E-PAPER 23 MARCH 2020 (ISB)

CMYK

Monday, 23 March, 2020 I 27 Rajab, 1441 I Rs 20.00 I Vol X No 264 I 60 Pages I Islamabad Edition

Sindh locked down for 15 dayS g

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TwO MOre peOple die Of cOrOna as cases crOss 750 pM says panic will cause MOre daMage, rules OuT lOcKdOwn

ISLAMABAD/KARACHI/LAHORE

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staff report

s coronavirus cross 750, the sindh government has decided to completely shut down the province for 15 days, whereas the federal government is still uncertain about the decision on account economic damage.

The number of cases was recorded at 764 on Tuesday by midnight, with two deaths reported in Quetta, Balochistan and di Khan, Khyber pakhtunkhwa. “a woman who came from Taftan, who later died while being shifted to dera ismail Khan, her results are back and her samples have also tested positive for coronavirus. Therefore, three deaths have been reported from the virus in Kp,” a spokesperson said.

CURFEW IN SINDH: The provincewide curfew announced by sindh chief Minister Murad ali shah came into effect at midnight. according to a notification issued in the evening, there was “a complete ban on movement of people including intercity or interprovincial travel or gatherings of any kind for social, religious, or any other purpose at any place, public or private, including all offices, public or private situated within the territorial limits” of sindh.

The notification said anyone related to health services like hospitals, laboratories, and medical stores, law enforcement agencies, any person in the need of medical care (with an attendant where necessary) or going to buy groceries and

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sindh gOvT enfOrces sTringenT curBs On puBlic MOveMenT, suspend flighTs

punJaB, BalOchisTan seeK deplOyMenT Of TrOOps in Bid TO iMpleMenT anTi-cOrOna Measures

medicines were exempt during the lock-down. “necessary and/or unavoidable religious rites like last rites, namaaz-e-Janaza, Burial and related events [were exempt] provided that all precautions against the spread of disease are taken and a safe distance of 01 metre (3 feet) is maintained between people gathered in small numbers/ close family members after prior intimation to shO of the area,” the notification added. “assistant commissioner and sdpO of the area will supervise and as and when necessary provide added force/manpower for compliance,” it read. during the lockdown period, all offices will be closed and gatherings banned. additionally, those who are not required to, will not be allowed to go outside in public. The law enforcement agencies will be told that if someone is out due to a necessity they should be permitted, adding that if anyone steps out, they should carry their computerised national identity card (cnic) with them. however, in case of sickness, people will be able to visit the hospital but there should not be more than three people in a car. Moreover, one driver and one passenger will be allowed in a car as per routine and essential services, including food supplies, will continue.

‘PM RELUCTANT TO LOCK DOWN COUNTRY’: in a brief pre-recorded address broadcasted live on mainstream as well as social media, the prime minister called on the citizenry to exercise self-isolation “as much as possible” to contain the spread of the viral disease. “if you feel any symptoms of

flu, it is better to avoid going out so that the virus does not spread to the elderly,” he said, adding that this would enable the healthcare system to take care of the people. he also said that people should show self-discipline to “win this war against the virus”.

The premier further claimed that if pakistan’s situation was as bad as italy, he would have imposed a lockdown immediately. however, he noted, pakistan’s financial situation does not allow this since there are daily wagers who have to be taken care of.

“The countries […] the developed countries, which imposed a [complete] lockdown, are rich economies,” he said, adding, “They have money, food supplies and resources to sustain [prolong lockdowns].” “if you [the masses] cooperate with us [the government], we will overcome [this] difficult time like china.” imran said that the pandemic has his full attention and that of his team. “all my team is thinking right now is how to tackle this [coronavirus],” he added.

The premier announced that he will address the nation again on Tuesday with a plan for the industrial sector without further divulging into details. “i want to assure you we’re working very hard […] i will announce on Tuesday a comprehensive plan for the industrial sector,” he said.

PUNJAB SEEKS ARMY DEPLOYMENT: On the other hand, the punjab government requisitioned the army under section 245 to help the provincial administration. section 245 empowers the provincial governments to requisition the pakistan army whose officials/troops would act in aid of civil power. speaking to reporters in lahore, punjab chief Minister sardar usman Buzdar clarified that rumors of a food shortage in the province were false and urged citizens to adopt precautionary measures as advised by the government. punjab joined sindh and Balochistan who had already asked for military deployments. On saturday, the aforementioned governments wrote to the Ministry of interior, seeking military assistance to maintain the law and order situations in their respective provinces.

GB doctor battling with coronavirus passes away

Lockdown: A less ‘painful victory’ over coronavirus ISLAMABAD sHaHZaD paraCHa

as cases of coronavirus continue to surge, experts and government officials have called upon the pakistan Tehreeke-insaf (pTi) government to impose a complete lockdown in the country, which would be difficult but still ‘a less painful victory’ in the fight against the deadly virus. a large number of people have expressed reservations over the government’s decision of not imposing a curfew to keep the virus at bay and warned that the time was short to adopt such preventive measures. The cases in pakistan have already quadrupled in a single week.

The demand has gained strength following the announcement of lockdown in sindh, which shut down the province for 15 days. however, the government officials, including chief executive imran Khan, are reluctant to shut down the entire owning to its economic and social cost. in order to understand the government’s perspective, different government officials, who are closing monitoring the situation were contacted. They said that a “lockdown was not suitable for any country in the world because of its social and economic implications and countries only opt for

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Officials say pOOr handling Of cases in TafTan, insufficienT funds led TO spread Of virus

it when there was no alternative”. however, others give the example of italy, battered by the virus because of its delay in chalking up a strategy to contain the disease. “italy delayed a lockdown and is now paying a heavy price for that. Over 5,000 people have died due to coronavirus whereas the economy is also dwindling. in order to control the economic situation, italy’s premier has repeatedly increased the size of the economic package. The most recent announcement was of 25 billion euros but the italian government is currently working on an even bigger package,” said an official. china is also an example. it locked down wuhan city in January with extreme limitations on movement and succeeded in curbing the spread of the virus.

Officials feared that pakistan was already late as the government had “avoided spending money on containing pilgrims at Taftan”.

They added that the maximum cost would have been rs1 billion with zero human casualties if a timely decision was taken to contain the people coming from iran, whereas now when the pilgrims have reached different cities of the country, the human and economic cost is likely to increase in the coming days. “pakistan should still go for a lockdown immediately,” an official said, adding the advantage of this move would be a less painful victory over the virus. The economy will suffer nevertheless, as demand would fall and production would also decrease, which will eventually bring the gdp growth down.

IS THERE AN ALTERNATIVE? when asked, the officials said that the answer is no because it would be impossible to keep the country running with unidentified coronavirus roaming around. They warned that if the situation continues like this, casualties will increase and the people will ask why did the government not go for an early lockdown.

They said that the prime minister has to decide between human life and economic gains but the decision must be made quickly as the country is running out of time.

CMYK

STORY ON PAGE 03

MQM-P retains alliance with PTI, rejoins cabinet KARACHI staff report

The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-pakistan (MQM-p) has announced that it is rejoining the federal cabinet after holding a meeting with sindh governor imran ismail. addressing a press conference, MQM-p chief Khalid Maqbool siddiqui said that the party’s leadership has decided to become part of the federal government and retain alliance with the pakistan Tehreek-e-insaf (pTi). he said that both political parties have to make decisions on many matters and major progress was seen in the fulfilment of the demands raised by MQM-p’s leadership. “MQMp is now satisfied over the progress made on demands tabled before the federal government. a meeting was also held with asad umar who had arrived in Karachi yesterday,” he said. “we have decided to become part of the cabinet. Our leadership thinks it is better to rejoin the federal cabinet. The alliance of MQMp and pTi should be remembered,” he said.

The development came after MQM-p leaders’ meeting with sindh governor ismail held at MQM-p’s headquarters in Karachi’s Bahadurabad on sunday. governor ismail in his statement said that the federal government has allocated rs7 billion development budget and rs1 billion will be handed over to Karachi Mayor waseem akhtar for the metropolis. he urged that Karachi mayor should be given powers to serve the citizens. answering a question regarding lockdown in sindh due to coronavirus, the governor said that a detailed discussion was held earlier in the day and all political parties are on the same page for the lockdown. he added that the nation will fight the war against coronavirus with unity and god will give them victory.

Coronavirus outbreak: PML-N calls for immediate lockdown STORY ON PAGE 03

govt approaches Opp for joint strategy against coronavirus STORY ON PAGE 03

in today’s issue

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Monday, 23 March, 2020

CMYK

Monday, 23 March, 2020

GovT aPProaChes oPP for joInT sTraTeGy aGaInsT CoronavIrus ISLAMABAD

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Staff rePort

HE federal government has approached the opposition parties for a joint strategy against coronavirus, with National Assembly (NA) Speaker Asad Qaiser summoning a meeting of the parliamentary leaders of Senate and Lower House to discuss the economic situation and coronavirus cases.

NA Speaker Asad Qaiser has called a meeting of parliamentary leaders at Parliament House on March 25 to review the role of the parliament for containing the spread of COVID-19 pandemic. The government on Sunday started approaching the opposition leadership for talks in a bid to put political differences aside and devise a joint strategy to fight coronavirus.

Qaiser also telephoned the Leader of the Opposition Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif on his return to Pakistan and com-

mended him for returning home to join the struggle against the coronavirus with all political leadership in this critical time.

Both politicians discussed the present state of the coronavirus spread and its im-

Coronavirus outbreak: Govt asked to ensure basic income for all citizens LAHORE: An open letter being circulated in influential circles is demanding the Pakistan government to ensure universal basic income during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic to protect the interests of the poorest in the country. The letter, which just began circulating and at the time of filing this report, had gathered over 500 signatures, called on political figures, professionals, students, teachers, workers, trade unionists, activists and concerned citizens to come forward and demand this of the government. The letter has been signed by professors from the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), University of Management Sciences (UMT), the National University of Science and Technology (NUST), and many other notable academics, including Dr Pervez Hoodhbhoy. It has also been signed by a number of prominent lawyers, including Abid Hassan Minto. “We are living in unprecedented times – as the COVID19 virus spreads rapidly across the globe, it undermines the very foundations of the global economy” the letter states. It points out that in the current circumstances, our economic system as we know it is grinding to a halt, and without drastic government intervention, countless numbers could suffer, businesses will close, unemployment will skyrocket, and the economy will go into a steep recession. “It is time for the Pakistani government to enact emergency universal basic income, ensuring that everyone in their jurisdiction has enough money to buy the food and other essentials they need to survive,” it adds. The letter admits that on its own such a step will not solve all the problems that the country will face in the days to come, but it argues that “an unconditional basic income should play a central role in the emergency response to this crisis because without it, lives will be lost”. abdullah Niazi

pact on the economy of the country.

Qaiser informed Shehbaz about the establishment of Parliamentary Committee on Coronavirus. He said that the committee will monitor the steps of the

government and forward its suggestions to the government. He said that a loud message needs to be sent to the people that their leadership was standing side by side with them. He asked him for giving the names of his party’s representatives for the parliamentary committee so that it could start functioning.

Shahbaz hailed the speaker’s efforts to unite political leadership in this difficult time. “We need to think beyond politics to tackle the coronavirus being a global epidemic,” he said.

He also said that they have to take every step thoughtfully. “Coronavirus has destroyed thousands of human lives in the world and it has hit the world economy very seriously. Our country is already facing economic challenges, therefore, adoption of a joint approach to address the detriments to the economy,” he added. He further said that whenever the difficult times have come upon the nation, all political leadership had stood firm with the nation.

Coronavirus outbreak: PML-N calls for immediate lockdown LAHORE Staff rePort

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Sunday called for an immediate lockdown of the country along the same lines as China to combat the coronavirus outbreak in Pakistan.

According to a statement issued by the party, while chairing a meeting of the party’s top leadership via video link, President and National Assembly (NA) Opposition Leader Shehbaz Sharif said that the party must come up with a national strategy to fight against the viral disease.

He said that he would present the national strategy and implementation proposals on Tuesday and will also announce an economic blueprint to deal with the financial and socioeconomic impact of the pandemic. He also said that he would talk to the nation about the role they should play on the economic, social, political and media fronts.

The PML-N president deliberated on a suggestion regarding a probable shutdown in the country and called for an immediate lockdown along the same lines as China.

During the meeting, Shehbaz established four different teams, vis-àvis economic team, health task force, political team and media team and directed them to put together comprehensive proposals regarding their fields. Representatives of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) were also consulted with during the meeting while the party president directed to enhance the efforts of educating the people regarding the virus and helping them fight the disease.

The meeting agreed that the entire country is suffering because of the criminal dereliction in the handling of the pilgrims from Iran. They pledged that nobody would be allowed to further jeopardise the health, lives and se-

curity of the people of Pakistan with their incompetence and blunders.

The meeting welcomed Shehbaz’s return despite party supreme leader Nawaz Shaif’s ailment and said that the people of Pakistan expect a lot from him and were waiting anxiously for his arrival during these testing times.

The PML-N leadership also agreed to keep a close eye on the government and its lapses. Shahid Khaqan Abaasi, Pervez Rashid, Ahsan Iqbal, Rana Sanaullah, Khawaja Saad Rafiq, Mushahidullah Khan, Barjees Tahir and Mushid Husssaid Syed were also present in the meeting.

General Abdul Qadir Baloch, Murtaza Javed Abbasi, Khurran Dastgir, Miftah Ismail, Sheza Khawaja, Saira Tarrar, mArriyum Aurangzeb, Shaista Pervez, Ayesha Raza Farooq, Azma Bukhari and Imran Nazir too attended the meeting while Khawaja Asif could not attend the meeting due to issues with telecommunication network.

Diplomats leaving Pakistan over coronavirus fears ISLAMABAD Shahzad Paracha

Diplomats belonging to different countries are leaving Pakistan as the number of coronavirus cases continue to increase. Sources said that diplomats belonging to the United States embassy in Islamabad are going back to their home states. On Sunday, 75 out of 103 officials of the embassy left Pakistan through flight AWC 720.

Recently, a US diplomat tested positive for coron-

avirus and now another employee has also been showing signs of the illness. The US government has also announced that it has no greater responsibility than the safety and security of its citizens. It is pertinent to mention that the US embassy has also cancelled all appointments. “As of 17 March, the US Embassy and consulates in Pakistan are cancelling routine immigrant and nonimmigrant visa appointments. We will resume routine visa services as soon as possible but are unable to provide a specific date at this time,” a message on the embassy’s website read.

GB doctor battling with coronavirus passes away ISLAMABAD Ghulam abbaS

The first doctor to get infected by coronavirus in Pakistan breathed his last on Sunday after fighting for his life for three days.

Dr Usama Riaz, who hails from Chilas of Diamer district of Gilgit-Baltistan (GB), was screening pilgrims arriving from Iran and other areas into GB, and was admitted to District Headquarter Hospital, Gilgit, on Friday night after falling unconscious.

Addressing a press conference in Gilgit on Saturday, the office bearers of Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) had said that the said doctor had tested positive for the novel virus. They had blamed the lack of facilities and the government’s negligence for Dr Usama’s condition, emphasising that he could have saved himself had he been provided with the required medical equip-

ment like polymerase chain reaction (PCR) kits specific to coronavirus.

It was stated that a medical board had been constituted for deciding Dr Usama’s fate after consultation with his

family as his condition was very critical.

It may be mentioned here that the affected doctor could not be moved to another hospital due to his condition.

“Dr Usama should be declared a na-

tional hero for his bravery against fighting the coronavirus,” they had said.

Meanwhile, with the confirmation of 16 new cases of coronavirus patients in GB, the total number of patients in the region increased to 71 on Sunday. While those who tested positive were shifted to isolation wards, GB Law Minister Aurangzeb Khan said that more tests of pilgrims were still awaited as the regional government lacks enough testing facilities.

Meanwhile the regional government has also announced a home lockdown across GB effective from midnight to control the spread of virus as the area is experiencing the highest ratio of virus affectees. Addressing a press conference in Chitral on Sunday, GB Law Minister Aurangzeb Khan said that the province would be locked down from midnight for an indefinite period.

He said that this will be called home lockdown and police and rangers will be patrolling day and night.

NEWS

03

PM urges President Trump to lift sanctions on Iran ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan on Sunday urged the United States President Donald Trump to lift sanctions on Iran on humanitarian grounds, as the country was worst hit by the recent wave of deadly coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. On his Twitter account, the prime minister posted, “I want to appeal to President Trump on humanitarian grounds to lift the sanctions against Iran till the COVID-19 pandemic is over.” He further said the people of Iran were facing untold sufferings as sanctions were crippling Iran’s efforts to fight COVID-19.

“Humanity must unite to fight this pandemic,” he added. Iran is among the worst affected Coronavirus countries in the world with over 1,000 reported human casualties. The country had already been facing crippling US sanctions after President Trump withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran. Staff rePort

PPP urges Centre to impose lockdown KARACHI: Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairperson Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari on Sunday urged the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-led federal government to review its decision of not imposing a lockdown in the country, saying a delay would aggravate the difficulties faced by the poor segments of the society. In a video message hours before the Sindh government imposed a province-wide lockdown to fight COVID-19, Bilawal said only unity would help defeat the coronavirus and that it was important for people to stay home as the virus was spreading fast. “This is war,” he said. “We need your [people’s] help. We need our friends in the media to help us. Strengthen our arms so we can help fight this disease,” he added. The PPP chair further urged the federal government to review its policy not to impose a lockdown across the country, saying “we all have to face this difficulty for 14 days”. Bilawal added that a delay would create more problems for the poor segment of the nation, referring to the prime minister’s earlier address wherein he had said a countrywide coronavirus-related lockdown would increase problems for the poor. Staff rePort

04 ISLAMABAD

Monday, 23 March, 2020

WEATHER UPDATES MONDAY

200C

120C

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WEDNESDAY

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PrAyer TImINgs FAJR SUNRISE

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ASR MAGHRIB ISHA

5:37

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4:57

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TwIn cITIes wITness DeclIne In TraffIc ISLAMABAD

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APP

HE twin cities of Rawalpindi and Islamabad has witnessed a decline in traffic and public turnout in markets, bazaars and major thoroughfares on intercity routes after novel Coronovirus (COVID-19) outbreak.

The major arteries of IJP Road, Murree Road, 9th Avenue, Expressway and others were less inhabited by automobiles plying within the twin cities.

The major Markaz (business hubs) of federal capital had fewer visitors as com-

pared to routine week-start day. The Commercial Market of Rawalpindi, 6th and 7th Road, Raja Bazaar and many other routes within the garrison city also witnessed less traffic as compared to other days.

Talking to APP, Saman Baig a university student said the educational institutions across the country had been closed due to the impending risk of COVID-19 outbreak which had reduced traffic on roads mainly at peak hours.

“My university has also been closed and I have just visited the market to get some grocery where people were buying household items and other goods but in-

terestingly the ratio of masses in the market was apparently less. People were found wearing pollution masks and safety gloves and had also put on masks on their kids’ faces,” she added.

Ms Baig regretted that she had found increased prices of hand sanitizers as an ordinary pocket size of Rs100 was sold for Rs280 which was disappointing.

