Epaper – August 30 ISB 2020

CMYK

30 August, 2020 I 10 Muharram, 1442 I Rs 15.00 I Vol XI No 61 I 12 Pages I Islamabad Edition

Centre, sindh to jointly work on major Problems of karaChi: Pm

ISLAMABAD

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STAFF REPORT

HE federal government, along with the Sindh government, is working together to resolve major problems of Karachi, Prime Minister Imran Khan said on Saturday after record-breaking torrential rains wreaked havoc in the port city.

“The whole nation feels the pain our people in Karachi are going through. However, out of this devastation and suffering there is now a positive development as my government, along with the Sindh government, is moving to immediately act and resolve three major problems of Karachi,” the prime minister announced on Twitter.

He added that the two will be working on cleaning the nullahs, finding a solution to the garbage issue in the city and resolving the water problems in the metropolis.

“Cleaning the nullahs once and for all and dealing with encroachments impeding water channels; devising a permanent solution to the solid waste disposal and sewerage problems, and resolving the critical issue of water supply to the citizens of Karachi,” PM Imran stated.

President Arif Alvi welcomed the development and said Karachi and the rest of Sindh will never be left alone.

“A positive development. Cooperation between the federal and provincial governments can do wonders during this devastating

Coronavirus in

Pakistan

CONFIRMED CASES:

295,372

LAST UPDATED AT 9:28 AM ON AUGUST 29, 2020 DAY'S DEATH TOLL: NEW CASES:

1

319

RECOVERED:

DEATHS:

SINDH:

PUNJAB:

280,340 6,284 129,179 KP:

35,971

96,699 BALOCHISTAN:

12,804

AJK/GB: ISLAMABAD: 2,290/2,832 15,597

crisis and also in the future in making of Storm Drains, Sewage Treatment, Solid Waste Management, Fresh Water Supply and Transport.

Karachi and the rest of Sindh will never be left alone,” he said.

It is pertinent to mention that the Centre and Sindh government have been at each other’s throats as rain spells have battered the province, with Karachi facing the major chunk of the disaster.

According to media reports, at least 80 people have died across Sindh -- 47 in Karachi -- due to various rain-related incidents.

On Friday, PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto had said he hoped that the Centre will fulfil its "constitutional duty" and help Sindh's economy get back on track.

The PPP chairman had also directed Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah to ramp up the ongoing relief activities in Sindh.

“The province should ensure timely relief to the people affected by the rains,” he had said, adding that a survey should be conducted to record the damage incurred to public and private property, The PPP chair had stated that the repairing of roads should be concluded at the earliest and they should be reopened for traffic.

According to an update from the Sindh Chief Minister House, several areas in the city are still submerged in water after torrential rains began Thursday.

"Rainwater has accumulated in some areas in Tower while several areas in Bath Island, Gulshani-Faisal and Clifton in the city's south district are also submerged," Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah informed the meeting, directing that those areas be cleared.

Pakistan observes 9th Muharram amid strict security KARACHI/LAHORE/ISLAMABAD STAFF REPORT

The 9th of Muharram is being observed across the country in solemnity to honour the memory of Karbala.

On Saturday, processions were taken out in different cities to mourn the martyrdom of Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA), the grandson of Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him).

Strict security arrangements were made countrywide, with cellular services suspended in some areas as processions to commemorate Muharram 9 were taken out in several cities.

Earlier this week, the interior ministry officials had said that cellular services would be suspended in 36 cities of Punjab on the request of the provincial government.

The Punjab police had also asked the Home Department for air surveillance in 13 cities — Lahore, Kasur, Gujranwala, Mandi Bahauddin, Rawalpindi, Jhelum, Sargodha, Bhakkar, Multan, Lodhran, Sahiwal, Muzaffargarh and Bahawalpur.

Sindh government spokesperson Barrister Murtaza Wahab said in a tweet on Friday that cell phone services would be restricted "only be in selected areas where the Muharram processions take place on the 9th and 10th of Muharram".

Cellular services were also suspended in Peshawar as part of the security plan, while

CM Murad slams KMC, others as rain-related death toll rises to 48 KARACHI STAFF REPORT

Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah censured the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) and other civic departments over their poor performance during torrential rains in Karachi, which caused eight more deaths on Saturday, taking the overall tally to 48.

Presiding over a meeting to review the overall post-rainfall situation in Sindh at the CM House, Murad Ali Shah directed the concerned departments to pinpoint areas where the flow of water could be stopped.

“If any building is obstructing the flow of water, bulldoze it whether it is public or private. We have to fix the city no matter how drastic the measures we have to take,” Shah noted.

He ordered that routes of the Muharram processions should be cleared immediately and directed the concerned authorities to drain the water in areas still flooded in the metropolis.

“Why are several areas in the southern district still submerged in water?” he asked.

The CM said that KMC’s Urban Disaster Response Unit was not at the forefront in

cleaning up the city after the heavy downpour. “KMC's Urban Disaster Response Unit does not appear to be active. Those involved in the clean-up should be made to wear specific jackets so that the public knows that the government is working,” he said.

The chief minister also directed senior Board of Revenue members to survey all the districts and to take note of them.

He also directed all the district commissioners to ensure their areas were cleaned, especially drains which get choked due to garbage.

“Drains get cleaned because of the flow of water but plastic bags and mud chokes it,” he noted.

Speaking about the power woes of the city, Shah said that power is yet to be restored in several areas in the city. “170 KE feeders out of 1,900 are yet to be restored,” he added.

Briefing the meeting, the deputy commissioner said there was an issue of garbage collection in the Central district. “We cleaned all the areas in the Central district. All the drains in the southern district were cleaned as well,” he added.

He added that low-lying areas were still flooded as all the nullahs were emptied in the Southern district, which takes time to drain.

To this, the chief minister said he was aware there was not enough staff, which is why temporary staff should be hired to move the cleaning process along.

Mirpur Khas commissioner told the chief minister that more than 80pc of the crops had been destroyed in Mirpur Khas and Tharparkar due to the recent rains, while water was yet to be drained from Mithi, Islamkot and other areas.

over 10,500 police and security personnel were deployed across the city for the security of mourning processions, police officials said.

KARACHI: The main procession in the metropolis emerged from Nishtar Park at 1pm, going through Mehfil-i-Shah-i-Khorasan and will end at Hussainian Iranian Imambargah in Kharadar.

The main majlis will be led by Allama Shahenshah Hussain Naqvi and the procession will also go through M.A. Jinnah Road and Empress Market. A spokesperson for the Karachi Police said that at least 6,368 policemen have been posted along the route the procession will take while 90 snipers of the Special Security Unit (SSU) have also been posted at the imambargahs and along the route.

The spokesperson added that 1,095 officials of the Traffic Police have been deployed to ensure smooth flow of traffic along the route. Police have appealed to the citizens to keep an eye on their surroundings and contact the police helpline in case of any suspicious situation.

LAHORE: The main procession in Lahore was taken out from Pando Street, Islampura which after passing through different areas including Khaima-i-Saadat will conclude at the same point, Radio Pakistan reported.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 02

more inside

Four in five businesses in Pakistan anticipate a better future: Gallup survey STORY ON PAGE 02

Sindh declares 20 districts in four division calamity-hit STORY ON PAGE 03

UAE scraps Israel boycott in new step towards normal ties STORY ON PAGE 12

Pakistan condemns Kashmiris’ killing, curbs on religious gatherings in IOK STORY ON PAGE 12

02

sunday, 30 August, 2020

news

On AsHurA, PresIDenT AlvI urges COunTrYMen TO sHun DIfferenCes iSLamaBad

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APP

RESIDENT Dr Arif Alvi urged countrymen to strive for national progress and prosperity while shunning mutual differences, sectarian biases, and faith-based hate, in light of Hazrat Imam Hussain (R.A)’s teachings.

In his message on the occasion of Ashura, the president said that since the beginning, Allah bestowed special status to the 10th of Moharram-ul-Haram. Many of the remarkable historic incidents had taken place on this day, be it the acceptance of Holy Prophet Adam’s apology, safe arrival of Hazrat Noah’s ark at Mount Jodi, turning of Namrood’s fire into coolness for Hazrat Ibrahim (A.S) and the martyrdom of Hazrat Umar (R.A).

The president said that the martyrdom

of Hazrat Imam Hussain (R.A) and his companions had eternally enriched the significance of 10th of Moharram in the Islamic history. The sacrifice of Imam Hussain gave Muslims a lesson that one

should not evade even sacrificing his life while fighting against the evil forces.

He said the martyrdom of Imam Hussain (R.A) was in fact the victory of truth, and symbol of steadfastness against op-

pression and a glorious example of sacrifice. He said Moharram-ul-Haram instilled a passion which made the followers cope with any ordeal.

The president said the Pakistani nation had shown exemplary discipline during its fights against coronavirus. As the pandemic is not yet over, we must still show further precaution, he advised.

He hoped that the people would adhere to anti-COVID 19 SOPs during the Ashura rituals in light of the guidelines issued after consultation with the religious scholars.

The president urged the countrymen to make a pledge to take every step for victory of truth, promotion of justice, adherence to Islamic values, and for national progress and prosperity. He prayed to Allah Almighty to turn the new Islamic year as the year of development and prosperity for Pakistan.

Youm-e-Ashur to be observed today ISLAMABAD: Youm-e-Ashur, the 10th of Muharram, will be observed today (Sunday) across the country with due solemnity to pay homage to the supreme sacrifice rendered by Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) and his devoted companions in Karbala. The mourning processions will be taken out in all the cities and towns of the country. The standard operating procedures (SOPs) have also been issued for the mourning processions after consultations with the religious scholars to avoid the spread of Covid-19. Ulema and Zakireen will highlight the bright and candid teachings of Hazrat Imam Hussain (R.A.) and various aspects of Karbala tragedy. In connection with the 9th Muharram on Saturday, Taazia, Alam and Zuljanah processions were taken out in different parts of the country in memory of martyrs of Karbala. Elaborate security arrangements have been made to avoid any untoward incident during the mourning processions. TLTP

Pakistan observes 9th Muharram amid strict security Continued from page 01

KARACHI: Mourners offering Namaz-e-Zohrain during the 9th Muharram procession. InP

Army, navy continue relief, rescue work in Karachi

Four in five businesses in Pakistan anticipate a better future: Gallup survey

iSLamaBad

KaraCHi

TLTP

ARIBA SHAHID

Pakistan Army and Pakistan Navy continued relief and rescue efforts in flood-hit areas of Karachi on Saturday. According to a press release issued by the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the dewatering process was completed at COD underpass at Shahra-e-Faisal while the process to drain water from KPT underpass was ongoing. “The dewatering process is also going on in other affected areas,” the army’s media wing was quoted as saying as the armed forces continue to provide ration, cooked food and other basic commodities to the rain-affectees through its mobile teams. The army recovery vehicle is shifting vehicles trapped in rainwater to safe locations and also removing other obstacles from the major thoroughfares in order to ensure smooth flow of traffic in the city. The ISPR said that 32 medical camps and 56 relief camps were also established with the support of the civil administration. “Three field medical centres have been established in Qayyumabad, Surjani and Saadi Town, where affected people are provided medical facilities,” it said. It is pertinent to mention here that a record monsoon spell has wreaked havoc in the city, causing urban flooding in parts of the metropolis. Pakistan Army has continued its relief measures in the city and other parts of the province from the past few days with several of the teams shifting rain-affected people to safer locations and providing food to them.

Meanwhile, National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) has established 56 relief camps besides providing 3,000 tents to Sindh government to provide solace to the people affected by rains in Karachi. According to NDMA spokesman, the relief and rescue operation is continuing vigorously in the rain affected areas of Karachi.He said Pakistan Army is carrying out drainage activities in collaboration with local civil administration.

The Gallup Business Confidence Index (BCI) reported a return to green indicating that businesses in the country are confident about the present and anticipate a better future.

As per a report published by Gallup in which 487 businesses across Pakistan were surveyed, the dividends of opening lockdown are clearly visible in the country.

The report said that fair confidence was observed for the current business situation score, great confidence in the future business situation score, and fair confidence in the direction of the country score.

According to the report, four in five businesses (81 per cent) were confident that the future would be better. Net future business confidence score rose by 65 per cent since the first quarter of 2020.

Similarly, more than half of the businesses surveyed believe that the country is moving in the right direction, which is a 15 per cent rise since the first quarter of 2020.

According to the report, half of the businesses which were surveyed reported good business conditions.

Net current business condition score rose by 66 per cent since the first quarter of the current year.

Moreover, two in five of the businesses which were surveyed reported satisfaction with the federal govern-

Chief Traffic Officer retired Capt Syed HammadAbid said that foolproof traffic arrangements have been made for the processions on Muharram 9 and 10. In a statement, he said that two superintendents, six deputy superintendents, 72 inspectors, hundreds of women traffic wardens and 1,390 traffic wardens would perform their duties along the route of the main procession. "Citizens can get information through Rasta App, Radio FM-88.6 and police helpline 15," the statement added.

PESHAWAR: Two main processions were taken out in Peshawar, according to police officials. The first procession was taken out from ImambargahHussainia Hall at 10am while the second was taken out from Imambargah Bibi Sahiba at 3pm. A total of 16 processions would be taken out in the city, the officials said. More than 10,000 policemen have been deployed for the security of the processions whereas 1,400 Frontier Corps officials will also perform duties.

ISLAMABAD: Mobile phone services in Islamabad remained temporarily suspended on account of Muharram processions. The affected areas include sectors G-6, G-7 and Blue Area.

Meanwhile, in a statement, Minister for Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony DrNoorulHaqQadri said the supreme sacrifice of Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) in Karbala taught a lesson to all and sundry to firmly stand for principles against tyranny and barbarism. It is pertinent to mention that there is a complete ban on pillion riding in Punjab and Sindh till Ashura to ensure law and order situation. A ban has also been imposed on carrying arms or ammunition, assembly of five or more persons (with the exception of Muharram processions).

PTI MPA demands audit of DHA Karachi, CBC neWS deSK

ment’s efforts in providing relief to businesses.

On a provincial level Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan boasted the highest business situation net score of more than 35 per cent.

More than four in five businesses from Sindh reported optimism regarding the future of their businesses while only one in four businesses from Central Punjab reported the same.

Similarly, two in three businesses surveyed from Sindh feel that the country is heading in the right direction. This number was again the lowest in Central Punjab.

The Northern Belt boasted the highest net direction score at +27 per cent, followed by the Karachi Belt at +25 per cent.

Net satisfaction among businesses from the Karachi Belt was lowest at -55 per cent followed by Central Punjab at -25 per cent.

According to the report, a greater percentage of young companies, which have been established for less

than 15 years, have reported an increase in sales. The report further said that one in three businesses that reported a decline in sales reported around a 40-60 per cent decrease, followed by one in five businesses reporting between a 60-80 per cent decline in sales.

However, three quarters of manufacturing businesses recorded a decline in sales owing to Covid-19.

Moreover, one in four businesses which were surveyed reported laying off/giving leave without pay to employees to minimise losses. More than half of the businesses which were established less than a year ago reported downsizing, while three in 10 manufacturing businesses reported layoffs.

Lowest downsizing was reported by trade businesses (7 per cent) and companies established more than 46 years ago (11 per cent).

Moreover, two in five food commodity businesses reported laying off employees, while industrial equipment businesses reported no layoffs.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Member Provincial Assembly (MPA) Shahzad Qureshi on Saturday demanded Prime Minister Imran Khan and President Arif Alvi to carry out an audit of Defence Housing Authority (DHA) Karachi and Cantonment Board Clifton (CBC) over their failure to provide adequate relief to residents amid the recent rains in Karachi. Taking to social media, the PTI MPA said that DHA’s Phase 1, 2, 4, 6 and 7 have been submerged due to the recent rains in Sindh’s metropolitan city.

He said that sewerage water has entered the road and water tanks of houses in these areas due to which people face huge difficulties.

The PTI MPA said that he and his team had been trying to contact DHA Karachi and CBC in order to get them to accelerate their rescue operations. However, he added that despite the passage of three to four days both the authorities have failed to provide ample relief to the residents of the area. “DHA residents are facing losses worth millions of rupees,” he said adding that he and the relevant Member National Assembly of the area have tried to provide some relief to residents of DHA. He demanded the Prime Minister Imran Khan and President Arif Alvi to carry out an audit of DHA and CBC adding that all blame is being wrongly put on elected representatives of the area.

sunday, 30 August, 2020

news

CM MurAD TAKes Ke TO TAsK AMID PrOlOngeD POwer OuTAges KaraCHi

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STAFF REPORT

INDH Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah on Saturday visited the K-Electric (KE) head office to take the company to task over continued power outages in numerous areas of Karachi despite the passage of nearly two days since torrential rains lashed the city.

His visit came as eight more people were found to have lost their lives in various rain-related incidents, taking the overall death toll in the record-breaking monsoon spell to 48, officials said.

