UNITED NATIONS, April 27 (APP):Reaffirming its support to the Palestinians’ cause, Pakistan has told the UN Security Council that international peace and stability cannot be promoted by denying freedom and justice to peoples living under foreign or alien occupation.
Peace in the Middle East could only be built on the foundations of a two-State solution, Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi, Pakistan’s permanent representative to the UN, said, warning that one-State “illusion” would provide neither peace nor security.
Speaking in a debate on the Middle East situation on Thursday, she put the spotlight on plight of Palestinians, saying no other people have suffered greater injustice in recent times. “During the past seventy years, they have been driven from their homes and their homeland, militarily occupied and obliged to live in conditions resembling apartheid,she said.
Condemning Israel’s cruel occupation and repression during the ˜Great March of Return” in Gaza, the Pakistani envoy said that a peaceful protest was transformed into a callous killing zone by the occupying power, even as the world watched the wanton shooting of unarmed Palestinians on their television.
Ambassador Lodhi recalled that in Gaza Strip, 35 Palestinians, including children as old as 14, had died while “this Council could not even call for an independent and transparent investigation into the incidents.”
“The Palestinian demand for justice was met, once again, by arrogant dismissal,” she told the 15-member Council.
Ambassador Lodhi said that instability in the Middle East was the result of big power politics and divergent interests of regional states that has led to suffering for millions of people in the region.
“Big power rivalries, combined with the divergent policies and interests of major regional states, presage a period of continued conflict and instability in the region, prolonged suffering for the millions of innocent victims of the regional conflicts and a rising danger of a major international conflagration.”
Warning that the region stood at a “dangerous crossroads, she said that the seething fires of conflict and violence threaten to exacerbate the multiple intersecting and overlapping regional fault-lines, thus presenting a greater risk to international peace and security than ever before.
Ambassador Lodhi urged the Security Council to analyze the reasons for the region’s “troubles, as some characterize the Middle East as a “troubled” place. Most of these troubles, she stressed, are a direct consequence of foreign occupation, annexation and intervention.
Condemning Israel’s “cruel occupation and repression during the “Great March of Return” in Gaza, Pakistani envoy said that a peaceful protest was transformed into a callous killing zone by the occupying power, even as the world watched the wanton shooting of unarmed Palestinians on their television screens.
Expressing grave concern about reports of the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria, Ambassador Lodhi condemned any use of chemical weapons by anyone, anywhere. “It is abhorrent and illegal and deserves unreserved condemnation, she added.
Ambassador Lodhi welcomed the deployment of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Fact Finding Mission to Syria, and expressed confidence that its investigations would assist in establishing the facts. “At the same time, we reiterate our call on all sides to refrain from actions that are incompatible with the Charter of the United Nations and international law”.
She concluded by cautioning that unless the value of human life and the rights of all peoples are respected; and unless the principles of the UN Charter are upheld, the Middle East – and other regions, near and far- may well be racing towards unprecedented disaster.
Opening the debate, the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Nickolay Mladenov, said that outside interference and growing risks of potentially explosive miscalculations, from Gaza to Syria to Yemen, everyone in the region must “step away from the brink.
“What happens in the Middle East today has immediate implications for the rest of the world, he said, while cautioning that a general lack of progress should worry everyone.
“The fires of the Middle East continue to expand and shift, and the Israeli,Palestinian conflict remains a perpetual source of oxygen for militants and radicals across the Middle East.
Pakistan calls for justice for suffering Palestinians in bid to promote Mideast peace
NH&MP sensitizes transporters on Road Safety
ISLAMABAD, April 27 (APP):National Highway and Motorway Police (NH&MP) M2 North Sector Friday sensitized the transporters about ‘how to have a safe journey while driving’ at Peerwadhai Public Service Vehicle (PSV) terminal.
This initiative was taken on the special directive of Senior Superintendent of Police Motorway M2 North Waheed-ur-Rehman Khattak in the wake of accidents occurring due to lack of some necessary knowledge by the motorway users.
On this occasion, the Motorway Road Safety Team educated transporters, drivers, bus hosts and hostesses about the traffic rules and regulations and let them know how to avoid accidents and adopt some certain measures for a safe journey.
The participants were of the view that the motorway police should organize such informative sessions time and again to create awareness about the significance of traffic rules.
They said such sessions would help decrease accidents ratio across the country and ensure the safety of life and property of motorists.
Inspector Imran Abbas, Sub-Inspector Muhammad Javed Khan and Junior Patrol Officer Ishrat Fatima were the team members of the awareness campaign.
During the session, they also shared their expertise with the people to acquaint them with the basic fundamentals of using highways and motorways.
