Epaper_22-10-28 KHI

ISI chIef cl aImS PTI offered Ba jwa ‘IndefInITe exTenSIon’ for helP In voTe of no-confIdence

SPY cHIEF cLAIMS

PM FIRST DOWNPLAYED, LATER PLAYED WITH cYPHER

Sharif on August 5 on special directive of chief Min ster Mahmood Khan” This shows the threat a ert was issued with the aim to force Sharif to leave the countr y he claimed

Salman Iqbal [ARY News boss] to d [ex ecutive vice president at the station] Ammad Yousuf after Shahbaz G ll s arrest to send Sharif out of the countr y he said adding that the ARY Group boss must “ be brought back to Pak stan and made part of the invest gations into the death of the journalist

“ We all should wait for the formation of an inquir y commission Have confidence in your institutions We have been washing the m stakes of the past with blood for the last 20 years We can make m stakes but we can’t be traitors or conspirers,” sa d the m l itar y spokesperson

Slain Arshad Sharif gets heroic farewell amid tears, sloganeering

ISLAMABAD

Hundreds of thousands of people attended the funeral of Arshad Sharif, anchorperson and outspoken militar y cr tic who was ki led under mysterious circumstances in Kenya at the Faisa Mosque in Islamabad on Thursday

Shar f was killed Sunday night when the car he was in sped up and drove through a checkpo nt outside the Kenyan capital of Na robi and po ice opened fire Nairobi pol ce expressed regret over the incident, claiming it was a case of “ m staken identity ” during a search for a simi ar car involved in a ch ld abduction case

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PAKISTAN Tehreek i Insaf (PTI) strug gling to secure its government n the face of a looming vote of no conf dence brought by the Pak istan Democratic Movement (PDM) all ance in March offered the army ch ef an indefinite extension apparently in return for help in sur viving it, cla med Lt Gen Nadeem Anjum chief of the Inter Ser vices Intelligence (ISI) agency, on Thursday

In an unprecedented explosive and rather strongly worded press conference h s first since assuming office in October ast year the spy chief who was accompa n ed by Lt Gen babar Iftikhar the d rector general of Inter Ser vices Public Re at ons (ISPR) spoke at length often candidly on issues ranging from the diplomatic cypher at the heart of Khan s ouster to the protest march and to the co d blooded assass na tion of ournalist Arshad Sharif in Kenya

Talking about the ucrative offer of ex tens on Gen Anjum c aimed the offer to the army ch ef was “ made in front of me He [Gen bajwa] rejected it because he wanted the institut on to move for ward from a controversial ro e to a constitutiona role ”

Taking a thin y veiled j be at the PTI chair man Gen Anjum sa d the former prime min ster met the army chief in the night and then called him a traitor the morning

If the commander in chief [of Pakistan Army] is a traitor then why did you meet him behind the curtain? Meeting [him] s your [constitutional] right but it cannot be possi b e that you meet at night and call [h m] a tra tor ” he said

Gen Iftikhar opened the press confer ence, saying the purpose of his ta k was to shed light on Sharif s kil ing and the circum stances surrounding it

“ Th s presser,” he sa d, “ is being held in the context of presenting facts so that ‘ facts, fict on and opinion’ can be differen tiated ” Shehbaz Sharif, who just returned from a state visit to Saudi Arabia had been “ specially informed ” about the sens tiv ty of the press conference he added

The chief militar y spokesperson said there was a need to exam ne how “a fa se narrat ve has been made and people have been misled on the assassination

“ Institutions, leadership, and even the army chief himself have been accused without a reason to create an extraordinar y chaotic situation said Gen Iftikhar

He said Sharif s death was a ver y tragic inc dent ” and ca led the journal st an “ icon in the field of journa ism a naval officer s son and a martyr s brother and a ser ving of ficer ’s brother in aw ”

His programmes wi l be seen as a role model for journalists, he added

Gen Iftikhar shared the government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa issued a threat alert for

Gen Iftikhar a so confirmed the militar y has requested the government to conduct a high evel probe nto the k lling of Shar f POLITICS BEING PL AYED WITH CYPHER: “ Since Arshad was an investigat ve journalist, he a so ooked into the cypher issue when it sur faced,” shared the general He also highlighted the journalist had a so inter viewed the then prime min ster Khan on the issue, adding that at the time, it was claimed that he was shown the confident a d p omat c document “

Facts linked with the cypher and Ar shad Sharif s death need to be found So there is no ambiguity left in this regard,” said the d rector genera of ISPR

He said that the facts linked with the cypher and Sharif ’s death need to be found so there is no amb guity

D sclosing how the cypher issue began Gen Iftikhar said the army chief had dis cussed t with Khan on March 11 after which the latter had termed it to be “not a big issue”

It was surpr sing for us when on March 27 a piece of paper was waved and an at tempt was made to build a narrative that was far from reality

He said that several facts had come to light regarding the cypher revealing the baseless and unfounded narrative sur rounding it The ISPR nformed the Nationa Secur ty committee (NSc) that no proof was found regarding the conspiracy against the PTI government, he said

A plane carr y ng his body touched down at the airport in Islamabad just after m dnight Wednesday Early Wednesday his family friends and government offic a s rece ved h s body

The funeral drew up to 400,000 mourners, accord ng to police at the scene with peop e spilling nto the gardens and surrounding streets

TV footage showed massive crowds outs de and inside the mosque It was rare in the histor y of Pakistan for a journa ist to have such a large funeral procession Funeral prayers in absentia were also arranged in cit es across the countr y

Many media figures attended but supporters of the Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) party made up a arge proportion of the crowd waving f ags and chanting “Arshad, your blood w ll br ng revolut on” Arshad Shar f sacr ficed his l fe to expose the faces of the corrupt and we should not let that sacrif ce be for nothing said Muhammad Iqbal, a 35 year old shopkeeper and PTI supporter who had travelled from Rawa p ndi

Another part cipant, Samina Quresh , said PTI supporters came “ to vent our anger against the militar y which has manipu ated po itics throughout After prayers, coffin bearers struggled to push through the crowd to a wa ting ambu ance for onward passage to the H 11 cemeter y in Islamabad

A l a r g e c o n t i n g e n t o f p o l i c e w a s d e p o y e d a t t h e g r a v e y a r d w h e r e j o u r n a l i s t s a n d m e m b e r s o f t h e c i v l s o c i e t y r e a c h e d i n h u g e n u m b e r s D u r i n g t h e b u r a , s l o g a n s o f “A l a h u A k b a r ” a n d t h o s e n f a v o u r o f f o r m e r p r i m e m i n i s t e r I m r a n K h a n w e r e c h a n t e d

The 50 year o d journalist f ed Pakistan in August amid threats to his l fe He traveled abroad after go ng into hiding n his own countr y to avo d arrest fo lowing an anonymous complaint aga nst him on allegations of mal gning the mi itar y His whereabouts were not publ cly known Most of h s re atives and friends knew only that he had spent time in Dubai and London A month later, Sharif ’s emp oyer ARY News f red him, claiming without offering evidence he had v olated the TV station’s social media policy His ta k show POWERPLAY, which aired on Mondays and Thursdays was discontinued

PTI chairman Imran Khan on Thursday raised questions over what he ca led the the “ unprecedented press conference”

by DGs of the Inter Ser vices Intelligence (ISI) Lt Gen Nadeem Ahmed An um and Inter Ser v ces Public Re at ons (ISPR) Lt Gen babar Ift khar arguing if nstitutions were apol tical, what was the purpose of holding a political presser

In an inter view to a private TV chan ne , the former premier said that the press conference was unprecedented and “ never heard of ”

“ E ther there shou d be some issue that concerns them like security but they held a pol tical press conference so I don t understand the rationale behind it

could the defence or nterior minister or pr me minister not have done this job?

What was their [the institutions ’] job in holding the press conference? argued

Imran Khan The PTI ch ef then went on to say that if he started giving answers to the quest ons ra sed by the off c als it w ll cause a lot of damage to the countr y and the institution and he d d not want to damage Pak stan army

“

Ever since I was removed from the off ce I tried my best to prevent any harm to the countr y and Pakistan army I know that if I wou d say anything about the establishment t will impact the army he said

“ but when they do a press confer ence like this [ ] and if I start responding [ ] it will directly damage our army and I don’t want to hurt them in any way Th s

is why I a ways tr y that my critic sm is con structive and benefic a to the institution Imran said He cont nued that he had been cr ticising Dirty Harr y who ac cording to h m has been recently posted in Islamabad for the torture inflicted on Azam Swati and Shahbaz Gill

Our effort are to crit cise them These actions that you ’re doing, who is hurting? The countr y is being hurt and what is hap pening because of these acts?”

Talking about backdoor ta ks Imran said that before the no confidence vote he was aware of the “conspiracy ” being hatched to toppled h s government

I ver y publ cly said again and aga n that I had told Gen ba wa that f at this time this conspiracy succeeds t w ll have a direct mpact and loss on economy

LAHORE

A l l S eT F o r P T I lo n G m A r C H S TA r T S T o d Ay

elections

PA K I S TA N Tehreek e Insaf (PTI)

finalized preparations of its Haqeeqi Azadi Long March which would be started on Friday (today) from Liberty Chowk Lahore, as PTI Chairman Imran Khan s Azadi container reached Lahore

According to detail, the PTI Chairman would visit the campus in Lahore and would start the long march from Liberty Chowk today (Friday)

In the first phase, the marchers would reach Shahdara and in the second phase, the long march would reach Gujranwala

The detail showed that in the third phase the marchers would reach Gujarat via Sialkot The long march convoys from Karachi and Quetta would leave for Islamabad on Friday, while the convoys from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, South Punjab and Multan would depart for Islamabad on Wednesday

According to detail, all the convoys of the Long March from across the country would reach Islamabad on November 4 SH RASHID URGES PEOPLE TO PARTICIPATE IN PTI’S LONG MARCH: Former interior minister Sheikh Rashid said on Thursday that he had reached Lahore Wednesday to participate in the PTI s long march, scheduled to begin from the

IHC asks PTI to satisf y cour t on request for inquir y into custodial tor ture

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday directed Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI)’s counsel to satisfy the court with legal arguments regarding formation of inquiry commission into the alleged torture on PTI s leaders during the police custody Justice Aamer Farooq of IHC heard the case filed by PTI s leaders including Asad Qaiser, Pervaiz Khattak and others The petitioners’ lawyer Sher Afzal Khan Marawat appeared before the court and adopted the stance that his all clients were lawmakers of PTI The court asked whether the petitioners filed any application to the concerned magistrate regarding the allegations they were levelling It further questioned that if a post event medical was conducted in any case Justice Farooq remarked that the petitioner had demanded formation of an inquiry commission but this court didn’t had unlimited powers Firstly, the lawmakers should introduce legislations then the court would take action into it, it said Justice Aamer Farooq remarked that it was giving one opportunity to the petitioners to satisfy the bench that under what law it should form inquiry commission The lawyer said that the actual victim persons didn’t arrive here instead the petition was filed by party leaders He said that their issue was not torture instead the case was against the bad treatment which couldn t be showed in any medical report The further hearing of the case was then adjourned

FIA arrests ‘wanted’ Achorperson Ch Ghulam Hussain in old case

LAHORE

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The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Thursday arrested senior anchorperson Chaudhry Ghulam Hussain from a coffee shop in Lahore, claiming Mr Chaudhry was “wanted” in case number 94/2011 by FIA’s Commercial Banking Circle In a statement issued after the arrest, the FIA further said that Ghulam had taken a loan worth over Rs50 million from a bank on fake documents in 2003 adding that two of his sons were also involved in the case The FIA said that a banking court in Lahore have issued a non bailable warrant for Hussain in the case “Further investigations are underway, it added Meanwhile, Chaudhry Ghulam Hussain s son told ARY News: My father was sitting in a coffee shop with friends when a FIA team comprising 30 to 40 officers came and took him into custody, probably in an old case ” Chaudhry Ghulam Hussain is not only a seasoned journalist but also a part of ARY News popular talkshow The Reporters viewed by hundreds of thousands of people daily He brings in his years long experience to analyze political developments and current affairs along with ARY News Islamabad Bureau Chief Khawar Ghumman

city s Liberty Chowk at 11:00am Friday (today)

In his video message, he appealed to the nation to become part of the march in large numbers and make it a historic event He also said that he was not feeling safe in Islamabad He vowed to make the long march successful

Later addressing a press conference, Awami Muslim League (AML) chief Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said Thursday that protests and rallies are democratic right of the political parties

Sh Rashid said that he will participate in the Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) long march tomorrow and later he will head to Rawalpindi “This fight is all about

“The country needs peace but there is a weak government Pakistan Army is the guarantor of the national security and we want to maintain its respect and dignity ”

Sh Rashid said that the ruling political parties were fully aware of not being able to challenge Imran Khan The former interior minister said that Islamabad is not the property of an individual and Rana Sanaullah will not find to way to run away from the federal capital

He added that protests and rallies are democratic rights of the political parties The AML chief suggested the federal government to not create hurdles for the marchers

IGP DIRECTS FOOLPROOF SECURITY FOR LONG MARCH ROUTES: Punjab Inspector General of Police Faisal Shahkar on Thursday directed that foolproof security arrangements should be made for the PTI long march in all the districts of the province, saying all available resources should be utilized for security of citizens participating in long march in all cities cities including Lahore, Gujranwala, Gujarat and Rawalpindi

“The law and order situation should be maintained at all costs

IG Police Faisal Shahkar issued the directives while presiding over a meeting held to review security arrangements for the PTI Long March

PML-N lawmakers in Punjab challenge suspension in LHC

Lawmakers belonging to the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML N) challenged the suspension of their Punjab Assembly membership in the Lahore High Court (LHC) on Thursday Parliamentarians including Zeeshan Rafiq Uzma Bukhari and Samiullah Khan, among others, have challenged Speaker Sibtain Khan’s order in the high court

“Speaker Punjab Assembly has

unconstitutionally and illegally suspended the assembly membership they petitioned to the court “Petitioners are being subjected to political victimizat i o n a c c o r d i n g t o t h e petition

“ S u s p e n s i o n o f t h e a s s e m b l y membership is a violation of the rules the members pleaded to the court

“ P M L N m e m b e r s h a v e b e e n a l l e g e d o f r i o t i n g a n d m i s c o n d u c t w h i l e P T I ’s a n d o t h e r m e m b e r s w e r e i n v o l v e d i n t h e r u c k u s , ” P M L N pleaded

“Targeting the PML N members is discrimination the court should declare t h e n o t i f i c a t i o n o f s u s p e n d i n g t h e a s s e m b l y m e m b e r s h i p a s v o i d , ” t h e PML N members pleaded

The petitioners have also requested the court to declare the election of the s p e a k e r o f t h e P u n j a b A s s e m b l y a s u n l a w f u l a s “ i t w a s h e l d u n l a w f u l l y, ” according to the petition

T h e a ff e c t e d l e g i s l a t o r s i n c l u d e d Z e e s h a n R a f i q , U z m a B u k h a r i , S a m i u l l a h K h a n , M i a n A b d u r R a u f , M a l i k Wa h e e d S a b a S a d i q R a b i a

Nusrat, Rabia Naseem Farooqi, Rahila N a e e m Z a i b u n N i s a Aw a n K a n w a l P e r v a i z , G u l n a z S h a h z a d i , N a f i s a A m i n , R a n a A f z a l , A l i B u k h s h C h a t t h a S a d i a N a d e e m R a h a t A f z a and Sumbul Malik

T h e s p e a k e r ’s s u s p e n s i o n o r d e r said when Usman Buzdar was moving a resolution during Saturday’s session to condemn the ECP for disqualifying P T I C h a i r m a n I m r a n K h a n i n t h e To s h a k h a n a c a s e , t h e o p p o s i t i o n l a w m a k e r s h a m p e r e d t h e p r o c e e d i n g s notwithstanding the speaker s requests

Pakistan hopes Sunak will push India on Kashmir resolution

GUJRANWALA

Pa k i s t a n co n d e m n s d e a d l y I ra n s h r i n e at t a c k

ISLAMABAD

s ta f f r e P o r t

Pakistan has condemned an attack on a Shi’ite shrine in Iran on Wednesday which killed 1 5 p e o p l e e s c a l a t i n g tensions in a country reeling from a wave of protests

Tehran said it had arrested a gunman who carried out the attack at the Shah Cheragh shrine in the city of S h i r a z S t a t e m e d i a b l a m e d “ t a k f i r i t e r r o r i s t s ” a label Iran uses for hardline Sunni militants like Islamic State

T h e m i l i t a n t g r o u p I s l a m i c S t a t e h a s c l a i m e d p r e v i o u s a t t a c k s i n I r a n , i n c l u d i n g d e a d l y t w i n bombings in 2017 which targeted Iran s parliament and t h e t o m b o f t h e I s l a m i c r e p u b l i c ’s f o u n d e r Ay a t o l l a h Ruhollah Khomeini

In a statement on Thursday, the Foreign Office said t h e g o v e r n m e n t a n d p e o p l e o f P a k i s t a n w e r e d e e p l y

oil

ISLAMABAD

ta f f r e P o r t

s a d d e n e d a t t h e p r e c i o u s l o s s o f l i v e s a n d i n j u r i e s sustained in the dastardly terrorist attack

The people of Pakistan stand in solidarity with their I r a n c o u n t e r p a r t s i n t h i s h o u r o f g r i e f a n d e x p r e s s p r o f o u n d s y m p a t h i e s t o t h e f a m i l i e s o f t h e d e c e a s e d , a n d p r a y f o r t h e s w i f t r e c o v e r y o f t h o s e i n j u r e d t h e statement said

P a k i s t a n s t r o n g l y c o n d e m n e d t e r r o r i s m i n a l l i t s forms and manifestations, it added