Numerous key arteries and underpasses, especially in the city's downtown, and several residential areas were still inundated. Some neighbourhoods remained without power even as work continued to restore supply lines.

The crisis-like situation led the Sindh government to declare 20 districts of the province, including all six districts of

Karachi, as "calamity-affected areas".

A notification issued by the provincial Relief Department said the deputy commissioners of the districts which have been declared calamity-hit "shall immediately assess specific losses and move for compensation".

At the KE office, Chief Minister Shah was given a briefing on the power supply situation by KE Chief Executive Officer Moonis Alvi.

"What kind of service is this that power remains absent for 30-35 hours?"

Shah was quoted as saying in a statement by his office.

Noting that electricity had yet to be restored in DHA, Clifton and many other areas, the chief minister expressed the fear that citizens could "create a law and order situation" out of frustration. He said people were already protesting against the outages.

Shah, who also visited the KE control room, was informed by its CEO that 1,615 out of the power utility's 1,900

43 hospitalised after consuming ‘poisonous’ drink in Karachi As many as 43 people, including 28 children, of the same neighbourhood in Karachi’s Gari Khata were hospitalized on late Friday night after consuming drinks unfit for human consumption from a milk shop that was distributing them for free. Those affected were taken to Civil hospital, said rescue officials, adding that they were all from the same neighbourhood.

According to the hospital, all the victims are out of danger and half of them have already been discharged. The police are investigating the incident. nEWS DESK

Five of a family die in roof collapse KASUR: Five persons of a family were killed when the roof of a house caved in due to rain in Kot Radha Kishan late Friday night. According to Rescue 1122, a family belonging to Narowal had come to see their relative Naveed Ahmad at Yusuf City, Kot Radha Kishan. The guests were asleep in a room when its dilapidated roof collapsed due to rain. As a result, the guests including Dilshad (45), his wife Shagufta (35), daughters Maryam (7) and Amina (4), and oneyear-old son Ali Haider died on the spot while Fatima Dilshad (2) remained unscathed. On receiving information, Rescue 1122 rushed to the spot and pulled out the dead bodies from debris. The bodies were shifted to THQ Hospital Kot Radha Kishan by the rescuers. APP

Pak-Afghan border crossing at Chaman closed ISLAMABAD: The border crossing point between Pakistan and Afghanistan in Chaman has been closed for two days due to security cancers. According to details, the government decided to shut the border crossing on 9th and 10th of Muharram to avoid any untoward incident. All kinds of traffic and business activities will remain suspended at the border during the two days. Meanwhile, the Federal Investigation Agency’s (FIA) immigration office and visa section have also been closed. TLTP

feeders were functional.

Alvi said that KE could not restore power when four feet of water was standing in some areas.

KE officials also informed the chief minister that many streets in DHA were inundated due to which "residents themselves are advising against turning on power", according to the statement.

They said the power utility could restore 50 per cent of DHA's 66 feeders by midnight to 1am if water was cleared from the area, Acknowledging the problem, Shah made a telephone call to the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board managing director, directing him to immediately take measures to dewater DHA and other others areas, the statement said.

Earlier in the day, Sindh Governor Imran Ismail discussed the city's power situation in phone calls with Energy Minister Omar Ayub and Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Power Shahzad Qasim.

Upon being informed about resi-

dents' suffering by Ismail, Ayub told him that his ministry was in contact with KE and had directed the power utility to restore power in the city by the evening.

Ismail also called the KE CEO, telling him that the failure to restore electricity despite the passage of two days was "beyond comprehension". He asked Alvi to ensure immediate resumption of power supply, according to a statement.

In its 5pm update, KE said more than 92pc out of nearly 1,900 had been restored. It said restoration work had "progressed swiftly" where ground situations were favourable, with over 100 locations having been restored at the feeder level in two hours.

"Our restoration efforts are being affected at several locations due to the presence of stagnant rain and gutter water in substations and meter-room," the company said, adding that it was "coordinating closely" with the local authorities so that necessary drainage could be done before switching on power.

Pakistan sentences to prison three leaders of Jamatud Dawa LaHore AGEnCIES

A court in Pakistan has sentenced to prison three leaders of Jamatud Dawa, an organisation accused by India and the United States of masterminding the 2008 attacks in Mumbai. The sentencing was not related to the Mumbai attack itself.

The sentencing comes ahead of a September deadline for Pakistan to avoid being blacklisted for failing to curb terror financing by global financial watchdog the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).

Inclusion on the blacklist, alongside Iran and North Korea, would mean being shunned by international financial institutions. The watchdog has called for Pakistan to prosecute those funding terrorism, as well as to enact laws to help track and stop terror financing.

Malik Zafar Iqbal and Abdul Salam were each handed 16-1/2 year total sentences on four charges, to be served concurrently, while a third man, Hafiz Abdul Rehman Makki, got 1-1/2 years on one charge, according to a court judgment seen by Reuters.

The men were associates of Hafiz Saeed, who was sentenced to a total of 11 years in prison in February. All the sentences are concurrent so Saeed, Iqbal and Salam will serve five years.

Saeed founded and led Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), or the Army of the Pure, a group blamed by India and the United States for the 2008 Mumbai attacks, which killed 160 people, including Americans and other foreigners.

Saeed and his associates also face a further slew of cases for allegedly financing militant activities, while Iqbal and Makki have already been convicted in several cases.

Saeed says his network, which spans 300 seminaries and schools, hospitals, a publishing house and ambulance services, has no ties to militant groups. Jamat-ud-Dawa funds the militant wing LeT. A 2011 US sanctions designation describes Iqbal as a co-founder of LeT and in charge of its financing activities. Salam is described as the interim leader of the group during the brief periods when Saeed was arrested in the aftermath of the Mumbai attacks, and running its network of seminaries.

Eight more die in rain-related incidents in Karachi KaraCHi nEWS DESK

Eight more people died, half of them from drowning, in rain-related incidents, in the metropolis, police and rescue officials said on Saturday.

The body of a woman was found floating in Malir river at Korangi Crossing, which was retrieved and sent to Edhi Home in Korangi. She was identified with the help of her jewellery as Sabira Ahmed, aged around 40 to 45 years, according to the chairman of Korangi union council-37, Mushtaq Tanoli. Ibrahim Hyderi SHO Raza Solangi said the woman had drowned in the river along with a relative, whose whereabouts were still unknown.

In another incident, the body of a man who drowned was recovered and sent to Edhi Home where he was identified by his relatives as Amjad, in his early 50s, Tanoli said. He was riding a motorcycle on his way from Bhittai Colony to Qayyumabad when strong currents swept him away. The deceased was stated to be a close relative of a

senior official of the police’s Counter-Terrorism Department. The UC chairman who is part of a rescue team said they had recovered seven motorcycles from the stream and he apprehended that 10 to 12 people were still missing who might have drowned in the Malir river.

The body of a man, identified as Bilal Yaqoob, 24, who died after drowning in a drain in Junejo Town was retrieved in Manzoor Colony and shifted to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, according to Baloch Colony police.

Saeedabad police said an unidentified body of a boy aged around 16 years was found in a pond of rainwater in Musharraf Colony and was shifted to the Dr Ruth Pfau Civil Hospital Karachi. A 40-year-old woman, Ishrat Jehan, died when she suffered an electric shock inside her home in Sector 14-D of Orangi Town, according to Chhipa officials. A man died after being electrocuted in Natha Khan Goth; he was identified as Ghazi Khan, 50. Another 50year-old man, Noor Husain, died when he suffered an electric shock inside his home at Aath Chowk in Lyari area on Saturday evening, according to Chhipa.

Bilawal expresses grave concern over GB situation after rain KaraCHi TLTP

Pakistan Peoples Party Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Saturday expressed grave concern over the Gilgit-Baltistan situation after rain.

The PPP said in a tweet that Karakorum Highway has been blocked due to flash floods and landslides, standing crops and orchids are destroyed following heavy torrential rain.

The press statement said, “Karakorum Highway have been blocked near Tatta Pani and Lal Pari areas in Diamer district due to flash floods and landslides following heavy torrential rain, which has destroying standing crops and orchids in the region.”

He said that media reports from Gilgit-Baltistan were scarce possibly due to intermittent communication breakdowns and urged the federal government to activate NDMA and other rescue and rehabilitation

departments to safeguard the people and infrastructure in the region.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari pointed out that a tunnel built on Karakorum Highway for protecting the commuters has developed cracks and may collapse if immediate steps are not taken to repair it.

He said that floods and ensuing land sliding have reportedly resulted in deaths of people, including a tourist in Chilas and other areas of Gilgit-Baltistan while standing crops and orchids have also been washed away in Diamir and other districts.

The PPP chairman asked the federal government as well as the government in Gilgit-Baltistan to utilize all the available resources to help out the citizens warning that his Party won't allow the government to ignore the sufferings of the citizens. He also instructed the PPP leaders and workers in Gilgit-Baltistan to extend all possible support to the victims of torrential rains, floods and land-sliding in every district of GB.

Meanwhile, Bilawal on Saturday telephoned Chief Minister Sindh Syed Murad Ali Shah and provincial ministers and lauded the measures taken by them during the rain spell.

The PPP chairman during his telephonic conversations sought information regarding relief measures taken after the heavy spell of rainfall from Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah and provincial ministers holding portfolios of public health engineering and local government. Efforts to drain rainwater in parts of the province are undergoing in a speedy manner and all available resources are being utilized for the purpose, they said. The PPP chairman asked the chief minister and the provincial ministers to make an estimation of losses from recent rainfall.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari expressed profound grief over the loss of lives during the rain and urged upon the federal and provincial governments to announce a special package for rain-affectees.

03

IOK people following Imam Hussain’s teachings: fM MULTAN: Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has said that people of Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) are following the teachings of Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) and are standing firmly against the Indian forces’ atrocities. Addressing the Hussainiya Conference on Saturday, he said although the Modi government tried to lure people by offering different perks, yet the innocent Kashmiris followed teachings of Shaheed-e-Karbala Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA). The foreign minister said that people in Indian Occupied Kashmir are facing difficulties but their resolve is firm and they want freedom.

He said the Modi government is violating the basic rights of the innocent Kashmiris. He said that Muharram congregations and gatherings are banned in IOK. He urged the international community and human rights organizations to force India to stop aggression in IOK. The foreign minister paid a rich tribute to Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA), saying that he was a man of principle and always took a stand for truth. Separately, Qureshi said that the situation with regard to the COVID-19 has improved significantly in Pakistan and now cordial ambiance is being witnessed in the entire country.

Talking to media persons in Multan, he stressed the need for strictly following standard operating procedures (SOPs) in order to curb spread of the pandemic.

He said, “The month of Muharram-ul-Haram demands that we should promote unity and harmony among our ranks.”“New spike in coronavirus cases can hit the country in winter”, the foreign minister cautioned. He said the smart lockdown policy of Prime Minister Imran Khan is being widely admired. The timely move helped in containing the outbreak.He said the situation of Karachi is very critical owing to the heavy rains there. He said the federal and the provincial government are required to work together to put an end to the sufferings of the people of Karachi. The foreign minister said that Karachi's drainage system needs to be revamped to secure the future of the city. TLTP

nawaz should voluntarily come back to Pakistan: fawad ISLAMABAD: Minister for Science and Technology Chaudhry Fawad Hussain Saturday said former prime minister Nawaz Sharif should himself come back to the country to face the corruption cases registered against him. “The investigation should be held about Nawaz Sharif’s health condition, whether he was medically fit or ill,” he said while talking to a private news channel. The minister said the corruption cases against Nawaz Sharif and his daughter Maryam Nawaz were based on authenticity and should be reached into logical conclusion. He claimed that Nawaz Sharif and Maryam Nawaz were involved in massive corruption and money laundering and had looted national exchequer ruthlessly. APP

sindh declares 20 districts in four division ‘calamity-hit’ KARACHI: The government of Sindh has declared four divisions comprising 20 districts as calamity-hit areas after heavy rains played havoc in the province, claiming 80 lives. The Relief Department issued a notification on Saturday declaring Karachi, Hyderabad, Mirpurkhas and Shaheed Benazirabad divisions as "calamity affected areas". The Sindh government in the “exercise of the powers vested under Section 3 of the Sindh National Calamities (Prevention & Relief) Act1958” declared 20 districts as "Calamity Affected Areas" because the “heavy rainfalls during Monsoon season have caused [a] loss of human life and property” in the province. The spokesperson of the provincial government, Barrister Murtaza Wahab also tweeted a copy of notification in this regard. TLTP

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Sunday, 30 August, 2020

NEWS

LAHORE

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TLTP

UNJAB Chief Minister Sardar Usman Buzdar has said that for the first time in the history of Pakistan, 13 special economic zones are being set up in Punjab.

The chief minister was talking to Ambassador of the United Arab Emirates Hamad Obaid Ibrahim Salem Al-Zabi on

Buzdar SEEKS uaE’S invEStMEnt in PunjaB SEzs Saturday.

He said that special facilities will be provided for investment in Special Economic Zones and Ravi River Urban Development Project.

The UAE ambassador lauded the steps and effective strategy adopted to curb coronavirus by the Punjab government under the leadership of Usman Buzdar.

Buzdar said work has been started on two special economic zones whereas the foundation stone of the third special economic zone in Bahawalpur will soon be laid.

“A new city will be established at Ravi River near Lahore which will resolve pollution and lowering the groundwater levels

CM Kamal forms committee to formulate SOPs for schools QUETTA: Chief Minister Balochistan Jam Kamal Khan has formed a committee to make standard operating procedures (SOPs) for educational institutions in the province. The chief minister chaired a highlevel meeting on Saturday to review the matters pertaining to the coronavirus situation and opening of educational institutions in the province. During the meeting, the chief minister constituted a committee comprising provincial secretaries of health, education, information technology departments and Chief Minister Delivery Unit to form a comprehensive guideline for making SOPs for educational institutions. The committee will submit its recommendations within four days. The meeting agreed for preparation of a comprehensive mechanism for opening educational institutions under which the teachers and students could be prevented from COVID-19. TLTP

Power supply to over 90pc areas restored, claims KE KARACHI: K-Electric (KE), the sole power supply company in Karachi, has claimed to restore power supply to more than 90 per cent areas of the city. The power supply in Karachi was badly affected after heavy rainfall lashed out the metropolitan on Thursday. According to the KE spokesperson, the disrupted power supply has been restored in Lee Market, Moosa Lane, Gulistan-e-Jauhar blocks 12, 15 and 16.

Electricity was also restored in Defence Phase One, Two and Eight, Korangi 7-A. The KE spokesperson said that 50pc of their substations were flooded after the heavy downpour. After heavy downpour in Karachi, the cellular services in the city were also affected due to prolonged power breakdown. The users of different telecom services providers are facing outages due to prolonged power breakdown after terrifying rain in the city since Thursday. TLTP

problems of the city.”

Usman Buzdar invited UAE investors to invest in special economic zones and Ravi RiverFront Urban Development Project and assured that special facilities would be provided to all interested.

He appreciated the cooperation of the United Arab Emirates in the development of Pakistan and lauded the UAE’s cooperation in education, health and other sectors.

He said that the government’s initiatives taken to deal with coronavirus have yielded fruitful results and the situation in Punjab is under control. “The Punjab government has increased its capacity for conducting corona tests.”

He said that measures are being taken

to open educational institutions after Muharram-ul-Haram. He said that there is a conducive environment for national and international investors. The government has planned to start Sheikh Zayed Hospital II in Rahim Yar Khan.

The ambassador invited the Punjab CM to visit UAE. Usman Buzdar said that he will visit the United Arab Emirates at the earliest.

Matters of mutual interest, promotion of bilateral relations and enhancing the mutual cooperation in the housing, industries, trade and business sectors, were discussed during the meeting. It was decided in the meeting that close liaison will be maintained to promote mutual cooperation.

Aug 2020: Rain-related incidents cause 19 deaths in Balochistan ISLAMABAD APP

The Balochistan Provincial Disaster Management Authority said on Saturday at least 19 people, including nine children and three women, lost their lives in rain-related incidents during the current month.

According to the report, nearly 13 people were injured during the downpour.

It said that the deaths in rain-related incidents were reported from Dera Bugti, Jaffarabad, Kohlu, Jhal Magsi, Zhob, Kalat, Kach, and Khuzdar.

At least 887 houses were completely destroyed while 98 were partially damaged in Jaffarabad, Dera Bugti, Kalat, Jhal Magsi, and Khuzdar.

The rains dealt damage to three bridges in Kachi and Gwadar, the report said.

It noted that the current rain and floods had also caused

damages to 11 roads in the province.

Meanwhile, Sibi-Quetta Highway had been repaired and restored for all kinds of traffic, while the flood situation was still persistent in urban and rural areas of the province. The heavy rains have also caused a loss in the livestock and agriculture sector, the PDMA report said.

Moreover, Balochistan Chief Minister Jam Kamal Khan has directed relevant departments to remain functional to address problems of the public in rain-affected areas.

