‘Operation Ashura’: Pakistan’s national airline launches special flights to Najaf for Muharram
‘Operation Ashura’: Pakistan’s national airline launches special flights to Najaf for Muharram/node/2545466/pakistan
‘Operation Ashura’: Pakistan’s national airline launches special flights to Najaf for Muharram
View of the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) passenger plane, taken through a glass panel, at Islamabad International Airport, Pakistan on October 3, 2023. (REUTERS/File)
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s national airline has launched special flights to Iraq’s Najaf city to provide a seamless travel experience to pilgrims during the Islamic month of Muharram, state broadcaster Radio Pakistan reported on Sunday.
Iraqi cities of Najaf and Karbala hold tremendous significance for Shia Muslims around the world, many of whom travel to these cities during the first two months of Islamic lunar calendar to recall the sacrifices made by Imam Hussain, the grandson of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him).
“Pakistan International Airlines has launched special flights for Najaf to facilitate pilgrims during Muharram,” Radio Pakistan said in a report. “The flights operation called ‘Operation Ashura’ is designed to provide a seamless travel experience for pilgrims during this significant period of religious observance.”
The state broadcaster said return flights from Najaf will begin on July 20.
Pakistan’s central moon-sighting committee met on Saturday in the southwestern city of Quetta to spot the Muharram crescent. The Ruet-e-Hilal Committee (RHC) announced that Pakistan would observe the first of Muharram on July 8 while Ashura, which marks the martyrdom of Hussian, would be observed on July 17.
Ashura, which falls on Muharram 10 every year, sees hundreds of thousands of Shia Muslims take part in religious gatherings and processions in Pakistan to mourn Hussain’s passing. These processions and gatherings take place amid tight security, as militant groups in Pakistan have often targeted them in the past and killed of hundreds of people.
Pakistan’s largest Punjab province has proposed a ban on all social media platforms from Muharram 6-11 to ensure proper security measures, provincial information minister Azma Bukhari said on Friday.
The measure was aimed at protecting Shia Muslims from sectarian violence and control the spread of hate speech and misinformation, the provincial government wrote in a letter to Pakistan’s interior ministry last week.
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s top diplomat at the United Nations on Tuesday criticized Israel’s “extremist leaders” for continuing the war in Gaza for their own political survival, as fresh Israeli airstrikes killed about 400 people, threatening to unravel a fragile ceasefire.
Addressing a UN Security Council briefing on the humanitarian situation in Gaza, Ambassador Munir Akram accused Israel of systematically eroding the ceasefire agreement reached in January and called for an end to its “slaughter” of the Palestinian people.
The ceasefire agreement was reached on January 15 following more than a year of Israeli airstrikes that flattened much of Gaza’s infrastructure, including schools, hospitals and residential neighborhoods.
In the weeks that followed, Hamas, which governs the enclave, returned several batches of Israeli hostages taken at the start of the war, and the international community began to discuss reconstruction plans for the war-ravaged territory.
“The agreement of 15th January for a ceasefire, for a three-phase ceasefire, offered a sliver of hope for the Palestinian people, for the Israeli people, and for the world community,” Akram said. “The Arab and OIC [Organization of Islamic Cooperation] reconstruction and peace plan was under consideration in capitals. It offered a road to peace.”
“But obviously, this glimmer of hope and hope for peace was not to the liking of the extremist leaders who rule Israel today,” he continued. “They see their survival in the continuation of the war.”
Akram said Israeli was guilty of violating every article of international law, urging the world community to respond with justice or risk the world order’s regression “into the barbarism from which the Charter of the United Nations was supposed to rescue us.”
Akram highlighted Israel’s deliberate efforts to dismantle the ceasefire agreement, starting with the imposition of a humanitarian blockade of Gaza. This, he said, was followed by restrictions on Palestinian Muslims from accessing Al-Aqsa Mosque during the holy month of Ramadan.
“These are all tactics of the oppressor,” he maintained. “And now, they have escalated to blatantly violate the ceasefire and resume attacks against the helpless Palestinians in Gaza who were just returning to rebuild their homes.”
The Pakistani envoy called for the resumption of humanitarian aid to the Palestinian enclave and the need for a revival of negotiations leading to a two-state solution, with an independent Palestinian state along pre-1967 borders and East Jerusalem as its capital.
