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Posts published in “Day: September 15, 2016

Deadlines and destitution: Editorial in The News, Sept 11, 2016

The Pakistani state is using a carrot-and-stick approach towards the Afghan refugees remaining in the country. The carrot was announced on Friday, when the federal cabinet approved a decision allowing Afghan refugees to stay in Pakistan till March, which followed an earlier extension in June which had set the deadline of December. The stick has already been wielded. According to the UNHCR, in August more than 67,000 refugees were permanently repatriated to Afghanistan, an stunning…

Ghani warns Pakistan : edit in DailyTimes, Sept 11, 2016

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has threatened to shut the Afghan transit route for Pakistani exports to Central Asia if Islamabad does not allow Afghan traders to use Lahore’s Wagah border for trade with India. President Ghani said this in a meeting with UK’s special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Owen Jenkins in Kabul. Furthermore, he said that Afghanistan is no more a landlocked country as it has many transit routes for the import and export…

13 soldiers martyred, 94 militants killed in past 24 hours, MoD claims By KHAAMA PRESS – Sat Sep 10 2016

At least 13 Afghan National Army (ANA) soldiers lost their lives during the latest counter-terrorism operations, the Ministry of Defense (MoD) said Saturday. According to an operational update by MoD, the soldiers lost their lives while combating the internal and foreign terrorists in various provinces of Afghanistan. The statement further added that the operations were conducted in Nangarhar, Ghazni, Paktia, Paktika, Logar, Kandahar, Uruzgan, Ghor, Takhar, Baghlan, Kunduz, Balkh, Sar-e-Pul, Jawzjan, and Helmand provinces. The…

US drone strike kill 4 militants in West of Afghanistan By KHAAMA PRESS – Sun Sep 11 2016

At least 4 militants were killed in a drone strike conducted by the US forces in western Farah province of Afghanistan, local officials said Sunday. Provincial governor’s spokesman Mohammad Asif Nang said the drone strike was conducted late on Saturday night in Khak-e-Safid district targeting the militants in the vicinity of Qarya-e-Surkh area. He said a hideout of the militants was targeted in the airstrike a commander of the group was likely among those killed.…

From Where Ex-Taliban Minister Sits, Demand Is Growing for Afghan Peace By CARLOTTA GALL in The NY Times, Sept 10, 2016

WITH the Taliban making territorial advances and bombing the capital every week, it may seem the least likely moment to be talking about an Afghan peace deal. But Agha Jan Motasim, a former Taliban minister, insists that now is the time. Once the Taliban’s finance minister and chief auditor, and a close associate of the Taliban’s founder, Mullah Muhammad Omar, Mr. Motasim has positioned himself as a back-channel negotiator between the insurgents and the Afghan…

Wagah open for Afghan traders: Pak FO Report in The Express Tribune, September 11, 2016

Pakistan has not stopped Afghan traders from moving their products to India through the Wagah border, Foreign Office spokesman Nafees Zakaria said on Saturday. “Pakistan is fulfilling its commitment to the Afghan people by providing them a trade transit facility,” he told BBC Urdu. He clarified that under Islamabad’s bilateral agreement with Kabul, only Indian goods could not be imported into Afghanistan through Pakistan. Zakaria’s remarks came in response to Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s threat…

US long-term interests in Pakistan dwarf those in Afghanistan, says expert Report in Dawn, September 11th, 2016

WASHINGTON: Long-term US strategic interests in Pakistan dwarf those in Afghanistan, argues a former CIA station chief in Islamabad, Robert L. Grenier, while urging both countries “to agree to disagree’’. In his testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Mr Grenier, who now heads a US think-tank, ERG Partners, advised the US lawmakers that too much focus on Afghanistan could hurt US interests in Pakistan. “Long-term US strategic interests in Pakistan in fact dwarf those…

Relations with Pakistan strong, says US: by ANWAR IQBAL in Dawn, September 11th, 2016

WASHINGTON: The United States on Friday rejected the suggestion that its relations with Pakistan now were at their lowest level, although it did call it a challenging relationship. “I would refute the premise of the question. I don’t believe they’re at their lowest level,” said US State Department’s deputy spokesman Mark Toner when asked if the relationship had hit rock bottom. In an earlier statement, Mr Toner had also ruled out any possibility of imposing…

Concerns about Indian consultants not addressed fully: By Jawad R Awan in The Nation, September 11, 2016

LAHORE – The hiring of Indian experts and workers by Pakistani sugar mills remains a hot topic amid concerns that some of them may not have passed all the security checks. The Nation has learnt that PTI Secretary General Jahangir Khan Tareen was the first industrialist who hired Indian consultants for his sugar mills in Rahimyar Khan and Ghotki in 2014. JDW Sugar Mills, owned by Tareen, had written a letter to Pakistan High Commission…

Acting Communist Party chief of Tianjin placed under investigation for suspected graft By Jun Mai in South China Morning Post, Sept 11, 2016

The Chinese Communist Party has placed its official in charge of the large northern municipality of Tianjin under investigation for possible corruption, the national anti-graft watchdog said late Saturday. Huang Xingguo, 62, was suspected of “serious violation of disciplines”, a term that usually refers to corruption, according to the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection. Huang was made mayor of Tianjin in 2007 and took on the additional role of acting party secretary in 2014 but…

Three Chinese among 12 sent to jail for bid to smuggle out turtles By M. Waqar Bhatti in The News, Sept 11, 2016

Karachi: A judicial magistrate on Saturday remanded three Chinese nationals and nine Pakistanis to the prison for 14 days for allegedly smuggling freshwater, black pond turtles. The court also allowed the Sindh Wildlife Department to immediately release the confiscated turtles into their habitat. The accused, including three Chinese nationals who are real brothers, were arrested by the Sindh Wildlife Department on Friday night from two different locations in Karachi when a team of officials, led-by…