The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Thursday unveiled nominations for its ODI Player of the Year award, with Pakistan skipper Babar Azam one of four contenders for the accolade. The national skipper scored 405 runs in six matches in the outgoing year at an average of 67.50 with two centuries in the 50-over format. Alongside Azam, Bangladesh’s Shakib Al Hasan, …

KARACHI: The Bank of Punjab (BoP) on Wednesday announced it’s going to acquire a strategic stake in NRSP Microfinance Bank from the National Rural Support Programme (NRSP), which owns a 57 per cent stake in the country’s fourth largest provider of microcredit in terms of the number of active borrowers. A stock filing by BoP stated that the commercial bank …

ISLAMABAD: Taking note of the resurgence in sug­ar prices, Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin on Wednesday directed the provincial authorities to take appropriate measures to control the prices of the sweetener. The meeting of the National Price Monitoring Committee (NPMC), chaired by Mr Tarin, was informed that sugar was still selling around Rs100 per kg in major cities including Karachi, Rawalpindi …

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan on Wednesday reconstituted the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the cabinet after the recent appointment of Shaukat Tarin as Finance Minister. Mr Tarin had on Dec 27 taken the oath as federal minister after being elected as Senator last week in a by-election for a general seat of the upper house of parliament from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. He …

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for IT and Telecommunication Syed Aminul Haque on Wednesday said that all efforts had been made to increase the access of technology in small towns and cities, adding that number of software technology parks would be almost doubled to 40 within a year. “Currently there are 22 software technology parks operating in the country and by December …

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Planning, Devel­opment and Special Initi­atives Asad Umar has said that Pakistan has simplified the process of investment in Special Economic Zones (SEZs) not only for Chinese companies but also for other international companies. Speaking at a ceremony held for the distribution of awards among 27 outstanding Pakistani staff of CPEC projects at the Chinese Embassy, he …

WASHINGTON: The United States on Wednesday appointed two special envoys for defending women’s rights in Afghanistan’s as the country’s new Taliban rulers further tightened gender restrictions. Rina Amiri, an Afghan-born US scholar and mediation expert who served at the State Department under former president Barack Obama, will take the role of special envoy for Afghan women, girls and human rights. …

JERUSALEM: Israel’s defence minister approved a raft of measures aimed at improving relations with the Palestinians on Wednesday following a rare meeting with Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas in Israel. Defence Minister Benny Gantz met Abbas at his private residence in a Tel Aviv suburb late on Tuesday night. It was the first time Abbas met an Israeli official inside Israel …

SYDNEY: Global Covid-19 infections hit a record high over the past seven-day period, a tally showed on Wednesday, as the new Omicron variant raced out of control, keeping workers at home and overwhelming testing centres. Almost 900,000 cases were detected on average each day around the world between Dec 22 and Dec 28, with myriad countries posting new all-time highs …

SARAJEVO: A Bosnian war crimes prosecutor has indicted nine Bosnian Serbs for the killing of around 100 Muslim Bosniaks, including seven entire families, early in the 1992-95 war, the prosecutor’s office said in a statement on Wednesday. Twenty-six years after the end of its devastating war between Orthodox Serbs, Catholic Croats and Muslim Bosniaks in which about 100,000 people had …