However, she said ordinary hand washing soaps were also serving the same purpose to keep oneself safe from the virus. “I preferred to buy hand washing soaps that are at the moment more easily available in the market,” she added.

She mentioned that pollution masks were not easily available to public in Rawalpindi where the district administration should take strict measures to provide relief to the masses. When contacted Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) spokesperson Dr Waseem Khawaja, he said the masks were necessary for an infected person and his attendant to wear whereas it was unnecessary for normal people to keep on masks outdoors.

He said if hand sanitizer was not available then people should use ordinary hand washing soaps to keep their hands safe from contamination of the virus.

Trend of online shopping gaining momentum amid coronavirus outbreak ISLAMABAD APP

As a precautionary measure to curtail social interaction amid Corona Virus threats, famous brands in the federal capital have started offering good discounts on dresses, shoes and other accessories to give an opportunity to the buyers for having good stock of required stuff at the very start of the summer season.

This time majority of the customers are likely to prefer buying the stuff online instead of visiting the shops physically to avoid interaction with people.

The trend of online shopping from the official websites of the famous brands is already in practice by a large number of people especially women in capital city but this time it is required for maintaining safety of the citizens.

Talking to this scribe of APP, Samina Mushtaq, a house wife said, “It is largely in the interest of the citizens to adopt preventive measures in wake of Corona Virus. Online shopping is the best way to protect ourselves and others from this infectious virus”.

She said, “I have planned to make online orders for summer clothes for me and my family taking advantage of this biggest sale at the advent of the summer season to have a good stock of all the required items for the whole season”.

“The online shopping facility offered by different brands, shopping marts and food outlets have made the lives of citizens quite easier especially at the time when staying at home and lessening interaction with people is a best possible precaution to prevent from the Corona Virus, Saeeda Irum, a working woman said.

She said these brands should also join hands with the authorities to promote awareness about prevention from this threat by bounding the buyers to purchase the stuff online and not to visit the outlets.

Although this practice can affect the business of those retailers who lack online shopping facility but this will largely in the interest of the citizens whose safety is more important at this time, she observed.

It has become a common practice for the brands, eateries and even the cabhailing and salon services to offer good discounts on different occasions including New Year, Christmas, Independence Day, Eid festivals and Holy month of Ramadan etc.

“The changing weather is always a time when we need to shop clothes, shoes and other accessories for ourselves and kids for the whole upcoming season and sale on such occasions are perfect time to do so”, Murad Ali, a businessman said.

It is a good tradition that not only famous brands are offering discounts on dresses and shoes but also the famous online retailers of all the home, electronics and kitchen accessories are offering good discounts ahead of Pakistan Day, he observed.

Mushtaq Awan, Manager at the famous brand shop said, we are the first one to bound customers to shop online, avoiding visits to our shop.

This is the time when we have to stand for a cause to prevent ourselves and the customers from interaction for safety purposes and shift customer’s focus to online shopping despite the fact it will inflict loss to our business.

Two women killed, two injured in roof collapse KOHAT APP

An Afghan woman was killed while her daughter and husband got injured when the roof of their house cave-in in Ghamkole Refugee Camp, district Kohat. According to police, the Afghan families living in a mud house in Ghamkole Refugee Camp and all of a sudden the roof of the house cave in when they were asleep. Soon after the incident, the local people rushed to the site of the incident and started relief operation by recovering the bodies of one Husna Bibi wife of Syed Nawaz and her daughter Hatima Bibi. Syed Nawaz and his another daughter Habiba Bibi also received head injuries after the roof caved in. The Police and Rescue 1122 teams were also rushed there and pulled out two dead bodies and two injured under the rubbles. Dead bodies and injured were brought to KDA hospital, after extending medical treatment to Syed Nawaz and his daughter Habiba both were relieved from hospital and both dead bodies were also handed over to their family. A police official had revealed that the roof collapse of already shabby mud house affected by constant rainfall for long period this month was caused by light rainfall during the night.

DIG for ensuring accused screening before sending to lockup ISLAMABAD INP

Deputy Inspector General of Police (Operations) Waqar-ud-Din Syed has directed all the police stations to ensure the screening test of accused from the area hospital before sending them into lockup. According to a press release the DIG has issued special directions in wake of Coronavirus for the protection of Police personnel’s and the accused. Waqar-Ud-Din Syed also ordered to ensure the availability of soap, tissue paper and water at all entry points of police offices as well as on police stations following the directions of Inspector General of Police Muhammad Aamir Zulfiqar Khan. He asked the police stations staff to maintain a distance of minimum six feet between the visitors and the accused besides to wear gloves while receiving applications from them. He said hand sanitizers and tissue papers should be available in all police mobiles.

Monday, 23 March, 2020

Reliving Pakistan Day

PAKISTAN DAY 05

A worthwhile experience

P

Sultan M Hali

akistan Day is celebrated every year to commemorate the Lahore Resolution, which was passed on 23 March 1940 and later on the same date in 1956, when its first Constitution was adopted, transforming it from a Dominion to the islamic Republic of Pakistan. the Muslim League held its annual session at Minto Park in Lahore that lasted from the 22nd to 24th of March 1940. During this event, the Muslim League led by Muhammad ali Jinnah and other founding fathers narrated the events regarding the differences between Hindus and Muslims, and moved the historical resolution that cemented the formation of a nation-state in south asia as Pakistan, even though the original documents did not actually mention Pakistan at all. the concept was approved but the name, suggested by Chaudhry Rahmat ali, came later. the day is commemorated by a grand parade in the federal capital. the provinces, various industries and latest weapons are displayed aboard gaily decorated floats; the event concludes with a fly past and aerobatic display by airborne military platforms including fighter jets, helicopters, UaVs and parachutists.

Pakistan came into being on 14 august 1947 and faced numerous challenges, vicissitudes and calamities but has survived to claim its place in the comity of nations. india refused to hand over the weapons, funds and other assets of the undivided sub-continent while a mass exodus of refugees, forced to flee their homes in india heading for the promised land, added to the woes of the fledgling state. Rehabilitating them with limited resources was a daunting task for the fledgling state. the day is commemorated by a grand parade in the federal capital. the provinces,

various industries and latest weapons are displayed aboard gaily decorated floats; the event concludes with a fly past and aerobatic display by airborne military platforms including fighter jets, helicopters, UaVs and parachutists First kashmir War 1947-48, 1965 and 1971 Pak-india wars not only took a heavy toll of lives and property but the latter resulted in the severance of its eastern wing.

Pakistan’s detractors deemed it a basket case, military coup d’états and political turmoil upset the applecart of democracy but Pakistan survived and has progressed. soviet Union’s invasion of neighbouring afghanistan in 1979 brought the Red army to Pakistan’s doorstep. islamabad aligned with Washington DC to train, equip and launch Muslim volunteers known as Mujahedeen to wage a successful guerrilla war against the soviets. in 1989, the Red army

withdrew but left destruction in its wake, which resulted in tribal wars, chaos and turmoil in afghanistan and scarred Pakistan too. in 1998, Pakistan was forced to cross the nuclear threshold by a belligerent india declaring to the world that Pakistan was in possession of nuclear weapons to uphold its security.

9/11 exposed Pakistan to a fresh challenge when Us led natO forces attacked afghanistan and commenced the war on terror. Pakistan threw its lot with the allies but has had to face the brunt of terror attacks, which resulted in a death toll of seventy thousand precious lives and heavy financial losses. Gravely, Pakistan has been blamed for sponsoring terrorism because many of the terror leaders including the al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden sought refuge in Pakistan. the armed

forces of Pakistan have launched numerous military operations and turned the tables on the terrorists.

Despite such serious challenges, Pakistan has managed to progress in the fields of industry, agriculture, information technology and defence production. the industrial sector has managed to stand on its own feet and continues to support Pakistan’s economy. Weak political governments and corruption have marred economic growth, yet Pakistan appears to have put the bad years behind and displayed a GDP growth of 5.3 percent at the end of 2017. after a weak performance in 2016, the agriculture sector picked up and showed a growth of 3.5 percent due to better sugarcane, cotton and maize crops. the services sector grew by 6.0 percent, surpassing the target of 5.7 percent. the growth of industry is estimated at 5.0 percent. Pakistan has achieved macroeco-

nomic stability in the past three years: the fiscal deficit has shrunk from eight percent to below five percent, international reserves have tripled to over $18b, and the rate of growth has increased by a full percentage point to 4.7 percent. in the realm of defence production, with joint venture projects like Main Battle tanks, Frigates, subs and Fighter aircraft, Pakistan is poised to enter in the field of indigenous production, export of defence equipment as well as self reliance in this vital sector. the happy communion of the private sector with defence production is yielding rich dividends. the advent of China Pakistan Economic Corridor brings the promise of an economic windfall in the shape of the operationalization of the strategically located deep sea Gawadar Port, communication infrastructure including roads, railways and air links, special Economic Zones, fiber optics, energy hubs, educational and vocational training institutions, health, trade and commerce facilities promise a bright future for Pakistan.

Pakistan’s mainstay, its youth, has broken numerous records of innovative achievements and made the nation proud. Women and minorities, who were once considered sidelined, are now contributing their fair share in nation building. sports suffered a handicap because owing to terror attacks, international teams shied away and Pakistan was forced to host events on neutral grounds. after turning a major corner in the war against terror, not only is international sports returning to Pakistan but the national teams in different disciplines, have won major events, keeping the green and white ensign of Pakistan proudly aloft.

Pakistan boasts of a rich cultural heritage. the federal as well as provincial governments, realising the rich dividends that can be achieved via showcasing its culture, are promoting Pakistan’s traditional heritage abroad to enhance its soft image. an era of accountability has commenced. it is hoped that across the board accountability will rid the nation of corruption, sleaze and perfidy and the nation is endowed with clean leadership. in the final analysis, Pakistan Day is an experience worth reliving, since despite its detractors’ machinations, it is a success story of which every Pakistani is proud.

MINAR-E-PAKISTAN

A symbol of political struggle for creation of Pakistan LAHORE aPP

the Minar-e-Pakistan, Lahore (1968) like the statue of Liberty, Usa (a symbol for abolition of slavery) represents anti-colonial political struggle of Muslims of the subcontinent for creation of a new independent state on map of the world.

Minar-e-Pakistan, also translated as ‘tower of Pakistan’ and ‘Minaret of Pakistan’, was built to commemorate Pakistan Resolution (Lahore Resolution) adopted during the all india Muslim League session of 22-24 March, 1940 held at the Minto Park (now renamed as the Greater iqbal Park). the Pakistan Resolution paved the way for the creation of a separate state –Pakistan- for the Muslims of northeast and northwest territories under the British india.

March 23, 1940 is an epoch-making day when the Muslims of india embarked on a journey for a separate homeland by rejecting the idea of a united india and enslaved Muslims. this day served as a true testament to the vision of allama Dr Muhammad iqbal, Poet of the East, who had claimed in his Presidential address at allahabad in 1930, “india is a continent of human groups belonging to different races, speaking different languages, and professing different religions.

Personally, i would like to see the Punjab, north-West Frontier Provinces (nWFP – now khyber Pakhtunkhwa) after independence, sindh and Baluchistan amalgamated into a single state. self-government within the British Empire, or without the British Empire, the formation of a consolidated north-West indian Muslim state appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims, at least of north-West india”.

Pakistan Resolution interpreted iqbal’s foresightedness in these words, “the areas in which the Muslims are numerically in a majority as in the north-Western and Eastern zones of india, should be grouped to constitute ‘independent states’ in which the constituent units shall be autonomous and

sovereign”. thus, the day – 23rd March, 1940- determined a new course of history for the Muslims who won a sovereign state on 14th august 1947 in the form of Pakistan.

Minar-e-Pakistan is not a mere monument but embodies islamic, Mughal and contemporary architecture, preserves on stone the text of Lahore Resolution in arabic, English, Bengali and Urdu; depicts different phases of freedom struggle for independence by the Muslims of india and hope for a glorious future for the nascent nation in its structure.

Built, between 23rd March 1960 and October 1968, at the Greater iqbal Park to commemorate historic Pakistan Resolution provides a vital link between the past and the present for the younger generation and stands as a symbol of achievement and hope of surmounting the impossible.

Minar-e-Pakistan, also called for some time Yadgar-e-Pakistan (Pakistan Resolution Memorial), is erected on the site where people had gathered for the all india Muslim League session on March 22-24, 1940 and the monument is 70 meter (203 feet) in height with eight meter base from which emanate the eight flower-petals which culminate at the top with a steel dome and a pinnacle. Minar e Pakistan was designed by Pakistani-Russian architect naserddin Murat khan (1904-70) who also designed Gaddafi stadium, Lahore and other buildings but he never charged a penny for Minar e Pakistan.

Different types of marble and concrete have been used in the construction of the minaret and according to historians, the use of coarse marble at the base is reminiscent of the hardships during the early days of the freedom struggle while the use of fine marble reflects the ultimate success and path to prosperity. the minaret has four platforms and all have been constructed with different kinds of marble and stone while 162 stairs besides an elevator lead a pilgrim to the top most platform of the monument. the unfolding flower-petals represent happiness and abundance besides symboliz-

ing wealth, fortune and prosperity which the independent state of Pakistan promised to its inhabitants. the flowers also symbolize purity and the literal meanings of the word ‘Pakistan’ mean ‘Land of the Pure’.

Within the base of the minaret and between the unfolding flower-petals, there stand ten marble slabs of seven feet height and two feet width with inscriptions of Quranic verses, sayings of Quaid-i-azam Muhammad ali Jinnah, selected poetic verses of allama Muhammad iqbal, text of Pakistan Resolution in English, arabic, Bengali and Urdu languages, text of Delhi Resolution (1946), national anthem of Pakistan in Urdu and Bengali and 99 names of allah. according to renowned archaeologist and Director Conservation at the Walled City of Lahore authority (WCLa) najamus saqib, the monument is designed on the pattern of a minaret which is an important feature of a mosque. He said the monument is islamic in spirit as dome and minaret are symbols of islamic civilization.

Minar-e-Pakistan faces the Historic Badshahi mosque- built by Moghul emperor aurangzeb alamgir in 1673- and it complements the minarets of the 17th century grand mosque. it embraces islam and islamic culture in all aspects as the minaret culminates with a dome and a pinnacle.

Decoding the symbolism of dome, Prof (Retd) Mazhar Moeen of Punjab University said, “it is significant that the Minar-e-Pakistan has an onion-shaped dome and a pinnacle at the top – this type of dome was popularized by the Moghuls in the south asia and is known as the arabic architectural style of dome.” the small dome reminds the onlookers that the islamic Republic of Pakistan exists under the shadow of allah almighty. the dome represents perfection, eternity and the heaven besides it conveys that sovereignty belongs to allah almighty.

Renowned archaeologist saif ur Rehman said he knew the architect personally and he was an idealist, adding that the structure of the monument needed to be viewed deeply.

“it is not a minaret only and if one takes an aerial view of the Minar e Pakistan, the architecture presents an image of a star and a crescent besides a flower”, he observed. about certain objections on its structure, saif ur Rehman said the detractors did not spare the national anthem and raised objections which died down gradually, adding that every creator has its own view of things and Minar e Pakistan presented a unified whole and the oneness of God in its symmetrical shape.

“Minar e Pakistan is a living monument and it is wrong to call it a memorial as it signifies the continuity of the struggle of a living nation which is destined to live by the grace of allah almighty”, the archaeologist remarked.

Being a symbol of political struggle of the indian Muslims, Minar-ePakistan has witnessed scores of political rallies by all political parties and gatherings by some religious parties under its dome over the past five decades. about the political vision of the Pakistan Resolution – in commemoration of which Minar e Pakistan was constructed – he said, in the current political scenario of Hindustan where Muslims were being subjected to a near genocide to make india a Hindu state by the indian government of Bhartiya Janta Patry (BJP) government’s narendra Modi, the students of political science and indian history did not need any explanation to justify Muslim demand at the beginning of the 20th century but the actions of the Hindu rulers of india today were selfexplanatory for the students, adding that the indian actions have proved conclusively how justified the Muslims leaders like allama Dr. Muhammad iqbal, Quaid e azam Muhammad ali Jinnah and others were in their struggle for a separate homeland for the Muslims of Hindustan.

However, the eminent archaeologist recorded his

reservations on the ‘re-planning of Minto Park’ and inclusion of Minar e Pakistan in the Greater iqbal Park, adding that the construction of the park had diminished the grandeur and importance of the historic piece of architecture as the focus was no more on the Minar e Pakistan but on other minor attractions like the restaurants and the lawns. He stressed the need of introducing the youth to the greatest event in the recent history as Minar e Pakistan was an expression of the sanctity of the historic event like Pakistan Resolution. “selection of the site for the construction of the Minar e Pakistan was also important as the Minto Park was used as a Parade Ground by the English rulers and the same piece of land was used to depict victory of the struggle of the Muslims against the Hindu mechanists and the English colonists”, saif ur Rehman added. saif ur Rehman said that the entry points of the Greater iqbal Park should be re-thought so that the visitors could have direct interaction with this specimen of history – Minar e Pakistan, adding that guided tours of the site should also be arranged to educate the youth and preserve the link between the past and the present. the renowned archaeologist was of the view that Minar e Pakistan embodied the glorious history of Pakistan movement and was a living tribute to all those who sacrificed their present for the future of their children in the face of a c l e v e r enemy.

Monday, 23 March, 2020

06 WORLD VIEW CORONAVIRUS

how AsiAn countries Acted while the west dithered IN HONG KONG AND TAIWAN, DEATHS ARE IN SINGLE FIGURES. BUT EUROPE GAMBLED ON A CONTAINMENT STRATEGY

Guardian

t

EMMA GRAHAM-HARRISoN

hE first coronavirus cases in Taiwan and Italy came only 10 days apart. On Sunday Taiwan, which has deep cultural and economic ties to China, has recorded just 153 cases and two deaths. Italy has more than 47,000 cases and 4,032 people have died.

Italy’s epidemic is currently the most devastating in the world; its death toll over-

took China’s last week and on Saturday officials in Lombardy said deaths in that region had jumped by 546 in one day to 3,095. The pattern of an exponential explosion in cases, after weeks of government inaction in the face of impending crisis, has been repeated across western countries from Spain, France and Germany, to the UK and the US. Leaders are now taking measures that would have been unthinkable weeks or even days ago, locking down tens of millions of people from Berlin to Madrid and San Francisco and pouring billions into rescue plans.

But had they acted a few weeks earlier, they could perhaps have avoided much of the human tragedy and economic catastrophe they now face. Taiwan, hong Kong and Singapore, which had their first confirmed cases before Europe, but acted early and fast, still have deaths in single digits and, at most, a few hundred cases.

Taiwan, helped perhaps by having an epidemiologist as vice-president, started

tracing passengers from Wuhan as soon as China warned of a new type of pneumonia in the city last December, before Covid-19 was identified. Social distancing, rampedup testing and contact-tracing followed soon after.

Most western countries did little, apart from developing a modest testing capacity – apparently gambling on the disease being contained elsewhere, as previous threatened epidemics, including Sars in 2002-03 and more recently Ebola and Mers, had been.