"Rehabilitation of rain-affected National Highway and roads should be ensured as soon as possible for provision of facilities in the areas", he said, adding that the irrigation sector would continue monitoring the water level of dams and spillway of Hub Dam to release extra water timely.

The PDMA has finalised all arrangements after following weather conditions, adding that data was being collected daily in liaison with all the divisional commissioners and deputy commissioners.

Opposition working without any agenda, says Sarwar ISLAMABAD APP

Punjab Governor Chaudhry Muhammad Sarwar said on Saturday that the opposition parties were confused on their own agenda and they were not being able to create obstacles in the way of the government’s development work.

Both the Pakistan Peoples’ Party and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz were doing politics merely to achieve their political mileage and advantages to save their bigwigs from corruption cases, he said talking to PTV. The governor said the whole nation was well aware that there was no chance of opposition’s unity on one platform as mistrust was found among them.

He urged all the political parties to refrain on playing politics on national issues.

Regarding Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, he said Nawaz Sharif’s health condition should be probed whether he was ill or medically fit.

Chaudhry Muhammad Sarwar asked the PML-N leadership to tell the truth about its supreme leader health issue.

The former prime minister should come back to the country to face the corruption cases registered against him instead of enjoying luxurious life abroad, he added.

Replying to a question, the governor said the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government would complete its constitutional term as it was effectively working to alleviate poverty, inflation and to bring change in the life of the common man.

He said the world organizations were acknowledging that the national economy was heading in the right direction due to prudent policies of the government.

‘Punjab depts on high alert to cope with flood situation’ LAHORE: Punjab Information Minister Fayyaz-ul-Hassan Chohan has said that flood relief and rescue activities are being carried out efficiently across the province. In a statement on Saturday regarding measures taken by the government to deal with the flood situation caused by monsoon rains in Punjab, Chohan said round the clock and dedicated control room has also been set up for monitoring. He said that WASA, district administrations and Provincial Disaster Management Authority are on 24/7 alert to prevent urban flooding in the cities. As per pre-monsoon arrangements, clogged drains were cleaned two months ago, he said. Talking about long term preparations to avoid urban flooding, he said that after successful testing of underground water storage tanks in Lahore, approval has been given for setting up of similar projects in other cities of Punjab as well. He said that round the clock monitoring of River Jhelum, River Chenab, Khanki Barrage as well as other similar installations is under way to protect rural areas from floods. He further said that de-silting of 7,000 km long water channels has been completed beforehand, while procurement of fibreglass boats, outboard motor engines, life jackets, generator sets and emergency lights, etc, has also been done to deal with possible floods. He said the government also has ample stock of water purification tablets and snake bite medicines. TLTP

Clifton, Punjab Chowrangi underpasses remain filled with rainwater KARACHI: Underpasses at Punjab Chowrangi and Clifton are still filled with rainwater, as authorities failed to drain out the areas even on Saturday. According to details, underpass at Punjab Chowrangi has been submerged with rainwater for the last three days, while vehicles can also be seen stuck there.

KPT underpass of Clifton is showing the same picture as Punjab Chowrangi underpass.

Meanwhile, traffic has been suspended from Boat Basin to Qayyumabad due to flooded roads, while basements of various markets including Zainab and others also remain inundated. Shopkeepers are draining out the rainwater from the markets on their own in a move to save their goods and business. On the other hand, several roads of the city are also flooded with rainwater and garbage, which is causing problems for the commuters. TLTP

AJK set to commemorate Youm-e-Ashur with religious solemnity MIRPUR APP

Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) people are all set to mark "Youm-e-Ashura" on Sunday (10th Muharram) with due religious solemnity and reverence to reiterate the pledge to follow in the footsteps of Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) and his companions who rendered greatest supreme sacrifices of their precious lives for the supremacy and upholding of righteousness, truth and justice.

With reiteration of a firm resolve they have shown an unwavering resolve to fight against all types of tyrannical forces and for the sake of rightness and justice, and to accomplish the cherished mission of Islam in all circumstances.

The significant day will dawn with special prayers by the faithful at all mosques and Imambargahs at Fajr in all eight districts of Azad Jammu Kashmir.

Processions of Alam and Zuljinnah will

be taken out from Imambargahs which, after passing through traditional routes, will culminate at their fixed spots.

A number of social and political organisations as well as individuals will establish stalls and ’ sabeels of juices and sweet water on the processions’ route to facilitate the faithful in nook and Cranny of the state.

Recalling the martyrdom of Hazarat Imam Hussain (RA), Ulema and Zakereen during the course of the processions will deliver special speeches, highlighting the great essence of the day.

Security has been beefed up across the AJK including all three districts of the largest Mirpur division including Mirpur, Kotli and Bhimbher to maintain complete peace and order on Youm-e-Ashura.

It may be added that complete exceptional sectarian harmony, cohesion and brotherhood prevail throughout the state.

The event of Karbala inspires us to uphold the glory of Islam coupled with

the renewed pledge and resolve that we should not hesitate to render any sacrifice for the lofty ideals of Islam.

Though the 10th of Muharram, the Ashura, is of exceptional significance in the Islamic history for diverse reasons, nevertheless, it gains special impact as Hazrat Imam Hussain (AS)’s martyrdom and the event of Karbala also took place on this day.

In Mirpur district, the local administration has made all necessary arrangements to ensure maintaining of peace during the course of the main Zuljinnah and Tazia procession in Mirpur city, to be taken out from central Imambargah Sa’adat colony on 10th of Muharramul Haram, the official sources said.

Exceptional security has been intensified across the district through the deployment of contingents of police which will remain alert till the time of reaching of the Zul’jinnah procession at its set des-

tination, SSP Mirpur Raja Irfan Salim told APP The SSP said that adequate exceptional security arrangements had been made by the district administration including police through the due deployment of police and other officials of the law enforcement agencies to maintain complete peace and order on this sanctified day.

Meanwhile, according to the organizers of the special religious programmes marking the historic day of Youm e Ashura in the Islamic history, eminent religious scholars including Ulema and zakir in their sermons, while addressing Azadar and other participants of the procession, will highlight the supreme sacrifices of Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) and his companions at Karbala for the supremacy of truth of justice and the teachings of Islam and will urge all sects of the faithful to renew their pledge to follow in footsteps of the martyrs of Karbal.

Sunday, 30 August, 2020

MuSk'S NeuraliNk putS coMputer chipS iN aNiMal braiNS

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ILLIONAIRE entrepreneur Elon Musk’s neuroscience startup Neuralink on Friday unveiled a pig named Gertrude that has had a coin-sized computer chip in its brain for two months, showing off an early step toward the goal of curing human diseases with the same type of implant.

Co-founded by Tesla Inc and SpaceX CEO Musk in 2016, San Francisco Bay Area-based Neuralink aims to implant wireless brain-computer interfaces that include thousands of electrodes in the most complex human organ to help cure neurological conditions like Alzheimer’s, dementia and spinal cord injuries and ultimately fuse humankind with artificial intelligence.

“An implantable device can actually solve these problems,” Musk said on a webcast Friday, mentioning ailments such as memory loss, hearing loss, depression and insomnia.

Musk did not provide a timeline for those treatments, appearing to retreat from earlier statements that human trials would begin by the end of this year. Neuralink’s first clinical trials with a small number of human patients would be aimed at treating paralysis or paraplegia, the company’s head surgeon Dr. Matthew MacDougall said.

Neuroscientists unaffiliated with the company said the presentation indicated

THE COMPANY AIMS TO IMPLANT WIRELESS BRAINCOMPUTER INTERFACES TO HELP CURE NEUROLOGICAL CONDITIONS AND ULTIMATELY FUSE HUMANKIND WITH ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE that Neuralink had made great strides but cautioned that longer studies were needed.

Musk presented what he described as the “three little pigs demo.” Gertrude, the pig with a Neuralink implant in the part of its brain that controls the snout, required some coaxing by Musk to appear on camera, but eventually began eating off of a stool and sniffing straw, triggering spikes on a graph tracking the animal’s neural activity.

Musk said the company had three pigs with two implants each, and also revealed a pig that previously had an implant. They were “healthy, happy and indistinguishable from a normal pig,” Musk said. Musk said the company predicted a pig’s limb movement during a treadmill run at “high accuracy” using implant data.

Musk described Neuralink’s chip, which is roughly 23 millimeters (0.9 inch) in diameter, as “a Fitbit in your skull with tiny wires.” “I could have a Neuralink right now and you wouldn’t know,” Musk said. “... Maybe I do.”

One comment from a webcast viewer

described the animals as “Cypork.”

Graeme Moffat, a University of Toronto neuroscience research fellow, said Neuralink’s advancements were “order of magnitude leaps” beyond current science thanks to the novel chip’s size, portability, power management and wireless capabilities.

Stanford University neuroscientist Sergey Stavisky said the company had made substantial and impressive progress since an initial demonstration of an earlier chip in July 2019. “Going from that to the fully implanted system in several pigs they showed is impressive and, I think, really highlights the strengths of having a large multidisciplinary team focused on this problem,” Stavisky said.

Some researchers said longer studies would be required to determine the longevity of the device.

Neuralink’s chip could also improve the understanding of neurological diseases by reading brain waves, one of the company’s scientists said during the presentation.

RECRUITING, NOT FUNDRAISING:

Musk said the focus of Friday’s event was recruiting, not fundraising. Musk has a history of bringing together diverse experts to drastically accelerate the development of innovations previously limited to academic labs, including rocket, hyperloop and electrical vehicle technologies through companies such as Tesla and SpaceX. Neuralink has received $158 million in funding, $100 million of which came from Musk, and employs about 100 people.

Musk, who frequently warns about the risks of artificial intelligence, said the implant’s most important achievement beyond medical applications would be “some kind of AI symbiosis where you have an AI extension of yourself.”

Small devices that electronically stimulate nerves and brain areas to treat hearing loss and Parkinson’s disease have been implanted in humans for decades. Brain implant trials have also been conducted with a small number of people who have lost control of bodily functions due to spiral cord injuries or neurological conditions like strokes.

Startups such as Kernel, Paradromics and NeuroPace also are trying to exploit advancements in material, wireless and signaling technology to create devices similar to Neuralink. In addition, medical device giant Medtronic PLC produces brain implants to treat Parkinson’s disease, essential tremors and epilepsy. AGENCIES

Trump administration says Sinochem and others backed by Chinese military WASHINGTON AGENCIES

The Trump administration has determined that another 11 Chinese firms, including construction giant China Communications Construction Company, are owned or controlled by the Chinese military, the Pentagon said on Friday, laying the groundwork for new sanctions.

The Department of Defense earlier this year designated 20 top Chinese firms as Chinese military companies operating directly or indirectly in the United States, including those “owned or controlled” by the People’s Liberation Army that provide commercial services, manufacture, produce or export. The updated list also included China Three Gorges Corporation Limited, Sinochem Group Co Limited and China Spacesat.

The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Pentagon’s designations do not trigger penalties, but a 1999 law that mandates compilation of the list says the president may impose sanctions that could include blocking all property of the listed parties.

The Pentagon has come under pressure from lawmakers of both US political parties to publish the list, amid rising tensions between Washington and Beijing over technology, trade and foreign policy.

The list will likely add to tensions between the world’s two largest economies, which have been at loggerheads over the handling of the coronavirus pandemic and China’s move to impose security legislation on Hong Kong, among multiple points of friction that have worsened this year.

On Wednesday, the United States blacklisted 24 Chinese companies, including China Communications Construction Company, and targeted individuals it said were part of construction and military actions in the South China Sea, the first such US sanctions move against Beijing over the disputed strategic waterway.

NEWS

05

Sanofi more confident about its coronavirus vaccines PARIS AGENCIES

Sanofi’s confidence in its coronavirus vaccine candidates has increased this summer as the French drugmaker prepares to start clinical trials, its chief executive told Reuters. The company is working on two of the more than 150 potential vaccines being developed across the world to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic, which has claimed more than 831,000 lives and sparked economic chaos. One candidate, to be manufactured on the back of an existing platform that develops vaccines to treat flu, will use an adjuvant made by Britain’s GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) to boost its efficacy.

The other, being developed with US company Translate Bio, relies on a different technology known as mRNA. “The early data is saying that we’re on the right track and that we have a vaccine,” Paul Hudson said in an interview on Friday, referring to the vaccine being developed with GSK. That vaccine is set to start clinical trials next month. Around 30 experimental coronavirus shots are already in human trials. But Hudson said in June the probability of Sanofi obtaining a vaccine with an efficacy of more than 70 per cent was higher than for rivals, in part due to its experience in vaccines. “Our confidence has increased. We have work to do like everybody on manufacturing in large volumes. But we will have one, maybe two vaccines next year,” Hudson said. Translate Bio said on Tuesday the mRNA vaccine had induced an immune response in non-human studies, with trials in humans expected to start in November. Sanofi has secured deals for the vaccine-plusadjuvant with the United States and Britain, and is in advanced talks with the European Union to supply it with up to 300 million doses. But the EU is offering only partial protection to vaccine makers against legal risks from side-effects of their potential shots, European officials said earlier this week, in a move that is hampering deals and contrasts with US policy. “I think with the level of protection, we have reached an ‘agreed level’.

And I think that has allowed us to go forward and sign. But I am aware there are different positions on how strong that is,” Hudson said.

With vaccines being developed at record speed during the pandemic, there is potentially a greater risk they may have unexpected consequences or may not be effective. The financial coverage of these liabilities is a key feature of drugmakers’ talks with governments keen to secure vaccine shots in advance. There is so far no approved coronavirus vaccine, except one authorised in Russia before largescale trials.

Walmart ad revenue could quickly jump if TikTok bid succeeds NEW YORK AGENCIES

Walmart Inc could turn into an online advertising leader if its plan to acquire popular short-form video app TikTok goes through, analysts said on Friday.

The proposed purchase, in partnership with Microsoft Corp, would allow the world’s largest retailer to quickly compete with Amazon.com Inc, Facebook Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google for eyeballs on social media, reaching customers across virtual and physical sales channels.

TikTok is up for sale as the Chineseowned company is under fire from the Trump administration as a potential national security risk due to the vast amount of private data the app is compiling on US consumers.

Walmart, which pitched its ad business to large consumer goods companies and advertising firms for the first time last year, said on Thursday it was “confident” it could meet US TikTok users’ expectations and satisfy US regulators’ concerns.

TikTok owner ByteDance aims to ink a deal by September 15, people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Thursday.

“Walmart is going to see a very quick rise in ad spend” if its bid succeeds, said Scott Smigler, president of e-commerce marketing agency Exclusive Concepts.

“From a brand standpoint, it’s a no brainer because of the reach Walmart has and the huge shift we’re seeing right now from offline to online (spending). ... For all of our brands and retailers that are eligible, we’re going to want them on Walmart for sure.”

Last week, Walmart posted its biggestever quarterly growth in online sales, as the unprecedented spike in demand seen by bigbox retailers at the peak of the coronavirus lockdowns has remained strong even as restrictions ease.

Walmart does not break out revenue from sponsored ads for products sold on its website. But online ads yield much higher margins than product sales, and ad revenue is growing as the retailer boosts investments in the area.

It has been more important than ever for Walmart to find new ways to win market share from its closest e-commerce rival Amazon.com, a fast-growing ad platform, as customers increasingly shop online.

Amazon reported $4.2 billion in adver-

tising and other revenue for the most recent quarter, nearly double what it brought in for the same period two years prior. That amount is up 41 per cent from the year-ago period.

CMYK

Retailers including Target Corp and grocers such as Tesco Plc have aggressively wooed big advertisers to their websites to drive sales through pop-up banners and

search-bar keywords.

In July, Bentonville, Arkansas-based Walmart rolled out new features for its in-house advertising platform Walmart Media Group.

Walmart has seized many opportunities to scoop up online brands like Bonobos, which it purchased for $310 million in 2017, and Art.com, which it bought for an undisclosed amount in 2018.

In 2010, Walmart announced its new video-on-demand service with its acquisition of Vudu, which also offers a free ad-supported streaming option. However, Vudu still lags far behind the monthly viewership numbers that competitors Netflix and Hulu pull in, and Walmart sold it to Comcast Corpowned Fandango Media LLC, a movie ticketing service, in April.

Investors are viewing Walmart’s play for TikTok as a potential win, and are raring to know more details.

“It’s really hard to put a value on the return they’re (Walmart) going to get from this” possible acquisition, said Randy Hare, portfolio manager at Huntington Private Bank.

“But clearly the market’s excited about this because this could really help Walmart with a new channel of advertising.”

Sunday, 30 August, 2020

06 COMMENT

Smoke and mirrors

Cooperation during rains havoc

‘Heads I win, tails you lose’

Wanted: An altogether different approach from PTI

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N just two days of record-breaking torrential rainfall, virtually the entire Karachi was under water with electricity unavailable, ATMs out of cash, fuel pumps dry, and cellular connections broken. Besides at least 30 deaths in two days there have been big property losses. houses in lowlying areas, inhabited mostly by the poor and lower-middleclass population, have been inundated, with roofs and walls collapsing in many cases, and people losing within days what they had earned after years of hard work and sacrifice. Sindh being the worst-hit province in the country, crops have been washed away at least in two districts and mud houses leveled.

