Bureau Report

PESHAWAR, March 10: Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf chairman Imran Khan said here on Sunday that 80,000 elected representatives of the party would take oath at what he called the party’s largest-ever public meeting at Minar-i-Pakistan in Lahore on March 23.

Kick-starting his formal election campaign, Mr Khan told a public gathering in Peshawar’s Ring Road area that the PTI would unveil at the Lahore meeting its manifesto which would offer ways of coping with the crisis the country was facing and present a glimpse of a new Pakistan the people would be proud of...

By Syed Irfan Raza

ISLAMABAD, March 10: President Asif Ali Zardari is visiting Iran on Monday to attend the groundbreaking ceremony of the long-awaited Pakistan-Iran gas pipeline.

The government believes the project will help Pakistan overcome the energy crisis and spur economic growth...

By Amir Wasim

ISLAMABAD: Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry has taken notice of Saturday’s arson attack on Christian houses in Lahore and directed that notices be issued to the advocate general and inspector general of police of Punjab to appear and put up comprehensive reports on Monday, says an official announcement.

It says that the action has been “taken on an office note initiated by the registrar of the Supreme Court (SC) based on press clippings of different newspapers containing the details of the incident that over 178 houses were burnt in a mob attack” on Saturday in a predominantly Christian colony in the Badami Bagh area over an alleged incident of blasphemy...

By Qasim A. Moini

QUETTA: Saeeda’s house is barely a few metres away from the snooker hall in Quetta’s Alamdar Road which was struck by devastating twin bombings on Jan 10. For her the sectarian violence targeting Balochistan’s Hazara community has come home: her eldest son Irfan Ali Khudi lost his life in the second of the two blasts.

The young man, who worked as a community activist and was married a year and a half ago, had gone to help the injured after the first blast at the snooker club...

KABUL, March 10: US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel’s first trip to Afghanistan was overshadowed on Sunday by a contentious speech by President Hamid Karzai and a security scare that forced their press conference to be cancelled.

Mr Karzai and Mr Hagel’s appearance in front of the cameras was to be a key part of the Pentagon chief’s visit to Afghanistan as strained US-Afghan relations focus on the withdrawal of Nato-led foreign troops by the end of 2014...

ISLAMABAD, March 10: Indian External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid has said that achieving success in efforts for resolving bilateral issues with Pakistan is “a time taking affair”.

Addressing a ceremony in the Indian city of Ghaziabad on Sunday, Mr Khurshid said he would not be able to give a timeframe as to when official talks between the two nations could take place, The Indian Express reported, quoting Press Trust of India...

By Waseem Shamsi

SUKKUR, March 10: A large quantity of ancient artefacts being taken from Islamabad to Karachi has been seized by the Customs intelligence, officials said on Sunday.

The seized artefacts worth millions of rupees belong to Gandhara civilisation, pre-Christian era and the periods of Muslim rule, Tasawwar Shah, a local Customs officer, told Dawn...

By Our Correspondent

MIRAMSHAH, March 10: A US drone fired two missiles on two suspected militants in Dattakhel tehsil of North Waziristan early on Sunday, killing both of them.

Sources said the attack took place in Degan village. The men were on a mule when the missiles were fired...

NEW DELHI, March 10: Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front chairman Yasin Malik, who returned here on Saturday after a visit to Pakistan, was allowed to leave for Srinagar on Sunday without ‘formal questioning’ by the authorities.

Apart from his brief interaction with intelligence officials manning the immigration counter at the Indira Gandhi International Airport, he was spared a detailed explanation for his appearance along side Hafiz Saeed, the suspected Mumbai attacks mastermind, at a protest in Islamabad...