Infinity Social Updates

Journalist Munizae Jahangir on Tuesday rejected allegations that people protesting in support of Gaza were manhandled by staff of the 5th Asma Jahangir Conference and termed than an “outrageous lie”. The 5th Asma Jahangir Conference, titled ‘People’s Mandate: Safeguarding Civil Rights in South Asia’, took place in Lahore over the weekend. A pro-Palestine protester had interrupted and chanted slogans during the German ambassador’s speech on civil rights at the conference on Saturday. Just moments after the ambassador began his speech, the protester could be heard saying, “Excuse me, Mr ambassador. I am shocked by the audacity that you are here to talk about civil rights while your country is brutally abusing the people speaking for the rights of the Palestinians.” The Progressive Students Collective (PSC) said its members had “exposed the hypocrisy of German ambassador” and also lashed out at the conference organisers, saying they had “forcefully silenced the voices of students wh...

King Charles III on Tuesday reportedly told fellow cancer patients “I’m well”, as he carried out his first official public engagement since being diagnosed with the condition. The British head of state appeared relaxed as he and his wife Queen Camilla met patients and staff at the University College Hospital Macmillan Cancer Centre in central London. He talked to patients receiving chemotherapy at a day unit, including 60-year-old Asha Millen, who has bone marrow cancer. “I said, ‘How are you?’ and he said, ‘I’m well’,” she told reporters afterwards. Another patient, Lesley Woodbridge, 63, said the king sympathised with her and added: “I’ve got to have my treatment this afternoon as well.” Charles, 75, suspended most of his duties in February after cancer was found while he was being treated for an enlarged prostate the previous month. The exact nature of his cancer has not been disclosed but doctors said last week they were “very encouraged” by the progress of his treatme...

Uber said on Tuesday that it had made the decision to cease operating its ride-hailing app in Pakistan. “We’ve made the decision to cease operating the Uber app in Pakistan,” a spokesperson for Uber told Dawn.com . “Our subsidiary brand Careem will continue to operate, with the Careem app offering ride-hailing services across Pakistan and earning opportunities for drivers,” the spokesperson added. In 2019, Uber had acquired its rival Careem for $3.1 billion. The two companies had said they would continue to operate their respective regional services and independent brands. In October 2022, Uber had ceased operations in Karachi, Multan, Faisalabad, Peshawar and Islamabad. It had decided to operate in the five cities through Careem and through the Uber app in Lahore. In an email sent to users in Lahore today, Uber said it had made the “difficult decision to no longer offer the Uber app services in Lahore as of April 30”. “Ride-hailing services will continue to be offered through ...

Pakistan leads the world in the tragic toll of neonatal, infant, and child mortality; the highest rate of first day deaths and stillbirths — future of promises snuffed out before they even begin. As of 2022, statistics reveal that 57 out of every 1,000 livebirths end in the child’s death indicating that Pakistan stands at the precipice of a healthcare crisis, where diseases claim the lives of children with alarming frequency. What’s worse is that the vast majority of these losses are preventable, succumbing to diseases that could have been stopped in their tracks by simple vaccinations. Against the backdrop of such a grim reality, World Immunisation Week , celebrated from April 24 to April 30, is a global initiative that stands as a powerful reminder of the lifesaving role of vaccines in safeguarding our most vulnerable and shaping a healthier world for generations to come. In Pakistan, as in every corner of the globe, understanding immunisation schedules, dispelling misconception...

Khalsa Day festivities in Canada’s Toronto were marked by slogans raised in favour of the Khalistan movement during a speech by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Indian media outlets reported on Monday. The festival of Vaisakhi — also known as Baisakhi — honours the founding of the Sikh community known as the Khalsa in 1699. It also marks the beginning of a new solar year and the harvesting season. India’s New Delhi Television Ltd reported that “loud chants” were raised in Sunday’s celebrations attended by “thousands” amid the presence of the Canadian premier, opposition leader Pierre Poilievre, Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow and prominent Canadian Sikh leader Jagmeet Singh, chief of the New Democratic Party. “Trudeau, in a staunch assurance to the Sikh Community in the country, has said that the government is always there to protect their rights and freedoms at all costs,” the report said. “To the nearly, 800,000 Canadians of Sikh heritage across this country, … we will always defe...