We d n e s d a y ’s k i l l i n g o f S h i ’ i t e p i l g r i m s c a m e o n t h e s a m e d a y t h a t I r a n ’s s e c u r i t y f o r c e s c l a s h e d w i t h i n c r e a s i n g l y s t r i d e n t p r o t e s t e r s m a r k i n g t h e 4 0 d a y anniversary since the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22 year old Kurdish woman

M i n i s t e r f o r I n t e r i o r A h m a d Va h i d i b l a m e d t h e p r o t e s t s s w e e p i n g I r a n f o r p a v i n g t h e g r o u n d f o r t h e S h i r a z a t t a c k , a n d P r e s i d e n t E b r a h i m R a i s i s a i d I r a n would respond, according to state media

in Punjab

Oil and Gas Development Company Limited (OGDCL) the largest oil and gas exploration company in Pakistan, on Thursday announced the discovery of oil reserves from its exploratory well in Punjab

In a notice sent to the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), the company announced that OGDCL being operator of Toot Mining Lease with 100% working interest has made oil discovery from Lokhart Formation at Toot Deep I well which is located in Attock District, Punjab Province, Pakistan”

OGDCL said that Toot Deep # 01 well was spudded in on December 25, 2020, and successfully drilled down to a total depth of 5 545 meters in Tobra Formation

Based on interpretation results of open hole logs data, Lockhart Formation has successfully tested oil at the rate of 882 barrels per day (bpd) and 0 93 million standard cubic feet per day (mmscfd) gas at Well Head Flowing Pressure (WHFP) of 600 pounds per square inch (psi) at 32/64” choke size,” read the notice

OGDCL discovers oil, gas reserves in Sindh and Punjab OGDCL said the latest oil discovery further extends the hydrocarbon play area in Pothohar basin, adding that it has adopted aggressive exploration strategies which have resulted in hydrocarbon discoveries

E a r l i e r t h i s m o n t h , P a k i s t a n P e t r o l e u m L i m i t e d (PPL) announced the discovery of gas and condensate reserves in Shahpur Chakar North X 1 an exploratory well, Block 2568 18 (Gambat South) located in District Sanghar, Sindh

Britain’s new prime minister, Rishi Sunak, has embraced his Indian and Hindu heritage but he also has roots in present day Pakistan, in the city of Gujranwala, where his paternal grandparents lived during Britain s colonial rule The city saw some of the deadliest sectarian riots during the Partition that carved out India and Pakistan from the former British Empire Today, many in Gujranwala, an industrial hub in Punjab along the border with India say the new UK leader is uniquely positioned to push for a solution to the Kashmir crisis the main point of contention between the two South Asian rivals Sunak s grandfather Ramdas Sunak and grandmother Suhag Rani lived in Gujranwala until 1935 and though most of the city’s residents today have no memory of those long ago days, they say they feel jubilant over the 42 year old politician s victory They hope diplomatic ties between Pakistan and Britain will improve under Rishi Sunak, who on Tuesday became Britain s youngest premier It is a matter of happiness that some of the new UK premier ’s ancestors hailed from here, said Omar Ali, a wrestler a sport that has made Gujranwala famous the world over College professor Khurram Shehzad said he hoped Sunak would work not only to strengthen relations between Pakistan and Britain but also bring a new era of success for Pakistan and India City authorities say most records were destroyed during the sectarian violence surrounding the partition, and that there is no proof of where exactly Sunak s grandfather lived though popular belief points to Machli Bazaar where most of the city’s Hindu community once lived An abandoned Hindu temple stands as a testament to the community s life here before the partition forced a mass migration to India

The name, Machli Bazaar, translates roughly as “fish market” and the neighbourhood is known for its delicious food and eateries

Throngs of food lovers visit every year and not just for the fried fish but also for other delicacies Sunak’s appointment “is an honour for us and for our city, and we are hopeful that in the coming days Pakistan and Britain’s diplomatic relations will improve,” said Hafiz Umar, whose family has a long history in Machli Bazar “It seems Rishi Sunak s priority will be to handle economic challenges at home but we hope he will also try to resolve the issue of Kashmir, which is the main cause of the rift between Pakistan and India said Musarrat Jamshed Cheema a Punjab government spokesperson Pakistan and India have a history of bitter relations and fought two of their three wars over the disputed Himalayan region, which is divided between them but claimed by both in its entirety Sunak has not been publicly outspoken on the issue of Kashmir His premiership is likely to be dominated at home by an economic crisis that has left millions in the country struggling to pay their food and energy bills and abroad with the ongoing war in Ukraine and how to approach relations with China

t h e a s s o c at e d P r e s s

LAHORE: A large number of people including PTI Chairman Imran Khan and other leaders offer funeral in absentia for slain anchorperson Arshad Sharif in CM’s House at 90 Shahra e Quaid i Azam Photo by zubair Mehfooz

TH E Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) on Thursday considered and approved a summary of Ministry of Industries & Production (MoIP), allowing the payment of projected net salary of Rs1 378 million for Financial Year 2022 23 to be disbursed every month to Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) employees through a technical supplementary grant

This decision will ensure the disbursement of monthly salaries to the employees

The ECC meeting was held with Federal Minister for Finance and Revenue Senator

Ishaq Dar in the chiar and was attended by Federal Minister for National Food Security and Research Tariq Bashir Cheema, Federal Minister for Commerce Syed Naveed Qamar, Federal Minister for Power Khurram Dastgir, Federal Minister for Industries and Production Makhdoom Syed Murtaza Mehmood, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Minister of State for Petroleum Musadik Masood Malik SAPM on Finance Tariq Bajwa Coordinator to PM on Commerce and Industry Rana Ihsan Afzal, Federal Secretaries and senior officers

On the occasion, the Ministry of Commerce tabled a summary on amendment in Import Policy Order 2022 to allow import of Holy Quran subject to NOC from the relevant Federal and Provincial Authority

World donors laud KP’s record in dealing natural disasters, financial discipline

PESHAWAR

s ta f f r e P o r t

KP Minister for Local Government, Elections and Rural Development (LG,E&RDD) Sardar Faisal Amin Gandapur called on the high ups of the development partners of his provincial government and international donor organizations to apprise them of the developmental momentum and the situation aroused of the recent stormy rains and floods in the province The minister briefed them in detail about the government’s measures for the rehabilitation of the affected people and restoration of the public installations and communication networks on this occasion Besides the Secretary LG E&RDD Syed Zaheerul Islam Shah and DG LG&RD Usman Mehsud, senior officials of United Nations Development Program UNDP Japan Government s Development and donor agency JICA and German aid agency GIZ participated in the meeting that was held at KP House Islamabad the other evening On this occasion, the Provincial Minister expressed his gratitude to the UNO and friendly countries for the generous financial support and assistance in every difficult hour including natural disasters and to speed up the development process in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa He clarified that keeping regional and political expediencies above all else, the international community and friendly countries extended whole hearted assistance to KP government in gearing up its development speed and rehabilitation of the affectees in backdrop of the recent devastating floods in the province we value the generous support of the world extended to the government and people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on this critical juncture he added Faisal Amin Gandapur kept on saying that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government was facing a major challenge in recent days in shape of flood disasters and herculean task of permanent rehabilitation of the victims, which has become the top priority of his government He said that the provincial government was fighting this natural calamity with full courage and is dealing with the challenge of rescue, relief and permanent rehabilitation of the victims in wake of its past experiences and we felt proud that our efforts have been recognized and appreciated at the international level

AS

emPloyeeS

The summary was presented in the light of the directives of the honourable Lahore and Balochistan high courts, asking the Federal and Provincial authorities to ensure only error free printing, publishing, recording and import of copies of the Holy Quran The proposed amendment to import policy on Holy Quean was subject to NOC The ECC after discussion approved the proposal

The ECC also approved another summary of Ministry of Commerce, seeking amendment to the earlier decision of the ECC dated 25 07 2022 on Regionally Competitive Energy Rates for Export Oriented Sectors during FY 2022 23 and allowed amendment that “the electricity tariff will be effective from 1st August, 2022,

whereas RLNG tariff will be effective from 1st July, 2022 ”

The ECC considered a summary of Petroleum Division and allowed to grant a Development and Production Lease (D&PL) for 15 years w e f 15 01 2022 over Kandhkot Mining Lease area on existing Gas Price and subject to the condition that M/s PPL will pay all the financial obligations in accordance with Petroleum Policy 2012

Kandhkot discovery was made by PPL in 1959 The government granted mining lease of Kandhkot Gas field for a period of 30 years in 1962, which was renewed for further 30 years in 1992

Petroleum Division submitted another summary on revival of revoked petroleum exploration licenses It was informed that

(11) eleven exploration licenses were revoked due to non performance of work commitment and non payment of financial obligations by various exploration & production companies

In all the eleven blocks status quo order was passed by the respective Civil Courts, Islamabad and Sindh High Courts It is pertinent to mention that the litigant companies have approached the government and shown keen interest in exploration of the blocks awarded In order to resolve this longstanding issue of litigation, which has resulted in halting of exploration and production activities in some of the respective blocks of the country, Petroleum Division has developed a framework for revival of revoked licenses through out of court settlement The ECC after detail discussion approved the proposed framework

The ECC approved another summary of Petroleum Division for change of effective control from M/s Eni ULX Limited M/s Eni UK Limited and M/s Eni Oil Holdings B V, in respect of its subsidiary companies i e M/s ENI Pakistan Limited ENI

IHC seeks written arguments from PTI in prohibited funding case

the arguments with Akber S Baber the complainant in prohibited funding case

The larger bench headed by Justice A a m e r F a r o o q a n d c o m p r i s i n g J u s t i c e Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb and Justice B a b e r S a t t a r h e a r d t h e c a s e A t t h e o u t s e t o f h e a r i n g P T I ’s l a w y e r A n w a r Mansoor said that deposit of money in a c c o u n t s h a d b e e n d e c l a r e d a s p r o h i b i t e d f u n d i n g T h e s a i d a m o u n t w a s c o l l e c t e d a b r o a d a n d s e n t t o

copy of

P a k i s t a n h e a d d e d s a y i n g t h a t w h a t ’s w r o n g i n i t i f t h e c o n c e r n e d c o m p a n y i t s e l f a d m i t t e d t h a t t h i s m o n e y w a s solely sent by it The lawyer adopted the stance that as per the procedure after the scrutiny of any party s accounts a show cause was used to be served and then a final decision was taken But in this case, the ECP declared this notice as the final verdict and proclaimed PTI as foreign funded, he said

CPEC to boost Pakistan’s agricultural modernization and food industrialization: Chinese exper t

ISLAMABAD

s ta f f r e P o r t

CPEC will boost Pakistan’s agricultural modernization and food industrialization, said Zhang Jishu, a Chinese pepper technician who is busy training Pakistani employees on how to grow pepper seedlings in a greenhouse in preparation for transplanting them into the fields next month

According to Gwadar Pro on Thursday, Zhang Jishu said the main process of raising seedlings is to distribute seeds evenly on the seedling bed spray water to make the seeds stick to the soil, cover them with plastic film, and then build a small arch shed to increase temperature and humidity

Zhang is an expert from Sichuan Litong Food Co Ltd Talking to Gwadar Pro, he said that the company would implement a 1,000 acre pepper cultivation demonstration garden in Multan during 2022 2023 growing season

In partnership with local agribusinesses and farmers in Pakistan, it intends to take over 15,000 acres of pepper orders in South Punjab with a planned harvest of 30,000 tonnes of dried pepper

The company also plans to build two pepper processing plants in Lahore and Multan and is currently in the process of locating them

Litong completed cultivar selection and trial planting in 2019 experimental planting in 2020 and small scale planting in 2021 Last month, the project organized and implemented by the company entered the first batch of agricultural projects under China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)

Pepper is an essential vegetable and condiment in China, with many processed products, a lengthy industrial chain, and high added value The Chinese market has a huge demand for bulk crops such as peppers and broad beans

Meanwhile, poor seed quality, lack of modern farming techniques, low yields and lack of skilled agricultural labor are among the major factors holding back agricultural development in Pakistan

To harvest high quality peppers, Litong is providing technology and training to local farmers It has carried out cooperation with Pakistani colleges and universities to cultivate talents with both agricultural knowledge and management ability, recruit local professional managers and top notch technical talents

In China, it cooperates with Sichuan Agricultural University and other institutions to set up demonstration bases for industry university research projects Seeds are the “chips” of agriculture Chen Changwei, Chairman of Litong claimed that the company would bring China’s advanced breeding technology to Pakistan next year work with Pakistan’s outstanding agricultural enterprises to carry out a variety of technology researches, production, industrial development researches, technical training, the establishment of R&D and testing platform marketing and human resources platform, giving full play to the leading role of agricultural technology under CPEC According to Chen, there is a huge demand in the global market strong complementarity in the food sector between China and Pakistan, and bright prospects for food processing

Minister MoST takes notice of embezzlement in PSQCA investment funds

ISLAMABAD G h u l a M a b b a s

As auditors set audit paras related to embezzlement of over a billion rupees in investment fund i e employees retirement benefits funds in Pakistan Standard and Quality Control Authority (PSQCA) an attached department of Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST), the federal minister of MOST has taken serious notice of the issue

According to available documents, Minister of Science and Technology Agha Hassan Baloch during a meeting held on September 15, 2022, has asked the authority to probe the issue and submit a detailed reply as soon as the massive embezzlement by the finance department of PSQCA was very surprising

The meeting was attended by former additional secretary MoST Syed Ataur Rehman Shahzad Naim former Chief Financial Officer (CFO) PSQCA, Khalid Ahmed Bablani, Director Finance PSQCA Syed Ali Muhammad

Bukhari Deputy Director Finance Shahzad Ahmed Siddiqui ,Audit Officer PSQCA and others The meeting was held to discuss internal audit report 2010 2022 of PSQCA in continuation of fact finding inquiry related to corruption cases in the authority

The Minister, after noticing negligence on the part of Syed Ataur Rehman who previously held acting charge as DG PSQCA, Shahzad Naim, as CFO, removed them from their positions last month Both officials later were also transferred from the ministry

It may be mentioned here that the minister has reportedly taken notice of a news item appeared in Pakistan Today regarding the audit report It was reported that the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has initiated an inquiry into the financial embezzlement in PSQCA The NAB Rawalpindi through a notice, had asked MoST to provide related information, documents and records about officials allegedly involved in financial and administrative irregularities and corruption cases

While taking notice complaints registered by employees of PSQCA against Ali Muhammad Bukhari, Deputy Director Finance of PSQCA the NAB Rawalpindi/Islamabad has asked the ministry to provide details required to initiate the inquiry

The complainants had requested NAB to conduct an inquiry and forensic audit of accounts of PSQCA as they suspect suspicious transactions and financial embezzlement worth over a billion Rupees in the government institution

Following audit reports of the Auditor General of Pakistan about the massive financial irregularities and illegal appointments at the PSQCA, the MoST had earlier constituted a committee to probe into the matter The committee comprising of MoST Chief Finance and Accounts Officer Shazad Naim and Assistant Accounts Officer (F&A) Adeel Ahmad, was constituted for conducting an inquiry regarding financial and administrative mismanagement allegedly committed by Ali Muhammad Bukhari

Apart from the financial irregularities, Bukhari was also alleged to get his two sisters, one brother and one niece appointed in the PSQCA Besides, the committee was also supposed to investigate the authenticity of the degrees of his relatives hired in PSQCA as well as alleged financial and administrative mismanagement of Bukhari himself

As per available documents, Bukhari has made over 55 suspicious transactions worth millions of rupees from 2014 to 2017 from various accounts of NBP, for reportedly PSQCA Investment purpose The transactions were suspicious and made in cash mode which is itself against the GFR rules and violation of government directives

Apart from the suspicious transactions, Bukhari, who served in the finance department of PSQCA from 2008 to 2022, was also alleged in financial irregularities regarding reinvestment worth billions of rupees in various branches of NBP in term deposit receipts (TDRs)

The lawyer also gave reference of a verdict of the top court and a US law and said that how his party could be declared as foreign funded

He, however, admitted that the ECP had authority to collect the relevant data The court asked the PTI’s leader to prepare paper work for it and submit written arguments on next hearing The further hearing of the case was then adjourned till November 22

Imran admitted offering indefinite extension to army chief: marriyum

ISLAMABAD

s ta f f r e P o r t

Minister for Information and Broadcasting Marriyum Aurangzeb on Thursday said t h e “ f o r e i g n f u n d e d F i t n a , P a k i s t a n Te h r e e k e I n s a f ( P T I ) C h i e f I m r a n K h a n h a s a d m i t t e d o ff e r i n g a n i n d e f i n i t e e x t e n s i o n t o t h e a r m y c h i e f i n h i s t e n u r e R e a c t i n g to the statement of PTI Chief Imran Khan, she asked the parents to keep their children and families away from the bloody long march which would begin on Friday from Lahore She said the “foreign funded Fitna is getting the treatment he deserves,” adding, “Imran Khan has not done any corruption, but indeed he has committed robberies in the last four years of his rule “The country was saved from destruction six months ago, she said She said the foreign funded fitna can only promote insurrections in the army and can only launch campaign against the martyrs Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf has been crushed only by the foreign funded fitna the minister held If Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Interior Minister Rana Sana Ullah Khan were criminals Imran would have proved it in four years of his rule,” she asserted She said the spying on the political opponents was allowed by Imran himself Commenting on holding early elections, the minister again reiterated that elections would be held next year after the completion of the constitutional terms of the incumbent assemblies

