Category: FEATURED

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Thursday chaired the review meeting of the National Youth Employment Plan and approved the plan to provide youth with training programmes according to market’s and industry’s demand. The meeting was briefed on the action plan to provide the youth training and employment opportunities through various institutions in the next four years. The prime minister decided to personally chair the monthly review meeting and monitor the implementation of the plan, the Prime Minister’s Office news release said. Speaking on the occasion, the prime minister said…

Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Asim Munir on Thursday vowed to bring the planners and facilitators of the recent terrorist attack on Bannu Cantonment to justice “wherever they may be”, the military’s media wing said. A statement issued from the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said the army chief visited Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Bannu district today in the wake of Tuesday’s attack. Two explosive-laden vehicles were rammed into the cantonment’s perimeter by a group of terrorists who wanted to breach it. As a result of the blasts, several houses and a mosque adjacent…

A delay in the audit process of state institutions has worried the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Auditor General of Pakistan (AGP) Ajmal Gondal told a meeting of the Publics Account Committee (PAC) on Wednesday. The development comes as discussions began this week between the IMF and Pakistan for the first biannual review of the $7 billion Extended Fund Facility to address governance and corruption vulnerabilities. While addressing today’s meeting, AGP Gondal disclosed that the IMF had expressed its concerns over nearly 600,000 pending audit paras. “The IMF has demanded early settlement of audit cases of institutions,”…

In response to a terrorist attack on the Bannu Cantonment in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, security forces eliminated 16 terrorists, including four suicide bombers, while five soldiers were martyred, the military’s media wing said on Wednesday. According to the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the attack occurred on Tuesday evening when terrorists attempted to breach the high-security zone by ramming two explosives-laden vehicles into the perimeter wall of the Bannu Cantonment. The ISPR stated, “Troops engaged the intruders with precision, eliminating all 16 terrorists, including four suicide bombers.” In the ensuing firefight, five soldiers embraced martyrdom in…

The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on Tuesday announced the men’s squad for the upcoming tour of New Zealand – Salman Ali Agha will be captaining the T20 International team while One Day International (ODI) captain, Mohammad Rizwan, will continue to lead the team in that format. However, a notable change in the T20 team is the exclusion of the country’s star batter Babar Azam and wicketkeeper Rizwan. Pakistan will play five T20s and three ODIs during the tour. The team announcement comes amid widespread criticism of the national team’s poor performance in the…

LAKKI MARWAT / NORTH WAZIRISTAN: Three policemen and a soldier were martyred and six wounded in Karak and North Waziristan over the past two days. On Wednesday night, terrorists attacked a police post in Bahadarkhel area of Karak, a police official confirmed, adding that the assailants used light and heavy weapons during the attack. He added that cops were deployed at the post loca­ted in the mountainous area on the Bannu-Hangu border. They “responded effectively and engaged the militants for two hours”. According to the official, the assailants atta­cked from…

ISLAMABAD: In order to address climate change and mobilise finance, experts have called for reforms in the public and private sectors to rake in much-needed funds req­uired to address climate change, particularly adaptation. On the first day of DawnMedia’s Breathe Pakistan International Climate Change Confe­rence, World Bank Global Director for Climate Change Valerie Hickey underscored the need for the removal of superfluous subsidies through policy reforms, such as mobilising domestic finance through taxes and expenditure. “…the mother of all policy reforms that will mobilise climate finance for which plumbing is absolutely critical is…

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has devised a new strategy to ‘register’ Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) after its previous efforts to ensure compliance failed to yield the desired results. The regulator has decided to introduce a new licensing category under which companies can apply for permits to provide VPN services. The move would eventually address the problem of what officials call unregistered VPNs, as all but those proxies provided by licensed companies would be dee­med unregistered and blocked. With licensed service providers, authorities would be able to monitor the VPN traffic, as anonymity…

KURRAM / PESHAWAR: At least 39 people, including seven women and a nine-year-old girl, were killed and 28 others injured when a convoy of passenger vehicles was ambushed in Lower Kurram on Thursday, officials confirmed, fearing that the death toll may rise further. The attack occurred in the Mandori Charkhel area, a region with a history of sectarian tensions and land disputes. Deputy Commissioner Javedullah Mehsood said the convoy, consisting of some 200 vehicles, was on its way from Parachinar to Peshawar when it came under heavy gunfire. Twelve injured passengers,…

GUJRAT: After PML-N launched its election campaign from Okara earlier this week, party supreme leader Nawaz Sharif made his first appearance on the campaign trail on Thursday, vowing to make Pakistan “stand on its feet again”. Addressing a public gathering in Hafizabad — where he arrived in a helicopter from Lahore — organised at the sports stadium, the former prime minister said it was his mission to revive the economy and end unemployment. “Had I not been removed, not one person in Hafizabad would have been unemployed,” he said. “If I was…

ISLAMABAD: The Islam­abad High Court (IHC) on Thursday again scrapped the cipher trial proceedings by setting aside the special court’s Dec 14 order sanctioning in-camera hearings. IHC Justice Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb also declared the testimonies of nine witnesses recorded before the special court illegal. The IHC was addressing an appeal challenging Special Court Judge Abual Hasnat Mohammad Zulqarnain’s Dec 14 decision, which had sanctioned a closed-door trial for former prime minister Imran Khan at the prosecution’s request. This directive also involved orders to the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority and the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority to…

ISLAMABAD: Amid the ongoing judiciary-executive tussle on the issue of Punjab polls and demands from ruling coalition lawmakers, National Assembly Speaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf on Wednesday wrote a letter to Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Umar Ata Bandial, conveying “profound concerns” of the elected representatives over recent Supreme Court orders and some comments by judges, terming them an “encroachment” on parliament’s domain. Through the five-page letter, released to the media by Information Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb, the speaker asked the apex court to “as far as possible, avoid getting involved in the political…

ISLAMABAD: An eight-judge Supreme Court bench, headed by the chief justice, will take up a set of three petitions challenging a pending legislation meant to clip CJP powers, on Thursday. However, the legal fraternity has opposed the apex court’s move to take up the petitions against an as yet proposed law, and the Pakistan Bar Council (PBC) has called on lawyers across the country to boycott courts on Thursday (today) to protest the formation of a “one-sided and controversial bench” to take up the issue “prematurely”. In addition to CJP, the bench…

ISLAMABAD/LAHORE: Annoyed by their persistent absence, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Tuesday issued bailable arrest warrants for PTI Chairman Imran Khan and senior party leader Fawad Chaudhry in a case pertaining to contempt of the ECP and chief election commissioner (CEC). Separately, Lahore police registered another case against senior PTI leaders for delivering incendiary speeches and accusing the state of hatching conspiracy to assassinate Imran Khan. A four-member ECP bench headed by member from Sindh Nisar Durrani noted that the former prime minister was not appearing before the…