Pakistan

Prime Minister Imran Khan appointed Hafeez Shaikh as the federal minister for finance, while Sheikh Rashid was handed the interior ministry portfolio in yet another cabinet shakeup, Radio Pakistan reported. Rashid has been replaced by Azam Swati as the railways minister while Ijaz Shah, who earlier held the interior ministry portfolio, has been appointed as minister for narcotics control. This is the …

ISLAMABAD: Asserting that scrutiny of funding of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) is continuing, the Election Commission of Pakistan announced on Wednesday the committee assigned the task would meet on Dec 24. In a statement issued here, the ECP’s director for public relations, Altaf Ahmad, said the scrutiny committee conducted numerous hearings and submitted interim reports to the commission. The scrutiny …

LAHORE: Working under the command of Capital City Police Officer Umar Sheikh seems to have become a ‘nightmare’ for the police officers as he has shown the door to yet another one — SSP Investigation Abdul Ghaffar Qaisrani — over a ‘petty issue’. Mr Sheikh got upset during a meeting held late on Tuesday for an official matter and then …

RAWALPINDI: Acting on the directives of the Punjab government, the district administration on Wednesday imposed lockdown in 19 localities of Rawalpindi district, including 16 in the garrison city, till Dec 21 following an increase in the number of Covid-19 patients in the last two weeks. According to figures released by the administrations of the twin cities, eight deaths were reported …

ISLAMABAD: Senior counsel Hamid Khan on Wednesday asked the Supreme Court to adjudicate former Islamabad High Court (IHC) judge Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui’s plea against Oct 11, 2018 notification of his removal before June next, a date when he would have retired, had he been in the office. Justice Umar Ata Bandial, who was heading a five-judge Supreme Court bench, …

n ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan, during a telephone conversation with Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation co-chair Bill Gates on Wednesday, discussed the Covid-19 situation and polio eradication efforts in Pakistan. According to an official press release, the prime minister informed Mr Gates about Pakistan’s policy to contain the pandemic and mitigate its deleterious impact on health and economy. Mr …

LAHORE: Just a few days ahead of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) power show at Minar-i-Pakistan, police on Wednesday arrested sound system provider DJ Butt on the charges of possessing an illegal weapon and interference in official work. Mr Butt has been providing a sound system to the rallies of the PML-N in Lahore and elsewhere and for the Dec …

ISLAMABAD: Legal and constitutional experts in the country are found to have unanimous opinion that the opposition through the planned en masse resignations of their members from the assemblies cannot stop the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) from acquiring majority in the upper house of the parliament after the Senate elections in March 2021, because laws and the Constitution are silent …

The Foreign Office (FO) on Thursday condemned what it described as India’s systematic tactic of a mass propaganda campaign to malign Pakistan and international institutions. The condemnation comes a day after a report was published by Brussels-based EU DisinfoLab, which uncovered a “vast network of fake media outlets, think tanks and NGOs serving Indian interests”. Addressing a press conference on Thursday, FO …

A Lahore court on Thursday granted bail to sound system provider DJ Butt, a day after he was arrested on the charges of possessing an illegal weapon and interference in official work. Butt had been providing a sound system for the rallies of the PML-N in Lahore and elsewhere and had also been hired for the Pakistan Democratic Movement’s (PDM) Dec 13 …