Infinity Social Updates

Attiq Ur Rehman is determined to follow his dream to become Pakistan’s first professional surfer despite his father’s concern for his future, a lack of equipment and the messy waves near Karachi. “I dont care about the money right now. I just want to compete,” the 21-year-old says, shrugging off his father’s plea to take up fishing so he can get married and support his family. “It’s my surfer attitude.” Rehman’s family are part of a poor coastal community in southern Pakistan that usually make a living from fishing or as lifeguards watching over more affluent residents of Karachi when they come for a day at the beach. Surfers check their boards as they prepare to surf at Tushan Beach in Karachi on Aug 28, 2024. — Reuters His father makes the equivalent of $100 a month to feed a family of 10 through fishing. “I told him a thousand times (to stop surfing) but he still doesn’t listen,” said Rehman’s father, Muhammad Rafiq. Rehman was a lifeguard but gave it up to concentrate on ...

A Karachi district and sessions court on Thursday acquitted Natasha Danish in a murder case, which was filed against her over the Karsaz road accident in August, as a reconciliation pact between the families was submitted in court. On August 19, a speeding Toyota Land Cruiser, driven by Danish, hit three motorcycles and another car on Karsaz Road, killing 60-year-old Imran Arif and his 22-year-old daughter Amna, as well as wounding three others. The driver was arrested and booked for manslaughter charges. Danish had already secured bail in the murder case on September 6 by a sessions court. After her bail pleas in a separate drug case were dismissed twice by the lower courts, she approached the Sindh High Court, which approved it against surety bonds worth Rs1 million. Advocate Amir Mansoob Qureshi, Danish’s lawyer, confirmed to Dawn.com today that his client was acquitted by the sessions court “on the basis of compromise” between the two parties. The suspect was not p...

Facing a results vacuum that could grind on for weeks, US TV networks are preparing to fill the airwaves against a backdrop of unprecedented pressure to avoid mistakes and a torrent of disinformation. In 2020, it took four tense days for President Joe Biden’s victory to be announced. This year, experts and observers will once again be waiting for the jigsaw puzzle of states to be declared for the Democrats or the Republicans one by one, and with them their electoral college votes, 270 of which are needed to win. “It’s all going to come down to seven really competitive swing states, and in a lot of those states, we’re not going to have sufficient data to make a projection until either late that evening, early the next day, or in some cases, it might be days after the election,” said Joe Lenski, executive vice president of Edison Research. His organisation will produce exit polls, projections and vote counts for the ABC, CBS, NBC News and CNN networks. In addition to a complex el...

Aiming to secure more investment, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Thursday invited Qatari investors to explore Pakistan’s various economic sectors during his official visit to the Gulf country. After securing investment pledges worth $600 billion during his Saudi Arabia trip, the prime minister is in Doha on a two-day official visit at the invitation of Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the Qatari emir. According to a Press Information Department (PID) press release , PM Shehbaz held an “extensive and productive meeting” today with his Qatari counterpart Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdul Rahman Al Thani. The prime minister “extended an invitation to Qatari investors to explore Pakistan’s diverse economic sectors, including agriculture, information technology, and tourism”. He underscored the government’s resolve to provide a “conducive environment for foreign investors and discussed potential incentives to facilitate their entry into the Pakistani market”. The two prime ministers also d...

https://aurora.dawn.com/news/1145236/a-womans-right-to-inherit from The Dawn News - Home https://ift.tt/9Z4UhVB

Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz on Wednesday reiterated her call for climate diplomacy with India to tackle the worsening issue of smog on both sides of the border. The New Delhi region battles pollution each year as temperatures fall and cold air traps construction dust, vehicle emissions and smoke, much of which officials say travels from the neighbouring breadbasket states of Punjab and Haryana. On Monday night, Lahore was the most polluted city in the world, touching 708 points on the Air Quality Index (AQI). Today, according to IQAir , Delhi held the top rank with 196 points, with Lahore just six points behind it. Addressing a Diwali event in Lahore today, Maryam said : “We need to have diplomacy with India regarding the issue of smog in Lahore. I’m thinking of writing a letter to the Punjab Chief Minister [Bhagwant Mann] in India that this is not just a political issue, this is a humanitarian issue. “And if we’re also taking steps towards this, then there should be a matc...