“The challenge faced by government is whether and when to act on a health threat.

If you act swiftly and the outbreak isn’t as bad as feared, then government gets criticised for overreacting. If you adopt a waitand-see approach and move too slowly, then government gets criticised for underreacting,” says Steve Taylor, professor at the University of British Columbia and author of The Psychology of Pandemics.

“In hindsight, the UK might have been better off if they had adopted the same practices as Taiwan. But if the outbreak had fizzled, the government would have been criticised for overreacting. Taiwan gambled successfully on the assumption that Covid19 would spread widely and rapidly.”

Other countries that initially allowed the disease to spread – most notably South Korea, which at one point was the country with the most infections outside China – managed to partially tame the outbreak through rigorous testing and tracing contacts of those infected. Subsequently, new infections levelled off, even as they spiralled across Europe.

“I do think we can learn from past mistakes, and South Korea is a really strong example of that if you look at the amount of testing they have been doing, and how fast they were able to mobilise,” said Ashley Arabasadi, chair emeritus of the Global health Security Agenda Consortium.

“It might be unfair to criticise governments that haven’t had to deal with something like this in over 100 years, while South Korea have had more recent experience.”

South Korea’s sense of urgency was driven in part by recent firsthand experience of how virulent coronaviruses can be due to an outbreak of Mers in 2015 and the 200203 Sars epidemic, which also affected Taiwan, hong Kong and others in the region.

Those diseases barely touched the west, being contained, like others including Ebola, near the site of their outbreak, potentially

Coronavirus, Chernobyl, Katrina no accident, were predicted but not averted US AGENCY CDC HAD PREDICTED COVID-19. EBOLA, SARS WERE NATURE’S ALARM BELLS. YET, HUMAN GREED AND NARROW PAROCHIAL GOALS SUPPRESSED THOSE WARNINGS

MediuM RAGHU RAMAN

All crises, including the current pandemic, are never “accidents”. Accidents themselves don’t cause death and damage. It is inaction by those responsible for protective measures that do. Disasters are the result of the interplay between complex, interdependent interactions of nature, technology, human and organisational behaviours and primarily — leadership failures. On 25 August 2005, hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in what was to become the costliest natural disaster in the US, killing over 12,000 people and causing damages worth up to $200 billion. Water and debris inundated the city for weeks, destroying transport and communication facilities and leaving tens of thousands of residents stranded without access to food, water or evacuation. Most of the deaths and destruction was because of fatal flaws in the flood protection system of the city.

But Katrina was no surprise.

Dozens of studies, articles, programs and reports by reputed establishments like National Geographic, Scientific American, New Orleans Times, PBS frontline had painted chilling scenarios of a catastrophe waiting to happen. The National Geographic article predicted the damage just ten months before with uncanny accuracy.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) had also warned that New Orleans was woefully unprepared for a Class 3 storm.

Unbelievably, there were several warning signs given by nature before Katrina. hurricane Betsy in 1965, hurricane Camille in 1969, hurricane Andrew in 1992 and finally a massive rainstorm in 1995 which left no doubt that New Orleans was unprepared for such disasters.

Yet, despite these warnings, decision-makers in several government establishments, including the army and the White house, miscalculated the chances of occurrence and damage potential of such a calamity.

As Marc Gerstein points out in his book “Flirting with Disasters” there are several com-

mon threads in virtually all disasters ranging from Katrina, Chernobyl, Space Shuttle Challenger’s crash to organisational collapses like Enron. First is the organisational or national culture which ‘denies’ bad news and actively punishes messengers who point it out, disincentivising others from voicing warning signs of impending disasters. Doctors and experts in China and other countries, who gave constant warnings about Corona’s lethality were pilloried, labelled as alarmists, ostracised & punished.

In the case of Chernobyl, there was prolonged denial at every level because of political fear even after it was amply clear that the nuclear reactor had exploded and was spewing lethal radioactivity. Gorbachev was not informed about the true extent of the damage until very late, and even then, the Soviet high command’s focus was on containing the news from the world, much like the Chinese in the current pandemic. The state did not even inform the people around Chernobyl who continued to stay in its vicinity and consume contaminated food for days after the accident. In disasters, every minute of denial and delay results in thousands of lives Second is pressure from leaders to achieve impossible and grandiose goals and severe penalties for failure. The Challenger Space shuttle launch was compromised amongst other reasons because NASA turned a blind eye to the lower performance of ‘O Rings’ — the sealing rings that caused the explosion, so as not to lose military funding or delay the launch because it was an ‘achievement’ to be mentioned in President Reagan’s presidential address on the very day of the launch.

The third is a focus on profitability or personal glory, at the cost of turning a blind eye to every danger. Enron’s Kenneth Lay, Jeffery Skilling and more recently Elizabeth holmes, CEO of Theranos, actively perpetrated fraud for years to increase market cap and personal wealth. Theranos, a blood-testing company, endangered lives of thousands of patients, giving them faulty results because their technology neither worked nor was approved by the FDA. The Theranos board included two former secretaries of state — George Shultz and henry Kissinger, former secretary of defence, William Perry, Gen James Matthis, two former senators and former CEO of Wells Fargo and Bechtel — all of whom stood to benefit from Theranos’s success. And Elizabeth continued the deception right under their experienced noses until caught by Wall Street Journal’s John Carreyrou, who was hounded and intimidated throughout his investigation by one of the most powerful law firms in the US — which too stood to benefit from Theranos’s increasing valuation.

The fourth reason is design and systems failure. While it is easy to blame an individual — and that blame may be justified — attributing every accident to ‘pilot error’ absolves the deeprooted design compromises and management’s negligence or active connivance. Causations are difficult to assign in complex systems, but systemic methods to amplify ‘weak signals’ and dissent from internal ‘rebels’ are often the only way to get those warning signals. George Shultz’s grandson worked for Theranos and was a strident whistleblower, but Shultz chose to believe Elizabeth, the CEO, rather than his grandson because of confirmation bias. Several leaders treat dissent as disloyalty and reward obeisance, thus wilfully suppressing those early warning signals.

And the last reason is not paying heed to reports and recommendations of experts’ teams commissioned or hired expressly for those purposes. There are examples of several such committee reports in cases like Katrina, Kargil war or police reforms etc that are ignored by decisionmakers. For instance, in 2007, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the US, had war-gamed the scenario of pandemic breakouts. They had simulated policy options of whether inbound passengers should be screened in existing airports or the flights to be diverted to special screening facilities — 13 years ago! Including the repercussions that while diverting flights would be a more cautious approach, doing so could cause panic and have global financial implications. Going by the US response, it seems those simulations weren’t heeded. At this point, there should be no delusion that we are facing what is arguably the biggest challenge of our generation. Like Katrina, there were several warnings to Covid-19. World influencers with resources like Bill Gates had spelt this out, agencies like CDC had predicted it. Climate change and animal rights advocates had campaigned for years. The Spanish Flu, Ebola, SARs and several local outbreaks were nature’s warnings. Yet, human greed, narrow parochial goals and in some cases, outright personal aggrandisement suppressed those warnings.

National and corporate decision-makers who were rapaciously plundering resources belonging to future generations had insulated themselves from the suffering of others. Now misery is democratised with almost every individual in the world, including the rich and powerful being damaged directly or indirectly. Perhaps there is some poetic justice in the Corona sparing future generations and the flora and fauna.

While the pandemic itself will eventually pass, its aftermath will ravage economic, political and social structures, relationships between nations, national and personal plans for years if not decades.

If the decision-makers — or whoever is left of them — do not pay heed to this apocalyptic warning and fundamentally alter our approach and governance structures, perhaps the next crisis will be existential for humankind and deservedly so.

leaving the west’s leaders too complacent.

“We should have used that time [in January and February] more wisely, but, to be fair, everyone was dealing with an unknown,” said Laura Spinney, a science journalist whose latest book is Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and how it Changed the World. Authorities didn’t want to cause panic initially, she said, but then the balance shifted so “the biggest danger was not panic – it was complacency, and too many governments weren’t moving”.

There is a chance some politicians in the US and Europe, lulled by decades of stability in their countries after the second world war – decades in which they have waged war overseas but never seen life totally upended at home – simply didn’t want to recognise the threat.

“People are not terribly good at estimating risk. Wishful thinking, overestimation of resources, and other factors can cloud our judgment of risk. This may have happened during the current pandemic,” Taylor said.

It’s important, however, that whenever the world does successfully develop a vaccine, or a cure for Covid-19, the tragic lessons of these early crises are not forgotten.

Governments need to invest in healthcare systems, so that when the next pandemic arrives, we are better prepared.

“You see a system of panic and response that we go into. Once that initial panic dies down, you get complacency, a lack of understanding that these novel viruses happen regularly and will happen with greater frequency as we become more interconnected,” said Arabasadi. “That’s why there needs to be a greater investment in health and health systems.”

Shut bars don’t mean you start throwing house parties THE TERM ‘CORONA PARTIES’ WAS COINED BY THE GERMAN MEDIA AFTER MANY OF THE YOUNG, CAREFREE GERMANS CONTINUED TO STEP OUT

Print SHUBHANGI MISRA

Today is a truly momentous day. It can either be viewed as a drill for more serious curfews that await us in the near future, or just an unnecessary, elaborate PR exercise.

Whatever you think it is, the lesson one must take home from this selfisolating, self-imposed ‘janata curfew’ is to stay indoors.

The shutdown of bars, restaurants and pubs in your city should in no way lead to fun parties or ‘corona parties’ at your house.

Some totally unfazed Germans with ‘I am never gonna die’ attitude did host such parties. It did nothing but helped the virus spread.

The term ‘corona parties’ was coined by the German media after many of the young, carefree Germans continued to step out, enjoying spring, completely disobeying government directives to maintain social distancing. Germany is the third-most impacted country in Europe with coronavirus, but shut schools, colleges and offices have become a reason for throwing techno parties in public parks.

Last Thursday, videos of spring breakers partying in Florida, US — probably damming themselves at the same time — showed many youngsters, who formed a dense crowd, having the time of their lives. If you know anything about spring break gatherings, you’re probably aware of all that goes on at such meets.

All over the world people have met for ‘lock down parties’ and ‘end of the world’ drinking sessions. Indulging in such reckless revelry is exactly the kind of behav-

iour based on which boomers paint our generation as senseless.

Young people are just as likely to get infected by coronavirus as the old, even if they remain asymptomatic at best. It’s important to remember that even if you don’t contract the disease, you still very well may be a carrier.

More than putting yourself at risk, think about the safety of others if you continue to go about your daily party scenes, like it’s no big deal. As is being advised, it’s better to panic now than to regret later.

If you think that shutting down malls, schools, temples, public places, offices, monuments, or an entire city, etc. is ‘over reacting’, then I won’t be surprised if you come out as a flat earther or climate change denier too. Teens partying in Germany or those gallivanting at a spring break in the US have acted nothing less than bio hazards, probably infecting hundreds of people.

We have similar examples back home: be it singer Kanika Kapoor of baby doll fame, who hid her travel history to escape quarantine or the six people who evaded quarantine from a government hospital in Delhi.

Not everyone we come in contact with are young and healthy.

Some could be diabetic, heart patients, and elderly, who might never recover from the disease once infected, something we must keep in mind before stepping out.

If you are one of those who avoids public places, but goes to a friend’s place, or works from home while chugging beers, then you should know the infamous case of Typhoid Mary. Mary Mallon infected at least 51 people, killing 3 of Typhoid fever in the US way back in 1906. She too was asymptomatic.We’re living through truly remarkable and historical times. Before you trivialise social distancing and choose having fun over exercising precautions, make up your mind: would you want to go down in history as ‘corona katrina’, the super spreader who put hundreds of lives in danger? No. Then please, for my sake and yours, stay right where you are.

That’s supposing you are inside your home, safe and sound.

Monday, 23 March, 2020

FOREIGN NEWS 07

BRItaIn’s Johnson waRns that health seRvIce could Be oveRwhelmed By coRonavIRus LONDON

B

AGENCIES

RITAIN’S National Health Service (NHS) could be “overwhelmed” by the coronavirus like the Italian health system in just two weeks, Prime Minister Boris Johnson warned on Sunday in the face of rising numbers of deaths.

The death toll in Italy — the world’s worst-hit country — reached almost 5,000 on Saturday, while in Britain it hit 233.

In a statement released by his office, Johnson again urged Britons to stay at home to stop the spread of the virus.

“The numbers are very stark, and they are accelerating. We are only a matter of weeks — two or three — behind Italy,” he said. “Unless we act together, unless we make the heroic and collective national effort to slow the spread — then it is all too likely that our own NHS will be similarly overwhelmed.”

Italy overtook China as the country worst affected by the highly contagious virus on Thursday. The Italian government has ordered that all businesses must close until April 3 in its latest desperate effort to halt the epidemic.

Johnson’s government has rapidly stepped up warnings and actions to combat the virus over the past week. It has closed schools for most pupils, told pubs and restaurants to shut and asked people to avoid unnecessary social interactions seeking to slow the rise of cases and enable intensive care units in the state healthcare system to cope with the epidemic.

On Saturday the NHS struck a deal

with the independent hospital sector, giving it more ventilators and thousands of extra beds and healthcare staff on hand from next week. Housing minister Robert Jenrick said on Sky News the government had received prototypes of new ventilators - the machines needed to keep the most critically ill alive - and should begin production of the machines soon.

In a separate interview with the BBC

he said that Britain needed to go further with testing, adding that it would order millions of an “antibody test” for those who have had the virus that he expected to be ready in the coming weeks.

JUMP BACK UP: Britain has urged 1.5 million people identified by the NHS as being at higher risk of severe illness if they contract coronavirus to not leave their homes, to protect themselves.

Johnson also advised people to keep away from elderly parents on Sunday, which is Mothering Sunday in Britain.

But physical distancing and strict restrictions on social activity are not enough to defeat COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) top emergency expert Mike Ryan said.

“What we really need to focus on is finding those who are sick, those who have the virus, and isolate them, find their contacts and isolate them,” Mike Ryan said in an interview on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show. “The danger right now with the lockdowns ... if we don’t put in place the strong public health measures now, when those movement restrictions and lockdowns are lifted, the danger is the disease will jump back up.”

Quake hits Zagreb, PM appeals for social distancing as residents rush onto streets ZAGREB AGENCIES

A large earthquake struck near the Croatian capital Zagreb on Sunday, leaving a teenager critically injured after an apartment building in the city collapsed, the GFZ German Research Center for Geosciences and a hospital official said.

Another minor was badly injured and the quake caused several fires and power blackouts in parts of the capital, hospital and emergency services said.

Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic called on citizens to remain outside their homes amid potential aftershocks.

Plenkovic and Interior Minister Davor Bozinovic also appealed for people rushing onto the streets to keep social distances from each other as the country struggles to contain the spread of coronavirus. So far, Croatia has reported

206 cases of the virus and one death.

“We will do our utmost to make the best estimate of what to do at the moment. There are protocols when it comes to an earthquake. But when it comes to an earthquake combined with the global pandemic, then it is a much more complicated situation,” Bozinovic told local media. Plenkovic said the quake, with a magnitude of 5.3 according to GFZ, was the biggest to hit Zagreb in 140 years. It struck 6 km north of the city and was felt across the Western Balkans.

Zarko Rasic, head of the Zagreb Emergency Medicine Institute, a children’s hospital, said a 15-year-old was in a critical condition after being found by an emergency services team under a collapsed building and another minor had been admitted with head injuries from a falling roof.

He did not give further details on the persons’ identities.

The Zagreb Fire Department said firefighting and res-

Belgium’s lockdown to last at least eight more weeks, says minister BRUSSELS AGENCIES

The lockdown of Belgium due to the coronavirus epidemic will continue for at least the next eight weeks, health minister Maggie De Block told the De Zondag paper on Sunday. From March 17, Belgians are only allowed to leave home to buy food, for healthrelated errands or to assist someone in need.

Schools and universities are closed and employees of most companies have to work from home. Non-essential travel abroad is prohibited until April 5, all gatherings are banned and police are patrolling the streets to monitor and enforce the restrictions. Asked how long this would last, De Block said: “That’s the million dollar question! We are now heading toward the peak of the epidemic, after which the curve will descend. I think this situation will last for at least another eight weeks. It would be the normal curve.” She said the estimate was based on what happened in China and South Korea, where the epidemic hit earlier.

Russian army to send coronavirus help to Italy after Putin phone call MOSCOW AGENCIES

cue operations were ongoing at several locations.

Plenkovic said the army had been called in to help clean up debris in Zagreb and urged citizens to “stay outside and keep your distance”. “The situation is contradictory, we invited people to stay at home to avoid spreading of the corona virus, and now we are advising them to leave their homes,” Plenkovic told a press conference.

GFZ downgraded the magnitude of the quake from an initial reading of 6.0. “It lasted over 10 seconds. By far the strongest I have ever felt,” one witness said, adding that it was followed by several aftershocks.

A Reuters reporter on the scene saw a church bell tower damaged, some buildings fell down as people fled apartments and took to the streets.

The government convened an urgent cabinet meeting and said it would hold another press conference on Sunday afternoon.

The Russian military will start sending medical help to Italy from Sunday to help it to battle the new coronavirus after receiving an order from President Vladimir Putin, Russia’s Defense Ministry said in a statement. Putin spoke to Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte on Saturday, the Kremlin said, adding that the Russian leader had offered his support and help in the form of mobile disinfection vehicles and specialists to aid the worst hit Italian regions. Italy recorded a jump in deaths from the coronavirus of almost 800 on Saturday, taking the toll in the world’s hardesthit country to almost 5,000. The Russian Defense Ministry said that military transport planes would deliver eight mobile brigades of military medics, special disinfection vehicles and other medical equipment to Italy from Sunday. Russia will also send about 100 military specialists in virology and epidemics, the Interfax news agency cited the defense ministry as saying. Russia itself has reported 306 cases of the virus, most of them in Moscow, and one coronavirus-related death.

Cuban doctors head to Italy battle coronavirus HAVANA AGENCIES

Communist-run Cuba said it dispatched a brigade of doctors and nurses to Italy for the first time this weekend to help in the fight against the novel coronavirus at the request of the worst-affected region Lombardy.

The Caribbean island has sent its “armies of white robes” to disaster sites around the world largely in poor countries since its 1959 revolution. Its doctors were in the front lines in the fight against cholera in Haiti and against ebola in West Africa in the 2010s. Yet with the 52-strong brigade, this is the first time Cuba has sent an emergency contingent to Italy, one of the world’s richest countries, demonstrating the reach of its medical diplomacy.

This is the sixth medical brigade Cuba has sent in recent days to combat the spread of the new disease abroad. It has sent contingents to socialist allies Venezuela and Nicaragua as well as Jamaica, Suriname and Grenada.

“We are all afraid but we have a revolutionary duty to fulfill, so we take out fear and put it to one side,” Leonardo Fernandez, 68, an intensive care specialist, told Reuters late on Saturday shortly before his brigade’s departure. “He who says he is not afraid is a superhero, but we are not superheros, we are revolutionary doctors.”

Fernandez said this would be his eighth international mission, including one in Liberia during the fight against ebola.

