EpaperKHI_21-11-15

Monday, 15 November, 2021 I 9 Rabi-us-Sani, 1443 I Rs 40.00 I Vol XII No 137 I 48 Pages I Karachi Edition

Muttaqi confirMs taliban Mediating between Pakistan, ttP g

no agreement yet but ceaSefire iS a ‘gooD Start’: SayS afghan fm muttaqi

ISLAMABAD app

t

he afghan taliban are mediating between Pakistan and the banned tehreek-i-taliban Pakistan (ttP) but no agreement has been reached so far, said afghanistan’s acting foreign minister amir Khan muttaqi on Sunday. in an interview, the official representing the regime in Kabul said the afghan taliban were acting as mediators on the desire of both the parties in Pakistan. muttaqi said the two sides had not yet reached an agreement, but the process has had a ‘good start’, leading to the announcement of a month-long ceasefire. he hoped that the process would not encounter any obstacles in the future and that relations between the government and the ttP would improve. Speaking to the bbc, in what the publication said was his first interview with a female journalist, the afghan minister said that Daesh (the militant islamic State group) was a threat to afghanistan. “however, the taliban government has eliminated it from a major part of the

Pakistan

CONFIRMED CASES:

1,279,636

LAST UPDATED AT 9:11 AM ON NOVEMBER 14, 2021

DAY'S DEATH TOLL:

NEW CASES:

11

263 DEATHS:

1,228,175 28,606 SINDH:

PUNJAB:

473,149

441,800

KPK:

BALOCHISTAN:

179,066 AJK/GB: 34,510/10,401

SayS DaeSh iS a threat to afghaniStan

country,” he said. “isolated incidents can take place anywhere in the world. Previously, 70 per cent of afghanistan was under the control of the islamic emirate. now, the taliban have purged these areas of the presence of Daesh,” he said, adding that they were present in areas ruled by the former Kabul government. after the taliban took over, Daesh started surfacing in these areas but the taliban government took effective measures to “control” them and confine them to certain areas, he said. “isolated (terrorist) incidents occur at some places such as mosques, which can also take place anywhere in the world,” he said.When asked about relations with new Delhi, the afghan official said that afghanistan did not want conflict with any country, including india.

“We do not want afghanistan to have a conflict with any other country or to have challenges arise that could affect our nation, therefore, we will continue to work on this issue,” he said.

When asked whether there was a reaction from china or Pakistan on afghanistan’s close ties with india, muttaqi referred to re-

coronavirus in

RECOVERED:

g

33,397 ISLAMABAD:

107,313

cent meetings held in moscow.

“When we participated in the moscow conference, the representatives of india, Pakistan and several other countries were also present. We had a positive conversation and will hopefully not oppose any country,” he said.

WOMEN’S RIGhTS aNd EducaTION: the afghan official also dispelled the impression that women were being excluded from different fields.

“Women have 100 per cent inclusion in the health sector. they are also teaching in the education sector. […] they are working in each and every one of those sectors where they are required,” he claimed.

“We have no such policy to deny women of their rights in any field,” he remarked. he said that the taliban government had not fired any female official who had worked under the previous government. “their salaries as well as opportunities for education and employment were also not affected,” he said. however, muttaqi conceded that educational institutions in some areas of afghanistan remain closed, citing the covid-19 pandemic as the reason. “educational institutes are closed in no province. educational institutes are open across the country,” he said, adding that schools had been divided into three categories. “all of the boys’ schools throughout the country are open while girl’s schools are open till class six,” he said. the afghan minister stated that higher education institutes were open in some provinces, but not all.

So far, 75pc of schools have been opened, he said, adding that officials were continuously making progress in this regard.

During the interview, muttaqi said that the taliban government had fulfilled the international community’s demand for an inclusive government, which represented all stakeholders in afghan society.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 05

Good news on IMF talks on the cards, says Tarin adviser to the Prime minister on finance and revenue Shaukat tarin on Sunday stated that uncertainty surrounding the international monetary fund’s (imf) loan facility for Pakistan will be over soon, saying a “good news” was in the offing.

While addressing a gathering today, tarin said the imf’s expected announcement of the eff resumption would also help arrest the rupee’s devaluation. “once the settlement with the imf is reached, it will also rein in speculators causing devaluation of rupee,” the Pm’s adviser said. tarin said speculative elements had caused eight to nine rupees’ worth of devaluation to the rupee, also adding that an additional demand for dollar by afghan citizens was also adding to the pressure on the Pakistani currency. the adviser thanked Saudi arabia for giving Pakistan $3 billion in safe deposits and $1.2bn to $1.5bn worth of oil supplies on deferred payments, saying “it will be materialised in the next few days”. earlier this month, tarin had announced that the government’s agreement with the imf over the revival of the $6 billion extended fund facility (eff) had been reached and a formal accord would be signed in a week. however, an announce-

Opposition sets preconditions for legislation on electoral reforms ISLAMABAD staff RepoRt

the joint opposition in the national assembly on Sunday proposed the formation of a Parliamentary committee comprising members from both houses to consider and approve with consensus a complete package of electoral reforms including the elections (amendment) bills 2021 passed by the lower house. the decision was made in a meeting of the Steering committee of the joint opposition, held at the Parliament house here. the joint opposition maintained that any future legislation would be made in consonance with parliamentary practice and precedence to achieve the required consensus on issues of national importance. in their response to the letter of national assembly Speaker asad qaiser, who sought opposition parties’ support in parliament over bills related to electoral reforms and accountability laws, the opposition leader in national assembly Shehbaz Sharif wrote that matters of wider national interest, especially legislation with far-reaching implications for the people, should be

ment in this regard is still awaited. as per sources, the deadlock between the government and the imf had broken after the two sides decided to show some flexibility in their respective stances on the issue of granting autonomy to the State bank of Pakistan (SbP).

Sources further revealed that imf was not happy with islamabad backtracking on its commitment of granting autonomy to the SbP, prompting the Washington-based lending agency to halt the resumption of the loan facility. earlier in march 2021, Pakistan had reached an agreement with the fund on granting autonomy to the central bank, which was also approved by the imf board.

Pakistan’s economic team, led by tarin, has had several rounds of talks with fund officials to apprise them of the numerical strength of the ruling Pakistan tehreek-i-insaf in the lower and upper houses of parliament where the constitution will be required to be amended to grant autonomy to the SbP. on march 9, the federal cabinet cleared a bill that was aimed at providing greater autonomy to the central bank over price control and fighting inflation. news desk

CONTINUED ON PAGE 03

more inside

Tarin hints at another petrol price hike STORY ON BACK PAGE

russia starts missile supplies to india despite uS sanctions risk STORY ON BACK PAGE

finalised through consensus-oriented consultation.

Shehbaz told the speaker that a proper procedure should be followed during the joint sitting of the parliament, implying this will allow an “objective consideration” of the bills referred by the government. the letter pointed out that the na speaker formed the committee on Legislative business on June 23, 2021 to consider the 21 bills passed by the national assembly on 10th June this year “without allowing the required legislative procedure”. as per the letter, the committee in its three meetings

could not even finalise the terms of reference (tors) for its procedural jurisdiction due to lack of support by the government members. During this period, all the bills which were to be considered by this committee either lapsed or were rejected by the Senate and were referred to the joint sitting of parliament, “thus completely negating the purpose for which the committee on Legislative business was formed”. the opposition also laid down suggestions in the letter for evolving consensus over the important legislation.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 05

Shibli Faraz says all bills will be passed amicably STORY ON BACK PAGE in today’s issue

attention Some readers have complained that they are not getting the magazine with their newspaper copy. Please call or WhatsApp us at the following number to register a complaint.

Contact: 0307-7338168 irfan.farooq@pakistantoday.com.pk

02

Monday, 15 November, 2021 | KARACHI

NEWS

FederAl ombudSmAn orderS inquiry into bribe AllegAtionS AgAinSt CuStomS oFFiCiAlS ISLAMABAD

t

app

HE federal ombudsman has directed Customs Intelligence and Investigation to conduct a detailed inquiry against officials into an allegation of them taking a bribe of Rs250,000 for clearing perishable goods.

As per details, the federal ombudsman has ordered

for the inquiry to be completed within one month and directed for strict action against the said officials if they are found to be guilty.

In addition, the agency has also advised to refund an amount of Rs295,596 to the complainant within 30 days.

A document in this regard states that the complainant, Mansoor Ahmad, took the plea before the ombudsman that Major (r) Majid took Rs250,000 from him when he visited the office for the first time.

The complainant said that he had no knowledge as to who the boss is and thought that Majid was the boss. He had requested an early seizure report so that he can pay the taxes and get his goods released but was told that he would have to wait for two months if he wants it early or pay Rs250,000 which will be distributed among all the staff.

The document states that the cash was paid in front of the office gate, detailing that Majid accepted Rs70,000 in front of Deputy Director Customs Ali Asad because

his perishable goods were involved.

It is pertinent to note that the Directorate of I&I Customs, Range Office, Gujrawala seized foreign origin Melamine Resin 17,740 Kg along with Truck No. TKL 257 from Quetta and forwarded the case to the adjudicating authority on October 15, 2019, for confiscation of the goods and vehicle whereas the claimant of the vehicle was given the option to to redeem the same on payment of redemption fine of 20 per cent of the accessible value.

In the light of the above judgment, the claimant of the vehicle deposited the redemption fine amounting to Rs295,596 as assessed by the MCC Sambrial in the National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) on October 22, 2019.

Later, the appellate tribunal Lahore was directed to release the goods against a bank guarantee equivalent to the department of duty and taxes along with the security of Rs200,000.

Taliban hold military parade with US-made weapons in Kabul KABUL agencieS

Shafqat for implementation of single national curriculum across country ISLAMABAD Staff RepoRt

Minister for Federal Education Shafqat Mahmood has stressed the need for implementation of Single National Curriculum across the country. Talking to media, Mahmood said a uniform education curriculum system would help in curbing the class division in Pakistan. The Minister said education is among the top priorities of present government and Single National Curriculum will unite 220 million people as a strong nation. On August 17 this year, Prime Minister Imran Khan officially launched the Single National Curriculum (SNC) for primary level, saying the initiative will end disparity in society and provide equal chance to all students to excel. He said SNC should have been launched soon after the country’s independence to avoid division in society.

He said the students of elite education system had privilege and passed civic service exams because of their good command in English. The British rulers had introduced their educational system in the subcontinent for their own interest, but after the independence “we carried their legacy and culture”, he regretted. The prime minister said mental slavery was worse than physical slavery, adding that no individual could make progress without innovation and critical and original thinking. He said the failure to introduce SNC earlier resulted into the growing division in society. PM Khan said he came to know that 800,000 students were pursing education in English medium schools, while over 300 million were studying in public schools and around 2.5m in seminaries. According to the education ministry, SNC will be introduced from classes 6 to 8 in 2022 and from classes 9 to 12 in 2023. However, PM Khan directed the education minister to take steps for launching SNC for classes six and above over the next six months, instead of next two years. The prime minister said the new curriculum laid special emphasis on teachings of Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). In an apparent reference to withdrawal of foreign troops and Taliban takeover of Kabul, PM Khan said the people of Afghanistan had broken the shackles of slavery. Earlier, terming SNC a milestone to end disparity from education system of the country, Shafqat Mahmood said the new curriculum had been launched at primary schools and seminaries in the provinces, except Sindh. He said he was optimistic that Sindh too would adopt SNC.

Taliban forces held a military parade in Kabul on Sunday using captured American-made armoured vehicles and Russian helicopters in a display that showed their ongoing transformation from an insurgent force to a regular standing army.

The Taliban operated as insurgent fighters for two decades but have used the large stock of weapons and equipment left behind when the former Western-backed government collapsed in August to overhaul their forces.

The parade was linked to the graduation of 250 freshly trained soldiers, defence ministry spokesman Enayatullah Khwarazmi said.

Members of Taliban sit on a military vehicle during amilitary parade in Kabul, Afghanistan, on November 14, 2021. — Reuters Members of Taliban sit on a military vehicle during a military parade in Kabul, Afghanistan, on November 14, 2021. — Reuters The exercise involved dozens of USmade M117 armoured security vehicles driving slowly up and down a major Kabul road with MI-17 helicopters patrolling overhead. Many soldiers

carried American made-M4 assault rifles.

Most of the weapons and equipment the Taliban forces are now using are those supplied by Washington to the American-backed government in Kabul in a bid to construct an Afghan national force capable of fighting the Taliban.

Those forces melted away with the fleeing of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani from Afghanistan — leaving the Taliban to take over major military assets.

Taliban officials have said that pilots, mechanics and other specialists from the former Afghan National Army would be integrated into a new force, which has also started wearing conventional military uniforms in place of the traditional Afghan clothing normally worn by their fighters.

Members of Taliban sit on a military vehicle during amilitary parade in Kabul, Afghanistan, on November 14, 2021. — Reuters Members of Taliban sit on a military vehicle during amilitary parade in Kabul, Afghanistan, on November 14, 2021. According to a report late last year by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (Sigar), the US government transferred to the Afghan government more than $28

billion worth of defence articles and services, including weapons, ammunition, vehicles, night-vision devices, aircraft, and surveillance systems, from 2002 to 2017.

Some of the aircraft were flown into neighbouring Central Asian Countries by fleeing Afghan forces, but the Taliban have inherited other aircraft. It

Settlement Commissioner rejects review petition of legal heirs of Iqbal Burki ISLAMABAD Shahzad paRacha

Unlike the perception of favouring the Burki family, the Chief Settlement Commissioner (CSC) Islamabad in its order gave the decision against the legal heirs of Iqbal Burki. Sources said that the legal heirs of Iqbal Burk submitted an application in the Court of CSC Board of Revenue Islamabad in 2020, with prayers to implement the orders already passed by the Notified Officer on 0312-2013 and upheld by the Islamabad High Court through its judgement dated 07-05-2020 in WP # 292 to 294/2014.

The CSC directed the district collector Islamabad to implement orders as per law on 18-09-2020 and 10-022021. Sources said that the legal heirs of Sakina Bibi had the choice to either go into appeal in the High Court or file a Review Petition in the same court of CSC against these orders. However, they preferred to file a Review Petition before the CSC. The case was again heard in the same Court of CSC, ICT and during proceedings, some new facts were presented before the court by the petitioners which were earlier never made part of any proceedings.

The legal heirs of Iqbal Burki respectfully accepted those facts and based on that, the case was decided against them on 27-09-2021.

Sources said that it is the legal heirs of Iqbal Burki whose rights and claims have been affected by the orders of CSC, ICT. Thus, the final decision of CSC is against

the legal heirs of Iqbal Burki and not in their favour.

They are the ones who are adversely affected by this final order, and they have the right to appeal in the High Court, sources added.

Sharing the detail of this case, sources said that the issue was basically of 1784 Kanals and 2 Marlas of land in village Sarai Madhu, being allotted to the legal heirs of Sakina Bibi in 1957 which was later cancelled by the Additional Deputy Commissioner Rawalpindi on 06-071960 and out of that, 313 kanals of land was allotted to Iqbal Burki vide final order dated 15-10-1960. Hence the land to Mst Iqbal Burki was first allotted in 1960.

Against the order of Additional Deputy Commissioner Rawalpindi, Sakina Bibi filed a Revision Petition before Settlement and Rehabilitation Commissioner Rawalpindi in 1960.

The revision petition was accepted while the order of Additional Deputy Commissioner Rawalpindi was set aside, and the matter was again decided in the favour of Sakina Bibi in 1961. This order of Settlement and Rehabilitation Commissioner Rawalpindi was challenged in the High Court, which remanded the case back to the Notified Officer in 1999.

The CSC Islamabad on the direction of the High Court heard the case of Sakina Bibi and dismissed it in the favour of Iqbal Burki in 2010.

As per the available record, this decision of Notified officer was again challenged in the High Court, which was again dismissed in 2012 and remanded the case back to the Notified Officer for rehearing.

Govt focusing on agricultural, industrial sectors to ensure growth: Tarin KARACHI Staff RepoRt

Advisor to the Prime Minister on Finance Shaukat Tarin expressed on Sunday the government is working on a long-term strategy to strengthen the national economy on a sustainable basis.

Speaking at a ceremony in Karachi on Sunday, he said Prime Minister Imran Khan took balanced decisions to protect the livelihood of people and economy during COVID-19.

The Advisor said the government is fully focused on construction, agriculture and industry to ensure growth

in all sectors, adding significant growth in agriculture produce has been witnessed during the last year and we are trying to increase our revenue from nine to eleven per cent.

Shaukat Tarin said Information Technology sector exports increased by 47 per cent during the last year and other sectors are also showing growth. He said promotion of the construction sector has generated job opportunities.

Later, talking to media persons, the Advisor on Finance expressed that all matters with the IMF will be settled soon saying artificial increase in price of dollar is being checked and stern action will be taken against hoarders and smugglers of currency.

remains unclear how many are operational.

