The lawyers will boycott proceedings at the Sindh High Court on May 12 to commemorate the killing of their colleagues, said PBC in a statement here.
The lawyer demanded of the Chief Justice of Pakistan Nasirul Mulk to take suo motu notice of lawyers killing on May 12, 2007.
They regretted that not a single killer involved in carnage of May 12 has been apprehended so far.
Over 45 people were killed including lawyers and dozens wounded on May 12, 2007 when a political rally was held the day then Chief Justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry landed at Karachi airport to address the Karachi Bar Association.
The counsel of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Shahid Hamid cross-examined the witness.
Replying a question of the counsel Anwar said that Additional Secretary Election Commission had telephoned him to help the Printing Corporation of Pakistan for additional staff.
Salman Akram Raja, the counsel of the election commission in a question asked Sindh Election Commissioner about ordering any printing press about printing of additional ballot papers after May 07. The witness replied in negation.
PTI counsel Abdul Hafeez Pirzada in his arguments said that he was unaware who has written the reply of the election commission and signed on the papers. He requested the commission for repeat cross-examination of the two witnesses.
The Chief Justice granted the request and remarked that the witness account will be finalized while hearing the audio recording.
Pirzada also requested for suspension of the cross examination of witnesses till availability of relevant documents.
The court adjourned the hearing on the request till tomorrow (Tuesday).
Imran Khan talks to media
Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan has said that the proceedings of the Judicial Commission (JC) would demonstrate the level of independence of the state institutions.
According to ARY News, Imran Khan was talking to media before appearing in the Judicial Commission hearing.
A three-member Judicial Commission headed by Chief Justice Nasirul Mulk inquiring into the rigging claims in May 2013 general elections.
The PTI leader referring the forensic report of NADRA about NA-122 votes said that 93,000 votes of the constituency could not be verified.
The child, whose named was not released, was brought to the Odessa Regional Medical Center on Friday where he was pronounced dead, Corporal Steve LeSueur, a spokesman for the Odessa, Texas, Police Department said on Saturday.
An autopsy will be performed on the child by authorities in Tarrant County, LeSueur said.
The accident occurred at the Ector County Cemetery in Odessa, in the western-central part of the state. – Reuters
For fans of swashbuckling actor Fawad Khan, we have good news. The actor commenced shoot for his upcoming film Kapoor and Sons alongside high-profile cast members Alia Bhatt and Sidhart Malhotra. The movie, which is going to be a family drama, is directed by Shakun Bhatra and will be produced by the esteemed Dharma Productions.
Bollywood actor Sidhart Malhotra was too ecstatic and took the liberty to share a picture from the sets of the film from his official Twitter account.
Last month, reports circulated in the media that Pakistani actor Fawad Khan was required to shoot an intimate scene with Alia Bhatt, to which the actor had frankly refused. Also read: Fawad Khan refuses to shoot intimate scenes with Alia Bhatt!
This is the second time that Alia and Sidharth will star in a Karan Johar production, as both stars made their debut in the acclaimed film Student of the Year. Fawad will be working in his second Bollywood film, after starring in last year’s Khoobsurat alongside Sonam Kapoor. The film helped Fawad earn a prestigious Filmfare award for the best male debut category, an award that no other Pakistani artist had ever achieved.
Fawad will be busy next month also shooting for Battle for Bhittora from June. For the film, Sonam Kapoor will act with Fawad for the second time, after Khoobsurat.
The Prime Minister visiting Afghanistan on an invitation of President Ashraf Ghani. Army Chief Gen. Raheel Shairf, Adviser to the Prime Minister on National Security and Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs Tariq Fatemi, Foreign Secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry and other senior officials.
This will be Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s second visit to Afghanistan and the first after the installation of National Unity Government in Kabul.
Sharif will hold a meeting with President Ashraf Ghani, who will also host a lunch for the Pakistani Prime Minister.
The Prime Minister will also hold a meeting with Afghan Chief Executive, Dr. Abdullah Abdullah. The two sides will hold delegation-level talks during the visit.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif visiting Kabul at a time when bilateral relations between the two countries are underpinned by unprecedented warmth and mutual trust.
The visit of Prime Minister Sharif expected to further strengthen the positive momentum in bilateral relations between the two neighboring countries.
Prime Minster Nawaz Sharif also chaired a high-level meeting at Prime Minister House in Islamabad today to discuss the Pakistan-Afghanistan relationship ahead of the visit to Kabul.
The meeting that was attended by Army Chief Raheel Sharif, federal minister Ishaq Dar, special assistant Sartaj Aziz and other ministers and top officials to discuss various aspects of the relations with Afghanistan.