Iran’s government on Wednesday appointed the first governor from the Baluch minority in the country’s restive southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan. “Mansour Bijar was chosen as the governor of Sistan-Baluchistan,” government spokeswoman Fatemeh Mohajerani said after a cabinet meeting. Bijar, 50, hails from the Baluch community, a mainly Sunni Muslim ethnic group in a Shia-majority country. His appointment follows an attack in Sistan-Baluchistan that killed at least 10 policemen, later claimed by the militant group Jaish al-Adl (Army of Justice). Sistan-Baluchistan straddles the border with Afghanistan and Pakistan, and is one of the Islamic republic’s most impoverished provinces. It has long been a flashpoint for cross-border attacks by separatists and Sunni extremists, and clashes between security forces and armed groups are common. Jaish al-Adl, which was formed in 2012 by Baluch separatists, is considered a “terrorist organisation” by both Iran and the United States. ...

UN chief Antonio Guterres said Sudan was enduring a “nightmare” of hunger, violence, illness and “unspeakable atrocities”. from The Dawn News - Home https://ift.tt/JOmHFfU

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday departed for Saudi Arabia to attend the eight edition of the Future Investment Initiative (FII) being held in Riyadh. The FII, scheduled for Oct 29-30, serves as a major platform for countries to promote economic potential, attract foreign investments, and discuss strategies for sustainable growth. This year’s theme, “Infinite Horizons: Investing Today, Shaping Tomorrow,” focuses on investment in emerging fields, including artificial intelligence, robotics, education, energy, space, finance, healthcare, and sustainability. The participating countries will engage in the dialogue for the promotion of investment and a sustainable future while highlighting the strength of their respective economies. The prime minister will be accompanied on the trip by key cabinet ministers, the Foreign Office had said in a statement on Monday. Furthermore, PM Shehbaz is expected to hold important bilateral talks with the Saudi Crown Prince and Prime Minis...

United Nations rights experts on Monday slammed decisions in France barring women and girls who wear the hijab from sports competitions as “discriminatory”, demanding they be reversed. France invoked its strict rules on secularism to ban its athletes from wearing religious symbols, including the hijab, during the Paris 2024 Olympics. France’s football and basketball federations have also opted to exclude players wearing the headscarf from competitions, including at the amateur level. These decisions “are disproportionate and discriminatory, and infringe on their rights [of French athletes] to freely manifest their identity, their religion or belief in private and in public, and to take part in cultural life,” said a statement signed by eight independent UN experts. “Muslim women and girls who wear the hijab must have equal rights to participate in cultural and sporting life, and to take part in all aspects of French society of which they are a part,” they said. The statemen...

Bangladesh’s President Mohammed Shahabuddin faced growing pressure on Monday to quit from leaders of the revolution that toppled autocratic ex-prime minister Sheikh Hasina in August, who argue he was her appointee. Shahabuddin, 74, widely known as “Chuppu”, was elected by parliament in 2023 by Hasina’s now ousted Awami League, but while the post is largely ceremonial, his potential removal from the role has sparked fears of a constitutional vacuum. “Any decision regarding the removal of the president will be based on political consensus,” Shafiqul Alam, press advisor to the interim government that replaced Hasina, said on Monday. The interim government is led by Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus as its “chief adviser”. Government spokeswoman Syeda Rizwana Hasan, a minister in Yunus’s cabinet, said there is “an ongoing discussion regarding the removal” of Shahabuddin. “It must be considered whether a government formed after a revolution should retain a president who wa...

Donald Trump rallies supporters Sunday at an iconic New York arena while Kamala Harris goes neighbourhood to neighbourhood in Philadelphia just over a week before America votes in an extraordinarily close White House race. Trump’s gathering at the nearly 20,000-seat Madison Square Garden is expected to draw a blitz of coverage in the Republican’s home metropolis, which is still very much a Democratic stronghold. Both candidates are making closing pitches to voters in one of America’s most divisive and suspense-filled electoral fights , with polls suggesting a dead heat ahead of the November 5 vote. Harris, 60, has planned a packed day of campaigning in the biggest city in must-win Pennsylvania, including stops at a Black church and barbershop, as well as a Puerto Rican restaurant. A senior Harris campaign official said Sunday’s visit will be the vice president’s 14th trip to Pennsylvania since she jumped to the top of the ticket after President Joe Biden’s shock withdrawal in July....

