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ISLAMABAD: Planning Minister Prof Ahsan Iqbal on Wednesday stressed the need for making collective efforts to put the country on a consistent path of progress and development saying it was high time to take all Pakistanis along in achieving national goals. The time has come to bring all Pakistanis forward and give them an opportunity to play a role in the development of the country, he said while addressing a two-day conference titled ‘Leaders in Islamabad Business Summit-2023’. He said that all possible support to business companies earning dollars and contributing towards building the country’s foreign exchange reserves must be extended. The minister said this year, the country faced the worst impact of global climate change, and now the incumbent government was working towards overcoming the issues of water and food security by switching over to a smart agriculture system. He said the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a key component of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (B...

• PM promises Fund chief ‘relief-budget’ within programme requirements • Terms statement by Nathan Porter ‘intervention in domestic political matters’ • SBP gives clean chit to banks for allegedly ‘manipulating’ dollar rates ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Wednes­day saw a new window of hope to get stalled funding from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) after Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s telephonic engagement with Kristalina Georgieva, the managing director of the Washington-based lender, the last weekend as the government promised a ‘relief budget’ next week within the requirements of the Fund programme. “We are following the programme in earnest at this stage and strongly hope that issues with the IMF would be settled very soon as the prime minister, the Ministry of Finance and the entire government were committed to the IMF programme and its amicable completion,” said Minister of State for Finance and Revenue Dr Aisha Ghaus Pasha. The programme has been hanging in balance since Oc...

KARACHI: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has allowed banks to acquire US dollars from the interbank market for the settlement of card-based cross-border transactions with the International Payment System, apparently to bring down the dollar rate in the open market. The SBP issued a circular on Wednesday, which indicates that this is a short-term move as the permission granted to banks will end on July 31. However, currency experts and bankers dealing in the currency business said it was a vital move, particularly due to the higher rate of the dollar in the open market. The open market dollar rate is elevated by Rs30 to Rs35 per dollar. “It has been decided to allow authorised dealers to purchase US dollars from interbank for settlement of card-based cross-border transactions with IPS (International Payment System),” the SBP circular said. Banks have been buying dollars from exchange companies for the last 17 years, while last year several banks were found artificially increasing t...

Kosovo’s top Olympic body said on Wednesday it had asked the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to open disciplinary proceedings against Serbian tennis star Novak Djokovic over his public statements on clashes in the country. On Monday, after confrontations began between ethnic Albanians and Serbs, Djokovic scrawled the message “Kosovo is the heart of Serbia. Stop the violence” on a camera following his victory in the opening round of Roland Garros. A Kosovo Olympic Committee (KOC) spokesman told AFP on Wednesday that Djokovic was “stirring up” political tensions. Djokovic “breached the fundamental principles of the Olympic Charter regarding political neutrality and involved yet another political statement in sports”, the KOC wrote in a letter sent to the IOC on Tuesday. KOC head Ismet Krasniqi asked the IOC to initiate disciplinary proceedings against Djokovic, an Olympic bronze medallist in 2008, said the letter posted on its Facebook page. Such “behaviour cannot be tolerate...

Gen Sir Nicholas Patrick Carter, chief of general staff (CGS) of the UK Army, on Wednesday called on Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Asim Munir and acknowledged the Pakistan Army’s sacrifices in the fight against terrorism. According to a press release issued by the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), Gen Sir Sanders met Gen Munir at the General Headquarters in Rawalpindi. “Upon arrival at the GHQ, CGS UK Army laid a floral wreath at Yadgar-e-Shuhada [memorials of martyrs]. A smartly turned-out contingent of the Pakistan Army presented the guard of honour to the visiting dignitary,” the military’s media wing said. During the meeting, regional security issues and matters of mutual interest were discussed. “The visiting dignitary acknowledged the sacrifices and achievements of the Pakistan Army in the fight against terrorism and efforts for bringing peace and stability in the region,” the ISPR said. The statement added that Gen Sir Sanders also called on Chairman Joint Chiefs...