Work on WB funded 245mW hyderopower projects in Swat to begin next year

PESHAWAR a z i z b u n e r i T h e Wo r l d B a n k w i l l s t a r t t w o h y d r o p o w e r p r o j e c t s o f 2 4 5 M W i n S w a t d i s t r i c t n e x t y e a r a n d i t s c o m p l e t i o n w i l l b r i n g a n a n n u a l i n c o m e o f m o r e t h a n R s 1 3 b i l l i o n t o t h e p r o v i n c e I n t h i s r e g a r d , a n i m p o r t a n t m e e t i n g w a s h e l d u n d e r t h e c h a i r m a n s h i p o f S e c r e t a r y E n e rg y a n d P o w e r N i s a r A h m a d K h a n w i t h t h e p r o j e c t d i r e c t o r s o f W B r e g a r d i n g t h e p r o g r e s s o n t h e p r o j e c t s T h e m e e t i n g w a s a l s o a t t e n d e d b y S p e c i a l S e c r e t a r y E n e rg y Ta s h f e e n H a i d e r, C h i e f E x e c u t i v e P E D O E n g i n e e r N a e e m K h a n a n d C h i e f E n g i n e e r P E D O S h a h H u s s a i n D u r i n g t h e m e e t i n g t h e S e c r e t a r y E n e rg y b r i e f e d t h a t t h e Wo r l d B a n k w i l l s t a r t c o n s t r u c t i o n w o r k o n t w o h y d r o p o w e r p r o j e c t s i n S w a t d i s t r i c t n e x t y e a r i n c o n n e c t i o n w i t h p r o v i d i n g f i n a n c i a l s u p p o r t f o r t h e d e v e l o p m e n t o f K h y b e r P a k h t u n k h w a ’s e n e rg y s e c t o r i n c l u d i n g 1 5 7 M W M a d y a n H y d r o p o w e r P r o j e c t a n d 8 8 M W G a b r a l K a l a m H y d r o p o w e r P r o j e c t I n t h i s r e g a r d a 4 5 0 m i l l i o n d o l l a r a g r e e m e n t h a s b e e n s i g n e d b e t w e e n t h e Wo r l d B a n k a n d t h e p r o v i n c i a l g o v e r n m e n t T h e s e p r o j e c t s w i l l b e c o m p l e t e d b y 2 0 2 7 , w h i c h w i l l g e n e r a t e a n a n n u a l i n c o m e o f m o r e t h a n R s 1 3 b i l l i o n f o r t h e p r o v i n c e

U S a m b a S S a d o r a n n o U n C e S a d d I T I o n a l $ 3 0 m n I n f lo o d r e l I e f

dO N A L D Blome US ambassador

to Pakistan, on Thursday an nounced an additional $30 million in humanitarian assistance to sup port flood relief efforts

Blome made the announcement during a visit with USAID implementing partner ACTED, in the Shikarpur district of Sindh, where he helped to distribute emergency shelter latrines and hygiene kits among flood affected people

The ambassador also traveled to Makhno village where the flood hit commu nity uses USG emergency shelter kits as temporary housing He talked with flood vic tims to learn about the impact of the flooding and understand their needs

This new funding brings the United States total assistance to Pakistan for flood response, food security and disaster pre paredness and capacity building efforts to $97 million this year, said a statement issued here by the US embassy in Islamabad

The new funding will expand efforts to address immediate needs, scaling up assis

tance to the most affected communities and enabling USAID to reach more than 4 mil lion people With the additional funding, Washington, through USAID, will provide life saving food nutrition and health assis tance to mitigate increased food insecurity and malnutrition resulting from the impact of the floods as well as curb the rise of dis eases resulting from stagnant flood waters

The new funding will also provide shel ter supplies to help families rebuild as well as winterization kits to help families prepare ahead of cold weather As women and girls are disproportionately impacted by natural disasters, like flooding, the United States is providing increased protection support to prevent gender based violence as well as provide support for survivors

UK rules grooming gang members can be depor ted to Pak istan

LONDON a f p

T wo die, seven injured in Quetta firing

QUETTA S ta f f R e p o R t

At least two persons died and seven others were re ported injured in firing between two groups at Ses sion Court area here on Thursday According to police sources, two sub clans were moving to Session Court when they opened fire at each other Media Co ordinator of Health Department Dr Waseem Baig said that two dead bodies and seven injured had been brought to Civil Hospital for medical aid He said that one of the deceased was identified as Muhammad Ha roon, while the other deceased could not be identified so far Among the injured are Sardar Naseem Tareen, Muhammd Lal Haji Muhammad Naeem Muhammd Imran, Muhammad Jameel, Dilawar and Muhammad Fazal

IHC gives one week to police for recover y of missing citizen

ISLAMABAD

S ta f f R e p o R t

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) Thursday granted one week time to capital’s police regarding recovery of a missing citizen Muhammad Hamid Justice Aamer Farooq of IHC heard the above case Petitioner s lawyer, Shahkhawar Advocate appeared before the court and said that the citizen was missing since Feb ruary 2 this year The officials of Islamabad police adopted the stance that the senior officials were in contact with the KPK police They prayed the court to grant some time so that they might apprise it regard ing development into the matter At this, the court ad journed hearing for one week

d

MIRPUR (AJK)

ta f f R e p o R t

Kashmiris held protest rallies on Thursday to observe the Black Day against the unlawful Indian occupa tion of Jammu & Kashmir and cate gorically warned the world of an unending war if the Kashmir dispute was not peacefully settled immedi ately

It was on this day in 1947 when Indian armed troops invaded Jammu & Kashmir and occupied it in sheer violation of the partition plan of the sub continent ignoring all interna tional norms and commitments

This year too, the black day against continual forced Indian oc cupation is being observed to con demn the scrapping of the special status of the disputed Jammu Kash mir State The call for observance of

A UK court has rejected an appeal against deportation to Pakistan by two members of a gang jailed a decade ago for grooming young girls for sex in northern England

In a ruling by an immigration tribu nal, judges said there was a “very strong public interest in removing the men Adil Khan, 51, and Qari Abdul Rauf, 52 from the UK after they mounted a

long legal battle against deportation They were jailed in 2012 as part of a g a n g o f n i n e m e n o f P a k i s t a n i a n d A f g h a n o r i g i n l i v i n g i n t h e t o w n o f Rochdale in northern England

T h e g a n g m e m b e r s r e c e i v e d s e n tences of up to 19 years for conspiracy to engage in sexual activity with chil dren under the age of 16 and other of fences

T h e g a n g t a rg e t e d w h i t e B r i t i s h girls as young as 13, repeatedly raping them and passing them to other men for

sex

This case was part of a series of tri als of similar grooming gangs in other English cities including Oxford Both Khan and Rauf had been Pak istani citizens and acquired British cit i z e n s h i p t h r o u g h n a t u r a l i s a t i o n T h e y were finally deprived of British citizen ship in 2018, along with another gang member

In a long running test case, the men c o n t e s t e d t h e i r d e p o r t a t i o n o n h u m a n rights grounds, citing the right to a pri

F B R c o n s i d e r i n g ex t e n s i o n o f t a x r e t u r n f i l i n g d at e fo r b u s i n e s s c o m m u n i t y

L A H O R E

S h a h a b o m e R

T h e F e d e r a l B o a r d o f R e v e n u e s C h i e f C o m m i s s i o n e r I n l a n d R e v e n u e R e g i o n a l Ta x O ff i c e ( RTO ) L a h o r e h a s a n n o u n c e d t o c o n s i d e r e x t e n s i o n o f t a x r e t u r n f i l i n g d a t e f o r t h e b u s i n e s s c o m m u n i t y w h e r e a s t h e C o m m i s s i o n e r w i l l p r o v i d e f a c i l i t i e s t o t h o s e c a s e s w h o w e r e f a c i n g u n a v o i d a b l e c i r c u m s t a n c e s T h e C h i e f C o m m i s s i o n e r N a s i r I q b a l , i n a m e e t i n g w i t h t h e b u s i n e s s c o m m u n i t y a t t h e L a h o r e C h a m b e r o f C o m m e r c e a n d I n d u s t r y ( L C C I ) h e r e o n T h u r s d a y, a s s u r e d t h a t f o r i m p r o v i n g t h e b u s i n e s s e n v i r o n m e n t , a t t e n t i o n i s b e i n g g i v e n f o r t h e l i n k a g e s w i t h b u s i n e s s c o m m u n i t y, d i g i t i z a t i o n o f t h e s y s t e m a n d d o c u m e n t a t i o n I q b a l f u r t h e r s a i d t h a t t h e s e n d i n g o f u n n e c e s s a r y n o t i c e s h a s a l s o b e e n s t o p p e d “

We w e r e a s k e d t o s u r v e y t h e m a r k e t s a s m a n y o f t h e b e t t e r b u s i n e s s e s a r e n o t i n t h e t a x n e t b u t w e d i d n o t d o t h a t b e c a u s e w e a r e c o m m i t t e d t o n o t s p r e a d i n g f e a r L a s t y e a r a t o t a l o f 5 8 8 , 0 0 0 t a x r e t u r n s

w e r e f i l e d i n RTO L a h o r e a n d e v e r y y e a r a r o u n d 8 0 t h o u s a n d n e w t a x p a y e r s a r e j o i n i n g t h e s y s t e m R a t h e r t h a n p u l l i n g i n t h o s e o u t s i d e t h e t a x n e t i t i s r e s t r i c t i n g t h e u s e o f u n t a x e d a n d i l l e g a l c a p i t a l

T h e t a x r a t e a n d t r e a t m e n t f o r a n o n t a x p a y e r i s d i f f e r e n t f r o m t h a t o f a t a x p a y e r I n t h e p a s t , p r o p e r t y t a x f o r n o n t a x p a y e r s w a s 2 p e r c e n t a n d n o w t h e p r o p e r t y t a x f o r t h e t a x p a y e r i s t w o p e r c e n t , w h i c h i s a d j u s t a b l e b u t f o r t h o s e w h o a r e n o t t a x p a y e r s , t h e t a x h a s b e e n i n c r e a s e d f r o m t w o p e r c e n t t o 7 5 p e r c e n t , ” h e a d d e d

H e a l s o s a i d t h a t a l l p o s s i b l e e f f o r t s h a v e b e e n m a d e f o r b e t t e r i m p l e m e n t a t i o n o f I n c o m e Ta x O r d i n a n c e 2 0 0 1

“ I n t h e t a x y e a r 2 0 2 1 , t h o s e w h o f i l e d t h e i r t a x r e t u r n s g u a r a n t e e d t h a t t h e y w i l l n o t r e c e i v e a n y u n n e c e s s a r y t a x n o t i c e s ” h e m a i n t a i n e d D u r i n g t h e m e e t i n g , L C C I p r e s i d e n t K a s h i f A n w a r d e m a n d e d t h a t t h e t a x a g e n c y a p p o i n t a f o c a l p e r s o n w h o c a n b e c o n t a c t e d i n c a s e o f p r o b l e m s “ L C C I a n d F e d e r a l B o a r d o f

R e v e n u e ( F B R ) a r e o n t h e s a m e p a g e a n d w a n t t h e t a x n e t t o i n c r e a s e We a l s o w a n t f a c i l i t i e s f o r t h e m e m b e r s o f t h e L C C I , ” h e s a i d R e f e r r i n g t o S R O 1 9 5 5 ( I ) / 2 0 2 2 K a s h i f A n w a r s a i d t h a t i n c o m e t a x f o r m s h a v e b e e n s i m p l i f i e d f o r r e t a i l e r s a n d s h o p k e e p e r s w i t h a n a n n u a l t u r n o v e r o f l e s s t h a n 1 0 m i l l i o n S i n c e s a l e s t a x a p p l i e s t o t u r n o v e r o v e r 1 0 0 m i l l i o n , t h i s s i m p l i f i e d f o r m s h o u l d b e f o r s m a l l r e t a i l e r s w i t h a n a n n u a l t u r n o v e r o f 1 0 t o 1 0 0 m i l l i o n T h i s w i l l e n a b l e m o r e p e o p l e t o b e n e f i t f r o m i t a n d h e l p i n e x p a n d i n g t h e t a x n e t , ” h e a d d e d T h e L C C I p r e s i d e n t a l s o d e m a n d e d t h a t t h e a s s e s s m e n t o f f i c e r s i n v o l v e d i n t h e m i s u s e o r e n f o r c e m e n t o f t h e l a w s h o u l d a l s o b e h e l d a c c o u n t a b l e , e s p e c i a l l y t h o s e o f f i c e r s w h o s e a s s e s s m e n t s a r e r e t u r n e d b y t r i b u n a l s o r c o u r t s T h e e x e m p t i o n g r a n t e d u n d e r S e c t i o n s 1 5 3 a n d 1 4 8 s h o u l d b e a l l o w e d t o a d j u s t t h e r e f u n d s , i f t h i s d o e s n o t h a p p e n , t a x p a y e r s m a y f a c e a s e v e r e c a s h c r u n c h w h i c h i s n o t f a i r a t a l l , ” h e c o n c l u d e d

i e s h e l d o n B l a c k D ay a g a i n s t I

Black Day was given by the top leadership of the Kashmir resistance movement All Parties Hurriyat Con ference, and the government of Azad Jammu & Kashmir

In the lake city of Mirpur the black day rally was held from dis trict court premises under the aus pices of the National Events Organising Committee Mirpur dis trict All civil society organizations participated in the rally

Waving black flags and banners, the participants of the rallies also fastened black ribbons on their arms as a mark of indignation and hatred against India and the reign of terror and state violence unleashed against the innocent people in the bleeding vale of IIOJK by the In dian occupying forces for the last 75 years

Leading personalities represent

ing diverse segments of the civil so ciety while addressing the main rally highlighted the significance of early peaceful settlement of the Kashmir problem besides register ing protest against the continued forced and illegal Indian occupation of Jammu & Kashmir

Speakers reiterated Kashmiris demand for restoration of the spe cial status of the disputed Jammu Kashmir state and most particularly the early grant of the right of self determination to Kashmiris without further delay which was being de nied by India for the last 75 years

The observance of the black day is aimed at reminding the inter national community and the global forums especially the United Na tions to perform their due role for the early peaceful settlement of Kashmir issue in line with interna

tional norms and commitments in cluding the UN resolutions which clearly speak of the grant of right to self determination through a free and fair referendum in entire

v a t e a n d f a m i l y l i f e a n d t h e f a c t t h a t b o t h h a d r e n o u n c e d P a k i s t a n i c i t i z e n ship

B o t h m e n w e r e r e l e a s e d s e v e r a l y e a r s a g o , a f t e r s e r v i n g a p o r t i o n o f t h e i r s e n t e n c e s , a n d w e r e r e p o r t e d l y l i v i n g i n R o c h d a l e , c l o s e t o t h e i r v i c tims

K h a n , w h o g o t a 1 3 y e a r o l d g i r l pregnant, told the tribunal he wanted to b e a “ r o l e m o d e l ” f o r h i s s o n p r o m p t i n g j u d g e s t o s a y h e s h o w e d a “breathtaking lack of remorse”

T wo new deaths from dengue fever

ISLAMABAD

Pakistan continues to face a growth in the number of dengue fever cases as two more deaths were reported from the dis ease in the country Both deaths were re ported from Punjab, the provincial health authorities said on Wednesday Punjab re ported 293 new cases Lahore reported 142 new cases, followed by Rawalpindi with 59 cases The total number of dengue cases in Punjab this year has now gone up to 13,742 In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 397 more people were di agnosed with the mosquito borne disease The number of active cases in the province currently stands at 1,514 while the total number of cases this year has reached 17,244 Sindh reported 220 new infections The worst hit area was Karachi the provincial capital which re ported 130 new cases With the newly re ported dengue cases, the October figure to date for the province has risen to 7,817, bringing the total local tally to 17,971 this year Islamabad reported 64 new dengue cases in the last 24 hours the health authorities said on Wednesday night The city’s total tally has risen to 4 552 this year

O J K

Jammu & Kashmir state

congregations in all

towns

headquarters were

the hallmarks of black day In IIOJK, Black Day was marked by

strike

shutter

India demonstrations in

state

parts of the

PA k I S TA N u r g e S M e A S u r e S T o

e N S u r e e Q u I TA B L e A C C e S S T o wAT e r

el Sheikh from November 6 to 18

PA K I S TA N has called for strengthening cooperation and upholding eco system approaches towards sound water management to achieve Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number six, which seeks to ensure access to water and sanita tion for all

Water is our lifeblood; its avail ability and management is key to the achievement of SDG 6 and all the other SDGs,” Ambassador Munir Akram told a meeting organised by Egypt, which is hosting the COP 27 climate change conference in Sharm

(There are 17 SDGs that are aimed at ending poverty, with strategies that improve health and education reduce inequality, and spur economic growth while tackling climate change and working to preserve the world’s oceans and forests )

Speaking on Water in COP 27 the envoy highlighted the devastation caused by the recent floods in Pak istan triggered by heat induced glacial melting and a “monsoon on steroids”, and said both solidarity and climate justice demand international support to the country’s endeavour to build back with resilience

“The unpredictable flow of waters in our eastern rivers, as well as cli

mate induced disasters have made it extremely difficult for Pakistan to achieve the water related SDGs,” he said while stressing that the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty between India and Pakistan must be fully implemented “in letter and spirit”

On its part, Pakistan has embarked upon an ambitious plan to rehabilitate the Indus basin through 25 projects under the overarching theme of “Liv ing Indus

While issuing a call for boosting cooperation a sound water manage ment, Ambassador Akram proposed: Adherence to environmental principles such as precaution, polluter pays, and no harm in maintaining freshwater resources including trans

e n t s i n c l i m a t e r e s i l i e n t i n f r a s t r u c t u r e i n w a t e r a n d sanitation need to be tripled from the current level; Financial resources and techni cal support must be mobilized mas sively for adaptation projects in developing countries to build re silience against future disasters, and, A financial facility to ensure that climate vulnerable developing countries are able to have access im mediately to resources for recovery and reconstruction from climate in duced natural disasters

Imran should stop daydreaming about coming into power: Muqam

SHC direct razing 7-storey illegal building in Liaquatabad

KARACHI: Sindh High Court (SHC) on Thursday ordered to raze 7 storey illegal building in the Li aquatabad area of Karachi

A citizen moved the court against the illegal construction of seven storey building at 90 yards plot number 464/8 in Liaquatabad The officials of the Sindh Building Control Authority appeared before the court in today’s hearing