As the US troops departed, they destroyed more than 70 aircraft, dozens of armoured vehicles and disabled air defences before flying out of Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport following a chaotic evacuation operation.

Pakistan, Afghanistan agree to extend facilities at Chaman border QUETTA Staff RepoRt

Pakistan and Afghanistan have agreed to extend more facilities at Chaman border crossing point of Bab-i-Dosti. Radio Pakistan reported on Friday that the border crossing will now remain open for movement of pedestrians and trade from 8:00 a.m to 6:00 p.m while the movement of trucks loaded with trade goods will be allowed from 8:00 a.m to 8:00 p.m. On November 02 one of the main crossings between Afghanistan and Pakistan reopened after being closed for almost a month. The officials have been reported offering hope for an end to a standoff that has caused heavy losses to traders and left thousands stranded. The Chaman crossing is a major transit point for truckers moving fruit exports from around the southern Afghan city of Kandahar and its closure during October this year for 27 days has come at a high cost for farmers unable to get their produce to market. “The Afghan transit trade and other trade and economic activities continue,” a senior border official said. The reopening should come as a relief to the Taliban government in Kabul, which desperately needs the customs revenues from the border posts.

Its cash-strapped economy has few other legitimate sources of foreign revenue. As Afghanistan has sunk deeper into economic crisis, with the abrupt withdrawal of foreign aid following the Taliban victory in August, Pakistani officials have been increasingly concerned by the prospect of a new wave of refugees. Pakistani authorities originally closed the borders due to security threats, but disputes over issues ranging from COVID-19 to the validity of Afghan travel documents prevented reopening for weeks, despite pledges of action.

Monday, 15 November, 2021 | KARACHI

NEWS

03

CaBiNet taKeS Note oF vaCaNt PoStS oF CeoS, MDs isLamaBad

t

ahMad ahMadani

OP positions of more than one dozen companies of the power division are currently lying vacant and being looked after on ad-hoc basis by their senior officials and the federal cabinet has taken note of these existing vacancies.

According to documents, top positions of Chief Executive Officers (CEOs)/Managing Directors (MDs) of LPGCL (Lakhra Power Generation Company Limited), AEDB (Alternative Energy Development Board), Power Holding Private Limited (PHPL), National Power Parks Management Company Limited (NPPMCL), Multan Electric Power

Company (MEPCO), Quetta Electric Supply Company (QESCO), Tribal Areas Electric Supply Company (TESCO), Power Information Technology Company (PITC), Faisalabad Electric Supply Company (FESCO), Central Power Generation Company Limited (CPGCL), Genco Holding Company Limited (GHCL), Gujranwala Electric Power Company (GEPCO), Central Power Purchasing Agency (CPPA), Power Planning and Monitoring Company (PPMC)/Pakistan Electric Power Company (PEPCO) are currently lying vacant and the senior officials have been assigned to look after the charge while these top lucrative positions to some extent have been not filled from the open market.

Sources said that the Secretary, Power

Division, in a meeting of the federal cabinet, had presented details of existing vacant positions under power division and the federal cabinet took note of the existing vacancies under the power division and also directed that the status of existing vacancies of Chief Executive Officers (CEOs)/Managing Directors (MDs) under the commerce division and information & Broadcasting Divisions be furnished and presented to the cabinet.

As per details, the top position of LPGCL (Lakhra GENCO-VI) has never been filled from open market and the reasons for not filling the post so far was due to planned closure/retirement of the plant as per decision of the CCoE dated 10-09-2020 ratified by the cabinet on 22-09-2020, the appointment of the CEO is not intended

because all plants of the company are already de-licensed.

Similarly, the top post of AEDB is lying vacant since 12-01-2021 mainly due to merger of AEDB with PPIB, the process initiated for the position of CEO AEDB was halted and the said process is not deemed to be processed ahead. The cabinet has approved this course of action on 13-072021. The CCLC has approved the draft bill for merger on 210-10-2021.

Important position of the head of PHPL has never been filled from open market.

PHPL is a very small organization with very limited functions. The market based appointment is not deemed cost effective by this division (power).

The position of CEO NPPMCL is also vacant since 03-09-2018 due to start of

privatization of NPPMCL, the cabinet decided on 18-05-2021 that Dhanpat Kotak, an employee of NPPMCL to continue to look as CEO. Likewise, the post of CEO/MD of MEPCO has never been filled from open market. The look-after charge has been assigned to a senior officer. At present, the panel has been submitted to ministry (energy). The summary will be submitted to the cabinet once stay ordered by the high court is vacated. The reason for not filling the top position post of MEPCO so far is restraining order against taking the final decision by the Punjab High Court. The Law Division has been informed with a copy to Prime Minister Office. The post of CEO/MD, QESCO has never been filled from open market and the look after charge has been assigned to the senior officer.

PML-Q MPs empower Pervez Elahi to take key decisions LaHore Mian abRaR

Fire breaks out at Cooperative Market in Karachi

The parliamentary party of the Pakistan Muslim LeagueQ (PML-Q), a coalition party of the ruling PTI in the federal and Punjab government, has given the powers of takin crucial decisions to party leader Pervez Elahi.

The PML-Q meeting resolved that it was becoming difficult to keep its alliance with the PTI government due to rising unemployment and inflation.

The party’s parliamentary members have handed over the decision-making power to Pervez Elahi.

The PML-Q lawmakers in the parliamentary party meeting have expressed concern over rising unemployment and inflation.

The meeting also expressed concern over rising dollar, petrol, electricity, gas prices and deteriorating law and order situation.

The PML-Q leader further said that due to all these reasons it is becoming difficult to work with the government and how can the people’s representatives face the people in their constituencies.

According to the announcement of the PML-Q parliamentary session, if the common man is not given relief, the situation will get worse. The government should take all these issues seriously.

The meeting was attended by Federal Ministers Tariq Bashir Cheema, Monis Elahi and Senator Kamil Ali Agha, and members of National Assembly Salik Hussain, Hussain Elahi and Mrs. Farrukh Khan.

The meeting was also attended by provincial ministers Hafiz Ammar Yasir, Bao Rizwan, Sajid Ahmad Khan Bhatti, Ehsanul Haq Chaudhry, Dr Muhammad Afzal, Shujaat Nawaz Ajnala, Khadija Umar and Abdullah Yousuf Warraich.

The meeting was also attended by Khyber

Pakhtunkhwa Assembly member Mufti Obaid-urRehman and PML-Q leader Shafi Hussain.

The participants of the meeting prayed for the recovery of party chief Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain.

news desk A fire broke out on Sunday evening at Cooperative Market near Regal Chowk in Karachi’s Saddar area. Fire department officials said that the fire erupted in one shop and soon engulfed several other shops in the market. They said that four fire tenders along with firefighting teams from different fire stations of the city were sent to the spot immediately. An operation to douse the blaze is currently underway with one fire tender and a team present on the spot. According to initial reports, people have been evacuated from the area and the roads leading to and from Cooperative Market have been blocked.

NBP to help Chinese companies relocate industrial units to Pakistan BeiJing app

Chief Representative of National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) in China, Shaikh Muhammad Shariq on Sunday announced that the bank is ready to facilitate Chinese companies to relocate businesses and industrial units to Pakistan under the ChinaPakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) framework.

“As we are about to enter into the second phase of CPEC, which is more focused on industrial cooperation, we are all set to facilitate Chinese companies to relocate to Pakistan,” he said while addressing the Pakistan-China Economic and Business Forum. The forum was organised by the Pakistan Embassy in Beijing, Beijing Nordic Exhibition Co. Ltd., and Shanghai Huiguan Culture Media Co. Ltd. Shaikh Shariq informed the participants that in the first phase of CPEC, billions of dollars were invested in infrastructure, power generation and Gwadar Port. The amount was in different modes including investment and financing whereas financing was availed through different institutions both from Pakistan and China. “The NBP was a part of most of these projects either in the form of consortium partner or lead arranger,” he added. He said, the NBP has already established strong banking partnership with major Chinese financial institutions to facilitate trade and investment under CPEC and the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) not only in Pakistan but in all places where the country has operations. He informed that in order to facilitate bilateral trade and facilitate smooth flow of funds between China and Pakistan, central banks of both the countries have signed the currency swap arrangement in 2011, amounting to 10 billion yuan and 140 billion Pakistani rupees. “As a result, bilateral trade and investment witnessed significant growth, and contributed to further strengthening close and special relationship between the two countries,” he added. He said that in 2018, the swap was extended for a period of three years, and the size was doubled to 20 billion yuan or 351 billion Pakistani rupees as China became the largest trading partner, and bilateral trade increased on a yearly basis.

35pc of development budget allocated for South Punjab: Buzdar raJanpur Staff RepoRt

Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar on Sunday expressed that the district development package of Rs360 billion will ensure equitable development in all districts of the province. During a meeting with PTI parliamentarians in Rajanpur on Sunday, he said for the first time, the PTI government has allocated over 35 per cent of development budget for South Punjab.

The Chief Minister said the government led by Prime Minister Imran Khan will complete its constitutional term. During last week Punjab Chief Minister Sardar Usman Buzdar disclosed that the Punjab government would contribute more than Rs2 billion for mother and child hospital in Attock, adding that the federal government had already contributed a hefty grant for the project. After the foundation stone-laying ceremony of mother and child hospital in Attock, the CM said that mother and child hospital would consist of 200 beds and

Good news on IMF talks on the cards, says Tarin Continued from page 01 Autonomy was also linked with adopting exchange rates and monetary policy in an autonomous manner without the government’s interventions. Under the proposed law, no one will question the decisions of top officials of the SBP. Soon after the decision, two leading opposition parties — the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and the Pakistan Peoples Party — announced that they would block the passage of the bill in parliament.

It is pertinent to note that in May 2019, Pakistan had reached an agreement with the IMF after months of difficult negotiations on a $6bn bailout package, called EFF. The 39-month bailout programme is subject to regular IMF reviews of Pakistan’s economic policy and growth. The arrangement calls for reducing domestic and external imbalances, removing impediments to growth, increasing transparency, and strengthening social spending.

In January 2020, the IMF put the programme on hold after the government did not agree to increase electricity prices and impose additional taxes. Recent media reports claimed that the IMF is demanding an increase of Rs4.95 per unit in electricity tariff and urging the government to impose taxes worth Rs150 billion.

The IMF also suggested concrete efforts for cost-recovery in the energy sector and stateowned enterprises. The Fund argued that this would help eliminate or reduce the quasi-fiscal deficit that drains scarce government resources.

The IMF further suggested modernising the public finance management framework to increase transparency and spending efficiency. It urged Pakistan to reduce fiscal deficit by tax policy revenue mobilisation measures and to eliminate exemptions, curtail special treatments, and to improve tax administration.

In todays’ gatherting, Tarin while talking about soaring prices of petroleum products in the country, Tarin closed the door on any relief, saying the local prices were directly proportional to the rates in international market. “There is no concession in it. Whatever [hike] comes will be passed through [to the public],” he said.

He said the government had only passed 34pc of the international price hike to the public, while absorbing around 60pc of the burden itself.

He said the government was implementing an all-round strategy to fix the economy. “We are aiming for sustainable growth so that the poor segment may also get the benefits of it.”

The finance adviser predicted that the economy could grow by more than 5pc [in the current fiscal year], adding that revenue had seen a growth of 36pc, while agriculture has had bumper crops and large scale manufacturing’s growth was in double digits. “It shows that our economy is growing by more than 5pc.”

“We have 32pc growth in income tax, and our growth is all-round including covering sales tax, income tax and customs. We will try to up revenue target to 11pc from 9pc and then 14pc after it,” he said.

Tarin said the government had also sought assistance from noted economist Dr Ishrat Hussain in identifying factors bottlenecking the growth of the national economy. “Dr Hussain came up with multiple reasons, including meagre saving rate, huge import-export gap, and belowpar economic productivity.”

Meanwhile, Tarin attributed the hike in food prices to disruptions caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

“The prices of food jacked up internationally.

We import some important food items and our common man is affected due to its soaring prices.

The purchasing powers in other countries is good, but we have a problem in that area. We are trying to fix it,” he added.

the hospital would be constructed on 75-kanal land with a cost of Rs 5 billion 32 crore.

Usman Buzdar said that the mother and child hospital would also have nursing college, hostel, residences, doctors apartments and ‘Panagah’ for patients care, adding that it would provide gynae health services to 200,000 to 300,000 female patients annually.

“Upgradation of health facilities in Attock will also benefit the people of adjoining districts of KPK Sawabi, Noshera and Haripur,” he added.

Shehbaz concerned over domestic, industrial gas shortage LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) President and Leader of the Opposition Shahbaz Sharif Sunday expressed serious concern over the gas shortage crisis in the country.

According to sources, he said the cold has not yet begun but gas supplies to homes and factories have been suspended. Shehbaz said the announcement of gas supply to the citizens only three times was the negligence and incompetence of the Imran leg government. He said that the government itself had admitted that 14 cargoes of gas could be brought from the infrastructure set up by the previous government of the PML-N. But, he added that the government was ordering only ten cargoes. The PML-N president further stated the country would have a shortage of 300 million to 400 million cubic feet of gas on which domestic stoves and heaters would not burn, adding that hot water for bathing had already been declared a luxury by the government. He was of the view the non-supply of gas to industries would increase unemployment in the country and the wheel of factories would jam. Staff RepoRt

04 NEWS 15th November 2021_Layout 1 11/14/2021 11:48 PM Page 1

Monday, 15 November, 2021 | KARACHI

04 NEWS

JOkhIO’S ClOthES, PhONE rECOVErED NEar PPP MPa’S FarMhOuSE pect — MPA Awais — had taken place so far. Besides, he said, the clothes, slippers, mobile phone and wallet of the victim, which were allegedly in the possession of MPA Awais, had not been recovered.

The complainant also believed that the current JIT was treating Awais as an MPA (rather than a suspect) and that he appeared to be a “special guest of honour” for the investigators.

Afzal further said police had not included any foreigner in the case nor conducted any investigation regarding Awais’s foreign guests. He stated that police had also not made any efforts to arrest MNA Jam Karim or for the recovery of the vehicles used by the foreigners, the vehicle used for “kidnapping” Nazim, the vehicle used by suspect Saleem Salar to proceed with him (Afzal) to Jam House, and other evidence related to the killing.

He also demanded that Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997, be included in the FIR in addition to other relevant sections of the Pakistan Penal Code as “this act of murder was carried out with the intention of creating terror in the poor downtrodden villages, so that no one can challenge their (the suspects’) atrocities and wrongdoings in the future.”

The complainant urged the provincial police chief to constitute a JIT that would also include representatives of other law-enforcement agencies.

Afzal also stated in his letter that he was receiving “serious threats of dire consequences” from the suspects to pressure him into “withdrawing the case and entering into a compromise”, and demanded security for himself as well as other witnesses and lawyers in the case.

OLICE investigators probing the brutal murder of Nazimuddin Jokhio at a PPP MPA’s farmhouse in Karachi’s Malir area on Sunday claimed to have made significant progress in the case, saying the victim’s mobile phone and clothes were recovered from a dried well near the lawmaker’s residence.

Meanwhile, Nazim’s family expressed dissatisfaction over the performance of the probe body and demanded the formation of a joint investigation team (JIT) and protection, alleging that the suspects were threatening them with dire consequences in order to pressure them to withdraw the case and enter into a “compromise”. The family also urged police authorities to treat the murder as an act of terror because, they said, the motive of the “influential persons (waderas)” nominated in the case was to trigger fear and panic among the poor so that no one could challenge their power.

Nazim Jokhio was found tortured to death at the farmhouse of PPP MPA Jam Awais on November 3.

The victim’s family accuses the MPA and his henchmen of torturing him to death for resisting houbara bustard hunting by the lawmaker’s Arab guests in Nazim’s Achar Salaar village in Malir district.

A senior police officer, who wished not to be named, told media that MPA Awais’s guards, who are among the arrested suspects, had revealed that they had thrown Nazim’s cell phone and clothes in a well near Jam House, Awais’s farmhouse, in Memon Goth, Malir. On this indication, investigators recovered

“some pieces” of the mobile phone and clothes from the well which were burnt. According to the officer, it was a dry well where garbage was being dumped.

The cell phone will be sent to a forensic lab in Lahore for analysis. Police termed the recovery as a significant development as it could help identify the people who allegedly threatened the victim after he made a video of the hunters in the outskirts of Karachi and uploaded it to social media.

The officer said it was possible that the suspects had set the garbage on fire to destroy the evidence.

