A Pakistani doctor has won the praise of Saudi Arabia after he successfully led fight against Covid-19 pandemic and lowered the fatality rate in the kingdom during virus upsurge. He was presented with the award during a ceremony to mark Saudi National Day on Sept 23. Hailing from Layyah, Dr Shahzad Ahmad Mumtaz has been working in Saudi Arabia for the last 18 years.
The US House of Representatives has overwhelmingly approved a bill that would require the Trump administration to toughen its response to China’s crackdown on its Muslim minority in Xinjiang. The Uighur Forced Labor Prevention Act calls on the president, Donald Trump, to ban imports from China’s Xinjiang region as an attempt to stop systemic forced labor from the Uighur community.
Saudi Arabia will gradually resume the year-round umrah pilgrimage from October 4, the interior ministry announced, after it was suspended in March because of the coronavirus pandemic. In the first stage, “6,000 citizens and residents within the kingdom will be allowed to perform the umrah per day from October 4,” the ministry said in a statement published by the official Saudi Press Agency.
Diplomatic breakthroughs between Israel and Gulf monarchies have left the Palestinians feeling betrayed and anxious about the future. Palestinians believe peace deals will encourage Israel to continue occupation with confidence an full force. US President Donald Trump has hinted that several more Arab states would soon announce their intention to sign similar deals, suggesting a more substantive shift.
A latest report, revealing role of global banks in industrial-scale money laundering, has named six Pakistani banks among transgressors. International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) published the catastrophic consequences of money laundering by banks globally in a report titled as FinCEN Files. The recently uncovered trove of government documents revealed 29 transactions that showed suspicious transactions to and from Pakistan.
Coronavirus vaccines being developed in China may be ready for use by the general public as early as November, an official with the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said. China has four Covid-19 vaccines in final stage of clinical trials. At least three of those have already been offered to essential workers under an emergency use programme launched in July.
US President Donald Trump announced on another “peace deal”, this time between Israel and Bahrain. This deal makes Bahrain, the second Arab country to settle with its former foe in less than a month, United Arab Emirates (UAE) being the first one. A joint US-Israel-Bahrain statement said there would be “full diplomatic relations”.
A Norwegian lawmaker has nominated US President Donald Trump for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in brokering a deal between Israel and the United Arab Emirates. This is the second time he has put forward the US president for the honour. The Norwegian Nobel Committee, which decides on the award, declined to comment.
As coronavirus cases surge in India, the country has now become the second worst hit with the pandemic, displacing Brazil on Monday. With its nationwide tally of 4.2 million exceeded only by the US figure of 6.2 million, India is adding more cases each day than any other country this year since the outbreak of the pandemic.
Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leader, Altaf Hussain has been fined by the British government for not paying nearly over £2 million to the national exchequer over a period of 20 years. Further investigations are underway for evading taxes over large earnings running into millions of Pounds. The tax investigation is based on income, payments, assets accumulation and National Insurance contributions which were never paid since 1995-2015.