The SHC bench asked the SBCA how a seven storey building was constructed on a 90 yard plot

The SBCA official said the building was built without an approved map and it would be taken down within a month

The court later adjourned the hearing after the assurance of the SBCA official and ordered to forward a copy of the order to the DG SBCA In one such judgement the SHC had ordered to immediately raze illegal portions in North Nazimabad Block L, Karachi

The lawyer of the applicant had said that ground plus three storey building had been constructed and now the building is constructing the fourth floor on the residential plot no B165 in North Nazimabad

The SHC had directed immediate action against illegal constructions on Plot No B165 in North Nazimabad Block L and also directed the DG Sindh Building Control Authority (SBCA) for immediate action against the builder S ta f f r e p o r t

PTI MNA Shakoor Shad meets NA speaker

ISLAMABAD: PTI Member of the National Assembly (MNA) Shakoor Shad met with the Speaker National Assembly Raja Pervaiz Ashraf on Thursday and informed that he had tendered resignation from the seat under his party pressure

He requested the speaker for not accepting his resignation

The Speaker listened to the MNA attentively and told him that he would inform him about the fate of his resignation only after reviewing his point of view from the constitutional and legal point of view S ta f f r e p o r t

Advisor to Prime Minister on Political and Public Affairs Engineer Amir Muqam on Thursday said that “incompetent” Imran Khan should stop day dreaming about coming into power and start wor rying about going to jail

“Imran Khan, who stole watch from Toshakhana, defamed Pakistan all over the world and it was proved in the Election Commission verdict that Imran Niazi and his gang are the real thieves of the country ”

PML N stalwart Amir Muqam expressed the views at the inauguration the project of 12 inch Sui Gas pipeline in Mingora, Swat here the other day

Amir Muqam claimed that after Faisal Vawda many people would now know the differ ence between lies and truth, saying now the health of Sheikh Rashid and many of his like will also start catching diseases

“We strongly condemn the murder of Arshad Sharif but he left the country through KP so the Chief Minister Mahmood Khan should also be in vestigated along with Imran Khan ” Engineer Amir Muqam severely criticized Chief Minister Mahmood Khan that the person behind the hollow words for gas projects in Swat had also with drawn the money released for the gas project and was trying to befool the people

He regretted that it is the misfortune of the Pakistani nation that incompetents got the gov ernment in KPK, while in the Federation, even

during four years, the incompetent person did nothing but destruction

Imran Khan did not spare Pakistan s forces and institutions as sometimes he claims he was removed through American conspiracy and sometimes says regime change he criticised He challenged Imran Khan to produce evidence of the conspiracy

He further said that Imran Khan lured the Pashtoons who went to Saudi Arabia for labour to shouting slogans at Masjid i Nabawi and were subsequently jailed by the government there “Now Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, during his recent visit to Saudi Arabia, requested Prince Sul man for their release who did not take time and ordered their release from prison although court had sentenced them eight years in jail ” Muqam said that Imran who raised slogans of thieves in the world, defamed Pakistanis and today these slogans of thieves have become a noose around his own neck He said that today Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has been bankrupted and even salaries are not available for employees Adding that after the successful visit to Saudi Ara bia, Shehbaz Sharif will visit China soon and work on CPEC will start again and the country will be on the path of development

“There will be no compromise on peace in Swat and there is no difference of opinion over the issue,” he said

Former District Nazim Muhammad Ali Shah, District President Qamoos Khan, General Secre tary Habib Ali Shah and other party leaders were also present on this occasion

Philip Morris announces results for Q3 ended Sept , 2022

Karachi: Philip Morris (Pakistan) Limited (PMPKL) has generated a Net Turnover of 14,966 million for the nine months ended September 2022, reflecting an increase of 17% vs the same period last year (SPLY) The Net turnover includes a Domestic Net Turnover of PKR 13,923 million, with an increase of 10 5% vs SPLY (reflecting excise driven price increases) coupled with an Exports Turnover of PKR 1,043 million The Exports turnover reflects an increase of over 100% vs SPLY, due to the delayed exports at the end of 2021 on account of external supply chain constraints and materialized in the first quarter of 2022 The Company recorded Profit after Tax of PKR 2,376 million with an increase of 14 7% vs SPLY driven by pricing as mentioned above During the nine months of the calendar year ended September 30, 2022, the Company’s contribution to the National Exchequer in the form of excise duty, sales tax, and other Government levies, stood at PKR 21,387 million reflecting an increase of 4 6% vs SPLY pr

ISI chief claims PTI offered Bajwa ‘indefinite extension’ for help in vote of no-confidence

continued fr om page 01

Srinagar a p p

All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC) said that it stands res olutely by its principled stand; the resolution of Kashmir A fact admitted by both India and Pakistan, the parties to the con flict, to the satisfaction of the entire people of J&K, the main party in the conflict

APHC said that the Hur riyat Conference is the manifes tation, in the form of a political

platform, of the deep desire for resolution among the people of J&K for decades Hurriyat seeks lasting peace and stability and good neighbourly relations in the region, an immediate con sequence of the settlement of the conflict

Such belief is at variance with the hyper nationalist out look of the ruling dispensation in India at present, which has detained Hurriyat leaders ac tivists and others in jails or at their homes, for this reason The

The ISI also did not find any evidence regarding the conspiracy, he added “This is all part of the record We wanted to bring this to the public And we left the decision to the then government ”

However, this did not happen and more rumours were spread to gain political mileage he said adding that the Pakistan Army was also targeted

At this time, Sharif and other journalists were fed a particular narrative and an attempt was made to defame Pakistan and the country’s institutions across the world, he said In this media trial, ARY News played the role of a spin doctor in targeting the army and promoting a false narrative [ ] the NSC meeting was presented in the wrong context ”

I m r a n q u e s t i o n s r a t i o n a l e b e h i n d ‘p o l i t i c a l p r e s s e r ’ b y s t a t e i n s t i t u t i o n

continued fr om page 01

“I warned and said that there were talks of an extension here I told him that if they re offering you [an extension], then we can do the same,” Imran said

To say that I was making deals in closed rooms [ ] what would I achieve from a deal? I said do this for Pakistan But they didn t stop the conspiracy and look what happened ”

E l a b o r

knew “attempts were made to silence him”

“Look at his programme, then who was in danger because of him [ ] look at his tweets This is not hidden Why did the pub lic come out like this for his funeral? People knew him and his truth

“Arshad Sharif’s truth will never be hidden He sent a letter to the Islamabad High Court and President Arif Alvi saying that his life is in dan ger He said the same to me and I advised him to leave country But he was so brave he didn t want to go,” the PTI chief added

On PTI leader Faisal Vawda’s press con ference yesterday, Imran said it he had seen many close people in his life change and show a different side during testing times

“I was very saddened by what he did and I was not expecting it This was done on request I know on whose request this was done dirty

harry’s request ” In a surprise media talk on Wednesday night, Vawda had alleged that blood would be shed and bodies would fall during the PTI long march slated to com mence from Lahore on Friday, October 28

During the interview today, Imran al leged that “dirty harry” was very close to Vawda and he had no doubt that all this drama about bloodshed [in the long march]” was done on the shadowy figure’s request

Earlier in the day PTI leader Asad Umar had said that his party chief never made any unconstitutional demands in “back door talks”

In a media talk flanked by fellow party leaders Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Fawad Chaudhry, Shireen Mazari and Hammad Azhar, Umar said that the matters discussed behind closed doors were no “secret” Imran Khan has discussed them in rallies

and press conferences The demands have been in front of the public since forever ”

Umar passed these comments in an ap parent response to Lt Gen Anjum In the press conference earlier today, the DG ISI seemingly talking about Imran had said that while citizens had the right to their opin ion, why did you praise him [the army chief] so much in the past if he was a traitor?”

“If you see him as a traitor, then why do you meet him through the back door? [ ] Don’t do this where you meet quietly at night through the back door and express your unconstitutional wishes but call [the army chief] a traitor in broad daylight That’s a big contradiction between your words and your actions,” he had said

Lt Gen Anjum also made the revelation that in March Chief of Army Staff General

Qamar Javed Bajwa was given a “lucrative offer” for an extension in his tenure “It was made in front of me He rejected it because he wanted the institution to move forward from a controversial role to a constitutional role ”

In the media talk in Lahore later in the day, Umar said that Imran owned both the army and the country But will Imran Khan agree with every decision taken by the army? Are there actions or decisions that he criticises? Absolutely This is his constitutional right

You may not agree with the criticism but in Imran Khan’s point of view, these are all things that if followed, would lead to the bet terment of the army and the country, he said Umar also clarified that Imran had never said anything that would weaken the army “So these things said should be reviewed [ ] maybe there is a need for consideration

the occasion pr

T r y s t a t t h e T o s h a k h a n a

the PtI is to begin its Long March on Islamabad from Lahore Friday (today), and it is unfortunate for it that the main concern of observers is not so much whether it will achieve its political goals, as whether it will lead to bloodshed While the latter concern was always hovering beneath the surface of the politics, it has come much more to the fore because former Minister Faisal Vawda has expressed fear of bloodshed and linked it to the murder in Kenya of journalist Arshad Sharif Mr Vawda held a press conference on the issue, which was not particularly clear, though he did say there was a conspiracy against Mr Sharif, though he did say by whom the political goals of the Long March are reasonably clear Going from Lahore to Islamabad means passing through most of Central and Northern Punjab, and passing through the main battleground for the Punjab in any future election, and is about as effective a campaigning tool as there can be More important for the PtI is to demonstrate to the establishment that it has the support of the electorate, and thus the umpire\s finger must be raised for fresh elections the audience is thus the establishment rather than the PDM government

It is possible to question the wisdom of the Long March under the present conditions of economic instability, the flood situation and political instability, but it is not possible to question the PtI’s right to conduct it Whether it yields the results the PtI wants is another matter, but it should be stressed, both in view of earlier fears and in view of Mr Vawda’s reservations, that the PtI must keep the Long March peaceful While it passes through areas where the PtI controls the provincial government, there should be no problem, but as soon as it enters federal territory, things could go awry the primary responsibility to maintain calm will rest on the government Even if there are miscreants out to exploit the situation it is the duty of the government to prevent them from wreaking any mischief the PtI should also realize that if it cannot achieve its goals peacefully, it will not improve its chances if any of its followers resort to the sort of violence that was witnessed in its previous Long March on May 25 Its leadership must exercise extra vigilance on the cadres

Th E disqualification of PtI Chairman Imran Khan from membership of Parliament for the remainder of the term of the National Assembly should not appear much of a hardship to someone who resigned in protest from the house which elected him as Prime Minister and whose avowed position is not to take up any of the six seats to which he was elected re cently, and since limited by the Islamabad high Court however it creates something of a crisis within the party, because that disqualification might deprive it of its Chairman, the infighting that might ensue over even acting charge till the next election would not be a pretty sight

the only thing standing between Imran having to make a call for a Long March and not doing so would be the judicial decision on his disqualifica tion, which has not come the extreme anxiety of the government and the powers that be that there be no Long March means that the disqualification should not be seen as final, but as a sort of bargain ing chip Another bargaining chip is the release of the much touted video clips of his about which there is so much noise however, now that he has been ousted politically he has no incentive not to call a Long March

there are problems with this, most notably with the financing the assistance expected from the Punjab government in particular, is apparently not forthcoming the assistance of those who helped in the 2014 dharna is not being extended Despite all this, what choice does Imran have? It may be that the Long March may fail even worse than that of May 25 which would end forever his dominance over the establishment I f h e d o e s n o t d e m o n s t r a t e h i s p o w e r t o m o bilise the street he will have no choice but to sit back and face thew various legal cases that are pil i n g u p a g a i n s t h i m I n c i d e n t a l l y, t h e to s h a k h a n a Refetrence like the prohibited funding case is not o v e r w i t h t h e E l e c t i o n C o m m i s s i o n o f P a k i s t a n ’s unfavourable verdicts Both verdicts also ordered cr imin al p r o s ecu tio n s u n d er th e law an d th e F I A h a s a l r e a d y m a d e a r r e s t s i n t h e c a s e s r e g i s t e r e d a f t e r i t o p e n e d i n v e s t i g a t i o n s i n t o t h e p r o h i b i t e d funding case that case has also led to a reference against the PtI to the Supreme Court, seeking its banning If that happens, then the duration of Imran s disqual ification loses all practical meaning It should also be noted that it would not stop a new party being r e g i s t e r e d w i t h t h e E C P, u n d e r a n e w s y m b o l I m r a n m i g h t b e f o r b i d d e n f r o m h e a d i n g i t , b u t n o t h i n g c o u l d s t o p h i m f r o m f i r s t c o n t e s t i n g t h e next election, and then being elected parliamentary party leader however, conviction in even one criminal case

would lead to his automatic disqualification for the term of his sentence plus five years more that would lead to unforeseeable consequences the ECP has refrained from declaring Imran not sadiq or ameeen and thus liable to lifetime disqualification however, Mian Nawaz Sharif was disqualified for the same offence of failing to include an asset in his wealth statement the difference is that the assets in Mian Nawaz’s case were unreceived salaries, which constitute an intangible asset On the other hand, Imran s toshakhana gifts or the money he got from their sale, were very much tangible assets thus, par adoxically, Nawaz fans are going to be as anxious to see Imran get judicial relief from the courts, as that relief will be claimed by Mian Nawaz as well t h e r e i s a l r e a d y a p r e c e d e n t f o r t h i s I m r a n K h a n w a s g r a n t e d t r a n s i t bail by the Islamabad high C o u r t w h e n h e c a m e f r o m K P, w h e r e h e h a d h o l e d u p t o a v o i d a r r e s t S i m i l a r l y, S e n a t o r I s h a q D a r o b t a i n e d t r a n s i t b a i l w h e n h e r e t u r n e d t o P a k i s t a n , s o a s t o a v o i d h a v i n g t o s u r r e n d e r t o t h e p o l i c e a s a n a b s c o n d e r s o t h a t h e c o u l d a p p r o a c h t h e a c c o u n t a b i l i t y c o u r t f o r b a i l I t w o u l d b e i m p o s s i b l e t o d e n y M i a n N a w a z t h e r e l i e f g r a n t e d I m r a n , b u t i f h e i s n o t g r a n t e d r e l i e f t h e n M i a n N a w a z w i l l h a v e t o s e e k s o m e o t h e r m e t h o d o f r e l i e f the flipside is that any relief to Mian Nawaz will also have to be given to Imran the only way out for the PML(N) is for it to have Parliament pass a law re ducing the period of dis qualification for those who are not sadiq and a m een from lifetime, as at present, to some period less than Mian Nawaz has already served such as five years the catch would be that Imran would have to wait out that period, which would mean missing the next general election In that case the PML(N) would probably hope that much would happen between the 2023 and 2028 elections Imran is not at an age (he turns 70 next year) when he would look upon a short but substan tial disqualification with the same equanimity as a 40 year old, but it would still be preferable to the dread finality of a lifetime disqualification the disqualification is a straw in the wind for those who still insist on being loyal to the institu

tions, even though they insist that they are apoliti c a l n o w J u s t a s t h e a u d i o l e a k s c a n b e s e e n a s doing a sort of striptease which will logically con clude with the leak of the compromising video clip, so also are the ECP verdicts threats on an escala tory ladder the final step may well be Imran s ar rest for high treason however, at the moment what he is facing are revelations about his personal corruption the pro hibited funding case showed that he had received funds from prohibited sources, which was bad, but worse was the use of the funds, which he and senior p a r t y l e a d e r s m a y w e l l h a v e d i v e r t e d t o p e r s o n a l use Similarly, while the toshakhana reference may a p p a r e n t l y b e a b o u t n o t d e c l a r i n g g i f t s , o r t h e i r s a l

Imran has been used to fling mud at his political opponents, and for some of it to stick. He is a past master of the ar t of using mere accusation as proof of guilt Now that he is finding himself the targ et rather than the rabble rouser, he is cr ying political victimization. True as this might be , even his suppor ters will have heard these cries before , from his political opponents, when he was in office

toshakhana rules allowing him to retain gifts by pay

s u r y thus allowing him to keep the difference the claim of Imran Khan to be a Mr Clean who will sweep the Augean sta bles of Pakistan clean of corruption is under chal lenge that means that an honest anti corruption cru sader can still be sought the underlying thesis, that corruption leads to skewed economic decision making, which in return leads to eco nomic downfall remains valid there is the option of claiming that the economy was doing perfectly fine under his watch

Imran seems to be try ing to have it both ways: he wants to claim that his gov ernment was performing, and that he was not allowed to perform freely (a more then strong hint that he was being held back by the es tablishment) he would like to be the messiah that the nation needs to escape the trap of corruption, but he may find some resistance against convincing the electorate that the verdicts of the ECP are incorrect

Imran has been used to fling mud at his political opponents, and for some of it to stick he is a past master of the art of using mere accusation as proof of guilt Now that he is finding himself the target rather than the rabble rouser, he is crying political victim ization true as this might be even his supporters will have heard these cries before, from his political op ponents, when he was in office

The writer is a member of staff

D e b u n k i n g m y t h s o n t h e p e a c e f u l u s e s o f n u c l e a r e n e r g y

It is often thought that having nuclear reactors for energy production is un reliable unsafe and requires exces sive manpower Where did these ideas come from? have we ever considered the operational aspects of nuclear power? And how is it produced?

the answers to these questions are not commonly known to the general population and therefore it is necessary to try to debunk such myths about nuclear reactors so that we may achieve their true potential for the greater good Before diving into the nitty gritty of nuclear energy’s true potential, it is essential to understand the basic mechanism of nuclear reactions It is quite understand able that it may not be easy for common peo ple to make great sense of the process but it is pertinent to identify and know the process

