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Listen to the buildings - please!

"A widow is a person who loses her spouse; an orphan loses his parent, but there is no word in English for the one who loses his child, because afterwards there is not much left to lose," said the protagonist of the movie in his deep midnight radio jockey voice while adjusting black spectacles on his nose. His face felt dead, expressionless, and his eyes blank. I pressed the stop button on my phone and thought if we could halt a painful scene in real life. My mind could draw immediate analogies between this scene and the pain through which the parents of the kids buried alive under the rubble of a collapsed building in Lahore must have passed. With those kids, their parents would have buried a lot more: dreams, hopes, futures, laughs, generations and life. On August 26, 2025 I wrote an Op-ed with the same title. To emphasise the gravity of the matter, I am publishing under the same title today. Buildings speak – not with words, but through the cracks that snake ac...

PVARA chief and Mufti Taqi Usmani discuss crypto, Shariah considerations in ‘constructive’ meeting

Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA) Chairman Bilal bin Saqib on Saturday met renowned Islamic scholar Mufti Taqi Usmani, with both sides holding a “constructive discussion” on digital assets and the ongoing debate over their Shariah status. In a post on X, Saqib said the meeting focused on the need to assess emerging financial technologies while ensuring protection for citizens from potential risks. “We are united on one fundamental objective: protecting Pakistanis from fraud, exploitation, and financial harm,” he said. Today, I had a constructive discussion with Mufti Taqi Usmani Sahib on digital assets and the ongoing conversation around their Shariah status. We are united on one fundamental objective: protecting Pakistanis from fraud, exploitation, and financial harm. I shared that… — Bilal bin Saqib MBE (@Bilalbinsaqib) July 11, 2026 The crypto chief said blockchain, digital assets, stablecoins and tokenised re...

South Africa World Cup midfielder Adams dies aged 25

South Africa international midfielder Jayden Adams, who featured in all three of his side's ​group stage games at the 2026 World Cup, has died, the ‌country's sports ministry said on Saturday. No cause of death was given. Adams, 25, started the Group A fixtures against Mexico and the Czech Republic, and came off the ​bench in the 1-0 win over South Korea that earned ​the side a first-ever place in the knockout rounds, ⁠where they were beaten by Canada. The player's grandmother died a day ​before South Africa played the Czechs, and he was replaced at halftime ​during the fixture. Read More: African results justify World Cup slots He played for the Pretoria-based Mamelodi Sundowns in South Africa, helping them to the African Champions League title in the 2025/26 season. "South African football has lost ​a gifted player, a proud servant of the game and a ​young life that still had so much to offer," the South African Football Players' ‌Union, ...

PM Shehbaz calls for restraint, regional peace in in calls with Iranian president, Qatari emir

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Friday urged restraint and called for the immediate restoration of peace and stability in the region during separate telephone conversations with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani amid recent regional tensions after the outbreak of fresh hostilities between the United States and Iran. An interim ceasefire agreement signed between Washington and Tehran — under the mediation of Pakistan — was intended to provide a 60-day window for negotiations on a permanent agreement, but indirect talks in Qatar ended last week with no sign of headway and the US military unleashed a new wave of strikes against Iran on Tuesday. Iran subsequently said it had targeted US military sites in Bahrain and Kuwait and that it had shot down a US MQ-9 drone attempting to interfere in the operation. Bahrain's army ​later said it had thwarted Iranian attacks.  According to a sta...

Four terrorists killed in Karak-Kohat joint police operation

Four terrorists were killed during a joint intelligence-based operation (IBO) carried out by the Karak and Kohat police in the Khattak Dam area along the Karak-Kohat border, the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Police said on Friday. According to a statement, the operation was launched at around 5am after police received credible intelligence regarding the presence of terrorists in the area. During the operation, the terrorists opened fire on the police party, prompting an effective retaliatory response in which four terrorists belonging to the Commander Zahid group were killed. Read: 14 killed in suicide attack on PPP leader's residence It added that the group was involved in the killings of Station House Officer Banda Umar Nawaz in Karak district and Inspector Tahir Nawaz in Kohat district in 2025, as well as Deputy Superintendent of Police Asad Mehmood, Sub-Inspector Anar Gul and other police officers and personnel in 2026. The statement said police had cordoned off the area and lau...

Turkey's Erdogan gives NATO leaders revolver conundrum after summit

Belgium's prime minister was a little surprised on landing back home from Wednesday's NATO summit in Turkey to find that he had a handgun and ammunition in his luggage. After NATO leaders gathered ​for Wednesday's fractious summit in Ankara, their host, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, handed each an unusual parting gift: ‌a vintage revolver, along with live ammunition indicating it was not just for show. Erdogan wanted to showcase Turkey's defence industry, which has become a key export and foreign policy tool. Images shared by the office of Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda showed what appeared to be the Gumusay .357 Magnum, a rare six-shooter ​produced by Turkish arms maker MKE in the 1990s. It was set in a wooden display box featuring Turkey's flag ​and the NATO logo as well as a placard inscribed "Gumusay, the first revolver-type handgun produced in ⁠our country" in Turkish and English. A gun gifted by Tur...

China warns of ‘space arms race’ as Japan expands military footprint

China on Thursday issued a strong warning against Japan’s growing military ambitions in space, cautioning that Tokyo’s latest defence reforms risk accelerating the weaponisation of space and fuelling a broader global arms race, Xinhua news agency reported. Senior Colonel Chen Xi, spokesperson for China’s Ministry of National Defence, sharply criticised Japan’s recent legislative move to rename its Air Self-Defence Force as the Aerospace Self-Defence Force and establish a specialised Space Operations Wing. Responding to media queries, Xi said that Japan has “openly designated space as an operational domain” and is actively pursuing a military build-up beyond Earth’s atmosphere — a shift that Beijing views with deep concern. Read: Japan rejects 'new militarism', accuses China of rapidly arming “Over the past five years, Japan’s military spending in relevant fields has increased tenfold, while its operational...