PORT MORESBY: Papua New Guinea banned flights from India indefinitely on Tuesday and accused the country’s diplomats of “deception” over apparent breaches to Covid-19 travel rules. The Melanesian nation’s top Covid-19 official said that in an act of “deliberate deception” India’s High Commission helped dozens of unauthorised travellers — some Covid-positive — to arrive in Papua New Guinea (PNG). A …

NABLUS: Israeli fire killed a 15-year-old Palestinian in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday when clashes erupted after Israeli forces searching for a suspect stormed a refugee camp near Nablus. The Palestinian health ministry said Imad Khaled Saleh Hashash died after sustaining a gunshot wound to the head in the Balata refugee camp. The Israeli army said it had conducted …

SEOUL/DUBAI: People infected with the more transmissible Delta variant have a viral load 300 times higher than those with the original version of the Covid-19 virus, when symptoms are first observed, a South Korea study found. But the amount gradually decreased over time — to 30 times in four days and over 10 times in nine days — and it …

MOSCOW: Russia, China, the United States and Pakistan are interested in serving as mediators in resolving the crisis in Afghanistan, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday. “We remain committed to the task of establishing peace and stability on Afghanistan’s territory so that it poses no threats to the region,” Mr Lavrov said. He also said Russia opposed the …

Saudi Arabia has eased Covid-19 restrictions for fully vaccinated residents, allowing them to directly travel to the Kingdom from countries facing a travel ban, including Pakistan. According to a report by the Saudi Gazette, it is only applicable for those who have a valid residency permit (Iqama) and left the Kingdom on an exit and re-entry visa after taking two doses …

Saudi Arabia has added the Sinopharm and Sinovac Covid-19 jabs to its list of approved vaccines, taking the total number to six, it emerged on Wednesday. According to the Saudi Gazette, the Ministry of Health announced that there are a total of six approved vaccines in the Kingdom; Oxford-AstraZeneca, Pfizer-BionTech, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna, Sinopharm, and Sinovac. “In the event of …

WASHINGTON: US Presi­dent Joe Biden decided on Tuesday to observe the Aug 31 deadline for withdrawing American troops from Afghanistan, the US media reported. The decision followed a meeting in Kabul on Monday between CIA Director William Burns and a key Taliban leader, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar. The US media reported that President Biden consulted his national security team before …

ISLAMABAD: Clerics and religious scholars who attended a meeting called by the Ministry of Religious Affairs to discuss the draft of the anti-forced conversion bill have expressed serious reservations over the bill and warned the ministry that it cannot be implemented in its current shape. The ministry invited only Muslim stakeholders to hold the in-camera meeting on Monday. Members of …

Justice Qazi Faez Isa has penned a letter to the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP), questioning the decision to form a larger bench in the journalists’ harassment case and terming the formation of the new bench a transgression of the Constitution, it emerged on Wednesday. On August 20, a two-judge Supreme Court (SC) bench, comprising Justice Isa and Justice Jamal Khan …

RAWALPINDI: Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has operated seven special flights and repatriated as many as 1,460 people, most of them foreigners, stranded in Afghanistan since the Taliban gained control of Kabul in the middle of August. However, more flights were not operated due to a lack of “permission” despite the fact that three planes and staff were ready to fly …