KARACHI: In an already tough business environment, exporters and importers are facing another challenge due to increase in stevedoring and cargo handling charges at Karachi Gateway Terminal Limited (KGTL). In some cases the charges are nearly twice the old rates. They believe that charges have been raised without making any investment at the terminal. As a result, exports will become …

Qatar will further raise gas production despite a steep drop in global gas prices, pushing ahead with plans to extract more of the resource amidst fierce competition with rivals such as the United States. QatarEnergy chief Saad al-Kaabi announced on Sunday a new expansion of its liquefied natural gas production that will add a further 16 million tonnes per annum …

BEIJING: At least 15 people have been killed and 44 injured in a fire at a residential building in eastern China’s Nanjing, local authorities said on Saturday. The fire broke out early Friday morning, officials said at a press conference, with a preliminary investigation suggesting the blaze started on the building’s first floor, where electric bikes had been placed. The …

PARIS: France’s Eiffel Tower that had been closed for five days by a strike will reopen on Sunday (today) after the monument’s management announced a deal had been struck with unions. The stoppage since Monday at one of the world’s best-known tourist sites was the second within two months in protest at what unions say was insufficient investment. The tower’s …

WASHINGTON: The first American spaceship to the Moon since the Apollo era is probably lying sideways following its dramatic landing, the company that built it said on Friday, even as ground controllers work to download data and surface photos from the uncrewed robot. The Odysseus spacecraft landed near the lunar south pole on Thursday at 6:23pm Eastern Time (2323 GMT), …

DURBAN: South Africa’s ruling ANC launched its election campaign on Saturday, hoping to overcome anger over high unemployment and a sluggish economy and to protect its three-decade-old majority. In power since the advent of democracy in 1994, President Cyril Ramaphosa’s African National Congress has suffered a sharp decline in support, beset by allegations of corruption and mismanagement. Yet the party …

WASHINGTON: A small balloon floating at a high altitude over the US state of Utah was intercepted by fighter aircraft on Friday but deemed to pose no national security or flight risk, a US-Canada military agency said, according to US media. The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) said in a statement it had detected the balloon traveling at an …

GUWAHATI: One person died and another was injured in a bomb blast at a college in Imphal, the capital of India’s northeastern state of Manipur, on Friday night, security officials said. No group has taken responsibility for the blast of the improvised explosive device (IED), the officials said. The IED exploded in the campus of a college [DM College campus] …

VIENNA: Austrian authorities were on Saturday investigating the killings of five women in the capital Vienna within a single day, sowing panic in the city. The dead included three women found brutally stabbed to death in a brothel. The bodies of three young women were found with fatal knife wounds in a brothel in Vienna’s underprivileged Brigit­tenau district on Friday …

ISLAMABAD: Pak­istan military on Saturday dismissed media reports that Iranian forces had eliminated a Jaishul Adl ‘commander’ inside Pakis­tani territory, suggesting the claims were aimed at mitigating the embarrassment arising from the recent ‘Operation Marg Bar Sarmachar’. “Social media and some foreign media are spreading false propaganda that Iranian forces have killed a commander of Jaishul Adl on Pakistani soil. …