Pakistan

PPP Senator Saleem Mandviwala on Friday said a review would be filed over the Supreme Court’s restoration of corruption cases against public representatives, terming it “an extremely biased order”. The Supreme Court had struck down some sections of the amendments made to the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO) last year by the previous coalition government on a petition filed by PTI Chairman Imran Khan. Speaking on the DawnNewsTV show “Dusra Rukh” …

LAHORE: Apparently dissatisfied with the response it has received regarding complaints about an ‘unlevel’ playing field, the PPP central executive committee has empowered former president Asif Ali Zardari to raise the issue with all quarters concerned and demand that the Election Commission immediately announce the election schedule. “It is not possible here to repeat all the reservations expressed by PPP’s representatives …

PTI Chairman Imran Khan on Saturday approached the Islamabad High Court (IHC) seeking post-arrest bail in the cipher case, in which he is currently incarcerated at the Attock jail. The development comes days after the special court, which has been established to hear cases filed under the Official Secrets Act, rejected the ex-premier’s plea seeking the same. The cipher case pertains to a diplomatic document which reportedly went missing from …

Residents of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Battagram took to the streets and blocked a stretch of the Karakoram Highway near the Khatm-i-Nabuwat Chowk on Saturday, decrying action against illegal connections (kundas) and electricity connections, as well as defaulters. Last week, the interim government announced plans to launch a crackdown on electricity theft, which federal ministers said led to combined losses of hundreds of billions …

KHYBER: The Torkham border, a main crossing point between Afghanistan and Pakistan, reopened to pedestrians and vehicles on Friday, eight days after it was closed following clashes between border forces of the two countries. A large number of travellers and trucks laden with goods were stranded on both sides of the border after the shooting on Sept 6. Immigration officials at Tor­­­kham …

DERA ISMAIL KHAN: During a crackdown on illegal currency exchanges on Friday, the Federal Investigation Agency, Dera region, arrested five persons and recovered foreign and local currency from their possession. FIA Dera deputy director Abdul Hai Khan Babar in a statement said the crackdown was launched on operators of hawala-hundi on the directives of FIA, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa director Nisar Ahmad …

SRINAGAR: Five Indian officers and two fighters were killed in separate gun battles this week in held Kashmir, with clashes ongoing, officials in the occupied region said on Thursday. On Wednesday, two Indian army officers and a senior policeman carrying out a security sweep in a forested area of the southern Kashmir valley were ambushed and killed, with the two …

LAHORE: In a major day-long operation launched on Thursday morning, joint teams of the Lahore Development Authority (LDA) and police retrieved 75 kanals of commercial land worth billions on the PIA Road near Hakim Chowk connecting D-Block, Johar Town, from the possession of notorious land grabber Mansha Bamm. The operation was carried out after some affectees of Samanzar Housing Scheme …

ISLAMABAD: While it welcomed foreign governments’ statements in support of free and fair elections, Pakistan on Thursday advised diplomats based in Islamabad to ponder how their activities were seen by the public at large. The remarks by Foreign Office Spokesperson Mum­taz Zahra Baloch came in reply to a question about British High Com­missioner Jane Marriott’s meeting with the chief election commissioner. Before …

KARACHI: Succumbing to what many believed an ‘outside pressure’, caretaker Sindh Chief Minister retired Justice Maqbool Baqar has withdrawn key portfolios of finance and planning and development from an upright former bureaucrat, Muhammad Younus Dagha. The CM allocated Mr Dagha a new portfolio of industries and commerce in addition to revenue. Official source said that the CM would himself hold …