Naval chief calls on Commander UAE Navy
ISLAMABAD, Apr 27 (APP):Chief of the Naval Staff, Admiral Zafar Mahmood Abbasi called on Commander United Arab Emirates (UAE) Navy, Rear Admiral Sheikh Saeed Bin Hamdan Bin Mohammad Al Nahyan at Abu Dhabi during his visit to (UAE.
During the meeting, matters of mutual interest and bilateral naval collaboration were dilated upon, said a press release issued here by directorate of public relations of Pakistan Navy on Friday.
Both the dignitaries also discussed avenues to augment bilateral cooperation and agreed to further enhance bilateral naval collaboration in diverse realms between Pakistan Navy and UAE Navy.
The visit would greatly augment the bilateral cooperation between both the countries in general and Navies in particular.
UN chief picks Swiss diplomat as envoy on Myanmar
UNITED NATIONS, Apr 26 (APP):UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has appointed a Swiss diplomat to serve as his special envoy on Myanmar, his spokesman announced Thursday.
The diplomat, Christine Schraner Burgener, is currently Switzerland’s ambassador to Germany.
Schraner Burgener served as the Swiss ambassador to Thailand from 2009 to 2015, and her husband was the Swiss ambassador to Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar.
There has been international criticism of Myanmar over the flight of nearly 700,000 minority Rohingya Muslims to Bangladesh following a brutal military crackdown. The UN and its member states have described the operation as ethnic cleansing, which Myanmar has denied.
The UN General Assembly adopted a resolution in December asking Guterres to appoint an envoy. This weekend, the UN Security Council is heading to Myanmar and Bangladesh.
Responding to a question, the secretary-general’s spokesman, Stephane Dujarric, said Schraner Burgener would be coming to New York “in the coming days” to take over her assignment.
Pakistan, US trying to remove some misperceptions to promote relations: Pakistani diplomat
CHICAGO, Apr 26 (APP):Pakistan and the United States (US) have been working on to remove some misperceptions in an effort to rebuild a mutually beneficial relationship, a senior Pakistani diplomat has said.
“Though there are some misperceptions on both sides, disengagement has never been a solution of issues in history,” Faisal Niaz Tirmizi, the consul general in Chicago, said during a public lecture at the University of Wisconsin in Madison on Wednesday.
Tirmizi was invited by the university, one of America’s top educational institutions, for a talk on Pakistan-US relations.
He said the geographical proximity with Afghanistan made Pakistan especially important for the United States.
The consul general talked about the sacrifices and efforts made by Pakistan during the ongoing war on terror, highlighting the successes of Pakistan’s armed forces in combating terrorists. Pakistan, he said, was perhaps the only country where extremist elements were being effectively pushed back without any external help.
Tirmizi also briefed the faculty and students of the university about rapidly growing economy of Pakistan. He said Pakistan’s enormous youth bulge had turned the country into the world’s fastest growing retail market. Pakistan’s retail market, he added, was the third largest retail market in Asia will cross $ 200 billion by 2020.
Speaking about the United States immense contributions to Pakistan’s economic, military and social development in the past, Consul General Tirmizi also referred Pakistan’s role in the two significant achievements of the US foreign policy — the US-China rapprochement and the decisive win against communism.
Despite challenges, Pakistan achieves 13 years highest growth rate of 5.8% :Ahsan
ISLAMABAD, Apr 26 (APP):The country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) recorded 13-year highest growth of 5.8 percent during the outgoing fiscal year (2017-18), indicating success of the government’s growth-oriented initiatives and prudent economic policies introduced for the economic development of the country.
“Had we not gone through political crisis, which created uncertainty, we would have exceeded the growth target of 6 percent during the outgoing fiscal year,” said Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Reforms, Prof Ahsan Iqbal at the launching of Pakistan Economic Survey for the outgoing fiscal year (2017-18) here Thursday.
The survey was launched by Adviser to Prime Minister of Finance, Miftah Ismail while among others Adviser to Prime Minister on Revenue, Haroon Akhtar, Minister of State for Finance Rana Muhammad Afzal, and Economic Adviser Finance Division Ejaz Ali Wasti were also present on the occasion.
Ahsan Iqbal said that despite these challenges, the government succeeded in achieving 5.8 percent growth rate, and expressed the hope that the momentum would continue in years to come.
The minister was of the view that there was dire need to avoid political adventurism, if we had to put the country on path of development and progress.
He said that Pakistan had made great strides in improving its economic outcomes and reducing its macroeconomic vulnerability in the recent years. As a result economic growth has continued to gain traction, albeit at varying speeds across the sectors, founded on the government’s commitment to higher growth and low inflation.