Police will now also invoke the relevant section of the law against the suspects on charges of destroying the evidence. The officer said that call data record already obtained by investigators had confirmed the presence of MPA Awais and his elder brother MNA Jam Karim Jokhio, who has secured pre-arrest bail, at the crime scene. The police officer further said the complainant, deceased Nazim’s brother Afzal Jokhio, was their “star witness” as he was reportedly accompanying Nazim when the latter was brought to Jam House on the night between Nov 2 and 3. Additionally, the family has also provided another witness in the case, he added.

Family wants Jit to probe killing: In another development, complainant Afzal has called for setting up a JIT and expressed dissatisfaction over the performance of the team formed by the East DIG to investigate the case.

In a letter to the Sindh inspector general, Afzal said that he was “not satisfied” with the JIT formed by the East DIG on Nov 4 and the investigation officer as no “proper investigation” of the primary sus-

NCOC relaxes COVID-19 restrictions in various cities as per vaccination rate

Pemra bans airing of Noor Mukadam's escape video

kARACHI

P

Staff RepoRt

News Desk

News Desk

The National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) has decided to ease restrictions in cities across Pakistan as per their vaccination rate. The NCOC took the decision on November 12 to review the COVID19’s positivity rate across Pakistan and the pace of the vaccination drive. “To encourage and incentivise cities with excellent vaccination progress, the forum decided relaxations in non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs)/return to normal life.

Accordingly, the basis of NPIs for cities have been decided as per following vaccination progress,” a statement by the NCOC read. As per NCOC, Rawalpindi, Sargodha, Sialkot, Mianwali, Kallar Kahar, Hafizabad, Rahim Yar Khan, Karachi, Chitral, Charsadda, Balakot, Jehlum Valley, Rawalakot, Muzaffarabad, Neelum, Hunza and Kharmang, the vaccination rate is between 40-50 per cent.

Where as in Narowal, Jehlum, Mandi Bahauddin, Peshawar, Bhimber, Bagh, Mirpur, Skardu, Gilgit, Ghizer and Islamabad, the vaccination rate is above 50 per cent. The rest of the cities, including Lahore and Hyderabad, have a vaccination rate of less than 40 per cent. “These NPIs will remain effective till November 30,” the NCOC said, adding that a review will be carried out at NCOC on 29th.

The NCOC said in the statement that more than half the students across the country had been inoculated so far.

The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) on Sunday prohibited all TV channels from airing a leaked CCTV footage of Noor Mukadam’s unsuccessful attempt to escape the premises of the house where she was eventually murdered.

According to the notification issued by Pemra, telecast of CCTV footage of Noor and Zahir has been prohibited under Section 27 of the Pemra Ordinance, 2002. “All satellite TV channels (news and current affairs/regional language) are, therefore, directed to stop airing aforementioned CCTV footage immediately,” the notification said.

The regulator warned that strict action will be taken against violators under Section 29, 30 and 33 of the Pemra Ordinance, 2002. On November 9, the prosecution in the Noor case had submitted the transcript of the CCTV footage to an Islamabad sessions court.

Subsequently, the court had directed the public prosecutor to provide the footage to the defence counsel.

Meanwhile, a Twitter account run by Noor’s friends denounced the fact that TV channels were airing the CCTV footage despite explicit instructions from the court stating otherwise. “Absolutely shocked and shattered. Its only been a day since the CCTV footage was given to the defence legal team,” a tweet published through the account said. “The Judge told them that it shouldn’t be leaked at all. Now it’s out there. No regard of what this would be like for Noor’s loved ones. Haven’t they been through enough?

PML-N’s Marriyum Aurangzeb said she was “disappointed” to see the CCTV footage being aired. “[I] can’t begin to imagine how distressing and

difficult this must be for Noor’s family and loved ones who are being forced to relive the barbarism she was subjected too,” the PML-N leader said on Twitter.

“This horrible, tragic crime tore through our social fabric and deeply affected all Pakistanis. Airing and sharing the video of Noor’s final moments only further damages that social fabric and causes anguish to her family. I’d request everyone to please not share the video,” she appealed.

As per the transcript of the CCTV, submitted in the court of Islamabad Additional Sessions Judge Ata Rabbani, the time of the digital video recorder was 35 minutes ahead of PST. As per the footage, on July 18 at 10:18pm, Noor could be seen entering Zahir’s home while attending a phone call. At 2:39am on July 19, the two could be seen coming out of the house with bags, which they placed in a taxi and then went back inside.

A couple of minutes later, at 2:41am, Noor comes running barefooted towards the gate in fear and panic upon which Iftikhar (watchman) could be seen closing the gate to prevent her from leaving. The transcript added that Zahir came out of the house and grabbed Noor, proceeding to forcibly drag her back inside despite her pleading with her hands joined together. Sometime later at 2:46am, the pair could once again be seen exiting the house and approaching the gate. This time, they sit in the taxi across the street with their baggage and depart in the car. They return just minutes later at 2:52am and go back inside the house with their bags while Iftikhar and a black dog could also be seen in the yard.

On July 20 at 7:12pm, Noor could be seen jumping from the first floor of the house, a cell phone in her hand — onto the grill beside the ground floor gallery.

Opposition rejects Senate’s decision of including Fawad, Swati in ECP panel News Desk The joint opposition has refused to accept the changes in the panel on the appointment of the members of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) after the Senate chairman included federal ministers Fawad Chaudhry and Azam Swati in the committee. The Opposition took the decision on Sunday, during a virtual meeting of the opposition steering committee that was held to mull over the National Assembly speaker’s letter to the opposition seeking cooperation on important legislation. The meeting had Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leaders Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Ayaz Sadiq, Sadiq Rafiq, Marriyum Aurangzeb; Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leaders Yousaf Raza Gillani, Shazia Marri, Sherry Rehman; and Kamran Murtaza and Shahida Akhtar Ali of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) in attendance.

About the changes in the ECP panel, the opposition members said during the meeting that the government included two members – Fawad and Swati – who have in the past threatened the ECP chief. One of the members talked about setting the ECP on fire, they said, adding that now these people were being asked to decide on the appointment of the ECP members. The opposition also expressed reservations over the government’s decision to remove Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) and Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) from the committee. The steering committee will also liaise with the PML-Q and MQM-P on the ECP issue. It may be noted that Senator Kamil Ali Agha of the PML-Q had been replaced by Azam Nazir Tarar of the PML-N, while Senator Taj Haider of the PPP had replaced Khalida Ateeb of the MQM. During the meeting, it was decided that the opposition will support the government on important legislation, but it will not help it tailor laws to facilitate individuals. The legislation should be in accordance with the constitution and the law, they concurred. They said the government wanted to violate the spirit of law-making by extending the tenure of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) chief Javed Iqbal.

“We can talk with the government about improving the laws, but it should not expect any help in making the laws worse,” the opposition members said, adding that the reply to the NA speaker’s letter will be prepared today.

Electoral reforms is national agenda: says Fawad Ch News Desk Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry on Sunday stated that the electoral reforms is not only PTI’s agenda but they are a part of the national agenda.

The minister stated that electoral reforms were not “the agenda of Imran Khan or Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf [PTI],” but were a national agenda. The minister while maintaining that all political parties should move forward towards electoral reforms stated that “It will be a great success for our political system if an electoral system is set up under which all the leaders are able to trust election results.” Earlier this month, in a post-cabinet meeting, the minister confirmed that PM Imran Khan had sought the support of PTI’s allies for electoral reforms, which included the use of electronic voting machines (EVMs) and giving roughly nine million overseas Pakistanis the right to vote in the next general elections. “We [the government] presented 49-point electoral reform idea before the allies,” the minister said, adding that further briefings would be given to the coalition partners in this regard. “We have sought their support for the electoral reforms agenda and they have graciously agreed,” he said.

However, earlier this week three of the allies had expressed reservations about recognising the EVM bill, during a meeting the government had convened to take on board its coalition partners over the electoral reforms. As per the sources, the PML-Q, Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA) and MQM-P had raised concerns with Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and Science and Technology Minister Shibli Faraz over the legislation on the use of EVMs, while mentioning that PML-Q’s Tariq Bashir Cheema said the party could not support the bill until it consulted its leadership.

32 high priced new vehicles to be purchased for Governor, CM of GB IsLAMABAD Ghulam abbaS

As Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-led government in Gilgit Baltistan (GB) has increased cabinet (public office holders) to a historic size of 28 members facilitating non-elected and elected members of the regional assembly, it is going to purchase at least 32 new high priced vehicles for the office holders.

According to documents available with this scribe, the regional government has asked the Ministry of Finance in the center to allow it to purchase 32 vehicles which included Toyota land cruisers, Toyota Fortuners and Toyota Revo which may cost the government around Rs 400 million.

As per the letter it sent to the Ministry of Finance, the GB government has sought approval for purchase of two Toyota Land Cruisers 200 VX ”SW”A/T Gasoline, one for Governor GB and one for the Chief Minister GB. It has sought approval for purchase

of 20 Field Vehicle 2800 CC LAT (G) MT (Fortuner) for Speaker, Deputy Speaker GB legislative Assembly, cabinet members, Advisers and Special Assistants to CM GB. The regional government has also wanted to purchase at least 10 Official Vehicles 2800 CC Toyota REVO for the coordinators to CM GB making the total number of demanded new vehicles to 32.

Justifying the purchase of new vehicles, the regional government claims that the existing vehicles of the public office holders were procured during 2011, while the Special Assistants and Coordinators to CM GB have been facilitated temporarily by requisitioning vehicles from different government departments.

The cabinet of the regional government, as per the documents, had approved purchase of the new vehicles from the regular budget of the government on November 5.

According to sources, the purchase of heavily prices vehicles from the budget of regional

government was burden on the limited budget (grant) of the regional government, where the ministers, coordinators and secretaries and other officials are already using heavy vehicles despite the fact that smaller vehicles could be used in cities and towns of the area.

The bureaucrats/officials who are entitled to use 1300 CC to 16 CC vehicles in the rest of the country are given vehicles of 2800 CC in GB using the limited budget of the regional government mercilessly.

The PTI, which talked about austerity and cutting administrative costs of the government, has facilitated 30 elected and nonelected members of the party and its allies through granting portfolios with a historic size of cabinet in GB. Interestingly two more coordinators were added to the cabinet when a party leader and applicant for GB Council’s member was admitted in hospital for his failure to get a single vote in the council’s election held at GB assembly on Friday.

CMYK

According to a notification of the law and prosecution department of GB, the government through amendment in rules of business has facilitated creation of posts of coordinators, under which the number of coordinators to the chief minister has been increased from two to 10. “It is notified for general information and compliance that the Governor Gilgit-Baltistan has been pleased to further amend rule 29(A) (3) amended in 2017 of the Gilgit-Baltistan Rules of Business, 2009 by inserting a new proviso i.e. after the word two special Coordinators to the Chief Minister GB the word “and ten Coordinators to the Chief Minister,” the notification said.

As per the new rules notified, the coordinators shall be appointed by the chief minister and shall hold the office during his pleasure. They shall be entitled to a salary equal to half of the salary of a special assistant to the chief minister.

The ruling party which formed the gov-

ernment in GB after the election has enhanced the number of cabinet to 28 consisting 12 ministers, two advisers, five special assistants to the chief minister, 8 coordinators and the chief minister. Including the speaker and deputy speaker the total number of public office holders in GB becomes 30, extremely larger than the total number of members of the ruling party and its allies in Gilgit Baltistan Legislative Assembly which is 23. Since the government has made legal amendments for creating room for 10 coordinators, the regional government may add two more coordinators in near future.

Interestingly this huge size of cabinet/office holders is formed to rule a 1.6 million populated region where only four to five members of the cabinet is enough to handle rule and run government affairs. As per the constitution, the Cabinet can have a maximum of 11 percent of the total strength of the parliament whereas each cabinet member must be a member of parliament.

Monday, 15 November, 2021 | KARACHI

ReMittaNceS Stay aBOve $2BN fOR 17th cONSecutive MONth

P

AKISTANI workers living abroad have sent $2.52 billion in remittances in the month of October 2021, translating to over $2 billion remittances for the 17th straight month, State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) said on Sunday.

According to details, the central bank said that the workers’ remittances continued their strong streak as inflows recorded $2.5 billion in October 2021, up 10.2 percent YoY and only marginally lower compared to 5.7 percent last month.

In addition to remaining above $2

SBP raises cash reserve requirement of banks by 1pc in over a decade

billion since June 2020, this is the eighth consecutive month when remittances have been close to or above $2.5 billion.

On a cumulative basis, remittances have risen to $10.6 billion during the first four months of FY22 (July-October), which is 11.9pc higher than the same period last year (4MFY21).

Remittance inflows during the first four months of FY22 have mainly been sourced from Saudi Arabia from where $2.7 billion was sent, UAE from where $2.0 billion was sent, UK with $1.5 billion, and USA $1.1 billion. newS deSk

Special team to probe 2011 assassination of Saudi diplomat KaracHi

The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Saturday raised the Cash Reserve Requirement (CRR) by one percentage point for scheduled banks for the first time in 13 years.

The move is a bid to curb excess liquidity on the banking system, which analysts had said is contributing to inflation, as per local media reports.

“SBP has decided to increase the average Cash Reserve Requirement (CRR) to be maintained during a period of two weeks by scheduled banks, from 5 per cent to 6pc and minimum CRR to be maintained each day from 3pc to 4pc,” the central bank said in a statement.

The revised average CRR of 6pc will be effective from November 12, whereas the revised daily minimum requirement of 4pc will be effective from November 15.

“With the economy recovering briskly from last year’s acute Covid-19 shock, there is a need to gradually normalise policy settings, including the growth of monetary aggregates,” the SBP said.

“In recent months, real money supply growth has drifted above its trend.”

The bank said measures will moderate money supply growth “as well as domestic demand, thereby helping to sustain the current economic recovery, achieve the government’s medium-term inflation target, and reduce pressures on the rupee”.

“This would incentivise banks to offer better returns on deposits to attract these funds; thus serving the SBP objective of encouraging savings,” the statement said.

“It may also be highlighted that [a] waiver of CRR on time liabilities with tenor more than a year will encourage banks to raise more longterm deposits, which will facilitate asset-liability matching and enable banks to extend long term loans for construction and housing financing.” Monitoring rePort

05

Opposition sets preconditions for legislation on electoral reforms continued from page 01 A parliamentary committee composed of members from both houses of parliament should be formed by the speaker to consider and approve with consensus a complete package of electoral reforms including the ‘Elections (Amendment) Bills 2021’ passed by the National Assembly but not passed by the Senate. “We believe the above process to be in consonance with parliamentary practice and precedence to achieve the required consensus on issues of national importance,” it added. Earlier this week, NA Speaker Qaiser had said that the government was planning about convening the joint sitting of parliament next week by November 20 and awaiting a positive response from the opposition parties. “A total of 28 bills will be presented for approval [during the sitting],” the speaker said while talking to the media persons on Thursday. Qaiser said he was in contact with various opposition leaders and hoped that they would respond positively. “As a speaker of the National Assembly, I am striving to pass legislation on which everyone can agree,” he said, adding that a meeting would be called as soon as there was a response from the opposition.

“I am in touch with (former prime minister) Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, Syed Naveed Qamar and Sardar Ayaz Sadiq,” he concluded.

PM to inaugurate track and trace system for sugar industry on Nov 23

StaFF rePort

The Sindh Police’s Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) has constituted a special investigation team at the request of the Saudi government to probe the assassination of a Saudi diplomat in Karachi in 2011.

Hassan Al Qahtani, an official at the Saudi consulate, was killed in a drive-by shooting in Karachi’s Defence Phase VI on May 16, days after Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden was killed by US special forces in a raid in Abbottabad on May 2, 2011. The Saudi official was shot dead by at least four attackers riding two motorcycles, who intercepted his vehicle after he left his residence near Khyaban-i-Shahbaz.

The attack had come days after two grenades had been lobbed at the Saudi Consulate building in Karachi.

At the time, a police officer had told media that a ‘Bahrain connection’ could not be ruled out as a possible motive for the two attacks, but it was also being investigated whether these were in revenge for the killing of Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

The New York Times, quoting a Pakistani security official, had reported that Qahtani was working on Saudi dissidents who had found refuge in the city and this most probably was the reason behind his killing.

NEWS

Sugar PriceS exPecTed To decreaSe in The coMing dayS when ProducTion STarTS iSLamaBad Shahzad Paracha

According to an order issued on Saturday by Counter Terrorism Department DIG Omar Shahid Hamid, a special investigation team has been constituted to probe the assassination as it is a matter of “extreme national importance”.

The order states that the investigation team would be led by CTD DIG Omar Shahid Hamid, while its members would include DSP Investigation CTD Naeem Ahmed,

Officer Incharge Transnational Terrorist Cell Raja Umar Khattab, Officer incharge Shia Militants Cell of the CTD Ali Raza, investigation inspector CTD Sarfraz Ahmed and representatives of the Inter-Services Intelligence, Intelligence Bureau and Rangers.

