Investigation begins into cause of Pakistan International Airlines crash that killed 97
The last thing Muhammad Zubair can remember before the plane hit the ground is the acrid smell of jet fuel and the cries of fellow passengers as flames began to engulf the cabin.
As he struggled to unbuckle his seatbelt with fire blazing beneath his chair, Zubair said he “followed the light and got to this hole and I jumped out on to the wing, and then to the ground”.
Continue reading...Muhammad Zubair, one of two people who survived a plane crash in Pakistan, has described his escape from the burning aircraft after a second failed attempt to land in Karachi on the eve of the Muslim festival of Eid. The Pakistan International Airlines Airbus A320 with 99 passengers and eight crew members onboard crashed into a crowded residential district on Friday afternoon
One of two survivors recalls how Airbus crashed during second attempt to land at Karachi airport, killing at least 97 people
One of the two survivors of the Pakistan plane crash has described his escape from the burning plane after it came down during a second attempt at a landing.
“All I could see around was smoke and fire,” engineer Muhammad Zubair told Geo News. “I could hear screams from all directions. Kids and adults. All I could see was fire. I couldn’t see any people – just hear their screams.”
Continue reading...Pakistan International Airlines plane arriving from Lahore comes down in residential area
At least 66 people are confirmed to have died after a Pakistani passenger aircraft crashed into a residential area near Karachi’s airport.
The pilot of the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) Airbus A320 jet travelling from Lahore called in to air traffic control describing a technical fault minutes before the crash, which happened at 2.45pm local time.
Continue reading...There are fears of mass casualties after a passenger aircraft carrying more than 100 people crashed into a residential area in the Pakistani city of Karachi.
The Pakistan International Airlines jet, carrying 99 passengers and eight crew members, was on its final approach to Karachi airport when it went down near Model Colony
Continue reading...Kaavan, a 33-year-old elephant living a sorry existence in Islamabad zoo, to be released after campaign by pop icon
The plight of an animal known as Pakistan’s loneliest elephant is set to come to an end after a court declared he should be freed from Islamabad zoo – to the delight of his longtime champion, pop icon Cher.
Kaavan, a 33-year-old Asian elephant from Sri Lanka, has been the focus of a four-year campaign by Cher to secure his release from Murghazar Zoo in Pakistan’s capital, after the singer saw pictures of the elephant living alone and held miserably in chains in a small enclosure, with only a small dirty pond to play in.
Continue reading...Father of one victim and brother of the other arrested in connection with the murders
Two female teenagers in Pakistan have been murdered by family members after a video emerged online of them associating with a man.
The pair, said to be aged 16 and 18, were shot dead by male relatives in their remote village in Pakistan’s North Waziristan province this week after footage was posted online of them in the company of a young man in a secluded area.
Continue reading...Sajid Hussain, who wrote about human rights violations, went missing in March
A Pakistani journalist living in exile in Sweden and who had been missing since March has been found dead in a river.
Sajid Hussain, who was granted political asylum in Sweden in 2019 after fleeing Pakistan, had been missing since 2 March. He was last seen boarding a train to Uppsala, a city 35 miles (56km) north of Stockholm.
Continue reading...Provincial government issues order despite court’s ruling to overturn the four’s convictions
Pakistani authorities have ordered four men including a Briton convicted of the 2002 murder of the US journalist Daniel Pearl to be detained for three months despite a lower court’s ruling to overturn their convictions.
The high court in the province of Sindh on Thursday acquitted the four, including Briton Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, who was sentenced to death in 2002 for masterminding Pearl’s murder. The other three were sentenced to life.
Continue reading...British-born Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh set to be released in coming days
A Pakistani court has commuted the death sentence of a British-born man convicted of the 2002 kidnapping and murder of the Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, and acquitted three co-accused.
At least four people were convicted in connection with Pearl’s murder, including Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh who was sentenced to death in 2002 for masterminding the killing. He has been in jail for 18 years awaiting the outcome of an appeal.
Continue reading...Sajid Hussain, who wrote about rights abuses in Balochistan, had been granted Swedish asylum
A prominent Pakistani journalist who fled the country after receiving death threats has gone missing in Sweden where he had been granted political asylum.
Sajid Hussain, 39, went into self-imposed exile in 2012 after his reporting on forced disappearances and human rights abuses in the turbulent region of Balochistan had led to death threats. He had continued to run an online newspaper, the Balochistan Times, from abroad covering the same topics.
