ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has expanded its Tajir Dost Scheme to include 36 new cities, aiming to bring traders and wholesalers into the formal tax structure as required by the IMF. Since April 1, tax authorities have registered over 40,000 traders under the scheme in six cities: Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad, Peshawar, Quetta and Rawalpindi. The registration scope has now been widened to cover more cities. FBR Chairman Zubair Tiwana told Dawn that negotiations with trader representatives are ongoing to finalise the tax system for retailers by the end of the month. “We will try to finalise the tax scheme this month…
Author: Hasnain Abid Khanzada
The benchmark index began the day on a positive note, reaching an intra-day high of 80,321.69 — some 330 points higher than the previous close — within the initial hours. However, strong selling pressure ensued after the Supreme Court announced its decision on reserved seats, taking the index down to a low of 78,611.68 points. A late-session buying spree then brought the KSE-100 back to near its starting point. The benchmark index finally closed at 79,944.09 points, noting a marginal overnight decline of 48.26 points or 0.06 per cent. “Volatile session was observed today, where the index at one point…
PETRICH: An exceptional white marble statue from Roman times was recovered from the sewer ruins of an ancient city in southwestern Bulgaria on Friday. The 2.1-metre tall statue, likely dating from the second century AD, is missing an arm but has a perfectly preserved head, a rarity for Roman statues and a unique find for Bulgaria, archaeological excavations chief Lyudmil Vagalinski said. “Such Roman copies of ancient Greek models can be seen in Athens and northern Greece, as well as in the Louvre museum, but they are rare,” he said, also noting its “very high quality” as a work of…
At least 63 people were missing in Nepal on Friday after a landslide triggered by heavy monsoon rains swept two buses off a highway and into a river, authorities said. Dozens of search and rescue personnel were combing the site for survivors of the accident in the central district of Chitwan, district official Khimananda Bhusal told AFP. Bhusal said that the buses were carrying at least 66 people between them but three passengers had been able to escape before they crashed into the Trishuli river and were now being treated in hospital. “We are not sure of the total number because…
KATHMANDU: Nepal is set for a new coalition government led by politician KP Sharma Oli after the more radical Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal lost a parliamentary vote of confidence on Friday, ending a tumultuous 20-month tenure. Nepal has been politically unstable since it abolished a 239-year-old monarchy in 2008. Oli’s new government will be the 14th since then. Its politics are closely monitored by its two big neighbours China and India, who have invested heavily in the Himalayan country as they jostle for influence. Dahal, 69, was forced to either resign or prove his majority in parliament after his largest ally,…
BRUSSELS: Elon Musk’s social media company X breached EU online content rules and its blue checkmark deceives users, EU tech regulators ruled on Friday in a finding that could lead to a hefty fine and significant changes in how it operates. The charges by the European Commission, the first issued under the Digital Services Act (DSA), follow a seven-month long investigation. The new rules require very large online platforms and search engines to do more to tackle illegal content and risks to public security. The EU executive’s preliminary findings or charges sent to X targeted the company’s dark patterns that shape…
NEW YORK: Earth’s population will peak in the mid-2080s at around 10.3 billion people, then drop slightly to a level much lower than anticipated a decade ago, the United Nations said. The current population of 8.2 billion people will rise to that maximum over the next 60 years, then dip to 10.2 billion by the end of the century, says a report released Thursday entitled ‘World Population Prospects 2024’. It said the size of the world’s population in 2100 will be six per cent lower, or 700 million people fewer, than what was anticipated in June 2013. “The demographic landscape…
WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden mistakenly referred to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Nato summit in Washington on Thursday before correcting himself. “And now I want to hand it over to the president of Ukraine, who has as much courage as he has determination. Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin,” Biden said, referring to Zelensky. While correcting himself two seconds later, Biden added: “President Putin, you’re going to beat President Putin, President Zelensky. I am so focused on beating Putin.” The room at the summit gasped when Biden misidentified Zelensky as Putin. The…
PARIS: Countries on the frontlines of climate change have warned they cannot wait another year for long-sought aid to recover from disasters as floods and hurricanes wreak havoc across the globe. The appeal came during a meeting of the “loss and damage” fund that concluded on Friday. “We cannot wait until the end of 2025 for the first funds to get out the door,” Adao Soares Barbosa, a board member from East Timor and a long-standing negotiator for the world’s poorest nations, told AFP. Nearly 200 nations agreed at the UN COP28 summit last November to launch a fund responsible…
WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden faced more calls from fellow Democrats to abandon his re-election bid on Friday, following a news conference in which he delivered nuanced responses but occasionally stumbled over his words. It was unclear whether Biden’s performance would convince doubters in his party that he is their best bet to defeat Republican Donald Trump in the Nov 5 election and serve another four-year term in the White House. At least 17 congressional Democrats so far have called for him to drop out and allow the party to pick another standard-bearer, including some who announced their positions after the…