Italy is the country that has been worst affected by

the highly contagious virus that originated in China, with the northern region of Lombardy bearing the brunt of the contagion. Its death toll rose on Saturday by 546 to 3,095, according to its head of welfare, Giulio Gallera, who requested the Cuban doctors. We are going to fulfill an honorable task, based on the principle of solidarity,” said Graciliano Díaz, 64.

Cuba built a healthcare system that was the envy of the developing world with economic aid from former ally Soviet Union, though some of those advances have been lost since the communist bloc collapsed.

Many Cuban hospitals have fallen into disrepair and Cubans say they have difficulty finding medicine, a situation the government says is largely due to decades-old U.S. sanctions although analysts blame also the inefficient state-run economy.

Still, Cuba has one of the highest ratios worldwide of physicians per capita even when excluding those doctors abroad, and its medical brigades for disaster relief continue to earn Havana goodwill worldwide.

“In a time of crisis, the Cuban government, the Cuban people ... have risen to the occasion, they have heard our appeal and they have responded,” Jamaican Health Minister Christopher Tufton said on Saturday upon greeting 140 Cuban medical professionals at Kingston international airport. Britain also thanked Cuba last week for allowing a British cruise ship that had been turned away by several Caribbean ports to dock on the island and for enabling the evacuation of the more than 600 passengers onboard.

Meanwhile Cuba, which is known for its disaster preparedness, is stepping up measures at home too to

stem the coronavirus contagion. Twenty-five cases have been confirmed so far.

President Miguel Diaz-Canel announced late on Friday the country would be closing its borders to foreign

non-residents from Tuesday in a major blow to one of the motors of its cash-strapped economy, tourism.

Thousands of doctors and medicine students are also going door-to-door monitoring their local communities.

Monday, 23 March, 2020

08 COMMENT

When the driver sleeps

To lockdown or not Sindh does, the country does not

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HILE Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah duly announced a lockdown of the province to stop the spread of CoVID-19, Prime Minister Imran Khan did not. However, he apparently felt his refraining from doing so needed to be explained, something he did in a televised address. The reason he gave was that he did not want daily wagers to face problems. He also admitted the government could not provide food to people who went into lockdown, as was done in China, Italy, the UK or the USA. However, while Mr Khan refused to impose a lockdown, he called for citizens to practise self-isolation and to quarantine themselves at home.

The federal government is apparently ignoring the dire examples of Iran and Italy, which imposed lockdowns too late, and witnessed a sudden upsurge in cases, so much so that Iran has experienced 1785 deaths and spread the disease in the region, such as to Pakistan. Italy has experienced more deaths than China itself, with over 3200. China had actually brought the epidemic under some sort of control by imposing a stringent lockdown, but has paid the terrible cost of over 81,000 of the world’s 300,000+ cases, not to mention those who died.

Mr Khan did not mention it, but countries which have been hit in the west have all given some sort of relief package so as to reduce the economic impact. That is something on which Mr Khan was silent, and something Mr Shah did not mention. He mentioned the need for people to listen to government recommendations of social distancing and self-isolation. However, the recent incident in Karachi, where a woman attended a wedding even though she was suffering from the disease, and infected nine others, is not very hopeful. The rapidity with which it has been spreading unless it has been defeated by draconian measures indicates that Mr Khan might find himself forced to order a lockdown later on, after many more lose their lives. Meanwhile, the KP government’s closing of shopping malls, and the Punjab’s calling in the Army, indicates that Mr Khan may have his hand forced by his own party.

Only keeping them awake will avert accidents

Dr FariD a malik

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few weeks back, the driver of a minivan fell asleep at the wheel while travelling on the Motorway (M-2). He crashed into a truck, which resulted in five casualties. Several slogans have been displayed on the roadside, saying “Speed thrills but kills”, “Don’t drive if you are tired”, “Check your tyres”, etc. Sloganeering helps but if the driver falls asleep it is invariably a disaster. while driving across Europe to Pakistan in the 1980s, I briefly dozed off on the wheels. I had driven all night to cross over from Yugoslavia into Greece. on the way to Athens, I was on a collision course with a bus coming from the opposite direction. Luckily the lorry was equipped with power horns and bright lights. I was alerted by a combination of noise and light and was woken up just in time to correct my course to reach the destination safely.

Drivers have to be alert to drive and must read and follow the signs on the road. After driving tests abroad, most Pakistanis receive a common observation, “Does not read the signs”. while we know how to drive, we ignore the requirements of the traffic regulation systems. while traffic violations affect the flow on the road, sleeping on the wheels is deadly.

Today most of the drivers in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan are either sleeping or not alert to read the signs on the road. Tunnel vision or blocked vision will get us nowhere. The signs are there but no one is reading them. Horns are on honking and lights are

Shehbaz Sharif’s return More questions arise

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HE return of PML-n President Shehbaz Sharif to Pakistan was said to have been among the last before Pakistan was isolated from the rest of the world after an airspace closure. Mr Sharif also, in his communication with national Assembly Speaker Asad Qaisar on his return, said he would cooperate fully in setting up a parliamentary committee on the coronavirus.

However, he had promised to return with his elder brother, ousted PM nawaz Sharif, but there has been no news of any change in the elder’s medical condition, so the younger’s return is obviously not related to either his condition or to the government’s recent correspondence with the British authorities. Besides, the elder Sharif has two sons in London who can look after his treatment.

Mr Sharif’s departure with his brother was seen by some as the result of a ‘deal’ with the establishment. That would mean that his return would also the result of some ‘signal’ from the same source. while he is presently head of a major opposition party, he had won his spurs as Punjab Chief Minister. It is that tenure which had won him admirers among the establishment, and makes the present incumbent, Usman Buzdar, look inept, which was bad enough in ordinary times, but has become even more risky now that the country faces the coronavirus crisis.

Another important reason for Mian Shahbaz’s return is the apparent disintegration of the PML(n) in the absence of both brothers. In their absence, party Vice-president Maryam nawaz, who had remained away from political activity after her bail, had come forward, but it was obvious that her known anti-establishment sympathies needed Mr Sharif to retain control of the party.

Mr Sharif has come at a time when the opposition is not fulfilling its role, and the government’s failures are now extending to the coronavirus crisis. There might be a desire in some quarters to see the entire system wrapped up so that the situation might be better handled. Mr Sharif’s return was greeted with a derisive tweet from federal Science and Technology Minister Fawad Chaudhry, who should have profited from PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto’s saying that the Prime Minister should not be criticised while the epidemic was on, and refrained from the digs he was trying to make.

Poetry that predicted Pakistan Saba Akbarabadi wrote national songs even before Partition Parvez Jamil

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nown for his quiet, yet inspiring contribution to Urdu poetry, naat, marsia, ghazal, rubai and unique research on the Persian poetry of Ghalib, omar Khayam and Amir Khusro is Saba Akbarabadi. His role in the Pakistan Movement is worth highlighting.

Zamzama-e-Pakistan, a creative collection of Saba’s three patriotically pulsating poems, published on 14 May 1946 in Agra, was the first publication dedicated to the Quaid-i-Azam before the creation of Pakistan. while courageously fighting the poetic battle for Pakistan under extreme circumstances, Saba produced Zamazama-e-Pakistan, the thunderous roar and the blitzkrieg of the Muslims of the Indian Subcontinent for a separate homeland and a promise of Pakistan.

Refusing to side with the intriguing and powerful imperialists, challenging the dirty politics of nepotism and favoritism, and exposing the nefarious designs of changing loyalties, Saba had chosen a daring course of expressing his patriotic feelings through Zamzamae-Pakistan. This became a source of enlightenment and inspiration for the Muslims.

At a time when the opportunists were supporting the high and mighty for personal gains and physical security, a weak Saba’s strong poetry had become a morale-booster for many Muslims. Instead of mincing words, by giving verses of altruism and patriotism amid various offers and opportunities, and being adamant against threats and dreads, Saba’s Zamzama-e-Pakistan was a timely revolutionary expression against the ruthless forces of imperialism, Hindu extremism, the crafty Congress and the traitors Muslim cause.

Zamzama-e-Pakistan makes an ideal beginning with a poem Sarpa-e-Noor. It’s a total and universal enlightenment associated with the divine and humane personality of Prophet Mohammad (PBUH).

According to this poem it is through Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) that God communicates, guides, consoles and helps His creation, and that Prophet

Dedicated to the legacy of the late Hameed Nizami

Arif Nizami Editor Aziz-ud-Din Ahmad

Umar Aziz

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Executive Editor

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Lahore – Ph: 042-36300938, 042-36375965

flashing, yet the drivers are not being alerted to get lic transport. The Lahore omnibus Service (LoS) back on course. Collision is imminent unless the driv- covered the entire city, including schools and colers wake up to take charge and correct their direction. leges. Punjab University started its own bus service Under the prevailing circumstances, a crash seems when the new Campus was built outside the city on the Canal. Model Town which was considered anunavoidable.

Then there are drivers who drive in the dark to other independent township had its own service inflict darkness on the passengers. I too had one such called MTBS (Model Town Bus Service). Most drivexperience. In 1971 after the FSc exams we decided ers were trained and buses well kept. It was a great to visit Chitral. It was an arduous journey mostly cov- service for the people, the double-deckers were very ered on foot from Dir with Loweri Top being the enjoyable. Students could travel on special dishighest point (10,000 ft). After reaching the top the counted fares (10 paisas). when I returned in the 1980s to the city of my team ran out of energy. It was decided to seek a ride for the rest of the journey. next morning we stood on birth the transport scene had changed. LoS was rethe road, a Land Rover jeep belonging to Tarbela placed with Punjab Urban Transport Corporation Joint Venture (TJV) was returning back which we (PUTC) with yellow-painted Volvo buses. LoS propboarded to abandon our adventure. we were dropped erties and assets were mostly squandered. new bus on the GT Road from where we boarded a GTS (Gov- depots were established. There was a great decline in ernment Transport Service) bus for Rawalpindi. As service, and the new transport system was named ‘Isthe sun set while we dozed off, loud noises were railis’ as the drivers were reckless. once I was returning from Kot Lakhpat in heard. The driver had light drizzle, I saw a lost his way and was loaded bus skidding in scraping against tree my direction, but with branches on the side of The nation has to become alert to quick reflex I was able to the road. ‘The bus had save my car by going off no lights as the fuse had keep the drivers on the road. Our road behind an electric blown. The driver was pole. relying on the lights of journey is seriously hampered with Invariably, in every the vehicle, following us bus on the front seat and denied him the the kind of intoxicated drivers that ply there was a sign posted space to overtake. In their vehicles on our thoroughfares saying “sleeping is profrustration the driver of hibited”. The same sign the trailing vehicle should now be posted on switched off his lights the driver’s seat as well. throwing us into darkness. It was a scary, unique experience of moving in with tired and fatigued individuals at the helm no one is safe. The slide of the decade of the 1980s has to be the dark. with borrowed lights, high speed and pitch dark- reversed, by bringing in trained and alert drivers who ness our choices were very limited. Though the driver can read the signs and drive safely.

The Quaid-e-Azam used to work late. once he was alert he lost control of the bus. we barely survived. The passengers then took control and forced was asked the reason of keeping awake at night. His the driver to drive slowly on the side. A journey of answer was, “How can I sleep when my nation is minutes was stretched to hours but we were able to asleep?”. It seems everyone is in a slumber in the land reach our destination in safety. Every journey is an ex- of the pure. The nation has to become alert to keep perience but some leave lasting impressions and un- the drivers on the road, otherwise the ‘Israelis’ will forgettable lessons. The driver is always a key player hit us. our journey is seriously hampered with the he has to prepared and alert for the safety of the pas- kind of intoxicated drivers that ply their vehicles on sengers that he has been assigned to carry. Unfortu- our thoroughfares. nately the lack of competent drivers is not limited to Dr Farid A Malik is Ex-Chairman Pakistan Sciour motorways, they are all over, and every institution ence Foundation, and can be reached at has been infested by ‘anarhis’ (the inexpert).

Growing up in Lahore we had the luxury of pub- fmaliks@hotmail.com

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Karachi – Ph: 021-35381208-9

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Mohammad (PBUH) graced human values to such heights that even the skies and heavens bow in respect. The Prophet (PBUH) eradicated the gap between the rich and the poor, made personal sacrifices to help the poor, the old and the weak, promoted unity and fraternity in diversity, taught the Muslims to be united and not to disperse under pressure and attached top priority to dignity of labour and the pursuit of knowledge.

The Prophet (PBUH) practised what he preached and personally became a trendsetter in love, peace, justice, tolerance, selflessness and respect in all walks of life. It is through Sarapa-e-Noor that Saba visualizes Pakistan and prays his heart out for this land of the pure, full of promise and potential.

The second poem highlights Pakistan in the historical perspective. This awakens a classical poet to write such poetry of revolution and rejuvenation where life and death have no meaning as compared national grace, dignity and honour in the comity of nations. Saba recollects when India was plunged into selfishness, wickedness, corruption, tyranny and exploitation. It was a time when ills and evil reigned supreme, when Mohammad Bin Qasim landed In Sindh with the divine and humane message of Islam.

India was then enlightened through such pioneering, selfless and inspiring leadership of Khawaja Islam Shah, naseeruddin Balban, Babar, Akbar, Alamgir and others who united the Muslims from Bengal to Kashmir, all marching towards one reality, Pakistan.

Recalling the episode of Bahadur Shah Zafar, Saba laments those traitors who betrayed the Muslim cause, strengthened imperialistic hands and enforced martyrdom on a pious king only to revive and activate the cause for Pakistan– a Pakistan free from greed, hypocrisy and exploitation, and a Pakistan of love, peace and justice under one Quaid, one nation and one flag to be cautioned and protected from traitors and betrayers both from within and without.

Kutba-e-Babri, the third poem begins with a wish and a wow for such Divine Light that illuminates the darkness of ills and evil by the higher values of humanity. It was truly a testing time for the Muslims when the burden of the white Man’s exploitation and the Banya tricks were telling on them. The Muslims,

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whether they were Ghaznavis, Ghauris, Khiljis or from Sindh, Kabul or Bengal, who enlightened India with decency, governance and civilization, were subjected to the worst kind of human jealousy, tyranny and duplicity. Better late than never, Babar rose with his few brave men to correct things and settle scores for the sake of suffering Muslims. At Fatehpur enlightenment was pitched against darkness when a handful of Muslims led by Babar conformed the evil, proud and massive focus of Rana Sanga. Babar’s address, which was full of Inspiration form the greatest source of strength, Allah and Prophet Mohammad (PBUH), and the vim and vigour of the Khulafa-eRashideen, was a life-tonic for the Muslims. The atmosphere echoed with Nara-e-Takbeer and in a swift action, a few soldiers of Allah overwhelmed the massive focus of evil to raise the flag of Islam and establish truth in India. The Moghuls laid the foundation for sound and stable government. Their courage and determination ruled every heart and inspired every thought. Art, architecture, literature and poetry flourished, and human dignity, respect, equality, truth and justice prevailed. This Muslim stability and prosperity was not to be tolerated by the jealous and cunning banyas who encouraged traitors within the Muslim ranks and found grand allies in the colonial masters to conspire against the Muslims in order to weaken and force them into oblivion and suffering. The English and the Hindus tried to exploit the Muslims. They did everything to prevent them from utilizing their promise and capitalizing on their potential.

It was under the Quaid-i-Azam that the caravan of Islam in India gained strength once again. The Quaid restored confidence of the Indian Muslims by refreshing and rejuvenating them with their winning traditions. He had become a model of inspiration drawn from the Islamic Principles of unity, faith and discipline. At the threshold of the creation of Pakistan, Saba’s Zamzama-e-Pakistan became a morale booster. India was divided and a reality was carved out as a homeland for the Muslims of India – Pakistan a symbol of love, peace and justice!

Parvez Jamil can be contacted at: parvezjamil@hotmail.com

Email: editorial@pakistantoday.com.pk

Monday, 23 March, 2020

COMMENT 09 Editor’s mail Send your letters to: Letters to Editor, Pakistan Today, 4-Shaarey Fatima Jinnah, Lahore, Pakistan.

E-mail: letters@pakistantoday.com.pk Letters should be addressed to Pakistan Today exclusively

Coronavirus and students AS we all are well aware Coronavirus is rapidly spreading in recent days, for our safety government has locked down every institution. But students have not taken this seriously. Instead of being serious they go for picnics, gathering’s, and visits to places these days. I humbly request that all individuals please stay at home for your safety.

ZAhrA hoth turbat

We must act

Thank you, Mr Jinnah The Two-Nation Theory has been proved right again

Sirajuddin aziz

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he picture of a Muslim man being beaten brutally became the defining image of the recent New Delhi religious riots. Muhammad Zubair survived the attack in North east Delhi.

Said Zubair to the BBC, “There were thousands in the crowd and many started beating me. They hit me with rods and sticks so many times that I lost the count after a while.” he was attacked while returning home from the mosque. “everyone at home was expecting me to bring sweets and savouries. I had almost reached home when I heard that some fight had started between hindus and Muslims…

“I tried to turn back but some people spotted me and soon a mob surrounded me. They started beating me. I was bleeding from the head, they hit me so hard…..I started to lose consciousness.

They were chanting “Jai Shri Ram” (hail Lord Ram), beat up the Muslims, beat up the Muslims,” The rioters thought he had died and left him on the street. ”I remember some people picked me up and took me somewhere…… I realized it was to a nearby hospital in an ambulance. My mother was not allowed to see me for four days. She was crying inconsolably… No one who saw the photo thought I would survive”. he adds, “The incident has not broken my faith in humanity… They broke my body, not my soul…… people who do horrible acts cannot be from any religion.”

Only a courageous Muslim would say that those who do horrible acts cannot be from any religion. Robert Burns in 1786 had written, “Man’s inhumanity to man, makes countless thousands mourn”. even India’s own Mahatma Gandhi had aptly remarked, “I can never understand the pleasure of one man at the insult of another.”

Planning to execute cruelty is possibly the worst sin any human can commit. Only a vile mind and a cowardly corrupt inner self can plan and inflict pain on fellow humans for personal pleasure.

Rabindranath Tagore, the celebrated writer, says, “Man is worse than an animal when he is an animal”. he said so in 1916; one cannot but admire the Nobel laureate for the foresight he had of his future compatriots (Narendra Modi and Amit shah). Can any expect civility from savages?

In the same 1916, the Indian National Congress chose Jawaharlal Nehru’s father Motilal to draft alongside a budding young Muslim lawyer, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, principles that would form the charter of cooperation with the Muslim League. This led to what is commonly known “Lucknow Pact”. The unanimity was so predominant over the principles of engagement, that the front line leading light, the nightingale of Indian politics, Sarojini Naidu, hailed Mr. Jinnah as the

“Ambassador of hindu-Muslim unity”. She than a complete victory. honour will be regained.

Congress, at least prima facie, has been went on to collect, compile and edit Mr Jinnah’s speeches and writings. Until here, the two com- friendly towards Muslims. It had towering Musmunities were fighting a formidable common lims like Abul Kalam Azad, Rafi Kidwai, hussain Ahmad Madni, Who also believed that foe, the British.