Continue reading...A full-scale disaster unfolded as we switched our phones back on after nine days of Colombian beaches and jungles
You can learn a lot about yourself in times of crisis, but you learn a hell of a lot more about the person you weather said crisis with. Best to strap in and bite your tongue. A lifetime of three weeks ago, my clever, rational other half and I went on a holiday to Colombia. He’s a man who rarely travels without a first aid kit, gaffer tape and a multi-tool thing allegedly essential for “survival”. I rarely travel without what he assumes are decadent luxuries – basic toiletries, to the rest of us – and three more books than I could possibly read. It’s a delightful match.
For eight or so days, we adventured on the country’s Caribbean coastline, trekked the jungle and landed on remote beaches far away from phone signal. It’s fair to say we were late to the memo. Turning our phones on after a self-imposed period of isolation was like watching a disaster film unfold. First, on a six-inch screen squinting at ticker tapes of rolling news. Then in full-blown Technicolor as Cartagena went into lockdown, with face masks being dealt out on street corners and a strict curfew enforced by police.
Continue reading...Rani Bibi was 14 when she was convicted but received no compensation for the miscarriages of justice that led to her spending two decades in prison
A child bride who spent 19 years in prison for a murder she did not commit is to sue the Pakistan authorities in an effort to persuade the country to help thousands of other victims of miscarriages of justice.
Rani Bibi was just 14 when she was convicted, alongside her father, brother and cousin, of the murder of her husband and spent the next two decades sweeping the floors of an overcrowded Pakistan prison.
Continue reading...Emmanuel Macron invites Christian who spent eight years on death row to live in country
Asia Bibi, the Pakistani Christian woman who spent eight years on death row on blasphemy charges, has filed an initial application for asylum in France and been invited to live in the country by Emmanuel Macron.
But speaking after a meeting with the French president in the Elysée palace on Friday, Bibi said she had not decided where she would settle. She was acquitted last year and granted a one-year leave of stay with her family in Canada.
Continue reading...Creators of Meray Paas Tum Ho could be facing legal suit amid accusations the hugely popular show was ‘misogynistic’
A court in Pakistan has summoned the creators of a wildly popular television series after a petition was filed demanding they apologise for portraying Pakistani women as “greedy, selfish and non-professional”.
In the petition filed at the Sindh high court last month, lawyer Sana Saleem said the television series Meray Paas Tum Ho (I Have You) was “ridiculing a woman who makes the same decision as every other man in society”.
Continue reading...Bibi, freed last year and now in Canada, will release her autobiography on Wednesday
Asia Bibi, the Christian woman who spent eight years on death row in Pakistan for blasphemy, has released two photographs taken in exile, as she prepares for the launch of her autobiography on Wednesday.
The former farm labourer, whose case became one of the most high-profile human rights campaigns in the world, was freed last year and flew to Canada, where she was reunited with her family. They are all believed to be living under assumed identities, at a secret location, as they still receive death threats from extremists.
Continue reading...Menus in sign language and jobs for the hearing impaired are challenging discrimination against those with disabilities
It’s not just the bright yellow walls that make the Abey Khao cafe in Islamabad’s Mughal Market stand out. The menu is in sign language, as is the English alphabet painted on the walls, along with the signs for “yes”, “no”, and “thank you”. Customers are encouraged to place their orders using sign language.
The Abey Khao - which means “Hey Eat” – cafe is the believed to the only fast food cafe in Pakistan set up and run by deaf people.
Continue reading...Former ruler, who no longer lives in country, was tried for imposing state of emergency in 2007
A Pakistani court has sentenced the country’s former military ruler Pervez Musharraf to death on charges of high treason and subverting the constitution.
Musharraf, who seized power in a 1999 coup and later ruled as president, is not in Pakistan and was not available for comment on the sentence, handed down by an anti-terrorism court hearing the high treason case.
Continue reading...Bill will allow refugees from nearby states to become Indian but not if they are Muslims
Indian lawmakers have approved legislation granting citizenship to migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan – but not if they are Muslim. Critics of the government said the legislation undermines the country’s secular constitution, as protests against the law intensified in some parts of the country.
The citizenship amendment bill seeks to grant Indian nationality to Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jains, Parsis and Sikhs who fled the three countries before 2015.
Continue reading...Source claims government plans secret vaccinations after 12 children fall prey to disease
Officials in Pakistan have been accused of covering up an outbreak of the most dangerous strain of polio and planning a covert vaccination programme to contain the disease.
According to a source in Pakistan’s polio eradication programme and documentation seen by the Guardian, a dozen children have been infected with the P2 strain of polio, which causes paralysis and primarily effects those under five.
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