Seymour Hersh, in his column on London Review of Books, claimed that former Army Chief General (Retd.) Ashfaq Pervez Kayani and former director general of ISI knew about Bin Laden’s hideout in Abbottabad and that the raid was going to take place. He added that Bin Laden was made a “prisoner” since 2006 in Abbottabad.
Osama Bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan’s city of Abbottabad
“This spring I contacted Durrani and told him in detail what I had learned about the bin Laden assault from American sources: that bin Laden had been a prisoner of the ISI at the Abbottabad compound since 2006; that Kayani and Pasha knew of the raid in advance and had made sure that the two helicopters delivering the Seals to Abbottabad could cross Pakistani airspace without triggering any alarms; that the CIA did not learn of bin Laden’s whereabouts by tracking his couriers, as the White House has claimed since May 2011, but from a former senior intelligence officer who betrayed the secret in return for much of the $25 million reward offered by the US, and that, while Obama did order the raid and the Seal team did carry it out, many other aspects of the administration’s account were false”, he claims.
Former Director General of ISI General (R) Shuja Pasha (left) and Former Army Chief General (R) Ashfaq Parvez Kayani (right)
“The Americans who planned the mission assured Kayani and Pasha that their co-operation would never be made public”, he writes.
“Abbottabad is less than 15 minutes by helicopter from Tarbela Ghazi, an important base for ISI covert operations and the facility where those who guard Pakistan’s nuclear weapons arsenal are trained. ‘Ghazi is why the ISI put bin Laden in Abbottabad in the first place,’ the retired official said, ‘to keep him under constant supervision.’’
He also claimed that ISI was going to use Bin Laden as leverage against Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
He sarcastically said that the United States’ account of OBL raid may have been written by Lewis Carroll-the author of Alice in Wonderland.
The US author Hersh Seymour said that a former Pakistani intelligence officer leaked the secret of Bin Laden’s whereabouts in exchange of a $25 million reward.
“It began with a walk-in. In August 2010 a former senior Pakistani intelligence officer approached Jonathan Bank, then the CIA’s station chief at the US embassy in Islamabad. He offered to tell the CIA where to find bin Laden in return for the reward that Washington had offered in 2001. Walk-ins are assumed by the CIA to be unreliable, and the response from the agency’s headquarters was to fly in a polygraph team. The walk-in passed the test. ‘So now we’ve got a lead on bin Laden living in a compound in Abbottabad, but how do we really know who it is?’ was the CIA’s worry at the time, the retired senior US intelligence official told me”, Seymour writes.
President of United States Barack Obama (2nd left) and Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (2nd right) look on as Navy SEALs raid Bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad
“Pakistani intelligence officer walked into the American embassy in Islamabad alone and offered information about Bin Laden’s whereabouts in August 2010, in exchange for the $25 million reward”, Seymour writes in his coloumn.
He also claimed that General Durrani made sure that the helicopters, carrying the Navy SEALs officer, get inside Pakistani airspace without triggering any alarms. He added that Durrani had told him that Pakistani nation would support US’ narrative of the raid.
“Pasha and Kayani were responsible for ensuring that Pakistan’s army and air defence command would not track or engage with the US helicopters used on the mission. The American cell at Tarbela Ghazi was charged with co-ordinating communications between the ISI, the senior US officers at their command post in Afghanistan, and the two Black Hawk helicopters; the goal was to ensure that no stray Pakistani fighter plane on border patrol spot the intruders and took action to stop them”, he writes.
“When your version comes out – if you do it – people in Pakistan will be tremendously grateful,’ Durrani told me. ‘For a long time people have stopped trusting what comes out about bin Laden from the official mouths”, he added.
The journalist stated that the burial of Osama in the sea also never took place.
“We thought the best way to ensure that his body was given an appropriate Islamic burial,’ Brennan said, ‘was to take those actions that would allow us to do that burial at sea.’ He said ‘appropriate specialists and experts’ were consulted, and that the US military was fully capable of carrying out the burial ‘consistent with Islamic law’. Brennan didn’t mention that Muslim law calls for the burial service to be conducted in the presence of an imam, and there was no suggestion that one happened to be on board the Carl Vinson.
In a reconstruction of the bin Laden operation for Vanity Fair, Mark Bowden, who spoke to many senior administration officials, wrote that bin Laden’s body was cleaned and photographed at Jalalabad. Further procedures necessary for a Muslim burial were performed on the carrier, he wrote, ‘with bin Laden’s body being washed again and wrapped in a white shroud. A navy photographer recorded the burial in full sunlight, Monday morning, May 2.’ Bowden described the photos:
One frame shows the body wrapped in a weighted shroud. The next shows it lying diagonally on a chute, feet overboard. In the next frame the body is hitting the water. In the next it is visible just below the surface, ripples spreading outward. In the last frame there are only circular ripples on the surface. The mortal remains of Osama bin Laden were gone for good.