Supplementing the convergence over prin- Muslims could co-exist with hindus; just as ciples, was Mohandas Karam Chand Gandhi’s much as Nehru and Gandhi, also believed so. active support and participation, alongside the The likes of Vallabhai Patel were a handful then.

Ali Brothers, in the movement for the restoration Modi’s BJP, is the blossomed plant that has had of the caliphate in Turkey. Gandhi’s sincerity has the RSS as its seedling. The assassin of Gandhi, Nathuram Godse, was an active RSS member. never been doubted.

I had read somewhere, today there is more Much, before Partition, Mr Jinnah, the epitome of being an ‘ambassador of hindu-Muslim fellowship among snakes than among mankind. unity’ had begun to realize the distinctions be- Wild beasts spare those with similar markings. tween the two were many and the areas of con- But the exception to this, is Narendra Modi– no vergence were few. he, after returning from wonder he is a permanently elected President of London, announced, “We are different beings. the Parliament of Cobras!

Indian historians blame unnecessarily There is nothing in life which links us together.

Our names, our clothes, our foods–- they are all Jawarharlal Nehru for having offered Pakistan on different; our economic life, our educational a platter to Jinnah. In doing so, they actually atidea, our treatment of women, our attitude to an- tempt to demean the struggle and relentless fight imals , we challenge each other at every point of our Quaid. This attitude and claim is well reof the compass”. here, we have now a changed futed by a well-known Indian Muslim. M.J Jinnah, working to establish the Muslim League Akbar, who in his biography of Nehru says, “Pakas the party of the entire Muslim community of istan was created by Jinnah’s will and Britain’s India. And he succeeded. Thank God for that. In willingness– not by Nehru’s wilfulness”.

Mr Jinnah’s mind was a workshop, where he 1939, the British invited Mr Jinnah to address a message over Radio to all the Muslims of India worked day in and day out, calibrating his moves; defining and sharpening his objectives, on the occasion of eid. The Quaid had arrived. on how to seek InJinnah’s mind dependence from was always hunting both the British and for freedom. he ulthe hindu Zealots. timately snatched Freedom exacts a price. My he was singlemindfreedom from the edly possessed of clutches of the only one objective– British and the Indi- compatriots, value your independence. ans. The plight of Just Imagine, without the Quaid, all of a homeland for the Muslims of India.

Indian Muslims us would have been Zubairs of New This sincerity of today mocks the purpose reflects so human sense of jusDelhi, in an undivided Bharat well, in the elegant tice. It is no violaarrangement of his tion of any notion priorities and by the or principle, when a thoroughness of his man seeks for himself to be secure, to be happy, to build his family, conviction– that the hindu majority in India to protect from harm those whom he loves and would dominate and deprive the Muslim minorto do what pleases him, without restraint or com- ity of its rights.

Despite the Muslim blood that flowed in the pulsion. Our Quaid stood up for the task.

Renunciation of liberty is surrender to slav- rivers of the Punjab, at the hands of the murderery. Liberty is the reward of struggle. Today an ous hindus, during the partition —- Partition average Indian Muslim denied of liberty desires was not a tragedy . It was a boon, a victory for death– Zubair Muhammad’s pictures on the BBC the Muslims of India. Today, the Quaid’s vision are a testimony to this. Gandhi, after independ- is a QeD of his belief and conviction. The Twoence and the creation of Pakistan, had remarked, Nation Theory is proven. And the creation of “The moment the slave resolves that he will no Bangladesh is not a negation; it actually is a hislonger be a slave, his fetters fall. he frees himself torical re-affirmation, that Muslims are a differand shows the way to others. Freedom and slav- ent community. Bangladesh is not part of West ery are mental states”. Mr. Gandhi, wherever you Bengal, it is independent. I am in personal adare, know that despite 70 long years of struggle miration of the Bangladeshi people for having by the Kashmiris to make the fetters fall, it hasn’t thwarted recently Modi’s official visit– they did happened … they wait for it to do so, despite the so, because he kills only Muslims. An evil man, unthinkable odds of insane atrocities, being com- leading an otherwise tolerant people.

Peace and freedom go together. how can mitted upon them by Narendra Modi and his cohorts. All Kashmiris and Muslims in India have there be peace when you are in fetters? Modi proven it is better to starve, suffer and take pain, doesn’t know, when pushed to the wall, humans than be a fat slave. They have decided to stand get fresh strength with every blow. Modi is a nuisance to humanity. Nature must not fold its on their feet and not be upon their knees. easier said than done. But freedom exacts a hands, but react– the sooner the better.

Many of my countrymen should know, with price. My compatriots, value your independence. Just Imagine, without the Quaid, all of us better understanding that those who have freewould have been Zubairs of New Delhi, in an dom, rarely appreciate its true value; ask those who don’t. Like our Muslim brothers in Indian undivided Bharat.

The menacing clouds of Indian arrogance over held Kashmir, the rest of India and Burma; only Kashmir for the last seven decades all have had sil- then, will we thank enough our founder, the ver linings, the time is nigh, when the sunshine of Quaid-e-Azam. freedom will break through. It is but natural and Sirajuddin Aziz is a freelance columnist. divine for it to happen. Muslims will accept no less

IT is always an implicit struggle or friction between the power circles in our country? Most importantly, there seems to be a confusion regarding roles and responsibilities among the government, bureaucracy, judiciary and professional. Unfortunately, different political leaders in various parties hold separate views. Irrespective of the differing views, the chief executive of the country is responsible for safety, security, and wellbeing of the citizens of the country. Napoléon, during his dictatorship years said that without any greenery human life is not possible, but greenery cannot spring without water. We as nation and our top leadership has not been able to get this simple rule yet. The government is obligated to preserve water through building dams, independent of the size. The two major dams built in 60’s are losing their capacity due to silting. Other water bodies such as the century old ‘Guddu’ barrage is also deteriorating fast partly due to aging and partly due to lack of timely maintenance and upkeep. We however are living in fool’s paradise busy in petty disagreements over building new dams. The government must persuade the leaders who oppose construction of damns to give consent in the national interest to build dams at sites which are declared suitable by engineers and experts. To ensure that these projects are not opposed, the proposed names may also be changed if needed. Our political leaders must shun petty politics of divide and rule at the provincial level where they use such thorny issues to instigate people just to strengthen their power. It is about time we realize the gravity of the problem, shun ethnic biases and unite to create unity to build much needed dams. rAJA ShAFAAtuLLAh Islamabad

Pakistan day in quarantine eVeRy year, Pakistan Day was celebrated enthusiastically in all the cities and small towns in Pakistan. however, this year due to the global emergency of coronavirus, the government has decided to cancel out the much awaited Parade in the federal capital in order to save the public from crowded gatherings. Undoubtedly, it will be a devastating moment for all the Pakistanis but as responsible citizens it is a duty of all of us to respect our government’s order and avoid unnecessary public meetings.

ANDLEEEB BAShArAt ABBASI rawalpindi

Prevention is better than cure AS we are looking at the current situation, many people have died and thousands are being infected every day due to the global emergency caused by coronavirus. To evade from this epidemic, we should comply on all the precautions which has given by Government and Doctors then we can save our life by our own self. Furthermore, in this time of global crisis, we all need to stand together and support each other in order to fight against this threat. The whole world is in some sort of a lock down and in complicated situations. As responsible citizens it is our duty to respect the government’s decision and follow preservation so we can get secure our life from this epidemic. We need to encourage the government to take more steps before the situation gets out of hand.

FArIhA YouSuF Karachi

Sindh under lockdown SINDh Chief Minister Murad Ali has announced a province-wide lockdown after midnight tonight (Sunday).

“After 12am tonight Sindh will undergo a lockdown,” CM said.

“People will not be allowed to venture out of their homes unnecessarily.”

In an earlier statement issued after a meeting, the chief minister had said that the government was taking this important decision in the interest of people and hoped that the public will support the government.

Sindh is struggling to contain the coronavirus, as it has reported the highest number of coronavirus cases as far as provinces are concerned, with the total tally rising to 292. “We are about to take major and difficult decisions for the safety of people,” Murad had said, adding that the government was concerned about the welfare of the masses. “There’s no option but to impose lockdown in the province and I will announce this later today,” Murad had said and urged the masses to stay home. No one will be allowed to hit the road without any strong reason.

MoNIS SALMAN Karachi

Stay at home, please COVID-19 respects no social border , culture or religion. It shows no mercy and will hit hard . From 1 person infected it can spread to 2.6 people . In multiple infection with 5-6 days can spread to 3500 others. But you can break this chain . Stay at home. The Movement Control Order (MCO) is an important measures to “flatten the curve” . In epidemiology, the curve is known as the projected number of new cases over a certain time frame .

Without any form of control , the Coronavirus would have a steep rise . This stressing the current capacity of the health system. Without the MCO , the curve can be flatten , to stagger new cases over a longer period, enabling people to have better access to health care can reduce infections . So stay at home to stop the spread of Virus.

Thanking you, hAruM ShuJAuDDIN SIDDIquI Karachi.

Monday, 23 March, 2020

10 FOREIGN NEWS

ONE iN fOur AMEricANs tOld tO stAy hOME As cONgrEss NEArs $1 trilliON stiMulus NEW YORK/WASHINGTON

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AGENCIES

EARLy 1 in 4 Americans were under orders to close up shop and stay at home on Saturday, as lawmakers in Washington neared a deal that could pump a record $1 trillion into the economy to limit the economic damage from the coronavirus.

New Jersey’s governor followed four other states - California, New york, Illinois and Connecticut - that have imposed unprecedented restrictions to slow the spread of infections, which have risen exponentially. Governors in other states urged citizens to avoid large gatherings, even if restrictions were not in place.

“It’s like we are all lost in a movie that we can’t relate to in any way,” West Virginia Governor Jim Justice said, as he urged residents of his state to take the threat more seriously.

At least 23,941 cases of the novel coronavirus have been reported in the United States and 306 people have died from the COVID-19 disease as of Saturday evening,

according to a Reuters tally of state and local government websites. In Washington, Republican and Democratic leaders appeared to be nearing a deal to pump more than $1 trillion into the economy, adding to the hundreds of billions of dollars in fiscal and monetary stimulus that has already been deployed to prop up the world’s largest economy.

“I think we’re clearly going to get there,” said Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, who scheduled a vote for Monday.

Hard-hit airlines are pressing for $29 billion in cash, promising in return not to furlough employees before September. But lawmakers said they were inclined to offer loans instead. Two members of the U.S. House of Representatives have tested positive, and U.S. Vice President Mike Pence and his wife tested negative after an unidentified aide was diagnosed with the virus.

Pence staffers said the aide had mild symptoms and had not had close contact with Pence or President Donald Trump. Trump tested negative for the virus last week, according to his doctor.

READINESS: As hospitals braced for an influx of patients, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the

U.S. government’s top infectious disease expert, urged Americans to postpone non-essential surgeries to keep beds available.

The Trump administration has struggled to line up tests to diagnose the disease, masks to slow its transmission, and medical equipment to treat those who have contracted it. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved a test that can deliver a result in 45 minutes, rather than days, according to Cepheid, its maker. At the White House, officials said they were delivering more tests and equipment where they were needed, but declined to say whether they had met benchmarks they had laid out earlier in the week. State and local officials say they are scrambling for supplies.

“We’ve gotten no help from the federal government, or limited help,” Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker said at a news briefing.

New york Governor Andrew Cuomo said the state had identified 6,000 ventilators to help sick patients keep breathing, but needed 30,000 more. He said the state is sending 1 million N95 respirator masks to New york City - short of the 3 million city officials are seeking.

“We are literally scouring the globe for medical supplies,” Cuomo said.

In New york City, where more than 6,000 cases have been diagnosed, about a dozen people waited for a test in the parking lot of the Brooklyn Hospital Center.

“That’s insane,” city council member Mark Levine said in a phone interview. “If they’re well enough to stand in a line, they should be home resting, they don’t need a test, and they need to get out of the way.”

Federal authorities briefly stopped flights arriving at New york City-area airports after a trainee at an air traffic control center tested positive. Neighboring New Jersey became the latest state on Saturday to adopt a statewide directive requiring residents to remain indoors except for trips to grocery stores, pharmacies, gas stations and

Australia takes stimulus to 10pc of GDP and orders closures to combat coronavirus MELBOURNE/SYDNEY AGENCIES

Australia ordered pubs, cinemas, churches and casinos to close and two more states said on Sunday they would shut their borders, while the government pledged an extra A$66.4 billion ($38.50 billion) to combat the impact of the coronavirus.

Along with neighboring New Zealand, Australia has brought in widespread measures to limit the spread of the virus, but they have been less stringent than the lockdowns in parts of Europe and North America where infection rates are higher. Australia’s new fiscal stimulus, the second in a week, will go to individuals in need and small and medium-sized businesses which account for about a third of output and employ more than 40% of the workforce, according to government statistics.

“We will be focusing on those in the front line, those who will be feeling the first blows of the economic impact of the coronavirus,” Prime Minister Scott Morrison said

SINGAPORE AGENCIES

Lockdowns and panic food buying due to the coronavirus pandemic could ignite world food inflation even though there are ample supplies of staple grains and oilseeds in key exporting nations, a senior economist at FAO and agricultural analysts said.

The world’s richest nations poured unprecedented aid into the global economy as coronavirus cases ballooned across Europe and the United States, with the number of deaths in Italy outstripping those in mainland China, where the virus originated. With over 270,000 infections and more than 11,000 deaths, the epidemic has stunned the world and drawn comparisons with periods such as World War Two and the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.

“All you need is panic buying from big importers such as millers or governments to create a crisis,” said Abdolreza Abbassian, senior economist at the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). “It is not a supply issue, but it is a behavioral change over food security,” he told Reuters by phone from Rome, the FAO headquarters. “What if bulk buyers think they can’t get wheat or rice shipments in May or June? That is what could lead to a global food supply crisis.”

Consumers across the world from Singapore to the United States have queued at super markets in recent weeks to stock up on items ranging from rice and hand sanitizers to toilet paper. The global benchmark Chicago wheat futures rose more than 6% this week, the biggest weekly gain in nine months, while rice prices in Thailand, the world’s 2nd largest exporter

in Canberra early on Sunday. “There will be more packages and more support.” The package dwarfs the A$17.6 billion ($10.20 billion) in initial measures announced last week. Morrison said later on Sunday that the country would close most public gathering venues from midday on Monday to enforce social distancing rules.

Many Australians appeared to disregard health warnings and flocked to pubs and beaches at the weekend amid a warm autumn spell. The number of coronavirus infections has risen quickly in recent days, climbing to 1,098 confirmed cases as of Sunday morning with seven recorded deaths linked to COVID-19.

Almost all sectors will be affected by the forced closures, although restaurants, cafes and catering businesses will still be able to offer delivery and take-away services.

“That is a very, very regretful decision. But a necessary one,” Morrison said at a conference late on Sunday.

Schools in Australia are set to remain open, Morrison said, although Victoria, the country’s second most populous state, will end its first term on Tuesday, a few days

early. South Australia and Western Australia on Sunday said they would close their borders as of Tuesday to restrict the movement of people, following similar actions in the Northern Territory and Tasmania announced last week. The other three states and one territory, home to much larger populations, remained open. The Australian Football League (AFL), which has been reluctant to suspend its games, said on Sunday the 2020 top flight Australian rules season would pause until the end of May. ECONOMIC HIT: Together with emergency banking measures and the initial stimulus package, Australia has now announced financial measures equaling about 10% of the country’s annual gross domestic product, the government said. Morrison said the government would help underwrite loans to small and medium-sized businesses and boost unemployment benefits as companies are forced to lay off staff. Jobseekers will get extra money and people in financial stress will also be able access some of their pension funds, while some not-for-profits and small businesses will have access to cash grants to keep staff employed.

Panic buying, lockdowns may drive world food inflation, analysts warn

of the grain, have climbed to the highest since August 2013. France’s grain industry is scrambling to find enough trucks and staff to keep factories and ports running as the panic buying of pasta and flour coincides with a surge in wheat exports.

Restrictions imposed by some European Union countries at their borders with other member states in response to the

pandemic are also disrupting food supplies, representatives of the industry and farmers said. However, global wheat stocks at the end of the crop marketing year in June are projected to rise to 287.14 million tonnes, up from 277.57 million tonnes a year ago, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) estimates. World rice stocks are projected at

182.3 million tonnes as compared with 175.3 million tonnes a year ago.

FOOD IN THE RIGHT PLACE: Logistics are likely to be a major global issue, analysts said. “There is about 140 million tonnes of corn that goes in ethanol in the United States and some of that can used for food as it won’t be needed for fuel, given the drop in oil prices,” said Ole Houe, director of advisory services at brokerage IKON Commodities “The concern is having food at the right time in the right place.”

Asian buyers were inactive this week with uncertainty looming in the market.

“We are not sure about the demand.

What it is going to look like in June or July?” said one Singapore-based purchasing manager at a flour milling company that has operations across Southeast Asia.

“Restaurant business is down, and as a result demand is a bit soft right now.” Asian wheat importers, including the region’s top importer Indonesia, have been taking a bulk of the cargoes from the Black Sea region amid a global oversupply. Oil exporting nations in the Middle East, which are also net grain importers, are likely to feel more financial pain with crude losing more than 60% of its value this year. “Net oil exporters’ capacity to buy grains has dropped given the fall in oil prices and depreciation in currencies,” said FAO’s Abbassian.

other “essential businesses.”

Stay-at-home orders now apply to 84 million people in states that account for a third of the nation’s economy. Other states encouraged residents to reduce activity but did not put restrictions in place. Missouri went in a different direction, allowing childcare providers to take on more children.

The state directives were for the most part issued without strict enforcement mechanisms to back them up. Cuomo said New york would fine and close businesses that defy the order. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said police would “admonish” people to go home. In Ridgefield, Connecticut, where six new cases were reported on Saturday, town official Rudy Marconi said he would dispatch the police to break up a teenagers’ basketball game.

Musk, Medtronic discuss ventilators amid coronavirus outbreak As the United States is combating a shortage of ventilators and respirators amid the coronavirus outbreak, Tesla Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk said he has had a discussion about ventilators with medical device maker Medtronic. “Just had a long engineering discussion with Medtronic about state-of-the-art ventilators,” Musk tweeted on Saturday. Medtronic confirmed having a discussion with Musk but neither elaborated further on the topic of the discussion or whether they will lead to any material steps.

Musk earlier this week offered to make ventilators for coronavirus sufferers, after the U.S. appealed for donations of respirator masks to fight a shortage. Governments across the world, including in the U.S., are drafting automakers and aerospace manufacturers to ramp up production of ventilators and other medical equipment. AGENCIES

Netflix to slash traffic across Europe to relieve virus strain on internet providers Netflix Inc said it will cut traffic by 25% on networks across Europe in a relief measure for internet service providers (ISPs) experiencing a surge in usage due to government “shelter in place” orders aimed at slowing the coronavirus outbreak. The streaming giant, which has already deployed a way to reduce its traffic on networks in Italy and Spain by a quarter, on Saturday said it would do the same for the rest of Europe in the next two days. Netflix said it will remove the highest bandwidth streams within each resolution category for the next 30 days in Europe wherein users might notice a slight decrease in video quality within each category. “Our goal is simple: to maintain the quality of service for our members, while supporting ISPs who are facing unprecedented strain on their networks,” the company said.

