ISLAMABAD: With the country set to approach the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a fresh programme, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Wednesday decided to include global experts and all stakeholders in a consultative process aimed at improving the country’s economic health and financial stability. Chairing a meeting on economic revival and reforms, the PM said he would oversee the implementation …

GAZA STRIP: US top diplomat Antony Blinken touched down on Wednesday in the Middle East to bolster international efforts to secure a truce in the war, as the threat of famine looms in besieged Gaza. Global concern has mounted over the military conflict now in its sixth month. The latest flare-ups included an Israeli assault on Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Hospital complex, an …

PARIS: The world threw away a record amount of smartphones, televisions and other electrical devices in 2022, the UN said on Wednesday, warning this avalanche of dumped gadgets was polluting the planet. Less than one quarter of the 62 million tonnes of e-waste produced in 2022 was recycled, resulting in heavy metals, plastics and toxic chemicals leaking from junked devices. …

MOSCOW: Russia launched a furious tirade at the International Olym­pic Committee (IOC) on Wednesday, arguing the IOC’s restrictions on Rus­sian athletes and its criticism of the Moscow-orga­nised Friendship Games amo­unted to “neo-Nazism”. The IOC on Tuesday both barred Russian athletes from taking part in the opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Olympics on July 26 and criticised the Kremlin for …

NEW YORK: Democrats and Republicans dominate the US two-party political system, but independent candidates like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and other third-party challengers could have a major impact in this year’s presidential election. This news agency spoke to a dozen strategists who are gaming out how a third-party candidate could land in the unusual US electoral college system. Early scenarios …

HELSINKI: Finland remained the world’s happiest country for a seventh straight year in an annual UN sponsored World Happiness Report published on Wednesday. And Nordic countries kept their places among the 10 most cheerful, with Denmark, Iceland and Sweden trailing Finland. Afghanistan, plagued by a humanitarian catastrophe since the Taliban regained control in 2020, stayed at the bottom of the 143 countries surveyed. For …

DUBLIN: Leo Varadkar on Wednesday announced that he was stepping down as Ireland’s prime minister and leader of the Fine Gael party in the governing coalition, citing “personal and political” reasons. Pundits called the surprise move, just 10 weeks before Ireland holds European Parliament and local elections, a “political earthquake”. A general election also has to be held within a …

RIYADH: Saudi Arabia announced on Wednesday it will donate $40 million to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, which has faced massive funding cuts and calls for its abolition spearheaded by Israel. The King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre (KSrelief) said the funds would support UNRWA’s “humanitarian relief efforts in the Gaza Strip”, where the crisis has raged …

WASHINGTON: More than a third of the US Senate’s Democrats called on President Joe Biden’s administration on Wednesday to take “bold” action towards establishing a Palestinian state, in the latest pushback against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The letter to Biden comes days after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, the country’s highest-ranking Jewish elected leader and longtime advocate for Israel, …

Neuralink on Wednesday streamed a video of its first human patient playing computer chess with his mind and talking about the brain implant making that possible. Noland Arbaugh, 29, who was left paralysed from the shoulders down by a diving accident eight years ago, told of playing chess and the videogame “Civilization” as well as taking Japanese and French lessons …