The first meeting of the team is expected to be convened on Monday at the office of SP Investigation CTD, Karachi.

Muttaqi confirms Taliban mediating between Pakistan, TTP continued from page 01 Asked what the group’s future course of action would be if the world did not recognise the Taliban, he said that the group was moving forward in its relations with the world and hoped that those ties would strengthen in the future.

He claimed that since the Afghan government consisted of representation from all areas and ethnicities, the world should recognise it.

“The incumbent Afghan government comprises staff and workers from the previous set-up that come

up to approximately 500,000 people. If the world had recognised the previous government as an inclusive government, then why don’t they do the same with us,” he asked.

“If they mean a cabinet representing all areas, then we have a minister from Panjshir. People from Badakhshan, Faryab, Kandahar, Nangahar and Kabul are also present [in the cabinet]. Therefore, every country has its own definition of an inclusive government,” he said.

He said that the Taliban will continue to make efforts to make the government even more inclusive and grant the people their rights.

Prime Minister Imran Khan will inaugurate the track and trace system of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) for the sugar industry on November 23. In this regard, Profit learnt that the premier will inaugurate the system through a Zoom link. Sources said that most of the sugar mills shall start production in the next two to three days and the the tax department wants to monitor production through the track and trace system from this year as mills do not report exact statistics of their production. Recently, FBR has also issued an SRO with regard to the implementation of the system on sugar bags. The SRO states that no sugar bag shall be allowed to be removed from a production site, factory premises or manufacturing plant without a Unique Identification Marking (UIMs) with effect from November 11, which are to be obtained from FBR’s licensee AJCL/MITAS/Authentix Consortium. It is pertinent to mention here that sugar is the second sector, after tobacco, where FBR will implement the system for electronic monitoring of production and sales of goods on all manufacturing sites. It is worth mentioning here that the sugar mills will start crushing sugarcane from November 15, in different areas of the country and the government is expecting a bumper crop of sugarcane during this season that will help in lowering the prices of sugar in the domestic market. On Sunday, Information and Broadcasting Minister Fawad Chaudhry in a tweet stated that prices of sugar have decreased to Rs43 per kg. Presently, the ex-mill rate of sugar is around Rs92 per kg in south Punjab and according to a Pakistan Sugar Mills Association (PSMA) representative, prices will further decrease up to Rs10 in the coming days when the production starts.

500 Global appreciates govt for giving incentives in STZs Global venture capital firm, 500 Global, has appreciated the government of Pakistan for introducing incentives in Special Technology Zones (STZs).

As per the details, a high-level delegation from global venture capital firm 500 Global visited the Special Technology Zones Authority (STZA) in Islamabad to meet with Chairman STZA Amer Hashmi and his team.

The delegation included Chief Operating Officer and Managing Partner Courtney Powell, Board Member Max Scheder-Bieschin and Alysia Lopez, Executive Assistant to 500 Global’s CEO Christine Tsai and Powell.

It is pertinent to note that Powell had previously met with the STZA delegation last month in Dubai to discuss investment opportunities and the burgeoning tech startup ecosystem in Pakistan.

The STZA chairman invited Powell for a visit to Pakistan to meet startups, incuba-

tors, local venture capitalists, and other stakeholders in the public and private sector that are working towards technology-driven growth in the country.

As per the details, the two sides discussed the global venture capital’s experience visiting the tech startup community in the country besides the support and mentorship that 500 Global can provide to startup founders to scale their ventures, and the firm’s plans to explore investment opportunities in Pakistan.

Both parties agreed to work together to identify and explore mutual areas of interest to foster innovation and promote a technology-driven knowledge ecosystem.

The STZA team briefed 500 Global about the STZs created by the government to attract foreign direct investment, allow technology transfer, boost technology exports, prioritize research & development,

and foster job creation for Pakistani youth.

The STZA aims to build knowledge ecosystems that will harness Pakistan’s technology potential and set the country on the trajectory of an entrepreneurial, innovative, and tech-driven future for shared prosperity and inclusive growth.

“We welcome 500 Global to Pakistan and look forward to working closely with them to support the startup and technology sector in Pakistan,” said STZA chairman.

Powell, noting the government’s commitment to facilitate the growth of the country’s high-potential technology sector, said, “We met fantastic founders in Pakistan during our visit and truly appreciate the incentives that the government has offered in its Special Technology Zones. The visit has also helped us understand how we can equip founders to establish themselves on a global level.” StaFF rePort

cmYK

06-07 Comments - 15th November 2021_Layout 1 11/14/2021 10:32 PM Page 1

Monday, 15 November, 2021

06 COMMENT

Iran-US nuclear talks

The hole keeps getting bigger Matters are heading towards an interest rate hike

e

The role of China is crucial

ACh of the reports could on its own trigger a rise in the interest rate, but put together, they merely make it certain. Also, they all indicate that there is more inflationary pressure on the economy, which will incline the State Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee to carry out a big increase in interest rates. The first problem has been the report that Pakistan’s trade deficit with the South Asian region has increased. This means that one of the supposed benefits of greater regional stability has not materialised, mainly because Pakistan has not done enough to get other countries to withdraw non-tariff trade barriers. It does mean that the region is adding to the balance of payments problem rather than solving.

One sign of that was the sharp fall in the rupee, which at close of trading on Friday had touched a new low against the dollar, with it not clear whether the decline was at an end, or whether the rupee would fall further.

The rupee had recovered earlier in the month, when the Saudi oil facility was announced, along with a major cash injection for the State Bank of Pakistan, but the receipt of the cash has not been confirmed. Indeed, it is not known what the SBP is upto, as to whether it will use this money to defend the rupee. Part of the reason is that the SBP Governor spends so much time in Islamabad, where he is said to be pursuing political ambitions.

The SBP has meanwhile been responsible for a lastditch effort to contain inflation by raising the Cash Reserve Requirement from five to six percent. This is almost a panic measure, which central banks only use when the government has run out of other options to control inflation. One of the knock-on effects is a rise in interest rates. Such a rise will also help bolster the foreign exchange reserves as ‘funny money’ comes in, in the form of portfolio investment, in search of the high returns which will be paid from SBP reserves. The signs are almost entirely negative, and give the impression of someone desperately bailing the ship even as the waves get progressively higher. There is a sentiment that no one is now bothering to reverse the situation, but merely to manage it so as to make the pain of the final fall as limited as possible.

Dr MuhaMMaD akraM Zaheer

I

RAN’S new president Ibrahim Raisi seeks a diplomatic way to end the sanction regime. At his swearing-in ceremony on August 5, he stated that the crisis in the region must be resolved through intra-regional dialogue. he said, “I extend my hand of friendship and brotherhood to all the countries of the region, especially to our neighbours, and I warmly shake their hands”. A few weeks ago, Washington also advised Tehran to turn to the talks quickly on reviving a nuclear deal.

In addition, if the President of Iran is genuine in his determination to see the sanctions lifted, that is precisely what’s on the table in Vienna. Washington hopes “Tehran seizes the opportunity now to advance a diplomatic solution”.

There are many reasons why analysts think that the situation is changing. First is the general course of SinoUS diplomacy. When National Security Adviser Jack Sullivan and Secretary of State Anthony Blinken met top Chinese diplomats in Anchorage in March, the tone was bitter and reproachful. On July 26, Under-secretary of State Wendy Sherman struggled to meet with her Chinese counterpart. China advised the USA to change its highly misguided mind-set and dangerous policy of

Local government woes

T

he local governments were turfed out by the present government with a substantial portion of their tenure unexpired. While the local bodies have been restored, and the section of the local government law under which they had been dissolved by the provincial government struck down, the Punjab government is not yet off the hook, and the Chief Secretary, has been threatened with imprisonment by the Supreme Court. The reason is that while the local bodies have been restored, they have been given no development funds.

The real crux of the matter seems to have been reached. Local bodies have development funds at their disposal, and thus councilors have been known to take payments from contractors who want their bills approved.

The power over contractors goes to the provincial government when it dissolves a local council. Also, MPAs and MNAs resent the councils. While the eighteenth Amendment removed the federal government from these councils, it did not provide for the funding of these councils, which are funded largely by the provincial governments.

On the campaign trail, Prime Minister Imran Khan praised the local councils highly, but once in power did not like the Punjab councils, which were dominated by the PML(N). his MNAs and MPAs also did not like these councils. Thus they were dissolved, and the present resistance to them built up. It did not help that the Minister in charge, Senior Minister Aleem Khan, had to resign because he was facing NAB charges, and was only recently reinstated.

The only way out is for the federal government to bring all the parties together and evolve a consensus on local governments, which will includes both a mechanism to secure their funding, and one to ensure that their tenure is not interrupted. After a number of elections, local governments will not just be nurseries of democracy, as they are supposed to be, but they will also be what they are supposed to be: a little boring.

ZeeShaN ahMaD khaN

T

he education system of Pakistan has failed to perform effectively for many years. Rote memorization has been at the heart of the issue which dominates the public schooling system. Besides, the present system of examinations is designed in such a way that only tests memory rather than the understanding of the subject.

The main cause of this symbolic state of examinations is a single prescribed textbook for each subject.

Words and phrases such as learning outcomes, comprehension, application and analytical ability are being mentioned widely in the backdrop of the Single National Curriculum (SNC). however, in reality, only the single assigned textbooks are used to set questions in the final examinations. The model textbooks which were designed under the SNC have a list of questions at the end of each chapter which are only for the reproduction of text for the answer. As a result of such construction, students are instructed to memorize certain portions of text books, and it is particularly urged on them to learn the questions at the end of the chapter.

Decades ago, there was no concept of a single prescribed textbook for a subject. At that time, authors were invited to design textbooks as per the prescribed curriculum and boards of education approved books after checking their validity in accordance with curricular guidelines. Consequently, a number of approved books for each subject were available in the market. Schools were free to choose textbooks for their students. Therefore, examination, at that time, was not based on a particular text but focused on competencies. The marketplace determined the fate of the textbooks. Those which helped the students achieve the best result were the ones to survive.

This method of formulating textbooks by individual authors was changed after the Sharif Commission Report of 1959. The Report suggested the formation of a specialized body for production of textbooks, because formation of textbooks was a laborious task and could not be left to individual authors. Moreover, the establishment of textbook boards for each province was proposed by the commission. The report further stated that only the textbooks written by the provincial boards would be applicable to their respective provinces. In this backdrop, an east Pakistan Textbook Board and a West Pakistan Textbook Board were set up.

As a result of the establishment of the provincial textbook boards, the quality of education and com-

Arif Nizami (Late) Founding Editor

Yousaf Nizami Umar Aziz

Joint Editor

Joint Editor

Executive Editor

Lahore – Ph: 042-36300938, 042-36375965

The writer has a PhD in Political Science. He can be reached at akramzaheer86@yahoo.com

The SNC’s single-textbook policy must be abolished

Dedicated to the legacy of late Hameed Nizami

M. A. Niazi

The Iranian leadership’s views on the nuclear talks are unclear, but there are growing indications that President Raisi and the clerics are more distrustful of the USA than ever before.

Tehran is examining the decline of US influence in the region. China is allying with the Iranian resistance and pursuing a goal of gaining special blessings from Iran which will bring energy benefits for it

Education system in doldrums

There will have to be a political consensus

Editor Aziz-ud-Din Ahmad

thinking China was an imaginary enemy. Before her arrival Mr Wang said that China would not accept the USA’s superior position in the relationship. A few weeks later, the same senior official of China also met the Taliban leadership. China’s “wolf warrior” diplomacy is crystal clear because it openly complains about the USA’s behaviour, ridicules the decline of the USA, and also expresses the view that Washington is facing the consequences of China’s violation. In broader scenarios, the Sino-US relationship is deteriorating.

The absence of collective efforts by the P5+1 to bring Iran back to the UN Security Council is another interesting reason. Russia has many differences with the Biden Administration and also has complex relations with Iran, including direct involvement in Iran’s civilian nuclear programme. however, Russian officials are clearly concerned about the possibility of Iran’s proliferation and speak of the need to limit Iran.

Russian diplomat Mikhail Ulyanov has played a key role in the Vienna-based nuclear talks with Iran and played the role of a messenger between Iranian and American officials. A senior US negotiator was in a closed-door meeting last week and appreciated Russia’s positive role. he described Russian willingness to adopt a “very cooperative approach”. In it, “they want to work with us to see if we can get back to the agreement.”

Another reason is the Chinese increasing its investment in the Persian Gulf, particularly in Iran. That is a clear violation of US sanctions against Iran. With a beginning in the Trump Administration and an increase under the Biden Administration, China has

made clear its violation of US law. Iran desperately needed cash, meanwhile, China has benefited from subsidized oil. As long as the nuclear talks continue, a few barrels of oil here and there can act as a negotiator. however, China imported a record amount of oil from Iran, which has increased more than 11 million barrels per day. The future of the nuclear talks is still unclear whether Iran will agree with the USA, and it is also unclear that China will agree to cut off its imports.

Although China also has serious concerns about Iran’s proliferation, it is happy to be freely involved in global efforts to stop Iran. China expresses all the feelings about its desire to resolve the dispute through negotiations, but at the same time adheres to its agreements with Iran. Both the countries are business partners and China is the only big customer of Iranian oil due to its isolation in the world.

China accounts for about a third of Iran’s trade and Iran accounts for less than one percent of China’s trade. China’s economy is 30 times larger than Iran’s and its population 18 times larger. China is an elephant and Iran is an ant. Although China does not agree with the proliferation of Iran, but it does not feel threatened

by Iran. China also sees Iran as a useful tool in its foreign policy, as a way to get closer to the USAand its allies, and takes Iran as a country in its proximity. The main thing is to pull the trigger.

The Iranian leadership’s views on the nuclear talks are unclear, but there are growing indications that President Raisi and the clerics are more distrustful of the USA than ever before.

Tehran is examining the decline of US influence in the region. China is allying with the Iranian resistance and pursuing a goal of gaining special blessings from Iran which will bring energy benefits for it.

I

Karachi – Ph: 021-35381208-9

I

petition suffered a lot. This exclusive control of the boards over the production of textbooks produced substandard books with poor pedagogy and cheap printing. Moreover, this move narrowed down the scope of learning. In short, quality of education was severely affected due to such a monopolistic act.

It also confined examinations to the material in the textbook, resulting in the development of a culture of rote memorization and a surging in the number of tuition centres and get-through guidebooks.

Today, the situation is also abysmal. handpicked authors of textbooks are paid handsomely. These authors introduce a new edition every year with slight changes only for financial gain at the expense of parents. efforts to end the system of single textbooks and to reintroduce the practice of multiple books of the past were made in 2007 under the National Textbooks and Learning Materials Policy. To abolish the monopoly of provincial textbooks boards, authors and publishers would have been invited in open competition with several approved textbooks for each subject and grade.

Islamabad – Ph: 051-2204545

however, the attempt was not allowed to materialize due to parochial interests of a few, preventing it from happening.

Now, the destructive policy of a single textbook has been imposed on schools by the existing government under SNC. These textbooks which are substandard and low quality in nature are prepared by the MOFe. The provincial textbook boards are instructed to print them.

This means teachers and students follow one book per subject per class. The development of cognitive skills which is much touted under the SNC is reversed. The Pakistani youth has been bearing the brunt of the flawed education policy based on rote memorization.

Poor performance of students of public and low-cost private schools in basic skills of language and arithmetic are unequivocal.

Fossilization of these deficiencies could impact their professional careers.

The first measure is to abolish the single textbook policy. Curriculum- defined learning outcomes are to be given priority while setting exam questions.

The Pakistani youth has been bearing the brunt of the flawed education policy based on rote memorization.

Poor performance of students of public and lowcost private schools in basic skills of language and arithmetic are unequivocal.

Fossilization of these deficiencies could impact their professional careers

I

Web: www.pakistantoday.com.pk

I

The writer is a freelance columnist

Email: editorial@pakistantoday.com.pk

06-07 Comments - 15th November 2021_Layout 1 11/14/2021 10:32 PM Page 2

Monday, 15 November, 2021

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

PTI’s governance and crippling economy The rampant inflation and plunging GDP have engulfed us this year. As per IMF Data Mapper, October 2020, GDP growth was -0.4 percent and the inflation was recorded as 10.7 percent. Such worsening conditioning has come up due to an unprecedented hurdle according to the government.

Which is said to be: Corona. State Bank, during corona, overprinted the currency to meet the cash flow as it wasn’t being deposited by people owing to Corona. however, in the present day, the policy of overprinting has pushed the inflation up. It has descended the value of Rupees and Dollar has peaked in comparison to it. In the present day, 1 US Dollar equals 162 Rupees approximately. Incumbent government seems incapable to cope up with the faced issues. economic indicators are towards gloom and doom in Pakistan. Opposition, taking the advantage of which, has stepped out on the roads against the government. Since the very first day people, in Pakistan, are facing such ups and down in the economy. Will a time appear that it will stand stable on its feet?