The enormity of the disaster forced Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah to seek the federal government’s help. PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari also called upon all political leaders to set aside their differences and help the people.

Similar sentiments were expressed by Prime Minister imran Khan also who announced his determination to immediately act alongside Sindh government to resolve the major problems of Karachi. This is the first time the PM has not rejected an opposition party’s offer of cooperation by calling it a trick to seek an NRO. The reason: the PTi wants to make further political gains in Karachi by using the opportunity to project the image of a saviour.

Fine, but the PTi has to understand that Sindh government which has been elected to govern the province is the sole executing authority in the federal unit. Despite an agreement to work together, the two parties have differences in approach. While the PTi is committed not to abandon the city from where the party had won 14 seats, the PPP is keen to provide succour to Karachi as well as to the rain affected districts of Sindh which constitute the party’s current support base. While the nuances in approach will persist, these should in fact encourage the two parties to extend their influence beyond their particular bases by extending help indiscriminately to the affected urban and rural populations. The PTi lawmakers in particular need to pay heed to sensitivities regarding provincial autonomy and avoid extending accusations and taking recourse to unparliamentary language.

aRif Nizami

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RiMe minister Khan, while granting longwinded interviews to pliant anchor-persons, usually on his favourite channels waxes eloquently about the real or perceived achievement of his two-year-old government. As per him, ad nauseam, all is well in the islamic Republic barring the recalcitrant attitude of the ‘corrupt’ opposition. in the latest interview on ARY News with Arshad Sharif the prime minister obliquely hinted at his preference for the presidential system. his intentions are quite clear: an authoritarian bent is well suited in a system that is bereft of any effective checks from the parliament or a beleaguered opposition.

Of course, a presidential system like prevalent in the US, operates on a combination of checks and balances. in Pakistan it has been tried and tested many a times, to amass powers only in one hand. it has miserably failed each time.

Military dictators like field Marshal Ayub Khan not only introduced a presidential system but also a unitary system in 1962 by foisting a highly centralised constitution on the hapless people of Pakistan. Under the constitution 80,000 'elected’ basic democrats (4,000 from east and an equal number from West Pakistan) were to form the electoral college for a presidential election.

According to Ayub Khan, direct elections were ill-suited to the genius (or lack of it) of the Pakistani people. This was actually a ploy by the dictator to perpetuate himself.

Upping the ante on censorship PTA’s broad definition of objectionable content is ridiculous

The polio story

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discernibly aggressive form of self-censorship has become a key characteristic of Pakistan’s supposedly ‘free media’ of late. There are no-go areas that have been so well-defined for newsrooms over the past few years that almost all conventional media houses understand the limits to the selection of stories and opinion pieces. This however does not apply to social media where the generation of content, its propensity to become viral and therefore the impact it has, cannot be easily monitored, regulated or controlled. But that doesn’t stop the state from making attempts to do exactly that. The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) writing to video sharing website YouTube to ‘immediately block vulgar, indecent, immoral, nude and hate speech content for viewing in Pakistan’ is the latest example of a ridiculous attempt to regulate social media the wrong way. YouTube has 1.3 billion users and around 300 hours of video are uploaded to the website every minute with close to 95 percent of the internet population using the platform to view and share content. To expect this global powerhouse of free video content creation to ban a broad category of videos deemed unsavory by PTA for viewing in Pakistan is absurd.

The lack of specificity in the request displays how little the PTA understands the complexities of modern day online media. earlier this year the PTi government tried to formulate a regulatory policy for social media by demanding that major tech companies such as Google and Facebook establish their regional offices in the country and grant Pakistani institutions access to user data upon request. Needless to say the proposal fell flat on its face after receiving widespread criticism locally and internationally, with the tech firms in question threatening to exit Pakistan.

Deeming certain content vulgar is quite a subjective matter best left to the consumer to decide. it is a slippery slope, the state deciding what is and isn’t appropriate for the citizenry. it was possible in a pre-internet era where brilliant authors like Saadat hasan Manto were dragged through courts for their work that was critiqued by psychiatrists hired by the prosecution. he now happens to be one of the most revered short story writers of the Subcontinent with all of his work available to read. With the connectivity and access to the plethora of content the internet has made possible at the touch of a button, it is simply not possible to achieve what the PTA has set out to do. if this is a precursor to banning YouTube outright, well, everyone knows what transpired the last time that happened in the country.

A disease overshadowed by covid-19

Rabia ahmed

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hile Covid-19 takes its toll in Pakistan; polio, the disease that has been around much longer, has made a comeback. The WhO also extended its travel restrictions to Pakistan earlier this year for the same reason.

Not that polio had ever gone. According to the WhO newsletter the number of cases of polio declined from 306 in 2014 to 54 in 2015, 20 in 2016, 8 in 2017, and just 12 in 2018. however, in 2019 the polio eradication programme witnessed a significant spread of the virus and reported 144 polio cases across all provinces. So far in 2020, 7 cases have been reported from various provinces.

And who knows how many are out there that have not come on record? if that does not sound like too many, keep in mind that one infected person in turn infects around 200 others. it is crucial that this disease is entirely eliminated if we are to gain any kind of victory over the terrible disabilities it causes.

Pakistan and Nigeria are the only two countries in the world where polio remains a threat to the population. Those children and adults you see on the street with wasted, useless limbs, most of them are victims of this dreadful disease which once threatened the entire world.

Polio is caused by any one of three viruses, type 1, 2 and 3. All of them must be eradicated, in fact

Dedicated to the legacy of the late Hameed Nizami

Arif Nizami Editor Aziz-ud-Din Ahmad

Umar Aziz

Asher John

Joint Editor

Executive Editor

Deputy Editor

Lahore – Ph: 042-36300938, 042-36375965

The fact that Ayub’s ignominious exit from power did not deter his successor usurpers (general Zia ul haq and Pervez Musharraf) to try the same formula under the garb of a federal parliamentary system. Actually, theirs was a chimerical system that was parliamentary in name only and was thrust upon the people with a little help from turncoats and opportunistic politicians. Unfortunately, the same kind of tried and tested and discredited formulas are being contemplated again. Khan and his mentors have rarely hidden their impatience with the eighteenth amendment in the constitution introduced by the PPP during its last tenure after reaching a consensus with the opposition parties.

Unfortunately, as if it is some kind of dole from the centre, a perception has been deliberately created that the centre has been impoverished by being forced to transfer a bigger chunk of financial resources to the provinces. it can be argued that the smaller provinces simply do not have the capacity to prudently spend the extra resources.

But it is a fallacy that has been deliberately created that the centre has a birth right on these assets. in reality it is the provinces that earn and pass on their constitutionally appropriated share to the centre. Reopening such settled, albeit contentious issues, is like opening a Pandora’s Box. Another matter, which is anathema to democracy, is the prime minister’s insistence that he will not spare the corrupt opposition. Actually ‘the corrupt opposition’ is an oxymoron. There is no such thing as an honest opposition politician in his lexicon.

According to him all opposition politicians are corrupt and he will not spare them or give them an NRO (National Reconciliation Ordinance that was enacted by Musharraf) come what may. A number of PPP, PMl-Q and MQM politicians availed the opportunity and got off the hook thanks to the controversial ordinance.

The NRO has hardly any relevance under the present so-called accountability process. it elapsed long ago. But Khan and his minions keep harping on the theme: hum NRO nahi dein gai (we will not grant the NRO). No one is really asking for an NRO, nor does the prime minister have the authority to give one. The NRO can only be revived in an extra- constitutional arrangement. For the time being such a scenario does not exist. it is another matter that the NAB Ordinance, according to a widely held perception, is a rampantly misused tool to victimise the opposition. Only last

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two of them virtually have been by means of vaccines. Once upon a time there was no vaccine to combat the disease, and although many people recovered from the infection, many did not. Those who did not became disabled for life and some of them died.

There was a polio pandemic in the early 1900s. in 1955 the first polio vaccine developed by Dr Jonas Salk was used, and another developed by Dr Alfred Sabin was used in 1961. The world owes much to these two men.

By 1988, when it was estimated that 350,000 children around the world had fallen victim to polio, the WhO became one of the founding members of the Global Polio eradication initiative which organised mass vaccination against the disease around the world. Organised teams went from house to house dispensing polio drops to vaccinate children against the disease. it took the concerted effort of parents, the Rotary Club, political and religious leaders and organisations to bring the world to the stage where Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria remained the only three countries on earth with reported cases of polio. This year, Nigeria went off that list when Africa was declared polio-free. it now remains for Pakistan and Afghanistan to achieve what even the poorest countries in Africa have managed to do, free their people from this threat.

Unfortunately those very people who helped eradicate polio around the world hamper that achievement in Pakistan. Our leaders appear to be more interested in ‘nabbing’ each other and working towards re-election and their own self-interest than helping the people they were elected to serve. Poliomyelitis is a highly infectious disease which spreads person to person contact, via the faeco-oral route, and even by contaminated food and water. The neglected sewage systems in Pakistan’s cities, such as those that have led to large scale flooding in Karachi, are certain to lead to a greater incidence of this and other diseases. The virus has already been detected in these areas and in other areas where the water is contaminated.

As for religious leaders, they have, many of them, prevented this country from reaching several of its goals. The eradication of polio has sadly been just one of those goals.

Covid-19 has now added to the hindrances in the way of polio eradication because parents are wary of going to clinics and hospitals to have their children vaccinated, in areas where workers cannot visit, or in

Islamabad – Ph: 051-2204545

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Thursday, virtually the whole of Shahbaz Sharif’s family including his wife, sons, daughters and sonin-laws were charged by NAB in different cases.

As Shahbaz alleged recently, this was all part of political engineering. how else is it possible that a vast majority of the ruling alliance is considered pristine by NAB? The only bad apples are the opposition stalwarts with most of them in the dock.

Whenever opposition figures try to put their act together, NAB initiates fresh cases against them.

Another subject that the prime minister touched upon in his interview is the perceived turnaround of the economy. According to the latest figures the remittances are up, the current account is now in a surplus and exports are showing an upward trend.

Cement consumption is growing owing to surge in activity in the country.

Perhaps in the process of viewing the economy through rose-tinted glasses, the small print is conveniently ignored. For example, latest figures reveal an alarming skyrocketing of the country’s debt and liabilities to a whopping Rs44.5 trillion by June this year. An addition of Rs14.6 trillion or 49% compared with the debt burden two years ago.

Total debt and liabilities also include the PSe’s (public sector enterprises) debt, non-governmental external debt and debt from direct investors abroad.

Reducing debt accrued by the much maligned PMl-N government was one of the main planks of the successor PTi government. The government has also failed in meeting its revenue targets in two consecutive years.

Notwithstanding the anticipated improvement in macroeconomic indicators in some areas, the plight of the common man- owing to perennially rising inflation (especially food inflation), soaring unemployment and a manifest increase in utility rates- remains hopeless. The question that needs to be asked is: if the economy is doing so well, why its benefits are not trickling down?

Khan in his interview castigated the opposition as being unpatriotic for not supporting two FATF (Financial Action Task Force) bills relating to money laundering. As pointed out by the opposition senator and former chairman of the Senate Raza Rabbani in the Upper house, the draft legislation was unconstitutional and undemocratic as it impinges upon the fundamental rights of the citizenry.

The Bills defeated in the Senate will go to the joint session of the parliament where it will pass. But here also Khan lost another opportunity to create a consensus.

Arif Nizami is Editor, Pakistan Today. He can be contacted at arifn51@hotmail.com http://www.pakistantoday.com.pk

the case of families who prefer to visit their personal physician for the purpose.

A year ago today a terrorist commander in North Waziristan threatened women polio workers. he ordered them to stop doing their job or suffer the consequences. As a result more than 40 polio workers quit their job in that area. One of the reasons behind this suspicion is the fake vaccination programme funded by the CiA. That fake programme led to the discovery of Osama bin laden in his hideout in Abbottabad, but it left behind a deep suspicion of such programmes in the minds of the local populace. That undercover action has since led to the death of workers, and of victims to polio.

There are other hindrances, such as if an area is not easily accessible. Pakistan has no shortage of such places. And then there is terrorism.

Aside from the incident in North Waziristan mentioned above, a couple of years ago two polio workers were killed and three others kidnapped in Mohmand Agency. earlier this year in 2020 two polio workers were killed in Swabi. The reasons have been distrust of the vaccination based on traditional and religious biases. indeed it takes courage to take part in this programme in Pakistan, yet most of the polio workers are women.

The Pakistan Polio eradication Programme newsletter applauds these workers, one of whom is a middle aged woman living and working in Karachi. She not only supervises the vaccinating teams but moves around on a large four-wheeler bike. You have to be a woman living in Pakistan to appreciate the courage it takes to do each of these things. She says she belongs to the area she works in, and because of this the people who live there, but belong mostly to the tribal areas of Pakistan and are distrustful of the vaccination programme for all the reasons given above, trust her and she is able to accomplish what a stranger might not have achieved. it is obvious therefore that we need to eradicate this disease from Pakistan. But like with most issues we need greater attention paid to the matter by the country’s leaders, a rational, aggressive, sustained and organised programme which needs to be supported by security agencies to protect those who are employed to do this job. We need greater funds so that these people can be better paid, and we must make sure that the vaccines that are being delivered are of a high standard. We also need education programmes that will allow the population to appreciate the terrible consequences of hindering these eradication programmes. Which government is willing to do this?

Rabia Ahmed is a freelance columnist. Read more by her at http://rabia-ahmed.blogspot.com

Email: editorial@pakistantoday.com.pk

Sunday, 30 August, 2020

COMMENT 07 Editor’s mail Send your letters to: Letters to Editor, Pakistan Today, 4-Shaarey Fatima Jinnah, Lahore, Pakistan.

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

Food insecurity The problem of food insecurity exists in Pakistan which affects the life cycle of thousands of people. Since the last decade, these throes have taken a bitter shape, worsened due to the long and ceaseless laxity of policymakers and no concerned authority gave its ears to it till today. While our country is naturally blessed with myriad resources that can feed the entire population of the state yet are not maintained aptly and these resources can produce agro commodities not only for domestic use but also for export. Unfortunately, despite being productive in the farming sector Pakistan still faces the threat of food insecurity. We witness the other picture of this issue and that is rise in inequality that remain the main factor, where rich consumes seven times more than the poor, increment in the food prices has cataclysmic outcomes, such scheme freezes the poor into worst pauperization and the trend is perilous to the idea of annihilation of hunger from Pakistan. in this regard Government needs to trace the genesis of the problem, outline the strategies undertaken by the State to tackle it, highlight various issues related to food security that have figured in the recent public discourse and also explain the response of the State to address the present problem.

SHAFI AHmEd KHowAJA JATI SuJAwAL

Dangers of depression

Redrawing the battle lines No reprieve without coughing up what has been stolen from the state coffers

Candid Corner Raoof hasaN “All right, they are on our left, they are on our right, they are in front of us, they are behind us. They can’t get away this time.”

–Lt. Gen. Lewis B. “Chesty” Puller

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he masks have come off. in a desperate bid to save the illicit billions their masters stole from the state coffers and avert the prospect of incarceration for crimes committed, the opposition senators lined up like a coterie of conscienceless and servile followers to vote against the FATF-related bills. Thus they proved that, for them, the fate of the criminals they owe their political existence to, is far more important than the future of the state itself. They are not bothered if, in the process, the state is pushed into the FATF black list, thus inflicting immeasurable damage to the prospect of its economic revival.

When questioned about their conduct, they did not feel even an iota of shame in fabricating all kinds of dubious and false pretexts for doing so, not even one of them justifying the absolutely untenable position to be recognised standing alongside corruption, loot and plunder.

The government’s resolve not to cave in to these blackmailing tactics of the opposition parties could not be better expressed than by the Prime Minister himself. in a series of tweets, he said that by defeating the Anti-Money laundering and iCT Waqf bills, they had proven yet again that “the self-serving interests of the opposition leaders and the country’s interests are divergent. As the accountability noose tightens, the opposition leaders have become desperate to save their corrupt money by trying to prevent the parliament from functioning– first by seeking to undermine the government’s effective covid-19 strategy, a recognised global success story, and now by trying to sabotage Pakistan’s efforts to exit FATF grey list”. he warned the opposition parties that they would not be allowed to hide behind the facade of democracy to protect their loot and plunder by defanging the NAB: ”let me make it clear: no matter what happens, my government will not allow any NRO as it would be betrayal of the nation’s trust in holding plunderers of public wealth accountable”.

