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Found 6698 news

  • Indian veterans to be redeployed as security guards in held Kashmir
    Dawn - 04:43 May 18, 2025
    SRINAGAR: Military veterans will be redeployed as security guards in India-occupied Kashmir, New Delhi said on Saturday, a week after reaching a ceasefire with Islamabad. The government of the occupied state in Srinagar approved a “proposal for mobilising ex-servicemen (ESM) to safeguard vital infrastructure”, according to a government press release. Around 4,000 veterans have been “identified” as non-combatant volunteers, out of which 435 have licensed personal weapons, it said. This will help by “significantly enhancing the capacity to respond effectively to localised security situations”, the government added. Veterans will work in “static guard” roles, focusing on “presence-based deterrence and local coordination”. India already has an estimated half a million soldiers permanently deployed in held Kashmir. But last year, thousands of additional troops, including special forces, were deployed across the occupied territory’s mountainous south following a series of deadly attacks that had left more than 50 s...
    Tags: Kashmir
  • Business leaders up in arms against new tax law
    Dawn - 04:18 May 18, 2025
    KARACHI: Business leaders have harshly criticised the Tax Ordinance Amendments 2025, warning that misguided policies from within the government pose a greater threat to the country’s economic stability than external adversaries. “We request Army Chief General Asim Munir to keep a vigilant eye on the country’s policymakers who are bent on causing irreparable losses to the country,” said Nasir Khan, vice president of the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI), during a press conference on the amendments held at the Federation House on Saturday. He was accompanied by other FPCCI leaders. Nasir Khan recalled that the army chief had assured the business community of safeguarding investments in Pakistan. “The enemy is not only on the border — it is also formulating destructive policies that are forcing investors and citizens to flee the country,” he added. FPCCI Senior Vice President Saquib Fayyaz Magoon expressed concern over the sweeping powers granted to tax officials under the new ordi...
    Tags: Business
  • WWF-Pakistan opposes move to export snow leopards to Russia
    Dawn - 04:15 May 18, 2025
    ISLAMABAD: WWF-Pakistan on Saturday demanded that the proposed export of snow leopards from Pakistan to Russia be immediately cancelled and reaffirmed Pakistan’s commitment to the conservation of its iconic wildlife species. The organisation called for strengthening the Naltar Rescue and Rehabilitation Centre to function as a dedicated facility for wildlife rescue, rehabilitation, and veterinary care. “A move to transfer the snow leopards from Gilgit-Baltistan to Moscow not only contradicts national and international conservation commitments but also risks setting a highly detrimental precedent for future transfer of threatened and iconic wildlife species from Pakistan,” WWF-Pakistan said in a letter to the Ministry of Climate Change and Environmental Coordination on the proposed transfer of two snow leopards, currently housed at the Naltar Rescue and Rehabilitation Centre, to the Moscow Zoo, Russia. According to WWF-Pakistan, the snow leopard is listed as a threatened (vulnerable) species on the IUCN Red Lis...
    Tags: WWF-Pakistan Russia
  • Trump to speak to Russian, Ukrainian leaders on Monday after Turkiye talks
    Dawn - 18:48 May 17, 2025
    US President Donald Trump said on Saturday he would speak to the presidents of Russia and Ukraine on Monday following talks between the two sides at which a Ukrainian official said Moscow’s negotiators voiced new demands before a ceasefire could be agreed. In Moscow, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told Russian news agencies preparations were underway for a conversation between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Trump. The talks in Turkiye on Friday were the first time the sides had held face-to-face talks since March 2022, weeks after Russia’s full-scale invasion of its smaller neighbour. A senior Ukrainian official familiar with the talks said Russian negotiators demanded Ukraine pull its troops out of all Ukrainian regions claimed by Moscow before they would agree to a ceasefire. Trump, writing on Truth Social, said he would speak with Putin to discuss stopping the war at 10am on Monday. “The subjects of the call will be, stopping the ‘bloodbath’ that is killing, on average, more than 5000 Russian and...
