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Dawn - 18:12 Aug 19, 2025
Flight operations were affected at Karachi’s Jinnah International Airport on Tuesday as the city received heavy rainfall, according to a statement issued by the Pakistan Aviation Authority (PAA). Karachi received heavy rainfall in several areas over the day, triggering power outages throughout the city as the authorities advised citizens to take precautionary measures. According to a statement issued by PAA spokesperson Saifullah Khan, several flights were affected due to inclement weather during the day. Affected flights included Pakistan International Airline’s (PIA) PK 304 from Karachi to Lahore, which was scheduled for 2pm but was delayed till 5pm. PIA’s flights from Karachi to Quetta and Sukkur were also cancelled, whereas the flight to Islamabad was delayed an hour till 5pm. The national flag carrier also confirmed in a separate statement that its flight operations were affected due to bad weather in Karachi and Islamabad. Flight path of Flydubai flight FZ335 from Dubai to Karachi diverted to Multan on ... -
Dawn - 12:50 Aug 19, 2025
South Africa’s Aiden Markram hit 82 before left-arm spinner Keshav Maharaj tore through Australia’s new-look batting order as the Proteas claimed the One-Day International series opener by 98 runs in Cairns on Tuesday. Sent in to bat, Markram — opening for the first time in ODIs since 2021 — crunched nine boundaries in his 81-ball knock to power South Africa to a formidable 296-8. Skipper Temba Bavuma (65) and Matthew Breetzke (57) also helped set the tone for the three-match ODI series. In reply, openers Mitchell Marsh and Travis Head flattened South Africa’s pacemen as Australia raced to 60-0 after seven overs. But the match flipped after the introduction of spin, with Maharaj conjuring rampant turn, and he picked up four wickets in his first 15 balls. He finished with career-best figures of 5-33 from 10 overs as Australia were dismissed for 198 in the 41st over. It was a strong bounce back from South Africa after their 2-1 defeat in the Twenty20 series between the teams. “I just tried to utilise the condit... -
Dawn - 11:53 Aug 19, 2025
The interior ministry informed the Senate on Tuesday that of the 567 cases of sexual abuse registered in Islamabad between 2021 and June 2025, 200 of them involved children. The data reported by the interior ministry was presented in a written response to Senator Shahdhat Awan during a Senate session today. Of the 200 cases of child sexual abuse reported, 93 of the child victims were male and 108 were female. The ministry added that 222 accused parties were arrested, of which only 12 were convicted. 163 remain under trial, while 15 have been acquitted and 26 remain at large. Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said in the written statement that “as per reports obtained from all police stations of Islamabad through (the) Zonal Superintendent of Police, during the period from January 1 2021 to 20 June 2025, (a) total 567 cases of rape were registered and 625 accused were arrested”. “Out of 567 cases, 485 cases were challaned, 80 accused were convicted, 23 accused were acquitted and accused in 406 cases are still fac... -
Dawn - 10:41 Aug 19, 2025
At least 358 people died as a result of heavy flooding and downpour in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa over the last three days, while rehabilitation efforts are still underway as the province recovers from the record deluge, the Provincial Disaster Management Authority said on Tuesday. Record rains in KP, which started on August 15, have wreaked havoc across the province. Last week, the provincial government declared an emergency as torrential rains ravaged homes, displaced families, and left a trail of destruction across Buner, Swat, Shangla, Mansehra, and beyond. According to the latest data from the KP PDMA, 358 people have died in rain-related incidents since August 15, with Buner reporting the highest toll at 225. Another 181 people were injured, while the dead included 287 men, 41 women and 30 children. Buner was the worst-hit district in the province, where flash flooding and building collapses left 225 people dead, including 193 men, 23 women and nine children, according to the report. Another 120 people sustaine... -
Dawn - 10:39 Aug 19, 2025
India’s National Sports Governance Bill has become an Act after President Droupadi Murmu gave her assent to the legislation, which promises to overhaul India’s sports administration, the Press Trust of India (PTI) reported on Tuesday. The development comes days after India said it will bid for the 2030 Commonwealth Games, seen as part of a wider push by the cricket-mad nation to host the 2036 Olympics. The presidential assent came on Monday, stated a gazette notification by the central government. The legislation has been described as a path-breaking reform by Sports Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, PTI reports. “The following Act of Parliament received the assent of the President on the 18th August, 2025 and is hereby published for general information — The National Sports Governance Act, 2025,” the legislation stated. The bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha (Lower House of Parliament) on July 23 and passed on August 11. A day later, it was passed by the Rajya Sabha (Upper House of Parliament). The bill provides... -
