Senior analyst and journalist Suhail Warraich recently revealed on Geo’s Report Card that ex-Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Asif Saeed Khosa, “created a false case against Nawaz Sharif.”
Warraich stated, “Marriyum Aurangzeb was one hundred percent correct about Justice Khosa that he made a frivolous case which was already dismissed by the previous CJP, gave the case legal cover and then guided Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) on how to proceed with the case.”
He stated that a “PTI member himself told me this at that time that they [PTI] didn’t know how to deal with the case and it was Justice Khosa that told them how to deal with it.”
“Maybe Justice Khosa had some personal problem with them [Nawaz Sharif] and Justice Azmat Saeed was also involved. These two were the main characters and another current serving Supreme Court judge was also involved in this,” said Warraich.
Over 350 Pakistani students have landed in Lahore and Islamabad from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.
Two of the three special flights landed at the Islamabad and Lahore airports on Sunday night, with 180 students on board each plane. The third plane was also expected to land later in the night.
At the Islamabad airport, the students who arrived were welcomed by federal minister Musadik Malik while in Lahore, the students were greeted by Information Minister Attaullah Tarar.
The Civil Aviation Authority had set up an immigration desk and provided transport to the students on arrival.
As per the instructions of the PM, the federal government will bear the expenses for these special flights.
Ishaq Dar downplayed mob violence
Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar — who put off his trip to Kyrgyzstan — downplayed the mob violence saying the situation in Bishkek was normal and there was no need to panic.
According to Ishaq Dar, 16 foreign students, including “four or five” Pakistanis, were injured in the violence.
FM Dar said that the government would cover the expenses of Pakistani students wishing to return home as 540 students would take three flights to return on Sunday. He said as many as 11,000 Pakistani students were studying in Bishkek, and those returning would be fully facilitated.
He quoted the Kyrgyz foreign minister as saying that the incident in Bishkek was due to a “misunderstanding”.
Students say all is not well
Many students on social media said that the embassy was not providing any help and that the situation in Bishkek was still bad. They said that the foreign students were attacked by Kyrgyz students and locals, adding that they were not even safe on the roads.
Balochistan students ‘ignored’
In Balochistan, Sajid Hussain, an educationist, claimed that the government had taken no steps to bring back at least 300 students from Balochistan stranded in Bishkek.
“Over 300 students from Balochistan are also studying in Kyrgyzstan but they have not been brought back,” Mr Hussain said.
His son and daughter are studying at the Asian International University in Kyrgyzstan along with five other students enrolled there.“I am in contact with my children,” he said, adding that no steps had been taken for the return of Baloch students.
He claimed that the federal government was repatriating students from other provinces and that parents of students from Balochistan were being asked to pay Rs100,000 for each student.
He appealed to Balochistan’s government officials to take notice of the situation and make special arrangements for the province’s students. CM Bugti has reportedly established a special desk in this regard, reported Dawn.
“To reach the students, the foreign ministry is in contact with the embassy of Kyrgyzstan,” the CM said, assuring “every possible assistance” for the students.
Pakistani PUBG mobile teams AsAgonxi8, 52 eSports, Team R3CIDIGE eSports and Team Guts and Glory which is currently playing under Mongolian eSports Organization WAWO eSports, reached Nepal to play in the Pubg Mobile Super League (PSML) 2024.
PMSL is a LAN (Local Area Network) event which is scheduled in Kathmandu, Nepal.
PMSL is a two phase event including league stage and final stage. The league stage is a three weeks battle with total 30 matches, staring from May 22. Each week will consists of five match-days with six matches per day.
Here is the list of teams participating in the event:
ASagi8 Esports WAOW Esports 52 Esports R3GICIDE DRS Gaming Horaa Esports KS AXE A1 TMT Esports IHC Esports Stalwart Esports 4Merical Vibes MadBulls Everest Gaming Stronger Esports Falcons Force Major Pride Team Lakers RUKH eSports HardBass Team De Muerte
A total of 20 team from Pakistan, South Asia and Central Asia will compete in this event. Top 16 teams from league stage will advance to three days final stage starting from June 13 to June 15.
The total prize pool of the event is $200,000. The matches will be live streamed on official YouTube channel of PUBG MOBILE eSports South Asia.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif declared a day of mourning after Iranian media reported that president Ebrahim Raisi had died in a helicopter crash.
“Pakistan will observe a day of mourning and the flag will fly at half mast as a mark of respect for President Raisi and his companions and in solidarity with Brotherly Iran,” Shehbaz posted on X, formerly Twitter.
“I along with the government and people of Pakistan extend our deepest condolences and sympathies to the Iranian nation on this terrible loss,” he added.
“The great Iranian nation will overcome this tragedy with customary courage.”
The Pakistani leader hosted Raisi in Islamabad for a three-day visit in April in a bid to mend ties between the neighbours after they traded deadly strikes earlier this year.
Information Minister Attaullah Tarar on May 19 condemned a political party, a thinly veiled reference to PTI, for spreading disinformation and negative propaganda online regarding the Kyrgyzstan incident in which mobs attacked Pakistani students.
The minister exclaimed that “wrong news” was being spread on social media by a single political party to “humiliate the government” and it is utterly condemnable.
It should be noted that social media was flooded with news of deaths and rapes of Pakistani students which has turned out to be not true.
“I believe that such shameful act should not be done in politics,” he stressed.
Tarar said there was a clash between local students and Arab students, after which this incident took place. He added that the government is helping the students who want to come back.
“Kyrgyz foreign minister has said that no deaths have occurred in the incident and that the situation is peaceful,” said Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar during a press conference.
