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  • Major win for Shehzad Roy as court bans corporal punishment for kids

    Major win for Shehzad Roy as court bans corporal punishment for kids

    The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday suspended Section 89 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and banned the practice of corporal (physical) punishment by parents, guardians and teachers on children.

    The decision was announced after singer-activist Shehzad Roy filed a petition in court to ban the use of violence to discipline children. A division bench of the IHC presided by Chief Justice Athar Minallah, suspended the PPC section until further notice.

    Section 89 of the Pakistan Penal Code 1860 (No XLV) allows parents, teachers and other guardians to use moderate and reasonable corporal punishment as a means to correct the behaviour of children below 12 years of age.

    In his petition, Roy claimed that Section 89 is contradictory to the Constitution as it violates basic human rights and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

    “Punishing children is being considered as essential for improving learning. News of torture and punishment of children have been reported every day in the media” read the petition.

    Justice Minallah, during the hearing, remarked that the country’s parliament had adopted a bill barring corporal punishment for children in 2013. The bill was not passed into law due to a technicality.

    Roy’s lawyer maintained that his client wanted the High Court to prevent violence against children until relevant legislation is passed.

    “Corporal punishment affects a child’s mental and physical health,” he asserted.

    After hearing the arguments, Justice Minallah directed the interior ministry to take immediate steps to protect the rights of children and asked for a reply from the federal government on the matter by March 5.

    Roy took to Twitter to express his gratitude over the IHC decision.

    Earlier, while speaking to the media outside the Islamabad High Court, Roy had said, “When a child is born, parents hit him, when he goes to school, teachers hit him, when he grows older and goes out in the society, police hits him to make him a better person. Research shows that the use of violence only increases violence.”

    Journalists, actors and members of the civil society lauded Roy for his initiative and hailed the court’s decision.

  • PTI’s new social media laws: Are you in some sort of danger?

    PTI’s new social media laws: Are you in some sort of danger?

    The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government in centre has approved a new set of rules to regulate social media, requiring companies such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and even TikTok, to register themselves and open offices in Pakistan to provide the government data of accounts found guilty of targeting state institutions, spreading fake news and hate speech, engaging in harassment, issuing statements that harm national security or uploading blasphemous content, Geo reported.

    But similar to claims of proponents of internet freedom, who fear that the legal document would be used to keep social media companies in check and curb dissent over the internet, is your freedom over the web really at risk?

    According to reports, the rules and regulations have been included in the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, 2016, and senior officials in the Ministry of Information Technology have confirmed that the cabinet has already given green light to the legal document.

    Further, IT & Telecommunication Federal Secretary Shoaib Siddiqui confirmed that after the cabinet’s approval, the rules and regulations need not be presented in the parliament for approval.

    According to the law, all global social media platforms and companies would have to register in Pakistan within three months and open offices in Islamabad within the same time period. The law requires digital media companies to appoint a representative in Pakistan to deal with a national coordination authority, which would be responsible to regulate content on social media platforms.

    It further requires the companies to set up data servers in Pakistan within a year and makes it compulsory for them to provide data of accounts found guilty of various crimes — including targeting state institutions, spreading fake news and hate speech, engaging in harassment, issuing statements that harm national security or uploading blasphemous content — to intelligence and law enforcement agencies (LEAs).

    It, however, is safe to say that only time would tell if the government can actually convince any digital media outlets to actually operate under these new regulations.

    Follow this link to give the new set of rules a read.

  • Shaniera Akram’s shoot for ‘Money Back Guarantee’ was full of drama

    Shaniera Akram’s shoot for ‘Money Back Guarantee’ was full of drama

    Shaniera Akram is making her movie debut and that too in Faisal Qureshi’s star-studded venture Money Back Guarantee. The star lineup also includes her husband Wasim Akram, Fawad Khan, Mikaal Zulfiqar, Gohar Rasheed and Kiran Malik.