The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on Sunday announced wicketkeeper Mohammad Rizwan as captain and batting all-rounder Agha Salman as the vice-captain of the cricket team for the white ball format. Babar announced he was stepping down as Pakistan’s One-day Interna­tional and T20I skipper on October 2 in a post on his social media platform ‘X’ account, saying he wanted to focus on his playing role. The national selection committee was tasked with finding the next white-ball captain following Azam’s resignation from the position. While speaking to the media in Lahore, PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi announced Rizwan and Salman as the captain and vice-captain of the cricket team for the one day international and T20 international, respectively. Earlier in the day, the cricket board had announced their squad for the upcoming matches against Australia and Zimbabwe. According to Pakistan’s squad, the skipper Rizwan was not included in the T20I squad against Zimbabwe. More to follow...

China’s Hunan University of Medicine has named it’s newly inaugurated research centre after Pakistani Professor Dr Muhammad Iqbal Choudhary. This centre will house 17 full-time researchers dedicated to advancing scientific collaboration between Pakistan and China, a press statement read. Founded in 1912, the institution is a national public medical university in China, offering around 20 undergraduate and graduate medical programmes with more than 4,500 faculty members and 14,425 full-time students. Dr Choudhary has, in the past, advocated for fostering cooperation between Chinese and Pakistani scientists, particularly for establishing research centres between the two countries. He has also recieved numerous awards, including civil awards as Hilal-i-Imtiaz, Sitara-i-Imtiaz, and Tamgha-i-Imtiaz. In 2021, he was awarded the Mustafa Prize for his services in the field of bio-organic chemistry. Currently, he serves as vice president of the World Academy of Sciences for Central and Sou...

LAHORE: Punjab teachers completely boycotted the Training Need Assessment (TNA) test held in the province on Saturday to assess the training needs of teachers in the School Education Department (SED). The government had designed the TNA App, developed by PMIU-PESRP, to assess the training needs of teachers in the department. It would enable efficient online testing through an MCQ-based assessment, evaluating essential teaching competencies. The app is designed to ensure seamless navigation and a smooth testing experience, effectively identifying key areas for professional development. The department had established 720 centres to conduct the test in the province and 60 teachers were to appear for the test at each centre. Around 43,000 primary school teachers (PSTs) were to appear in the test being held in Punjab on Saturday. The TNA was planned to be conducted from Friday and would continue on Saturday and Sunday. Only 80 out of 43,000 appear in Training Need Assessment test Pun...

ISLAMABAD: Quorum syndrome hit the Senate again on Friday and the House had to be adjourned till Monday even without completing the question hour. This was the second sitting of the House after it passed the controversial set of constitutional amendm­e­nts — both of which had to be adj­o­urned on account of lack of quorum. Former deputy chairman Saleem Mandviwalla was chairing the session when quorum was pointed out by a lawmaker in the midst of the question hour. Quorum bells were rung for five minutes but to no avail. The chair then suspended the proceedings for 30 minutes, but this too did not work as only 15 members turned up. The chair then adjourned the Hou­­se to meet again on Monday at 3pm. 17,738 Madaris registered Earlier during the question hour, the Senate was told that the directorate general religious education, which works under the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training, has already registered 17,738 Madaris till Sept 11, adds APP . In a written ...

A former wife of legendary US boxer Muhammad Ali arrived in the Afghan capital, a Taliban government official said on Friday, to reportedly open a stadium in a country where women are barred from sports . The head of the Taliban government’s sports directorate, Ahmadullah Wasiq, told AFP that Khalilah Camacho-Ali, who was married to the boxer for a decade from 1967, had arrived in Kabul. State media cited the directorate as saying she was in the city “to build a sports stadium to be named ‘Pirozi’ (victory in Dari) and a sports association named after Muhammad Ali”. Born Belinda Boyd in 1950 in the United States, Camacho-Ali, like her world champion boxer ex-husband, converted to Islam after they married. Muhammad Ali himself visited Kabul in 2002, a year after the US forces overthrew the first Taliban government, visiting a girls’ school in his role as a United Nations peace ambassador. Since the Taliban government came to power in Afghanistan in 2021, they have imposed a stric...