So patently stark is the divide between the two sides, and so pronounced the resolve of the

Prime Minister not to allow the opposition par- question of putting one or another thing right. ties to blackmail the government that a middle There is an unending sequence of inflictions ground appears unthinkable. The function of the that the country suffers from– inflictions government as the custodian of public money is which are the creation of the cursed ruling elite not to allow people to indulge in remorseless who held the charge of the country. it is as if banditry in the name of political expediency. the whole system has to be dug up and then That is not what the Prime Minister would allow pieced together so that it could stand on susto be done. The uncompromising stand that he tainable foundations to put the country on has taken in the face of relentless pressure ex- course to progress without remit. in spite of his indomitable courage and reerted by the opposition reflects immense strength and character which has no precedent solve, the Prime Minister will need a lot of supin the history of Pakistan. Only he has the ca- port to dismantle this monstrous edifice of pacity to have demonstrated this with unwaver- corruption. The judiciary must refrain from intruding into the executive domain, thus slowing ing determination. it had to come to this. it is better now than the accountability process, and the media must later. From day one, the parties of the opposi- cease trading their written and spoken words tion have been clamouring forth this sordidly shamelessly for a few coins. it is through a comout-of-sync narrative that the government bined and cohesive effort that the way would be lacked the capability to perform. Well, all that found for initiating an era of development in an has been rubbished already. The government’s environment of transparency and accountability performance- whether it be in dealing with the where the achievers will be acknowledged and scourge of the pandemic, or in improving the the guilty censured and punished. The state caneconomic indicators, or in conceiving and not move forward without holding to account launching projects exclusively for the benefit those criminals who have reduced it to its presof the state and its people, or its efforts to elim- ent nadir of shame. it has to rise again virtually inate corruption, or its resolve in making the from the ashes.

Frederick Douglass once said that “it is not entire system transparent and accountable, or its initiatives for the uplift of the business com- light that we need, but fire. it is not the gentle munity, or its eagerness for undertaking proj- shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the ects primarily for the benefit of the whirlwind, and the earthquake”. That is the kind of combination that we marginalised communineed here in Pakistan. ties in the society– has For it to start its journey been established withonward to salvation, it out a shade of doubt. it needs fire, it needs thunhas not only demonPakistan beckons. We cannot der, it needs a whirlstrated its ability to rethings that will dress Pakistan’s fail it. We can’t let it suffer any wind– shake up those millions problems, it has also shown compassion for further at the hands of these who have been lost in slumber, insensitive to prioritising those segshameless bandits and the excesses their counments which deserve try has been subjected to help more than others. marauders. They must be by a despicable bunch of This is also reflected in criminals. it must win its a number of public consigned to where they freedom from their ugly welfare projects under the ehsaas banner that belong– to the bin of shame, and clutches.

Prime Minister the government has unfurled for the benefit that, too, when they have served Khan has rightly redrawn the battle lines. of the poor and the their period for having he is invoking his needy people. charges to move on The challenge that committed these crimes without fear for reclaimthe Prime Minister has ing the glory for this undertaken is daunting. country which was its This is more so berecognition once, but cause there are thick which was stolen by layers of corruption operative within the society. This malaise has hordes of muck-preachers and evil-doers. it has been systematically injected by the ruling elite to be reclaimed by an unfailing dint of courage of the past because it was only by creating and resolve.

Pakistan beckons. We cannot fail it. We can’t willing accomplices that they could get away with the extent of loot and plunder that they let it suffer any further at the hands of these indulged in. There are no gauges available shameless bandits and marauders. They must be which would actually measure the extent of consigned to where they belong– to the bin of pillage they perpetrated. They were not alone shame, and that, too, when they have served in skinning the country. There were hordes of their period for having committed these crimes. aiders and abettors who had their own hefty There is no reprieve without coughing up what pounds of flesh stashed away. The institutions has been stolen from the state coffers. were rendered dysfunctional by appointing The writer is a political and security stratecorrupt cronies as their heads who did as they were ordered. With such horrible preponder- gist, and heads the Regional Peace Institute – ance of individual and institutional bankruptcy, an Islamabad-based think tank. Email: Twitter: the ruling elite had a field day to indulge their raoofhasan@hotmail.com. greed to sickening limits. So, it is not just a @RaoofHasan

DePReSSiON is a common and most dangerous disorder that can cause thinking creativity, feelings, concentration on daily chores and so on. For today's people, it has become a big challenge and it is creating countless difficulties for them. it is type of anxiety which takes your abilities and puts you in emotional or physical problems.

Depressed people cannot concentrate their works properly, do not give time to their family, friends and colleagues. According to World health Organization (WhO), it can affect adults, adolescent and children mostly.

More than 264 million people all ages suffer from depression, the ratio of women are more than men. Therefore depression is the leading cause of disability and is the major contributor to overall global burden of diseases.

Besides this, Suicide is the second leading cause of death in 15-29 years olds. it is estimated that 800000 people die due y suicide every year.

Depression is caused by a combination of biological, psychological and social factors which is treatable by the help of psychologists. Psychologists can help to get free from mental disorder, sadness inactivity, difficultly in thinking and so on. According to a report 80 percent to 90 percent of people with depression get treated by psychologists. Apart from these, there are a lot of other activities by which people overcome depression like regular exercise, eating healthy food, sleeping overcome feelings of dejection and hopelessness and suicidal tendencies. lastly, it is important to note that if someone feels depressed, can directly visit psychologists and take suggestions from close colleagues because depression is very a dangerous disorder for one's health. it can compel one to take negative or harmful actions which are the cause of death.

ALIJAN dILwASH KARAcHI

Experimentation in the power sector

POWeR sector in Pakistan has been grossly mishandled , maladministered and very poorly governed since last over two decades and still this process is going on .Back in 1998 , WAPDA's vertically integrated power wing comprising generation, transmission and distribution sectors were dismembered into a number of semi - autonomous companies on the advice of foreign aid giving agencies and their consultants with a view to ultimate privatisation to bring in more competition and with a philosophy of open market based power system operation thought to be benificial to the consumers who may choose their service providers on the basis of quality and competitive ( lower ) tariffs .Alas , all this painted rosy picture did not materialise . Contrarily , we have seen ever esclating power tariffs , load shedding , unreliable service and continously rising circular debt eating away the national economy . increased inefficiency , incompetance and corruption are the hallmark of the power sector as a whole .To govern and oversee the performance of these about ten distribution companies , a central agency PePCO was created but whithin a few years it was abolished for reasons best known to the higher management in the government. Public was kept in dark about the reasons of restructuring .As a result the distribution companies became headless with unpleasant consequences as is evident from their performance , in general .Now after many years of experimentation , the government has revived PePCO . have they studied why it failed to deliver earlier ? have any technical, economic and other related studies been carried out to confirm transparency to achieve the intended goals ? in my opinion , the awnser is No .The government's new power policy looks good on paper only . The borrowed ideas like creating " competitive market " and the right of consumers to select their service povider will only remain a dream in our existing environment .Our priority should be to concentrate on better management , efficient governance and control , which remain wanting . One may ask how many inefficient , incompetent and corrupt people have been shunted out so far and how many capable and hard working have been rewarded ? every one is aware of the dismal performance of the power sector . Our top management is required to sincerely look into our pitfalls and put the power sector on the right path . Nontransparent and unworkable reorganisation will add further to the woes of the poor consumers in the shape of higher tariffs as all the reorganisation charges will be passed on to them .it is high time we stop adhoc half hearted unfeasible and impractical experimentation in the power sector which is supposed to be backbone of the national economy . We have seen great vicissitudes , in the last over two decades , in the power sector performance and still there is no light at the end of the tunnel.

The management at all tiers from top down to the operational level should consist of administrators with relevant technical expertise and with knowledge of nuts & bolts of the intricacies of the various branches of the power sector. We can not afford any further experimentation in the power sector. A major administrative , managerial, technical and commercial overhaul has become necessary in all the tiers of the power ministry and its subordinate organisations to arrest the deteriorating scenarios in almost all segments of the power sector. Rest assured , Pakistan's economy can not take off unless power problems are addressed appropriately and speedily .

ENgR RIAz BHuTTA LAHoRE

Sunday, 30 August, 2020

08 WORLD VIEW

Why the West seeks to vilify political islam ISLAMISM IS A POWERFUL, TRANSNATIONAL POLITICAL MOVEMENT THAT CHALLENGES WESTERN IMPERIALIST HEGEMONY - AND THAT'S WHY IT'S OFTEN PORTRAYED AS A THREAT ISLAMISM SEEKS TO ORGANISE THE RESISTANCE TO BOTH THE ONGOING WESTERN PUSH FOR HEGEMONY, AND TO CORRUPT, CO-OPTED NATIVE AND NATIONAL ELITES middle eaSt eye

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ALAiN GAbON

N his preface to the English edition of Francois Burgat’s Understanding Political Islam, author Pascal Menoret tells us the book is “the work of a trespasser.

It sums up the breakthroughs of a French scholar who escaped the snug - and often smug - Western enclave to research one of the least understood political movements: Islamic activism.”

Understanding Political Islam, initially published in 2016, is also the work of a passeur - one whose unique, lifelong experiences of travelling, living, working and conducting research across the Middle East and North Africa region enables westerners to understand the world through the subjectivity of the “Islamic Other” (whom Burgat reminds us is not as different from us as we often fantasise Arabs and other Muslims to be).

One of the many benefits of the book is to offer us an analysis of political Islam that is not tainted or distorted by western prejudices, ideologies, abstractions and Orientalist fantasies that structure the analyses of other Islamologists.

The depth of Burgat’s familiarity with these countries, cultures and peoples stands in sharp contrast to the often abstract or theoretical takes by other Islamologists.

Burgat’s Islamic/Islamist “Other” is situated, historicised and humanised, as opposed to the vilified caricatures we have been served for decades by virtually all western media and politicians as the new enemy - the “Green Threat” that replaced the Communist Red Scare after the fall of the Soviet Union.

Written in elegant prose that is as rich, dense and intelligent as it is clear and accessible, Understanding Political Islam is part autobiography, part travel memoir and part scholarship, where Burgat both synthesises and revisits his prior works on the subject, but also updates them, especially with respect to the Arab Spring and its aftermath.

A true page-turner where the warm, charismatic, personable and generous author is present with us on every page, each chapter takes us on a geographical and analytical journey to one of the various countries where Burgat has worked or studied.

The book is a synthesis of a lifetime of thinking, researching and writing on Islamist activism around the world.

THE SPECTRUM OF POLITICAL ISLAM: Without generalising, Burgat effortlessly explains both the diversity and the specificity of the various Islamist movements around the world, France included, as well as their shared commonalities.

We are reminded that “Islamism” is by no means the scary, violent, anti-democratic and dangerous monolith it has for years become in western media and political dis-

IT IS CRUCIAL THAT WE STOP MISUNDERSTANDING THE PHENOMENON OF THE RISE AND SPREAD OF ISLAMISM - SO THAT ONE DAY, HOPEFULLY, THE WEST CAN FINALLY DEVELOP MORE RATIONAL, MUTUALLY BENEFICIAL RELATIONS WITH ISLAM course, where it is now systematically - and wrongly - associated with “fundamentalism” and religious “extremism” at best, and more often terroristic “jihadism”.

In reality, these groups, movements and parties are often radically different from one another. The spectrum of political Islam comprises both ultra-violent terrorist groups, such as al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (IS), but also Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood under the country’s first democratically elected president, Mohamed Morsi, and other pacifist parties, such as Tunisia’s Ennahda, which has exerted a profoundly democratising and pacifying influence on the political life of that country.

None of those movements are static or immune to change. Far from it: they usually evolve over time, often radically, and sometimes in surprising ways.

THE KEPEL-ROY-BURGAT DEBATE: In the somewhat simplistic typology of mainstream French media, Francois Burgat has been cast as “the third man,” usually after the much better-known political scientists Gilles Kepel and Olivier Roy. While much has been written on the theoretical rivalry between Kepel’s thesis on the “radicalisation of Islam” versus Roy’s reverse theory on the “Islamisation of radicalism” - with other analysts claiming the two are not incompatible, but complementary Burgat, the third major figure of French scholarship on Islam (third in terms of the level of media attention he receives, but second to none in terms of analytical power) has rejected both.

Instead, Burgat champions a qualitatively different explanation of Islamism and jihadism. Its starting point is western imperialism, the legacy of colonialism and neocolonialism, and the continuing racism and discrimination of European societies.

In France, the media attention given to Islamologists is primarily determined by whether they fit within the group-think and dominant narrative about “Islamism” - in other words, whether they contribute to that “green scare”. Kepel does, while Burgat does not.

If Kepel and his many disciples highlight the religious, scriptural-theological and ideological dimensions of “religious extremism” (including the non-violent type), and if Roy and others emphasise its psychological and even psychiatric aspects, Burgat re-contextualises, re-historicises, and above all repoliticises Islamism and jihadism, without assuming that the former leads naturally to the latter in “conveyor belt theory” fashion.

SEARCHING FOR THE ROOT

CAUSES: For Burgat, both Kepel, who “ascribes a decisive role to the influence of religious doctrine on society,” and Roy, who tries to explain Islamism and jihadism through paradigms such as nihilism, the “death drive” or jihadis as “small-time crooks,” confuse the symptoms for the causes.

Their theories are like “trees that hide the political forest” and misleadingly replace the fundamentally political root causes with religious, ideological, psychological or psychosocial ones.

By excluding the colonial and neocolonial political and historical backgrounds of these phenomena, including western domination of the Muslim “other” through violence far greater than jihadism itself; and by refusing to take into account the enormous responsibilities of non-Muslim actors, such as western governments, and their usually despotic Arab allies in the making of jihadist violence; such disingenuous explanations are also, for Burgat, complicit with French or US nationalist and imperialist neoconservatism.

Analytically and politically, they obfuscate the real drivers, along with the fundamentally political, reactive and oppositional nature of Islamism and jihadism.

For Burgat, Islamism and jihadism do not signal a “return of religion” or a “revenge of God,” but a return to centre stage of the (still-dominated) Global South in the international geopolitical arena, but also at the domestic level.

RETALIATORY TERRORISM: Far from the psychosocial or religious and doctrinal “spasms” described by Kepel, Roy or Abdelwahab Meddeb in his equally ubiquitous Malady of Islam, Islamism and jihadism are foremost mass protests by self-conscious political, often revolutionary actors.

They have everything to do with “postcolonial suffering, youth identification with the Palestinian cause, rejection of western intervention in the Middle East, or exclusion from a racist and Islamophobic France, relations of domination endured by the Muslim component of the population... and the policies of our governments”.

Jihadism thus constitutes a “counter-violence” - a logical outcome of the fact that all “the most ordinary political conditions for extreme violence have been brought together,” mostly by western states and Arab regimes.

There is therefore no need to invoke as root causes a “contamination of Islam,” an alleged malady of Salafism, or other religious, theological, psychosocial or even sexual pathologies. With or without those, the toxic political and geostrategic terrain upon which groups such as al-Qaeda and IS have

The world to come: Revenge of the nation state

New StateSmaN HELEN THOMPSON

The Covid-19 crisis has dealt a decisive blow to the political forces that sought to advance economic cosmopolitanism over the nation state.

In the new politics, consumption will be subordinated to production – even if the present economic slump across the world has been generated by governments annihilating consumer demand through lockdowns – and recovery will be dependent on its re-

vival. A consumption-centric politics, which privileges low prices, presumes that only the present matters. But we now live in a world that must engage pre-emptively with the risk of repeated lockdowns. For nearly two decades, cheap labour in China drove consumer prices down. But when goods are produced in a world of fear and geopolitical rivalry, the origins of goods, and not just their cost, really matter.

The pandemic will accelerate the growing primacy of geopolitics. Donald Trump’s election in 2016 represented a clear break with international economic liberalism. He did not create strong protectionist pressures in American politics, which had begun to assert themselves at the end of the Obama presidency. But Trump did direct that discontent about global trade against China. He reoriented the US towards open technological competition with Beijing, and told the EU and Britain they would have to adjust towards this strategic rivalry or face the consequences for Nato. In the wake of the pandemic, there is even less possibility that any European country, or the EU as a whole,

will be able to chart an independent course that privileges economic relations with Beijing, however much they may wish to.

Within the EU, economic borders and internal geopolitics will reappear. The difficulties of keeping fully open borders in the Schengen area have been evident since the 2015 migrant and refugee crisis. The single market has proved more robust, but it too will become a site of political contest. With its rules on state aid partly suspended, governments that can finance corporate and national bailouts will do so. Indeed, more than half of the emergency state aid the European Commission has approved is funds provided by the German government to German firms.

Now the eurozone crisis has also returned, national trade surpluses and deficits will continue to generate demands for more symmetrical burden-sharing across member states.

As the pre-eminence of the nation state is reasserted, politics within nation states – especially multinational states, such as the UK, and federal states, such as the US – are likely to experience fierce disputes about political authority. This is already evident in

emerged remains bound to generate reactions of a similar, sometimes violent nature.

