,286 at BC Place, and the rest of the teams in the 16-team Gold Cup have been likewise warned.    Canada sits atop Group B with three points, ahead of Curaçao and El Salvador (one point each) and Honduras (zero points). The top two teams in each of the four round robin groups at the Gold Cup advance to the knockout round. The Canadians can ...

KARACHI: The board of directors of Fauji Fertiliser Company Ltd (FFCL) has approved the submission of an expression of interest (EoI) and pre-qualification documents to the Privatisation Commission for acquiring stakes in Pakistan International Airlines Corporation Ltd, along with a comprehensive due diligence process. FFCL shared this development in a stock filing on Monday. The 234th board meeting of FFCL was held on June 13, at which the decision to acquire PIA shares was taken. The government last month extended the deadline to submit EoI for buying PIACL until June 19 from June 3 deadline with all terms and conditions remaining the same. In a surprising turn of events, the People’s Unity of Pakistan International Airlines employees’ union, which had previously opposed the privatisation of PIA, has now submitted a bid to the Privatisation Commission to acquire shares of PIA and gain management control. While submitting the EoI, the joint letter, signed by the central president...

• WWF-P adviser suggests the marine mammal may have died after becoming entangled in gillnets • The most recent sighting of the world’s largest mammal was off the coast of Gadani in April last year KARACHI: A 35-foot-long blue whale was found dead in the Arabian sea, in a remote area called Gwater Bay, between Pakistan and Iran, on Monday. According to officials representing the World Wide Fund for Nature-Pakistan (WWF-Pakistan), local fisherman Ahmad Baloch spotted the dead whale floating near Kuntani, Balochistan. “It is likely that the whale may have died a few days back in the open sea between Pakistan and Iran and drifted towards the Gwater Bay by rough sea and strong currents,” said Muhammad Moazzam Khan, technical adviser at the WWF-Pakistan. He added that while the exact cause of the death could not be ascertained, the marine mammal might have gotten entangled in gillnets, commonly used in the coastal and offshore waters in the area for fishing. Classified as an endanger...

ISLAMABAD: While Islamabad police on Monday claimed to have arrested the alleged killer of a 22-year-old female student of International Islamic University Islamabad (IIUI), human rights activists demanded adequate proof to ensure that the actual perpetrator had been apprehended. Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG) Islamabad Mohammad Jawad Tariq told a press conference at Rescue 15 that they had achieved a major success by tracing and arresting the suspect in the blind murder case. “The arrested accused has been identified as Feroz, a resident of Jhang, who had gone into hiding after the incident,” the DIG added. He said the arrested man had entered a girls’ hostel and fired a shot at the student that led to her death. Several police teams were formed under the command of the SSP operations and SSP investigations. “These teams employed modern techniques and human intelligence to arrest the accused. Police teams obtained sketches of the suspect, videos from nearby buildings and...

In April, President Trump told journalists in the Oval Office that he was pretty confident there would be a deal with Iran “without having to start dropping bombs all over the place”. A little more than a month later, Israel is doing exactly that — dropping bombs all over the place. It is now clear that the bait for surprising the Persians was dialogue with the US; talks that were cancelled and rescheduled to allow the Israelis to attack, and that Trump was playing his role in this deception. Meanwhile, the West offers pathetic platitudes to de-escalation but sends jets to Israel, the glorified petrol stations of the Gulf look on with feigned concern as Israel does their bidding, and non-Arab states like Pakistan avert their gaze haplessly as Tehran is ravaged by bombs battle-tested on Palestinians. It is only Iran that stands against Israel, and it stands completely alone. Cast in the same mould Iran and Israel are surprisingly alike. Both countries are nestled among neighbour...

SOUTH WAZIRISTAN/KOHAT: A Frontier Corps (FC) soldier was martyred in a targeted gun attack in Ladha tehsil of Upper South Waziristan district on Sunday night. Ladha assistant commissioner Shadman Safi said the incident occurred when the soldier, Lance Naik Iqbal Khan, was on duty. “Armed men opened fire on him without warning, resulting in his death on the spot. Despite retaliatory fire by the security forces, the attackers managed to escape from the scene,” he added. Meanwhile, a police official was martyred when terrorists attacked a checkpost in Ghiljo area of Orakzai district on Saturday night. Sub-divisional police officer Mehboob Khan told Dawn that an unknown number of terrorists surrounded the police post at around 9.40pm and started indiscriminate fire at it, which was duly retaliated by the personnel, and the exchange of fire continued for about an hour. During the fierce skirmish, a sub-inspector Inayatullah hailing from Kohat district was martyred. The terrorists late...

New Delhi said on Monday its diplomats were helping some Indian students relocate out of harm’s way in Iran, which has come under days of deadly Israeli bombardment . Tehran has hit back with strikes against Israel since it unleashed waves of attacks against Iran on Friday, sparking global alarm that the conflict could erupt into a regional war. New Delhi, which has relations with both countries, has sought to relocate its citizens within Iran after Tehran closed its airspace. “The Indian Embassy in Tehran is continuously monitoring the security situation and engaging Indian students in Iran to ensure their safety,” a foreign ministry statement said. “In some cases, students are being relocated with [the] Embassy’s facilitation to safer places within Iran,” the ministry added. There are around 10,000 Indian citizens in Iran, according to government data last year, while figures from 2022 listed more than 2,000 students in Iran. New Delhi on Friday said it stood ready “to ex...

A SECRET MEDIATION Little is known publicly about President Asif Ali Zardari’s efforts to play a mediatory role and seek a rapprochement between Iran and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. In January 2011, the Iranian president’s special envoy invited Zardari to a conference on the global ‘War Against Terror’ in Tehran. Despite advisers suggesting Pakistan participate at a lower level, Zardari readily accepted and decided to attend personally. During his visit to Tehran in June 2011 for the conference, Zardari met with Rahbar Ayatollah Khamenei. After initial pleasantries, Zardari asked his delegation members to leave him alone with Iran’s supreme leader. The contents of their discussion remained undisclosed. A press release from the Rahbar’s office merely reiterated the usual diplomatic language about “historical, cultural and religious bonds” and the need to “strengthen Tehran-Islamabad relations in all areas.” Unusually, Zardari revisited Tehran the following month, meeting the Rahbar ...