ISLAMABAD: The International Monetary Fund said on February 4 it had agreed to release a $497 million tranche for Pakistan after the latest review of a bailout package awarded in 2013, though the disbursement still requires IMF board approval. Once the latest disbursement is made the IMF will still have to release $1.1 billion of the total $6.7 billion loan agreed three years ago. IMF agrees to delay PIA sell-off for six months “After constructive discussions, the mission and the Pakistani authorities have reached stafflevel agreement on the completion of the tenth review under the EFF (Extended Fund Facility) arrangement,” the IMF said in a statement. Pakistan has shelved plans to privatise its power supply companies and wi...
February 4, 2016 at 7:08 pm | News Desk
ISLAMABAD: The defence ministry has expressed concern over the delay in release of the $350 million tranche of the Coalition Support Fund (CSF) by the US Congress for want of a certification by the American defence secretary that Pakistani counter-terrorism operations were disrupting the Haqqani Network’s sanctuaries on its soil. “The issues of the decrease in Coalition Support Fund and the economic difficulties in dealing with the crises of North Waziristan’s internally displaced persons also came under discussion,” a defence ministry statement said, after a meeting between defence secretary, retired Lt Gen Muhammad Alam Khattak, and US Ambassador David Hale. Under the US National Defence Authorisation Act (NDAA) for the fisc...
February 4, 2016 at 11:36 am | News Desk
RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s fiscal reserves dropped to a four-year low last year as the government sought to finance a budget deficit caused by plunging oil revenues, a report said on Tuesday. The reserves of the world’s largest crude exporter dropped to $611.9 billion at the end of 2015, the lowest level since 2011, down from $732bn a year before, the Saudi Jadwa Investment said in an economic report. Jadwa said it expected reserves to fall to around $500bn by the end of 2016, after oil prices fell by three quarters since mid-2014. The kingdom, the second largest crude producer after Russia, posted a record budget deficit of $98bn last year after oil income dived by 60 per cent to just $118bn. Riyadh also projected an $87bn ...
February 3, 2016 at 1:00 pm | News Desk
WASHINGTON: Seven years into his presidency, Barack Obama will make his first trip to an American mosque on Wednesday, offering a symbolic rebuttal of harsh Republican election rhetoric against Muslims. Obama, whose grandfather converted to Islam, will make the short helicopter ride to the Islamic Society of Baltimore mosque, where he will meet community leaders and deliver remarks. He has visited mosques from Malaysia, to Indonesia and Egypt as president, but has yet to visit one of America's 2,000-plus mosques. In 2009, a freshly elected Obama travelled to the Egyptian capital to call for a "new beginning" with the Muslim world. Much of Obama's foreign policy agenda has focused on improving ties with Muslim nations, from makin...
February 3, 2016 at 12:53 pm | News Desk
KARACHI: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday said protesting employees of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) will be fired from service and can be sent to jail for a year, media reported. Talking to reporters during his visit to a coal power plant in Sahiwal, the premier went on to say that airline employees working during the strike will be given special rewards for their service. Nawaz accused PIA workers of politicising the privatisation issue by resorting to strikes, adding that such acts were costing PIA Rs100 million per day. In a move to stall the strike, Nawaz had already enforced the Essential Services (Maintenance) Act 1952 for six months, barring protesting members of the PIA from participating in any union activit...
February 2, 2016 at 7:36 pm | News Desk
TOKYO, JAPAN — The Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI) was ranked second among the world’s government-affiliated think tanks, after the World Bank’s Development Research Group. The2015 Global Go To Think Tank Index Report, produced by the University of Pennsylvania’s Think Tanks and Civil Societies Program (TTCSP), is the result of a survey of 6,846 think tanks and 4,750 journalists, policy makers, public and private donors, and functional and regional area specialists. ADBI also ranked second in 2014. ADBI has been improving in the rankings over time and is now recognized as a leading think tank in several categories. ADBI is ranked the 29th best think tank in the world, 20th best non-US think tank, 6th best international de...
February 2, 2016 at 7:30 pm | News Desk
WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama on Thursday appreciated Pakistan’s on-going efforts to degrade and ultimately defeat al Qaeda and its affiliates, noting that it had disrupted terror plots against the US homeland as the two sides renewed their resolve to counter all forms of extremism and terrorism in the region. During a bilateral meeting between a high-powered delegation led by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Obama at the White House on Thursday, the two discussed a wide range of bilateral and regional issues, particularly terrorism in South Asia. According to a joint statement of the meeting, Obama, while acknowledging the sacrifices rendered by Pakistani security forces in the region, noted how it had degraded the ability ...