To take an obvious example, Iraq under US military occupation did not need to get “Islamised” for armed resistance to inevitably occur. Yet, the ideological function of abstract theories, such as those of Kepel and Roy, is to deny or “conjure away the various effects of the persistence of North/South domination, to discredit the protests of the dominated,” and to maintain the illusion that “their bombs have nothing to do with ours”.

POLITICALLY INCORRECT TRUTHS: In sharp contrast, Burgat has tirelessly repeated politically incorrect truths that no one wants to hear, including “that the precondition of the long-awaited democratic transitions is not excluding Islamists from the political sphere. Much less is it hoping that they disappear. The solution is integrating them in the political sphere.”

He notes that the “Islamic reference point” of these movements is in no way “a dogmatic, intangible dead-end divorced from history or impervious to change,” and that there will be no end to terrorism until western states and societies recognise and address their own fundamental responsibilities in the creation of such Frankenstein monsters as al-Qaeda and IS. They must start by ending their “unwavering support for regimes like that of [President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi] in Egypt; for anti-religious elites marginalised in their own societies; or even for our Israeli ally”. Such indefensible policies, he notes, serve only to “exacerbate the radical, reactive threat these policies are precisely supposed to preserve us from”. Alas, so far, such healthy recommendations have fallen on deaf ears.

Burgat insists that far more than theoretical disagreements are at stake in the proper understanding of political Islam. The question is which representation of the “Muslim Other” will dominate the public sphere, which affects how we relate to other countries and domestic Muslim populations.

That is why it is crucial that we stop misunderstanding the phenomenon of the rise and spread of Islamism - so that one day, hopefully, the West can finally develop more rational, mutually beneficial relations with Islam and its more than 1.5 billion believers.

CHALLENGING WESTERN IMPERIALISM: So far, it has been unable to do so.

Instead, it has opted for hostility towards, and even eradication of, anything labelled “Islamist” - a toxic and counterproductive policy that is not so much due to the alleged “threat to peace and freedom” but to the fact that Islamism is a powerful, transnational

angry debates in the UK and Spain – each facing long-term serious secessionist challenges, from Scotland and Catalonia – about who decides when and how lockdowns should end. In the US, individual states have been largely left to enact their own health responses to Covid-19. Yet they are all financially dependent on the federal government.

The huge growth in borrowing prompted by the crisis is likely to aggravate these simmering tensions over sovereignty and whose taxes pay for what.

Nonetheless, certain features from the pre-Covid-19 political landscape will remain. Nation states may be resurgent as the only sites of political authority that can command the political loyalty and coercive power required to implement shutdowns.

But they cannot fund themselves from the taxes their citizens pay. Only the US has a central bank that can act as a lender of last resort to support the dollar borrowing through which many banks and corporations across the world function.

All democratic nation states must borrow in international capital markets, and the most prosperous in Europe, especially Germany, need to maintain a credit line with the US Federal Reserve. For the moment this dependency is not a political problem. But

political movement that for decades has openly challenged western imperialist and neo-imperialist hegemony and the sacred cow of “secularism”.

So, what exactly is “Islamism”? In Burgat’s analysis, and again contrary to groupthink, it “is less the result of an ideology than the production of new political identities from one’s own ground”. Similarly, the Global South is “a region whose specificity is less its religion or culture than its position right outside the West’s bloody borders”.

Islamism is the adoption of an “Islamic religious lexicon against colonial oppression and post-colonial modernism,” by which newly independent countries sought to modernise along European lines.

It signals a fundamentally political (as opposed to ideological or religious) and anticolonialist “turn towards speaking Muslim” - an effort to forge an “indigenous” and “authentic” social and political vocabulary that would be imposed neither from the outside by former colonial powers, nor from the inside by post-independence westernised regimes, nor from above by elites and puppet regimes serving the West.

Islamism seeks to organise the resistance to both the ongoing western push for hegemony and to corrupt, co-opted native and national elites. A fundamentally reactive and oppositional political movement - and furthermore a major one that Burgat correctly predicted would not disappear, but rather remain an essential and major part of the political cultures of these countries - Islamism is essentially a continuation of the long historical fight for independence from western domination. It is “the extension of the dynamic that successfully fought for independence”.

'THE NEW VOICE OF THE SOUTH': Islamism, in all its variants, is indeed “the new voice of the South” - one that is not so much produced by “Islam” as by the history suffered by Muslims at the hands of both foreign colonial states and authoritarian Arab states. In Burgat’s reading, it historically represents the third stage of decolonisation, pursuing the anti-imperialist struggle for independence of now-discredited and ossified nationalist movements, such as Algeria’s National Liberation Front.

In addition to pursuing political and economic independence, or at least distancing from the West, Islamism is now also “starting to reconquer, often successfully, the ideological territory once lost to the North”.

At its core, and regardless of the various forms it takes - whether admirably democratic like Ennahda, or violently terroristic like al-Qaeda - Islamism is the continuation of the South’s long process of self-emancipation from the North. As such, it threatens western imperialist domination, influence and control over these countries, peoples and cultures. It is therefore not surprising that the West vilifies and seeks to eradicate even the most perfectly democratic and peaceful expressions of Islamism, given that they, too, announce the end of the era of unchallenged European and American hegemony.

Dr. Alain Gabon is Associate Professor of French Studies and Chair of the Department of Foreign Languages & Literatures at Virginia Wesleyan University in Virginia Beach, USA. He has written and lectured widely in the US, Europe and beyond on contemporary French culture, politics, literature and the arts and more recently on Islam and Muslims.

while letting central banks take the strain of more debt is a necessity, it is one that will fuel demands for more democratic control of monetary decision-making without changing the international conditions around debt.

This partial rupture in an internationalised economy is not new. The American and British architects of the postwar Bretton Woods monetary system supposed that a distinction between trade and capital flows – such that freer trade did not have to mean the free flow of capital across national borders – would stabilise democratic nation states. We appear headed for a political world that revives the same distinction but the opposite way around.

A version of this politics, where trade is restricted but money moves freely across borders, played out in the 1920s. Its dangers are abundant. But so is any notion that central banks have rendered international financial markets immaterial. In many ways, the democratic nation state never went away.

But as a tax state that could significantly redistribute income and wealth to suppress the dangers of debt-fuelled politics, it did. Internationalised debt politics is here to stay.

Helen Thompson is professor of political economy at Cambridge University and a regular on the Talking Politics podcast.

Sunday, 30 August, 2020

BUSINESS 09

PakIstanI e-CoMMerCe PlatForM PrICeoye seCures sIx-FIGure FunDInG In reCent rounD

corporate corner

LAHORE

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KARACHI: Bahria Town Karachi is a model city of excellence, an epitome of state-of-the-art infrastructure and modern town planning.. Its brilliance was put to test during the first spell of monsoon rain.. Not surprisingly, during this heavy downpour, there were no water puddles nor any overflowing gutters, rather the rain made the roads look cleaner and the environment even greener.. Water drained out completely and caused no power supply interruptions.. PRESS RElEASE

TAIMOOR HASSAN

COMMERCE platform PriceOye on Saturday announced that it has raised sixfigure funding in its ongoing pre Series-A round led by a United States (US) based venture capital fund SOSV. The startup declined to share the exact amount and only told Profit that the investment raised is the first in its ongoing round and more investments will follow. PriceOye also declined to publicly share the funding target for the round.

Profit independently tried to verify the size of the investment with the investor, SOSV. The venture capital fund also maintained confidentiality in respect of the size of the investment but confirmed to Profit in an email response

THE E-COMMERCE STARTUP SAYS INVESTMENT RAISED IS THE FIRST IN ITS ONGOING ROUND AND MORE INVESTMENTS WILL FOLLOW that all the funds have been disbursed to PriceOye. PriceOye had earlier raised a $450,000 seed round investment in 2019 from Fatima Ventures.

PriceOye.pk, the Islamabad-based e-commerce startup was co-founded by brothers Adnan Shaffi and Adeel Shaffi in 2015 to provide authentic, high-end products at low prices. The startup claims to have over two million monthly active users on its website and 38 per cent month-on-month growth as of August 2020.

“Pakistani consumers are ready for

a world-class online shopping experience, and PriceOye has proven itself to be the market leader thanks to the platform’s unbeatable prices and seamless experience. We’re grateful to back Adnan and Adeel as they go on to shape the future of the Pakistani economy,” SOSV General Partner William Bao Bean said while commenting on the recent funding.

“One of the biggest problems with online shopping in Pakistan is counterfeit products. PriceOye is bringing transparency and trust to the online shopping experience, helping the 210 million Pak-

Comprehensive economic reforms vital for sustainable growth: FPCCI ISLAMABAD ISLAMABAD: In line with the directive of Prime Minister Imran Khan on reaching out to the public through holding Khuli Kachehris by organizations under the federal government, National Highway Authority Chairman Capt (r) Sikander Qayyum held E-Kachehri at head office of the Authority through NHA official Facebook Page and answered the questions placed by the people from all over the country.. PRESS RElEASE

Petro Division terms media reports regarding GIDC judgment as 'misleading' ISLAMABAD APP

The Petroleum Division on Saturday took note of misleading advertisements printed by some newspapers regarding the Supreme Court’s (SC) judgment in the Gas Infrastructure Development Cess (GIDC) Act-2015 case.

"These advertisements have wrongfully presented the SC’s landmark judgment of August 13, 2020 on the GIDC Act 2015," the Petroleum Division said in a press statement. The Petroleum Division further said that such advertisements have wrongfully implied that the judgment would negatively affect the national economy and that there is no need to collect the outstanding GIDC as the already collected amount is sufficient to complete gas pipeline projects. "The advertisements erroneously claim that the North South Gas Pipeline project has already been awarded to another country,” the division said. The Petroleum Division refuted such stories and said that SC’s judgment is a win-win for both the government and the industry as it gives a timeframe of six months to the government to initiate gas infrastructure development projects by utilising the amount collected under the GIDC Act. Similarly, the division said that after the SC’s judgment collecting of cess has been stopped until the already collected amount is spent.

It further said that it has waived late payment surcharge and allowed 24 monthly installments to the industry for paying back the outstanding amount.

STAFF REPORT

Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) President Mian Anjum Nisar on Saturday stressed on the need for structural and economic reforms in order to ensure sustainable growth of the country’s economy.

He said that consistent borrowing by the country to increase reserves will only lead towards a debt trap adding that borrowing from other countries and financial institutions should be seen as a shortterm solution to prevent further depreciation of the local currency.

He said that the government should focus on increasing exports and restricting imports while urging the government to work on making the domestic industry more competitive in order to increase Pakistan’s export market.

He further said that the rise in exports will lead to a rise in aggregate demand and output which will help raise per capita income and reduce poverty in the country.

Anjum Nisar said that the global trade is still in a state of downturn due to the Covid-19 pandemic, however he added that Pakistan’s exports have bounced back after the country recorded a 5 per cent growth in exports in July 2020.

Prior to July, Pakistan’s exports were on a downward trajectory due to the global economic slump induced by Covid-19.

He further urged the government to work on diversifying Pakistan’s export market adding that the country’s exports are still heavily dependent on traditional export markets. He underlined the need for

istani consumers seamlessly buy certified products at low prices. Our focus on customer happiness has made PriceOye a leading e-commerce platform in Pakistan, and we look forward to going further with the support from SOSV,” said PriceOye Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Adnan Shaffi.

Pakistan has witnessed massive growth in e-commerce during the Covid-19 pandemic. According to the statement from the company, the country now has 170 million mobile users, of which 81 million are connected to the internet, making it the ninth country with most number of mobile users in the world.

PriceOye said that it will use the funds to expand its market share while continuing to serve the growing needs of Pakistani consumers in these challenging times.

Public debt sustainable, govt’s capacity to repay remains adequate: MoF ISLAMABAD STAFF REPORT

evaluating geographical diversification in order to re-align the focus towards new opportunities.

He said that the World Bank (WB), International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other donor agencies should be considered as a stop-gap arrangement, which may have forced excessive devaluation, steep monetary tightening and cut in development and defense expenditures.

Loans simply serve to bridge the gap until the effects of the reforms take effect. Problems occur if the country takes loans but fails to implement reforms, he added.

While talking about Pakistan’s tax policy, he said that the current tax system is heavily skewed towards indirect taxation and implementation of more direct taxes can improve tax collection.

Anjum Nisar further urged the government to enhance its focus on import substitution which he said will help reduce the import bill of

the country. He added that industries like chemicals, agriculture and steel are ideal candidates for import substitution.

“Enacting structural reforms, such as improvements in tax collection system, bureaucracy and ease of doing business requires political will and strict implementation of policies,” he said while adding that the government has taken initial steps in the right direction.

Quoting a report issued by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) the FPCCI president said that Pakistan’s current account deficit has contracted to a six-year low, foreign exchange reserves have increased, primary budget has recorded a surplus and core inflation has eased.

He further added that, exportbased manufacturing in the country has also showed signs of traction and construction activities have picked up pace which indicates that the economy is on the path of recovery.

The Ministry of Finance (MoF) on Saturday said that Pakistan’s public debt is at a sustainable level and the country’s capacity to repay it remains adequate. According to the latest date released by State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) the country’s total public debt-to-Gross Domestic Product (GDP) ratio has increased from 86.1 per cent in June 2019 to 87.2 per cent in June 2020. The same ratio had gone down to around 84 per cent in December 2019 due to a strong growth in Federal Board of Revenue’s (FBR) tax collection and strict control on current expenditure. According to the MoF, the government was able to post a primary surplus in February 2020 after a gap of many years due to its prudent policies. However, post February 2020, Pakistan’s economy was hit by a Covid-19 induced economic slowdown which led to reduction in revenues, increase in expenditures, decline in domestic and global demand, lower tourism and business travel and disruption of supply, trade and production linkages. The MoF said that Pakistan’s debt-to-GDP ratio has increased due to a sharp decline in growth and an increase in the budget deficit primarily due to Covid-19 related expenditures, during the last four months of FY20. However, it added that the government will be able to bring the debt-toGDP ratio on a downward path over the medium term by increasing revenues and maintaining fiscal discipline. According to the Global Economic Prospects report published by the World Bank in June 2020, Pakistan’s economy has fared better than its other South Asian economies during the coronavirus pandemic.

Value stocks may lead US out of economic slump, experts say NEW YORK AGENCIES

As US stocks hit record highs, some investors are betting the market’s future gains will be increasingly driven by some of its lesser-loved companies.

Value stocks - shares of economically sensitive companies trading at multiples that are usually below those found on growth names - have been among the laggards in the market’s blistering rally from its March lows.

Some investors believe the relative cheapness of value stocks, which include energy companies, banks and industrial conglomerates, will catapult them to leadership if the nascent US economic revival gains momentum, shifting focus from the big technology-related stocks that have led markets during the coronavirus pandemic.

The Russell 1000 Value index trades at almost 18 times earnings, up from 14 a year ago, and is up some 45 per cent since late March. By comparison, the Russell 1000

BOFA GLOBAL RESEARCH SAYS US VALUE STOCKS HAVE LED DURING THE RECOVERY FROM EVERY ONE OF THE LAST 14 RECESSIONS Growth index trades at a multiple of 31, up from 22, and has gained over 70 per cent in the same period.

“It’s an important part of validating the market’s rise, to have cyclicals and value sectors move,” said Nicholas Colas, cofounder of DataTrek Research.

“At the end of the day I think value can outperform, but it’s going to be very episodic.”

Hopes of economic healing got a second wind Thursday, when Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell rolled out a sweeping policy rewrite that puts more focus on fighting unemployment than controlling inflation, sending shares of banks like Wells Fargo and Citigroup higher on the day.

Investors in the coming week will be keeping a close eye on Friday’s US non-farm payrolls data, looking for a snapshot of how

the country’s economic recovery is faring.

Other arguments for a value resurgence have been fueled by signs of progress on a vaccine against Covid-19, which some investors believe could accelerate business reopenings and a return to in-person schooling across the United States.

US President Donald Trump has said a vaccine for the novel coronavirus could be available before the November 3 presidential election, sooner than most experts anticipate.

Some analysts, including those at Goldman Sachs, believe a vaccine could be approved as early as the end of this year.

That could take the S&P 500 as high as 3,700 by year-end and spur a rotation to value names, especially if the news flow regarding a vaccine continues to be encouraging, Goldman’s analysts said earlier this month. The index recently hovered near 3,500.

CMYK

Plenty of market participants doubt value will return anytime soon, or that such a move can be timed profitably.

Value sectors such as retail have struggled for years with lackluster earnings or business models that are being disrupted in a shift to a more tech-driven world, a process that accelerated during the coronavirus pandemic.

“Valuation alone doesn’t drive stock prices. It’s the combination of valuation and improving fundamentals,” said Richard Bernstein, chief executive officer and chief investment officer at Richard Bernstein Advisors in New York.

“For value to outperform, one typically needs profit growth to accelerate. That’s not happening yet,” he said.

