Pakistan

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In a bid to enhance public access to digital identity services, the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) organized a special awareness campaign at Centaurus Mall, Islamabad, highlighting the features and benefits of its Pak ID Mobile App.

Israel said on Sunday it would halt military operations for 10 hours a day in parts of Gaza and allow new aid corridors as Jordan and the United Arab Emirates airdropped aid to the enclave, where images of starving Palestinians have alarmed the world. Israel has been facing growing international criticism over the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, with Amnesty International already declaring its actions in Gaza as a “genocide”, which Tel Aviv rejects. Indirect ceasefire talks in Doha between Israel and Hamas have broken off with no deal in sight. Israel imposed a total blockade on Gaza on March 2 after ceasefire talks broke down. In late May, it began allowing a small trickle of aid to resume, amid warnings of a wave of starvation. Military activity will stop from 10am to 8pm (12pm to 10pm PKT) until further notice in Al-Mawasi, a designated humanitarian area along the coast, in central Deir al-Balah and in Gaza City, to the north. The military said designated secure routes for convoys delivering food and medicine...

Ukrainian drones targeted St Petersburg on Sunday, Russian authorities said, forcing the airport to close for five hours as Russian President Vladimir Putin marked the country’s Navy Day in the city, despite the earlier cancellation of its naval parade due to security concerns. St Petersburg usually holds a large-scale, televised navy parade on Navy Day, which features a flotilla of warships and military vessels sailing down the Neva River and is attended by Putin. Last year, Russia suspected a Ukrainian plan to attack the city’s parade, according to state television. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed on Sunday that this year’s parade had been cancelled for security reasons, following first reports of its cancellation in early July. Putin arrived at the city’s historic naval headquarters on Sunday by a patrol speed boat, from where he followed drills involving more than 150 vessels and 15,000 military personnel in the Pacific and Arctic Oceans and Baltic and Caspian Seas. “Today we are marking this ho...

Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz Sharif has said Suthra Punjab Programme is progressing successfully and complaints related to sanitation in certain districts will be resolved promptly.

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar on Sunday announced that Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates have agreed on multiple visa waivers for diplomatic and official Pakistani passports, and vice versa. Pakistan and the UAE share close diplomatic, economic, and cultural ties. The UAE is one of Pakistan’s largest trading partners in the Middle East and a major source of remittances, with a large Pakistani expatriate population living and working there. In a post on X, Dar announced the agreement with the UAE’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, hailing the decision between “our two brotherly countries”. “I have been informed by the UAE authorities that the visa waiver for diplomatic and official Pakistani passports entering the United Arab Emirates has been activated, effective July 25, 2025, at all UAE airports,” the foreign minister wrote. “We agreed [on] mutual visa waivers on diplomatic and official passports between our two brotherly countries an...

Pakistan women’s cricket captain Fatima Sana on Sunday said that her team will look to continue their winning momentum on the upcoming Ireland tour. On Wednesday, the Pakistan Cricket Board named the squads, with Fatima continuing to lead the team, as the national selection committee named a 15-member squad for the forthcoming T20 International series in Ireland. The three-match T20 series against Ireland will be played at the Clontarf Cricket Club in Dublin from August 6 to 10. In their last encounter in April, Pakistan women defeated Ireland by 38 runs in a low-scoring thriller to win the opening One-Day International (ODI) encounter of the ICC Women’s World Cup 2025 Qualifiers. Led by Fatima, Pakistan subsequently qualified for the World Cup after winning the tournament unbeaten, which was held in Lahore earlier this year Responding to a question by Dawn.com at the National Stadium in Karachi, Fatima said, “Despite the difference in conditions, batters are confident and since our Qualifiers went well, we a...

Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC) activists marked the 12th day of their sit-in in Islamabad on Sunday, demanding the release of their jailed leaders, as protesters alleged police were asking to see their Computerised National Identity Cards (CNICs). BYC, a Baloch advocacy group active since 2018, has been campaigning against enforced disappearances. Its chief Dr Mahrang Baloch and other activists were arrested on March 22 for allegedly attacking Quetta Civil Hospital and inciting violence, a day after police cracked down on their protest. Earlier this month, an anti-terrorism court remanded them into 15-day police custody. The Islamabad sit-in began on July 16, with BYC leaders and members demanding the release of its activists. Political leaders, journalists and activists have joined the sit-in over the past few days. Last week, the BYC continued the demonstration on the road leading to the National Press Club in Islamabad, as the route had been blocked by police with barbed wire, preventing activists from re...

The Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) said on Sunday it has formed an inquiry committee to probe “serious irregularities” during the Fisu World University Games 2025 in Germany, including the reported disappearance of two athletes. The Fisu World University Games is a tournament that brings together students from all over the world every two years to compete across 18 sports. This year, 8,500 students from across the world took part in the event, which was held from July 16 to July 27, according to its website. In a statement issued today, the PSB said Pakistani contingent’s participation in the tournament faced “significant administrative failures”, including a “lack of transparency in the selection of team officials, discipline issues, logistical mismanagement, and the alarming disappearance of two student-athletes”. One of the many “failures” was that “two student-athletes were reported missing or suspected of fleeing during the event”, the PSB said, citing the Higher Education Commission (HEC). The sports board...