October 23, 2015 at 10:06 am | News Desk
By Atul Singh In 52 BC, Vercingetorix threw down his arms at the feet of Julius Caesar. This marked the Roman victory over Gaul. Caesar went on to write Commentarii de Bello Gallico, while Vercingetorix was paraded as a prisoner in Rome and then strangled to death. Caesar claimed he had to invade Gaul to protect Rome. In reality, he was deep in debt. His overriding motive was to pay back his debt by conquering and plundering Gaul. Yet over time, Romans built roads and aqueducts in Gaul and other conquered lands. The civil law systems used by much of the world have their roots in Roman law. This article itself is written in the Roman alphabet. The United States is the Rome of our times. It fashioned the exist...
October 17, 2015 at 10:37 pm | News Desk
NEW DELHI: India has accelerated plans to buy drones from Israel that can be armed and can allow the military to carry out strikes overseas with less risk to personnel, defence sources have said. The news comes weeks after Pakistan reported using a home made drone in combat when it attacked militants on its soil, raising the prospect of a new front in the nuclear-armed neighbors' standoff over Kashmir that has twice spilled into war. The plan to acquire Israeli Herons was first conceived three years ago, but in January the military wrote to the government asking for speedy delivery, the sources said, as Pakistan and China develop their own drone warfare capabilities. India has already deployed Israeli unmanned aerial vehicles (U...
September 22, 2015 at 4:40 pm | News Desk
DUBAI: Saudi Electricity Co (SEC) has received approval from its executive committee to negotiate for loan financing worth $2.3 billion and to set up a Sukuk Programme worth as much as $1.5 billion, the Gulf's largest utility said on Monday. The two-part loan, to serve as a back-up facility for the company, would be structured as a revolving credit facility and have a lifespan of between three and five years. One tranche would be worth up to 3 billion riyals ($800 million) and the other would not exceed $1.5 billion. The Sukuk Programme would be used to fund capital projects, the statement added without elaborating. Sources told Reuters in July that the kingdom's monopoly utility was in talks with local and international banks t...
August 31, 2015 at 2:46 pm | News Desk
Farhan Bokhari High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Pakistan could have the world’s third largest stockpile of nuclear weapons after the US and Russia within a decade if it continues to build up to 20 nuclear warheads annually, a new report warns. The report, written by two respected US analysts and published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, concluded that Pakistan is outpacing India, with its neighbour and rival appearing to produce just five warheads annually. High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this articl...
August 29, 2015 at 12:06 pm | News Desk
Hatf IX (Nasr) is a Pakistani ballistic missile which can deliver a sub-kiloton nuclear warhead over a range of 60 km, or 37.3 miles. It is supposed to have entered service in 2013 and is believed to be fully integrated into Pakistan’s C3I (command, control, communications and intelligence). Its purported role is as a low-yield battlefield deterrent against mechanised columns. Should India – and the world – take Nasr seriously? The development and deployment of Nasr by Pakistan was inevitable and the impact of this tactical nuclear weapon (tac nuke) on the emerging India-Pakistan deterrence relationship is inherently destabilising. Defining Tactical Nuclear Weapons: The Pakistani Context There are four different yardst...
August 21, 2015 at 6:46 pm | News Desk
The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) submitted before the Supreme Court a report containing details of 150 mega corruption cases against prominent parliamentarians, politicians, bureaucrats and industrialists. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, former president Asif Ali Zardari, former prime ministers Yousaf Raza Gilani and Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, PML-Q chief Shujaat Hussain, former Balochistan chief minister Nawab Aslam Raisani, QaumiWatan Party chief AftabSherpao, former ambassador to US Hussain Haqqani are some of the prominent people on the list. The document lists 50 cases each of monetary irregularities, misuse of powers and land scandals. Among the monetary irregul...
August 21, 2015 at 6:14 pm | News Desk
Russian President Vladimir Putin is playing a very dangerous game. On July 4, while Americans celebrated Independence Day, a cinematic, tension-filled drama unfolded along America's western skies. In two separate incidents, U.S. fighter jets were scrambled to intercept Russian bombers approaching the country's airspace; first near the California coast, then just outside U.S. airspace over Alaska. [caption id="attachment_6360" align="aligncenter" width="500"] Russia's President Vladimir Putin gestures as he chairs a government meeting at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence outside Moscow, June 25, 2014. The Russian parliament on Wednesday revoked the right it had granted Putin in March to order a military intervention in Ukraine, where...