BofA Global Research points out that value stocks have led during the recovery from every one of the last 14 recessions.

Yet it also warns of “value traps” - stocks whose prices are falling faster than earnings are deteriorating. Such stocks have underperformed broader markets by four percentage points a year since 1997, the bank said.

BofA’s model identified energy and brick-and-mortar retail as sectors where value traps can be found.

Kim Forrest, chief investment officer at Bokeh Capital Partners, believes resurgences in value may be a thing of the past.

Technology has transformed the way companies deal with their inventory and altered the business cycle, sapping the benefits cyclical companies would receive from an upswing in growth, she said.

“There are some dinosaurs that don’t get that the comet has hit and the (investment) environment has changed,” said Forrest.

Others, like Bill Smead of Smead Capital Management, remain hopeful.

An eventual rise in inflation could boost the shares of energy companies, banks and home builders, which have tended to perform better when consumer prices trend higher, Smead said in a note to investors.

Even longtime value bulls like Smead can have their fortitude tested, however.

“We are patient, but that patience doesn’t last forever,” he wrote.

Sunday, 30 August, 2020

10 FOREIGN NEWS India records another surge in daily coronavirus cases NEW DELHI AGENCIES

India reported 76,472 new coronavirus cases on Saturday, slightly lower than the record breaking numbers of the past couple of days, but extending a run that has made the country’s outbreak currently the world’s worst. India has reported a total of 3.46 million cases during the pandemic, a tally that places them behind the United States and Brazil in terms of total caseload. However, the south Asian country has reported higher single-day case rises than both those countries for almost two weeks. India’s death toll rose by 1,021 to 62,550, data from the federal health ministry showed, even as local media reported that some nationwide restrictions on travel could be eased from next week. The government might allow underground train networks to partially reopen, local media reported, an easing that Delhi’s chief minister has said is necessary to get the city back to full speed.

The western Indian state of Maharashtra, home to India’s financial capital Mumbai, recorded 331 fatalities, the steepest single-day increase among all states over the past two days. On Friday, lawmaker H. Vasanthakumar from the country’s main opposition party Congress became the latest high profile figure to die from Covid-19, the infection caused by the novel coronavirus. “The news of Kanyakumari MP, Shri H Vasanthakumar’s untimely demise due to Covid-19 has come as a shock,” Rahul Gandhi, a leading member of the Congress party said in a tweet late on Friday.

Berlin police disband mass protest against Covid-19 restrictions Berlin police on Saturday disbanded a mass protest in the German capital against coronavirus curbs a few hours after it had begun after marchers failed to heed their orders to keep their distance and wear masks.

The protest came as infections rise across Europe, with similar protests during the day in Paris and elsewhere. "Unfortunately, we have no other option," Berlin police said on Twitter. "All the measures taken so far have not led to compliance with the conditions." A police spokesman said the protesters were dispersing peacefully, though the police also reported on Twitter pockets of disturbance, such as a construction container fire and blocked roads. Police, who deployed 3,000 officers to control crowds estimated at 18,000, had been preparing for possible violence as activists opposed to the virus measures urged social media followers across Europe to arm themselves and gather in Berlin. Earlier this week the city banned the protest but a German regional court overnight gave the final go-ahead by overruling the earlier decision. Activists, angered by the city's attempt to ban their protest after demonstrators at a previous rally failed to wear masks or keep their distance, flooded the city with thousands of applications for additional protests this weekend.

Until now Germany has managed the coronavirus crisis better than many of its European counterparts, with rigorous testing helping to hold down infections and deaths. But new daily infections have accelerated in recent weeks, as in much of the world. On Friday, Chancellor Angela Merkel urged citizens to keep up their guard against the virus. "This is a serious matter, as serious as it's ever been, and you need to carry on taking it seriously," she said. AGENCIES

TUrkey CondeMnS eU'S SanCTIonS ThreaT ANKARA

T

TLTP

URKISH Vice President Fuat Oktay has slammed a recent threat by the European Union to slap Ankara with sanctions as "hypocritical" as his country prepares to carry out a military drill off the coast of Cyprus amid tensions in the eastern Mediterranean.

Oktay's comments on Saturday came a day after Josep Borrell, the EU's foreign policy chief, said the bloc was preparing to impose sanctions on Turkey - including tough economic measures unless progress is made in reducing soaring tensions with Greece and Cyprus in the eastern Mediterranean.

"It is hypocritical for the European Union to call for dialogue and, simultaneously, make other plans regarding

ISSUES ADVISORY FOR LIVE-FIRE DRILLS IN EAST MEDITERRANEAN TILL SEPT 11 Turkey's activities within our continental shelf in the Eastern Mediterranean," Oktay said on Twitter.

"We are proficient in the language of peace and diplomacy, but do not hesitate to do the necessary thing when it comes to defending Turkey's rights and interests. France and Greece know that better than anyone."

Ankara has also issued a new Navtex maritime advisory, stating it will hold military exercises in the Eastern Mediterranean in the next two weeks. The announcement comes amid a tense territorial dispute with Turkey’s neighbor Greece.

The live-fire drills will be held be-

tween August 29 and September 11, according to the advisory issued by the country’s navy late on Friday. The area marked for the exercise lies to the south of the town of Anamur, between the Turkish coast and Cyprus.

The announcement follows other advisories issued by Turkey this week.

Ankara previously announced a gunnery exercise in the Eastern Mediterranean for September 1-2, and extended the survey mission of its Oruc Reis research vessel, which was set to end this Thursday.

Oruc Reis, backed up by several military vessels, has been conducting oil and gas exploration in the contested waters of

White House suggests $1.3tr Covid aid bill; Pelosi says not enough WASHINGTON AGENCIES

President Donald Trump is willing to sign a $1.3 trillion coronavirus relief bill, a top aide said on Friday, but Democratic House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the sum was not enough to meet the needs of the American people.

Trump said later that Pelosi was only interested in bailing out states run by Democrats, casting doubt on chances of reviving stalled talks for another round of fiscal stimulus.

The new figure was put forward

by White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, marking a $300 billion increase from an initial $1 trillion offer from the White House and Senate Republicans.

Three weeks after talks on Capitol Hill broke down without a deal on legislation to help Americans suffering from the coronavirus pandemic, Meadows said the Republican president was “right now willing to sign something at $1.3 trillion.”

Hours later, Pelosi in a statement repeated her call for a $2.2 trillion bill and said Meadows’ offer would not meet the needs of American workers and families.

Pelosi said, among other things, the Republicans “are rejecting the funding needed for testing and tracing

the Eastern Mediterranean close to the Greek islands, adding to the tensions between the two NATO allies. The increased activity in the region has resulted in several incidents between the two nations.

The latest one came late on Friday, when six Greek F-16s approached the area affected by Ankara’s Navtex and were driven away by their Turkish counterparts.

Both Greece and Turkey assert overlapping claims to parts of the waters surrounding the islands of Crete and Cyprus.

Ankara’s claims have been bolstered by its maritime agreement with the UN-recognized government of Libya, reached last year. The deal has been rejected by Greece, however, as well as a number of other countries, including France. Despite the mounting international pressure, Ankara has refused to back down, vowing to continue oil and gas exploration in the troubled waters. TLTP

Military won't play role in US 2020 election, says top general WASHINGTON TLTP

to crush the virus and safely reopen schools and the economy.”

She said she hoped the Republicans would accept the Democratic offer and resume negotiations.

Asked about talks between Pelosi and Meadows about another stimulus package, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on a flight to Washington from New Hampshire: “My im-

pression is she wants to give no stimulus, all she wants is bailout for badly run Democrat states.”

He said another stimulus package would be good.

The Democratic-led House in May passed a $3.4 trillion coronavirus relief bill, which was not taken up by the Republican-dominated Senate.

The US military will not play a role in this year's election, according to the country's top general. "In the event of a dispute over some aspect of the elections, by law U.S. courts and the U.S. Congress are required to resolve any disputes, not the U.S. military," Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman, wrote in a letter released on Friday responding to questions from two House lawmakers. "I believe deeply in the principle of an apolitical U.S. military," Milley continued. "I foresee no role for the U.S. Armed Forces in this process."

The answers came as presidential nominees stoke questions about military involvement in this year's election. The US President and 2020 Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has raised the prospect that he won't accept the results in November, claiming without providing any evidence that mail-in voting could lead to widespread voter fraud. "I have to see," Trump told Fox News's Chris Wallace last month when asked if he would accept the election results. "No, I'm not just going to say yes, I'm not going to say no, and I didn't last time either." Former US Vice President and 2020 Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden said in June that he's "absolutely convinced" that the military would step in if Trump rejected the results.

After Shinzo Abe's resignation, what's next for Japan?

The abrupt resignation of Japan's longestserving prime minister, Shinzo Abe, on Friday triggered an election in his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to replace him as its president, followed by a vote in parliament to elect a new prime minister.

Abe and his cabinet will continue to run the government until a new premier is elected but will not be able to adopt new policies. The winner of the party election will hold the post until the end of Abe's LDP term in September 2021.

The new party president is virtually assured the premiership, since the party has a majority in parliament’s lower house.

Usually, the party must announce the election for its leader a month in advance, and its members of parliament vote along with grassroots members. In case of a sudden resignation, however, an extraordinary vote can be called "at the soonest date possible" with participants narrowed to MPs and representatives of the party's local chapters.

The LDP has yet to decide on the format for the elections. It is considering holding the vote around Sept. 15, local media said on Saturday.

Here are details of some likely contenders to take the helm.

Shigeru iShiba: A hawkish former

defence minister and rare LDP critic of Abe, Ishiba, 63, regularly tops surveys of lawmakers whom voters want to see as the next premier, but is less popular with the party's lawmakers.

The soft-spoken security maven has also held portfolios for agriculture and reviving local economies. Ishiba held a meeting of his LDP faction on Friday and indicated he would enter the race, with an announcement expected early next week. He defeated Abe in the first round of a party presidential election in 2012, thanks to strong grassroots support, but lost in the second round when only MPs could vote. In a 2018 party leadership poll, Ishiba lost heavily to Abe. He has criticised the Bank of Japan's ultra-low interest rates for hurting regional banks and called for higher public works spending to remedy growing inequality.

Fumio KiShida: Kishida, 63, served as foreign minister under Abe from 2012 to 2017, but diplomacy remained mainly in the prime minister's grip.

The low-key lawmaker from Hiroshima has been widely seen as Abe's preferred successor but ranks low in voter surveys.

Kishida seemed caught off guard by Abe's announcement. The news broke while he was meeting supporters in eastern Japan.

"I want to confirm the facts," he said, rushing back for a Tokyo-bound train, when asked by reporters for his reaction. Later, in Tokyo, he said he would run for party leader.

Kishida hails from one of the party's more dovish factions and is seen as less keen on revising the pacifist postwar constitution than Abe, for whom it was a cherished goal.

The BOJ's hyper-easy monetary policy "cannot go on forever," Kishida has said.

YoShihide Suga: Suga, 71, a selfmade politician and loyal lieutenant since Abe's troubled term as premier in 2006 and 2007, was among a band of allies who pushed Abe to run again for the top post in 2012.

Back in office, Abe tapped Suga as chief cabinet secretary, a pivotal role that includes acting as top government spokesman, coordinating policies and keeping bureaucrats in line.

Talk of Suga as a contender bubbled up in April 2019 after he unveiled the new imperial era name, "Reiwa", for use on Japanese calendars after the enthronement of the new emperor. Although he has so far publicly denied interest in being prime minister, Suga went on a publicity blitz in the week before Abe's resignation, giving interviews to at least four major media organizations.

Suga's clout was dented by scandals that toppled two cabinet ministers close to him

last October.

Taro Kono: Defence Minister Taro Kono, 56, has a reputation as a maverick but has toed the line on key Abe policies, including a stern stance in a feud with South Korea over wartime history.

Educated at Georgetown University and a fluent English speaker, he previously served as foreign minister and minister for administrative reform.

He has differentiated his conservative stances from those of his father, former chief cabinet secretary Yohei Kono, who authored a landmark 1993 apology to “comfort women”, a euphemism for women forced to work in Japan's wartime military brothels.

Shinjiro Koizumi: The name of Koizumi, 39, now environment minister and the son of charismatic former premier Junichiro Koizumi, is often floated as a future premier, but many consider him too young.

He shares some of Abe’s conservative views and has paid his respects at Tokyo's controversial Yasukuni Shrine for war dead.

Koizumi has projected a reforming image on the basis of efforts to cut Japan's backing for coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel, but has typically taken care not to offend party elders.

ToShimiTSu moTegi: Currently foreign minister, Motegi, 64, previously served

as economy minister, facing off with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer in tough negotiations.

Motegi was trade minister under Abe when he returned to power in 2012, tackling talks on the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade pact.

Educated at the University of Tokyo and Harvard, Motegi was first elected to the lower house in 1993 from the then-opposition Japan New Party. He joined the LDP in 1995.

KaTSunobu KaTo, YaSuToShi niShimura: As health minister, Kato, 64, was in the limelight in the early days of Japan's coronavirus outbreak but then-Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura, 57, a former trade official, emerged as point person on virus policy.

In 2015, Kato, a father of four, was handed the portfolio for boosting Japan's rock-bottom birth rate, a task that has had little success. He is a former official of the finance ministry.

SeiKo noda: Noda, 59, has made no secret of her desire to become Japan's first female premier. An Abe critic, the former internal affairs minister, who also held the portfolio for women's empowerment, fell short of backing to join the race for party leader in 2018.AGENCIES

Sunday, 30 August, 2020

SPORTS 11

BAnTOn hiTS OuT BeFOre rAin enDS 1ST eng-PAK T20

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Babar Azam rejoins Somerset for T20 Blast MANCHESTER AGENCIES

Pakistan star Babar Azam will rejoin Somerset for this year's domestic Twenty20 Blast, the English county announced Saturday. Babar, the world's top-ranked Twenty20 batsman, was the leading run-scorer in the 2019 edition. Babar, currently captaining Pakistan in their T20 series in England after featuring in all three Tests earlier in the tour, had agreed to return to southwest club Somerset before the coronavirus pandemic upended cricket schedules around the world. But while Covid-19 has seen several counties cancel deals with overseas players, Babar will be back at Somerset's Taunton base on Wednesday. The 25-year-old is set to be available for Somerset's final seven group matches plus the knockout stages should they qualify. "For obvious reasons, this year has been very different from what we were all expecting, and I fully appreciate the challenges the game has faced globally as well as here in England," Babar said in a Somerset statement.

"We have all had to adapt and I'm just really pleased that we could find a way to make this happen. I hope that I can help to contribute to success on the field for Somerset again." In his first season with Somerset, Babar compiled 578 runs at an impressive average of 52.54 and an astounding strike-rate of 149.35. "He is a great player, is so easy on the eye and fitted brilliantly into our environment last year," said Somerset director of cricket Andy Hurry. "We consider Babar to be one of our own."

Britain's Lizzie Deignan wins women's Tour de France event NICE AGENCIES

Britain's Lizzie Deignan won the women's cycling race La Course on Saturday, edging a desperate rush for the line by a whisker ahead of defending champion Marianne Vos. The one-off single stage event preceded the start of the Tour de France which gets under way later Saturday. The 96km course around Nice embarked with 138 riders but was blown apart on a 5.5km climb in the rolling hills outside Nice. Deignan, who lives in nearby Monaco, was part of the escape that rushed down a steep, technical descent led by current world champion Annemiek Van Vlueten.

Once the breakaway pack of six were on the flat coastal run into Nice it was a cat-andmouse affair until Vos attacked and opened a gap large enough to believe in victory. But Deignan put in an irresistible late dash to finish just centimetres ahead.

AGENCIES

NGLAND rising star Tom Banton made a fine 71 before Pakistan fought back in the first Twenty20 international at Old Trafford on Friday only for rain to reduce the match to a no-result washout.

England had threatened a huge total while the 21-year-old Banton was compiling his maiden fifty in four T20s at this level. But his exit left England 109-3 and sparked a collapse that saw the 50-over world champions lose four wickets for 14 runs — all to spin — in 19 balls.

Rain fell with England 131-6 off 16.1 overs.

The umpires held a lengthy inspection but decided shortly after 9:00pm (2000 GMT) that the outfield was too wet to get the game back on.

But Banton, opening after Jason Roy was ruled out with a side injury, at least had a night to remember after being dropped on five when Iftikhar Ahmed floored a routine slip catch off unfortunate paceman Shaheen Afridi.

“It was good fun,” Banton told Sky Sports. “I struggled to begin with, they bowled quite nicely and then I just backed myself when the spinners came on. There was a small boundary on one side.”

Pakistan struck five balls after captain Babar Azam won the toss when left-arm spinner Imad Wasim caught and bowled Jonny Bairstow.

But Banton took charge with two slog-swept sixes off consecutive balls from leg-spinner Shadab Khan. He went on to complete a 33-ball fifty featuring three fours and three sixes before scooping paceman Haris Rauf for an audacious six over fine leg only to slice Imad to extra-cover.

