KARACHI: The strained relations between the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government in Sindh and the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf in the centre suffered another blow on Saturday when the provincial administration revised its coronavirus lockdown restrictions it had imposed a day earlier, but Islamabad still called the lockdown decision “defiance of the terms agreed between the two sides”, rejecting a “curfew-like situation …

KARACHI: An accountability court acquitted on Saturday a former chairman of the Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) with 16 dealers in a Rs311 million graft case, as the prosecution had failed to prove the case after the lapse of 12 years. Then PSM chief Moin Aftab Shaikh, then director (commercial) Sameen Asghar with private dealers — Abdul Razzaq, Mansoor Ali, M. …

KARACHI: People are rushing for Covid-19 vaccination in large numbers following the government announcement that mobile phone SIMs of unvaccinated people would be blocked and they wouldn’t get their August salary, it emerged on Saturday. Sources said long queues were being seen at all vaccination centres across the province, particularly in Karachi, where the situation became serious when people waiting …

Taliban fighters struck Kandahar airport in southern Afghanistan with at least three rockets overnight, the insurgent group’s spokesperson said on Sunday, adding that the aim was to thwart air strikes conducted by Afghan government forces. “Kandahar airport was targeted by us because the enemy was using it as a centre to conduct air strikes against us,” Zabiullah Mujahid, a Taliban …

WASHINGTON: National Security Adviser Moeed Yusuf has said that arrangements should be made to keep displaced Afghans inside their country instead of pushing them into Pakistan. Addressing a news conference at the Pakistan embassy here on Saturday, Mr Yusuf said Pakistan was focused on ensuring that tensions in Afghanistan do not lead to more bloodshed. “But if a situation arises, …

Iran said on Sunday it was not involved in an attack on an Israeli-managed petroleum product tanker off the coast of Oman, referring to an incident last week that killed two and which Israel blamed on the Islamic Republic. “The Zionist regime (Israel) has created insecurity, terror and violence … These accusations about Iran’s involvement are condemned by Tehran,” Foreign Ministry spokesman …

Police in China said they have detained a 30-year-old Canadian man surnamed Wu on suspicion of committing rape, with state media identifying him as Chinese-born pop singer Kris Wu. Wu was being investigated over accusations made online of “tricking young girls into having sex with him”, according to a statement by police in the Chaoyang district of the Chinese capital …

UNITED NATIONS: Hun­g­er is expected to rise in 23 global hotspots in the next three months with the highest alerts for catastrophic situations in Ethiopia’s embattled Tigray region, southern Madagascar, Yemen, South Sudan and northern Nigeria, two UN agencies warned on Friday. The Food and Agriculture Organisation and World Food Programme said in a new report on Hunger Hotspots between …

HERAT: Afghan troops and Taliban fighters clashed again on the outskirts of Herat on Saturday, a day after a police guard was killed when a United Nations compound in the western city came under attack. Violence has surged across the country since early May, when the militants launched a sweeping offensive as US-led foreign forces began a final withdrawal that …

KUALA LUMPUR: Hundreds of black-clad Malaysians staged an anti-government protest on Saturday in defiance of a ban on public gatherings under coronavirus curbs, piling pressure on the embattled prime minister to resign. The mostly young protesters, wearing masks and keeping a distance from one another, waved banners reading “failed government” as well as black flags. It was the first sizeable …