    In an Instagram post, Shaniera talked about working on Money Back Guarantee and how her 12 days on set included a “sprained ankle, a bathroom lock-in, a painful tetanus shot, sleepless nights, loads of Lays Masala chips, language barriers to the next level, a romantic moment and an unforgettable chandelier stunt” that gave her “an out of body experience.”

    https://www.instagram.com/p/B8fsczRA2OC/

    The shoot for Money Back Guarantee has wrapped up and the film is eyeing an Eid ul Fitr release. The film, reported to be a satirical comedy, was shot in Karachi, Lahore and Houston.

    https://www.instagram.com/p/B7u4TK_jgDr/
  • Bilawal names sister Aseefa to lead party if arrested by NAB

    Bilawal names sister Aseefa to lead party if arrested by NAB

    Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) chief Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari has named his sister and daughter of the late former prime minister (PM) Benazir Bhutto, Assefa Bhutto-Zardari, to lead the party in case he is arrested by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in the days to come.

    As the PPP chairman spoke to journalists after appearing before the anti-graft watchdog in the case related pertaining to JV Opel-255 — a joint venture between Zardari Group Pvt Ltd, of which Bilawal is a director, and a large real-estate business –, he was asked about his party’s plans regarding the execution of its forthcoming protest movement against the “anti-people” government’s economic policies in case he was arrested by NAB.

    “The [protest] march would go on come what may. Both the leaders and workers of the PPP know what struggle is and have never shied away from it,” Bilawal said, adding that his sister Assefa would, however, be there to lead PPP workers. “She’ll be my voice if I am arrested.”

    NAB HEARING:

    Earlier, Bilawal appeared before NAB for hearing of the case regarding JV Opel-255. 

    PPP Senator Mustafa Nawaz Khokar had confirmed Bilawal’s appearance before the accountability bureau.

    “PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari will appear before the NAB despite the fact that the NAB notice to him is just political victimisation. The PPP chairman believes in the supremacy of the law of the land,” Khokar had said.

    Khokar had noted that NAB sent Bilawal a notice within the week after he protested against the PTI’s “anti-poor” economic policies. 

    “NAB sends a notice to Bilawal whenever he criticises the government,” he had alleged, adding that the Supreme Court (SC) has already declared Bilawal innocent. “This is nothing but political victimisation by NAB.”

    The PPP chairman on Thursday reportedly recorded his statement with regard to the alleged transfer of over Rs1 billion from the accounts of JV Opel-225.

    JV Opel-255:

    JV Opel was set up in 2011 and had its office on a property in Karachi owned by the Zardari Group. From 2011 to 2013, the company did not generate any revenue, yet it purchased major assets, agriculture lands, commercial and residential properties in Islamabad and Karachi, according to a joint investigation team (JIT) report.

    The only amount it received, during this period, was Rs1.2 billion from its business partner, the real-estate firm, which, according to the JIT report, was not due to the Zardari Group.

    The investigators suspect that this payment was made by the real-estate company as a bribe or kickback for getting favours from the Sindh government in the form of illegal allotment of state land.

    While the JIT has not been able to make a direct link between the Bhutto scion and the fake accounts, it states that money stashed in these fictitious bank accounts was used to pay the water and sewerage bill of the Bilawal House; an amount to a restaurant that catered an event; to purchase air tickets for Bilawal and his younger sister; and to renovate his bomb-proof container and bullet-proof vehicles.

  • WhatsApp reaches 2 billion users

    WhatsApp reaches 2 billion users

    Facebook-owned instant messenger — WhatsApp — has crossed 2 billion users around the world, and on this success, has reaffirmed its commitment to strong encryption to protect the privacy of users’ data.

    WhatsApp, which was acquired by Facebook in 2014, turned into the most widely-used free messaging app that provides free text, voice and video communication services; enabling more than 2 billion people to have conversations from anywhere in the world.

    “Strong encryption is a necessity in modern life. We will not compromise on security because that would make people less safe,” WhatsApp said in an official statement. “For even more protection, we work with top security experts and employ industry-leading technology to stop misuse as well as provide controls and ways to report issues without sacrificing privacy.”