“The upcoming June conference, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, is an important opportunity for the peaceful resolution of the Palestinian question and the implementation of the two-state solution,” he said, adding that “to realize the possibility of peace, Israel’s aggression, its attacks and its slaughter of the Palestinians must stop.”
RAWALPINDI: As visitors walk into the newly established ‘New Kartarpura Food Street’ at Chandni Chowk in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi, they are immediately drawn to a unique sight: a group of men dressed in long, ankle-length robes typically worn by men in the Middle East and North Africa, their heads covered in ghutras, spinning lassi with wooden ladles in large metal pots.
The food vendor called Lahore 0 Kilometer is one of around 30 eateries that have come up on the new food street, seen as a more spacious, less crowded and family-friendly alternative to the historic Kartarpura Street in Rawalpindi.
Kartarpura Street was part of Rawalpindi’s Sikh neighborhood and the city’s main commercial area in the 19th century but over the past few decades has developed into a major food street and become famous for dishes such as nihari, a stew of tender beef or mutton meat with bone marrow, and siri paye, a traditional breakfast dish of cow or goat head and trotters. Lassi, both saltish and sweet, remains a key attraction, with a large number of vendors coming from Lahore and Gujranwala to sell the yogurt–based beverage, which is a staple at iftar and suhoor meals, especially when Ramadan falls in warmer months.
But customers and sellers alike have long complained of traffic congestion and overcrowdedness on the narrow street. This year, many of the stalls and food vendors have been shifted to the New Kartarpura Food Street, set up under the Chandni Chowk flyover on the first day of Ramadan. The market will continue to operate after the end of the holy month.
“Our main branch is in Kartarpura, but this venue has created a new trend, a proper space for families,” Abdul Latif Rashid, from the famed Kala Khan Nihari House, told Arab News. “Because of that, the [public] response here has been very good.”
Visitors are seen having suhoor meal at the New Kartarpura Food Street during Ramadan in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, on March 15, 2025. (AN photo)
The food street’s organizer, Raja Usama, said the idea for the new market was inspired by Ramadan food festivals in Dubai.
“Different kinds of food are available here,” he told Arab News. “Small, new businesses and young people are also being promoted. Families are being given a good environment.”
A motorcyclist rides past New Kartarpura Food Street in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, on March 15, 2025. (AN photo)
Muhammad Hamza at Lahore 0 Kilometer said people were coming from both Rawalpindi and Islamabad to try their lassi, which sells in seven flavors for between $0.71 to $2.85.
“We have great love for Arab countries. The attire I am wearing has been given a lot of respect by the [local] people, and I wish to wear the same attire when I visit Saudi Arabia,” Hamza told Arab News, as people stopped to take photos of him preparing lassi in his thobe and ghutra.
A collage of images shows vendors preparing lassi, a yogurt-based beverage, in Arab attire for suhoor at the Lahore 0 Kilometer in the New Kartarpura Food Street in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, on March 15, 2025. (AN photo)
For visitors like Mahnoor Kareem, a Chinese language instructor, the new food street provides much-needed respite to the overcrowded old Karparpura.
“Kartarpura in Rawalpindi is very famous, especially for sehri [suhoor], but we never went there because it’s always too crowded. Most people prefer to come here with their families,” she said. “We tried their paye and lassi, and we really liked it.”
Kanwal Zahra, who sells Pakistani cuisine, has also set up shop at the new food market.
“We serve traditional dishes passed down from our grandmothers, roti made from pure wheat flour, special jaggery and sugar tea, palak paneer, and lassi,” she said.
A food vendor prepares food for suhoor at the New Kartarpura Food Street in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, on March 15, 2025. (AN photo)
Besides traditional dishes, the food street also has more innovative offerings.
“Initially, people said they did not eat momos, especially boys,” dumplings vendor Meena Nabeel said. “But once they try, they come back with their friends and say that it is good, they like the taste. The filling and dough get a lot of praise. Our sauces also receive a lot of compliments.”
ISLAMABAD: The local administration has imposed a curfew in several areas of northwestern Pakistani districts of North Waziristan, South Waziristan and Tank on Wednesday, the respective district authorities said, amid a rise in militant attacks in the South Asian country.