Netflix said it will continue to adhere with normal procedures for all other networks “until and unless they experience issues of their own”.

The world’s largest streaming media service had said on Thursday it would reduce bit rates across all of its streams in Europe, in effect cutting traffic on its European networks by 25% to preserve the smooth functioning of the internet during the coronavirus crisis. While partners in regions such as Latin America want the company to reduce its bandwidth as soon as possible, others wanted to continue business as usual, Netflix said. Netflix had over 42 million subscribers in Europe, Africa and the Middle East at the end of the first quarter of 2019, showed an exchange filing, with the bulk estimated to be in Europe. AGENCIES

Monday, 23 March, 2020

BUSINESS 11

Govt urged to allow freight movement at Torkham border PESHAWAR stAff RePoRt

Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry President Engr Maqsood Anwar Pervaiz on Sunday welcomed the reopening of the Chaman-Spinboldak border. He, however, demanded the cross-border movement of goods trucks at the Torkham border. Speaking to a delegation of traders at the Chamber House, he termed the reopening of Pakistan-Afghan border at Chaman was a right step of the government under the prevailing circumstances. “The reopening will not only give further boost to bilateral trade and economic activities in the border region, but will also avoid further financial losses to the business community,” Perviaz said. The SCCI chief called upon the government to allow movement of trucks, loaded with perishable and other goods items and stranded at Torkham for many days due to closure of the border. Expressing concern over meager cut in policy rate announced by the State Bank of Pakistan, Pervaiz said the reduction in interest rate was not justifiable as business and trade activities were getting adversely affected after outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic. He urged the government to immediately reduce policy interest rate to single digit level in order to save businesses from the negative impact of the virus. The SCCI chief said the electricity and gas were main source to keep the wheel of manufacturing units running, but constant hike in power and gas rates was a major hurdle in industrial growth in the country. He urged the government to reduce rates of electricity and gas to give boost to industrialisation and to generate more employment opportunities. The chamber’s president also urged the central bank to re-schedule the disbursement of loans, which were given to business institutions in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak.

Steel sector seeks bailout package due to virus impact KARACHI inP

The Pakistan Steel Re-Rolling Mills Association on Sunday sought the federal government’s intervention in saving the ailing industry from the adverse impact of the coronavirus outbreak. In a statement, the association’s chairman Karim Aziz Malik said as the coronavirus had upset global and Pakistan’s economy to a great extent their industry needed a bailout package. He said Pakistan’s steel industry was suffering from a financial crisis due to the sudden outbreak of the pandemic, which had disturbed pace of work on public sector developmental projects and CPEC. Malik, who has also served as Vice President of FPCCI, said prevailing circumstance had reduced the turnover of steel industries to unsustainable levels.

Moreover, he said, high mark up on running finance facilities, 1.5 per cent turnover tax on sales, withdrawal of steel industry from fixed sales tax regime and increasing utility bills had taken the toll on the industry. Malik said the business community hoped that the business and coordination committee appointed on the directions of Prime Minister Imran Khan for the revival of the industries would announce a relief soon. He said the government should consider slashing bank mark up to zero per cent and mark up payment should be deferred to zero for six months by the State Bank of Pakistan. Turnover tax should be reduced to 0.25pc from existing 1.5pc while the fixed sales tax regime should be restored for the steel industry instead of the federal excise duty, he further suggested. The steel smiller further said the government should consider the revival of the steel industry and include recommendations of this sector in the forthcoming relief package.

SNGPL board To ProPoSe 5 freSh NameS for md’S aPPoiNTmeNT ISLAMABAD

T

AHMAD AHMADAni

HE Board of Directors (BoD) of the Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL), in its upcoming meeting to be held on March 26, is likely to forward five suitable names to Prime Minister Imran Khan for consideration to fill the top slot, Pakistan Today has learnt.

According to sources, the BoD is likely to take the decision to remove the acting managing director of SNGPL. Five fresh names will be proposed to the premier from the list of already shortlisted 15 candidates.

Sources further said the PM Office had earlier rejected the BoD’s summary about regular appointment of incumbent acting SNGPL MD Amer Tufail.

They further said the PM had declared that acting MD Amer Tufail or deputy MD Sohail Gulzar were not eligible to become head of the gas utility due to their adverse reports and ordered to remove them from their portfolios.

Sources said though the Petroleum Division has kept mum over the matter for a month despite the PM’s orders, it has now asked the SNGPL’s board to suggest fresh five names for the top position. Private members of the SNGPL’s board are resisting the PM’s decision to remove the acting SNGPL MD, sources added.

Officers on acting charge basis have

THE PM OFFICE HAS ALREADY REJECTED ACTING MD AMER TUFAIL AND DEPUTY MD SOHAIL GULZAR DUE TO THEIR NEGATIVE REPORTS

been running the company’s affairs for the last one year or so. SNGPL’s board had earlier proposed names to PMO for the appointment of MD SNGPL on 1st January this year. However, PMO returned the summary to the Petroleum Division with observations of lowdown reports of proposed candidates Amer Tufail and Sohail Gulzar had re-

flected negative remarks.

PMO observed that Rule 5 (2) of the Public Sector Companies (Corporate Governance) Rules, 2013 provides that the board shall recommend a panel of three officers to the federal government /cabinet for the appointment of any of them as the Chief Executive Officer /Managing Director. Since the

candidates have been found unsuitable owing to their adverse low-downs, the proposed panel has fallen short of the three requisite officers.

Similarly, a list of senior management officers of SNGPL was obtained for assigning the additional charge to any suitable senior officer other than Amer Tufail and Sohail Gulzar.

As per the list of senior management officers (Grade IX and above), Senior General Manager (SGM) Muhammad Aslam was to retire on 29th February, 2020, SGM Human Resources Azam Khan Wazir was to retire on 31st January, 2020, while Chief Financial Officer Faisal Iqbal was to retire from his position on 23rd February, 2020.

It is also learnt from sources that in view of the above scenario and in the light of observation raised by PMO, the case regarding the appointment of the SNGPL MD was referred to the Board of Directors (BoD) of SNGPL with the directions to propose the names of at least five candidates excluding Amer Tufail and Sohail Gulzar for onward submission to PMO and the Cabinet Division.

The SNGPL’s board, its meeting on March 26, would take appropriate action as per service rules of the company against Amer Tufail and Sohail Gulzar, following the stock of comments made

by PMO, sources said, adding the board would also propose the name of suitable candidate for the acting charge of the SNGPL MD.

Coronavirus: Emirates to ground entire passenger fleet and cut wages

DUBAI Agencies

Emirates, one of the world’s biggest international airlines, will ground its entire passenger fleet this week and cut staff wages by as much as half because of the coronavirus and its impact on travel demand.

The state-owned Dubai carrier had already announced the suspension of nearly 70pc of its network, asked staff to go on unpaid leave and frozen recruitment as the industry faces one of its biggest ever challenges.

“As a global network airline, we find ourselves

in a situation where we cannot viably operate passenger services until countries reopen their borders and travel confidence returns,” Emirates Chairman Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed al-Maktoum said in a statement.

The Dubai based airline will stop passenger flights by Wednesday and did not say when they would resume, though cargo flights will continue.

International connectivity is crucial for Emirates’ Gulf hub model, which transformed Dubai six years ago into the world’s busiest international airport. It does not operate domestic flights and most of its passengers transit through Dubai.

Emirates Group, a state holding company that includes the airline among its assets, will enforce a temporary 25pc to 50pc reduction in basic salary for the majority of employees.

Emirates President Tim Clark, who is due to step down in June, and Gary Chapman, president of the holding group’s airport and travel services company, will forgo their basic salaries for three months.

“We want to avoid cutting jobs,” Sheikh Ahmed said. “When demand picks up again, we also want to be able to quickly ramp up and resume services for our customers.”

Pakistan needs special economic policies to implement SEZs: Cheng Xizhong BEIJING inP

Pakistan’s government will be required to establish recently announced 10 Special Economic Zones (SEZs) in the country by adopting economic policies and systems different from those of other regions.

“National conditions vary from country to country, so special and brand-new economic policies and systems should be determined according to the actual situation of the country with its own characteristics,” Chinese scholar and economic expert Prof Cheng Xizhong stated in an article carried

by Gwadar Pro App on Sunday.

According to Prof Cheng, the overall target is to make SEZs attractive to domestic and foreign investors through the promulga-

tion of a series of preferential policies, so that they (Chinese investors) are willing to invest in the SEZs on a large scale.

Citing the practices of China's SEZs, he said in April 1979, Deng Xiaoping, the Chief Architect of China’s Reform and Openingup, first proposed the establishment of "special export zone".

In March 1980, the name of "special export zone" was changed to "Special Economic Zone", which was first implemented in South China’s Shenzhen City.

“In essence, SEZs are one of the main forms of free port area in the world. By tariff reduction and other preferential policies, and by creating a good investment environment, encouraging foreign investment, and introducing advanced technology and scientific management, we can develop na-

tional economy and technology,” Prof Cheng suggested.

He said Pakistan would be required to adopt special economic policies, flexible economic measures and special management systems, and adhere to the development target of export-oriented economy.

Pakistan has decided to set up 10 SEZs in four provinces, it is not necessary that every region of a country should be promoted in an absolutely balanced way. The reason why China’s first established SEZ is situated in coastal area is that such areas have the potential to absorb foreign capital, advanced science, technology and management experience.

When the most developed regions are further developed, they will help develop other regions, so as to put the national econ-

omy and technology on the track of rapid development.

Prof Cheng pointed out that China is now one of the major investors in the world.

There are two advantages in China's foreign investment, capital and technology.

In 2018, China's overseas direct investment reached $143.04 billion, becoming the second largest foreign investor in the world. Japan, the largest investor, reached $143.16 billion in the same year, a little higher than China’s.

At present, more than 27,000 Chinese investors have established 43,000 overseas direct investment enterprises in 188 countries and regions around the world. There are more than 10,000 overseas enterprises established in the countries and regions along the Belt and Road.

It is reported that China will invest $5 billion in Pakistan's SEZs in the next three to five years. This figure is very conservative. The relations between China and Pakistan are so close, and the mutual interests between the two countries blend so closely, so I believe the amount of investment should be much higher than this.

How much will China invest in Pakistan in the next few years? It depends on the courage of Pakistan's reform and openingup, the substantial improvement of business environment in Pakistan and how flexible Pakistan's preferential policies for foreign investment will be.

In addition, it depends on the security environment and the stability of Pakistan's political situation, the Chinese economist added.

Monday, 23 March, 2020

12 BUSINESS

JOinT COrOnAvirus Fund FOr sAArC COunTries PrOPOsed

A fresh wave of coronavirus job losses is about to come crashing down LONDON Agencies

The coronavirus pandemic has quickly thrust the world into recession as bars and restaurants shut down and countries instruct their citizens to hunker down. The question now is just how deep the pain will be, and how long it will last. A picture of the economic devastation in North America and Europe has already started to emerge. A US government report published Thursday showed that 281,000 Americans filed for their first week of unemployment benefits last week — a sudden 33PC jump over the week before and the largest percentage increase since 1992. This week is expected to be much worse. Goldman Sachs predicts that a shocking 2.25 million Americans will have filed for their first week of unemployment benefits. That would be eight times the number of people who filed last week and the highest level on record. Watch this space: The investment bank thinks the US unemployment rate will shoot up from an all-time low of 3.5pc to 9pc "over the next couple of quarters." Fears about joblessness on this scale could jolt markets again.

Investors have priced in a recession by now, but may still be processing the size of the hole the coronavirus has blown into the global economy, Jeffrey Kleintop, chief global investment strategist at Charles Schwab, told me. "The market is expecting bad data," he said, but the jobs numbers may be "far worse" than investors think. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is now down 35pc from its all-time high in mid-February, erasing all its gains since President Donald Trump's inauguration. Between January 20 and last Thursday, $27 trillion was wiped off global stocks, according to Bank of America. And there's still no nadir in sight, especially as dismal economic data from Europe and North America begins to roll in. "[The market is] unlikely to bottom until we see the peak in new virus cases, and we just don't know when that will be," Kleintop said. "We don't have anything for the market to hold onto to steady it." Fearful of devastating layoffs in the travel and hospitality industries, governments are taking radical steps to support businesses. The United Kingdom on Friday pledged to pay 80% of wages, up to £2,500 ($2,895) per month, for employees who can't work because of the pandemic. That could help: Economists are hopeful that such dramatic measures can ease some of the pain. Capital Economics believes that in the United Kingdom, unemployment will now rise from 4pc to 6pc, instead of to 8pc as had been "previously feared." "Providing cash-strapped firms with generous subsidies to retain their staff will dramatically lower the risk of surging unemployment during the coronavirus recession," Kallum Pickering, senior economist at Berenberg Bank, told clients Friday. And it "raises the chance that the economy can get back to normal quickly" once restrictions are lifted, he added.

Ford, GM, Tesla getting 'go ahead' to make ventilators: Trump WASHINGTON Agencies

US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that US automakers Ford Motor Co, General Motors Co and Tesla Inc had been given the green light to produce ventilators and other items needed during the coronavirus outbreak. “Ford, General Motors and Tesla are being given the go ahead to make ventilators and other metal products, FAST! @fema Go for it auto execs, lets see how good you are?” he said on Twitter. It was not immediately clear what Trump meant by the companies “being given the go ahead.”

LAHORE sTAff RepoRT

s

AARC Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCI) President-designate Iftikhar Ali Malik on Sunday proposed COVID-19 emergency fund for member countries to jointly combat the pandemic.

In a news statement, he suggested that Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh should pool an initial amount of $5 million each on voluntary basis.

Malik said Maldives, Nepal, Bhutan and Afghanistan should contribute $2 million in this proposed virus fund as “this is important for South Asian countries to focus on collaboration, not confusion, and preparation, not panic.”

"Looking ahead, we can create a common re-

search platform to coordinate research on controlling epidemic diseases within our South Asian region,” he added.

Malik said while setting an example for the world, South Asian countries come forward with commitment and determination and contribute to a healthier planet, putting all kinds of skirmish on the backburner as the coronavirus is a common threat for human beings.

“Unlike Western countries that have a proper quarantine mechanism in place at airports and other places and medical facilities available to patients, whereas countries in South Asia lack preparedness to tackle the situation. A possible spread of the virus in these countries could prove to be catastrophic,” he added.

Appreciating Prime Minister Imran Khan for

Gulf nations, not Russia, to blame for oil prices fall: Belousov MOSCOW ReUTeRs

Russia never sought a sharp oil price fall or an end to cooperation with Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), and the Gulf nations are to blame for the crisis on the global oil markets, a senior Russian official said.

In early March, Russia and OPEC failed to agree how their deal to cut oil production should work: OPEC wanted to deepen the cuts while Moscow proposed extending existing curbs. The disagreement came at a time when global demand was slumping because of the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Oil prices fell from nearly $50 per barrel on March 6 when the deal collapsed to below $27 on Friday, as Saudi Arabia, the top OPEC player, and Russia, the world’s second biggest oil exporter after Riyadh, prepare to open the taps from April 1.

“Russian position was never about triggering an oil prices fall. This is purely our Arab partners initiative,” Andrei Belousov,

Russian first deputy prime minister, was quoted as saying by TASS late on Saturday.

“Even oil companies who are obviously interested to maintain their markets, did not have a stance that the deal (OPEC+) should be dissolved.”

Belousov reiterated that Russia was proposing to extend the existing curbs by at least one more quarter and potentially until the end of 2020. “But (our) Arab partners took a different stance,” TASS quoted him as saying.

Igor Sechin, head of Russia’s topoilproducerRosneft,hasalways opposed the three-year-long deal, saying it allows non-members such as the United States to increase their marketshareatexpenseofwhosecutting supply.

“Is there a point to cut further if other producers will increase?”, Sechin was quoted as saying on Friday in his first public comments since the deal fell apart.

Sechin said he believed that global oil prices could return to $60 per barrel by end2020 if shale oil is forced out of the market.

Belousov believes that oil prices will balance at around $35-40 per barrel.

taking exigent measures against the coronavirus in Pakistan, Malik said the good thing is that the government was making all-out efforts to deal with the deadly virus.

He urged all segments of the society to come forward and play their role in containing the spread of novel coronavirus.

He said like other countries in the world, Pakistan’s initial economic losses in different sectors of the country’s economy have been estimated at Rs1.3 trillion.

“These losses are going to be incurred on account of drop in the GDP growth because of reduction in services sector, including airline business and others, FBR’s revenue loss, massive decline in imports, exports, reduction in remittances, disruption in food supplies and other fronts,” Malik said.

China’s economy to return fast to potential growth, PBOC says China’s economy will swiftly return to its potential growth rate and there’ll be significant improvement in the coming three months, a senior central bank official said Sunday.

“Economic indicators will likely show significant improvement in the second quarter and the Chinese economy will return to potential output level rather swiftly,” People’s Bank of China Deputy Governor Chen Yulu told reporters in Beijing. Chen repeated earlier pledges to keep credit growth stable and make good use of the central bank’s targeted easing approach, and did not announce any new stimulus measures. China was hit hard in February by the virus and the measures taken to stop its spread, with a historic slump seen across all economic indicators as quarantines and shutdowns stopped the movement of goods and people. Although activity has restarted it’s still not back at normal levels, with many services business struggling and the outlook for exporters grim as the outbreak covers the rest of the world. “Based on payments, deposits and loan data since March, China’s real economy is improving somewhat due to earlier targeted monetary policies,” Chen said. The PBOC will continue to direct funding to private and small firms as well as those critical to the supply chain, he said. China’s surveyed unemployment rate jumped in March to 6.2 percent, indicating headwinds for local consumption ahead. The stock market has been more resilient than other global markets, with risks low and the impact of the virus being absorbed, said Li Chao, vice chairman of China’s securities regulator, who spoke at the same briefing. Agencies

Coronavirus aid bill includes $3,000 for families, $4 trillion liquidity for Fed: Mnuchin WASHINGTON Agencies

The coronavirus economic relief bill being finalized by the US Congress will include a one-time $3,000 payment for families and allow the Federal Reserve to leverage up to $4 trillion of liquidity to support the nation’s economy, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on Sunday.

Mnuchin, speaking on the “Fox News Sunday” television program, said the additional liquidity measures would allow the U.S. central bank to help a broad base of businesses to get through next 90 to 120 days.

Trump administration officials hoped to finalize the legislation on Sunday and see a vote on Monday, Mnuchin said, adding that further steps could be taken if the crisis did not abate in 10 to 12 weeks.

Mnuchin said the US economy would clearly take a hit from the health crisis, but

should rebound once the new coronavirus has been contained.

“We need to get the money into the economy now. If we do that, we think we can stabilize the economy,” he said.

Nearly one in four Americans, or 80 million people, were under orders to close up shop and stay home as New York, California, Illinois, Connecticut and New Jersey instituted statewide lockdowns to try to contain the rapid spread of the highly contagious respiratory illness.