    The social network is working to extend end-to-end encryption across its messaging applications, including Facebook Messenger and Instagram.

    In a recent statement, Facebook had said some 2.89 billion people globally were daily users of at least one of its services. The growth has attracted more attention of regulators and activists concerned over the dominance of major tech platforms.

  • ‘Neutral’ Switzerland helped CIA spy on Pakistan, others?

    ‘Neutral’ Switzerland helped CIA spy on Pakistan, others?

    Outraged commentators warned on Wednesday that the CIA and Germany’s intelligence service had for decades used a Swiss encryption company for spying, seriously damaging Switzerland’s cherished reputation for neutrality, AFP reported.

    Critics voiced particular concern that Bern may have been at least tacitly complicit in the secret operation. Switzerland, which takes pride in its neutral and non-aligned status, “was hosting a quasi ally intelligence agency,” the Tribune de Geneve daily said in an editorial.

    Swiss officials “very likely” knew what was going on but “closed their eyes” in the name of neutrality, it added. Home to the United Nations European headquarters and the International Committee of the Red Cross, Switzerland is recognised worldwide for its standing as an honest broker.

    But media revelations on Tuesday told how for decades the US and West German intelligence services raked in the top-secret communications of governments around the world. The Trojan horse they used was their hidden control of Swiss encryption company Crypto AG.

    The company supplied devices for encoded communications to some 120 countries from after World War II to the beginning of this century, including Iran, South American governments, and India and Pakistan.

    Unknown to those governments, Crypto was secretly acquired in 1970 by the US Central Intelligence Agency together with the then West Germany’s BND Federal Intelligence Service.

    Together they rigged Crypto’s equipment to be able to easily break the codes and read the government’s messages, according to reports by the Washington Post, German television ZTE and Swiss state media SRF.

    Citing a classified internal CIA history of what was originally called operation “Thesaurus” and later “Rubicon,” the reports said that in the 1980s the harvest from the Crypto machines supplied roughly 40 percent of all the foreign communications US code-breakers processed for intelligence.

    The spy agencies were thus able to gather precious information during major crises such as the hostage crisis at the US embassy in Tehran in 1979 the 1982 Falklands War between Argentina and Britain. They also got information on several political assassinations in Latin America.

    The Swiss government said on Tuesday it had named a retired federal judge to look into the matter, with his findings due out in June. But Carolina Bohren, a Swiss defence ministry spokeswoman, stressed the difficulties ahead. “The events in question began in 1945 and are difficult to reconstruct and interpret today,” she said.

    Bern also announced it had suspended export licenses for Crypto’s successor companies, until the situation has been “clarified”. But a number of political parties, insisting that far more needed to be done, on Wednesday called for a full-blown investigation.

    The Swiss Socialist Party wondered in a tweet whether the country’s own intelligence service was a “victim or an accomplice”, demanding “clarifications and a full investigation”. The Greens and Christian Democrats also suggested a parliamentary commission might be called for.

    Amnesty International’s Swiss chapter meanwhile raised questions about the Swiss authorities’ responsibility both for the espionage and for how the information gathered had been used.

    “Were our intelligence services and the government aware of the torture and the murders committed by military dictatorships in Chile and Argentina?” it asked in a tweet. “Did they take any measures? A full investigation must be carried out.”

    Switzerland has a centuries-old tradition of neutrality. It avoided being drawn into either of the World Wars and has stayed outside political and military alliances such as NATO.

    Several media reports noted on Wednesday that this reputation ended up providing excellent cover for the United States and Germany when they set up their spying operation there.

    Whether this was done “out of incompetence, because of a desire to cover for foreign secret service agents, or to profit from the information they uncovered, must now be clarified,” the Tages-Anzeiger daily insisted. “That is the only way to get out of this mess.”

  • Freelancers payment limit raised to Rs. $25,000: State Bank of Pakistan

    Freelancers, who provide services in information and communication technology, can now receive payments worth up to $25,000 (Rs 3.9 million) per month, which, earlier, stood at a mere $5,000 (Rs 0.7 million).

