LAHORE: Police have detained 15 people, including two women, as they pursue the men accused of drugging and gang-raping a 20-year-old Azerbaijani woman in Lahore, in a case that has drawn comparisons to the abduction and assault of two foreign tourists in the same neighbourhood barely two months earlier.
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Shanghai bloc to hold first coordination talks in Islamabad Sept. 28-30 since Pakistan took chair
ISLAMABAD: Senior officials from across the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation are gathering in Islamabad next week for the first substantial coordination talks since Pakistan took over leadership of the eight-nation bloc, in a meeting Pakistani officials have billed as the opening move in a two-year diplomatic programme that will culminate in a full leaders’ summit in the capital.
Pakistan’s new Chinese-built submarine fires first missile in test off Karachi
KARACHI: Pakistan’s navy has carried out the first live missile firing from its newly delivered Chinese-built submarine, a test the military says confirms the vessel’s combat readiness at a moment of heightened friction with India at sea.
Pakistan says more than 70 militants killed in four-day Balochistan offensive
QUETTA: Pakistan’s military said on Sunday that security forces had killed more than 71 militants across Balochistan province over the previous 96 hours, in a serious blow to terrorists backed by India and sheltered by Afghanistan’s Taliban government.
Pakistan rejects Taliban claim of role in Nuristan clashes between rival rebel groups
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has categorically denied any involvement in violence in eastern Afghanistan after the Taliban regime accused Islamabad’s security forces and intelligence agencies of recruiting former Afghan soldiers and funnelling Islamic State-linked fighters across the border — allegations that surfaced hours before a rival account emerged suggesting the casualties in question came from an unrelated battle against an anti-Taliban resistance group.
CM Afridi warns of ‘unprecedented’ backlash if province placed under federal control, calls for talks
The chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province warned on Saturday that any attempt by Islamabad to strip him of office would trigger a reaction “never witnessed” in the country’s history, as a stand-off between the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf and the PML-N led coalition government showed no sign of easing.
TTP suicide bomber kills 12 at DI Khan police checkpost near Afghan border
A suicide bomber detonated a vehicle packed with explosives at a police checkpost in north-western Pakistan on Saturday, killing at least 12 people and wounding around 30 others in an attack the Pakistani Taliban has claimed as its own.
Banks roll out Rs16 billion lottery to boost remittances
KARACHI: Pakistan’s banking industry launched a cash-prize program on Friday that will pay out 16 billion rupees a year to households that receive remittances through official channels, a bid by the country’s lenders to keep foreign currency flowing through the formal financial system without dipping into public funds.
Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey vow to fast-track military cooperation after urgent Riyadh talks
ISLAMABAD: The military chiefs of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey have agreed to move without delay to convert their recently signed defence pact into concrete military cooperation, following urgent talks in Riyadh prompted by a sustained Houthi bombing campaign against the kingdom.
PM Sharif tells UN that Indian move to divert Pakistan’s water would be ‘act of war’
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif tells the UN General Assembly that Islamabad has “made its choice” for peace with New Delhi but also warned India that any attempt to obstruct or divert his country’s share of shared river waters would be regarded as an act of war, in a wide-ranging address that also touched on Kashmir, the war in Gaza, and escalating turmoil across the Middle East.