JaHangir JamEEl TurbaT

Increasing infection

Geopolitics of Sea Power

MuhaMMaD aSif Baluch

I

T is a fact that the sea played a vibrant role throughout the history of mankind.

The ocean, one of the God-gifted resources, has a great influence upon the economic and political activities of human beings. It has been a significant source for trade, commerce, transportation, movement of people, goods, and ideas from one part of the world to another. Likewise, maritime strategic choke points have also been used by major powers of the time to expand their territorial, military, economic, political, and ideological influence beyond their border. Whereas, for european imperial powers, strategic chokepoints and naval bases, ports, and trade routes, and sea lines of communications were major factors through which they imposed their military power upon colonies in Asia, Africa, and America.

Sea power has always been at the centre of geopolitical, geostrategic, and geoeconomic calculations of major powers. In the geopolitical structure of the world, states have always relied on maritime power for a full realization of their power potential, during peace or war.

A nation strategically occupying a key maritime position with a long coastline, ports and chokepoints, can influence regional, evencum global, geopolitics.

The concept of Sea power, as a formal strategic concept, was first introduced by Alfred Thayer Mahan (1840-1914), an American naval strategist and a historian known as the Godfather of sea power and strategy. his works mainly focused on the history, power, and strategy of the sea as a determining factor in international politics. For him, command of the sea at the time of war and peace is the most prominent factor for national growth, prosperity, and greatness. he pointed out that, ‘control of the sea by maritime commerce and naval supremacy means predominant influence in the world… and is the chief among the merely material elements in the power and prosperity of nations.’ Simply put, sea power is about the seabased capacity of a state to determine or influence events, currents, and developments both at sea and on land. It is not just for the economic activities and development, also considered a broad spectrum of a nation’s strategic culture.

In the contemporary globalized world, states are more connected and any occurrence in the sea could directly influence political, economic, and strategic life on land.

Furthermore, Mahan also considered marine civilization as equal to commercial civilization and trade as the main policy tool, whereas military operations can only be used as a source to create a favorable environment for commercial activities. There are three key factors of this business cycle employed by a sea power to achieve its geoeconomics and geopolitical objectives. These consist of production, shipping, or navigation and colonies or commercial ports.

First, that nation should have the capability of exchanging goods and services through sea routes. Second is that of shipping to implement exchanges to the destination. Finally, to become a sea power, a nation needs to build offshore colonies to regulate and protect commodity exchange throughout the world. Trade and commerce have been initially used as a colonial tool by major powers for geostrategic purposes.

Great Britain used the east India Company as a colonial tool to further its colonies. It would not be wrong to say that utilizing soft power masks hard power.

Thus, it is challenging to measure the driving elements of a sea power because it is not based on a single and defined factor. But maritime strategic thinkers, Mahan in particular, put certain criteria for analyzing the position and geostrategic status of that state. These criteria are made up of the geographical position, of how much a state is open to the sea. The strategic configuration of the state is equally important because the prosperity of trade and security depends upon this. Likewise, the length of coastline and size of the population is also decisive. however, it is not the total size of the population but that portion which can build ships and engage in maritime trade activities. Finally, to employ these human and natural resources depends upon the political nature and character of the government, its willingness and maritime policies. to effectively materialize these factors as a source of national power.

In international politics, the sea has been considered as a dominant strategic paradigm for the rise and fall of nations. As Sir. Walter Raleigh, an english statesman, rightly put it into account, “he that commands the sea, commands the trade, and he that is lord of the trade of the world is lord of the wealth of the world, and he that owns wealth, controls the world itself.” So, the naval strategic thinkers believe that sea power should be at the centre of the geopolitical debate. he further argued that Great Britain’s role as a vibrant sea power immensely contributed to its economic growth and military expansion throughout the world. Britain is much smaller than the USA and Russia, but it had strategic position and openness to maritime trade and transportation. Likewise, the Ryoal Navy immensely contributed to its expansion. That was so for the USA as a great power, thanks to its indispensable naval force. Those were their strategic capabilities through which they integrated their continental and maritime sources of power in their foreign and strategic policies. however, the geopolitical history of sea power is not motionless, and it is floating from one part of the world to another. It has been traveling from the european continent to the American, and now in the 21st century the Asian. Look at the transformation of Chinese, Indian, and Southeast Asian nations from continental considerations to maritime trade, commerce, and transportation.

The economic and military rise of China and India is now featuring the rise of Asian maritime power in the 21st century. Their high economic growth, maritime trade and transportation, naval-industrial complex, industrial transformation, and building their naval military capacity in the world determined the rise of the Asian century. Southeast Asia is at the converging point of the dynamics of China and India. Both states are rising either economically or militarily mainly focusing on maritime activities. Geographically, both states own a long coastline and some of the key shipping ports of the world.

China under the Maritime Silk Road is expanding its economic and strategic sphere of influence throughout the Indo-Pacific region through constructing commercial ports and naval bases. India doesn’t let China rule the waves alone. India also expanded its economic and strategic wings in the Asia-Pacific region under its necklace of diamonds called Look east Policies.

The Chinese Maritime Silk Road and expansion of its blue-water navy in the Pacific and Indian Oceans is a clear indication towards becoming a maritime power. Since 2013 Chinese policymakers have shifted their focus towards maritime economic and strategic thinking.

China’s building of artificial islands in the South China Sea, strengthening its blue-water navy throughout the Indo-Pacific region and investing billions of dollars in littoral countries for commercial and strategic port construction is a clear Chinese message of its maritime thinking.

Furthermore, China has become the world’s factory and has become the second fastest growing economy in the world.

In Shipping and transportation, Chinese state-owned shipping companies are its strategic assets. Its shipping company COSCO is ranked second largest container shipping company in the world and is functioning in over 50 countries.

Correspondingly, India has a great strategic concern to turn its brown-water navy into a bluewater one, owing to the world’s geostrategic transformation. Since its inception as a sovereign state, maritime thinking has been at the core of India’s foreign policy. Once Jawahar Lal Nehru said, “To be safe on land, we must be supreme at sea.” In the 21st century, India is modernizing its naval power. Blue Water Navy, defined as the capability of naval forces to function and perform their sea-based activities and protect their national interests beyond their own maritime territory. however, most of the naval strategists believe that it is the capability of extended and sustained operations across the open seas and has a capacity to project credible power in the distant seas.

India’s contemporary Sagarmala Programme (Garland of the Sea), a flagship project of the Ministry of Shipping to boost sea-based development in the country by exploiting India’s 7,500 km long coastline. The key initiatives under the Sagarmala Programme include port modernization, development of new ports, port connectivity enhancement, developing coastal zones, establishing connectivity between port and roads, and coastal community development as well. The geopolitics of sea power has clearly been transformed from West to east.

The writer can be reached Muahammadasif94@gmail.com

at

ACCORDING to statistics, for some weeks, Pakistan is reporting 14 to 16 deaths due to Covid-19 everyday.The most reasonable explanation behind the rising number of cases are the people who are seen violating the SOPs. Although everyone is in the know how deadly the virus is, but the Pakistanis are yet to follow the SOPs.If it remains the same, then the government would surely be closing the businesses and industries across the country, including educational institutions.While the country went for a lockdown in the first wave of the virus, students were involved in different injurious activities.They were ruining their lives, and we do not want that to happen once again.Lastly, I would like to request the people to please follow the SOPs to save yourself from novel coronavirus.

Hammal m naHEEm bugH

Biden v Trump FOR the most integral times of the US presidential election, where Donald Trump has twiced become known to be selected, and there’s a huge change in votes between Trump and Joe Biden. In the coming hours or days, Donald Trump falsely claimed victory and made unsubstantiated allegations of electoral fraud. however, Biden held a small advantage with votes still left to be tallied, and those states would deliver Biden 270 votes needed in the state-by-state to win the White house. Although, Trump still has a path to victory as being a most successful president in America. According to the latest news, Biden takes the lead in Georgia as race for the White house. Surprisingly, Biden jumped ahead of Trump by 917 votes. Accepting the fact that , no democratic presidential nominee has won the state since Bill Clinton in 1992. At that time, Clinton narrowly defeated former president George h.W. Bush in that state in part because he and Bush were in a three-way race that included Ross Perot, an independent candidate for the presidency. The election is continued and Biden put himself on the doorstep of the critical threshold of 270 votes needed to become president. The president’s allies launched legal challenges and floated conspiracy theories and Trump tries to keep his hopes alive. But there’s obviously less chances for Trump to make him sure about what he makes such a change in votes counts. barkaTullaH TurbaT

Face mask mandatory KARAChI Commissioner Iftikhar Shalwani on Friday issued a citywide directive, making the wearing of face masks compulsory for all citizens. The decision was taken in view of the rising incidence of coronavirus cases in the port city, according to a press release issued by the commissioner’s spokesperson. Shalwani, who also holds the charge of Karachi administrator, directed deputy commissioners to ensure that all citizens wore masks and to impose penalties of up to Rs500 in case of violation of the order. The commissioner further directed the DCs to ensure that SOPs to combat the virus were being implemented in markets and shopping malls in their respective areas, adding that shopkeepers must ensure that their staff and customers don’t enter the premises without wearing a mask. he added that penal action would be taken against the shopkeepers and market administration in whose premises SOPs were being flouted. To a question about whether commuters will also have to wear masks while riding vehicles, the commissioner replied in the affirmative. mEHmooD kHan karacHi

Babar number 1 again?

PAKISTAN captain Babar Azam will be looking to regain the top place in the ICC Twenty20 player rankings, in the upcoming three-match series against Zimbabwe to be held in Rawalpindi from Saturday. Babar, who scored 221 runs including a fine 125 in the final match of their ICC World Cup Super League ODI series against Zimbabwe on Tuesday, has been a familiar name at the top of the Twenty20 batting table and was currently the only one in the top five of all three formats, said a press release issued here. The Pakistan skipper, who has been number one for a total of 774 days in four different stretches since January 2018 and was at the top till September this year, was only eight rating points adrift of Dawid Malan (877 rating points), who leapfrogged him during england’s 2-1 home series win over Australia. Similarly, Pakistan all-rounder Imad Wasim would be looking to move back towards the top spot for bowlers from his current eighth position in the series. aHmaD buTT laHorE

08 WORLD VIEW 15th November 21_Layout 1 11/14/2021 7:54 PM Page 1

Monday, 15 November, 2021

08 WORLD VIEW BISA journAl revIew of InternAtIonAl StudIeS (rIS) Zaheer KaZmi

F

or over forty years, radical Islam has been one of the most clichéd expressions in Western political discourse. From around the time of the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979, it has been invoked habitually by policymakers, the media and academics alike.

At the heart of justifications for war, it has also dominated analysis of global terrorism and political violence since 9/11. Yet it has often displayed a ‘we know it when we see it’ quality, evident not only in assumptions that underpin its usage in the lexicon of Western security policies but in settled genealogies of ‘Islamism’ or ‘jihadism’ recycled routinely by scholars across various disciplines. rather than being self-evident, however, analysis of radical Islam functions more as a kind of rorschach test onto which assorted interpretations of ‘radicalism’ and ‘Islam’ are projected. In my article for rIS, I address the vagaries of radical Islam’s widespread presence in the Anglophone academy by treating the labelling of Islam and Muslim actors as radical as a particular scholarly practice.

Scholars of radical Islam tend to pay less attention to what radicalism means than what Islam is. To put this another way, despite growth in studies of ‘global’ movements and thought, there has been little reflection on radicalism as a comparative concept in the study of global politics. In the history of political and international thought, for instance, radicalism remains a category defined by, if no longer entirely confined to, its Euro-American intellectual heritage. At the same time, the study of radicalization in the behavioural sciences turns the focus of concepts long-applied to historical movements in Europe to the more recent exigencies of global Western counter-terrorism concerns. In this milieu, radicalism’s Eurocentric character tends to be assumed rather than examined when allied to Islam. It might even be said that, as a scholarly category applied universally, radicalism has no content beyond its Western understanding which is itself variable because it has no fixed definition even though the term is used so profusely.

My article essentially does two things.

First, by treating radicalism as a meta-concept it identifies four discourses of radicalism - originating in the Western academy to address Western contexts and phenomena which scholars have used to describe radical Islam: Euro-radicalism, which I identify with the European left and critical theory, fundamentalism, radicalization and liberalism. They show how the content of radical Islam has been variously determined by specific concepts attendant to each discourse. This can reveal both radical Islam’s malleable and composite nature and the enduring Eurocentrism at work in defining it, including in critical and post-Western approaches which unreflectively import certain concepts, such as radicalism, into the analysis of non-Western traditions, while critiquing others. Second, I point to the apologetic recovery of Islam which is apparent in critical approaches to radical Islam, especially critical accounts in Ir since 9/11. These approaches often deploy narratives of Islamic legal, historical or ethical orthodoxy to counter orientalist depictions of Islam - narratives which are, however, insufficiently attentive to marginal and heterodox voices which fall outside hegemonic conceptions of Islamic normativity. In doing so, they also betray paradoxical affinities with proponents of liberal Islam who see it as a vehicle for promoting Islamic moderation in the face of militancy. All of this also suggests that critical approaches to Islam should not themselves be immune from ideological critique.

Below, I give a brief overview of four distinct ways radical Islam is conceptualised

What is radical islam?

THE ARTICLE AIMS TO INTERROGATE THE LABELLING OF ISLAM AND MUSLIM ACTORS AS ‘RADICAL’ AS A PARTICULAR SCHOLARLY PRACTICE. THE AUTHOR ARGUES THAT RADICAL ISLAM IS UNDER-THEORISED AND OVER-DETERMINED AS A SCHOLARLY CATEGORY ANTI-COLONIAL MUSLIM ACTORS - FROM JAMAL AL DIN AL AFGHANI, A FOUNDING FIGURE OF PAN-ISLAMISM TO MAULANA BARKATULLAH OF THE GHADAR PARTY ARE CONNECTED EXPLICITLY TO GLOBAL CIRCUITS OF RADICAL AND REVOLUTIONARY EUROPEAN LEFT ACTIVISM BY SCHOLARS WORKING IN THIS VEIN in the Anglophone academy.

RESISTANCE: When radical Islam is comprehended through the interpretive prisms of Euro-radicalism, narratives of resistance to domination are foregrounded.

Anti-colonial Muslim actors - from Jamal al Din al Afghani, a founding figure of PanIslamism to Maulana Barkatullah of the Ghadar Party - are connected explicitly to global circuits of radical and revolutionary European left activism by scholars working in this vein. These accounts of ‘radical Islam’ stand alongside global histories of other forms of ‘non-Western’ radicalism.

Beyond empire, Islamic socialism also gained scholarly currency in the context of Cold War decolonization. Scholars read these developments through conceptual frameworks which pointed to the radical nature of socialism or Marxism inhering in these manifestations of Islamic thought and practice. Yet radicalism itself is not addressed as a transcultural concept in these accounts. Instead, radicalism’s ‘indigenous’ properties tend to be assumed as an extension of Euro-radicalism; authentically recovered, yet presented as mirrors to Marxism, socialism, anarchism etc. The result is an odd assortment of globalising ‘radical’ non-Western actors largely through the analytical prisms of Western thought, coupled with an absence of reflection on the substance of radicalism as a cross-cultural concept.

Critical theorists often share an underlying vision of radical Islam as a legitimate form of resistance to Western hegemony.

Euro-radicalism is projected onto these accounts both by the adoption of the theories of Western critical theorists and the framing of Islam as an idiom of resistance.

When critical scholars of Islam have criticised the Eurocentrism of Western critical theorists, they have tended to do so with a view to the apologetic recovery of Islam as itself a form of critical theory. This can involve recovering premodern Islam as a means of critiquing Western Enlightenment modernity which, in a kind of methodological circularity, in turn, corresponds with Western counter-Enlightenment critiques.

The influence of Euro-radicalism is also reinforced by how axes of Western criticaltheoretical debate which have played out in postcolonial theory - notably, between Marxists and poststructuralists - are refracted in critical-theoretical accounts of Islam. Thus, while the burgeoning field of ‘Critical Muslim Studies’ can display antifoundationalist and particularist tendencies in its appropriation of Foucauldian and Derridean concepts which present Islamism as a non-Western discourse of resistance, radical readings of Muslim politics which privilege more universal and progressive themes grounded in socialist and Marxist thought can be found in the

explicit adoption of the vocabulary of the European left in terms such as the “Muslim Left” and the “Muslim International” which draw consciously on genealogies of the “Third World Left” as guiding concepts for understanding radical Muslim thought and movements as forms of resistance to the hegemony of liberal capitalism.

REVIVAL: Fundamentalism represents a different conception of radicalism derivative of Western concepts, one originating in studies of Anglo-American Christianity.

