Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: Former senator Farhat­ullah Babar said on Friday that the Pakis­tan Peoples Party (PPP) had tabled in the Senate a constitution amendment bill to create south Punjab province along the lines of a bill that was passed by the upper house of parliament in 2013. The new pro­vince will comprise Multan, Bahawalpur and Dera Ghazi Khan divisions and districts of …

The Punjab government on Tuesday, during a hearing in the Supreme Court, rejected Bahria Town’s offer to build the Dadhocha Dam. In 2006, the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) had purchased 18,000 kanals near Rawalpindi at the site where the dam was to be built, and launched a housing scheme as a joint venture with Bahria Town. The DHA Valley scheme, …

ISLAMABAD: China on Tuesday hinted at ‘progress’ on designation of Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) chief Masood Azhar by the United Nations’ 1267 Sanctions Committee, as the United States called for resolving the contentious matter. Senior Pakistani officials disclosed to Dawn that China could lift its technical hold leading to Azhar’s designation, while developments in this regard are likely to be shared by the Foreign …

An accountability court in Lahore on Tuesday accepted the National Accountability Bureau’s (NAB) plea to close an 19-year-old inquiry against Punjab Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi and PML-Q chief Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain due to lack of evidence. Both brothers had been accused of causing losses to the state exchequer by influencing Lahore Development Authority (LDA) officials to exempt more than …

ISLAMABAD: The federal cabinet on Tuesday deferred up to 14 per cent increase in prices of petroleum products proposed by the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) and referred the matter to the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) for further consideration. Read: Ogra proposes up to 15pc hike in petroleum prices A meeting of the cabinet presided over by Prime Minister Imran …

LAHORE: The provincial government made large-scale reshuffle in the Punjab Police’s senior hierarchy on Tuesday. More than two dozen police officers in BPS 20, 19 and BPS 18, including Lahore DIG Operations Waqas Nazir and SSP Operations Mustansar Feroze, were transferred and assigned new jobs besides many district police officers (DPOs) across the province. The reshuffle came after Chief Minister …

ISLAMABAD: Health advocates on Tuesday were shocked after they came to know that Prime Minister Imran Khan not only held a meeting with the representative of an international tobacco company, but also received a cheque for Rs5 million from him as a donation for the construction of dams in the country. It is a clear violation of Article 5.3 of …

ISLAMABAD: A day after the passage of a billseeking to set minimum age for marriage at 18 in the Senate, a similar legislation was introduced in the National Assembly on Tuesday, but only after an intense discussion which exposed cracks within various parties on the issue. Deputy Speaker Qasim Suri referred the Child Marriage Restraint (Amendment) Bill, 2019 to the committee …

ISLAMABAD: Another accused on Monday sought the accountability court’s permission to become an approver in a reference against former president Asif Zardari and his sister Faryal Talpur. Sher Mohammad offered to stand in the witness box rather than defending himself as an accused three weeks after two women accused expressed their willingness to become approver in the case. On April …

ISLAMABAD: The government has firmed up a plan for privatisation and restructuring of major public sector entities (PSEs) as part of the proposed medium-term economic and financial policies. This will be part of discussions with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) this week for a three-year bailout package under which the provinces have agreed in principle on a single sales tax …