Mnuchin downplayed a question about a possible recession, calling it a “technical question” that was not “terribly relevant” in the current situation since the government was effectively shutting down large parts of the economy to slow the virus.”

“When people focus on recessions, it’s normally because of a prolonged economic environment,” Mnuchin said. “This is a very unique situation that we’ve never had

before. This is the government has self-imposed shutting down large parts of the economy. And as soon as we can get the medical situation under control, we’re going to reopen it.”

Mnuchin declined to comment specifically about a Washington Post report that the Trump administration did not act on repeated warnings about the potential impact of the coronavirus from the US intelligence community, but said no one expected the crisis to escalate as quickly as it had.

“I don’t think that anybody should second guess the government’s actions,” Mnuchin said. “This has been moving very quickly and I think we’ve responded appropriately.”

Many critics have said the administration has been slow in both its preparation and response to the crisis as President Donald Trump for weeks played down the situation before changing his tone more recently.

All You Need To KNow AbouT CoRoNAVIRuS ANd KNow whAT To do.

FINCA Pakistan response to COVID-19 Pandemic

By AmnA BAtool

T

he disease has now hit all global regions, shredding up sporting and cultural calendars, causing fear in stock markets and companies — particularly airlines — and prompting often conflicting responses from governments.

While China remains the country with the most deaths with 3,199, the deadly disease is now spreading more rapidly in europe.

Scientists and public-health officials are learning more about the recent corona virus behind an epidemic that has spread to dozens of countries. Pakistan has also encountered a few cases this month and people have started to freak out. Schools are closing in Karachi and the respirator masks have reached an all time high and now are out of stock.

The first case of COVID-19 has emerged in Punjab, Sindh’s tally has reached 35 [including two patients who have been discharged after recovery) with 18 new patients, and another person has been diagnosed with the disease in Islamabad.

Let’s talk about this virus.

This virus belongs to a family of viruses known as corona viruses. The name “corona virus” comes from the crown-like projections on their surfaces. “Corona” in Latin means “halo” or “crown.”

This virus infects mostly bats, pigs and small mammals. But they mutate easily and can jump from animals to humans and from one human to another.

SymptomS incLude: Sneezing Runny nose Fatigue Cough Fever in rare cases Sore throat Exacerbated asthma

HOLLYWOOD BOLLYWOOD

The virus infects the lower respiratory tract. Patients initially develop a fever, cough, aches and can progress to shortness of breath and complications from pneumo-

nia, according to case reports. They might develop nausea, with vomiting and diarrhea. Some patients haven’t had a fever initially or might develop a “walking pneumonia,” meaning they might spread their infection to others because they aren’t sick enough to be in a hospital.

Several groups of people have the highest risk of developing complications due to COVID-19. These groups include: young chiLdren People aged 65 years or older Women who are pregnant

Adults of all ages have been infected, but the risk is highest for older people and those with other health conditions such as diabetes.

There is no cure, so treatments include self-care and over-the-counter (OTC) medication. People can take several steps, including: Resting and avoiding overexertion Drinking enough water Avoiding smoking and smoky areas Taking acetaminophen, ibuprofen, or naproxen for pain and fever Using a clean humidifier or cool mist vaporizer

N95 respirator mask certified by an independent agency can guard against the virus. Paper or polyurethane foam masks don’t filter out smaller particles responsible for transmitting infectious agents.

They might help prevent sick people from transmitting to others.

The most important thing you can do is wash your hands frequently, for at least 20 seconds each time. Wash them regularly when you are at the office, when you come home, before you eat, and other times that you are touching surfaces. You can also use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer. Don’t touch your eyes, nose or mouth—viruses can enter your body that way. Wipe down objects and surfaces frequently with household cleaner, which will kill the virus. Maintain a distance from people who are sick. Get a flu shot, if you didn’t get one already.

As the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic spreads, FINCA Pakistan, part of a global network, is playing its role to stem the spread. The Microfinance Bank has taken swift and divisive measures to ensure the health and safety of its employees, partners and customers all over the world in cognisance of the guidelines suggested by the World health Organisation. In Pakistan specifically FINCA Microfinance Bank is closely monitoring the situation.

FINCA has issued progressive internal guidelines for all of its employees, ensuring the strict enforcement of all precautionary measures encouraging employees to adhere to the new no-contact greetings, limiting unnecessary travel, social distancing measures as recommended. FINCA is one of the first financial institutions to implement a Work From home (WFh) plan, to do its best to ensure the safety of its employees and their well-being. At the same time, Business Continuity Plan (BCP) has been re-assessed to ensure that our patrons have access to financial services during this pandemic.

As a responsible organization, FINCA Pakistan is further providing free health care (in case of COVID-19) to all of its employees, free hand sanitizers have been placed across the network for employees & customers, protocols to disinfect regularly all premises have been put in place, Bank will rotate critical resources between office/work from home while keeping the BCP resources separate, strict screening at office entrance has started and visits of external vendors have been limited.

For its customers, FINCA has sent out communication recommending limiting branch visits and offering incentives to use its digital and alternate delivery banking channels; which include Phone Banking, ATM channel, and the FINCA Pakistan’s Wallet and SimSim APP which enable customers to responsibly make transactions without leaving their homes as well as repay their loans or withdraw cash using partner merchant networks as UBL Omni. Both FINCA Pakistan and the SimSim app allow a host of financial facilities such as funds transfers and mobile recharge, all from the comfort of their homes.

About FincA microfinance Bank FINCA Microfinance Bank Ltd is one of the leading microfinance banks in Pakistan. The bank is part of FINCA Impact Finance, a global network of 20 microfinance institutions and banks that provides socially-responsible financial services and enables lowincome individuals and communities to invest in their futures.

FINCA Microfinance Bank is licensed to operate nationwide through a network of 135 branches in 120+ cities. FINCA Microfinance Bank offers a complete suite of products combined and convenient banking services. The bank offers a variety of loan products specifically designed for individuals running micro, small and medium-sized enterprises. PACRA and JCR-VIS have affirmed FINCA Microfinance Bank Limited, a Long-Term Credit Rating of ‘A’ and a Short-Term credit rating of ‘A1’ with a “Stable” outlook in April 2019 & May 2019 respectively.

The AMC Gremlin was released on April 1, 1970. AMC advertised it saying “competitors will find there is nothing ‘April Fool like’ about this car.”

It’s a tradition for the post offices of Romeo, Michigan and Juliette, Georgia to offer a special dual postmark leading up to Valentine’s Day.

Veterans Stadium, former home of the Philadelphia Eagles, featured a courtroom for handling rowdy fans.

Daniel Craig won’t leave fortune to his kids, will give what’s left to charity: ‘I think inheritance is quite distasteful’

Amitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai, Aaradhya, Shweta Nanda, Abhishek ring bells, clap to thank coronavirus warriors

Janta curfew: Deepika Padukone-Ranveer Singh, Kangana Ranaut hit balconies with drums, plates and bells

hollywood star Daniel Craig won’t be leaving his fortune to his children, saying he plans to live life large and then leave what’s left to charity. Craig, who has an estimated $145 million fortune, won’t be giving his children hand-outs, saying his philosophy is to “get rid of it or give it away before you go”, reports aceshowbiz.com.

The 52-year-old told Saga magazine: “I don’t want to leave great sums to the next generation. I think inheritance is quite distasteful.”

Craig has a 28-year-old daughter from his marriage to formerwife Fiona Loudon and a young child with his current partner, actor Rachel Weisz.

During a recent appearance on Saturday Night Live, Craig, who also played Ian Fleming’s beloved secret agent in Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, Skyfall and Spectre, said: “This next James Bond film is going to be my last but it’s gonna be one of the best.”

As India thanked its corona warriors with the ringing of bells, beating of metal plates and clapping, actor Amitabh Bachchan also gathered his entire family on the terrace of his residence in Mumbai, Jalsa. his son Abhishek Bachchan was seen with daughter-in-law Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and granddaughter Aaradhya Bachchan.

The actor’s daughter Shweta Nanda was also seen with her daughter Navya Naveli Nanda.

Amitabh shared a video of the family, “At 5pm March 22nd the entire nation came out & applauded. NeVeR SeeN ANYThING LIKe ThIS ! PROUD TO Be AN INDIAN - JAI hIND.” In a photo shared by Aishwarya on Instagram, she and Aaradhya can be seen ringing a bell while Amitabh and Abhishek clapped. The entire family was dressed in white. Amitabh earlier shared how impressed he was by the enthusiasm with which all of India has been observing janta curfew on Sunday and following due health guidelines in the wake of coronavirus outbreak.

The biggest Bollywood stars took part in the janta curfew on Sunday and even hit their balconies at 5pm to pay their respects to healthcare workers toiling round the clock to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

Deepika Padukone, Kangana Ranaut, Bhumi Pednekar and many other actors and filmmakers have shared videos from their homes and neighbourhoods.

Deepika did a live from Instagram and could be seen blasting AR Rahman’s Vande Matram from her house on a speaker. Next to her, husband and actor Ranveer Singh was beating a drum. he posted her picture on Instagram and wrote, “Thank you to our heroes.”

Bhumi Pednekar also made a video of her family applauding the emergency workers from their balcony and even filmmaker ekta Kapoor brought out a giant bell to ring. hema Malini decided to arm herself with a conch shell before the applauding began. She even shared a video of herself practising with it.

14

Monday, 23 March, 2020

NEWS

Federal govt can’t remain isolated from provincial decisions: FM Qureshi ISLAMABAD

F

coronavirus pandemic.

The foreign minister said that each individual must act responsibly in the face of the deadly and fast-spreading virus.

He said that all instructions being disseminated to the nation are for their own individual and collective wellbeing and should be followed religiously.

“A lot of European countries are suffering due to the doubts and non-seriousness shown towards the virus,” he added.

StAff rePort

OREIGN Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi on Sunday said that the federal government cannot remain isolated during times where provincial governments are seriously mulling lockdowns in their regions. In a statement, he spoke about regarding the rapidly changing situation of the country due to the global

FM QureShi CallS iran, nePal CounterPartS to diSCuSS anti-Corona MeaSureS ISLAMABAD

ongoing pandemic, the foreign minister commended the government and people of Iran for valiantly combating the COVID19 global pandemic.

Foreign Minister Javad Zarif appreciated Pakistan’s reaffirmation of support and solidarity and call to lift sanctions on Iran, in view of COVID-19. He informed the Foreign Minister Qureshi that under President Hassan Rouhani’s instructions, two hospitals had been allocated for foreign pilgrims from Pakistan and other countries.

QURESHI TALKS TO NEPAL FM: Qureshi also held a telephonic conversation with his Nepali counterpart Pradeep Kumar Gyawali and discussed the situation arising from the rapid spread of COVID19, and ways to enhance cooperation to combat the threat.

StAff rePort

Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Sunday called Iran and Nepal’s foreign minister separately to discuss the situation arising out of coronavirus pandemic and measures to eradicate it.

In a telephonic conversation with his Iranian counterpart Javad Zarif, Qureshi apprised him of Pakistan’s diplomatic outreach for lifting sanctions against Iran. The foreign minister reiterated the earlier call made by Prime Minister Imran Khan to lift sanctions against Iran, to enable it to utilize its resources to save precious human lives, said a press release.

Conveying deep concern and sorrow over the tragic loss of innocent lives in the

“Italy, France, America, Britain, Germany among others have suffered and their examples are for the world to learn from. I got to talk to the German ambassador in Pakistan over the phone yesterday, I was told that 20,000 people have been diagnosed with the coronavirus in the country,” he further said.

FM Qureshi said that the country and its nationals must take extreme caution and take the threat of the deadly pathogen very seriously. “Social distancing seems to be the only workable solution to defeat the virus at the moment, Chief Minister Sindh had made an appeal to the people of Sindh to observe a three-day self-isolation amid legitimate fears related to coronavirus but the appeal was handled with a non-serious attitude by the masses,” he said.

Talking about the Sukkur quarantine centre fiasco, FM Qureshi said that the people broke out of quarantine centres and could have possibly endangered the lives of many healthy suspects who were yet to contract the virus. Qureshi also said that the Prime Minister Imran Khan had stated in the recent past that the coronavirus situation was evolving rapidly and decisions will be made after careful monitoring.

The foreign minister also admonished the role of the educated people of Pakistan amid the global crisis and termed it unfortunate. We need to form a united front and devise a mutual strategy to deal with the coronavirus on the blueprint adopted by China, Qureshi entailed.

The foreign minister stressed on a united effort by all the concerned authorities and people along with the federal and provincial governments on the matter.

He also revealed that almost 200 thousand overseas Pakistanis were currently stranded at various airports or are willing to fly back to their native lands from their cur-

CORONAVIRUS OUTBREAK

Govt to announce economic relief package soon ISLAMABAD MiAN AbrAr ANd ShAhzAd PArAchA

The federal government will soon announce an economic relief package for the people and businesses being affected by the coronavirus outbreak in the country.

Sources said that the Ministry of Finance is working out a package to provide subsidy to the people of the country and under this package, concession would be awarded in electricity bills, gas bills while a Rs20 reduction is likely to be announced in petrol price. The ministry is also planning to add some measures in the upcoming federal budget and subsidy is likely to be given to farmers, workers and peasants, they added.

Adviser to the Prime Minister on Finance and Revenue Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh met Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Social Protection and Poverty Alleviation Dr Sania Nishtar on Sunday and different options and proposals as part of the proposed package were discussed.

Sources said that the government may enhance the amount allocated for its social safety programme which currently stands at Rs190 billion. There is a space for Rs200 billion to Rs300 billion under the Ehsaas Programme and the premier can announce those funds for the public and if the situation gets worse, the government may use the amount allocated for the Ehsaas Programme, they added.

Petition in SC seeks usage of dams fund to fight coronavirus

They also said that the premier will also announce a support package for low cost housing as government can provide loans with 7 per cent interest rate to ensure affordable housing.

They further said that a considerable subsidy is also being planned in the prices of food and eatables and Ministry of Food is also working with Ministry of Industries to help provide food items on subsidised and cheaper prices.

Sources said that Pakistani envoys in China and Italy are also studying the subsidies announced by the two countries during their lockdown and they are working to prepare proposals for Pakistan in the same manner.

They said that the government was

No evidence of chloroquine curing coronavirus, says Mirza

LAHORE AbdullAh NiAzi

A constitutional petition filed in the Supreme Court (SC) demanded that the government should use the funds collected for the construction of dams to fight the coronavirus outbreak in the country. Petitioners requested the court to order the federal government to declare a national public health emergency across the country, establish an emergency relief fund, and to use funds collected for dams to tackle the virus. The petitioners claimed that the government’s response has been lackluster as it had failed even at such an early stage of the outbreak. “This global epidemic poses an unprecedented threat to the fundamental rights of the public at large, including, but not limited to, the right to essential healthcare, the right to earn a livelihood, the right to enjoy equal protection of law, the right to freedom of movement and assembly, the right to trade, the right to receive information, the right to education, and all in all, the right to a dignified and free existence,” the petition stated. “This pandemic disease, if not curbed urgently, possesses the capacity to destabilise the entire nation, resulting in unmatched physical, mental, economic, and social loss to the country,” it added. The petition is one of a number of pleas being made to the government, the courts and any branch of the government to take the pandemic seriously as Prime Minister Imran Khan has ruled out a complete lockdown.

planning to provide cash grants to daily wagers affected by the lockdown while food packages would also be provided to their families by Utility Stores Corporation on subsidised rates. The FBR is also looking for more areas to provide relief to importers of relevant medicines and related products, they added.

The prime minister will chair a highlevel meeting on Monday to give final touches to the relief package.

It is pertinent to mention here that the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) had already announced relief measures for exporters last week. Meanwhile, the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) had also given tax exemption on 61 health-related machinery and compulsory equipment.

ISLAMABAD StAff rePort

Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Health Dr Zafar Mirza on Sunday said there was no evidence to suggest that

the medicine chloroquine was effective in preventing the coronavirus, clarifying that the government was consulting experts in this regard.

Addressing a press conference, Dr Mirza said reports were rife that chloro-

quine could be used to treat coronavirus.

“We are consulting experts on whether chloroquine can be used to treat the [corona] virus,” he said.

However, there is no evidence to suggest that using chloroquine will prevent one from contracting the coronavirus, he told reporters.

The prime minister’s aide noted that there was a ban on the export of antimalaria drug. He said that Pakistan had ample stock of chloroquine.

Dr Mirza provided the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Pakistan and explained the province-wide breakdown.

“The suspected coronavirus cases total 5,650, among them the confirmed stand at 646. Three people have died of coronavirus so far.

“Sindh has 292 cases, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 31, Gilgit-Baltistan 55, Azad Jammu and Kashmir one, Islamabad Capital Territory 11, Punjab 152, and Balochistan 104,” he added.

The special assistant to the prime minister said the data was “compiled through extremely reliable monitoring” and that it would be updated on the government’s website on an hourly basis.

“We will train 5,000 doctors to treat coronavirus,” he added.

rent places of residence.

He further said that Pakistan is not prepared to house an influx of patients in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak in isolated quarantine centres and yet against implored the people to take the threat presented by the virus with extreme seriousness.

officials suspended for taking selfie with CoVid-19 patient Six officials of the Sindh Revenue Department were suspended on Sunday for taking a selfie with a person who had tested positive for coronavirus a few days ago. Khairpur deputy commissioner’s (DC) office issued a notification stating that six persons were suspended for taking a selfie with a coronavirus patient who had tested positive for COVID-19 after returning from Iran. The DC also called on the relevant authorities to quarantine the officers for 14 days to prevent the spread of the highly-contagious disease. NewS deSk

ihC steps in to help stop CoVid-19 spread in capital courts ISLAMABAD tltP

A day after the top court took measures to prevent coronavirus spread in the Supreme Court (SC), district and session judges of the capital were asked to take all necessary steps to minimise danger of the virus in courts. While taking measures to remain safe from COVID-19 pandemic on Sunday, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) asked the subordinate court to operate with bare minimum duty judges and staff on rotation. Besides, the district and session judges were also asked to issue orders accordingly, and take all necessary measures to ensure the safety of all concerned. “It is preferred that the officers drive the vehicles themselves, all the female staff have been advised to stay at home,” stated in a circular of the IHC administration. In another circular issued on Sunday, in the present spate of coronavirus pandemic, the IHC administration decided to close mosque in the court premises till further orders citing an increase in the number of pandemic cases which were likely to have devastating effects on human lives. “Hence, it is mandatory to take all possible measures to contain the further spread of coronavirus as a top priority. In order to prevent danger to human life, the competent authority has directed that the high court mosque will remain close till further orders,” the IHC administration said.

Monday, 23 March, 2020

ROssi fOcuses On HelPinG iTaly befORe MOTOGP fuTuRe call

V

ALENTINO Rossi says he is “cheering for the people” in regions hit by the coronavirus including his hometown Tavullia and says he will not make a decision on his MotoGP future until the season can start.

The nine-time world champion has effectively been in lockdown for the past two weeks following Italian government and health authority orders while the foreseeable future remains unclear during the pandemic until the situation improves.