    The decision has been made by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) to broaden the scope of remittances in Pakistan. This will facilitate freelancers to bring a greater value of funds through more economical and efficient channels of home remittances and help in receiving foreign exchange flow through formal banking.

    Read more – Pakistan’s first manmade island to be built in Gwadar at a cost of $10 billion

    According to SBP, “this would enable freelancers to expand their services and engage new individuals to join the workforce that will inevitably create more employment opportunities in Pakistan”.

    Read more – Largest gas reserve in 20 years discovered in Balochistan

    The concept of freelancing is the emerging trend in Pakistan. Freelancing is a term used commonly for people who are self-employed. Mostly, they are not committed to a particular employer for the long term. They provide services in the local and international market.

  • American woman comes to Pakistan to marry a man from Sialkot

    American woman comes to Pakistan to marry a man from Sialkot

    After becoming friends on Facebook four years ago, Zohaib Butt and Marjory have tied the knot and the Virginia citizen recently flew to Sialkot from the States to be with Butt.

    According to the groom, the two started as friends two years ago and decided to get engaged when Marjory visited Pakistan. The American native came back recently and the two tied the knot. Zohaib further revealed that Marjory accepted Islam and changed her name to Fatima.

    Meanwhile, in an interview, the bride said that she flew to Sialkot to marry the “love of her life,” adding that she loved the Pakistani culture as well.

    “I have enjoyed traveling to Pakistan. I’ve been here before and was welcomed by his family. I have enjoyed learning about his traditions, culture, and religion.”

    She continued, “Zohaib and I have talked for a long time over Facebook. This extended to his family where some of the children would take the phone from their parents and ask me for pictures of my dogs and children.”

  • PICTURES: Inside Hania Aamir’s ‘Stranger Things’ themed birthday

    PICTURES: Inside Hania Aamir’s ‘Stranger Things’ themed birthday

    Asim Azhar threw a Stranger Things themed party for rumoured beau Hania Aamir’s 23rd birthday. The party was hosted at Super Space in Karachi with the couple’s close friends including Iqra Aziz, Yasir Hussain, Ali Rehman Khan and Nomi Ansari in attendance. Check out the pictures below:

    Hania with Shazia Wajahat

    Asim brought Hania to the venue blindfolded.

    https://www.instagram.com/p/B8cHEfAnxYk/

    Following the celebrations, Hania took to social media to reflect on her life’s journey and thanked everyone for all the good wishes they sent her way.

    https://www.instagram.com/p/B8d106fDdsY/

    Asim also shared a funky picture of the two penned a sweet wish for the birthday girl.

    https://www.instagram.com/p/B8eJWCQlvaC/

    Last year, Asim had thrown her sunflower-themed birthday for Hania.

  • Man threatens to set himself on fire after coronavirus cancels 60th birthday

    Man threatens to set himself on fire after coronavirus cancels 60th birthday

    A man in southwest China doused himself with petrol and tied firecrackers around his waist because authorities cancelled his birthday banquet as a precaution against spreading the coronavirus.

    The Chongqing resident, a 59-year-old surnamed Wang, had planned to hold a banquet with 10 tables late last month, state news agency Xinhua reported Wednesday.

    But with authorities across China restricting public gatherings to contain the outbreak, officials told Wang to cancel the party.

    Hundreds of millions of people across China face restrictions and interruptions to their lives due to efforts to contain the coronavirus outbreak, which has now infected more than 44,600 people and killed over 1,100.

    Beijing’s municipal authorities announced last week that parties and group dinners at restaurants would be temporarily forbidden in the Chinese capital to prevent the spread of the virus.

    After his party was cancelled, the Chongqing man showed up at a village committee office armed with firecrackers, which he tied around his waist. He also poured gasoline on his chest and held out a lighter in an attempt to “scare and threaten the village committee into allowing the birthday party”.

    Local procurators later filed charges of disorderly behaviour against Wang on Tuesday.