Tag Archives: Islamabad

The government has imposed the most severe restrictions since a one-month lockdown in April last year. Pakistan on Saturday began a nine-day shutdown affecting travel and tourist hotspots in a bid to prevent a surge in COVID-19 cases during the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr. Already battling the third wave …

Pakistani opposition parties criticized Prime Minister Imran Khan on Thursday after he told parliament that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden had been “martyred” in 2011 by US forces. Bin Laden, who masterminded the 9/11 attacks on the United States, was killed in a raid on his hideout in the …

More than 30% of civilian pilots in Pakistan have fake licenses and are not qualified to fly, the country’s aviation minister revealed Wednesday. Addressing Pakistan’s National Assembly, Ghulam Sarwar Khan said 262 pilots in the country “did not take the exam themselves” and had paid someone else to sit it …

Two employees at India’s embassy to Pakistan have been released after they were detained in relation to an alleged hit-and-run incident in the capital Islamabad. An alarm was raised Monday when the Times of India reported that two diplomatic staffers were “missing in Pakistan,” with a suggestion the case was …

Officials in Pakistan have estimated that nationwide confirmed cases of COVID-19 infections could reach up to 1.2 million by the end of July, urging the nation to strictly comply with safety guidelines to help reverse the rising trajectory of new cases. The national tally of infections has surpassed 140,000, with …

A powerful explosion ripped through a crowded bazaar in Pakistan’s garrison city of Rawalpindi on Friday, killing at least one person and wounding 15, police said. The source of the blast was unclear and police said bomb disposal experts were still trying to determine whether it was a low-intensity bomb …

Pakistani aviation authorities have told Pakistan International Airlines that the pilot of a passenger plane that crashed into a residential district of Karachi last month had ignored air traffic control’s instructions for landing, a PIA spokesman said on Wednesday. The PIA Airbus A320 crashed on May 22 while trying to …

Two Pakistani embassy staff accused of spying have been expelled from India, Indian officials said on Sunday. “Two officials of the High Commission of Pakistan in New Delhi were apprehended today by Indian law enforcement authorities for indulging in espionage activities,” a statement from the Indian external affairs ministry said. …

Several civilians, some of them children, have been injured in an explosion in India’s state of Jammu and Kashmir, where security forces have been clashing with militants. The blast took place on Monday while local residents were clearing debris left by heavy fighting earlier in the day, local media reported, …

The death toll from the bombing of a mosque in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta rose to 15 on Saturday, officials said, in an escalation of militant violence. An improvised explosive device ripped through the mosque during Friday evening prayers, killing 13 people and wounding more than 20, police …

Junaid Hafeez, 33, was arrested in March 2013 and accused of posting derogatory comments about the Prophet Mohammed on social media. Allegations of blasphemy are taken very seriously in Pakistan, and even an accusation is often enough to make someone a target for hardliners. Mr. Hafeez’s first lawyer, Rashid Rehman, …

A strong 5.8 magnitude tremor has hit the Pakistani capital Islamabad and other cities in the eastern Punjab province, leaving at least 19 people dead and 300 injured, officials said. The earthquake was also felt in Lahore, Peshawar and Pakistan-administered Kashmir, with people rushing into the streets in case of …

Hundreds of incidents of protest have erupted in Indian-administered Kashmir since the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi stripped the Muslim-majority Himalayan region of its autonomy and imposed a security clampdown more than three weeks ago. A senior government source told media outlets on Wednesday that at least 500 protests …

Prime Minister Imran Khan is considering closing Pakistan’s airspace to India and blocking its eastern neighbor’s land trade route to Afghanistan, the science and technology minister in Islamabad said on Tuesday. Pakistan reopened its airspace to India in mid-July, having closed it in February after an attack by a Pakistan-based …

  Five Indian soldiers and three Pakistani troops were killed in an exchange of gunfire across the de facto border of the disputed Kashmir region, the Pakistani Army claimed in a statement. The chief spokesman, Major General Asif Ghafoor, said in a tweet that the Indian troops had “increased fire” …

At least 18 people were killed and several injured when a small military plane crashed into a residential area near the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi. Five crew members and 13 civilians were among the dead, rescue services said. The aircraft was on a training flight when it crashed and set …