Dawn - 10:00 Aug 19, 2025
We’ve seen these headlines before. Heard anchors screech body counts as if they’re in a competition for the highest number. Hundreds of lives lost, thousands displaced, homes swept away and losses that won’t ever be compensated. Pakistan is once again in the midst of a ruthless monsoon season, which began in late June, and on the radar is the country’s mountainous north — Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit Baltistan, and Azad Jammu and Kashmir. Last week, unprecedented flash floods left behind a trail of wreckage in Buner, Swat, Shangla, Mansehra, and beyond. A week before that, Muzaffarabad bore the brunt of monsoon rains. Almost a month back, 37 villages across GB were declared calamity-hit. Visuals coming out of the region are terrifying; monstrous rivers unleashing their wrath and sweeping along anything in their way, from main city bazaars to entire villages. According to a report by the National Disaster Management Authority, at least 392 people have died in KP from June 26 to August 18. The number of fatalitie... -
Dawn - 08:51 Aug 19, 2025
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is set to visit the country this week for the sixth Pakistan-China Strategic Dialogue, the Foreign Office (FO) said on Tuesday. Pakistan and China share a longstanding strategic partnership with ties ranging across different sectors — including trade, energy, defence and infrastructure. The fifth round of Strategic Dialogue in May 2024 was co-chaired by Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar and his Chinese counterpart Wang in Beijing. According to the FO’s statement today, “On the invitation of Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar … Mr Wang Yi is visiting Islamabad for co-chairing the sixth Pakistan-China Foreign Ministers’ Strategic Dialogue on August 21, 2025.” “The visit is part of the regular high-level exchanges between Pakistan and China to further deepen their ‘All-Weather Strategic Cooperative Partnership’, reaffirm support on the issues of respective core interests, enhance economic and trade cooperation, and reaffirm their joint commitment to re... -
Dawn - 08:12 Aug 19, 2025
Indian police have exhumed human remains in a temple town in Karnataka, officials said, as part of an investigation into allegations that hundreds of murder and rape victims were secretly buried there from around the mid-1990s. The probe centres on Dharmasthala, home to an 800-year-old temple dedicated to the Hindu god Shiva in the state of Karnataka and is drawing headlines in media nationwide. A former cleaner at the temple told police last month that he had been forced by superiors to dispose of hundreds of bodies over two decades, many of them women and girls showing signs of sexual assault. His allegations were made in a police complaint dated July 4 and seen by Reuters. The man, whose identity authorities have withheld for safety reasons, fled Dharmasthala in 2014 but said he was compelled to speak out now because of lingering guilt. “If the skeletons now exhumed receive respectful funeral rites, those tormented souls will find peace and my sense of guilt could also decrease,” he wrote in the complaint.... -
Dawn - 08:07 Aug 19, 2025
A 5.2-magnitude earthquake on Tuesday jolted Islamabad, Rawalpindi, and several parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the Seismic Network of the Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) said in a statement. According to the statement, the quake was felt in Islamabad, Rawalpindi, KP’s Peshawar, Swat, Chitral, and Abbottabad. The PMD’s press release said that the earthquake originated at 10:20am PKT. Its epicentre was the Hindu Kush region in Afghanistan, at a depth of 190 kilometres. Punjab’s Provincial Disaster Management Authority reported that the earthquake was also felt in the province’s divisions of Bahawalpur, Dera Ghazi Khan, Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Gujrat, Lahore, Multan, Sahiwal and Sargodha. No casualties have been reported so far, and according to KP’s Rescue 1122 spokesperson Bilal Faizi, an emergency has not yet been declared. Pakistan falls on three major tectonic plates — the Arabian, Euro-Asian and Indian — which create five seismic zones under the country. The intersection of multiple fault lines mean... -
Dawn - 07:24 Aug 19, 2025
The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on Tuesday announced central contracts for 30 male cricketers for the upcoming 2025–26 international season, with no players placed in the top-tier Category A. Last month, the number of male and female players in the central contract lists rose, according to PCB’s 2025-26 budget documents. According to a press release by PCB today, the contracts, effective from July 1, 2025, through June 30, 2026, “reflect the board’s continued commitment to recognising and supporting national talent.” This year’s roster sees ten players each placed in Categories B, C, and D, with the PCB acknowledging that “no player has been selected for Category A in this cycle.” Pertinent to mention is that Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan were the only two players in Category A for the 2024-25 season. The duo have seen their stock fall over the past year; the former batting mainstays having been sidelined from the T20 squad. “Compared to last year’s list of 27 contracted players, the PCB has expanded the po... -