When described as fundamentalist, accounts of radical Islam emphasise religious revivalism. The conservative impulses of Christian fundamentalism, often linked in political terms to the Christian right, contrast with the Euro-radicalism of the European left, complicating conceptions of radicalism applied to radical Islam. Interest in comparative fundamentalism formed part of an emerging scholarly drive to understand global religious resurgence in a secular age which appeared in tandem with Western concerns about the rise of radical Islam. The 1980s saw the increasingly explicit use of ‘radicalism’ to refer to Muslim thinkers and movements often also labelled fundamentalist. Cementing this terminological link in Western policymaking, in 1985 the United States House of representatives’ Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Europe and the Middle East published hearings under the title, Islamic Fundamentalism and Islamic radicalism.

Two broad forms of activism can be discerned in scholarly accounts of Islamic fundamentalism. ‘Societal (nonviolent) activism’, which points to a range of contemporary groups which largely recoil from conventional forms of politics as well as premodern thinkers and movements, and ‘political (violent and nonviolent) activism’ which refers to modern Islamist political thinkers, movements and parties. These are not mutually exclusive definitions and, while some scholars make qualified distinctions between them, fundamentalism is used to describe both tendencies. Fundamentalism in its original Western usage centres on the properties of scriptural absolutism, antimodernism, and illiberalism and these traits are carried over into accounts of Islamic fundamentalism. They cut across the duality in accounts of Islamic fundamentalism by adapting and contextualising their meanings. In doing so, the content of radicalism in radical Islam is reconstituted by these ‘fundamentalist’ properties in ways quite distinct from those associated with discourses of Euro-radicalism, radicalization or liberalism.

TERROR: Unlike Euro-radicalism and fundamentalism, radicalization, located in the behavioural sciences, privileges the study of behaviour rather than the content

of political or religious thought. When defined in terms of radicalization, radical Islam again transmutes tying it to processes which lead to terrorism and political violence. radicalization reframes the radicalism in radical Islam in three ways. First, by defining its core meaning in terms of a propensity for violence as a form of political action. The academic discourse of fundamentalism pointed radical Islam towards questions of violence but did not centre, chiefly, on theorizing violence. radicalization is distinguished by a concern with political violence and terrorism in relation to radical Islam. Second, by allying violence to psychological factors which may or may not be determined by the adoption of ‘radical’ thought or ideologies. While they may share with studies of radicalization a concern with radicalism as a process which involves psychological distortions, critical-theoretical accounts of radical Islam tend to link these factors to a singular cause - the predicament of being an oppressed colonial subject. Studies of radicalization address a broader constellation of psychological processes and causes.

Finally, radicalization expands radicalism’s analytical focus from the activities of marginal actors – the main focus in accounts of radical Islam linked to Euro-radicalism, fundamentalism and liberalism - to everyday citizens. In this respect, the absorption of ‘extremism’, violent and nonviolent, into an everyday latent conception of radicalization has redefined radicalism by making it, at once, an individuated concept that can exist potentially everywhere - a reframing tied also to justifications for expansive surveillance measures by states.

Studies of radicalization share much vocabulary with accounts of Islamic fundamentalism and Euro-radicalism, in descriptions of particular theologies, political ideologies and grievances against Western domination. However, they also add conceptually to the lexicon of radical Islam through these three properties.

LIBERAL V RADICAL ISLAM: Critical Ir scholarship focused on Islam’s neglected contribution to Ir represents a distinct approach to understanding radical Islam.

While it follows other critical approaches in challenging Eurocentrism even as it draws on Euro-radical concepts, it also departs from them in being both more markedly apologetic, in seeking to recover Islam’s positive contribution for Ir, and more concerned with ‘de-othering’, or arguing that Islam is not anathema to Western liberal democratic norms. It is particularly evident in the work of Mustapha Kamal Pasha and Co-IrIS (International relations and Islamic Studies Cohort). Highlighting the heterogeneity of Islam and the Muslim world - against monolithic, regressive and violent representations – critical Ir/Islam

scholarship seeks to recover a more pluralistic and nonviolent vision of Islam from within this multiplicity, seen as masked by the West’s ‘othering’ of Islam.

The critical recovery of Islam by Ir scholars leads to particular interpretations of Islam. Against an Islam distorted by orientalist assumptions, its actual traditions and practices are seen to offer enriching alternatives for Ir. In these ways, critical Ir/Islam scholarship can be seen as a form of ‘strategic essentialism’ where the ‘essence’ of Islam, variously defined, is naturalised as an instrumental means of challenging Western readings of Islam and providing novel resources for theorising the international. While they usefully expose Ir’s Eurocentrism, such readings can advocate particular visions of Islam which are left uncontested for the most part because they themselves are vehicles for critique.

This has significant implications for how these accounts view radical Islam which point to the positive contribution of Islamic theories, concepts and ethics for Ir while distancing this contribution from ‘orientalist’ conceptions of Islam as backward and violent, especially since 9/11. This latter political context has meant that critical Ir/Islam scholars have also been particularly concerned with marginalising radical Islam, or dismissing it as being beyond Islam and, paradoxically, betraying liberal impulses even as they contest Western liberalism by seeking identification between Islam and the West.

Not unlike apologetic accounts of liberal Islam, critical Islam/Ir scholars seek not to reframe but to negate radical Islam.

They illustrate how radical Islam shares an intimate relationship to liberalism through defining Islam by its very opposition to radicalism. In this way, ‘liberalism’ can be described as a fourth discourse of radicalism which defines radical Islam, alongside Euro-radicalism (resistance), fundamentalism (revival) and radicalization (terror); one pointing to an absence of radical properties in Islam rather than their variously defined presence. Seen in the light of accounts of liberal Islam which negate Islamic radicalism, it is the absence of radicalism in Islam, rather than its apparent presence, or indeed, prevalence, that has enabled multiple scholarly readings of radical Islam. This can seem less ironic given there is no tradition of radical thought in Islamic intellectual history which equates with traditions of radicalism in Western thought, the only one being that recently constructed in Western scholarly accounts of radical Islam which subsumes genealogies of ‘political Islam’ and so obscures the discrete investigation of radicalism as a cross-cultural category.

Like the phantom nature of liberal Islam which is animated through the projection of Western liberal categories, accounts of radical Islam step into the interpretive gap opened up by this absence.

Having no discernible radical tradition of their own, narratives of Islam which depart from dominant conceptions of Islamic normativity require a language of legitimation which radical Islam, via Western conceptions of radicalism, provides. In doing so, academic accounts of radical Islam also authenticate Islam in some fashion by advancing selective or apologetic descriptions of what constitutes radicalism.

Portugal’s law on bosses contacting employees after office hours ignores the blurred lines between work, life post Covid THE NEW LAW IS MEANT TO ENSURE A HEALTHIER WORK-LIFE BALANCE BY DISALLOWING SUPERVISORS FROM CONTACTING EMPLOYEES AFTER “WORK HOURS” IndIAn expreSS

s

editorial

PArE a thought for your good ole boss. After all, no less a rebel than Bob Dylan said, “everybody’s gotta serve somebody”. It’s not like supervisors don’t have people to report to, and targets of their own to meet. When they call, text, mail after hours, it is likely not for the pleasure of conversing. And, given the blurring of lines between office and home, the work-day and personal time, after the pandemic

struck, it is that much more difficult to know when “office hours” end. It is the complexity of this “new normal” that the well-meaning law passed by Portugal’s socialist government seems not to comprehend.

The new law is meant to ensure a healthier work-life balance by disallowing supervisors from contacting employees after “work hours”. It aims to make Portugal an attractive destination for “digital nomads”: If you have to work-from-home, why not do it from Portugal, where labour laws favour you?

The problem with trying to provide such benefits to “digital nomads”

is that they do not really function in a traditional 9-5 setup. A coder for an Indian company living in Lisbon may well want working hours that are very different from “office hours” in both countries. In fact, one of the few advantages for many people working from home during the pandemic has been the flexibility it affords: Make a meal, spend time with the kids, and work around a schedule you set for yourself. Digital nomads move temporally, not just spatially. With all this flexibility and freedom, the notion of “work hours” all but disappears. And, if you can work any time, so can your boss.

Monday, 15 November, 2021 | KARACHI

NEWS

09

naya nazimabad hoSPital gRoundbReaKing PeRFoRmed by ShauKat taRin KARAcHI

a

Filling stations’ owners seek protection amid increasing robberies in KP PESHAWAR aziz Buneri

Filling stations owners and petrol dealers have urged the police high ups to take immediate notice of increasing robberies at petrol pumps and issuing of orders to ensure security and protection at every level.

The demand was made during an executive council meeting of Sarhad Petroleum Cartage and Dealers Association Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, chaired by its chairman Abdul Majid Khan here on Sunday.

Filing stations owners and petrol dealers, office bearers of the association and representatives relevant stakeholders were present during the meeting.

The meeting thoroughly discussed the growing robberies at filling stations and suggested a number of proposals to eliminate such cash snatching incidents and criminal activity.

The meeting fully agreed with proposals and decided to hold a meeting with Inspector General of Police Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (IGP-KP) forthwith to take up grievances and reservations of the association.

Participants of the forum emphasized that police highups should take immediate notice of increasing robberies at filling stations and ensure protection and security of managers and staff, while carrying cash for deposit to commercial banks and urged them to issue special instructions to all police stations in this regard.

The meeting asked the association members and dealers to take special care and extra measures to ensure protection of managers and staff under the prevailing circumstances.

Abdul Majid Khan while speaking on the occasion said that the increasing number of robberies at filling stations is unbearable and highly condemnable, saying that there is much involvement of cash in the business of petrol pumps. Therefore, he urged the police to ensure security at every level.

The meeting made it clear that if the cash over Rs1.8million had been looted from Afridi Khan Filling Station Charsadda Road Peshawar and Itefaq Filling Station Kohat Road Peshawar, couldn’t recover within next 10 days, the association will compel to take extreme steps and suspend supply of petrol filling stations and depots.

City notes M a niazi

i

MRAN Khan was remarkably prescient when he, while in opposition, kicked up such a fuss about drone attacks. Of course, he objected to their slaying of Pakistani citizens without due process, but the recent drone attack on Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi sheds another light on this. There seems to have been a tacit agreement that heads of state or government are not punished when their country is defeated, or when they are overthrown by a revolution.

But will this agreement survive the coming of drones? Revolutions seem to more dangerous at first. Charles I and Louis XVI were both beheaded in their countries’ Resolutions, while after that, exile seems to have been preferred, apart from Tsar Nicholas II, who was shot with his entire

news desk

DVISOR to the Prime Minister, Mr. Shaukat Fayyaz Tarin, performed the Groundbreaking of Naya Nazimabad Hospital on Sunday.

Naya Nazimabad Hospital, a tertiary, notfor-profit but self-sustainable institution, will be developed in two phases. The first phase will consist of 250 beds across 4 floors and is targeted to be inaugurated by April 2023.

Speaking at the occasion, Advisor to the Prime Minister, Mr. Shaukat Fayyaz Tarin, said, “Availability of quality health care facilities for all is very much a part of our Government’s vision. It gives me great joy that Naya Nazimabad has taken the initiative for the construction of a 500-bed hospital under SBP’s Islamic Refinance Facility. The parent company of Naya Nazimabad, Javedan Corporation Limited (JCL), has received a sanction of PKR 1 billion from Habib Bank Limited (HBL) under SBP’s Islamic Refinance Facility at zero percent (0%) mark-up for construction of Naya Nazimabad Hospital.”

Naya Nazimabad had initially planned to construct this hospital in 2025 but SBP’s Islamic Refinance Facility and HBL’s contribution to participate in this project initiative by passing on this facility at zero percent (0%) enabled and encouraged Naya Nazimabad to advance construction of the Hospital by 4 years.

“We are committed to providing a holistic living experience to all our residents with world-class amenities”, said Chairman, Javedan Corporation Limited, Mr. Arif Habib. “Naya Nazimabad Hospital will maintain the same excellence providing quality healthcare facil-

ities to its residents and its neighbouring community.”

The Ground breaking ceremony was attended by top businessman, bankers, and industry leaders of Karachi.

Naya Nazimabad is an integrated housing scheme which focuses on healthy community living. It is the largest master-planned, gated residential development

CPEC will flourish Pakistan’s development, prosperity: Soomro

in Karachi and will house more than 50,000 families at its completion. It has the provision for all necessary amenities for today’s living, within walking distance for its residents. Naya Nazimabad is a self-contained city, conceptualized and developed with the vision of providing a peaceful community atmosphere and a healthy lifestyle.

2nd phase of Raiwind congregation ends amid prayers RAIWIND staff report

BEIJING agenCies

China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a crucial component of Belt and Road Initiative and a symbol of China-Pakistan friendship, would flourish Pakistan’s development and prosperity, said Muhammadmian Soomro, Federal Minister for Privatisation while addressing the forum titled “2021 China Pakistan Economic and Business Forum”.

“We’re getting even closer and more active in our business relationship through CPEC, and this could help build up infrastructure energy projects, railways, and basically enhance closer cooperation,” he added, according to Gwadar Pro. Soomro further said China Agriculture University with the cooperation of local government would set up an echo park near Thatta and Badeen,

Sindh, Pakistan, adding that CPEC has provided an opportunity to create a win-win situation.

Member of Standing Committee on Planning Development and Special Initiatives and MNA Dr. Seemi Bukhari said that after the signing of Free Trade Agreement, trade activities have increased tremendously.

Pakistan is an agriculture based country and the goods related to that have increased their exports to China.

Speaking at the occasion, Shaikh Muhammad Shariq, Vice President of National Bank of Pakistan and Chief Representative in China said, adding “We have already established strong banking partnership with major Chinese financial institutions to facilitate trade & investment under CPEC and BRI not only in Pakistan but in all the places where we have operations.”

The second phase of the Raiwind congregation has culminated Sunday with the final dua recited by Maulana Ibrahim Deola. Today was the last day of 3-day-long second phase of the religious congregation at Raiwind. A large number of devotees from across the country including Lahore Deputy Commissioner Umar Sher Chattha came to attend the Ijtima. The participants have started departing the congregation venue. While delivering the final dua, Maulana Ibrahim Deola said that prayer is a weapon in the hands of Muslim Ummah.

Always pray to Allah, he emphasized. Tears rolled down the eyes of the audience who were listening to his prayers with rapt attention. The Maulana sought forgiveness of Allah from sins and prayed to Him to shower His mercy on the Muslim Ummah. He urged the Muslims to observe Salah and act upon the injunctions of Allah and follow the traditions of Holy Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). The Raiwind congregation was consisted of two phases. Due to corona epidemic, the gathering was limited in number and it has been held in phases for the last two years. The first phase was ended with prayers on Nov 7 and was attended by delegates from Lakki Marwat, Karak, Bannu, Dir, Bajaur, Chitral, Pindi, Jhelum, Sargodha, Khushab, Bhakkar and Sindh. The second phase was started on Nov 11 and ended today (Nov 14). Delegates from Kohat, Orakzai, Adamkhel, Malakand, Bahawalpur, Lodhran, Gujarat, Sialkot and Narwal participated in it. The administration has chalked out a special traffic plan. It has also made strict security arrangements, more than 2,000 personnel including 9 SDPOs, 27 SHOs were on duty under the supervision of three divisional officers. More than 30 PRU’s and Dolphin teams were deployed under the supervision of SP Dolphin. Seven parking stands, 20 fork lifters were arranged, walk-through gates were installed at the entrance and exit points.

Sending in the dRoneS family.

With monarchs, you have to get the whole family. I mean, look at Charles I. His sons survived, and not only did one become Charles II, but the other James II. They had to rebel against him all over again, in what was called the Glorious Revolution. He survived, and so did his son James, who became known as the Old Pretender. He was the father of the Young Pretender, who entered legend and song as Bonnie Prince Charlie, whose campaign in 1745 culminated at the Battle of Culloden, when the Scottish clans were crushed forever.

To keep things in perspective, Culloden was just 12 years before the Battle of Buxar, and 19 ahead of that of Plassey. So there were still tremendous forces at home while they were building an empire over here.

Again to keep things in perspective, Punjab had not even seen the ascent of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. It was the time of the classic Sikhashahi, when there was total disorder.

Ranjit Singh actually provided stability, until his death and the frequently violent succession struggles which constitute the Sikhashahi that people still talk about.

Ranjit Singh knew about there being no respect for heads of state. But he was effective. His sons were not. The eldest, Maharaja Sher Singh, was shot by a weapon he was inspecting. Nowadays even shoes are not thrown at heads of government with impunity. Those must have been simpler times, when it was possible to take a loaded weapon into the presence, without any security detail to fuss over it. Actually, security details can be pretty laid back.

Remember how someone got into the wedding of an MNA’s son, and shot dead the MNA’s brother, ignoring the CM who was in attendance?