First, uranium called “yellowcake,” a substance most important for nuclear energy is mined from the region of Dera Ghazi Khan in Pakistan It is also essential to know that the amount of uranium 235 in yellowcake consists of only 0 7 percent the natural ura nium found is mainly not enriched the ura nium 235 used in operating nuclear power plants is enriched due to the type of nuclear power plants we have in Pakistan the plants are light water reactors for which enriched uranium is required the process of enriching uranium is done through a centrifugal

process the centrifugal process is carried out in a gaseous form that separates uranium 235 from the ore the amount of enriched uranium 235 required in nuclear power plants for energy production is 4 5 percent Furthermore, the enriched uranium is further fused with neutrons when it is put in the core of the nuclear reactor When coming into contact with uranium 235, neutrons start a chain reaction of multiplication called the fis sion process this fission process is further a source of energy production, ultimately lead ing to the production of clean electricity

Second having gone through these processes, the nuclear energy produced in Pakistan is around 3530 megawatts, with a total installed capacity of six nuclear power plants two power plants are in Karachi called KANUPP II and III and the other four plants are in Chashma called C1, C2, C3, and C4 Given the current situation of nuclear power plants in Pakistan, it is also vital to understand the in ception of nuclear power pro duction the first ever nuclear reactor installed in Pakistan was the PARR I reactor, which was installed in Islamabad in 1965 by America for research purposes this initiative led to the establishment of Pakistan’s first nuclear power plant, KANUPP I, in Karachi the KANUPP I was dismantled a

few years back after completing its life cycle third, the pros of nuclear energy are comparatively more than their cons Al though the construction of a nuclear power plant can be costly, the safety and security of nuclear power plants can necessitate strin gent safeguards But the availability of nu clear fuel and the dumping process appear to be minor in comparison to the benefits Nu clear power plants once fully operational with advanced technology and materials, will not likely require any technical or oper ational maintenance for almost 2 3 years It will keep on producing clean and cheap en ergy, making it a reliable energy source with zero carbon emissions the energy produced is high in density, meaning that the energy released in the process of a nuclear fission reaction is ten million times more energy re leased than the amount of energy released in

the process of burning fossil fuels

Nuclear energy, with its pros and cons, also has multiple peaceful applications Nu clear energy is used in multiple areas related to health, agriculture, industry, food preser vation, water mining, and security Not div ing into detail about every application of nuclear energy, health is one key area where nuclear energy is put to the fullest use

Under the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC), 19 cancer related hos pitals are operating in Pakistan According to the PAEC annual report of 2018 2019, some 38, 457, and 40,797 cancer patients were registered in different cancer hospitals all around Pakistan, respectively the cancer patients were mainly suffering from breast cancer, amounting to 22 9 percent, and oral cavity cancer, amounting to 9 7 percent the one thought provoking thing about these

cancer hospitals apart from treating the cases, is that they do not reject any case of cancer, be it in the final stage

Considering the numerous benefits of nuclear energy irrespective of the small number of cons It is pertinent to invest in nuclear energy for better and cleaner energy Nuclear energy is not only an answer to cheap energy and environmental issues, mainly global warming but also a key prospect for solving extensive social issues Pakistan needs to stay focused on its goal for the year 2050 to provide 40,000 MW of en ergy Nuclear energy is the way forward for the already dire situation of the energy crisis in Pakistan this 2050 plan will not only ad dress the energy deficit, but it will also serve as a means of economic sustainability

The writer is

The PTI must keep it peaceful in the interest of the countr

Life and Times of Rishi Sunak

College, Oxford, and later to Stanford Univer sity as a Fulbright Scholar

and he became a member of the Privy Council, the very next day After re election in the 2019 general election with an increased vote of 27 210 he represented the Conservative Party in a seven way election debate organized by both the BBC and television

E d

t o

Development important for peace

t h E Soviet Afghanistan war in 1979, the so called war on terror led by the United States and the subsequent American invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 turned out to be terrible events for the erstwhile Federally Administered tribal Areas (Fata), which are now part of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province

After the 9/11 attacks, Fata emerged as the most volatile region and was believed to be the epicentre of international terrorism Furthermore, multiple military operations were launched to counter terrorism which created issues of national integration Post merger, the youth of erstwhile Fata saw a change, such as young boys and girls got admissions to universities and other capacity building programmes People mostly ask if the Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR), a set of British colonial laws, was better for the people of the region, or the Fata’s merger with KP the answer is not easy but the two different scenarios need a critical analysis the British colonial legacy ruled for more than one century where a victim had no right to have a defence lawyer or to appeal against a verdict the people of Fata were kept marginalised by depriving them of justice and human rights During those days, access to information was severely limited Post merger, the system of governance, laws, policing judiciary and power to local departments changed the tribal people were familiar with the FCR because of its hundred year history of practice, and their nucleus of decision making was based on those draconian laws therefore in time such laws got the status of a social code of honour, called Pashtunwali, such as nang (honour), melmastiya (hospitality), turah (bravery), badal (revenge), wafa (loyalty) and nanawatey (asylum)

Recently, the idea and practice of development has become increasingly contentious, not the least because it has a problematic relationship with both individual and communal human rights, and it is up against significant opposition from regional, localised approaches, particularly in ex Fata areas In the words of Arturo Escobar, “remaking of development must start by examining local constructions, to the extent they are the life and history of people, that is, the conditions for and of change” the government should address the problems of each district with different lenses For example, Kurrum and Orakzai districts have land disputes with more than a hint of sectarianism about them In contrast North and South Waziristan are engaged in land disputes on the basis of tribalism therefore, the government has two options; jirga and judiciary

Earlier to this event Sunak was finally left the sole candidate in the race for the leader of Conservative Party of the country due to the de clining by former PM Boris Johnson to become a candidate and the withdrawal of Penny Mor daunt on October 24, the day Sunak was de clared leader of the Party

It’s a time for Asians in general, and Indians in particular, to rejoice, as he is the first British Asian to assume this prestigious office and also the first non white and hindu individual, having strong faith in Indian culture and civilization, to become the Prime Minister of United Kingdom he is the richest British prime minister, with a net wealth of £730 million, since the 14th Earl of Derby who served the country three times as prime minister between 1830 and 1852, and also the youngest prime minister since William Pitt the Younger British prime minister who was just 22 when he first became Prime Minister in1782 With so many feathers and qualities, now he is the most important politician of the country who will control the government through cabinet be coming chairman of the cabinet and a member of the Privy Council By centuries long tradition of the United Kingdom, he is not the head of the state but head of the government chosen by the monarch and the party as well

the present British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was born on 12 May 1980 at Southamp ton s general hospital to Indian parents Yashvir and Usha Sunak who were born in Kenya and tanzania respectively his father was a general practitioner while mother ran a local pharmacy his India connection is very strong because his grandfathers were born in Punjab, British India, and migrated to the United Kingdom in the 1960s from East Africa

Initially he was edu cated at Winchester College but went to Lincoln

After his graduation he took an internship with Goldman Sachs, primarily an investment bank and worked there from 2001to 2004 as an analyst At the time he left the job to join the C h i l d r e n ’s I n v e s t m e n t F u n d M a n a g e m e n t (tCI) and became a partner in the company in S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 6 a n d m o v e d t o a n o t h e r f u n d firm theleme Partners in 2009 and served as a d i r e c t o r o f i n v e s t m e n t f i r m C a t a m a r a n Ve n t u r e o w n e d b y h i s f a t h e r i n l a w w i t h w h o s e daughter Akshata Murthy, a fashion designer, he was married in the year 2009 his father in law N R Narayan Murthy and mother in law Sudha Murthy were an Indian billionaire busi n e s s i c o n a n d h e l d m a n y h o u s e s a n d p r o p e r t i e s i n s e v e r a l parts of England itself his political career began in October 2014 when he was selected as a Conservative can didate for Richmond (Yorkshire) and de feated Wendy Morton, As the seat was one of the safest seats of the party and had been held by the party for the last hundred years, he was sure about the victory

All these things taken tog ether have brought the countr y’s economic future to the verg e of decline for a long time to come It has created a social as well as environmental challeng e where developing a coherent/forward-looking policy has become difficult and a fear of industrial and technological recession is looming larg e .

In the same year he was made head of the Black and Minority Ethnic (BME), a re search unit of a centre right think tank and also prepared a report in co writing on BME com munities in the UK A year later in 2015 he was elected a Member of Parliament (MP), for the constituency in the general elections with a majority of 19,550 and served as a member of the Environment Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee between 2015 2017 On major issues like UK s leaving or remaining in the Brexit, a European Union in June 2016 Sunak supported England’s exit from the organization but at the same time also suggested to establish free ports and advocated the creation of a retail bond mar ket for small and medium sized enterprises by writing a report in the same year his political fortune moved further and he was re elected in 2017 general election for the second term with an increased vote of 23,108 and served as parlia mentary under secretary of state for local gov ernment from January 2018 to July 2019

In the same year Rishi Sunak supported Boris Johnson as Conservative Party candidate for its leadership and also wrote an article with others in The Times to advocate the campaign in Johnson s favour Boris Johnson appointed Sunak as chief secretary to the treasury on July 24,2019 to serve under chancellor Sajid Javid

Now, with the continued jump in Rishi Sunak’s political career many began to view him as a rising star of British politics as he was again promoted Chancellor of the Exchequer on 13 February and remained on the post till July 2022 when he resigned from the post to stand up as a candidate for the party’s leadership election to replace Boris Johnson but lost the members’ vote to Liz truss, who resigned in October 2022 and paved the way for Sunak to become the Prime Minister of the country unopposed on 25 October 2022 however the timing of Rishi Sunak’s pre miership of the United Kingdom is more an occasion of challenge than of rejoicing as the country is facing an unprecedented set of economic shocks and waves combined, which are capable of threatening the basis of UK s daily life and prosperity on a large scale in the whole na tion the impacts of covid 19 and Brexit are becoming heavy and proving costly in spheres of the job cre ating and export earn ing sectors of the economy In addition the old model busi nesses require techno logical change in unpredictable ways, re sulting in low produc tivity growth and regional inequality All these things taken together have brought the country’s economic future to the verge of decline for a long time to come It has created a social as well as en vironmental challenge where developing a coher ent/forward looking policy has become difficult and a fear of industrial and technological reces sion is looming large At the juncture, policy mak ers need a clear cut plan to tackle the disruption by adopting a three prong policy 1 Kickstarting and sustaining a return to growth and prosperity, 2 Levelling up productivity, income and oppor tunity, and 3 Addressing the challenges of net zero carbon emissions by 2050 by establishing a clean industry In other words, a new vision is the need of the hour to handle the whole situation

The writer is presently Professor of Political Science Dean of Social Sciences and Dean Stu dent s Welfare (DSW) at B N Mandal Univer sity, Madhepura (Bihar), India His 22 books published in addition to 900 articles in national and international journals and daily newspapers from 25 foreign countries

With respect to education the approach should comprise the history political science, economy, social structure, innovation, and anthropology of the areas concerned Besides, the government should engage the youth in paid internship focussing on skill oriented programmes, such as learning languages, computer software, traffic rules, entrepreneurship, rational thinking and digital economy Lastly, erstwhile Fata and Afghanistan share a border People who reside on either side of the Durand Line are closely connected economically Six of the eight trade routes that connect Pakistan and Afghanistan go via erstwhile Fata these are Angoor Adda Ghulam Khan Kharlachi Khyber Pass, Nawa Pass and Gursal As a separate province, erstwhile Fata has enormous potential for transit trade earnings But a rise in militancy and fear affect trade and economy badly

For the young in such areas, joining the militant groups is the easy way out in the face of lack of development in the region there are hardly any social services and virtually no employment or entrepre neurship opportunities despite the fact that the territory has vast potential for development, particularly in mineral and tourism sectors For immediate and long term peace and development in the region a sustained dialogue with the stakeholders is essential to peace and development in the region

TUFAIL DAWAR ISLAMABAD

Ad Hoc Posts

t h E government of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) recently announced its intention to appoint subject specialists in BPS 17 in its education department on an ad hoc basis however, past experience shows that whenever the AJK Public Service Commission tries to conduct exams for filling the said posts, some people take the matter to the court and disrupt the whole process the relevant authorities should conduct the exams before history repeates itself yet again

KHATEEB KHAN KOTLI, AJK

School parking

t W O prestigious schools are situated on the main road of Qasimabad in hyderabad beside each other the commute of most of the students attending these two schools is managed by private cars Due to the lack of a proper parking space, parents stop and park their cars as per their convenience It is only natural that this creates bottlenecks on the road the situation gets worse at the schools’ closing time when most parents come early and park their vehicles on both sides of the main road, leaving only the middle lane for the entire traffic to make use of the people of Qasimabad face this problem on a daily basis Other drivers cross the road slowly in order to avoid any accident Due to this, the route becomes obstructed and traffic jams last hours Despite maintaining excellent standards and charging high fee, both these institutions are unable to address the parking problem the area deputy commissioner should get in otuch with the administrations of the two schools and get the matter resolved

TALAT AZIZ HYDERABAD

Wahi Pandhi

t h E R E seems to be no ease in the sufferings of the people of Wahi Pandhi who have been awaiting relief since the recent floods devastated their area Currently, there is only one functional hospital and it has the services of just one physician who has been attending to hundreds of patients every day Wahi Pandhi needs medical camps on a war footing since malaria is spreading quickly the government should mobilise resources urgently to set up medical camps in the area

RIAZ AHMED WAHI PANDHI

FO L L O W I N G the resignation of Liz truss amid the crisis in UK government on 25 October 2022, Rishi Sunak, a British politician, who remained Chan cellor of the Exchequer in the govern ment of Boris Johnson from 2020 to 2022, was elected unopposed to succeed to the chair of British Prime Minister when he accepted the in vitation of King Charles III to form the new ad ministration in the country

DR RAjKuMAR SINgh

M I 5 ’ s w a r a g a I n s T B r I T I s h

I n T e l l e C T u a l s a n d a r T I s T s

uS R i c h a R d J E va n s

wh E n some of the people blacklisted dur ing the McCarthy era left the United States to find work in the United King dom they might have thought they had left their troubles behind them But they were wrong the FBI passed its files on to MI5, the British Security Service which seems to have accepted the bureau’s judgments without question the theater and movie director Joseph Losey was a case in point openly a man of the left he was fingered in hollywood after the war as a possible Soviet agent “I was offered a film called I Married a Communist, which I turned down categorically ” Losey reported “I later learned that it was a touchstone for establishing who was a red : you offered I Married a Communist to anybody you thought was a Communist and if they turned it down, they were ” (the film was eventually made as the Woman on Pier 13 by the British born director robert Stevenson who went on to direct Mary Poppins ) Even tually named as a member of the Communist Party, Losey found it almost impossible to obtain employment in the US and settled in Britain in 1953

MI5 was on his case in a flash he was, the Secu rity Service asserted, associating with communists in Britain too Losey mixes with the usual Bohemian set of the film and theatre world, which includes many left wing supporters,” MI5 told the Ministry of Labour, which supervised aliens (non British citizens) look ing for work Losey, the report added, was “very short of money ” But he had done nothing to provide a pre text for deportation and he was protected by his 1956 marriage to an Englishwoman When Losey visited the US Embassy in London, he confessed to his past mem bership in the Communist Party which he said he had given up Losey went on to work with the British play wright harold Pinter on a string of movies that became i n s t a n t c l a s s i c s i n c l u d i n g t h e S e r v a n t t h e G o B e tween, and accident

TELLING IT LIKE IT IS: the actor Sam Wanamaker was another american who came under the surveillance of MI5, which noted that he had been involved with in dividuals mentioned by the house Un american activ ities Committee his conversations, it was reported, had “a distinct Communist bias,” and he was an associate of the actor James robertson Justice with his Communist views” (Justice had fought for the republicans in the Spanish Civil War and later appeared in the Guns of navarone) But Wanamaker stayed in the UK despite MI5’s suspicions and later successfully campaigned for the re creation of the Globe theatre in London near its original location, which produced Shakespeare s plays in an authentic Elizabethan setting, earning him an hon orary degree from the University of London and an hon orary CBE from the queen the Security Service also kept a file on Paul robe son, the Black singer and actor who played othello to Peggy ashcroft s Desdemona at the Savoy theatre in 1930 robeson lived in Britain for much of the 1930s and attracted MI5’s attention by championing a variety of left wing causes he is rather strongly anti white, a r e p o r t f r o m 1 9 4 3 c o m p l a i n e d “ a n d s l i g h t l y a n t i British as the result of a social insult sustained at the Savoy hotel in London he is a crank on the colour q u e s t i o n ” r o b e s o n r e t u r n e d t o t h e U n i t e d S t a t e s i n 1939 and inevitably fell afoul of the State Department, which denied him a passport after the war and contin ued to do so until 1958 preventing him from leaving the country

MI5 s files, released for public scrutiny piecemeal over the past few years though in many cases with the names of the informers redacted provide many other examples of people placed under surveillance because of their (real or alleged) communist views and associ ations the veteran historian, novelist, and playwright David Caute has gone through them in detail and pro duced a book red List: MI5 and British Intellectuals in the twentieth Century, that summarizes their con tents person by person although it reads a little like a catalog or a biographical dictionary with too much triv

ial detail and too little analysis, the book provides a wealth of information about left wing British intellec tuals and artists in the postwar era Some are more or less unknown, but a good number are quite famous, in cluding the oscar nominated actor Michael redgrave ( very active on the left ) and the composer Benjamin Britten (“a pacifist for many years”)

Customs

which

not contain

i n g t h e C o m m u n i s t P a r t y a l o n g w i t h s e v e r a l o t h e r M a r x i s t historians with the notable exception of Eric hobs bawm, whose seventh and last file in the MI5 collec tion still hasn’t been released hobsbawm, whose six other files I read when re s e a r c h i n g m y b i o g r a p h y, E r i c h o b s b a w m : a L i f e i n history was also under suspicion MI5 stepped up its surveillance and for a time even opened his mail, turn i n g u p n o t h i n g m o r e c o m p r o m i s i n g , h o w e v e r, t h a n love letters from his married French girlfriend in Paris t h e S e c u r i t y S e r v i c e w a s e s p e c i a l l y s u s p i c i o u s o f h o b s b a w m b e c a u s e h e s e e m e d r a t h e r f o r e i g n ( h i s mother was austrian and he maintained contacts with h i s t o r i a n s o n t h e C o n t i n e n t , i n c l u d i n g i n E a s t G e r many) an agent listening in on one of his lectures was u n a b l e t o f i n d a n y t h i n g m o r e i n c r i m i n a t i n g t h a n t h e fact that it was “really interesting ” MI5 became ex c i t e d w h e n i t l e a r n e d t h a t h o b s b a w m h a d v i s i t e d Spain at the time still under the dictatorship of Fran cisco Franco, only to discover that he had been there as a reporter for the new Statesman MI5 also kept files on E P thompson the author of the 1963 classic the Making of the English Working Class, who was found to be “in contact with known communists on one occasion it confused him with E a thompson, the historian of late antiquity, describ ing E P , somewhat implausibly, as the author of a scholarly work on attila and the huns on opening his letters, the agents must have been somewhat discon certed to discover that many were essay length disqui sitions thompson being as usual totally unable to restrain his verbal exuberance Particularly dubious in the eyes of the Security Service were his relations with anti colonial campaigners like Cheddi Jagan, later the prime minister of British Guyana Some aliens have stayed with thoMPSon from time to time,” an agent reported in 1958, but the service was unable to identify these suspicious foreigners any further the Security Service also took an interest in poets a n d w r i t e r s , i n c l u d i n g C e c i l D a y L e w i s ( n o w a d a y s better known as the father of Daniel Day Lewis), de scribed as being of “not altogether smart appearance in dress (MI5 officers took a dim view of any subject w h o , a s t h e y n o t e d o f h o b s b a w m , “ d r e s s e s i n a slovenly way ”) Day Lewis became Britain’s poet lau reate, a royal appointment, not long before his death in 1972 MI5 opened a file on another poet Stephen Spender, who was refused a visa to go to harvard in 1949, though the decision was reversed after protests in the press Spender had briefly been a member of the Communist Party in the 1930s, which he’d joined after being repelled by the nazi regime during a visit to Ger m a n y h o w e v e r h e w a s s o o n p u t o ff b y t h e p a r t y ’s treatment of the arts as no more than instruments of p o l i t i c a l i n d o c t r i n a t i o n , a n d h e w a s d i s m a y e d b y a leading communist harry Pollitt who Spender com plained, “whenever I met him would say: ‘Why don’t you write songs for the workers, as Byron, Shelley and Wordsworth did?’”