The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Monday chose to maintain the status quo by upholding the key policy rate at 22 per cent for the seventh policy meeting in a row. The announcement came after a meeting of the bank’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC). In a statement , the MPC said that the continuation of the current monetary policy stance, with significant positive real interest rates, was necessary “to bring inflation down to the target range of 5-7pc by September 2025”. Giving its reasoning, the MPC noted that global commodity prices appeared to have bottomed out with “resilient global growth”, recent geopolitical events had also added uncertainty about their outlook and the upcoming budgetary measures may have implications for the near-term inflation outlook. It said it viewed the level of inflation to still be high, albeit it did expect inflation to continue to remain on a downward trajectory. The MPC said that in line with its expectations, inflation continued to “mo...

Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf resigned on Monday, further opening the door to the UK opposition Labour Party to regain ground in its former Scottish heartlands in a national election expected later this year. The 39-year-old politician said he would also stand down as leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP) but would stay on until his successor was found. Yousaf quit as head of the SNP after a week of chaos triggered by his scrapping of a coalition agreement with Scotland’s Greens. He then failed to secure enough support to survive votes of no confidence against him expected later this week. Resigning a little over a year after he replaced Nicola Sturgeon as first minister and SNP leader, Yousaf said it was time for someone else to lead Scotland’s devolved government. The SNP’s fortunes have faltered over a funding scandal and the resignation of Sturgeon as party leader last year. There has also been infighting over how progressive its pitch should be as it seeks t...

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi denied on Monday that his country was sliding towards autocracy, following accusations that his government orchestrated criminal probes to weaken rivals ahead of an ongoing general election. Modi, 73, remains resoundingly popular after a decade in office, and he is widely expected to win a third term when the six-week-long national polls conclude in June. His prospects have been further bolstered by several criminal investigations into opponents, including a tax probe that in February froze the bank accounts of Congress , India’s largest opposition party. But Modi said the suggestion India was becoming “an electoral autocracy” under his rule was a fiction spread by his disgruntled rivals. “Because the opposition is not able to get power, they start defaming India on the world stage,” he told the Times of India newspaper in an interview published on Monday. “They spread canards about our people, our democracy and our institutions.” India’s pres...

Arsenal held on to beat battling local rivals Tottenham Hotspur 3-2 away and move four points clear at the top of the Premier League after an emphatic first-half display and a nervous second period in an electric derby atmosphere on Sunday. An own goal by Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and efforts from Bukayo Saka and Kai Havertz put the Gunners in control at halftime and although Spurs fought back through Cristian Romero’s strike and a Son Heung-min penalty, the visitors claimed the three points. Victory moved Mikel Arteta’s Gunners further ahead of second-placed champions Manchester City, who have two games in hand and visit struggling Nottingham Forest later on Sunday. Liverpool are in third spot a point behind City but like Arsenal having played 35 matches with three games left. Tottenham’s defeat hit their hopes of playing Champions League football next season as they stand seven points off fourth-placed Aston Villa, albeit still with two games in hand. Having built such a command...

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Sunday said that a “malicious campaign” was being run against Justice Babar Sattar on social media, as part of which confidential information and documents belonging to the judge were leaked online. Justice Sattar is one of the six IHC judges who have complained of interference in judicial affairs by the country’s intelligence apparatus. Earlier this week, a full court meeting of the IHC decided to introduce several measures, including the reactivation of ‘empo­wered’ inspection teams, to end the alleged meddling. In order to make the court immune from undue influence, the full court decided to reactivate its ins­pection teams and emp­ower inspection judges to enable them to address the complaints of judicial officers of the subordinate judiciary against any interference and pressure, sources told Dawn . The IHC also issued a press release today, a copy of which is available with Dawn.com , in which it stated that those behind the campaign agains...

Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar was given the additional charge of deputy prime minister on Sunday, according to a notification issued by the Cabinet Division. According to the notification, the appointment was made by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif “with immediate effect and until further orders”. Before Dar taking the role, the last deputy prime minister of the country was Chaudhry Pervez Elahi, then of PML-Q, who was appointed to the position in June 2012. Dar had long been the PML-N’s finance expert but was surprisingly made the minister of foreign affairs when PM Shehbaz picked his new look cabinet in March, with his preferred finance portfolio going to Muhammad Aurangzeb. More to follow from The Dawn News - Home https://ift.tt/psm2ES9