Bowden was careful not to claim that he had actually seen the photographs he described, and he recently told me he hadn’t seen them: ‘I’m always disappointed when I can’t look at something myself, but I spoke with someone I trusted who said he had seen them himself and described them in detail.’ Bowden’s statement adds to the questions about the alleged burial at sea, which has provoked a flood of Freedom of Information Act requests, most of which produced no information. One of them sought access to the photographs. The Pentagon responded that a search of all available records had found no evidence that any photographs had been taken of the burial.”, he wrote.
“The White House press corps was told in a briefing shortly after Obama’s announcement that the death of bin Laden was ‘the culmination of years of careful and highly advanced intelligence work’ that focused on tracking a group of couriers, including one who was known to be close to bin Laden. Reporters were told that a team of specially assembled CIA and National Security Agency analysts had traced the courier to a highly secure million-dollar compound in Abbottabad. After months of observation, the American intelligence community had ‘high confidence’ that a high-value target was living in the compound, and it was ‘assessed that there was a strong probability that [it] was Osama bin Laden’. The US assault team ran into a firefight on entering the compound and three adult males – two of them believed to be the couriers – were slain, along with bin Laden. Asked if bin Laden had defended himself, one of the briefers said yes: ‘He did resist the assault force. And he was killed in a firefight”, he added.
US President Barack Obama announces the death of Osama Bin Laden shortly after the raid in Abbottabad
Pakistan’s renowned talk show host Reham Khan recently had a candid chat with an Indian magazine where much was revealed about her married life. When asked as to how Imran is like at home, Mrs.Imran Khan revealed that the cricketer-turned politician was a simple human being ‘who doesn’t even get cooked porridge!’ Reham also further revealed that the PTI chief was, contrary to popular belief, not an arrogant celebrity but was typically down to earth.
‘He’s very forgiving and if someone makes a mistake, he overlooks it at once. Especially our employees. One would think he’s an arrogant celebrity, but he’s extremely down-to-earth.’
When it came to her children, Reham did not shy away from providing details about how she goes about parenting her children. Stating that she encourages an open, candid environment in the house, Reham revealed that she wasn’t a rigid parent to her kids and allowed her children the luxury of listening to loud music in the house.
Kaptaan Khan’s wife was all praise for the man and stated that he was an extremely sensitive and caring person, especially for his children. She also stated that Imran was a kind step-father and she often told her children to be like the man that he was. She also recalled how the wedding day had been, stating that she had chosen Imran’s outfit and the fact that she is colorblind.
‘Imran can’t stand uncomfortable clothes; all he wanted to do was–photo khenchain aur main khane pe baithoon. It was a very lovely day spent with my family, children, dogs.’
In a bid to highlight the Pashtun culture in a befitting way and get rid of all the negative stereotypes associated with Pakhtoons, Reham stated that she was producing two upcoming films. One was based on the renowned Pashtun poet Khushal Khan Khattak and the other was a light, romantic comedy film.
In the same interview, Reham also mentioned her favorite dishes. ‘Sushi is my favourite but I like pizza as well. In fact, I can’t live without pizza. I cook a lot and I love trying out new desserts. I make a number of wicked puddings, including tiramisu.’
The national bhabi (as she is often referred to) also revealed that every morning after his jog, Imran presents his new wife with roses. And he also knows how to pick the very best of them! ‘I told Imran that my father used to bring flowers for my mother every day when he went for a jog. Imran brings me flowers every day after his morning run. I don’t need jewellery; Imran picks the best roses for me from our garden.’
According to ARY News, all preparations for execution of Mirza have been completed in the jail.
The executioner has been sent to Machh Jail from Quetta. Saulat Mirza will be hanged to death by early morning on Tuesday at 5:00 am, sources said.
The President had deferred the death sentence of Saulat Mirza after a video statement smuggled out of the jail in which Mirza had made sensational disclosures against his former party MQM and its leaders.
The government had formed a Joint Investigation Team (JIT) to question Mirza in prison.
According to sources, the Ministry of Interior has received the JIT report, which says no more questioning required from the death row convict.
After which the federal government has decided to implement the death sentence, sources said.
Sindh High Court had rejected a petition on May 8, filed by the wife of Saulat Mirza, which sought re-opening of the Shahid Hamid murder case and deferment of her husband’s execution.
The court while rejecting the petition filed by Nikhat Mirza, said that it could not decide the plea since the Supreme Court had already passed an order on the matter.
Former MQM worker Mirza was sentenced to death in 1999 for murder of then managing director of Karachi Electric Supply Corporation Shahid Hamid, his driver Asif Brohi and gunman Khan Akbar in 1997 in Karachi.