Part of the trouble, for Spender and many of his peers, was that the Communist Party of Great Britain never really accepted the intellectuals into its ranks: t h e p a r t y r e m a i n e d d o m i n a t e d b y “ d o n k e y j a c k etism,” or veneration for manual laborers, whose char a c t e r i s t i c c l o t h i n g w a s a d o n k e y j a c k e t ( a d a r k b l u e overcoat with black leather shoulder pads) yet even if the party often rejected its intellectuals, MI5 treated them as in need of constant surveillance Spender was m o n i t o r e d e v e n a f t e r c o n t r i b u t i n g t o t h e G o d t h a t Failed, a 1949 collection of essays by ex communists, i n c l u d i n g a n d r é G i d e , I g n a z i o S i l o n e , a n d a r t h u r Koestler MI5 agents recorded everything including t h e e n t i r e l y i n c o n s e q u e n t i a l : a r e p o r t o n S p e n d e r dated September 27, 1951, for example, noted that the a g e n t s h a d s e e n “ a n o d d c r e a t u r e ” l e a v i n g h i s b a s e m e n t a p a r t m e n t i n L o n d o n b e t w e e n 1 a n d 2 a m , dressed in white overalls they cannot say whether the odd creature is a man or a woman ”

Spender belonged to a group of poets and novelists whose members included Christopher Isherwood, the author of the short novels Mr norris Changes trains and Goodbye to Berlin; the novels’ atmospheric depic tion of Berlin decadence on the eve of the nazi seizure of power later formed the basis for the successful mu sical Cabaret Isherwood wasn’t a communist, but he was “a member of the anti War Movement in the 1930s as one agent noted During Isherwood s inter views in 1951 with the FBI in California, where he lived, he handed the agents a list of contacts that in cluded Spender as well as the novelist E M Forster and the poet W h auden a document that was duly for warded to MI5

Isherwood also pointed MI5 to anthony Blunt an art historian who later became surveyor of the queen’s pictures, in charge of the great collection kept at Buck ingham Palace and other royal residences Blunt really was a Soviet spy, unmasked many years later, but on this occasion he got away with it, partly by naming names himself one of them was David Footman a for mer agent with MI6, or the Secret Intelligence Service, who, when I was a grad student at St antony’s College, oxford served as the college librarian Footman had the reputation of being a recruiter for the British secret services, and I spent three years waiting for an ap proach but alas none ever came

What all these men had in common was that they knew Guy Burgess, who worked at the Foreign office Like many of them Burgess was homosexual and they knew one another through the clandestine gay subculture within the London establishment When Burgess was fi nally revealed, together with Donald Maclean, as a So viet agent, MI5 suffered “a panic attack of extended surveillance and involuntary interviews,” as Caute puts it It even placed a phone tap on the apolitical author and literary editor Cyril Connolly, “a member of a circle which included Soviet agents Burgess and Maclean,” predictably without result

What all of these cases reveal, as well as those of many lesser known British intellectuals, is above all the futility and stupidity of the secret services, along w i t h t h e i r s o c i a l s n o b b e r y a n d r a c i a l p r e j u d i c e s a c a s e i n p o i n t w a s G e o rg e o r w e l l , w h o i n t h e m i d 1930s was said to be conducting Communist activi ties” because he was meeting with “undesirables” and was published by Victor Gollancz, “a firm which spe cializes in Left Wing literature In fact, the undesir a b l e s ” i n q u e s t i o n w e r e u n e m p l o y e d p e o p l e i n t h e industrial north of England, whom orwell was inter viewing for his 1937 book the road to Wigan Pier M I 5 d e s c r i b e d o r w e l l ’s a n t i c o l o n i a l i s t o p i n i o n s which derived from his early experiences in the colo n i a l I n d i a n p o l i c e s e r v i c e , a s a d v a n c e d c o m m u n i s t v i e w s ” h e r e w a s a n o t h e r i n t e l l e c t u a l w h o a r o u s e d suspicion because “he dresses in a bohemian fashion both at his office and in his leisure hours yet an officer who took the trouble to read orwell’s

books condescendingly dismissed these reports as writ ten by someone who was a good Sergeant rather at a loss ” “orwell does not hold with the Communist Party nor they with him,” the officer wrote this bet ter read agent was not wrong: animal Farm and nine teen Eighty Four were devastating critiques of Stalinist totalitarianism, and orwell would happily volunteer his services to those monitoring communists and their sus pected sympathizers not long before his death he sub mitted to a secret department of the Foreign office dedicated to anti communist propaganda a list of peo ple he thought unsuited to work for it because they were too sympathetic to Stalinism these more than 35 “cryptos” included not only Spender (“sentimental sympathizer tendency towards homosexuality ) robeson (“very anti white”), and Cecil Day Lewis, but also the historians E h Carr, Isaac Deutscher, the nov elist J B Priestley the nobel Prize winning scientist Patrick Blackett, the actor and film director orson Welles, the journalist (and future leader of the Labour Party) Michael Foot and scores more

m

M

h

u n t s o f t i m e and resources pursuing these essentially harmless in tellectuals it ignored the real traitors in the British es tablishment, men like the Cambridge Five (Burgess, Maclean, Blunt, Kim Philby, and John Cairncross) and the betrayer of Britain s nuclear arms secrets Klaus Fuchs, whose activities were revealed by a partnership b e t w e e n t h

U S a r m y ’s S i g n a l I n t e l l i g e n c e S e r v i c e and GChQ the agency charged with radio traffic sur v e i l l a n c e , n o t M I 5 L i k e s o m a n y M I 5 o ff i c e r s , t h e Cambridge Five had been educated at prestigious pri vate schools spoke with cut glass accents and (with the exception of Burgess) behaved like proper English gentlemen they didn’t in the end do a huge amount of damage except perhaps to Britain s secret services themselves Caute dismisses them as “material for the ongoing explosion of spy books popular among adults with the hearts of boys

Many years ago, the historian hugh trevor roper, who served in MI5 during the war, penned a biting cri tique of the Security Service he described the agents as of “very limited intelligence by and large pretty stupid, some of them very stupid ” MI5 was full of “metropoli tan young gentlemen whose education had been expen sive rather than profound and who were recruited at the bars of White’s and Boodles” two conservative gentle men s clubs in London they wore pin striped suits and club ties and were suspicious of ideas, insofar as they had heard of them at all In an odd way, their anti intel lectualism was a mirror image of the anti intellectualism of the Communist Party the many other officers who had begun their careers in the Colonial Service were even more blinkered the use of racist language was common; one senior agent reported in 1950 his belief after a visit to West africa, “that the West african natives are wholly unfitted for self rule the Security Service was obsessed with communist “subversion” while at least until the outbreak of World War II, viewing fascist and nazi sympathizers like Sir oswald Mosley (a hered itary baronet) with an indulgent eye as for the intellectuals, MI5’s suspicions on the whole did little to damage their careers, except perhaps for limiting their ability to broadcast on the BBC an in stitution over which, this book shows, MI5 had a sur prising degree of influence More harm perhaps was done to the careers of the 1 420 junior civil servants identified as “subversive” by the thatcher government in 1985 on the basis of information supplied by MI5 Most of them were alleged trotskyists or communists though there were also a few Scottish nationalists and “black or asian racial extremists ” they were denied promotions and carefully monitored in their work Po litically, MI5 was firmly on the side of the Conservative Party; Labour politicians were suspect to its agents, es pecially if they were on the party s left the Security Service even kept a file on harold Wilson, the prime minister from 1964 to ‘70 and 1974 to ‘76, though it has never been released MI5 s manifest incompetence makes it hard to take these activities very seriously, but the culture wars that it carried on behind the scenes were a feature of British conservatism s tendency to regard left wingers as potential “enemies of the people” one that has persisted to the present day

The curse of ‘green’ energy

Justin

o n c o u n t r i e s w h o s e p o l i t i c a l v i e w s a r e i n i m i c a l t o o u r o w n ” In case the trudeau government hasn t noticed what Germany and Europe need right now to get through the winter is natural gas a fossil fuel, al beit the cleanest burning one when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions

irony is that even countries that are

wind and solar

need natural

gas to back up the unreliable and intermit tent energy that wind and solar power pro vide that’s because they don’t work when the wind isn’t blowing and the sun isn’t shining and we don t yet have batteries powerful enough to store energy at the lev els needed for modern industrialized states F r e e l a n d s a i d i n h e r s p e e c h t h a t t h e

“curse of oil” is that many of the world’s l i b e r a l d e m o c r a c i e s a r e d e p e n d e n t o n petro tyrants like Putin In the real world, the curse of wind and solar power is now happening in countries that forfeited their e n e rg y s e c u r i t y i n p u r s u i t o f t h e m J u s t ask Germany

H E B R I T I S H S E C U R I T Y S E R V I C E ’ S F U T I L E

E CO R D O F H A R A S S M E N T A N D S U R V E I L L A N C E

Pakistan

help of Thai Ministry of

Fe D e R A l Minister for Cli mate Change, Senator Sherry Rehman, said that Pakistan is gearing up to make the case for climate justice at the up coming multilateral climate forum COP27 in egypt

Minister Rehman said, “We are in the 20th nightmarish week of longest relief phase in Pakistan’s history As of now, 1,731 people have lost their lives and more than 12 000 are injured The government has dispersed PKR 66 6 billion to more than 2 6 million people from the affected populations via our BISP program The flood has redefined all priorities for us and it has made cli mate induced catastrophes a reality Pakistan has raised its case at every in ternational forum highlighting that what’s happening in Pakistan will not stay in Pakistan, and we plan to do the

Sharjeel

same at COP27 ”

Speaking at a briefing at the Min istry of Climate Change about the COP27, she said, “Prime Minister She hbaz Sharif will address the head of states during the World leaders Sum mit, and he will also co chair a high level roundtable with the Prime Minister of Norway on the theme of “Climate Change and the sustainability of vulnerable communities The Prime Minister will also have bilateral engagements with other head of states and ministers Pakistan s Pavilion will host 25 side events and panel discus sions including screening of videos showcasing Pakistan’s vulnerability to Climate Change & the recent cata strophic floods

She continued, “COP is a discus sion forum where long term deals and discussions related to climate change happen, mainly negotiations on coun tries NDCs Pakistan’s delegation will be attending the key committees at

COP27 such as Committee on the Bu reau of the COP, CMP and CMA, Committee on the Clean Development Mechanism, Standing Committee on Finance, Committee on Adaptation Fund, Consultative Group of experts, Technology executive Committee, Warsaw International Mechanism for loss and Damage and the Committee to Facilitate implementation of the Paris Agreement The delegation will highlight and advocate the unique vul nerability of low emitting nations at these committees

Talking about the search for cli mate justice, she said, “This current cli mate system has failed the Global South since 2009 even during the last COP in Glasgow there was a deep re gret over the unmet goal of US$100bn per year The developed countries of the Global North who have the biggest share in carbon emissions, are ignoring the ongoing problem of Climate Fi nance and loss and Damage, and we

hope there is no sidelining of these pressing matters at COP27 We have repeatedly made a case for enhancing climate funding The US$100bn bill has never been paid, nor has the Adap tation Fund been capitalized”

She continued, “With the support of other developing countries, Pakistan will seek to put the creation of a loss and Damage Finance Facility on the agenda Pakistan has fought for loss and Damage to be added to the provi sional agenda of COP27 This has hap pened for the first time in COP s history, and credit is to Pakistan’s ex tensive diplomacy Begging bowl diplomacy must stop and in turn must transform into a funding window, where affected countries can access funds for humanitarian response, reha bilitation, and recovery Humanitarian appeals happen but they are under funded Relief and assistance for cli mate disasters should not hinge on other country’s mercy and pity

HBL par tners with NIFT ePay to accelerate digital payments in Pakistan

Sindh Minister for Information, Transport and Mass Transit Sharjeel Inam Memon has anounced to launch peoples bus service mobil application and activate ITS in all buses from November 30 The minister made this announcement after chairing an important meeting regarding people's bus service at his office on Thursday Proj ect Director NRTC Sohaib Shafiq and Managing Director Sindh Mass Transit Authority Cap ( R ) Altaf Hussain Sario attended the meeting In the meeting,provincial minister was briefed on the operations of People s Bus Service new routes, ITS system and estab lishment of command and con trol room On this occasion, Provincial Transport Minister

Sharjeel Inam Memon an nounced the launch of mobile application of People's Bus Service and activation of ITS system for the convenience of citizens The minister said that the mobile app will facilitate citizens to track the bus service in real time and make payments online while CCTV cameras screens, live tracking and mon itoring facilities will be acti vated with the installation of

BankIslami marks 194pc growth in operating profits

Karachi: BankIslami Pakistan Limited (‘the Bank’ or ‘BankIslami’) announced its financial results for the quarter ended September 30 2022 For nine months BankIslami closed operating profits before provision at Rs 7 79 Bn, 194% higher than same period last year The growth in profitability was achieved primarily due to increase in volumes and yields of earning assets while growth in non funded income also played pivotal role in improving the profitability Given the current economic scenario, as a precautionary measure, the Bank recorded additional general provision of Rs 1 65 Bn during the nine months, to close the total provision pr

NdcTech wins Best Sales Par tner Award

Karachi: NdcTech,

and

global

the

partner of Temenos has recently won the Best Sales Partner Award at Temenos MEA Annual Sales and Partner Summit 2022 owing to its exceptional sales capabilities The best sales partner award recognizes NdcTech’s strong footprint in the MEA region and ability to penetrate into new markets and geographies, while providing value added services to Banks & Financial institutions in the region Due to NdcTech s rich experience of over 22 years of transforming the banking sector and in depth expertise, the company is currently serving over 115 clients in Middle East, Africa, & APAC region On this occasion, Ammara Masood, CEO, NdcTech said: “We are thrilled to be recognized as the best sales partner among other regional and global partners of Temenos pr

ITS in the buses He said that the command and control room of People's Bus Service is being established in the office of Sindh Mass Transit Authority Sharjeel Inam Memon said that People's Bus Service mobile app and ITS system will be ac tivated from November 30 and added that they were endeav ouring to provide maximum facilities to the citizens under the People's Bus Service

Lucky Cement announces PKR6.93b earnings for Q1-2022

Karachi: On a consolidated basis, Lucky Cement Limited has reported a profit after tax of PKR 6 9 billion, for Q1 FY23, of which PKR 1 5 billion is attributed to non controlling interests The resultant earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter comes out to PKR 16 85 Moreover, on a consolidated basis, the Company attained a gross revenue of PKR 107 2 billion which is 54 8% higher than the revenue for the Same Period Last Year (SPLY), PKR 69 3 billion Meanwhile, during the quarter under review, the consolidated net profit (attributable to owners of the holding company) decreased 18 1% as compared to the SPLY pr

Standard Char tered repor ts record profit in Q3-2022

Karachi: Standard Chartered Bank Pakistan Limited (SCBPL) delivers record profit before tax of PKR 36 4 billion, registering an increase of 98 per cent year on year Performance was driven by strong income growth, as well as continued cost and risk discipline Overall revenue grew by 70 per cent to deliver a top line of PKR 45 1 billion, with positive contributions from all segments Despite a high inflationary environment and continuous investments in our infrastructure, operating expenses continue to be well managed through efficiencies and disciplined spending with an increase of 12 per cent from the same period last year Moreover, reversal of Covid 19 general provision, coupled with lower impairments and strong recoveries led to a net release of PKR 1 5 billion during the period against a net release of PKR 0 8 billion in loan impairments in the comparative period pr