Tesla CEO Elon Musk arrived in Beijing on Sunday for a surprise visit, where he is expected to meet senior officials to discuss the rollout of Full Self-Driving software and permission to transfer data overseas, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. The US electric vehicle maker rolled out Full Self-Driving , or FSD, the most autonomous version of its Autopilot software, four years ago but has yet to make it available in China, its second-largest market globally, despite customers urging it to do so. Musk said this month Tesla may make FSD available to customers in China “very soon” , in response to a query on social media platform X. Rival Chinese automakers such as Xpeng have been seeking to gain an advantage over Tesla by rolling out similar software. Musk is looking to obtain approval to transfer data collected in the country abroad to train algorithms for its autonomous driving technologies, the person said. Tesla has since 2021 stored all data collected by its ...

Iran’s foreign minister said the crew of a seized Portuguese-flagged ship linked to Israel have been granted consular access and are expected to be freed, Iranian media reported on Saturday. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards seized the container vessel MSC Aries with a crew of 25 in the Strait of Hormuz on April 13, days after Tehran vowed to retaliate for a suspected Israeli strike on its consulate in Damascus. Iran had said it could close the crucial shipping route. Recent attacks on merchant shipping in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden by Yemen’s Houthis, claiming solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza during Israel’s bombardment, have affected global shipping. Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian told his Portuguese counterpart Paulo Rangel in a telephone call that the “humanitarian issue of the release of the ship’s crew is of serious concern to us,” Iranian media said. He was quoted as saying the crew would be turned over to their ambassadors in Tehran. The reports d...

US intelligence agencies have determined that Russian President Vladimir Putin most likely did not order the killing of opposition politician Alexei Navalny at an Arctic prison camp in February, The Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. Navalny, 47 when he died , was Putin’s fiercest domestic critic. His allies, branded extremists by the authorities, accused Putin of having him murdered and have said they will provide proof to back their allegation. The Kremlin has denied any state involvement. Last month, Putin called Navalny’s demise “sad” and said he had been ready to hand the jailed politician over to the West in a prisoner exchange, provided that Navalny never return to Russia. Navalny’s allies said such talks had been underway. The Wall Street Journal , citing anonymous people familiar with the matter, said on Saturday that US intelligence agencies had concluded that Putin probably did not order Navalny to be killed in February. The report said Washington had not absol...

A pro-Palestine protester on Saturday interrupted and chanted slogans during the German ambassador’s speech on civil rights at a conference in Lahore. Germany’s Ambassador to Pakistan Alfred Grannas was speaking at the 5th Asma Jahangir Conference titled ‘People’s Mandate: Safeguarding Civil Rights in South Asia’. Announced by the Asma Jahangir Legal Aid Cell (AGHS), the two-day conference is being organised in collaboration with the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and the Pakistan Bar Council (PBC). Just moments after the ambassador began his speech, the protester can be heard saying, “Excuse me, Mr Ambassador. I am shocked by the audacity that you are here to talk about civil rights while your country is brutally abusing the people speaking for the rights of the Palestinians.” View this post on Instagram His comments drew applause and cheer from the crowd, while chants of “Free, Free Palestine” and “From the River to the Se...

The arrest warrant against Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP) chairman Mahmood Khan Achakzai was suspended on Saturday by a judicial magistrate in Quetta. A candidate for the presidential election , Achakzai was booked under section 448 (house trespass) and section 447 (criminal trespass) in a First Information Report (FIR) registered at Gwalmandi police station on March 11. Officials from the local administration and Quetta, as well as the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) charged Achakzai with illegal occupation of government land and interference in official duties when his security guard allegedly resisted a team of officials who raided a plot of land opposite Achakzai’s residence. The guard was taken into custody and was found possessing a firearm without a licence, according to the FIR. The warrant was issued after the PkMAP chief failed to appear in court on April 22 for a hearing in connection with the FIR. While issuing the arrest warrant, the judicial magistrate directe...

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese hailed as a hero Pakistani security guard Faraz Tahir, killed in Sydney while trying to stop a mass stabbing attack , in remarks delivered on Friday at a funeral attended by hundreds. Tahir, who would have turned 31 on Wednesday, was on the first day of his job when he became one of six killed this month during the stabbing spree at a busy mall in beachside Bondi. “Running toward danger, to protect people he had never even met, without doubt, he helped save lives that day,” Albanese said. “Without question, Faraz Tahir died a hero.” The ceremony was held before a crowd gathered outside the city’s Baitul Huda mosque, under a banner that read “Love for all — hatred for none”. Tahir arrived in Australia as a refugee from Pakistan, according to the Ahmadiyya Muslim community of Australia, to which he belonged . Mass stabbing attack injured Pakistani security guard Muhammad Taha attends compatriot Faraz Tahir’s funeral prayer at Baitul Huda...

Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Asim Munir on Friday said that complete independence was not possible without first achieving economic stability. According to the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the army chief made the remarks while addressing the Green Pakistan Initiative conference. The remarks were also carried by state-run APP and Radio Pakistan . The federal government’s Green Pakistan Initiative is aimed at introducing the latest farming on 4.4 million acres of land across the country. The government is eyeing to fetch around $40 billion during the next five years through the agricultural initiative and hopes to create four million jobs through this process. The initiative seeks to revolutionise agriculture with the help of the armed forces and the promised partnerships of friendly countries. It was inaugurated at the National Seminar on Food Security and Agriculture in July last year and Gen Munir had assured the military’s full support of the initiative. In hi...

As PPP Senator Sherry Rehman and PML-N’s Irfan Siddiqui struck a reconciliatory tone with the opposition on Friday, PTI’s Ali Zafar lamented the “political victimisation” of his party. Addressing the Upper House on Friday, Rehman hailed yesterday’s Senate session as “very exemplary”, adding that it was a source of pride for the lawmakers. Her statements today echoed those made a day ago, wherein she had called on the PTI to “not add fuel to fire” and warned that “keeping the country at a boiling point was to no one’s benefit”. Speaking in the Senate today, Sherry welcomed Leader of the Opposition Shibli Faraz back to the upper house of Parliament. The PPP leader also said that she had not prepared a speech since “speaking from the heart on the first day is a good indicator”. “I think that what President Zardari has said should be welcomed,” Rehman said, referring to the president’s parliamentary address wherein he had called for moving on from the polarisation plaguing domestic po...

Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday told top US diplomat Antony Blinken that the world’s two biggest economies should be “partners, not rivals”, but that there were a “number of issues” to be resolved in their relations. Blinken, in China for the second time in less than a year, met leading Chinese politicians in Beijing. US officials said he would directly raise crucial areas of difference including Russia, Taiwan and trade. Meeting Blinken in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, Xi said the two countries had “made some positive progress” since he met with US President Joe Biden last year, according to state broadcaster CCTV . “The two countries should be partners, not rivals,” Xi said. “There are still a number of issues that need to be resolved, and there is still room for further efforts,” the Chinese leader added. “We hope the US can also take a positive view of China’s development,” he added. “When this fundamental problem is solved […] relations can truly stabilise, get ...

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif has rejected PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Khan’s claims that former premier Imran Khan was being pressured to accept a ‘deal’. In an interview published on Wednesday on Independent Urdu , Asif said, “There is no truth in claims of pressuring Imran Khan to come to the negotiating table. Speaking to reporters outside the Parliament House on Tuesday, Gohar had first replied in the negative when asked if he had said there was “pressure being exerted for a deal” with Imran: “No, I have not given any such statements”. “What I have said is that if there is any dialogue or communication, we will not hide it from you all […] Khan sahib himself said that there has been no contact with him [to strike a deal],” he added. However, Gohar also said: “Another thing we (PTI) are saying is that the way Khan sahib is being kept in jail, the way [Bushra] Bibi has been [jailed], these are all [forms of] pressure that Khan sahib somehow agrees to a deal. “And these ar...

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday suspended till May 6 a recent city administration notification that had reduced the prices of roti. On April 14, the Punjab government slashed the price of roti, followed by a similar decision by the Islamabad administration. The Punjab government had reduced the prices of roti from Rs20 to Rs16 while the price of naan was cut from Rs25 to Rs20. However, the All Pakistan Naanbais Association (Apna) had rejected the move. In the following week, 14 people were arrested in the Lahore district for flouting the notification of new prices of roti and naan at tandoors. The teams also sealed various tandoors. Two days later, another 16 were taken into custody in Rawalpindi district for not complying with the new rates as the city observed a partial strike against the government decision. On April 19, the All Pakistan Naanbai Association (Apna) ended their strike , agreeing to sell roti at Rs16 and naan at Rs20 after being assured that their...