August 21, 2015 at 6:05 pm | News Desk
An unnamed American diplomat told the Sunday Times in Britain that President Barack Obama “believes a peaceful Iran could be a bulwark against ISIS in the Middle East and the key to peace there.” The Iranian people and government strongly oppose ISIS, no doubt about it. They are predominantly Shias while ISIS is the most deranged Sunni Islamist terrorist organization in the world. Its attitude toward the Shia is outright genocidal. It’s easy, then, to see why a powerful Shia bloc might act as a “bulwark.” The problem here is that the Iranian- led Resistance Bloc—which includes the Assad regime in Syria, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and a smorgasbord of Iraqi Shia militias—is the primary instigator of ISIS. Look: ISIS is jus...
August 21, 2015 at 5:59 pm | News Desk
When the US sneezes, an old saying goes, the world catches a cold. That’s been nowhere more true than in Asia. But as China’s coughing fit grows louder, countries in the region are wondering whether their neighbor’s illness will also prove contagious. Since Wall Street’s crash in 2008, Asia has been pivoting to China. The $16.8 trillion US economy is still 1.8 times bigger and its per capita income dwarfs China’s. But China is Asia’s biggest trading partner and, increasingly, its benefactor. Flush with $3.7tr of currency reserves and its new $100 billion Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, China has used checkbook diplomacy to make friends across the region. Asia’s social media accounts are now pulsating with talk of h...
August 21, 2015 at 5:40 pm | News Desk
Car manufacturers in Pakistan had a blissful 2014-15 as they saw sales jump to 151,134 units from 118,102 in the preceding fiscal year. The launch of new Toyota Corolla brought a big relief to its assembler, pushing up the company’s sales to 51,398 units from 29,087 and also making a positive impact in overall sales figures, Pakistan Automotive Manufacturers Association (PAMA) announced on July 10th. Uplift in overall sales came from Punjab government’s taxi scheme that helped sales of Suzuki Bolan rise to 23,582 units from 14,088 and that of Suzuki Ravi to 22,815 from 12,419. Even increase in car prices by the manufacturers did not dampen buyers’ enthusiasm. Moreover, a decline in interest rates to seven per cent from 10pc b...
August 21, 2015 at 5:35 pm | News Desk
Born and raised as privileged individuals, it’s often the case that we end up raising our voice and concern for the rights of Muslims far away in Palestine or Myanmar, forgetting our very own neighbourhoods that have been struggling for their rights for decades. Many of us who do even end up raising our voices, seldom do so beyond social media, doing more harm than good to the Baloch cause — a cause which is more about getting an equal playing field and less about Baloch independence. My experience with Baluchistan has been different, and naturally my problem-identification and solution is also counter-intuitive. Successive governments in Pakistan, both democratic and military, have tried to reach middle ground to resolve the crisis ...
August 21, 2015 at 5:26 pm | News Desk
Looking from abroad at the statements of the Australian government regarding security, one would be forgiven for thinking the country had just suffered a 9/11 scale attack or was currently engaged in a war for its very survival. The country’s hard right Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, has over the past six months employed increasingly shrill and fearful language to address the threat posed by terrorism and the Daesh in particular. The government’s increasing use of such loaded language began last year, in the months after the release of its first Federal Budget. The Government had fought its election campaign around the issues of illegal immigrants and the budget deficit, with the latter in particular being spoke of as a “debt ...
August 21, 2015 at 5:10 pm | News Desk
Aakar Patel Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to be congratulated for his brave move in announcing he will visit Pakistan. I do not only mean brave from the point of view of physical courage. I have been to Pakistan many times and not felt unsafe, and it is clear that Modi will find that he is given security of the highest standard. But even so, Pakistan’s most protected man, former president Pervez Musharraf had his convoy bombed twice and its former prime minister Benazir Bhutto was killed not that long ago. So Modi is brave in agreeing to go where even cricket teams have refused. The second way in which he has been brave is that he has defied many in our media and also our strategic affairs experts in reachi...
August 18, 2015 at 2:26 pm | News Desk