The venue inscribed on the birthday invitation was an orphanage in Islamabad. Walking down the entrance, I saw a stage fully decorated with the honouree’s beautiful calligraphy and painting collection. The birthday girl’s father, a man weighed down by loss yet resilient to the core, embraced me and thanked me for coming. Unfortunately, the birthday girl would not be joining us today. Noor Mukadam was murdered a year and a half ago at age 27, and we were all present to celebrate her memory. Shaukat Mukadam, her father, told me that his daughter would come here every year to celebrate her birthday with the orphans. “She would have been here if she were alive,” he murmured with a smile, his eyes glistening with unshed tears, glancing around the venue as if he felt her presence lingering among us. Remembering the victim of a horrific murder that jolted the city was a small crowd of mere 10 to 15 people present in a two million-strong city. In our midst at Noor’s birthday, the family of ...

LAHORE: Former prime minister Imran Khan furnished surety bonds on Tuesday, 11 days after securing pre-arrest bail from the Lahore High Court (LHC) and an anti-terrorism court (ATC) in four criminal cases, including the May 9 attacks on Jinnah House, Askari Tower and the Shadman police station. Separately, the joint investigation team (JIT) probing the May 9 attack on Jinnah House refused to meet the legal team of Mr Khan after he refused to appear before it citing serious security threats to his life. The PTI chief first appeared before the ATC along with his guarantor Advocate Mohammad Habib to deposit the bonds in three cases relating to the May 9 protests. On May 19, Judge Ijaz Ahmad Buttar had granted bail to Mr Khan in the three cases till June 2, subject to furnishing surety bonds of Rs100,000 each. However, the bonds could not be furnished due to Mr Khan’s unavailability. JIT refuses to meet legal team after ex-PM doesn’t join probe into attack on corps commander’s residen...

KARACHI: Bank lending to the private sector has shrunk to just Rs28 billion this fiscal year after plummeting 98 per cent compared to last year, central bank data showed on Tuesday. The State Bank reported that from July 1 to May 19, the private sector borrowed a record low Rs27.9bn from banks compared to Rs1.414 trillion a year ago. The economy has been facing a constant problem of a record-high interest rate of 21pc and headline inflation at 36.4pc. Average inflation is estimated to reach 30pc this fiscal year, which ends in June. “There is no chance to run a business with such a high interest rate and an unprecedented 36pc inflation,” Aamir Aziz, who manufactures and exports finished textile products, told Dawn . He said textile exports had already started falling and feared that things would worsen in the coming months since millers had exhausted their cotton stocks. “The country has produced five million cotton bales while the need is about 15 million bales. The country has no...

PARIS: Global leaders should be working to red­u­­ce “the risk of extinction” from artificial intelligen­ce technology, a group of ind­ustry chiefs and experts warned on Tuesday, urging policymakers to equate its threat on a par with risks posed by pandemics and nuclear war. “Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war,” more than 350 signatories wrote in a letter published by the nonprofit Centre for AI Safety (CAIS). The one-line statement was signed by dozens of specialists, including Sam Altman whose firm OpenAI created the ChatGPT bot. As well as Altman, they included the CEOs of AI firms DeepMind and Anthropic, and executives from Microsoft and Google. Also among them were Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio — two of the three so-called “godfathers of AI” who received the 2018 Turing Award for their work on deep learning — and professors from institutions ranging from Harvard to Chin...

LAHORE: A committee formed to probe allegations of mistreatment of women prisoners arrested after the May 9 violence has rejected the claims of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf chief Imran Khan. The committee comprising SSP Investigation Dr Anoosh Masood and Lahore Deputy Commissioner Rafia Haider told Caretaker Chief Minister Mohsin Naqvi on Monday, after a visit to the Kot Lakhpat jail, that the inmates were being treated as per standard operating procedures (SOPs). The two officers said they met everyone separately and questioned them over any mistreatment. “All inmates in the case, including Khadija Shah, were fine,” SSP Anoosh Masood told the media outside the prison. She said no male from jail staff could enter the area allocated for women prisoners. She said a female doctor, a psychologist and two lady health workers were there round the clock. The caretaker government formed the committee on Monday morning to investigate Imran Khan’s allegations of ill-treatment of arrested PTI wo...