    Tags: Turkiye Ukrainian Russian Monday Trump
  • PM Shehbaz, DG ISPR hail Iran’s peace efforts amid Pak-India escalation
    Dawn - 18:32 May 17, 2025
    Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Inter-Services Public Relations Director General Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry have lauded Iran’s peace efforts in the recent Pakistan-India conflict and warned of “forces” seeking to create a rift among the two brotherly countries. Just two days after India, without any evidence, blamed Pakistan over last month’s deadly attack in occupied Kashmir’s Pahalgam, Iran had offered to mediate between the two as tensions escalated. A press release from the PM’s Office said the premier had a telephonic conversation with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian. “During their warm and cordial conversation, the prime minister conveyed his warm regards to Supreme Leader Ayatullah Khamenei and thanked President Pezeshkian for Iran’s sincere and brotherly diplomatic efforts to defuse tensions in South Asia. He particularly thanked the president for his telephone call to the prime minister last month as well as for sending Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi to the region during the crisis,” the PMO...
    Tags: Iran
  • PM tasks Bilawal with presenting Pakistan’s case ‘for peace’ on global arena
    Dawn - 17:39 May 17, 2025
    Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Saturday tasked PPP Chairman and former foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari to present Pakistan’s “case for peace” on the global arena in the aftermath of the recent military escalation with India. The military confrontation between India and Pakistan came as tensions over last month’s Pahalgam attack continued to build up. On the night of May 6-7, New Delhi launched a series of air strikes in Punjab and Azad Kashmir, resulting in civilian casualties. Islamabad responded by downing five Indian jets. After intercepting drones sent by India and tit-for-tat strikes on each other’s airbases, it took American intervention on May 10, when tensions between the two countries peaked, for both sides to finally drop their guns as a ceasefire was reached. India has since continued its aggressive posturing even as Pakistan has warned against any further military aggression and offered talks. The military flare-up saw China expressing solid diplomatic support to Pakistan, but there wasn...
    Tags: Pakistan
  • FIA detains 4 Pakistani suspected human smugglers from UAE in Karachi
    Dawn - 16:50 May 17, 2025
    The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Saturday arrested four suspects in Karachi believed to be involved in human trafficking in the United Arab Emirates. According to a statement issued by the FIA today, four suspects from UAE were detained after the agency conducted an operation at the Karachi airport. “The suspects were involved illegal activities in the UAE,” the statement said. It said that the suspects, belonging to Hafizabad, Mandi Bahauddin and Gujranwala, were arrested by UAE authorities and deported to Pakistan upon completion of their sentences. “They arrived in Pakistan on emergency passports,” the statement added. The crackdown against human trafficking and illegal activities was ongoing, it said, adding that global cooperation was essential against human smugglers running prostitution rings. “The suspects were transferred to the Anti-Human Trafficking Circle in Karachi for further legal action,” the statement said. All resources are being utilised to eliminate human trafficking, it concluded...
    Tags: Karachi
  • UK urges ‘all sides’ to meet treaty obligations amid India’s suspension of IWT
    Dawn - 16:25 May 17, 2025
    UK’s Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs David Lammy on Saturday urged “all sides” to abide by their treaty obligations, referring to India’s move last month to hold the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) with Pakistan in abeyance unilaterally. Delhi’s suspension of its participation in the 1960 IWT was part of its series of measures against Pakistan, which it blamed, without any evidence, for a deadly attack in occupied Kashmir’s Pahalgam. Pakistan strongly denied any involvement and offered a neutral probe into it. “We would urge all sides to meet their treaty obligations,” Lammy told Reuters in Islamabad at the end of his two-day visit, when asked about India’s April 23 suspension of the (IWT), potentially squeezing Pakistan’s water supply. The 1960 pact governs the use of the Indus River system. Pakistan has said it would consider “any attempt to stop or divert the flow of water belonging to Pakistan” to be an “act of war”. Islamabad plans to launch international legal action against India over its move. The Pa...