Karachi: HBL and NIFT ePay have joined hands to accelerate digital payments in Pakistan Through this partnership, HBL customers will enjoy the benefits of making digital payments to more than 400 NIFT ePay partner institutions and merchants using their HBL bank accounts Similarly, the customers of other NIFT ePay partner banks will be able to make Digital Payments to HBL merchants thus creating an expanded enabling environment

This initiative will contribute substantially towards the uptake of digital payments in Pakistan and enable people to perform secure online purchases using their bank accounts It will expand the pool of pre paid customers for merchants, creating a win win scenario for everyone pr

Indus Motor sales, profit decline in Q1- F Y2023

Indus Motor Company Limited (IMC), announced its financial results for the first quarter ended September 30 2022, witnessing a massive decline in profit after tax by 76% to Rs 1 30 billion, as against Rs 5 42 billion achieved in the corresponding quarter last year The decline in net profit was mainly due to lower CKD and CBU sales volume and increase in input costs mainly on account of severe PKR devaluation against US Dollar, which is partially off set by an increase in other income due to higher fund size and higher interest rates During the quarter, the Company s combined sales of Completely Knocked Down (CKD) and Completely Built Unit (CBU) vehicles decreased by 52% to 8,994 units as against 18,855 units sold in the same quarter last year

The Company produced 9,218 vehicles, 45% lower, as compared to 16,896 units produced in the same quarter last year The decline in production was mainly owing to limited imports of CKD kits as allowed by State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), forcing the company to observe regular plant shutdown during the quarte pr

FFC unveils Q3-FY 2022 results

Fauji Fertilizer Company Limited (FFC) has announced its financial results for the period ended September 30, 2022 in its Board of Directors’ meeting held on October 26, 2022 Company’s Sona urea production of 1,808 thousand tonnes was 3% lower than last year mainly due to higher maintenance shutdown of plants during the period Higher import prices of DAP resulted in contraction of DAP market thus the agriculture sector switched to urea Urea demand in the Country thus increased as compared to last year The increase in demand was met through higher production by RLNG based plants besides imports by the Government, which increased the competition in the industry However, concerted marketing efforts enabled Sona urea sale by the Company of 1,795 thousand tonnes which was only 1% lower than last year pr

Japanese Ambassador

Pakistan

BErN SWiTZErLaND: Federal Minister for Communications Asad Mehmood and DG Pakistan Post Rana Hassan Akhtar met Mr Nattapon Natthasomboon, Deputy Permanent Secretary Ministry of Digital Economy and Society, Thailand at UPU Head Quarters in Bern, Switzerland

A fruitful interaction revolved around policy exchange and mutual business collaboration between Pakistan and Thai Postal Network Nattapon Natthasomboon Deputy Permanent Secretary Ministry of Digital Economy and Society, Thailand showed his concern about the recent devastations made by floods in Pakistan and expressed solidarity with Pakistan Post He appreciated the efforts of Pakistan Post for digitizing the postal operations and assured to maintain cordial relations with Pakistan Post The Federal Minister urged upon mutual cooperation to bring

launch mobile app, ac tivates ITS in People's Bus Ser vice from Nov 30

Karach:

X i s ay s C h i n a , U s m U s t ‘ f i n d w ay s t o g et a lo n g ’

BeiJiNg Ag e n c i e s

PRESIDENT Xi Jinping said China and the United States must “find ways to get along to safeguard world peace and development, state media reported Thursday, as he embarks on his precedent breaking third term in power China and the United States have butted heads in recent years on issues ranging from Beijing’s aggression towards self governing Taiwan to its crackdown in Hong Kong and alleged rights abuses in Xinjiang

Washington has also accused Beijing of providing diplomatic cover for Russia’s in vasion of Ukraine

Xi sealed another five years as China’s leader at the end of a twice a decade Com munist Party Congress on Sunday

“The world today is neither peaceful nor tranquil,” Xi wrote in a congratulatory letter to the National Committee on US China Re lations some of his first remarks since the Congress according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV

“As major powers strengthening com munication and cooperation between China and the US will help to increase global sta bility and certainty and promote world peace and development,” he reportedly told the New York based non profit organisation Xi added that China was “willing to work with the US to give mutual respect, co

exist peacefully (and) find ways to get along in the new era”, the broadcaster re ported

Doing so will not only be good for both countries, but also benefit the world”, Xi wrote T h e B i d e n a d m i n i s t r a t i o n s a i d t h i s month that China is the only competitor to the United States “with both the intent to r e s h a p e t h e i n t e r n a t i o n a l o r d e r a n d , i n

creasingly, the economic, diplomatic, mil itary and technological power to advance that objective”

China ready to work with Saudi Arabia for regional peace, stability: Wang Yi China is ready to step up communication and coordination with Saudi Arabia on hotspot issues in the Middle East and jointly safeguard regional peace and stability, Chi nese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Thursday

Wang, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee said China at taches great importance to the development of the China Saudi Arabia relationship and has always regarded Saudi Arabia as a pri ority in its Middle East diplomacy

Co hosting with Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud Wang made the remarks at the fourth meet ing of the Political and Diplomatic Sub com mittee of the China Saudi Arabia High level Joint Committee designed to guide and co ordinate bilateral cooperation China appreciates the Saudi side’s adher

italian coastguard rescues over 1,000 migrants

r OMe Ag e n c i e s

Italy s coastguard said it had rescued more than 1,000 migrants from two fishing boats in the Mediterranean overnight, while two bodies had been recovered The two complex operations off the coast of Syracuse in Sicily, involving boats from Libya, followed an alert on Tuesday from Alarm Phone, a group running a hotline for mi grants needing rescue From the first boat, about 35 miles from the Sicilian coast, an Italian coast guard ship rescued 416 migrants while a Spanish patrol vessel working with EU border force Fron tex rescued another 78 From a second fishing boat, 60 miles from the coast, vessels from the coastguard and Italy’s financial crime police inter vened to rescue 663 migrants and “two lifeless bodies were recovered, it said Italy s new Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni vowed on Tuesday to stop migrants crossing in boats from Africa, in her first speech to parliament since taking office at the weekend Meloni said her government the coun try’s most far right since World War II, wanted to stop illegal departures and break up human traf ficking” notably by preventing departures from crisis hit Libya She insisted it was time to stop traffickers being the ones who decide who gets in” Italy has long been on the migration frontline taking in tens of thousands of people who attempt the world s deadliest crossing yearly Two charity ships currently operating in the Mediterranean the SOS Humanity’s ship Humanity 1 and SOS Mediterranee s Ocean Viking, were on Tuesday carrying around 300 people between them after multiple rescues

ence to the one China principle and thanks the Saudi side for its longstanding and firm support on issues concerning China s core interests such as issues related to Xinjiang Taiwan, Hong Kong and human rights, Wang said China appreciates the Saudi side’s sup port for China’s Global Development Initia tives and welcomes its active participation

in the implementation of the initiatives, he said Wang said China also appreciates that the Saudi side pursues an independent and autonomous energy policy and makes active efforts to maintain the stability of the inter national energy market

China supports Saudi Arabia to play a greater role in international and regional af fairs, and is willing to strengthen communi

cation and collaboration with the Saudi side in the United Nations, BRICS, Shanghai Co operation Organization, G20 and other plat forms to practice multilateralism and safeguard international justice, he added Faisal congratulated on the successful convening of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China He said

, achieved fruitful cooperation results, con ducted close coordination and communica

common interests

The China Saudi Arabia High level Joint Committee has played an important role in promoting the development of Saudi Arabia China relations, he said

Saudi Arabia has always prioritized its

Faisal said Saudi Arabia appreciates China’s support for the just cause of the Arab people, its support for the establish ment of a weapons of mass destruction free zone in the Middle East and its initiative to establish a multilateral dialogue platform in the Gulf region

The Saudi side is willing to continuously promote the level of practical cooperation with China in political, economic and invest ment fields he added

US, Japan, S. Korea warn of ‘unparalleled ’ response if Nor th conduc ts nuclear test

AgeNcies

Washington and its allies believe North Korea could be about to resume nuclear bomb testing for the first time since 2017 “We agreed that an unparalleled scale

response would be necessary if North Korea pushes ahead with a seventh nuclear test, South Korean First Vice Foreign Minister Cho Hyun dong told a news con ference in Tokyo

Cho was speaking alongside his Japanese and US counterparts Vice Foreign Minister Takeo Mori and

The United States and its allies have offered few de tails on what new measures they might take, and ob servers say they have few good options for preventing a new test

For the first time since North Korea began testing nuclear weapons in 2006 China and Russia this year ve toed a US led push for additional United Nations Secu rity Council sanctions, and stepped up allied military drills have only been met by more North Korean tests and exercises

We urge (North Korea) to refrain from further provocations ” Sherman said calling them “reckless and deeply destabilising for the region Anything that happens here, such as a North Ko rean nuclear test has implications for the security of

the entire world,” she said, sending a thinly veiled mes sage to Pyongyang’s supporters, China and Russia, in the UN Security Council

“We hope indeed that everyone on the Security Council would understand that any use of a nuclear weapon will change the world in incredible ways When asked about the comments out of Tokyo Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin called on all the countries to acknowledge the root causes of the long standing impasse” and take steps to enhance mu tual trust and address the concerns of all parties in a bal anced manner

N orth K orea has been carrying out w eapons tes ts a t a n u n p r e c e d e n t e d p a c e t h i s y e a r, f i r i n g m o r e t h a n t w o d o z e n b a l l i s t i c m i s s i l e s , i n c l u d i n g o n e t h a t f l e w o v e r J a p a n

New YOrk

Ag e n c i e s

Closing in on his Twitter megadeal, Elon Musk said Thursday his goal is to enable healthy debate of ideas and counter the tendency of social media to splinter into partisan “echo chambers ”

The billionaire entrepreneur pursued the deal be cause it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner, without re sorting to violence,” Musk tweeted on the eve of a court

imposed deadline to finalize the $44 billion purchase

The Tesla boss’s on again, off again acquisition of the influential website appeared to be entering its final phase after Delaware Judge Kathaleen McCormick paused litigation on October 6 on a Twitter suit against Musk after he previously walked away from the deal

Since then Musk has reportedly been lining up fi nancing While there is always the chance of a last minute curveball, more signs pointed to the deal s likely closure The New York Stock Exchange posted a pend ing order to suspend trading in Twitter before Friday’s session Shares of Twitter which vaulted higher after

McCormick’s October 6 move climbed 1 2 percent to $53 97 by 1500 GMT Thursday, not far below the $54 20 purchase price in Musk s deal

“We expect Musk and Twitter to officially close the deal by Friday morning with Cinderella finally getting the glass slipper that fits, said Wedbush analyst Dan Ives “We also believe the overhang on Tesla is now re moved with Musk having likely sold stock this week to fund the rest of the Twitter deal I think on Friday, we’ll get an announcement that says that Elon Musk has purchased Twitter,” University of California, Berkeley law professor Adam Badawi told AFP

British lawmakers, youth leaders disc uss K ashmir issue; pass resolution

LONDON Ag e n c i e s

Call for end to illegal Indian occupation of Kashmir reverberated during week long events to mark 75th year of Indian occupa tion of Kashmir held across Europe and the UK by Kashmiri and Pakistani diaspora and their allies

As part of the campaign to allow Kash miris in IIoJK to decide their future accord ing to UN resolutions through a free and fair plebiscite, a conference was held in British Parliament on Kashmir black day chaired by Afzal Khan, British lawmaker, and organ ised by Fahim Kayani, leader of Tehreek e Kashmir UK

The conference saw an encouraging par ticipation of the UK lawmakers including Sarah Owen MP, Rachel Hopkins MP, Paul Bristow MP, Paul Blomfield MP, Kate Hollern MP, James Daly MP, Tahir Ali MP, Liam Byrne MP and Lord Qurban Hussain, among others

Youth leaders from various British uni versities and organizations, including those from IIoJK, attended the conference and

urged the UN to intervene and allow Kash miris to use their vote in the plebiscite

Drawing attention of the UK govern ment, the British lawmakers agreed that non resolution of Kashmir dispute can trigger a nuclear war between India and Pakistan that will affect far beyond region

The Kashmir issue is not a territorial dis pute between India and Pakistan it is a mat ter of right of self determination of millions of Kashmiris This right is not only denied by India but demanding this fundamental right granted by the UN has become crime in IIoJK

Visiting Pakistani journalist, Zafar Mah mood Malik, who edits News International, drew a bleak picture of how India has muz zled media in IIoJK

“Indian fascist policies have made life of journalists a living hell as they are being tar geted for presenting the ground situation to international audiences which has resulted in reporters taking self care and avoiding come in the eye of brutal Indian state, he said

Khawajah Muhammad Suleiman Direc tor Kashmir Information Cell TeK UK; Re hana Ali, Information Secretary, TeK UK;

“The denial of right to self determina

tion is basic reason for every violation hap pening in IIoJK,” the speakers concluded Fahim Kayani, president of Tehreek e Kashmir UK read London resolution on Kashmir, demanding right to self determina tion for Kashmiris in IIoJK

The resolution expressed solidarity with the Kashmiri people suffering un precedented abuse of human rights and sup ported their struggle for a just cause which is right to self determination as enshrined

in various resolutions passed by the UN General Assembly and Security Council, from time to time We note with heavy heart the grave human rights situation in IIoJK, especially after August 2019 when India re annexed the UN designated dis puted territory and is engaged in military backed settler colonialism

This conference brings to the attention of international community to act fast against settler colonialism under which more than three million Indians, mostly non Mus lims, are being settled in IIoJK to artificially change demography of the UN designated disputed region which is blatant violation of Geneva Conventions,” the resolution said It called out the inaction by international community on two reports by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, released in 2018 and 2019 which “has given India a free hand to commit crimes against human ity and war crimes in Kashmir ”

“The regular reports by various interna tional human rights watchdogs have found little attention in the international media out lets The deficiency needs immediate atten tion and redress

Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman

Anushae Khan and Zain Haji from City Uni versity, Human rights activist Naila Azmat, Sabba Khan from City University London, Shareen Raja Human rights activists Gur charan Singh from Dal Khalsa UK, TeK leadership Ch Ikram ul Haq ,Ch Zahid Iqbal, Daud Shah Raja Abdul Qayoum Shukat Malik, Haris Kayani and representatives from IIoJK spoke on the occasion, stressing on need to end Indian occupation

Z i M b a b W E b E at Pa k i s ta n b y o n E r u n i n n a i l - b i t i n G t h r i l l E r

ZIMBABWE produced one of the all time World Cup upsets with a bril liant performance in Perth to beat Pakistan by one run in a match that went down to the very last delivery Pakistan needed 11 to win off the final over of a pulsating evening, and that equation came down to three from three with the well set Mohammad Nawaz at the crease

But 25 year old Brad Evans produced three stunning deliveries right when it mat tered First, he fizzed through a pacy bouncer that Nawaz failed to connect with And a miscue off the penultimate ball had Nawaz caught at mid off by captain Craig Ervine, a wicket that saw both batters sink to their knees with heartbreak again for Nawaz in the second successive match

Shaheen Shah Afridi punted the final ball down the ground tearing back in a des perate attempt for a second run to tie the match Wicket keeper Regis Chakabva fum bled the throw at first but recovered to whip off the bails with Afridi still short of his ground, sparking jubilant scenes among the Zimbabwe players and supporters

Pak

Pakistan had made a measured start to the chase of 131 to win, but two huge Pow erplay wickets gave Zimbabwe a sniff as the big name opening pair both went cheaply Babar Azam was squared up by a lovely piece of bowling from Brad Evans to be sent back for just four runs off nine balls And the outstanding Blessing Muzarabani cleaned up Mohammad Rizwan via an inside edge for 14 (16)

After Iftikhar Ahmed was also removed cheaply Pakistan seemingly got the match under control with a solid partnership be tween Shan Masood and Shadab Khan to reach 88/3 with six and a half overs still re maining

But the inspired Zimbabwe all rounder Sikandar Raza took two wickets in two balls to remove Shadab and Haider Ali, before having Masood stumped in his very next over to give Zimbabwe hope and set up a big finish

After opting to bat first, Zimbabwe got off to a flier as a daring Wessley Madhevere and skipper Craig Ervine played some eye catching shots inside the first two overs With five boundaries inside the first three overs Zimbabwe had a fabulous start racing

away at 10 runs per over

Some of that early momentum toned down when Ervine was sent back by Haris Rauf and his partner got trapped in front by Wasim in the following over Shadab Khan prized out Milton Shumba before Sean Williams and Sikandar Raza went about the resurrection work

Things turned south pretty quickly when Shadab sent back Williams and Chak abva off successive deliveries, the latter dis missed off a spectacular grab at first slip by Babar Azam

Shadab completed a brilliant spell of 4 0 23 3 but there was more in store for Zim babwe from the other end In the very next over after losing two wickets off back to back balls to Shadab, Zimbabwe lost a fur ther two as Mohammad Wasim dismissed Raza and Luke Jongwe off successive balls 95/3, and what appeared to be a solid start, quickly turned into 95/7 as Pakistan’s bowlers went on a rampage in Perth Even tually, they put up 130/8 on board with some help from Brad Evans down the order

It seemed unlikely to be enough, but a superb bowling display from Zimbabwe en sured otherwise

c an bounce from

defeat in

LAHORE s tA F F R e P o R t

Former Pakistan cricket captain Muham mad Hafeez said that Pakistan’s loss to India in the opener of the World T20 Cup is damaging for Pak players and ex pressed the hope they can bounce back provided play they play good and positive cricket in the rest of the mega event He said on Thursday that he wanted Pakistan s match against India to be a nail biter and he certainly got hid wish fulfilled

This fixture is always something special and people travel from all over the world to see it Whenever it happens, it brings a lot of joy to the fans and to see that atmosphere inside the MCG with over 90,000 spectators in the stadium, was special and the match itself gave them all something to remember