Now imagine that security detail responding to a drone attack. I don’t suppose it was a US-style military drone carrying a Hellfire missile. It was probably a quadcopter drone which can carry only a few kg of payload. Actually, it isn’t meant to deliver payloads at all. Even if it was loaded with pure high explosive, it wouldn’t be much more than an IED. Actually, maybe you don’t need IEDs, or indeed explosives of any kind, to cause casualties. Look at how casually Australia brushed Pakistan aside in the T20 World Cup semifinal. Wade walked when he shouldn’t have, but that didn’t change the result.

I assume there were pins being poked into a doll of Shaheen Shah Afridi when he was being hit all over the place, just to make sure that a potential rival didn’t crop up.

Imran also had problems with his numbers. If the government loses any vote, it should ensign. Maybe it wins the confidence of the House again, but that resignation should come. If nothing else, the Chief Whip should be sacked. If possible, worse should be done to him, but that would be dark-alley work by beefy individuals with low foreheads and beetling brows. Hockey sticks, knives or iron rods should not be used. The idea is to tell the Chief Whip what’s what, not cause a bye-election. I suppose the joint session was postponed because the Chief Whip could not be trusted to handle it, because it would be more complicated.

By the way, did Malala Yousafzai’s wedding to the PCB’s high-performance manager help the team or hinder it? I don’t know, and I suspect Malala doesn’t either.

Monday, 15 November, 2021 | KARACHI

10 FOREIGN NEWS

SaudI arabIa tO cOntInue talkS wIth Iran, SayS SaudI FM PARis

S

Monitoring report

AUDI Arabia will continue to hold talks with Iran and an additional round of negotiations between the regional rivals was expected soon, top Saudi diplomat said on Saturday. Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud told France 24 tele-

kuwait emir accepts govt resignation: state news agency Agencies Kuwait’s Emir Sheikh Nawaf al-Ahmed al-Sabah accepted on Sunday the resignation of the government, state news agency KUNA reported, as the oil-rich country’s rulers seek to end a feud with lawmakers that has hindered fiscal reforms. Prime Minister Sheikh Sabah al-Khalid al-Sabah submitted on Nov. 8 the resignation of his cabinet, formed in March. An Emiri decree asked the outgoing government to remain in a caretaker capacity until a new cabinet is formed, KUNA said. The disagreement centres on the prime minister having been granted temporary immunity by parliament protecting him against questioning from MPs on issues including handling the Covid-19 pandemic and corruption until the end of 2022. It has hindered efforts to boost state finances – hit hard last year by low oil prices and the pandemic – and enact a debt law needed to tap global markets.

clashes erupt in yemen’s hodeidah as pro-coalition forces cede ground to houthis

vision that four previous rounds of talks were merely “exploratory” rather than substantial, but said both sides were committed to engagement.

But he expressed strong reservations about Iran’s nuclear negotiations which are set to resume in a few weeks, citing Tehran’s past “deception” about its nuclear activities.

The foreign minister also denied reports that Saudi Arabia was withdrawing troops from Yemen. The situation was deadlocked militarily and diplomatically, he said, lamenting that the Houthis had not agreed to a Saudi proposal for a ceasefire earlier this year. ‘no purpose in engAging LebAnon At this time’: The foreign minister said that the kingdom does not plan to engage with the Lebanese government at this time.

Lebanon is facing its worst diplomatic crisis yet with Gulf states, spurred by a minister’s critical comments about the Saudi-led intervention in Yemen that prompted Riyadh to expel Lebanon’s ambassador, recall its own envoy and ban all imports from Lebanon.

“We see no useful purpose of engaging with the Lebanese government at this point in time,” he said. “We think that the political class needs to step up and take the necessary actions to liberate Lebanon from the domination of Hezbollah, and through Hezbollah, Iran.”

Saudi Arabia was angered by an interview in which Lebanon’s newly-appointed information minister George Kordahi appeared to side with Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis and said Yemen was being subjected to external aggression.

Kordahi said the interview was recorded before he

became a minister and has refused to apologise or step down.

Hezbollah’s leader last week described Riyadh’s reaction to comments by information minister George Kordahi as “exaggerated” and accused Saudi Arabia of seeking a civil war in Lebanon.

Riyadh, long locked in a rivalry for regional influence with foe Iran, has said its actions were driven not just by Kordahi’s comments, made before the cabinet formation, but rather its objection to the growing heft of Hezbollah in Lebanese politics.

Gulf states were traditional aid donors to Lebanon but, dismayed by Hezbollah’s expanding power, have been loathe to help rescue Lebanon from a devastating economic crisis, rooted in decades of corruption and mismanagement.

Gaddafi’s son set to run for Libyan president TRiPOLi agencies

The son of Libya’s late dictator Muammar Gaddafi appeared for nearly the first time in a decade on Sunday to register as a presidential candidate for a December vote planned to help end the years of chaos since his father was toppled.

Saif al-Islam al-Gaddafi, 49, appeared in an electoral commission video in traditional brown robe and turban, and with a grey beard and glasses, signing documents at the election centre in the southern town of Sebha.

Gaddafi is one of the most prominent – and controversial – figures expected to run for president, a list that also includes eastern military commander Khalifa Haftar, Prime Minister Abdulhamid alDbeibah and parliament speaker Aguila Saleh. However, while his name is one of the best known in Libya, and though he once played a major role in shaping policy before the 2011 NATO-backed uprising that destroyed his family’s regime, he has barely been seen for a decade.

His formal entry into an election whose rules are still contested by Libya’s squabbling factions may also cast new questions over a contest that features candidates viewed in some regions as unacceptable.

Despite the public backing of most Libyan factions and foreign powers for elections on Dec 24, the vote remains in doubt as rival entities bicker over the rules and schedule. A major conference in Paris on Friday agreed to sanction anyone who disrupt or prevent the vote, but with less than six weeks to go, there is still no agreement on rules to govern who should be able to run.

While Gaddafi is likely to play on nostalgia for the era before the 2011 NATO-backed uprising that swept his father from power and ushered in a decade

of chaos and violence, analysts say he may not prove to be a front runner.

The Gaddafi era is still remembered by many Libyans as one of harsh autocracy, while Saif al-Islam and other former regime figures have been out of power for so long they may find it difficult to mobilise as much support as major rivals.

Muammar al-Gaddafi was captured outside his hometown of Sirte by opposition fighters in Oct 2011 and summarily shot. Saif al-Islam was seized days later by fighters from the mountainous

Zintan region as he tried to flee Libya for Niger.

Ambitions: Just over a decade later, Saif al-Islam is now something of a cipher for Libyans. The Zintan fighters kept him for years out of public sight and his views on the crisis are not known.

He gave an interview to the New York Times earlier this year, but has not yet made any public appearance speaking directly to Libyans.

Complicating his presidential ambitions, Gaddafi was tried in absentia in 2015 by a Tripoli court at which he appeared via videolink from Zintan, and which sentenced him to death for war crimes including killing protesters during the 2011 revolt. He would likely face arrest or other dangers if he appeared publicly in the capital Tripoli. He is also wanted by the International Criminal Court. Educated at the London School of Economics and a fluent English speaker, Saif al-Islam was once seen by many governments as the acceptable, Westernfriendly face of Libya, and a possible heir apparent. But when a rebellion broke out in 2011 against Muammar Gaddafi’s long rule, Saif al-Islam immediately chose family and clan loyalties over his many friendships in the West, telling Reuters television: “We fight here in Libya; we die here in Libya”.

Agencies Yemen’s warring sides clashed south of the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah late on Saturday, after Iranianbacked Houthi fighters moved into territory ceded by forces allied to a Saudi-led coalition, military sources and witnesses said. Yemeni forces backed by the United Arab Emirates had on Friday announced they were redeploying from around Yemen’s main port in the west, a move which a UN monitoring mission and the government said they had no advance notice of. The Saudi-backed government and the Iran-aligned Houthis, who hold Hodeidah city, had in 2018 agreed a United Nations-sponsored pact for a truce in Hodeidah that largely held and a troop withdrawal by both sides, stalled since 2019. Coalition warplanes launched air strikes on the Al Faza area south of Hodeidah as Houthi fighters battled UAE-backed forces until midnight, two military sources and residents said. Al Faza lies 15 km (9 miles) from coalition-held Al-Khokha, to which hundreds of Yemenis have fled after the Houthi advance.

A UN mission overseeing the Hodeidah pact, UNMHA, on Saturday urged both sides to ensure the safety of civilians, saying it “was not informed in advance of the movements”. The internationally recognised government’s team for UNMHA said in a statement it also had no prior knowledge and warned that Houthi advances would be “a glaring violation” of the pact. It was not clear if the withdrawal in Hodeidah was linked to what the Saudi-led alliance had described as a re-deployment in south Yemen, where sources said the Saudi military had left a main base in Aden, the interim seat of government. Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister, in an interview with France 24 TV on Saturday, reiterated a coalition denial that the Saudi military was withdrawing, saying “there continues to be strong support for the government of Yemen and (coalition) forces”. The alliance intervened in Yemen in 2015 after the Houthis ousted the government from the capital, Sanaa. The conflict is seen as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran. The Houthis say they are fighting a corrupt system and foreign aggression. Washington is pressing Riyadh to lift a coalition blockade on Houthiheld ports, a condition from the group for ceasefire talks. Hodeidah is the main entry point for commercial goods and aid flows and a lifeline for millions facing starvation in what the UN describes as the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis.

Chinese companies keen to explore dairy cooperation with Pakistan BeiJing Mian abrar

A leading Chinese entrepreneur Sunday said that Chinese companies would love to learn more about Pakistan’s dairy industry and actively participate in its growth.

“The yield and quality of dairy products in Pakistan is very high and has huge potential. We are willing to explore dairy cooperation based on the belt and Road Initiative and have had some communication with them.

We’d also love to learn more about Pakistan’s dairy industry and actively participate in it,” Li Yunjie, Overseas Business Manager of Bright Dairy & Food company, one of the largest dairy groups in China said at the China International Import Expo (CIIE).

Chinese enterprises welcome Pakistani milk to enter the Chinese market, which will benefit Pakistan’s economic development, industrial upgrading and industrial chain extension.

At the same time, it will also meet the demand of Chinese consumers for high-quality milk products.

Li added that the demand for dairy products in China is huge, and has gone beyond basic products such as milk.

“Although the consumer market in China is constantly changing, the trend for health is not going to change,” he says, “regarding our data and analysis, we believe that cheese and cream are going to be two of the fastest growing categories in the future.”

He said that in addition to infant milk powder, large packages powder, and liquid milk, high value-added dairy products such as whey, cheese, butter and cream are also in great demand in the Chinese market.

If the industrial chain can be transplanted to Pakistan, it is expected to achieve a win-win situation for the milk industry of the two countries.

Dairy products received great attention on 4th CIIE. At the occasion, the Dairy Industry Forum of CIIE was successfully held as well. At the event, the Committee also released a Report on China’s Dairy Industry, calling for enhanced cooperation in the dairy industry along BRI. The Chinese market has shown great demand for dairy products.

In 2020, China imported 3.39 million tons of dairy products, 10.2% year on year increase.

I m p o r t s amounted to $12.4 billion, up 6.5% year-onyear.

From 2011 to 2020, China’s dairy imports grew at a compound annual growth rate of 12.3%, and this demand continues to expand. China’s diversified demand for high-quality milk products has also offered a new option for Pakistan’s dairy industry.

At present, China’s dairy import are mostly from New Zealand (40.44%), the Netherlands (17.15%), Australia (7.38%) and other European and American countries. By contrast, Chinese dairy companies are trying to tap high-quality milk sources in Belt and Road countries such as Pakistan.

One dies as two quakes hit southern Iran Agencies Tehran, Iran – Two powerful earthquakes have hit southern Iran in quick succession, leaving at least one person dead and sending panicked residents rushing to the streets. Esmaeil Bayramnejad, the head of the Iranian Seismological Center, told state television the two tremors of magnitude 6.4 and 6.3 respectively struck one minute apart in an area near the island of Qeshm, close to the port city of Bandar Abbas, on Sunday afternoon. The quakes were felt in neighbouring provinces, including Kerman, as well as in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.

Several aftershocks were reported in the following hours in Iran. The victim died when an electricity pole fell on him while walking on a street in Bandar Abbas. Videos on social media also showed parts of the Geno Mountain in Bandar Abbas collapsing. Emergency officials told state TV that no further casualties or extensive damage have been reported so far. “We were working when we felt the building shake badly,” a young woman told state TV. “We thought it would be over soon but it went on for about 30 seconds so we ran out.” Electricity and internet outages have been reported in the affected provinces, some areas of which have also experienced disruptions in landline phones.

Officials said they would be reconnected soon.

President Ebrahim Raisi ordered an immediate gathering of his cabinet to discuss measures to ensure the safety of affected areas. He also ordered his first vice president, Mohammad Mohkber, to travel to Hormozgan to personally assess the situation. Eerily, the quakes come a day after a senior deputy at the Tehran Municipality announced that a large cemetery with an area of 13 hectares is being prepared to be able to house the victims of a potentially deadly quake in the capital. Experts have for years warned that Tehran may one day be hit by a major earthquake as it sits close to fault lines.

Monday, 15 November, 2021 | KARACHI

SPORTS 11

MbAppe fires frAnce to World cup finAls

W

AFP

ORLd champions France booked their place at next year’s World Cup in Qatar in style as Kylian Mbappe fired in four goals in an 8-0 thrashing of Kazakhstan at the Parc des Princes on Saturday.

Karim Benzema scored twice and there were further goals for Adrien Rabiot and Antoine Griezmann whose penalty marked his 42nd goal for France, taking him ahead of Michel Platini.

Only Thierry Henry (51) and Olivier Giroud (46) have scored more for France.

The French will be joined at the finals by neighbours Belgium as the world’s top-ranked team saw off Estonia 3-1 in Brussels to ensure top spot in Group E ahead of Gareth Bale’s Wales who beat Belarus 5-1 in Cardiff.

The Netherlands, who missed out on the 2018 World Cup, looked on course to join them as they led Montenegro 2-0 going into the last 10 minutes of their encounter in Podgorica.

However, the dutch conceded two goals in the last 10 minutes to draw 2-2. They still top Group G but are just two points ahead of Turkey and Norway.

On the sixth anniversary of the 2015 attacks in Paris which claimed the lives of 130 people, France put on a spectacular show for their supporters.

Mbappe set the ball rolling when he put the world champions ahead after just six minutes.

The Paris Saint-Germain star, playing on his home ground, added a second six minutes later and completed his first hat-trick for France with a thundering header just after the half-hour.

Leading 3-0 at the break, France turned up the heat even more in the second half as Benzema struck twice before Rabiot and Griezmann had their moments in the spotlight.

It was fitting that Mbappe had the final say, stroking home his fourth to complete the rout three minutes from time.

France top Group d, leaving Finland and Ukraine to scrap over second place.

“A World Cup is a dream, an

aim, it’s everything and it’s a unique chance to play in a team that can win it. We’re going over there to win it,” Mbappe said.

The Finns have a two-point advantage going into the final round of matches after seeing off BosniaHerzegovina 3-1.

The Finns had Jukka Raitala

sent off before half-time but goals from Brentford forward Marcus Forss, Robin Lod and daniel O’Shaughnessy sealed the win.

Belgium had dropped just a single point in qualifying up to this point and knew that victory over Estonia would guarantee them top spot in Group E.

Manager Roberto Martinez, however, was without first-choice strikers Romelu Lukaku, Mitchy Batshuayi and Touri Tielemans who were all injured.

That meant a call-up for Christian Benteke and the Crystal Palace forward did not disappoint, taking his chance to press his claims by netting the opener after just 11 minutes.

“I know I’m only the third choice in the hierarchy of the forwards but I’m not giving up,” said Benteke.

“The place in the squad for Qatar will be earned on the pitch.”

Yannick Carrasco doubled the lead eight minutes into the second half and although Erik Sorga pulled one back for the visitors, Thorgan Hazard put the game to bed shortly after.

That win meant that Wales, who had already secured a place in the play-offs, would not be able to catch them.

The Welsh, however, boosted by the presence of Bale making his 100th appearance, produced their own impressive show with Aaron Ramsay scoring twice on a noisy night in Cardiff.

The dutch, meanwhile, who

would have qualified with a win over Montenegro, will rue careless defending after Memphis depay had scored twice to give them a 2-0 lead.

Ilija Vukotic marked his international debut with a goal in the 82nd minute to give the home side some hope and four minutes later Nikola Vujnovic looped in a header to halt the orange march to Qatar.

“The way we played in the second half was just outrageous,” dutch captain Virgil Van dijk told dutch broadcaster NOS. “Our organisation was just awful. We should have qualified here.”

The dutch are just two points ahead of Turkey, who put six past Gibraltar, and Norway who proved toothless without the injured Erling Braut Haaland as they were held to a 0-0 draw against Latvia in Oslo.

