Pakistan used to be the richest country in South Asia. Today, it is near the bottom, with India, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka far ahead. Our government’s tax and expenditure policies haven’t catered to our people’s economic welfare for decades. But then, neither have our education, health, or other policies. Therefore, we need to fundamentally change our governance. This budget, the first for the new government, was a chance to alter the course of our downward trajectory. In that, it has failed. The budget is good for governments and legislators. National Assembly members get Rs75bn worth of new projects, legislators in…
Author: Hasnain Abid Khanzada
President Joe Biden on Tuesday will announce a program offering a path to citizenship to hundreds of thousands of immigrants in the US illegally who are married to US citizens, a large-scale legalization effort that contrasts sharply with Republican rival Donald Trump’s plan for mass deportations. The program, which will roll out in coming months, will be open to an estimated 500,000 spouses who have lived in the US for at least 10 years as of June 17, senior Biden administration officials said in a call with reporters on Monday. Some 50,000 children under age 21 with a US-citizen parent…
Russian President Vladimir Putin vowed on Tuesday to deepen trade and security ties with North Korea and to support it against the United States, as he headed to the reclusive nuclear-armed country for the first time in 24 years. The US and its Asian allies are trying to work out just how far Russia will go in support of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, whose country is the only one to have conducted nuclear weapon tests in the 21st century. In a signal that Russia, a veto-wielding member of the United Nations (UN) Security Council, is reassessing its entire…
Diplomats on Tuesday said at least 550 pilgrims died during the Haj, underscoring the gruelling nature of the pilgrimage which again unfolded in scorching temperatures this year. At least 323 of those who died were Egyptians, most of them succumbing to heat-related illnesses, two Arab diplomats coordinating their countries’ responses told AFP. “All of them (the Egyptians) died because of heat” except for one who sustained fatal injuries during a minor crowd crush, one of the diplomats said, adding the total figure came from the hospital morgue in the Al-Muaisem neighbourhood of Makkah. At least 60 Jordanians also died, the diplomats said, up…
Renowned American intellectual Noam Chomsky has been discharged from a hospital in Sao Paulo, Brazil, where he had been receiving treatment for some time. In a statement, the Beneficencia Portuguesa Hospital in Sao Paulo announced that Chomsky had been discharged and his treatment would continue at home. The report came as the 95-year-old’s wife, Valeria Wasserman, dismissed media reports that Chomsky had died, saying in an email to AFP: “It’s false. He is well.” The newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo reported that Chomsky was recently taken to a hospital in the city after a stroke a year ago left him with difficulty speaking…
At least four people were killed and 120 injured on Tuesday in a 4.9 magnitude earthquake that hit Iran’s northeastern city of Kashmar, state media reported. The quake struck at 1:24pm (9:54am GMT), Kashmar’s governor, Hajatollah Shariatmadari, who gave the casualty toll, said on state television. Thirty-five people were hospitalised, he said, adding the quake damaged mostly dilapidated buildings in urban and rural areas of the city. State television aired footage of the aftermath of the quake showing first responders working in a street where all buildings were reduced to rubble. The United States Geological Survey said the earthquake hit…
India was battling on Wednesday extreme weather that caused severe heatwaves, landslides and floods, killing at least 11 people this week, among them a woman and her three daughters buried alive in a northeastern state, officials and media said. The capital, New Delhi, sweltered through its hottest June night in six years on Tuesday, with hospitals in the city of 20 million reporting at least five deaths from heatstroke this week, the Times of India newspaper said. Its power consumption touched an all-time high on Tuesday, when the minimum nighttime temperature reached 33.8 degrees Celsius (93°F), it added. Floods and landslides triggered…
KARACHI: Highlighting the hazards of genetically modified (GM) crops, the Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT) has urged the National Biosafety Commission (NBC) to reject the proposal for commercialisation of two GM sugar cane crops. In a press release, the PKMT stated that it strongly opposed the recent move of the Technical Advisory Committee, operating under the Environment Protection Agency (EPA), Islamabad, wherein it had approved and recommended commercialisation of two high-yielding GM varieties of sugar cane; insect-resistant transgenic sugar cane (CABB-IRS) and herbicide-tolerant transgenic sugar cane (CABB-HTS) developed by the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad. It now needs final approval of…
LAHORE: Lahore’s traffic situation has reached a boiling point, with citizens facing severe congestion and gridlocks, particularly during the past few days. Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz has expressed her displeasure over the worsening traffic situation and has questioned the eligibility criteria for the posting of the Lahore city traffic officer (CTO). According to an official, the chief minister conveyed her strong annoyance to the inspector general of police for not bringing relief to the citizens ahead of Eidul Azha. The official claimed the chief minister said the government has spent billions of rupees on building flyovers, underpasses, U-turns and signal-free…
RAWALPINDI: As the mercury soared above 45 Celsius in Rawalpindi over the past month, wardens of the Rawalpindi traffic police stood under the scorching sun regulating traffic at major intersections, including The Mall. A warden, whose primary responsibilities include traffic regulation and enforcing rules and regulations besides frequent protocol duties, remains in the field for almost eight hours a day without any breaks or access to basic facilities. On special occasions, they sometimes have to work for 10 hours. In a conversation with , multiple wardens spoke about apathy meted out to them by their parent department, saying other things…