    Tags: India
  • Moody’s cuts America’s pristine credit rating, citing rising debt
    Dawn - 15:17 May 17, 2025
    Moody’s downgraded the US sovereign credit rating on Friday due to concerns about the nation’s growing $36 trillion debt pile in a move that could complicate President Donald Trump’s efforts to cut taxes and send ripples through global markets. Moody’s first gave the United States its pristine “Aaa” rating in 1919 and is the last of the three major credit agencies to downgrade it. “Successive US administrations and Congress have failed to agree on measures to reverse the trend of large annual fiscal deficits and growing interest costs,” Moody’s said on Friday, as it changed its outlook on the US to “stable” from “negative”. The announcement drew criticism from people close to Trump. Stephen Moore, former senior economic adviser to Trump and an economist at Heritage Foundation, called the move “outrageous”. “If a US backed government bond isn’t triple A-asset then what is?” he told Reuters. White House communications director Steven Cheung reacted to the downgrade via a social media post, singling out Moody’s ...
    Tags: Moody
  • Iran’s Khamenei says Trump is lying when he speaks of peace
    Dawn - 14:03 May 17, 2025
    Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei accused Donald Trump on Saturday of lying when the US president said during his Gulf tour this week that he wanted peace in the region. On the contrary, said Khamenei, the United States uses its power to give “10-ton bombs to the Zionist (Israeli) regime to drop on the heads of Gaza’s children”. Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One after departing the United Arab Emirates on Friday that Iran had to move quickly on a US proposal for its nuclear programme or “something bad’s going to happen”. Earlier on Saturday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Trump speaks about peace while simultaneously making threats. “Which should we believe?” Pezeshkian said at a naval event in Tehran. “On the one hand, he speaks of peace and on the other, he threatens with the most advanced tools of mass killing.” Tehran would continue Iran-US nuclear talks but is not afraid of threats. “We are not seeking war,” Pezeshkian said. His remarks, said Khamenei, “aren’t even worth resp...
    Tags: Khamenei Iran Trump
  • Security forces kill two assailants after they attempt to attack FC post in Turbat: police
    Dawn - 13:30 May 17, 2025
    Security forces killed two armed assailants on Friday night in an encounter after they tried to attack a Frontier Corps (FC) check post in Balochistan’s Turbat city of Kech district, according to the police. Faced with increasing attacks by militants, especially in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, security forces have also intensified counterterrorism operations. According to a police statement, Kech SSP Zohaib Mohsin said, “Unidentified armed men tried to attack an FC check post last night, but the forces killed the two armed men in retaliation. “While chasing the two armed men, they were surrounded and killed in Sangani Sar and their bodies were later handed over to the administration. However, the identities of the slain men have not been ascertained yet,” the statement quoted him as having said. In another incident in Nasirabad, 40 kilometres from Turbat, women and children were injured when a grenade was thrown at a house. According to police office Zahoor Ahmed, unidentified motorcyclists threw a gre...
    Tags: Turbat Security
  • Aleema Khanum and PTI’s Kanwal Shauzab face off in tense court exchange over leaked video
    Dawn - 13:00 May 17, 2025
    PTI founder Imran Khan’s sister Aleema Khanum and former party MNA Kanwal Shauzab had a tense exchange in court on Saturday over a video that surfaced of the latter criticising the former. In the recently surfaced video, Shauzab can be allegedly heard and seen criticising Aleema for disrespecting party office-holders and interim chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan, saying that Imran’s sister should not dent the party. Shauzab allegedly said she would confront Aleema herself over the issue. That happened today as Shauzab approached Aleema in the Rawalpindi anti-terrorism court (ATC), saying she wanted to talk to her. However, Imran’s sister said: “Just leave it. What you said was right. Many other people speak against us. We are now used to such accusations.” To this, Shauzab told her that she wanted to speak with her in this regard to which Aleema rebuffed her, saying: “I am not angry with you, [now] go.” Shauzab replied: “A specific part of an old video of mine was used against me.” Aleema subsequently told he...