IMPORTERS have urged the government to allow them to import wheat from Ukraine. They claim that at the current price, the imported grain will cost less than locally-produced wheat.—Reuters/file KARACHI: The prices of wheat and pulses have failed to subside even after massive imports in the first 10 months of the current fiscal year as consumers were still paying hefty prices for the commodities. The government spent over $1 billion to import 2.68 million tonnes of wheat during July-April FY23 compared to $795 million for procuring 2.20m tonnes in the corresponding period last year. The average per tonne (APT) price of grain stood at $393 this fiscal year compared to $360 in the corresponding period last year. Similarly, a whopping $818m was spent to import 1.14m tonnes of pulses compared to $520m on the 783,634 tonnes in the same period last year. The APT price this year was $715 against $664 last year. Traders plead with govt to allow private wheat import The latest Sensiti...

STOCKHOLM: A harness-wearing Beluga whale that turned up in Norway in 2019, sparking speculation it was a spy trained by the Russian navy, has appeared off Sweden’s coast, an organisation following him said on Monday. First discovered in Norway’s far northern region of Finnmark, the whale spent more than three years slowly moving down the top half of the Norwegian coastline, before suddenly speeding up in recent months to cover the second half and on to Sweden. On Sunday, he was observed in Hunn­ebostrand, off Sweden’s southwestern coast. “We don’t know why he has sped up so fast right now,” especially since he is moving “very quickly away from his natural environment”, Sebastian Str­and, a marine biologist with the OneWhale organisation, said. “It could be hormones driving him to find a mate. Or it could be loneliness as Belugas are a very social species — it could be that he’s searching for other Beluga whales.” Believed to be 13-14 years old, Strand said the whale is “at an age...

LAHORE: The caretaker Punjab government has placed before the Lahore High Court documents showing that a ministerial committee that met last year to modify the terms and conditions for corporate farming under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), had not recorded its formal minutes. The provincial government submitted the record in the case challenging its decision to hand over 45,267 acres on lease to the Pakistan Army for corporate farming, as the decision taken in this meeting formed the basis for the handing over of the land. Justice Abid Hussain Chattha, who is hearing a public interest petition, had stayed the handing over of the land. Asked about the names of the provincial ministers who attended the Oct 14, 2022 meeting — held before the dissolution of the provincial assembly by Chaudhry Parvez Elahi — a law officer said Mohsin Leghari and Raja Basharat were in attendance, though the latter did not put his signatures on the attendance sheet. Two ministers attended O...

• WFP, FAO report notes $77.5bn to be repaid over next three years • Political instability, lack of IMF deal to hit ability to import food ISLAMABAD: Acute food insecurity in Pakistan is likely to further exacerbate in coming months if the economic and political crisis further worsens, compounding the effects of the 2022 floods, warns a new United Nations report published on Monday. The report titled, Hunger Hotspots: FAO-WFP early warnings on acute food insecurity, jointly published by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the World Food Progra­mme (WFP) covers the June to November 2023 period. It notes that amid the current global economic slowdown, mounting public debt has exacerbated the ongoing financial crisis in Pakistan. It points out that authorities will have to repay $77.5 billion external debt between April 2023 and June 2026, a substantial amount considering the country’s GDP of $350bn in 2021. Growing political instability and lagging reforms prevent th...

Lahore: A joint investigation team (JIT) probing the attack on Lahore Corps Commander House (Jinnah House) on May 9 has summoned PTI Chairman Imran Khan on Tuesday (today). Mr Khan has been asked to appear before the JIT at 4pm at the Qilla Gujjar police headquarters. He has been called for questioning in a case registered with the Sarwar Road police station against the attack. Mr Khan has been nominated in the case for allegedly abetting the attackers who ransacked and set fire to the Jinnah House when he was in prison. “Imran Khan is required to attend the office of the DIG Investigation to join the investigation proceedings entrusted to the JTI formed by the Punjab government,” reads the summon notice issued by Lahore DIG (investigation) Kamran Adil, who is heading the JIT. Lahore police chief Bilal Siddique Kamyana confirmed that the PTI chief has been summoned for questioning. An official source said that the former prime minister will be questioned to determine the scale of...

Societies leaning towards capitalism have small governments that provide essential public goods to the people, formulate policy and leave the rest to the imagination and executing capabilities of the private sector. Governments in most developing countries, on the other hand, continue to be large. Investment in these countries is low, and the loss in the investment share of the GDP is either picked up by government spending or higher levels of consumption. Government revenues in many of these countries, India, Pakistan and, to some extent, Bangladesh, which has successfully implemented many fiscal consolidation measures, are low, and so are their fiscal capacities to undertake public welfare programmes. Governments are large with idle administrative capacities, often leading them to imagine and perform unnecessary regulatory functions. Many of the regulations stifle the private sector, thereby seriously limiting its growth potential. Any policy, plan or strategy that makes a case ...