Rossi has described some areas in Italy “like a war zone” due to the high rate of infections and deaths in Italy which is the worst-hit country in Europe with over 53,000 cases and 4,800 deaths so far. Speaking to Sky Sport Italia via a video call from his home, the 41-yearold says he is supporting his fans and fellow Italians amid the coronavirus crisis.

Rossi has been part of the social distancing social media campaign in Italy while his VR46 team have been raising funds to support local hospitals.

“Here in Tavullia the situation is difficult, unfortunately many people are sick here and also in Pesaro. We must all hold on, waiting for this moment to

pass,” Rossi said.

“We cheer for the people of Bergamo and Brescia. I have seen very bad images, it looks like a war zone. I have many friends there and right now I’m the one cheering them on, while usually I’m the one they cheer for.”

With the coronavirus superseding all major sport including MotoGP, Rossi says a decision on his own future will not come into his thoughts until he

completes a handful of races when action resumes.

Rossi’s situation had been set to dominate the early 2020 MotoGP paddock talk, with the Italian already set to step down from the factory Yamaha team from 2021 with Fabio Quartararo coming in as his replacement.

The Italian has already been guaranteed a full factory Yamaha ride for

Social distancing has Serena 'on edge' amid coronavirus pandemic LONDON AGENCIES

Tennis great Serena Williams says she is “on edge” as she practices social distancing recommended by health experts in a bid to slow the spread of coronavirus.

The 23-time Grand Slam champion posted a series of videos on TikTok describing her concerns for her 2-year-old daughter, Olympia.

“Now I’ve been social distancing for actually a really long time, for probably two weeks now, and every little thing makes me crazy,” the 38year-old superstar said.

“And by anxiety I mean I’m just

on edge. Any time anyone sneezes around me or coughs I get crazy. I don’t hang out with anyone, and when I say anyone I mean my daughter.

“She coughed, I got angry and gave her a side-eye. I gave her that ‘angry Serena’ and then I got sad.

“I was like, ‘Is she OK? Is there something wrong with my daughter?

Is there anything I can do?’ I just don’t know what to do, so instead of being relaxed I’m really under a ton of stress.”

Williams said that like many people she first thought the coronavirus wouldn’t affect her.

“And then suddenly Indian

Thousands flock to see Olympic flame in Japan despite virus fears TOKYO AGENCIES

Tens of thousands of people flocked to a cauldron with the Olympic flame in northeastern Japan over the weekend despite concerns about the coronavirus pandemic.

The flame arrived in Japan to a scaled-down welcoming ceremony on Friday as doubts grew over whether the 2020 Tokyo Olympics will go ahead on schedule as the deadly virus causes chaos around the world. The pandemic has already shredded the global sports calendar, with top sports leagues suspended and major tournaments postponed.

More than 50,000 people on Saturday queued to watch the flame displayed at Sendai station in Miyagi, chosen as part of the “Recovery Olympics” to showcase the region’s revival after the 2011 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown.

Some had to stay in a 500-meter (1,650-foot) queue for several hours, local media said.

Many of them wore masks as they took pictures with the cherry blossom-shaped cauldron.

“I queued for three hours but watching the Olympic flame was greatly encouraging,” a 70-yearold woman told public broadcaster NHK. But organisers, concerned about the bigger-thanexpected gathering, have warned the viewing event could be suspended if a crowd becomes “extremely dense”, local media reported.

The nationwide torch relay begins on March 26, starting from the J-Village sports complex in Fukushima that was used as a base for workers during the 2011 nuclear disaster.

But organisers have been forced to scale back the relay, closing daily ceremonies to the public and urging spectators to “avoid forming crowds” along the route.

Wells was cancelled and I was like, ‘Oh, OK, that’s weird but I have a little time off and I’m going to enjoy that time off,'” she said of her reaction when the prestigious ATP and WTA tournament in Indian Wells, California, was called off earlier this month.

But as more tournament cancellations followed, Williams said she found herself feeling more anxiety.

“It is what it is, we’ll get through this. We have to,” added Williams, who has used other social media platforms, including Instagram, to urge her followers to heed recommendations to stay home when health authorities deem it necessary.

World champion Hamilton self-isolating as precaution LONDON AGENCIES

Six-time Formula One champion Lewis Hamilton says he is self-isolating but will not get tested for coronavirus as others need attention more than him.

The 35-year-old Briton said he decided to self-isolate because he had been at the same function in London that actor Idris Elba and Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau’s wife Sophie Gregoire-Trudeau attended earlier this month.

Elba and Gregoire-Trudeau subsequently both tested positive for COVID-19.

“I want to let you know that I am doing well,” Hamilton said in a statement. “There has been speculation about my health, after I was at an event where two people later tested positive for coronavirus.

“I have zero symptoms and it has now been 17 days since I saw Sophie and Idris. I have been in touch with Idris and happy to hear he is OK. “I did speak to my doctor and double checked if I needed to take a test but the truth is, there is a limited amount of tests available and there are people who need it more than I do, especially when I wasn’t showing any symptoms at all.”

Hamilton has been in isolation since last Friday.

The start of the Formula One season has been wiped away by the pandemic with races in Australia, Bahrain, Vietnam, China, Netherlands and Spain shelved and the iconic Riviera showpiece in Monaco cancelled.

A season which should have started in Melbourne on March 14 will now not start until Azerbaijan on June 7 at the earliest. Formula One’s British-based teams are also hoping to contribute away from the track.

They are working on a plan to manufacture medical equipment needed to fight the coronavirus which up to Friday night had claimed 177 victims in the United Kingdom with the numbers infected set to top 4,000.

The British government and health authorities need more ventilators in intensive care units to deal with respiratory problems caused by the illness.

Formula One teams have engineering capabilities that could speed up the production of the units.

CMYK

2021 if he opts to continue racing, which would effectively see him slot into the Petronas Yamaha squad, but he wants to assess his own competitiveness over the opening rounds of the 2020 season before making a final call on whether he would continue racing or retire at the end of 2020.

“It was hard, because we understood that we would not have run just on Sunday before leaving [for Qatar],” Rossi said about the 2020 MotoGP opener being cancelled for the premier class.

“This has messed up my plans, we will have to understand when we will be able to run. Things seem to go long, they have cancelled the European Championship in football.

“As for my choice, I was hoping to decide whether to continue after the first part of the season, but now everything slips. I would like a few races to understand how competitive I can be, that would be important.” Rossi says he is keeping race-ready in the gym he has in his home and remains busy despite being stuck at home. “Here at home I have a gym, I am training and I try to keep fit,” he said. “I spend a lot of time in a playful way!

SPORTS 15 MotoGP rider Tito Rabat loses both grandparents within a week In this time of frustration at the shutdown of motorsport around the world due to the coronavirus, it is easy to forget the profound impact it is set to have on the wider community on a personal level and the hardships they will face on return to competition. This is especially true of MotoGP rider Tito Rabat, who has reportedly lost both of his grandparents – one of which was to the COVID-19 virus - in the past week, only four days apart. According to GPOne.com, the former Moto2 Champion, who competes with the Reale Avintia Ducati team had his grandfather Rosendo Rabat pass away after a long illness before his wife Rosa Sabater also passed just four days later because of the coronavirus. Riders have been at the forefront of the campaigns to encourage people to stay at home in the midst of this crisis that has now claimed the lives of more than 11,000 people globally. Having originated in China, Europe has now become the epicentre of the virus’ spread with Italy now the worst affected nation having suffered almost 5,000 of those deaths.

In recent days though Spain has also experienced a sharp spike in cases and deaths associated and is now close to becoming the third worst affected nation globally. There have been wonderful acts of kindness across the community though with Valentino Rossi reportedly donating a large sum of money to his local hospital, while the SIC56 foundation has begun a crowdfunding page for people to donate. Close to home, TT rider James Hillier has offered up his services as a delivery rider for those in need as a response to those which have stockpiled supplies at the behest of others. AGENCIES

Published by Arif Nizami at Plot # 7, Al-Baber Centre, F/8 Markaz, Islamabad. Ph: 051-2204545. Email: newsroom@pakistantoday.com.pk

Monday, 23 March, 2020

NEWS

WOrLd gOes On LOckdOWn as virus kiLLs Over 13,000 WASHINGTON

n

Agencies

EARLY one billion people around the world were confined to their homes on Sunday, as the coronavirus death toll crossed 13,000 and factories were shut in worst-hit Italy after another single-day fatalities record.

The raging pandemic has forced lockdowns in 35 countries across the globe, disrupting lives, travel and businesses as governments scramble to shut borders and unleash hundreds of billions in emergency measures to avoid widespread virus-fuelled economic meltdown.

More than 300,000 infections have been confirmed worldwide, with the situation increasingly grim in Italy where the death toll spiked to more than 5,000 — over a third of the global total.

Italy reported 651 in a day on Sunday.

The total number of cases in Italy rose to 59,138 from a previous 53,578, an increase of 10.4 per cent, the Civil Protection Agency said — the lowest rise in percentage terms since the contagion came to light on February 21.

Of those originally infected nationwide, 7,024 had fully recovered on Sunday compared to 6,072 the day before.

There were 3,009 people in intensive care against a previous 2,857.

The hardest-hit northern region of Lombardy remained in a critical situation, with 3,456 deaths and 27,206 cases against a previously given 3,095 and 25,515 respectively.

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe

ITALY REPORTS 651 MORE DEATHS, SPAIN’S DEATH TOLL PASSES 1,700 Conte announced a closure of all non-essential factories in a late-night television address on Saturday.

The Mediterranean nation of 60 million is now the epicenter of the disease, which first emerged in central China late last year before marching out to the rest of the world.

Across the Atlantic, more than a third of Americans were adjusting to life in various phases of lockdown, including in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles — the three biggest US cities. Other parts of the United States are expected to ramp up restrictions as well. “This is a time of shared national sacrifice, but also a time to treasure our loved ones,” US President Donald Trump said. “We are going to have a great victory,” he added.

As world leaders have vowed to fight the pandemic, the number of deaths and infections has continued to rise, especially in Europe — the main global hotspot.

Spain’s death toll from coronavirus soared to 1,720 on Sunday from 1,326 the day before, according to latest data from the Health Ministry.

The one-day rise in deaths of 394 was higher than the previous day’s increase of 324. Spain is grappling with Europe’s second-worst coronavirus outbreak.

The number of registered cases in the country rose to 28,572 on Sunday from 24,926 in the previous tally announced on

Saturday, the official data showed.

Of those, 2,575 people have been cured of the virus, while 1,785 are hospitalised in intensive care units.

Fatalities in France jumped to 562 as police officials said helicopters and drones were being deployed to boost the government’s attempts to keep people in their homes. The unprecedented measures to counter the spread of COVID-19 have shredded the international sports calendar, and pressure is mounting on Olympic organisers to postpone the 2020 Tokyo Games.

‘MONTHS, NOT WEEKS’: The pandemic has bludgeoned global stock markets, and the United States — the world’s biggest economy — is preparing a huge emergency stimulus package that could top $1 trillion.

Millions have been ordered to stay home in the United States.

Congress members are hoping to agree on a $1 trillion emergency aid package as fears grow about the economic fallout from the crisis.

The US Food and Drug Administration also approved the first coronavirus test that can be conducted entirely at the point of care for a patient — and deliver results in 45 minutes.

Vice President Mike Pence and his wife tested negative for the coronavirus, his press secretary tweeted Saturday. The

couple had taken the test after one of Pence’s staffers contracted the illness.

China reported its first local infection in four days on Sunday. While the number of cases in the mainland has slumped dramatically since the crisis began, there are fears of “imported” cases from other hotspots like Europe.

France, Italy, Spain and other European countries have ordered people to stay at home, threatening fines in some cases, while Australia on Sunday told citizens to cancel domestic travel plans.

Britain has told pubs, restaurants and theatres to close and warned citizens to stop panic-buying.

And India went into lockdown on Sunday with a one-day nationwide “selfimposed curfew”.

While the elderly and those with preexisting medical conditions are the hardest hit by the virus, the WHO has warned that young people are also vulnerable.

Accurate COVID-19 figures are difficult to reach because many of the victims suffered from other illnesses, and infection rates are uncertain because of a lack of testing in many countries.

The coronavirus has infected more than 1,000 across Africa too, where healthcare systems are limited and social distancing measures — like the ones being adopted in North America and Europe — are difficult in crowded cities.

The Middle East also remains on high alert, where Iran — which suffered a major outbreak — reporting 123 new deaths on Saturday. But the Islamic Republic has refused to join the rest of the world in imposing heavy restrictions.

Indian districts under lockdown to contain coronavirus spread MUMBAI/NEW DELHI Agencies

New Delhi will be under lockdown until March 31, the Indian capital’s government announced on Sunday, seeking to keep citizens indoors to prevent the spread of coronavirus and giving police powers to punish violators.

The city’s borders with neighboring states will be sealed and public transport will be suspended, said the city’s chief minister, Arvind Kejriwal.

“We have learnt this from the world that the less you venture outside, the less you come in contact with the world that much we can save ourselves,” Kejriwal told reporters.

“We are saying this repeatedly that you can save yourself from coronavirus,” he said.

In Mumbai, Indians came out onto their balconies and stood near open windows to clap, clang metal vessels and ring bells to cheer emergency workers battling the spread of the coronavirus during a nationwide lockdown.

The order to shut down the capital came hours after hundreds of millions of Indians heeded Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s appeal for people to self-isolate for a day to contain the spread of the disease.

India has registered 341 cases of coronavirus, with seven deaths, the federal government said in statements on Sunday. Experts have said the number of cases mirror

rates during the early stages of the outbreak in other countries, which then went on to see very rapid growth.

While Sunday’s curfew was voluntary and not an outright ban on movement, it was followed by series of announcements by states to continue the lockdown till the end of March.

At least 75 districts across the country where cases of coronavirus have been detected have been put under

stringent lockdown.

“State governments will issue orders allowing only essential services to operate in about 75 districts with confirmed COVID-19 cases or casualties,” said a home ministry official in New Delhi.

Indian Railways, which carries more than 25 million commuters a day, canceled all passenger train services until March 31.

Medical experts say a lack of testing facilities could be hiding the true extent of cases in India, which has a population of more than 1.3 billion people.

Testing has been expanded to private laboratories and will now include asymptomatic people who have had contact with confirmed cases.

FUMIGATION: Firefighters in western India fumigated areas around closed markets, public squares and urban slum districts.

“The curfew period gave us a chance to scale down each and every activity across India,” said a senior aide to Modi, adding that a more rigid approach could trigger protests or unrest.

“A breakdown of law and order will be the worst thing to happen at this point,” he said on condition of anonymity.

Factories, large industrial parks and banks have declared shutdowns or found ways to minimize contact in offices.

Merkel in quarantine after meeting virusinfected doctor BERLIN Agencies

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will quarantine herself at home after being treated by a doctor who has since tested positive for the novel coronavirus, a government spokesman said Sunday. “The Chancellor has decided to quarantine herself immediately at home. She will be tested regularly in the coming days… (and) fulfil her official business from home,” Steffen Seibert said in a statement. The doctor had visited Merkel Friday to vaccinate her against the pneumococcus bacteria. It could take some time to determine whether the chancellor is herself infected as “a test would not yet be fully conclusive,” Seibert said. During her 15-year term in office Merkel has largely enjoyed robust health, although she suffered repeated shaking spells in public appearances during a summer 2019 heatwave that were never fully explained. In response to the tremors, she chose to sit on a chair when receiving guests with military honours outside the chancellor’s office in Berlin. Previously the veteran leader broke her pelvis in a cross-country skiing accident in 2014.

Lockdowns not enough to defeat coronavirus: WHO World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Chief Executive Director Mike Ryan on Sunday said that countries cannot simply lock down their societies to defeat coronavirus, adding that public health measures are needed to avoid a resurgence of the virus later on. “What we really need to focus on is finding those who are sick, those who have the virus, and isolate them, find their contacts and isolate them,” Mike Ryan said in an interview on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show. “The danger right now with the lockdowns […] if we do not put in place the strong public health measures now when those movement restrictions and lockdowns are lifted, the danger is the disease will jump back up,” he added.

Ryan said that the examples of China, Singapore and South Korea, which coupled restrictions with rigorous measures to test every possible suspect, provided a model for Europe, which, the WHO said, has replaced Asia as the epicentre of the pandemic.

“Once we have suppressed the transmission, we have to go after the virus. We have to take the fight to the virus,” Ryan said. Much of Europe and the United States have followed China and introduced drastic restrictions to fight the new coronavirus, with most workers told to work from home and schools, bars, pubs and restaurants being closed. Agencies

Iran's Khamenei rejects US help offer, vows to defeat coronavirus DUBAI Agencies

The United States’ offer to help Iran in its fight against the new coronavirus pandemic is strange, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a televised speech on Sunday, describing U.S. leaders as “charlatans and liars”.

Washington has offered humanitarian assistance to its longtime foe, the Middle Eastern country most affected by the coronavirus, with 1,685 deaths and 21,638 people infected.

Tensions between the two countries have been running high since 2018, when U.S. President Donald Trump exited Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal with six world powers and reimposed sanctions that have crippled the Iranian economy.

“Several times Americans have offered to help us to fight the pandemic. That is strange because you face shortages in Amer-

ica. Also you are accused of creating this virus,” said Khamenei, an anti-U.S. hardliner who has the final say in Iran.

“I do not know whether it is true. But when there is such an allegation, can a wise man trust you and accept your help offer? … You could be giving medicines to Iran that spread the virus or cause it to remain permanently.”

Frictions increased when Trump ordered a U.S. drone strike that killed the top commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, Qassem Soleimani, on Jan. 3. Iran retaliated by hitting U.S. targets in Iraq on Jan. 8.

“Our number one enemy is America. It is the most wicked, sinister enemy of Iran … its leaders are terrorists … Liars and charlatans,” said Khamenei.

Iranian authorities have blamed U.S. sanctions for hampering its efforts to curb the outbreak and President Hassan Rouhani has urged Americans to call on their government to lift sanctions as Iran

fights the coronavirus.

China, a party to Iran’s nuclear deal, has urged the United States to lift sanctions on Iran immediately amid Tehran’s response to

the coronavirus outbreak.

But the United States sent Iran a blunt message this week: the spread of the virus will not save it from U.S. sanctions that

Published by Arif Nizami at Plot # 7, Al-Baber Centre, F/8 Markaz, Islamabad. Ph: 051-2204545. Email: newsroom@pakistantoday.com.pk

are choking off its oil revenues and isolating its economy.

Khamenei, who canceled his annual speech for Persian new year from the holy Shi’ite Muslim city of Mashhad on March 20 because of the outbreak, said Iran would triumph over the virus.

“The Islamic Republic has the capability to overcome any kind of crisis and challenges, including the coronavirus outbreak,” said Khamenei, who called on people to stay at home.

While many Iranians avoided traveling during the Persian new year holiday, police said millions have defied warnings issued by officials to avoid unnecessary trips aimed at curbing the spread of the virus.

The office of Tehran’s governor said all shopping centers will be closed in the capital from Sunday.

“Only pharmacies and shops that provide essential goods will remain open in Tehran,” Iranian state TV reported.