    Tags: Aleema Khanum
  • International law & Indus wars
    Dawn - 12:40 May 17, 2025
    ON April 23, India unilaterally declared the Indus Waters Treaty to be “in abeyance” — a term neither recognised in treaty law nor found in the IWT itself. The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT) — the authoritative international agreement on treaty law — instead describes a party’s releasing itself from its treaty obligations as a ‘suspension’. Treaties such as the IWT are not limited by time, continuing instead in perpetuity under Article 42 of the VCLT. And under Article 57 of the VCLT, a treaty can only be suspended if it allows for such suspension, or with the mutual consent of all contracting parties. The IWT, a multilateral treaty with India, Pakistan and the World Bank as signatories, does not provide for suspension and can unilaterally only be terminated or suspended if a party commits a material breach of treaty as described under Article 60 of the VCLT. India’s accusations of Pakistan’s alleged role in the Pahalgam attack are completely unsubstantiated; but in any event, that attack has...
  • ISKP claims responsibility for May 11 Peshawar suicide attack
    Dawn - 11:13 May 17, 2025
    PESHAWAR: Terrorist group Islamic State’s regional affiliate Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) has claimed responsibility for the May 11 suicide blast, which martyred two police officials and injured three here. In its weekly publication Al-Naba on Friday, the ISKP insisted that one of its members, Abu Ibrahim al-Khorasani, carried out the suicide attack by detonating his explosive belt when the police tried to stop him at a checkpost in the jurisdiction of the Chamkani police station. Police investigators believe that the police weren’t the target of the suicide bomber, who actually wanted to attack a Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl gathering at the party’s Mufti Mehmood Markaz headquarters, which was attended by leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman the same night. “It appears that the bomber’s target was the JUI-F gathering, but it has yet to be confirmed,” a source in the police’s counter-terrorism department told Dawn. Police believe bomber was planning to target JUI-F rally He, however, said an investigation was ...
    Tags: ISKP
  • PTI’s Shah Mahmood Qureshi moved to cardio institute due to heart pain
    Dawn - 09:54 May 17, 2025
    Former foreign minister and PTI leader Shah Mahmood Qureshi has been moved from Lahore’s Kot Lakhpat Jail to the Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC) on Saturday after he suffered heart pain, his lawyer said on Saturday. Qureshi has been indicted in multiple cases pertaining to the May 9, 2023 riots and has remained behind bars since August 2023. Speaking to Dawn.com today, Advocate Rana Mudassar, Qureshi’s lawyer, said his client suffered heart pain early in the morning after Fajr prayers. He underwent a medical assessment by prison doctors. “He was shifted to the PIC by Rescue 1122 after his health failed to improve,” Mudassar said, adding that Qureshi was currently undergoing various tests at the hospital. The PTI leader’s family had been informed about his condition, the lawyer added. In a post on X today, Qureshi’s son urged the nation to pray for his speedy recovery. In July 2024, the PTI vice-president was indicted by a Lahore anti-terrorism court in a case registered by the Shadman police over alleged...
    Tags: Shah Mahmood Qureshi
  • 38,229 Pakistani Haj pilgrims under govt scheme landed in Saudi Arabia so far
    Dawn - 09:41 May 17, 2025
    The Pakistan Haj Mission (PHM) has welcomed 38,229 pilgrims in Saudi Arabia (Madina and Makkah) under the government scheme since the start of the month-long pre-Haj flight operation on April 29. These pilgrims arrived via 143 flights under the government scheme, while 3,440 more intending pilgrims through 13 flights will reach the holy land today, said Muhammad Umar Butt, a spokesman for the Ministry of Religious Affairs. Sharing the details with APP, he said that there are five scheduled flights from Lahore, four from Karachi, three from Islamabad and one from Multan today. This year, the PHM will host over 88,380 pilgrims under the government scheme and more than 23,000 under the private scheme. He said that as possession of the Nusuk Card is a mandatory requirement for entering Haram Sharif, the pilgrims are being given these through Tawafa Company Al-Rajhi, responsible for facilitating Pakistani pilgrims during Haj, soon after their arrival. The PHM is utilising Pak Haj App, two toll-free helplines 80024...