Dawn - 06:56 Aug 19, 2025
KOHAT: Counter Terrorism Department and a federal intelligence agency busted a terrorist network, which was actively planning to carry out a series of high profile major terrorist activities in the district including the bombing of a mosque inside police lines and a Muharram procession, Regional Police Officer Abbas Majeed Marwat told a news conference here. “They were planning to carry out major terrorist attacks,” said Mr Marwat, flanked by senior CTD and police officers. He said that the arrest of Siraj and Faridoon, both brothers, serving as constables in CTD and police, had facilitated the network of a terrorist organisation and their handlers operating from Afghanistan. A senior CTD official told Dawn on background basis that initial investigation and interrogation of the accused had led them to unravel a plot to bomb the mosque inside the district police lines that would have caused massive casualties, a re-enactment of a similar bombing in Peshawar which had led to the death of more than a hundred pol... -
Dawn - 05:57 Aug 19, 2025
Relations between China and India are on a “positive trend” towards cooperation, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Indian counterpart in New Delhi, according to a readout of the meeting published on Tuesday. The world’s two most populous nations are intense rivals competing for influence across South Asia, and fought a deadly border clash in 2020. India is also part of the Quad security alliance with the United States, Australia and Japan, which is seen as a counter to China. But caught in global trade and geopolitical turbulence triggered by US President Donald Trump’s tariff war, the countries have moved to mend ties. During talks on Monday with Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, India’s foreign minister, Wang said the two countries should “view each other as partners and opportunities, rather than adversaries or threats”. He pointed to the resumption of “dialogue at all levels” and “maintenance of peace and tranquillity in border areas” as evidence that bilateral ties were on a “positive trend of returning t... -
Dawn - 05:29 Aug 19, 2025
ISLAMABAD: Fitch Ratings on Monday projected improved prospects for Pakistan’s banking sector, citing stabilising macroeconomic indicators, falling inflation, and a return to economic growth. The global credit agency expects Pakistan’s GDP to grow by 3.5pc in FY27, with inflation averaging 5pc — a significant shift from the turmoil and high inflation of recent years. In a brief commentary, Fitch said banks are well-positioned to capitalise on improving operating conditions as macroeconomic headwinds ease. It noted that stronger business volumes, driven by economic recovery and better credit demand, would support banking performance in the near term. The outlook follows Pakistan’s upgraded sovereign credit profile, with Fitch raising its Long-Term Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to ‘B-’/Stable from ‘CCC+’ in April 2025. The upgrade reflects ongoing reforms, fiscal improvement, and greater economic resilience. The agency pointed out that consumer price inflation, which had peaked at 38pc in May 2023, eased to 4.1pc... -
Dawn - 05:10 Aug 19, 2025
QUETTA: The Government of Balochistan on Monday dispatched a sizable consignment of relief goods to assist families affected by flooding in Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP). The shipment, which includes essential items and non-food supplies, is designated for 1,500 families in GB and 1,000 families in KP. Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti issued special directives to send the relief to address the urgent needs of those impacted by the disasters, according to Government spokesperson Shahid Rind. “Balochistan stands with the people of the flood-hit provinces in this difficult time,” Mr Rind said. Published in Dawn, August 19th, 2025 -
Dawn - 04:53 Aug 19, 2025
• Over 20 rescued; local govt shuts down schools in light of extreme weather • Flooding continues to afflict GB areas; govt says 39 people killed, 1,000 homes damaged since July People, including foreign tourists, make a hazardous crossing after a flood swept away the bridge in Ghanche.—Dawn MUZAFFARABAD/GILGIT: At least five people were killed in Azad Jammu and Kashmir on Monday in different rain-related incidents as monsoon-induced floods ravaged multiple areas in the Ghizer district of Gilgit-Baltistan, blocking roads and destroying infrastructure. In Neelum Valley, a vehicle with tourists on board skidded off the “slippery road” and plummeted almost 250 feet down the ravine. Three people were killed on the spot, while the fourth succumbed to his injuries on the way to the hospital. Neelum Deputy Commissioner Nadeem Ahmed Janjua said a Karachi-based couple along with their two-year-old daughter — who survived the accident — and a helper were coming back from Taobutt when they met the accident near Shu... -
