Pakistan

In Nowruz message, says war began after the enemy lost hope of sparking an uprising inside Iran

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif held separate telephone conversations on Friday with Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, focusing on Eid greetings and regional peace.

Masked settler attacks, arson, beatings and theft have become near-daily in the West Bank

Hard-right UK lawmaker Nigel Farage, currently leading opinion polls, said he will ban mass Muslim prayer at historic British sites if he becomes prime minister. The anti-immigrant firebrand called an open Iftar in London’s Trafalgar Square earlier this week an “attempt to overtake, intimidate and dominate our way of life”. Monday’s open Iftar has been the subject of political debate in recent days, with Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer criticising a Conservative MP for opposing the event. “We have to stop this kind of mass demonstration, provocative demonstration, in historic British sites, because that’s what it is,” Farage said on Thursday. Asked during a visit to Scotland whether he favoured banning all mass religious observances, Farage, leader of Reform UK, replied “yes”. Pressed on whether that included Jewish or Catholic observances, he added: “I’ve never seen Jewish services taking place in places of historic Christian worship, or anywhere else. “We have to get this right. We can’t stop individuals...

KARACHI: The Sindh Counter-terrorism Department (CTD) on Friday arrested five members of the proscribed Baloch Republican Guard (BRG), who were allegedly planning to carry out an attack on railway tracks in Karachi. In a press release, the department said that it conducted a joint intelligence-based operation (IBO) with rangers and the federal intelligence agency, “arresting five members of the BRG, and foiling a terrorist plan on railway tracks in Karachi”. The CTD said, in its statement, that the group has carried out “six low-intensity explosions in Jacobabad, Shikarpur districts of Sindh, resulting in partial damage to the railway track and train carriage”. It said that the group had claimed responsibility for the attacks on its social media accounts. It added that the CTD, working in collaboration with the “civilian federal intelligence agency [..] identified the network and monitored them day and night”. The CTD recovered explosives, improvised explosive devices (IEDs), weapons, and ammunition from the ...

KARACHI: The Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) on Friday forecast rain in Karachi and other parts of Sindh for tomorrow, when the country will celebrate the first day of Eidul Fitr. In its daily weather forecast, the weather body said a westerly wave was “continuously affecting” most parts of the country. It said “rain/thunderstorm with strong winds” was likely in Karachi Division and various other Sindh districts tomorrow. The same was forecast for Larkana, Qambar-Shahdadkot, Shikarpur, Jacobabad, Sukkur, Jamshoro, Hyderabad, Thatta, Sujawal, Badin, Matiari, Umerkot, Mirpurkhas, Naushahro Feroze, Shaheed Benazirabad and Dadu districts. However, in a three-day weather outlook for Karachi, the PMD said the weather in the city tomorrow was expected to be “mostly cloudy with chances of isolated thunderstorm/rain at outskirts”. Daytime temperatures will range between 29 and 31 degrees Celsius, while night temperatures could drop to as low as 17-19°C. Humidity levels in the morning were expected to remain b...

Hundreds of Muslim worshippers held Eidul Fitr prayers at the gates of Jerusalem’s Old City on Friday, with Israel closing access to the Al-Aqsa mosque and other holy sites over its war on Iran. “Today, Al-Aqsa has been taken from us. It’s a sad and painful Ramazan,” Wajdi Mohammed Shweiki, a silver-haired Palestinian man in his 60s, told AFP. “It’s a catastrophic situation for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for Palestinians in general and for all Muslims across the globe.” Since Israel and the United States started the war on Iran on February 28, Israeli authorities have closed access to Jerusalem’s world-renowned holy sites over security concerns — Al-Aqsa Mosque for Muslims, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre for Christians and the Western Wall for Jews. As Iranian missile barrages head towards Israel, the authorities have banned gatherings of more than 50 people nationwide to limit potential casualties. In a sign of the risks, police said this week that shrapnel fragments had fallen on the Old City. Research...

No decision yet to send troops into Iran, but capacity will be built for future regional ops

Forced by yet another Israeli bombardment on Lebanon to flee his home for the second time in just two years, and mourning lost relatives and friends, Hassan Kiki said he feels much older than 16. “War has aged us… We have lived through what no one else has,” the tall teen from south Lebanon told AFP in Beirut. “I miss my school, my friends… I lost two cousins and two friends in a massacre in Shehabiyeh,” he added, referring to a deadly Israeli strike in his town that killed at least seven people on March 11. Kiki is among more than a million people Lebanese authorities have registered as displaced since the country was drawn into the Middle East war on March 2. On that day, Hezbollah launched rockets towards Israel to avenge the assassination of Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Israel, which never stopped bombing Lebanon despite a 2024 truce that sought to end the last fighting with Hezbollah, responded with widespread strikes, ground operations along the border, and an evacuation warning for swa...

The Islamabad Traffic Police (ITP) is set to introduce a new uniform featuring a revised black and grey colour scheme, following similar changes implemented in Punjab.

Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif on Friday held a telephone conversation with President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and exchanged greetings on the auspicious occasion of Eid-ul-Fitr.

Energy expert Vaqar Zakaria believes solar power makes “excellent economic sense” — and he lives by it. For over five years, his rooftop panels have slashed his bills, sometimes to zero, even allowing him to sell surplus electricity back through net metering. Last month, he took it further. After buying two electric vehicles, he has almost “declared independence” from the national grid. With more panels and doubled batteries, even his cars run on sunshine. “I am moving away from their fuel, and I don’t need their power,” said the CEO of Hagler Bailly, Pakistan, an Islamabad-based environmental consultancy firm, over the phone from Islamabad. “I call it the hand of God driving my car,” Zakaria said. He is already seeing economic gains from his investment. “The electricity I generate, including battery costs, comes to about Rs12 ($0.043) per unit, while it can be sold to the Islamabad Electric Supply Company at around Rs26 ($0.092) per unit.” However, he adds that he does not currently claim this benefit, as it...

Punjab has taken a major step toward strengthening technical education by approving the creation of its first-ever Skill City aimed at preparing young people for modern job markets.

'Without the USA, NATO is a paper tiger!' Trump lashes out

Extends Eid greetings to people

Norris starred in more than two dozen films portraying silent loners, soldiers, lawmen, veterans, All-American heroes

Govt says no new licences issued for war materiel exports to US since Feb 28 strikes on Iran

'Our missile industry deserves a perfect score,' says Iran's Revolutionary Guards spokesman Ali Mohammad Naini

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has decided to strictly enforce its austerity policy by introducing significant reductions in petrol allowances for government officials.

A federal arts panel comprised of members appointed by Donald Trump on Thursday unanimously approved a commemorative gold coin featuring his image, part of a series of coins the US Mint is planning to produce to celebrate America’s 250th birthday this year. The 24-carat gold coin is the latest effort by Trump and his allies to put the president’s name on buildings, government programmes and US currency since his second White House term began in January 2025. During a presentation by a US Mint official to the Commission of Fine Arts, discussion turned to what diameter the 24-carat coin should be, up to three inches (7.6cm). Chamberlain Harris, a White House aide whom Trump appointed to the commission this year, said the biggest possible coin would be Trump’s preference. “The larger the better,” she said, shortly before the coin was approved by the entire panel. People view the portrait of US President Donald Trump, taken by official White House photographer Daniel Torok which is the basis of a proposed US Mint...