    Tags: Saudi Arabia Pakistani
  • PM Shehbaz nominates ministers Kheal Das, Ramesh Singh to attend oath-taking ceremony of Pope Leo
    Dawn - 09:27 May 17, 2025
    Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has received an invitation to attend the oath-taking ceremony of the new spiritual leader of Catholic Christians Pope Leo XIV, and has nominated two ministers to participate in the event, state-run Radio Pakistan reported. Cardinal Robert Prevost was elected in a surprise choice to be the new leader of the Catholic Church earlier in the month, taking the name Leo XIV, becoming the first American pontiff. Last week, the newly elected Pope welcomed the ceasefire between Pakistan and India in his first Sunday message, the pontiff had said he was glad to hear of the recent Pakistan-India ceasefire and hoped negotiations would lead to a lasting accord between the nuclear-armed neighbours. According to the Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony, PM Shehbaz has nominated the Minister of State for Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony Kheal Das Kohistani, along with Punjab’s Minister for Minority Affairs, Ramesh Singh Arora, to attend the ceremony. They will represent Pa...
    Tags: Pope Shehbaz
  • HBL PSL 2025: Action resumes after nine-day hiatus with playoffs race wide open
    Dawn - 08:36 May 17, 2025
    ISLAMABAD: The HBL Pakistan Super League (PSL) is set to resume on Saturday after a nine-day hiatus with the league entering a decisive phase as five teams remain in the hunt for the four playoff spots. The league was postponed due to cross-border tensions taking place between Pakistan and India between the early hours of May 7 and May 10, when the escalation seized after a ceasefire agreement. The disruption had seen overseas players fly out of the country before the Pakistan Cricket Board’s decision to resume the tournament got the six franchises scrambling to get their squads back together. With only eight matches left in the league stage of the 34-match season, the battle for qualification has intensified, with last year’s finalists Multan Sultans already knocked out of contention after losing eight of their nine matches. The Rawalpindi leg will host the final round of league matches before the playoffs shift to Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore, scheduled from May 21 to 25, with May 24 marked as a rest day. Satu...
  • FBR overhaul, laptop scheme among Rs143bn projects cleared by CDWP
    Dawn - 07:48 May 17, 2025
    ISLAMABAD: The Central Development Working Party (CDWP) on Friday cleared 10 development projects worth Rs143 billion, including a Rs41bn initiative to revamp the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), enabling the government to secure a $150 million loan from the World Bank despite a more than 225 per cent increase in project costs. The CDWP meeting, presided over by Pla­n­­­ning Minister Ahsan Iqbal, also cleared Rs27bn expansion of laptop scheme in Pun­jab and Sindh’s Rs60bn worth of three major projects in the roads and education sectors. The meeting requested the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (Ecnec) to formally approve five projects worth Rs127.1bn and itself approved five other projects worth Rs15.9bn. Under the current financial rules, the CDWP is empowered to approve projects costing up to Rs7.5bn, while the projects of higher estimated costs are approved by Ecnec on the recommendations of the CDWP after clearance on technical grounds. The meeting approved the “Construction of Academi...
    Tags: CDWP
  • Leaders booked over pro-army rally in Lahore: PTI
    Dawn - 07:04 May 17, 2025
    LAHORE: The Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) has claimed its leaders and workers have been booked for taking out a ‘Pakistan Zindabad’ rally, after an FIR was registered against them for ‘rioting armed with deadly weapons’, ‘mischief by injury to public road, bridge’ and other similar alleged offences. According to party and police sources, the Lahore police registered the FIR against the PTI leaders and workers for taking out a rally to express solidarity with the armed forces, burning Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s effigy, and torching tyres on Ferozepur Road near Model Town. The FIR was registered against PTI Lahore president Imtiaz Sheikh, Zaheer Abbas Khokhar, Ali Warraich and around 50 other workers under Sections 290 (public nuisance), 291 (Continuance of nuisance after injunction to discontinue), 148 (rioting armed with deadly weapons), 149 (Every member of unlawful assembly guilty of offence committed in prosecution of common object) and 431 (mischief by injury to public road, bridge) of the PPC...
    Tags: Lahore

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