Rehan Ahmed’s three quick wickets turned an evenly poised deciding third Test England’s way on Friday, leaving Pakistan teetering on 187-7 in Rawalpindi. The 20-year-old knocked over Mohammad Rizwan (25), Salman Agha (one) and Aamer Jamal (14) to enter the lunch break on day two with figures of 3-25. England still lead by 80 runs. Pakistan’s batting was held together by Saud Shakeel’s unbeaten 72. He was accompanied by Noman Ali on six not out after no other batter from the home team managed to cross 30. Pakistan added 114 runs in the extended two-and-a-half-hour session due to Friday prayers. Shakeel, who reached his eighth Test half-century off 132 balls, has so far hit four boundaries in his fighting knock. England’s frontline spinners Jack Leach and Shoaib Bashir could not extract the same sharp turn from the pitch as rival Sajid Khan, who took 6-128 to dismiss the visitors for 267 on Thursday. Pakistan resumed the day at 73-3 in search of a lead to press for a series...

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz wants to deepen defence ties with New Delhi and bring the two countries’ militaries closer, he said on Friday, after meeting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Germany has not traditionally had close defence ties with India, but is now pitching to join the latter’s effort to wean its arms base from decades of dependence on Russia, at a time when the West seeks to counter China’s growing influence. “Our overall message is clear, we need more co-operation, not less,” Scholz said. “At our inter-governmental consultations with India, we also want to deepen co-operation in defence and agree to bring our militaries together.” Scholz, accompanied by most of his cabinet, is leading a high-level delegation to New Delhi, betting that greater access to the vast Indian market can reduce Germany’s reliance on China. German Thyssenkrupp is one of two bidders to have partnered with Indian firms to build six conventional submarines in India, in a deal estimat...

Lahore-based startup Colabs, which provides small and medium enterprises, entrepreneurs and freelancers with spaces and a tech platform to build and grow businesses, announced on Thursday that it raised $2 million in Pre-Series A further funding round. In a press statement, the startup announced that it had “raised an additional $2m in pre-series A, bringing the total to over $5m in venture capital funding from top investors”. “This funding marks a pivotal moment for Colabs as we set our sights on the vibrant MENA market, with a particular focus on Saudi Arabia’s flourishing entrepreneurial ecosystem,” said Omar Shah, co-founder of Colabs. The company currently has more than 10 locations, 5,000 members, and partnerships with companies like EY, Endeavor, Spotify, and Google Cloud. The statement also highlighted that the company is set to expand to Saudi Arabia with the new $2m funding, aiming to replicate “its success by promoting a culture of innovation, networking, and community b...

Britain will ban single-use vapes from next year, a government minister said on Thursday, seeking to crack down on the environmental harm and rising usage levels among children. Health authorities have raised concerns about the use of vapes among young adults, with their colourful designs and fruity flavours making them stand out on grocery store shelves. According to a 2024 survey by health charity ASH, about one in five children aged 11-17 said they had tried vaping. It is illegal to sell nicotine-containing e-cigarettes to anyone under the age of 18 or for adults to buy them on behalf of under-18s. The plan to ban disposable vapes was initially set out by the previous Conservative government in January but was not implemented before the July election, which was won by the Labour Party. Labour’s culture minister said that the number of children vaping had tripled in the last three years, and that disposable vapes were causing a lot of problems for the environment. “We have b...

Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb and his Saudi counterpart Mohammed Al-Jadaan on Wednesday expressed their resolve to deepen economic ties between Islamabad and Riyadh by facilitating investment in key sectors. In a post on X, the finance ministry confirmed that Aurangzeb met the Saudi minister of finance on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank annual meetings in Washington DC. Aurangzeb is leading a delegation that includes the finance secretary, economic affairs secretary, State Bank of Pakistan governor, and other key officials from the financial sector. During their week-long visit, the Pakistani delegation is scheduled to engage in high-level discussions with IMF and World Bank leaders. Bilateral meetings are also on the agenda, with discussions planned between Pakistani officials and their counterparts from China, Saudi Arabia, Turkiye, and other allied nations. “[The] two ministers resolved to further deepen mutually beneficial economic t...