The dutch host Norway in Rotterdam on Tuesday in the final round of matches while Turkey travel to Montenegro.

France and Belgium join denmark and Germany as confirmed qualifers from Europe with the other six automatic places to be settled over the course of the final matchday.

Japan’s Uno back on top after NHK Trophy win AFP

Alcaraz ends year in ‘best way possible’ MILAN Agencies

Carlos Alcaraz became the first Spaniard to win the Next Gen ATP Finals on Saturday when the 18-year-old beat American Sebastian Korda 4-3(5) 4-2 4-2 in Milan to cap a memorable breakthrough season. With the “First-to-4” format in place, top seed Alcaraz needed only 82 minutes to seal his second title of the season. He saved all six break points he faced while breaking twice and firing 15 winners past the 21-year-old Korda. Alcaraz, who climbed into the top 50 in the rankings this year, also became the youngest player to finish a year with 32 Tour-level victories since Ukrainian Andrei Medvedev achieved that feat in 1992 as an 18-year-old. “I feel amazing. It’s pretty good to end the year in the best way possible, winning this title, playing great matches against great players. It’s the best way to finish the year,” Alcaraz told reporters. “(My coach) Juan Carlos (Ferrero) tells me that in the best, in the tough moments you have to play aggressive, you have to go for it, and that’s what I did. “I’m working on that, to be calm in the tough moments. That’s the key for winning the tough points, the tough moments.” The tournament for players 21 and under has different rules in place such as court-side coaching which Alcaraz said should be on the ATP Tour as well. However, he was not a fan of the shorter warm-up periods which were reduced to just one minute. “You have no time to warm up. I would say for the player, you can’t warm up everything, every shot – the volley, the serve, the backhand, the forehand – at all. “I would say that you have to warm up four minutes… to start the match in the best way possible.”

Japan’s Shoma Uno said he was “back fighting at the top” of figure skating after winning the NHK Trophy on Saturday — his first major title in almost three years.

Uno, the silver medallist at the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics, claimed a personal-best score of 290.15 in Tokyo, beating American Vincent Zhou into a distant second.

Uno’s last major win came at the Four Continents in February 2019, and he thought of quitting skating during the barren spell that followed.

But he said he had got his mojo back after qualifying for next month’s Grand Prix final with Saturday’s victory, which came in the absence of injured Olympic champion Yuzuru Hanyu.

“I haven’t been able to stand on the podium for a few years, and finally I’m back fighting for a place at the top again,” said Uno. “I don’t want to be satisfied with this result. I want to keep aiming higher.”

Hanyu withdrew from the competition last week after injuring an ankle ligament in a fall in practice.

Zhou was looking for his second Grand Prix win of the season, after claiming the Skate America title ahead of Uno last month.

But a mistake-riddled free skate left him far adrift in second place on 260.69, ahead of South Korea’s Cha Junhwan on 259.60.

“I really wish I could have done better and capitalised on my opportunity here, but thankfully this isn’t the Olympics,” said Zhou, who also qualified for the Grand Prix final.

“I think this is good to get this out of my system now, because this is not who I am.”

In the women’s competition, Japan’s Kaori Sakamoto cruised to victory on 223.34 points, well clear of secondplace Mana Kawabe’s 205.44.

Sakamoto is performing a new free skate routine this season — to “No More Fight Left In Me” and “Tris” —

and she admitted she felt “lost” over the summer as she tried to get to grips with it.

But she said she is now “going in a good direction”, having also finished fourth at Skate America, and she looked set to qualify for the Grand Prix final.

“If I think back to where I was a month ago, I wouldn’t have imagined I could perform as I did today,” she said.

Kawabe was a late replacement for the injured Rika Kihira, and she seized her chance to claim second in the short programme.

The 17-year-old fell early in her free skate but recovered to win the silver medal ahead of third-place You Young of South Korea.

“I made a mistake on my axel but I was able to put that behind me and skate calmly, and I think that’s where

I have grown as a skater,” Kawabe said.

“That was a personal best overall score so I’m very happy.”

Russia’s Anastasia Mishina and Aleksandr Galliamov won the pairs title with a score of 227.28 — the highest of the Grand Prix season so far.

The world champions, who were making their first appearance of the season, finished ahead of compatriots Evgenia Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov, who scored 213.27.

There was also success for Russia in ice dance, with Victoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov topping the podium with 215.44 points.

Madison Chock and Evan Bates of the United States were second on 210.78, while Britain’s Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson were third on 191.91.

England eye World Cup berth AFP England manager Gareth Southgate plans to rotate his team against San Marino as the Three Lions look to seal their place at the World Cup on Monday.

Southgate’s side will be guaranteed to feature at next year’s tournament in Qatar if they avoid defeat in San Marino.

The Group I leaders crushed Albania 5-0 on Friday and should have few problems with the world’s lowestranked side in their last qualifier on Monday.

After Harry Kane’s hat-trick and goals from Harry Maguire and Jordan Henderson put England five up halftime against Albania, Southgate was able to make a raft of second half changes to rest his stars.

But he still plans to switch things up in San Marino, while also admitting Mason Mount and Luke Shaw are likely to miss out again as they recover from a tooth infection and a head injury respectively.

“Yes, we will make quite a few changes but what we’ve done well in the past is sustain good performances, even with those changes,” Southgate said.

“Although it was one of the more experienced teams we’ve fielded, we still had a lot of exciting young talent out there.” Maguire’s headed opener for England was a

welcome boost after a difficult period for the out-of-form Manchester United centre-back.

Maguire celebrated by sliding to his knees, cupping his ears and sticking his fingers in them in what was perceived as message that he won’t be distracted by his critics.

Former Manchester United captain Roy Keane said Maguire’s celebration was “embarrassing” but Southgate was quick to defend his player.

“I don’t know, is he a Hulk Hogan fan? I don’t know what the celebration was for,” Southgate said.

“He’s a fabulous player, two months ago he was in the European Championship team of the tournament.

“He’s rushed back because he’s the sort of player that has a huge conscience to help his club and I said during the week you get lots of players that hide in the treatment room when the pressure’s on.

“He hasn’t done that and I’ve got massive respect for doing that.

“He’s been able to switch his focus, have a few more days on the training pitch, which has probably helped him as well, and his performance was very good.”

Southgate also dismissed talk about his future as an “irrelevance” after the Albania victory.

Reports before the game suggested Southgate was ex-

pected to sign a new two-year deal to take him through to Euro 2024, but he insisted it was not his focus.

“It’s an irrelevance for me. I’m under contract, I’m not out of contract, and I’m very well backed and supported here,” he said.

“My focus is getting this qualification done and everything else can wait.

“We need a point, we are not done, and it would be wrong for my attention to be anywhere else than that.

“My job was to get this team to a World Cup and then we can look at everything else after that.”

Monday, 15 November, 2021

prayer tiMings

NEWS

TarIN hINTS aT aNoTher peTrol prICe hIKe KARACHI

p

staff report

RIME Ministers Advisor on Finance Shaukat Tarin on Sunday hinted that petrol will become more expensive as the Pakistani rupee continues to depreciate against the US dollar.

While talking to the media in Karachi,

Tarin said that that if global prices go up, then Pakistan will also have to follow suit.

He said that the ‘satta mafia‘ is involved in the depreciation of the rupee.

“The dollar is being smuggled to Afghanistan but the government is going to tighten the noose around the mafia,” he added.

The advisor said that the government is working on a long-term strategy to

strengthen the national economy on a sustainable basis.

Tarin said Prime Minister Imran Khan took balanced decisions to protect the livelihood of people and the economy during COVID-19.

He said the government fully focused on construction, agriculture and industry to ensure growth in all sectors.

He said significant growth in agricul-

ture production was witnessed during the last year whereas the government is trying to increase revenue from nine to 11 per cent.

‘Similarly, information technology (IT) sector exports increased by 47 per cent during the last year and other sectors are also showing growth,” he said.

Later while talking to media persons, the advisor said all matters with IMF will be settled soon.

Russia starts missile supplies to India despite US sanctions risk

Shibli Faraz says all bills will be passed amicably PESHAWAR staff report

Federal Minister for Science and Technology Shibli Faraz said Sunday that all the bills [related to electoral reforms and other issues] will be passed in the Parliament. “After a briefing on the matter, all the allied parties have been convinced [to support the ordinance and bills],” said Faraz, while briefing media about consultations between the ruling party and its allies. The PTI allies, PML-Q and MQM-P, had expressed their concerns over the new legislation proposed by the government and complained of being “kept in the dark” over important decisions. The differences among the coalition partners emerged when the government postponed the joint sitting of the Parliament due to a lack of consensus over the bills to be placed for passage. Faraz reiterated that bringing transparency in the electoral process is impossible without the use of modern technology as he asserted his support for the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs). The minister said that the Opposition parties’ alliance — the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) — is politicising inflation.

“PDM wants to oust the [incumbent] government by capitalising on inflation but it will fail,” said Faraz, adding that inflation is rising on a global level and Pakistan is just another country that is affected by it. He said that PDM wants to benefit from every crisis but it neither has the solution for the problems of people nor does it have an alternate option to control inflation. Faraz further stated that the “economic situation of Afghanistan is worrisome”, adding that international forces must play their part in the Afghan crisis.

Russia has started supplying India with S-400 air defence missile systems, Russian news agencies reported on Sunday citing Dmitry Shugayev, the head of the Russian military cooperation agency.

The supplies put India at risk of sanctions from the United States under a 2017 U.S. law aimed at deterring countries from buying Russian military hardware.

“The first supplies have already been started,” Interfax cited Shugayev as saying on Sunday at an aerospace trade show in Dubai.

He said that the first unit of an S-400 systems will arrive in India by the end of this year.

The $5.5 billion deal for five

long-range surface-to-air missile systems, which India says it needs to counter a threat from China, was signed in 2018.

India faces a range of financial sanctions from the United States under Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA), which names Russia an adversary alongside North Korea and Iran for its actions against Ukraine, interference in the U.S. 2016 elections and help to Syria.

New Delhi said it has a strategic partnership with both the United States and Russia while Washington told India it was unlikely to get a waiver from CAATSA. Last year the United Stated im-

posed sanctions citing CAATSA on NATO ally Turkey for acquiring S400 missiles from Russia. The sanctions targeted the main Turkish defence procurement and development body Presidency of Defence Industries.

Washington also removed Turkey from a F-35 stealth fighter jet program, the most advanced aircraft in the U.S. arsenal, used by NATO members and other U.S. allies.

Russia said it had offered Turkey its help in developing advanced fighter jets but no agreement has been reached so far. “We are still at a stage of negotiations on this project,” RIA new agency quoted Shugayev as saying on Sunday. agencies

Govt to take allies into confidence today on EVMs ISLAMABAD staff report

An important meeting of the government and the coalition parties would be held today (Monday) where federal ministers would try to remove the reservations of their allies.

Sources claimed the government would brief the coalition parties on the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) and the proposed electoral reforms.

The reports disclosed that a special delegation of the government would meet the allied parties including the Pakistan Muslim League Quaid (PML-Q) and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan (MQM-P).

Fajr SunriSE

Zuhr

aSr MaGhrib iSha

5:27

12:16

3:24

6:44

5:47

7:05

Indian Sikhs set Nov 19 as deadline for Kartarpur Corridor reopening As Pakistan issues visas to 3,000 Sikh pilgrims for the 552nd birth anniversary of Baba Guru Nanak, the Sikh community in India has given a deadline of November 19 to their government for reopening the Kartarpur Corridor. “Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi has issued around 3,000 visas to Indian Sikh pilgrims to participate in the 552nd birth anniversary celebrations of Baba Guru Nanak in Pakistan from November 17 to November 26, 2021. Thousands of Sikh pilgrims residing in countries other than India would also be visiting Pakistan to attend the event,” the Pakistan High Commission in India announced Friday. During their stay in Pakistan, the Sikh pilgrims would pay obeisance at different Gurdwaras including Gurdwara Janam Asthan in Nankana Sahib and Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Kartarpur. However, the Sikhs in India have formed a Sri Kartarpur Sahib Corridor Sangarash Committee (SKSCSC) which had announced to take its movement for the cause on international platforms if the demand was not met by November 19. The Indian media quoted SKSCSC member Surinderpal Singh Talibpur as saying they had formed a 13-member committee to demand the reopening of the Kartarpur Corridor so that followers could travel to Pakistan and return on the same day after paying obeisance at Gurdwara Darbar Sahib.

Another member of SKSCSC, Balwinder Singh Pakhoke, said they had offered prayers at the international border at Dera Baba Nanak for the reopening of the Kartarpur Corridor at the earliest. “If the government doesn’t accept our demand, then we will spread our movement across the state to generate pressure on the government,” said Pakhoke. Talibpur claimed that they had received immense response from the foreign Sikh bodies who had assured them of throwing their weight behind the SKSCSC’s movement. “After November 19, we will hold a meeting and also have virtual discussions with our supporters abroad to chalk out further course of action,” he said. On Friday, the Foreign Office spokesperson said that the Corridor was open from the Pakistan side and India was also expected to allow the Sikh pilgrims desiring to join the upcoming celebrations. “We are all set to welcome thousands of devotees from India and around the world coming to Pakistan for the upcoming birth anniversary celebrations … for which elaborate arrangements have been put in place,” he said in his weekly press briefing. Pakistan also commemorated the second anniversary of the opening of the Kartarpur Corridordubbed the ‘Corridor of Hope’ by the UN Secretary-General. Inaugurated by Prime Minister Imran Khan in 2019, the Corridor is a shining example of Pakistan’s efforts to promote interfaith harmony and reflected the primacy Pakistan accorded to religious minorities in the country. On the second anniversary of the Corridor, Prime Minister Imran Khan had tweeted: “Today is the second anniversary of the Kartarpur Corridor – a corridor of interfaith harmony that allows India’s Sikh community special access to one of their holiest sites.” He said Kartarpur Corridor reflected his government’s commitment to minority rights and interfaith harmony. Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) president Bibi Jagir Kaur on Friday also wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging him to reopen the Kartarpur Corridor. “The government has allowed political and religious gatherings and events with Covid 19 protocol in place; so it should also reopen the Kartarpur Corridor for pilgrimage as soon as possible,” said Kaur. app

Australia beat New Zealand to lift maiden T20 WC trophy DUBAI Mian abrar

Australia late Sunday night won its maiden T20 World Cup, defeating New Zealand for eight wickets.

Chasing a target of 173, Australia won the game with 7 balls to spare, thanks to halfcenturies by Mitchell Marsh and David Warner. Warner scored 53 runs off 38 balls while Marsh scored 77 runs off 50 balls.

Glen Maxwell remained not out with 28 runs off 18 balls.

Earlier, Australia won the toss and decided to put New Zealand to bat first. The two teams had played a match together only once before in the T20 World Cup history when New Zealand had defeated Australia by 8 runs in India.

Displaying an impressive start, New Zealand opening batter Martin Guptill struck a four on the very second ball of the first

over but lost their first wicket at 28 runs when Daryl Mitchell was sent back to the pavilion by Josh Hazlewood towards the end of the 3rd over.

New Zealand lost their second wicket in the 11th over after opening batter Martin Guptill was dismissed by Adam Zampa’s bowl after scoring 28 runs. By this time, the team had scored 76 runs.

Meanwhile, New Zealand captain Kane Williamson completed his half-century as the team scored a total of 108 runs in 14 overs.

By the end of the 16th over, New Zealand had scored 136 runs at the loss of 2 wickets. But in the very next over, Glenn Phillips and Williamson both were sent back to the pavilion by Hazlewood after scoring 18 and 85 runs, respectively.

At the end of the first innings, New Zealand handed over a 173 run target to Australia.

AustrAliA responds: Aussie opening batters David Warner and skipper

Aaron Finch started their team’s innings with a careful start while New Zealand only allowed the team to score one run in the first over.

By the end of the 4th over, Australia scored 39 runs at the loss of one wicket when skipper Finch was sent packing by Trent Boult.

Australia’s strong batting put considerable pressure on the Kiwis as the team scored 100 runs in 11 overs while losing only one player.

Boult tried to bring New Zealand back in the game as he bowled the power-hitter of the kangaroos, David Warner. However, Glenn Maxwell and Mitchell Marsh were quick to take the score to 135 to give control of the game to Australia by the end of the 14th over.

In the 15th over, Maxwell hit another six, leaving his team needing only 24 runs off 25 balls.

Published by Arif Nizami at Plot No 66-C, 1st Floor, 21st Commercial Street, Phase-II (Extension), DHA Karachi and printed at Ibn-e-Hassan Printing Press, Hockey Stadium, Karachi, for PT Print (Pvt) Limited. Ph: 021-35381208-9. Email: newsroom@pakistantoday.com.pk