ISLAMABAD: Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar left Islamabad on Thursday for a two-day visit to Shanghai, where he is expected to sign Pakistan into a newly formed international body aimed at coordinating global cooperation on artificial intelligence, according to a statement from the Foreign Office.
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Pakistan’s energy squeeze widens as priciest LNG buy meets fuel, gas warnings
KARACHI: Pakistan’s energy sector is confronting simultaneous pressures on multiple fronts, as the country secured its costliest spot liquefied natural gas cargo since February even as two sanctioned tankers carrying Iranian crude signalled Pakistani waters as a destination, and industry groups warned of imminent petrol and propane shortages.
Pakistan’s factory output rebounds as autos, food drive 5.8 percent manufacturing surge
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s large-scale manufacturing sector expanded 5.77% in the 11 months through May, its strongest stretch of growth in years, as a rebound in car production and food output offset persistent weakness in textiles, pharmaceuticals and steel.
Pakistan textile exports barely grow as costs, Afghan halt bite
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s textile and clothing exports, the backbone of the country’s outbound trade, grew just 0.26% in the fiscal year through June, one of the weakest annual performances in recent years, as elevated production costs and the loss of key regional markets undercut an industry that accounts for roughly half of national exports.
Twin attacks in Pakistan’s northwest leave 3 policemen dead, 20 wounded
PESHAWAR: Militants ambushed a security convoy in Pakistan’s northwest on Wednesday, and hours later a suicide bomber drove an explosives-laden vehicle into a police station in a nearby city, leaving at least three police officers dead and 20 wounded in the latest sign that violence is intensifying along the border with Afghanistan.
Vitol turns Pakistan’s Gwadar into bunkering bet as Hormuz risk grows
KARACHI: Vitol Group has started supplying marine fuel at Pakistan’s Gwadar Port, a wager that the deep-sea facility can carve out a share of the lucrative bunkering trade as shipping lines look for alternatives to Persian Gulf hubs rattled by the conflict between Israel and Iran.
PTI to mark three years of Imran Khan’s imprisonment with nationwide rallies
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, the party of imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan, announced on Wednesday it will hold rallies in cities across the country on Aug. 5, the date that will mark three full years since Khan’s arrest set off one of the most turbulent chapters in the nation’s recent political history.
Pakistan tightens travel rules for dual nationals with expired NICOPs
ISLAMABAD: Dual-national Pakistanis living abroad will no longer be permitted to board flights to Pakistan if they are carrying an invalid, expired, or cancelled National Identity Card for Overseas Pakistanis, according to officials who said the government has ordered airlines to begin verifying the documents before passengers reach the gate.
Banned Kashmiri rights group delays protest march as mediators seek deal to end deadly unrest
A banned protest coalition that has led weeks of unrest in the mountainous Azad Kashmir region agreed on Wednesday to postpone a long-threatened march on the regional capital, a reprieve that came after back-channel negotiations raised hopes for a lasting settlement to a standoff that has left at least nine people dead in the past two days alone.
Pakistan crypto regulator presses clerics to split bitcoin from ssset-backed tokens
The head of Pakistan’s virtual assets regulator has asked the country’s most influential Islamic seminary to distinguish between speculative cryptocurrencies and digital tokens backed by real assets, an attempt to contain the fallout from a religious ruling that has unsettled the government’s crypto ambitions.