England captain Eoin Morgan was then lbw to Iftikhar Ahmed before Moeen Ali was well caught

by Mohammad Rizwan off Shadab.

Wicketkeeper Rizwan, who impressed during Pakistan's recent 1-0 Test series defeat by England, then stumped Lewis Gregory off Imad, who took 2-31 from his maximum four overs. The second fixture in this three-match series takes place at Old Trafford on Sunday.

Anderson record may be 'Jimmy's alone', says Sangakkara MANCHESTER AGENCIES

Sri Lanka great Kumar Sangakkara believes England's James Anderson may have set a record that will be "Jimmy's alone" after he became the first paceman to take 600 Test wickets.

Anderson, 38, made history when he had Pakistan captain Azhar Ali caught at slip by England skipper Joe Root in the drawn third Test at Southampton on Tuesday.

MCC president Sangakkara, in an email to club members published Saturday, said Anderson's feat was a "joyful moment for the ages" and "an exceptional achievement". "Jimmy is a fast bowler of immense skill and determination," added the 42-year-old Sangakkara, a former Sri Lanka captain.

"His achievement is tremendous,

not just for the fact that it is 600 wickets, but also for what that entails in terms of effort, commitment and reinvention." The only bowlers ahead of Anderson in the all-time list of Test wicket-takers are three retired spinners -- Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan (800), Australia's Shane Warne (708) and India's Anil Kumble (619).

And of the three other fast bowlers to have taken more than 500 Test wickets, only Anderson's longstanding England new-ball colleague Stuart Broad (514 wickets), is still an active cricketer, with Australia's Glenn McGrath (563) and West Indies' Courtney Walsh (519) having long since hung up their boots. "He has set a record for current and future pace bowlers to chase, but it may just be one record that will be Jimmy's and Jimmy's alone," said Sangakkara, a former wicketkeeper-bats-

man who appeared in 134 Tests and was Sri Lanka's captain when they lost the 2011 World Cup final to India in Mumbai. "It was my great privilege to play against him and I now share with you the enjoyment of watching him from beyond the boundary rope for as long as he may continue."

Sangakkara is the first overseas president in the 233-year-old history of Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), the owners of London's Lord's cricket ground. By tradition, MCC presidents serve for just one year.

But with no internationals being played at Lord's, 'the home of cricket' in 2020 because of Covid-19 -- Saturday will see the ground's first match of the season when Middlesex play Kent in an English domestic Twenty20 -Sangakkara's time in office has been extended by 12 months.

Ferrari face Belgian qualifying embarrassment AGENCIES Last year's winners Ferrari faced the prospect of an embarrassing qualifying performance on Saturday after a disappointing final practice for the Belgian Grand Prix.

Charles Leclerc, who claimed his maiden F1 victory last year, was 17th and four-time champion Sebastian Vettel 20th and last in the session, the two Ferrari men struggling even to match the Italian outfit’s customer teams.

The two Haas drivers, powered by Ferrari engines, Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean, were 14th and 15th ahead of Ferrari-powered Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Raikkonen, 16th.

Team boss Mattia Binotto had warned on Friday that Fer-

rari faced a host of issues as they battled to find performance at the long, demanding and high-speed Spa-Francorchamps circuit. The team has struggled this year with a power deficit to their rivals, but Binotto said it was not only this deficiency that hampered their speed, but also a struggle to warm up their tyres and find balance.

"We struggle to make the tyres work," said Binotto. "We are lacking grip, both in braking and acceleration. There is no overall performance to the car. So certainly the drivers are complaining about grip, overall grip.

“I think it's the same situation on both cars so it's not driver related. It's really the way we set up the car in order to find the right window on the tyres."

Australia's Stoinis glad of no more apple attacks in England MANCHESTER AGENCIES

Cricket behind closed doors may have its drawbacks, but it should at least spare Australia's Marcus Stoinis from being pelted with fruit again if he makes a return to international action in England next month.

The 31-year-old batting all-rounder has not featured for his country since their World Cup semi-final loss to eventual champions and tournament hosts England last year -- a match in which he was out for a duck.

But he is now back in the squad for next month's Twenty20 and one-day international series against England.

Unlike the World Cup semi-final, played at a raucous Edgbaston, September's fixtures will not have any fans in the stands because of the coronavirus outbreak.

And while star batsmen Steve Smith and David Warner were the main targets for English crowd taunts last year following their roles in a ball-tampering scandal in South Africa, Stoinis was not immune.

"We always love playing here (England) regardless," Stoinis told reporters Saturday.

"The banter is usually pretty good. I did have an apple thrown at me last year but apart from that it's pretty good. It will be a different experience. It will be up to the team to create some energy and run around."

Stoinis was dropped after averaging a meagre 14.50 with the bat during the World Cup, with a side strain limiting his effectiveness as a medium-pace bowler.

But after more than a year of international exile, Stoinis has forced his way back into the squad after becoming the leading run-scorer in this season's Aus-

tralia's domestic Twenty20 Big Bash League, with 705 runs at 54.23 for the Melbourne Stars.

"It can be frustrating when you feel like you're results on the board and you don't get rewarded," said Stoinis, a veteran of 41 ODIs and 19 T20s.

"But in the same breath there's probably five, six, seven players who feel the same way. So you don't get too carried away with it, you just keep doing your thing. "It's a nice reward to be back."

Stoinis boosted his hopes of a recall with an unbeaten 21 off 17 balls in Australia's first intra-squad match on Friday.

The postponement of the T20 World Cup, due to start in Australia in October, could also work in his favour. The 2021 edition will take place in India.

But with the pandemic playing havoc with the cricket calendar, Stoinis said: "The schedule is so up in the air."

CMYK

England and Australia will play three T20 matches and three ODIs. The first T20 game takes place in Southampton on September 4.

Karachi may host remaining PSL matches KARACHI PPI

Karachi may host the remaining four matches of Pakistan Super League (PSL) 2020 matches, likely to be held between November 12th and 18th. PSL 2020 edition had to be ended abruptly earlier this year after coronavirus cases started to rise in the country. But PCB has been encouraged by the falling number of Covid-19 cases in the country and is now pondering over hosting the remaining PSL 2020 matches in a bio-secure environment, according to a local media report. PCB has identified a window for the remainder matches. The window falls after the Zimbabwe home series and before the T10 league in UAE. It is expected that foreign players may not come to join their respective teams except players from other Asian countries. PCB is expected to follow SOPs similar to what England followed while hosting Pakistan for Test and T20I series.

However, unlike England PCB may allow a limited number of fans to witness the games within the stadium. The biggest challenge the board faces in its aspirations to organize the remaining matches is that it will have to settles its differences with broadcasters and franchises. Moreover, it will also have to get a green signal from the government as well.

Ollie Pope out for four months after suffering dislocated shoulder AGENCIES Ollie Pope has been ruled out for up to four months after dislocating his left shoulder during last week's third Test against Pakistan at the Ageas Bowl. The injury occurred on the fourth day of the match, when Pope slid to save a boundary off the second ball of Stuart Broad's first over of the day and left the pitch immediately. He underwent an MRI scan in London on Wednesday and was reviewed by a consultant on Thursday. He will now have surgery on the injured shoulder in the next couple of weeks before commencing a rehabilitation programme with the Surrey and England medical teams. The injury is a cruel recurrence for Pope, given that he injured the same shoulder while playing for Surrey last summer. He was out of action for three months on that occasion, and was unavailable for selection during England's Ashes campaign. It is possible, however, that Pope will not miss any Test cricket on this occasion, with England's next engagements coming against Sri Lanka and India in early 2021, by which stage it is hoped that he will have recovered full fitness. Despite a tailingoff in form during the Pakistan series, Pope has been one of England's breakthrough players of the past few months. He scored a matchwinning 135 not out against South Africa in Port Elizabeth in January, then made a crucial 91 in the series decider against West Indies in Manchester. He was also England's top scorer in the first innings of the first Test against Pakistan, making 62 out of a total of 219, a performance that would prove vital in the team's fightback to win on the fourth afternoon.

Sunday, 30 August, 2020

PrAyEr TImINGS

NEWS

PakiSTan CondemnS kaShmiriS’ killing, CurbS on religiouS gaTheringS in iok

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ISLAMABAD TLTP

AKISTAN has strongly condemned the extra-judicial killing of four Kashmiris in fake encounter and imposition of restrictions on religious gatherings and processions in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK).

In a statement on Saturday, Foreign Office Spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri strongly condemned the extra-judicial

killing of four more Kashmiris in a staged encounter in Shopian region of the IOK. He said equally condemnable are the restrictions imposed on religious processions and gatherings during Muharram. Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri said India's inhuman methods to subjugate the Kashmiri people through killings, torture, forced disappearances and incarcerations have failed in the past and will not succeed in the future.

He urged the international community to hold India accountable for its serious

crimes against the Kashmiri people. The spokesperson reiterated Pakistan's commitment to expose India for its illegal and unacceptable actions in IOK and extend its full support to the Kashmiris in their just struggle for the inalienable right to self-determination.

Earlier on Friday, Indian troops in their fresh act of state terrorism martyred four more Kashmiri youth in Shopian district.

The troops martyred the youth during a cordon and search operation in Kiloora

area of the district.

On the other hand, the occupation authorities prevented Muharram processions, on Friday, by imposing strict restrictions across the Kashmir Valley and arresting dozens of mourners.

Hurriyat leaders, Muhammad Yousuf Naqash, Khawaja Firdous and Yasmeen Raja, in their statements in Srinagar denounced the use of brute force on Muharram processions in Srinagar, Badgam and other parts of the Kashmir Valley.

Single Covid death reported as active cases fall to 8,748 ISLAMABAD TLTP

The number of active coronavirus cases in the country has dropped to 8,748 from 8,833 during the last twenty-four hours as a total of 280,340 patients have recovered from COVID-19 in the country, said National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) on Saturday. According to the latest statistics, the country reported 319 new coronavirus cases and only a single death over the previous 24 hours, lifting the number of fatalities to 6,284. New 319 new cases were detected when 22,434 samples were tested during this period across the country. A total of 1,084 patients are under treatment in 735 hospitals across the country, out of whom 112 are on ventilators. Meanwhile, Punjab reported 63 new coronavirus cases over the past 24 hours and no death related to the contagion was reported in the province. According to the Punjab Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department, the total number of confirmed cases across the province has reached 96,699. As many as 935,716 samples have been tested to diagnose the presence of COVID-19 so far, according to a statement of the health department. The number of people recovered from the infection in the province has surged to 92,449. The number of people who died of the disease in the province stands at 2,195.

The Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department requested people to continue taking precautionary measures to keep the virus at bay until it is completely weeded out. The provincial government had recently imposed “micro smart lockdown” in small neighbourhoods of three cities for a period of fourteen days to prevent the spread of the deadly virus. The localities have been sealed in Lahore, Rawalpindi, Gujranwala and other cities.

China's Wuhan says all schools to reopen on Tuesday SHANGHAI AGENCIES

China’s Wuhan, the initial host of Covid19 pandemic and the city that reported the maximum number of cases in China, has decided to reopen its educational institutes including kindergarten by Tuesday, according to the local authorities.As many as 2,842 educational institutions across the city are set to open their doors to almost 1.4 million students when the autumn semester gets underway, the local government announced on Friday. Wuhan University reopened on Monday.The city said it has drawn up emergency plans to switch back to online teaching should risk levels change. It advised students to wear masks to and from school and avoid public transportation if possible.Schools have been ordered to stock up on disease control equipment and to carry out drills and training sessions to help prepare for new outbreaks. They must also restrict unnecessary mass gatherings, and submit daily reports to health authorities.Foreign students and teachers who have not received notice from their school will not be allowed to return, it said.The central Chinese city, where the COVID-19 epidemic is believed to have originated, was locked down for more than two months from late January.

LAHORE: A security officer checks a mourner before allowing him to attend the 9th Muharram procession near Data Darbar. Zubair Mehfooz

FAJR SUNRISE

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Three more youth martyred in iok ISLAMABAD TLTP

The Indian troops in their fresh act of state terrorism martyred three more Kashmiri youth in Pulwama district of Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) on Saturday. The troops martyred the youth during a cordon and search operation in the district. Meanwhile, All Parties Hurriyat Conference spokesman, in a statement in Srinagar, paid rich tributes to the martyred youth. He condemned the use of brute force on Muharram processions and arbitrary arrests of youth in Srinagar, Badgam and other areas of the territory. Defying restrictions and ban on Muharram processions, people took out processions and held mourning prayers in Srinagar and Badgam. The speakers emphasized that the Kashmiris are treading the path of Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) by offering sacrifices for a sacred cause. Tehreek-e Wahdat-e-Islami raised pro-freedom banners at many places describing Narendra Modi as the Yazid of the time. The Jammu and Kashmir Anjuman Sharie Shian in a statement issued in Srinagar deplored that the party President, Agha Syed Hassan Al-Moosvi Al-Safvi, was again prevented from presiding over the annual Muharram majlis in Markazi Imam Bargah, Shariyatabad in Badgam. It said that thousands of mourners gathered and protested against the continued house arrest of Agha Hassan Al-Moosvi. The Chairman of Jammu and Kashmir Tehreek-e-Mazhamat, Bilal Siddiqi, in a statement in Srinagar expressed grave concern over the stepped-up human rights violations and killing of Kashmiri youth by Indian troops in the occupied territory.

Earlier, Indian troops martyred four Kashmiri youth in Shopian district on Friday last.

UAE scraps Israel boycott in new step towards normal ties DUBAI AGENCIES

The president of the United Arab Emirates scrapped an economic boycott against Israel, allowing trade and financial agreements between the countries in another key step towards normal ties, the UAE’s state news agency reported on Saturday.

Israel and the UAE said on Aug 13 they would normalise diplomatic relations in a deal brokered by US President Donald Trump that reshapes the order of Middle East politics from the Palestinian issue to the fight against Iran.

President Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan issued a decree abolishing a boycott law as part of “the UAE’s efforts to expand diplomatic and commercial cooperation with Israel, leading to bilateral relations by stimulating economic growth and promoting technological innovation,” the WAM news agency said. The announcement came as Israeli flag carrier El Al Israel Airlines Ltd prepared to operate the country’s first direct flight between Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport and the UAE’s capital, Abu Dhabi.

An Israeli government delegation and top aides to Trump, including his senior adviser Jared Kushner, are due to travel on the flight on Aug. 31, a U.S. official said.

Before the Aug. 13 deal can be offi-

UAE PRESIDENT ISSUES A DECREE ABOLISHING A BOYCOTT LAW AS PART OF ‘THE COUNTRY’S EFFORTS TO EXPAND DIPLOMATIC AND COMMERCIAL COOPERATION WITH ISRAEL’

cially signed, details must be agreed on issues such as the opening of embassies, trade and travel links.

Israel’s Channel 13 TV said bilateral

trade could initially be worth $4 billion a year, a figure it said could soon be tripled or quadrupled. Government officials did not immediately confirm that estimate.

Israeli Agriculture Minister Alon Schuster said Israel was working on potential joint projects that could help improve the oil-rich Gulf nation’s food security, such as water desalination and crop cultivation in the desert. “With their money and our experience, we could go a long way,” he told Tel Aviv radio station 102 FM in an interview on Friday.

Officials from the two countries recently said they were looking at cooperation in defence, medicine, tourism and technology.

The decree announced on Saturday means UAE citizens and businesses will be free to do business with Israel.

The two countries do not yet have official air links, and it was unclear whether Monday’s El Al flight would be able to fly over Saudi Arabia - which has no official ties with Israel - to cut down on flight time.

In May, an Etihad Airways plane flew from the UAE to Tel Aviv to deliver supplies to the Palestinians to help fight coronavirus, marking the first known flight by an UAE carrier to Israel.

Afghanistan flash floods kill 160, search for bodies continues KABUL AGENCIES

Rescuers in Afghanistan continued to search amidst mud and rubble for missing people on Saturday after flash flooding this week killed around 160 people and washed away homes across the country, officials said.

Thirteen provinces, mostly in the

country’s north, had been affected by floods, according to the Ministry for Disaster Management.

In Parwan, just north of the capital Kabul, 116 people had been killed and more than 120 injured, with 15 people still missing, national and local officials said.

“Rescue teams are still in the area and searching for the missing bodies,” said Wahida Shahkar, a spokeswoman for Par-

wan’s governor.

Flash flooding hit Parwan early on Wednesday, washing away homes and buildings. Local police spokesman Salim Noori said that the community in the worstaffected areas were mostly farmers and informal workers who were already struggling financially and that police were appealing for donations of blood for the many injured.

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

The Ministry of Defence said that Afghan security forces were assisting in recovery efforts and distributing aid. The forces have also been dealing with rising violence from the insurgent Taliban as the start of peace talks in Doha hit delays.

NATO said that its forces were also supporting the Afghan military and had flown food, water and blankets to the area earlier in the week.