Pakistan men’s team, including captain Babar Azam, Senior Manager Wahab Riaz, Shaheen Afridi and others met the Pakistan women’s team to offer them encouragement in England tour.
Pakistan’s men’s team is also in Leeds to play a four-match T20 series against England. The first T20 match of the series will be played at Headingley, Leeds on May 22.
England women’s cricket team defeated Pakistan by 34 runs and won the 3-match series by 3-0.
Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi, and his foreign minister Hossein Amr-Abdollahian, have been killed in a helicopter crash on Sunday night in the north of the country near the border with Azerbaijan, State Television has confirmed.
Rescue teams finally reached the site of the helicopter crash where dense fog and adverse weather conditions impeded rescue and recovery efforts.
“Upon finding the helicopter, there was no sign of the helicopter passengers being alive as of yet,” state TV reported. The helicopter carrying the head of the state crashed during President Raisi’s return flight to Tabriz after he and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev inaugurated the Qiz Qalasi Dam on the border.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged calm and assured his people that there would be no disruption in the country’s governance.
Vice President Mohammad Mokhbar is expected to become the new President now, Al Jazeera has reported.
The federal government has announced plans to revise Pakistan’s solar net metering policy, aiming to reduce losses within the power sector. This announcement was made by Federal Minister for Energy, Sardar Awais Ahmad Leghari, during a press conference where he highlighted current issues surrounding solar net metering.
Minister Leghari noted that citizens installing solar systems initially expected to recover their investments within three years. However, due to recent advancements, this period has been significantly reduced to just one to one and a half years. This rapid return on investment underscores the growing efficiency and popularity of solar energy solutions.
The PML-N-led government had initially promoted solarisation in 2017, resulting in 113,000 connections currently operating under the net metering scheme. Leghari reassured that while the government is open to revising the solar net metering policy if necessary, it remains committed to sustaining the programme.
“We will take effective measures to eliminate power theft and thereby reduce the financial burden on the national exchequer,” he stated, emphasising the government’s dual focus on promoting clean energy and maintaining economic stability.
The government is also assessing the impacts of the increasing trend towards rooftop-generated electricity. Minister Leghari explained that this assessment would help determine the rate of return on investments in solar equipment and understand the broader implications of this shift.
He highlighted the need to analyse whether the growing reliance on solar panels is leading to inflated electricity prices for local households. “We will be involved in analysing and balancing the solar net metering,” Leghari added, indicating a comprehensive approach to ensuring the policy benefits all stakeholders.
Net metering, a billing mechanism that credits solar energy system owners for the electricity they add to the grid, remains a pivotal aspect of the government’s strategy to encourage renewable energy adoption. This revision aims to optimise its benefits and address emerging challenges within the power sector.
The ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) in India is now heading towards its end where the win of Royal Challenger Bangalore (RCB) on Saturday left Virat Kohli and Anushka Sharma emotional.
In the match played on Saturday was Royal Challengers Bangalore’s last chance to go to the play-off stage. Royal Challengers Bangalore defeated the defending champions Chennai Super Kings (CSK) by 27 runs to secure the last position in the play-off stage.
Virat Kohli and his wife Anushka Sharma couldn’t contain their emotions as the result of the match came and both were seen emotional in various videos.
Fans of Virat Kohli’s team Royal Challengers Bangalore were also very happy on this occasion.
LGBTQ groups protested Friday outside Peru’s health ministry after the government issued a decree listing transsexualism as a mental disorder.
“It is a decree that takes us back three decades,” said Jorge Apolaya, spokesman of the Collective Pride March, a Lima-based rights group.
“We cannot live in a country where we are considered sick,” he said.
Transgender people are those who reject the sex they were assigned at birth. Some opt for surgical or medical intervention.
The government on May 10 updated its list of insurable health conditions — which since 2021 has offered benefits for mental health treatment — to include services for transgender people.
In the decree, the health ministry describes the condition as a “mental disorder” — an obsolete term long officially abandoned by the World Health Organization.
More than 200 activists gathered outside the health ministry to demand the revocation of the decree on Friday — the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia.
Police guard the entrance of Peru’s Ministry of Health during a protest staged by LGBTQ groups against a new government decree listing transsexualism as a “mental disorder” (Cris BOURONCLE)
“It is a regulation that violates us … they are positioning us as sick people, as if we have a problem,” said 25-year-old Afrika Nakamura.
With slogans like “It’s not a disease, it’s diversity!” and “We are trans and we are not sick,” the protesters blocked the busy avenue in front of the ministry for a few hours.
No clashes with police were reported.
“We demand the repeal of this transphobic and violent decree, which goes against our trans identities in Peru,” activist Gianna Camacho of the Coordinacion Nacional LGTBIQ+ told AFP.
“We are not mentally ill and we do not suffer from any mental disorder,” she added.
The government said it would not scrap the decree.
Health ministry official Carlos Alvadrado told AFP that doing so would “remove the right to care.”
The ministry has previously insisted it does not consider gender diversity as an illness, and in a statement expressed “our respect for gender identities and our rejection of the stigmatization of sexual diversity.”
It said the decree was meant merely to extend mental health coverage “for the full exercise of the right to health and well-being” of those who want or need it.
An article on the website of Human Rights Watch describes the decree as “profoundly regressive” in a country that does not allow same-sex marriage nor for transgender people to change their identity documents.
For Percy Mayta, a medical doctor and activist, “pathologizing” transgender people “opens the door to… conversion therapy” — which UN bodies have equated to torture and is not illegal in Peru.
In its press statement, Peru’s health ministry underlined that “the sexual orientation and gender identity of a person does not in itself constitute a physical or mental health disorder and therefore should not be subjected to medical treatment or care or so-called reconversion therapies.”