Passengers on a US domestic flight were forced to evacuate onto a runway due to a brake fire just ahead of the plane taking off in Denver, the airline said. American Airlines Flight 3023 was departing for Miami on Saturday but “experienced a mechanical issue” while accelerating ahead of takeoff at Denver International Airport, the airline told AFP, adding all 173 passengers and six crew “deplaned safely”. One passenger sustained a minor injury and was taken to a hospital for evaluation, American Airlines said. View this post on Instagram Blown tires and the deceleration of the plane while braking resulted in an isolated brake fire, which was extinguished by city firefighters, according to the airline. Social media videos published by US media outlets showed passengers frantically evacuating an American Airlines plane via an emergency slide as smoke billowed from beneath the aircraft. A man held a child as they rushed down the slide, stumbling as he hit the ground. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) sai...

Interior Minister Syed Mohsin Raza Naqvi called on Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in Islamabad today.

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar has said Pakistan received “recent assurances” from Afghan authorities that the neighbouring country’s soil would not be used for terrorism — a key issue of contention between Islamabad and Kabul. Both countries have witnessed an improvement in bilateral relations after taking steps to improve ties, such as the revival of the Joint Coordination Committee (JCC) and upgrading diplomatic ranks. Dar visited Kabul earlier this month, where an agreement was signed for the Pakistan, Uzbek­istan and Afghanistan railway project to boost regional connectivity. According to a Foreign Office (FO) statement issued on Saturday, Dar engaged with the Pakistani-American community at the Pakistan Consulate in New York, where he “shared Pakistan’s expectation that Afghan soil would not be used for terrorism, noting recent assurances received from Afghan authorities in that regard”. The foreign minister also highlighted the “country’s outreach to Afghanistan with a view to enh...

Thailand and Cambodia have agreed to Malaysia acting as a mediator in their border conflict, the Malaysian foreign minister said on Sunday, as the combatants each said the other had launched further artillery attacks across contested areas. Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet and Thai Acting Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai are expected in Malaysia on Monday evening, Foreign Minister Mohamad Hasan told state news agency Bernama. “They have full confidence in Malaysia and asked me to be a mediator,” Mohamad said, adding he had talked with his Cambodian and Thai counterparts and they agreed no other country should be involved in the issue. The talks in Malaysia come after Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, chair of the regional Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) forum, had proposed a ceasefire on Friday and US President Donald Trump said on Saturday that the two leaders had agreed to work on a ceasefire. Four days after the worst fighting in more than a decade broke out between the Southeast Asian neig...

A suspected honour killing in Rawalpindi’s Pirwadhai area has taken a dramatic twist after the victim’s second husband surrendered to police late Saturday night, officials confirmed.

A tragic incident has deeply shaken the village of Pandu Nalai in Jhelum Valley, Azad Kashmir, where an 8-year-old girl was killed in a leopard attack on July 25, 2025.

Corps Commander Balochistan, Lieutenant General Rahat Naseem Ahmad Khan, conducted a special interactive session with university students from across Balochistan.

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar has appreciated and acknowledged the vital role and contribution of Pakistani diaspora in strengthening bilateral relations between Pakistan and the United States.

The death toll from floods in Gilgit-Baltistan stood at 10 as search and rescue operations continued across the region and stranded tourists were moved to safer locations, officials said on Sunday. The devastating impacts of climate change have become more visible in GB as unprecedented heat­­waves, erratic weat­her patterns and glacial melting have triggered cloudbursts and intense floods across the region. Floods swept across GB on Monday, causing landslides, leaving many stranded, and damaging more than 500 houses, roads and other infrastructure. In a statement today, GB government spokesperson Faizullah Faraq said flood-related incidents in the region have claimed 10 lives since Monday, when four were killed and 15 went missing in Babusar. The toll in Babusar has risen to seven, while two deaths were reported from Diamer’s Thore Valley and another from the Astore district, Faraq added. The body of an unidentified woman was recovered from the Indus River in Chilas’s Minar area. “The body could be that of o...

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Islamabad on Saturday confirmed three new polio cases in the country, taking the total number of cases detected this year to 17. Pakistan is one of the last two countries in the world, alongside Afghanistan, where polio remains endemic. Despite global efforts to eradicate the virus, challenges such as security issues, vaccine hesitancy, and misinformation have slowed progress. The latest cases include one each from the Lakki Marwat and North Waziristan districts in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and one from Sindh’s Umerkot district, a statement by the Pakistan Polio Eradication Programme (PPEP) said. A 15-month-old girl from Takhtikhel in Lakki Marwat, a six-month-old girl from North Waziristan’s Mir Ali tehsil and a five-year-old boy from Umerkot’s Chajro were the latest polio cases confirmed by the NIH’s Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication. With these new detections, the total number of polio cases in Pakistan in 2025 has risen to 17 — including 10 from KP, f...

Nine passengers died and 30 others were injured after the bus they were travelling on fell into a ditch near Balkassar Interchange in Punjab’s Chakwal district on Sunday morning. According to a spokesperson of Chakwal Rescue 1122, the bus was heading to Lahore from Islamabad when one of its tyres burst near the Balkassar Interchange on the Islamabad-Lahore Motorway (M2). The driver lost control of the bus, causing the vehicle to fall into a ditch and overturn. “Nine people died in the accident and 30 were injured,” Dr Saeed Akhter, chief executive officer of the Chakwal District Health Authority (DHA), said in a statement. It added that Chakwal Deputy Commissioner Sarah Hayat and Assistant Commissioner Zeeshan Sharif also visited the injured at the District Healthquarters (DHQ) Hospital. DC Hayat, who was briefed on the accident’s details, directed that all possible medical facilities be provided to the wounded. Eight passengers died on the spot, while one succumbed to her injuries at the hospital, according ...