GDP continued to grow above 5 percent in each of the last 2 years and 4 percent in each of the three preceding years. This achievement is remarkable as it has been accomplished in the face of global head winds.
“We have turn around the economy of Pakistan and the measures introduced by the government had put the economy on path of sustainability,” the minister added.
The minister said that the growth was not only endorsed by the government but also by world organizations including the World Bank, which he said was an encouraging sign. He said that Pakistan’s growth rate remained stagnant at only 3 percent growth during the period from 2008 to 2013, while now it had achieved 5.8 percent growth.
He said that the government had ensured construction of 1750 km of motorways during previous five years and the country had even surpassed the neighboring country in that regard where total length of motorways is around 1400 km.
The minister said that during next fiscal year, a big portion of development funds had also been earmarked for the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) projects.
He said so far a huge investment of US$29 billion had been made on various projects of CPEC while more investment is expected in the second phase of CPEC in sectors including energy, infrastructure, and Gwadar port development.
Miftah Ismail on the occasion said that the macroeconomic indicators had shown satisfactory performance during the outgoing fiscal year as Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate was recorded at the all time high in 13 years at 5.8 %.
He said that all the economic indicators have shown positive growth while the government succeeded in containing inflation rate at 3.8 % while current year will end with around 4.5 %,” he said adding the deficit which was 8.2 % in 2013 will remain at 5.5 % by the end of current fiscal year.
He said revenues of Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) will be around Rs 3935 billion by the end of year, while the revenues in 2013 were only Rs 1980 billion.
However, the net debt to GDP ratio, he said had increased from 60.2 % to 61.4 % now. He said the external debt to GDP ratio remained 20.5 % which was low as compared to the ratio of 21.14 % in 2013.
“Our current expenditures have declined while the development expenditures have increased considerably,” he said adding, “We have added 12000 MW to national grid in five years, we completed the long awaited projects such as Neelum Jhelum power project and Lowari Tunnel project, which were lingering for decades and we also concluded Tarbela-IV project.”
The adviser said these development expenditures were now giving dividends as the country witnessed the highest growth rate of 5.8 % in 13 years.
He said the weak point remained the declining exports during the first four years, however he informed that with the start of current calendar year, the exports have captured the upward trend as during March only, 24 % growth of exports was recorded compared to same month of the year 2017.
According to the survey, the highest growth of 3.81 percent in agriculture sector in last 13 years was achieved on the back of initiatives taken to improve the sector such as expansion in credit to agriculture sector along with agriculture Kissan Package, provision of better quality seeds including hybrid and high yield varieties and timely availability of agriculture inputs including fertilizer, pesticides etc.
Large Scale Manufacturing (LSM) also recorded a growth of 6.13 percent highest in ten years. Industrial sector growth improved by 5.80 percent, highest in ten years. Manufacturing grew by 6.24 percent highest in 11 years. The performance of services sector witnessed a stable growth of 6.43 percent in last two years while the Mining and Quarrying sector grew by 3.04 percent in FY 2018 as against -0.38 percent last year.
Fiscal sector continued to perform well during the first half of current fiscal year as strong growth in revenues relative to expenditures helped in containing the fiscal deficit to 2.3 percent of GDP during first half of FY2018 as compared to 2.5 percent of the corresponding period last year.
Total revenues grew by 19.8 percent to reach Rs 2,384.7 billion (6.9 percent of GDP) during July-December, FY2018 against Rs 1,990.6 billion (6.2 percent of GDP) in the same period of FY2017. The impressive performance both in tax and non tax revenues attributed to this significant rise in total revenues.
According to the survey, during the current fiscal year, CPI increased to 4.6 percent which was the highest since the start of current fiscal year, in January 2018 it came down to 4.4 percent and in March 2018, it fell eight month low to 3.2 percent on account of subdued food prices, which offset the impact of rise of petroleum prices.
The average inflation during first nine months of the current fiscal year, July-March FY 2018 has been contained at 3.78 percent which was lower than the level observed during the same period of last year recorded at 4.01 percent.
Exports during July-March FY2018 reached to US$ 17.1 billion as compared to US$ 15.1 billion in July- March FY2017, registered a growth of 13.1 percent.
Pakistan’s imports were up by 15.7 percent in the first nine months of the current fiscal year, rising from $ 38,369 million during FY2017 (July- March) to 44,379 million, showing an increase of $ 6010 million in absolute term. To slow down the imports, an additional regulatory duty was imposed to curtail the inflated imports.