It was definitely one of the best T20 games we’ve seen in recent years I’ve never watched a game quite like it and I think this match has set the tone for the World Cup as a whole

The former all rounder said as an ex Pakistan cricketer, he was obviously dis appointed with the result but can only give credit to Virat Kohli What a special cricketer he is

“ He (Kohli) absorbed all the pressure when Pakistan were in control and condi tions were tough The way he handled it, particularly given the magnitude of this match and how it can wear you down, was unbelievable

“

I can relate it to Carlos Brathwaite’s four sixes against England in the 2016 final There’s no pressure quite like the last over of a World Cup final but this game comes close, so the way he man aged the game was incredible

‘Doesn’t get bigger than this’: Finch relishes England MCG showdown

SYDNEY A F P

Australia captain Aaron Finch said Thursday he could n’t wait to face England in a Twenty20 World Cup clash that is shaping up as a must win showdown for the Ashes rivals The cavernous Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) is set for another carnival atmosphere on Friday night after hosting more than 90,000 rau cous fans when India edged out Pakistan in a thriller on Sunday “It doesn’t get bigger than MCG with a full house with a lot on the line,” Finch told reporters, with the only dampener being the threat of rain which af fected both matches at the famous venue on Wednes day “It will be a great occasion and hopefully the weather clears up and we can have a great game Finch said Australia got their title defence back on track in Perth on Monday when they bounced back from their opening drubbing by New Zealand to ham mer Sri Lanka by seven wickets on the back of a 17 ball fifty from power hitting all rounder Marcus Stoinis Jos Buttler s England opened with a win against Afghanistan but were then shocked by Ireland on Wednesday in a rain hit Super 12 match “I think the group is wide open, absolutely, said Finch of Group 1 where all six teams are separated by just two points with three matches each to play “Any team can win on their day, that s the thing about T20, you can t take anything for granted in the game ”

Pressure of exPectation: Only the top two teams in the group will qualify for the semi finals

“Afghanistan, they are a really skilful, talented side Ireland have got the skills there Sri Lanka on their day can beat anyone as well It s a tough group

Cup

From a Pakistan point of view, we made mistakes but there are positives Shan [Masood] and Iftikhar [Ahmed] played superbly They have been waiting patiently for their opportunities and now they have grabbed them

We have had middle order problems but these two can play their shots and are technically solid, which will give the team and management confidence “The result could and should have gone in our favour and the players now have to pick themselves up They will have to sit down and talk it through with each other Nothing went badly wrong, we played a very good game on the whole but made mistakes at key stages I played in many Pakistan India matches and they are always very impactful whether you win or lose he asserted

“ As a player, you put so much into it it can either boost your confidence or it

could potentially break you “ This defeat will be damaging for the Pakistani players but I believe they can bounce back and play good, positive cricket for the rest of the tournament

The former Pak captain said Shaheen Afridi, for one, will improve as the World Cup goes on and I want to praise his will to feature in Australia “ A month ago, we were all thinking he may not be able to make it because of his injury so I’m very impressed to see him playing He’s not in full rhythm yet but he is giving his best for the team and he will get better “ U l t i m a t e l y, w e h a v e t o f o rg e t t h i s r e s u l t q u i c k l y a n d m o v e o n t o t h e n e x t g a m e We m u s t r e s p o n d w e l l a g a i n s t Z i m b a b w e a n d t h e N e t h e r l a n d s a n d w e w i l l a l s o h a v e t o b e a t S o u t h A f r i c a i n w h a t w i l l b e a m a s s i v e m a t c h i n t h i s g r o u p t h a t l o o k s l i k e t h e k e y o n e f o r u s n o w ”

Four Pakistani Pl ayEr to FEaturE in asian quash tEaM C’shiP

ISLAMABAD s tA F F R e P o R t

Four Pakistani players will feature in the 21st Asian Squash Team Championship for Men & Women to be held at Cheongju International Squash Stadium, Korea from October 31 to November 4 The Pak istan squash team would participate in the Men’s event only, said a press release issued here on Thursday The players include Hamza Khan Noor Zaman, Ahsan Ayaz and Farhan Mehboob Wg Cdr Ali Saud Hassan (manager), Zulfiqar Ali Khan (coach) and Chf Wrt Off Muhammad Boota (physi cal trainer) would also accompany the players A total of 12 Men teams were divided into two pools India Qatar Pakistan Kuwait Korea and Taipei were placed in Pool A whereas, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Japan, Iran, Philippines and Singapore are in Pool B Pakistan team would face Taipei in its first match, on October 31 and Korea in the second game in the evening session on the same day

Riding on an imperious batting

play by Rilee Rossouw and Quinton de Kock South Africa outplayed Bangladesh in their second match of the T20 World Cup in Sydney

In reply to South Africa’s mas sive total of 209 runs, Bangladesh tumbled for 101 in 16 3 overs and

the match by a huge margin of 104 runs

Bangladesh made a short and brisk start to their innings, as Soumya Sarkar scored 16 off just 6 balls But that was the only point in

the match when Bangladesh were hopeful about a comeback after con ceding more than 10 runs in a over while bowling UNB reports

In the third over of Bangladesh’s innings, both Soumya and Najmul Hossain Shanto were sent back by Anrich Nortje who eventually was the main reason behind Bangladesh’s batting collapse Nortje bagged four wickets, conceding only 10 runs in 3 3 overs

Litton Das was Bangladesh s torch bearer, scoring 34 off 31 runs But his innings only reduced the margin of Bangladesh s heavy de feat

o u w w a s d i s

m i s s e d b y S h a k i b A l H a s a n , b u t only in the 19th over when he did enough damage to Bangladesh The left handed batter ended up on 109 o ff j u s t 5 6 d e l i v e r i e s w i t h s e v e n f o u r s a n d e i g h t s i x e s I t w a s t h e s e c o n d c o n s e c u t i v e t o n b y Rossouw in T20Is only the sec ond instance of such fate

In the first 15 overs, South Africa posted 176 for only two wickets But in the last five overs, Bangladesh made a good comeback conceding only 29 runs and taking three more wickets

While Rossouw was the best scorer for South Africa, de Kock was the second best batter for them scor ing 63 off just 38 balls

Earlier, Taskin Ahmed removed South African captain Temba Bavuma for two in the first over But the Tigers failed to continue on a good start

For Bangladesh Shakib bagged two wickets conceding 33 runs in three overs while Taskin, Hasan Mahmud and Afif Hossain scalped one wicket each

B a n g l a d e s h w o n t h e i r f i r s t m a t c h a g a i n s t t h e N e t h e r l a n d s while South Africa shared points in t h e i r f i r s t m a t c h t h a t w a s w a s h e d away due to rains

T h e Ti g e r s w i l l t a k e o n Z i m babwe on October 30 at the Gabba

kohli in runs again as india down Dutch at t20 World Cup

SYDNEY e u t e R s

Virat Kohli hit a second successive unbeaten half century as India made it two wins from two matches at the T20 World Cup with a comfortable 56 run victory over the Netherlands at the Sydney Cricket Ground on Thursday Skipper Rohit Sharma and Suryakumar Yadav also reached the 50 mark as India eased to a competitive 179 for two before re stricting the Dutch to 123 for nine to move a point clear of South Africa at the top of Group Two Kohli s 44 ball 62 featured only three fours and two sixes the first when he went inside out over the covers to bring up his 50 but was full of delight ful touches and took his tally to 144 runs from the two matches While the night lacked the extraordi nary drama of their Super 12 opener against Pak istan in Melbourne on Sunday, there was a similar party atmosphere in Sydney with a big noisy crowd almost entirely made up of India fans Hav ing won the toss and elected to bat, India served up another relatively modest powerplay tally of 32 as the Dutch bowlers did a good job of containing the batsman and removed opener KL Rahul cheaply

E

s tA F F R e P o R t

SYDNEY

11th JCC of CPEC finE-tunES MouS to bE SignEd during

to ChinA

tH E 11th meeting of Joint Co operation Committee (JCC) of China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) was held here in Islamabad through video link with both sides expressed satisfaction over the ongoing pace of work on projects under CPEC and pro posed execution of several projects

The meeting was co chaired by Federal Minister for Planning Devel opment & Special Initiatives, Prof Ahsan Iqbal and Vice Chairman Na tional Development & Reform Com mission (NDRC), China Mr Lin Nianxiu Under the leadership of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, the CPEC has emerged as the topmost national prior ity of the Pakistan China all weather strategic cooperative partnership, said the minister in his welcome address

During the meeting, the conveners of the Joint Working Groups (JWGs) on Energy, Transport Infrastructure, Gwadar Socio Economic Develop ment, Security, Long Term Planning of CPEC, Industrial Cooperation, Interna tional Cooperation, Science & Tech nology, and Agriculture Cooperation made a presentation, highlighting progress on their specific areas and the future plans of actions

According to official handout issued after the meeting, the Minister high lighted three basic objectives in the 11th JCC which includes the revival of CPEC, which has been revived since the incumbent government came into power in April this year The inclusion of new projects, which will increase the CPEC’s portfolio and third was Business to Busi ness cooperation, which was earlier based on Government to Government

The JCC was organized keeping in view the important visit of Prime Min

ister Shehbaz Sharif scheduled to begin from November 1, 2022 in which all important MoUs will be signed for mally said the minister while briefing the media after the JCC

It is important to mention here that Ahsan Iqbal has honored to co chaired the first 7 meeting of the JCC

According to officials, during the JCC meeting the government of Pak istan has made a number of new pro posals on which agreements are expected to be completed shortly which includes: Post Disaster Recon struction; Global Development Initia tives: Strengthening of Digital Investment in Economy and arrange ments for SEZs; Agreement between Geological Survey Intuitions of the two countries and Cooperation to de velop export potential of Pakistan

Similarly, the framework agree ment on Single Window Cooperation in inland trade was also proposed Pak

istan also proposed a mechanism for a new area of Water Resources Manage ment and Climate Change under the CPEC framework considering the en hanced vulnerability of Pakistan to cli mate Change events

Pakistan also assured Chinese counterparts to continue beefing up se curity of Chinese working on CPCE projects and in this regard several ini tiatives have been taken Both sides agreed to expand their cooperation in Information Technology and it was de cided that Chinese companies will es tablish research centres in Pakistan to explore new avenues in this sector

The upcoming visit of Prime Minis ter Shahbaz Sharif will be significant es pecially at a time when President Xi Jinping of China has been elected for a third term as China leader, ” said the minister, while reiterating that the incum bent government has revived the CPEC which remained neglected in the past

NEPR A imposes Rs 10 million fine on NTDC

ISLAMABAD

The National Electric Power Regulatory Author ity (NEPRA) has slapped a fine of Rs 10 million on the National Transmission & Despatch Com pany (NTDC) for its failure to satisfy the Author ity in the matter of revision in the minimum loading limit of Lalpir and Pakgen power plants According to NEPRA, the minimum loading limit of Lalpir and Pakgen power plants was re vised from 20% to 50% in April 2021 whereby General Manager System Operation had opined to CPPA G that there will be no adverse opera tional effect of the said revision on national grid However, the succeeding General Manager System Operation informed that the said revi sion had adversely affected system operation and has led to increase in generation basket price

NEPRA inquired from NTDC/NPCC to clar ify the reasons for its change in stance of the later GM However NTDC/NPCC failed to satisfy the Authority Subsequently, the Authority initi ated legal proceedings against NTDC Consequently, an Explanation dated October 13, 2021, was issued to NTDC under Rule 4(1) of the NEPRA (Fines) Rules 2002 followed by a Show Cause Notice dated December 30, 2021, under Rule 4(8) & (9) of the NEPRA (Fines) Rules 2002

Moreover, an opportunity of hearing was also granted to NTDC on April 06, 2022, how ever, NTDC failed to provide any satisfactory re sponse and was found guilty of violating relevant provisions of the NEPRA Act, Rules, and Regu lations made thereunder

Therefore, the Authority has imposed a fine of Rs 10 Million on NTDC said NEPRA

ISLAMABAD

S ta f f R e p o R t

The eight member medical board of the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) has prepared an initial post mortem report of the slain senior journalist Arshad Sharif

Initially, the federal government had constituted a six member medical board to conduct autopsy Two more members were included in the medical board on the appeal of Sharif ’s family

The medical board performed the autopsy in accordance with the standard operating procedures (SOPs) and inspected Sharif ’s body besides conducting forensic, toxicology and pathology tests

Sources added that samples of organs including heart, lungs and stomach were taken for forensic examination and a detailed post mortem report will be prepared on the basis of the test reports The body was also X rayed and CT scanned

According to the initial report, the journalist received bullets in the head and right lung and the death was caused by a gunshot wound to his head within 10 to 30 minutes

The report added that Sharif died of blood loss thirty minutes after he was shot in the chest and head

The final report would be prepared after receiving the forensic laboratory’s findings

Sharif was laid to rest in Islamabad s H 11 cemetery on Thursday The journalist was buried after his funeral prayers were offered amid high security at Islamabad’s Faisal Mosque

Scores of people including members of the journalists’ fraternity attended Sharif ’s funeral prayer

Long march won’t be allowed to enter Red Zone, says S ana

i n p

Minister for Interior Rana Sanaullah Khan said Thursday that the long march of Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) would not be allowed to enter the Red Zone in Islamabad at any cost

Addressing a news conference in Islamabad, Rana Sanaullah said that a more disgusting face of Imran Niazi had come to the fore adding that he concocted the cypher play to defeat the no trust motion against him

“On the apolitical role of the institution, Imran Khan hurled the jibes of Mir Jafar, Mir Sadiq neutral and animal he deplored

“Imran Khan has taken the form of an ulcer The treatment of this ulcer is crucial for the country and the nation he emphasised

“Imran Khan played a farce on the issue of the cypher He took a stance which did not have a solid ground An ugly and brutal face of Imran Khan has come to the fore,” he castigated Imran Khan did not think how much the country would lose [due to his cypher narrative]

His party leaders are saying that there will be a bloody march [in Islamabad],” he abhorred Imran Khan is plotting to divide the nation He is misleading the young generation He can only spread sedition and corruption in the coun try he stated

“The facts that have come up are being in vestigated The matter of Arshad Sharif ’s murder leads to two people Imran Khan wants dead bodies before every long march,” he added

“A narrative was made that Arshad Sharif was being intimidated and threatened,” he added

ihC directs police to deal with Pti long march as per law

ISLAMABAD S ta f f R e p o R t

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday directed the capital police to continue its actions as per law in line of the long march call given by the Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) The law would take its own course if anyone do illegal act, the court said and, however, instructed the police not to harass petitioner ex advocate general Niazullah Niazi without any reason

Justice Aamer Farooq heard the case filed by Niazullah Niazi alleging the federal police for harassing him in connection of PTI s long march

The petitioner ’s lawyer adopted the stance that the police had prepared the lists of people with regard to maintenance of law and order

The matter of affidavit and surety bonds demanded by the police was heard by the court in last hearing he said The court questioned that whether the police had involved in law and order

DSP Legal Islamabad police informed the court that no action was taken as per the said lists

The court remarked that whatever the matter was, the police should proceed and take action only as per law Justice Farooq said that the demand of surety bonds by the police was also an illegal act

The lawyer prayed the court to issue a direction so that no action would be taken without any reason

The court taunted it had already been cleared in English and Urdu, and now there was no need to issue orders in Punjab and Sindhi languages The lawyer said that he was not favoring any illegal action The further hearing of the case was then adjourned

imran invites nation to join long march to rid countr y of ‘thieves’

Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan urged that entire nation should participate in the Haqeeqi Azaadi” Long March to liberate the country from the “thieves” who seized power to end corruption cases of billions of rupees In a special message ahead of long awaited historic long march, PTI Chairman said that the Haqeeqi Azaadi Long March would kick off from Liberty Chowk, Lahore today (Friday), which was not for any personal and political interest to oust or to form the government Imran Khan reiterated that the Long March was for a real independence of the country, where decisions could be made within the country, not outside the country He said that there should be justice in the country and everyone should be equal before the law, adding that progress and prosperity of a country could only be ensured where there was a just system Imran Khan went on to say that a small class was occupying the resources of the country and these thieves committed robbery every time but gave themselves NROs every time PTI Chairman said that the Haqeeqi Azaadi Long March was to rid the country from the corrupt class vowing that the movement would last until the country was liberated in real sense He stated that the people had the right to decide elect government through

adding that they wanted a country for which Quaid e Azam struggled and Allama Iqbal dreamed of

rupee losing streak against dollar continues

Chief

was not em powered to disqualify a public representative under Article 62(1)F

A three member SC bench comprising Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial Justice

Syed Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Ayesha A Malik heard a case filed by Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) Leader Faisal Vawda challenging his lifelong disqualification by

the ECP and the subsequent ruling by the Is lamabad High Court (IHC)

During the course of proceedings, the chief justice said that the ECP decided the matter after considering over the facts, which was upheld by the high court

He asked the counsel for Faisal Vawda whether the declaration of the high court under Section 62(1)F could be upheld by the Supreme Court or not

He asked why shouldn’t the Supreme Court use the power of Article 187 to meet the requirements of complete justice in the light of facts?

Justice Mansoor Ali Shah asked when the case had been filed before the Supreme Court andb why should the Supreme Court not use Article 187?

On which Faisal Vawda’s lawyer Waseem Sajjad said that the Supreme Court had the power to hang anyone

Addressing the counsel, the chief justice said that he should think about the points of the case In Faisal Vawda disqualification case, not only senior but also two ex chair man senate were lawyers, he added

Subsequently, hearing of the case was adjourned till November 9

E C P n o t e m p o we r e d t o d i s q u a l i f y p u b l i c r e p r e s e n t a t i ve u n d e r A r t i c l e 6 2 ( 1 ) F: C J P

Medical board prepares initial postmor tem repor t of slain journalist Arshad Sharif