THE world has seen sweeping geopolitical changes over the past 70 years. The international landscape has been fundamentally transformed by the dispersion of power more widely among states. This redistribution of global power is a dynamic process and continues apace, accelerated by economic and technological developments of the 21st century. The shift in economic power from the West to the rest is one of the defining features of the contemporary world. Multipolarity is an increasing reality. So too is the fact that in a diverse, complex and interconnected world even the most powerful countries cannot achieve outcomes on their own and need the help of allies. The institutional architecture of the international system, however, remains the product of a specific historical era. International institutions — the Bretton Woods twins, IMF and World Bank, and the United Nations — created in 1944-1945, reflect the realities of that time. The structure and composition of the UN’s premier organ, ...

• Says clampdown on PTI an attempt to ‘roll back democracy’ • Alleges govt ‘maltreating women prisoners’ • Unfazed by exodus from party, ex-PM reiterates demand for polls • Minister calls out ‘venomous propaganda’ LAHORE: Terming the clampdown on the PTI an attempt to roll back democracy, Imran Khan requested the Supreme Court judges on Sunday to take notice and ensure a judicial inquiry into the May 9 violence so that only the “guilty should be punished”. Speaking about the PDM government’s alleged efforts to “cripple the PTI through a streak of desertions”, Mr Khan said the government could continue ‘pressuring’ party leaders and make as many defections as it wanted to do in the “next two, three or even four weeks”. “But, then give a timeframe for elections,” the PTI chief demanded while speaking to supporters through a video link from his Zaman Park residence in Lahore. The former prime minister asked the PDM government to give a timeframe and announce elections to steer ...

RAWALPINDI: Police have detained 532 suspects in connection with violent protests on May 9 and the attack on the General Headquarters (GHQ) and other sensitive installations. Police have been verifying their alleged involvement in the attack on GHQ and other sensitive installations to determine whether or not they should be tried under the Army Act, 1952. Only after the verification will the cases be sent to military courts, according to sources. The suspects have been detained after FIRs were registered with the Rawal­pindi, Attock, Jhelum and Chakwal police. Out of the 532 suspects, 374 had been arrested under section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997, which outlined punishments for acts of terrorism. The sources said that police investigation into the GHQ attack case has not been finalised as the verification of suspects — two of whom were women activists — was underway. They said raids were being conducted to arrest all those who have been nominated in the FIRs or identifi...

Finance Minister Ishaq Dar on Sunday said negotiations can’t be held with PTI Chairman Imran Khan until “he apologises, takes corrective actions, owns the problem, and promises” the nation that anything even close to the May 9 riots will take place in the future. In recent days, Imran has made impassioned appeals to state institutions to immediately sit with his party, talk and find a solution to put the country on the path of progress. The PTI on Saturday also constituted a seven-member “negotiation committee” without any explanation of who the committee will negotiate with for talks on elections. Speaking on Geo’s Jirga , the PML-N leader was of the view that the May 9 riots “changed everything completely” bringing the election negotiations between the government and PTI back to square one. “Now in this situation how will you negotiate until he (Imran) doesn’t apologise to the nation, he has only condemned the Jinnah House [torching] along with others, but he hasn’t condemned a...

PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif on Sunday rued that “some people” had tried to “pull his legs” during his three government tenures when he aimed to ensure that Pakistan remained ahead in development and prosperity. Addressing a PML-N rally in Lahore to commemorate the silver jubilee of Youm-i-Takbeer, the date of Pakistan’s nuclear tests, Nawaz said that going ahead with the tests despite all international pressures and offers was the “real absolutely not”. “We do not carry aggressive designs against anyone but cannot permit anyone to look at us with a dirty eye. It has always been my wish for which I made efforts … that Pakistan remains ahead in development and prosperity as well … but what can I do unfortunately I have to say, that some people began pulling my legs. “This happened in 1993, again in 1999 and you saw it happened in 2017 as well. Who knows what fear these people have of me that they want to ruin a smiling and thriving country,” the former premier said. He contrasted t...