BEIJING: A furious China launched “punishment” drills around Taiwan on Thursday in what it said was a response to “separatist acts”, sending up heavily armed warplanes and staging mock attacks as state media denounced newly inaugurated President Lai Ching-te. The exercises, in the Taiwan Strait and around groups of Taiwan-controlled islands beside the Chinese coast, come just three days after Lai took office, a man Beijing detests as a “separatist”.UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres’s spokesman called for all sides to “refrain from acts that could escalate tensions in the region” amid China’s military drills around Taiwan. “On China, I can tell…
Author: Hasnain Abid Khanzada
TORONTO: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Wednesday said Canada is “prepared to recognise the state of Palestine at the right time — not necessarily as the last step along the path.” Trudeau’s statement came in response to a challenge from New Democratic Party (NDP) MP and foreign affairs critic Heather McPherson in the House of Commons, as she urged him to “take a stand” on the matter. “We urgently need to build a credible path towards lasting peace. We oppose efforts by the Netanyahu government to reject a two-state solution. At the same time, Hamas, a terrorist group, currently controls…
PARIS: A mind-boggling number of shining galaxies, a purple and orange star nursery and a spiral galaxy similar to our Milky Way: new images were revealed from Europe’s Euclid space telescope on Thursday. It is the second set of images released by the European Space Agency since Euclid launched last year on the first-ever mission to investigate the mysteries of dark matter and dark energy. Scientific results were also published for the first time in the six-year mission, which aims to use its wide view to chart two billion galaxies across a third of the sky. Star nursery Euclid also captured the…
UNITED NATIONS: Countries at the United Nations’ General Assembly voted on Thursday to observe an annual day of remembrance, for the Srebrenica genocide in 1995. The vote went ahead, despite furious opposition from Bosnian Serbs and Serbia. The resolution was authored by Germany and Rwanda, which were two countries synonymous with genocide in the 20th century. The vote received 84 votes in-favor, 19 against, with 68 opting to abstain. This effectively makes the 11 of July the “International Day of Remembrance of the Srebrenica Genocide.” Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic warned the General Assembly ahead of the vote that the move “will just…
TORONTO: The son of Ripudaman Singh Malik, one of the men accused of having a role in the 1985 Air India bombing, has been officially warned by the national police service of Canada that his life could be under threat, CBC News reported. Hardeep Malik, a businessman in Surrey, British Columbia, is the son of Ripudaman, who was acquitted in 2005 of mass murder and conspiracy charges related to a pair of bombings in 1985 that killed 331 people. He was gunned down outside his office in Surrey on July 14, 2022. Two men have since been charged with his murder. The warning to…
WASHINGTON: A proposal to invite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of the US Congress has raised hackles among Democrats, with some key Democratic leaders urging Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to abstain from endorsing the invitation. Democrats hold the Senate majority while Republicans dominate the House of Representatives. Most liberal Democrats and progressives have already announced they will boycott the session if it’s held. This further complicates the situation for the Biden administration and other Democratic leaders who are trying to balance their support for Israel with criticism of Netanyahu’s military tactics, which have led…
GAZA STRIP: Israel launched devastating air strikes on Gaza early Thursday while also saying it is ready to resume stalled talks on a truce and prisoner release deal with Hamas to pause the war raging since October 7. Israeli forces killed at least 50 Palestinians in aerial and ground bombardments across the Gaza Strip, health officials and Hamas media said. The Gaza Strip’s civil defence agency said two pre-dawn air strikes had killed 26 people, including 15 children, in Gaza City alone. Agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said one strike hit a family house, killing 16 people, in the Al-Daraj area,…
QUETTA: The Balochistan Assembly on Thursday called upon the government to pay compensation to the truck driver who lost his life and truck owners whose vehicles were damaged in an armed attack in Sanjavi area of Ziarat district. The demand was made through a resolution moved by Food Minister Noor Muhammad Dummar and unanimously adopted during the session presided over by Speaker Abdul Khaliq Khan Achakzai. The resolution also demanded strict action against those involved in the attack and torching of the trucks laden with coal. “Government should provide financial assistance to owners of trucks whose trucks were set on fire by…
ISLAMABAD: After remaining at loggerheads with the establishment and some political parties for over a year, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) on Thursday said it does not believe in a “clash of titans” and showed willingness to “forgive everyone”. Talking to the media on Thursday, PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan said the PTI will not indulge in the politics of revenge and was not interested in vengeance, despite the fact that it has been suffering. He announced that his party is forgiving all its opponents. He said there was a need to “ceasefire” for the sake of the nation and…
ISLAMABAD: Islamabad High Court (IHC) Justice Babar Sattar on Thursday issued notices to the president and secretary of the Islamabad High Court Bar Association (IHCBA) for allegedly restraining the lawyers and litigants from entering the court premises during a strike called by the Pakistan Bar Council. The judge also decided to examine the authority of regulatory bodies of the lawyers regarding the issuance of the strike calls and threats of disciplinary action to lawyers over non-compliance. The court sought a report along with CCTV footage dated May 9 from the IHC registrar in which the elected representatives of the IHCBA…