Dawn - 04:26 Aug 19, 2025
Carlos Alcaraz won the Cincinnati Open after top seed Jannik Sinner retired as he was feeling unwell on Monday, raising concerns about the Italian’s fitness just days before he is due to begin the defence of his US Open title. The Spanish second seed snapped the world number one’s 26-match winning streak on hardcourts when his ailing rival signalled he could no longer continue while trailing 5-0 in the first set of the final. “This is not the way that I want to win trophies, I just have to say sorry, I can understand how you must feel now,” Alcaraz told Sinner during the presentation ceremony after capturing his third Masters 1000 crown of the season following his success in Monte Carlo and Rome. “As I said many times, you are a true champion and I am sure from these situations, you are going to come back even stronger, as you always do. That’s what true champions do.” View this post on Instagram Sinner had been bidding to become the first man since Roger Federer in 2015 to win back-to-back Cincinnati titles ... -
Dawn - 03:11 Aug 19, 2025
BERLIN: German foreign ministry spokesman Josef Hinterseher has said more than 200 Afghans waiting to be offered sanctuary in Germany had been deported by Pakistan to their Taliban-run home country in recent days and the German government was urging Islamabad to allow them back. The deportees are part of a group previously offered refuge in Germany but now caught between Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s tougher immigration policy and a wave of expulsions from Pakistan. Hinterseher told reporters that Pakistani police recently arrested “around 450” Afghans who were previously accepted under the German scheme for people at risk from the Taliban. Of those, “211 people, according to our current information, have been deported to Afghanistan,” he added. Another “245 people were allowed to leave camps” in Pakistan where they had been gathered prior to their scheduled deportation, he said. “We are continuing to talk to Pakistan to facilitate the return of those who have already been deported.” Last week, tw... -
Dawn - 02:33 Aug 19, 2025
• Awan refers to SC ruling on no-trust motion against Imran Khan as ‘complex matter’ requiring adjudication • PTI’s counsel rejects AGP’s view, says parliament is sovereign and not subordinate to courts • Senators alarmed by rising cases of gender-based violence in 2024; conviction rates below 1pc ISLAMABAD: Attorney General for Pakistan (AGP) Mansoor Usman Awan on Monday called for keeping the doors open for judicial intervention in parliamentary proceedings. Making a rare appearance before the Senate, some three weeks after being summoned for an explanation on the alleged interference of the judiciary in internal parliamentary processes, the AGP referred to Article 69 of the Constitution, under which the validity of any proceedings in parliament cannot be called in question on the ground of any irregularity of procedure. However, he insisted that the bar was not absolute. “There is a lot of sanctity attached to it, but it is not absolute,” he remarked. He also referred to April 4, 2022, judgement of the Sup... -
Dawn - 00:14 Aug 19, 2025
ISLAMABAD: Amid strong opposition from Balochistan senators, the Senate Standing Committee on Petroleum on Monday reluctantly cleared with narrow majority vote a government bill — The Petroleum (Amendment) Act, 2025 — already passed by the National Assembly last week to digitalise petroleum products at every stage. Senators Maulana Abdul Wasay of JUI-F and Manzoor Kakar of BAP from Balochistan alleged the bill would deprive citizens of a livelihood as authorities plan crackdown on small petroleum related businesses with closures and heavy fines, open floodgates of corruption, thus further alienating the people of Balochistan while large tankers would keep flowing smuggled products across mainland. PML-N Senator Sadia Abbasi also initially appeared unimpressed by the proposed bill and suggested a meeting with FBR and Customs authorities for the senators from Balochistan. She said there was no point in passing the bill while senators from Balochistan opposed it and recalled that a bill about federally admini... -
Dawn - 19:24 Aug 18, 2025
The provincial government on Monday released Rs800 million in relief funds for all affected districts, with an additional Rs 500m specifically for worst-hit Buner, as flash floods continue to ravage Khyber Pakhtunkhwa with the death toll at 341. The recent catastrophic floods in KP have claimed at least 341 lives as of data from the Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) Monday at 7pm and injured 178 people. Meanwhile, data from the National Disaster Management Authority showed the nationwide toll from rain-related incidents since late-June rose to 660 deaths and 935 injured. The KP Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) on Monday announced Rs800m in relief funds to the administrations of affected districts on the instructions of the provincial government. A separate relief fund of Rs500m has been earmarked for Buner district, which accounts for the majority of casualties with 222 deaths and 120 injuries, according to a PDMA report released today. Buner was followed by Shangla, with 36 death...
10783 items