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Wednesday granted bail to Bushra Bibi, the wife of PTI Founder Imran Khan, in the new case related to an expensive Bulgari jewellery set obtained from the Toshakhana at a throwaway price. On October 4, the IHC notified the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) of Bushra’s petition seeking post-arrest bail. According to the prosecution, the jewellery set, worth Rs71.5 million, was retained by the former premier and his spouse for Rs2.9m only. Justice Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb heard the bail petition on Wednesday. Bushra’s counsel Barrister Salman Safdar and FIA prosecutor Umair Majid Malik also appeared in court. Malik opened the arguments since Safdar had concluded his remarks a day prior. While speaking to the FIA prosecutor, Justice Aurangzeb recommended that he or the deputy attorney general visit Azerbaijan if they ever get a chance. He went on to explain that in Azerbaijan, there was a museum where all state gifts were kept on display; everythin...

The United Nations Human Rights chief Volker Turk has said he was “concerned” that the 26th constitutional amendment would “seriously undermine” the judiciary’s independence“. The newly enacted 26th Constitutional Amendment has brought numerous changes pertaining to the judiciary — including taking away the Supreme Court’s suo motu powers and empowering parliamentarians to nominate the next chief justice of Pakistan from among the three most senior SC judges. Turk was concerned that the “latest constitutional amendments — adopted hastily, without broad consultation and debate — will seriously undermine independence of the judiciary”, the UN Human Rights office said on X on Tuesday. “Constitutional reforms must be in line with international human rights law,” the statement added. On Monday, the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) called the amendments a “blow” to the judiciary’s independence. ICJ Secretary General Santiago Canton said: “They erode the judiciary’s capa...

The European Union lags far behind the United States and China in investing in artificial intelligence (AI), the chief executive of AI chipmaker Nvidia, said on Wednesday. While there are only a handful of artificial intelligence companies in Europe, such as France’s Mistral and Germany’s Aleph Alpha, the bloc passed the world’s first comprehensive rules to govern AI which came into force in August. “The EU has to accelerate the progress in AI,” Nvidia’s Jensen Huang said during a visit to Copenhagen. “There’s an awakening in every country realising that the data is a national resource.” Huang was in Denmark to launch a new supercomputer named Gefion, which boasts 1,528 graphic processing units (GPUs) and was built by Nvidia in partnership with the Novo Nordisk Foundation and Denmark’s Export and Investment Fund. Nvidia is the world’s top maker of GPUs, which are in high demand because they can be used to speed up artificial intelligence work. OpenAI’s ChatGPT, for example, was ...

An infection with the new mpox variant clade 1b has been detected in Germany for the first time, the Robert Koch Institute health authority said on Tuesday. The infection occurred abroad and was detected last Friday, the institute said, adding that it did not see an increased risk for Germany but was “monitoring the situation very closely”. Mpox, a viral disease related to smallpox that causes fever, body aches, swollen lymph nodes and a rash that forms into blisters, has two main subtypes — clade 1 and clade 2. From May 2022, clade 2 spread around the world, mostly affecting gay and bisexual men in Europe and the United States. In July 2022, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared an international public health emergency, its highest level of alarm over the spread. Vaccination and awareness drives in many countries helped stem the number of worldwide cases and the WHO lifted the emergency in May 2023 after reporting 140 deaths out of roughly 87,400 cases. But this year, a ...

LAHORE: The Student Action Committee Lahore, organised by students of various educational institutes, has called for transparent investigations into incidents of rape and harassment at the Lahore College for Women University (LCWU) as well as Punjab College, demanding strict punishment for the culprits and safer campuses for students. It also demanded action against police officers involved in torture of students during protests and the release of all students from custody. The committee organised a protest against rape and harassment in front of the Punjab Assembly at The Mall on Monday where students from FC College, Punjab College, LCWU, Garrison College and GC University were present. Along with students, parents, workers from public and private sectors, and members of the Revolutionary Communist Party also joined the protest. A heavy police contingent was present at various locations in Lahore, especially outside educational institutions. The students of different educational i...