Meanwhile, total public debt stood at Rs 22,820 billion at end of December 2017, while Total Debt of the government was Rs 20,878 billion. Total public debt recorded an increase of Rs 1,413 billion during the first six months of current fiscal year.
According to the survey, the government scrutinized pro-poor expenditure in 17 sectors through the Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) under PRSP-II. The provisional expenditures for July-December FY 2017-18 have been estimated at Rs 1,134.1 billion as compared to Rs 1,017.5 billion of the corresponding period last year.
The number of BISP beneficiaries increased from 3.73 million in FY 2012-13 to 5.6 million as on December 31, 2017. BISP’s annual disbursement increased from Rs 16 billion in FY 2008-09 to Rs 121 billion in FY 2017-18.
The quarterly cash grant enhanced from Rs 3000 per family in FY 2012-13 to Rs 4834 in FY 2016-17.
Two victories for Pak Jr team in Asian hockey qualifier
LAHORE, Apr 26 (APP):Pakistan youth team notched two big wins on the second day of the 5-A-Side Asian hockey qualifiers for the Youth Olympics in Bangkok, Thailand on Thursday.
Pakistan routed Singapore 5-0 and gave hockey lesson to little known Cambodia with a 20-0 thrashing, said the information made available to APP by the Pakistan Hockey Federation.
Pakistan drew 3-3 with Chinese Taipei in its opening match.
It is 5-A-Side tournament played on a smaller field with matches of 30-minute duration.
In the morning match, Pakistan brushed aside Singapore. Murtaza Yaqoob, grandson of Olympic silver medalist late Afzal Manna, notched a hat-trick scoring three goals while Chichawatni’s Hammad Anjum netted the other two goals.
In the afternoon, Pakistan tore apart Cambodia with a heavy score line.
Scorers, Hammad Anjum: 6, Waqas Ahmed (captain): 4, Murtaza Yaqoob: 3, Zulqarnain: 3, Mohsin Khan: 3 and Mohibullah.
Pakistan lose semi to Nepal
ISLAMABAD, Apr 26 (APP):Nepal beat Pakistan by 2-1 in the tennis semi-final of the South Asia Regional Qualifying Event (U-12) being played at Kathmandu, Nepal in Thursday.
Nepal beat Pakistan 2-1. Aki Zuben Rawat beat Huzaifa Khan 6-3, 6-3; Hamid Israr beat Aarav Samrat Hada 7-5, 6-7(4), 6-0; Aki Zuben Rawat, Aarav Samrat Hada beat Huzaifa Khan, Hamid Israr 6-2, 6-2, said a press release issued here.
Pakistan will play Sri Lanka for the 3rd Position on Friday.
NDU delegation visits High Commission London
LONDON, Apr 26 (APP):A group comprising faculty and course participants of the National Defence University (NDU), Islamabad, headed by Lt Gen Majid Ehsan, HI(M), President National Defence University, currently on a Foreign Study Tour of the UK, visited the Pakistan High Commission here the other day.
A statement of the High Commission issued here Thursday said that while welcoming the delegation, Syed Ibne Abbas, the High Commissioner of Pakistan to United Kingdom (UK), briefed them on socio-economic as well as political developments taking place in the UK.
He also briefed the delegates on various aspects of the Pakistan-UK bilateral relations as well as the post Brexit scenario and opportunities for Pakistan.
The High Commissioner informed the participants that under the Enhanced Strategic Dialogue (ESD), the bilateral relations have become institutionalized and more inclusive, and are on an upward trajectory.
Speaking about the changing dynamics of diplomacy in the present age, he updated the participants on the functioning and responsibilities of the Mission.
The briefing concluded with a Q&A session.The delegation was later hosted over a dinner.
The visit programme of the delegation covered a wide range of activities including briefings at the Ministry of Defence, Royal College of Defence Studies (RCDS), Houses of Parliament, Oxford University, Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO), International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) and Northwood Headquarters.
Chief Minister Punjab women squash to get under way
LAHORE, Apr 26 (APP):The Inaugural Chief Minister Punjab National Women Squash Championship will get into action here from Friday, April 27, at Punjab Squash Complex.
Sheraz Saleem told APP here on Thursday that players from all over the country will be seen in
action during the event which aims at further promoting squash among the women folk.
“We are confident to identity new women squash talent from the event which will be groomed
keeping in view future needs and participation of our national squash teams in international events abroad,” he said.
Dr Nadeem Muktar, President PSA, will inaugurate the event in which U19 and senior women
event will be played.
The competition offers cash money of Rs150,000 for both events, he said.
“The five-day event will provide a good platform for senior women and under-19 girls to
showcase their talent,” he added. Final of the event will be played on April 30.