SWAT: Speakers at a training session here on Sunday said that tourism industry was badly affected by the Covid-19 pandemic during the five-month lockdown in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The training session and awareness campaign on standard operating procedure for tourism was organised by directorate of tourism services. The director general of the directorate, Ghulam Saeed, the general manager of tourism corporation, …

UNITED NATIONS: The Covid-19 pandemic has had some profoundly serious consequences for children’s health in Pakistan and Afghanistan, noted a report released this weekend by the UN Children’s Fund (Unicef). The document is based on statistics collected from 136 countries that responded to a recent Unicef survey about socio-economic impact of the viral disease that has killed more than 800,000 …

PESHAWAR: The health authorities have warned private hospitals against offering bribe to get registered for free treatment of people under Sehat Sahulat Programme (SSP) and said that the facilities fulfilling the prescribed criteria will be selected after complete assessment process. As the health department is preparing to extend SSP to the whole province in a phase wised manner, private hospitals …

Prime Minister Imran Khan on Monday said the country’s current account balance had recorded a surplus of $424 million in July, signalling that the economy was “on the right track”. Hailing the development in a message on Twitter, the premier noted that in July last year, Pakistan had a current account deficit (CAD) of $613 million while last month the …

ISLAMABAD: In an interesting tug of war with the finance ministry, the Auditor General of Pakistan (AGP) is resisting the audit of the accounts of his own office to avoid ‘infringement upon its independence’. Created under Article 170 of the Constitution, the AGP is a constitutional body responsible for examining public accounts of all tiers of the governments to rule …

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Information Shibli Faraz on Sunday posted on his official Twitter account the drafts of the proposals made by the opposition parties for bringing changes to the country’s accountability laws, terming them a “proof” of Prime Minister Imran Khan’s claim that the opposition had tried to make a bargain with the government during negotiations on the FATF …