Pakistan has witnessed a sharp increase in militant attacks in its northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and southwestern Balochistan provinces, with an unprecedented train hijacking killing 31 people, including security men, in Balochistan’s Bolan range last week, followed by a suicide attack in Nushki that killed five people on Sunday. In KP, the Pakistani Taliban, or the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), and other militant groups have mounted their attacks in recent months, frequently targeting security forces convoys and check-posts, besides targeted killings and kidnappings of law enforcers and government officials.
The precarious security situation prompted top Pakistani civilian and military leaders to huddle together at the Parliament House on Tuesday to carve out a strategy to deal with the renewed wave of militancy. Senior military and intelligence officials briefed participants at Tuesday’s meeting, following which Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif called on the country’s political leadership to unite in its resolve to combat militants with “the full force of the state.”
The office of the deputy commission in KP’s Tank district announced that a curfew will remain in place from 6am till 6pm from Kaur Fort to Manzi-Khirgi to Jandola areas on Wednesday, while the Dabarra market will also remain closed during this period, citing “heightened threat” to the movement of law enforcement agencies.
“All concerned are requested to cooperate with security forces and avoid traveling during curfew hours,” the Tank deputy commissioner’s office said in a notification.
The development comes weeks after a paramilitary troop and 12 militants were killed in a gunbattle in the district after the militants carried out a suicide attack at the Frontier Constabulary (FC) headquarters, a police official with direct knowledge of the development said.
The attack took place in the Jandola tehsil.
In South Waziristan, a curfew will remain imposed along the Aziz Abad Chowk-Sarwakal-Jandola, Spin Jumat-Asman Manza-Ladha-Makin, and Bibi Raghzai-Kotkai-Jandola roads, according to the local administration.
Authorities in North Waziristan asked people to abide by the curfew from 6am till 6pm in Nawaz Kot Bridge to Dunkan, Tehsil Razmak, and Dunkan to Malogai Bridge in Tehsil Dossali in the wake of “current spell of insurgency, terrorism and targeting of security forces by the militants.”
Both North and South Waziristan districts, which border Afghanistan, had been a stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban before successive military operations drove the militants out of the region more than a decade ago.
Pakistan ranks as the second-most affected country by terrorism, according to The Global Terrorism Index 2025. Militancy-related deaths surged by 45%, rising from 748 in 2023 to 1,081 in 2024, marking one of the steepest global increases.
Militant attacks in Pakistan more than doubled from 517 in 2023 to 1,099 in 2024. Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa remained the hardest-hit provinces, accounting for over 96 percent of attacks and fatalities.
Pakistani officials have accused the neighboring India and Afghanistan of fanning militancy in KP and Balochistan provinces. New Delhi and Kabul both deny the accusation.
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan condemns fresh Israeli strikes on Gaza that have killed hundreds of people and threatened a ceasefire with Hamas, the Pakistani foreign office said on Tuesday, expressing fears about renewed regional instability.
Israel launched airstrikes across the Gaza Strip early Tuesday that killed more than 300 Palestinians, including women and children, according to hospital officials.
The surprise bombardment threatened to wreck the ceasefire in place since January and fully reignite the 17-month-old war, with Israeli officials saying the operation was expected to expand.
Pakistan’s Foreign Office condemned the strikes as a “horrific act of aggression” in the holy month of Ramadan and called it a flagrant violation of the ceasefire agreement.
“This horrific act of aggression, in the holy month of Ramadan, is a flagrant violation of the ceasefire agreement and marks a dangerous escalation that threatens to destabilize the entire region once again,” it said in a statement.
The surprise attack shattered a period of relative calm during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and raised the prospect of a full return to fighting in a 17-month war that has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and caused widespread destruction across Gaza. It also raised questions about the fate of the roughly two dozen Israeli hostages held by Hamas who are believed to still be alive.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he ordered the strikes because of a lack of progress in talks to extend the ceasefire. The White House said it had been consulted and voiced support for Israel’s actions.
A senior Hamas official said Netanyahu’s decision to resume the war amounts to a “death sentence” for the remaining hostages. Izzat Al-Risheq accused Netanyahu of launching the strikes to try and save his far-right governing coalition and called on mediators to “reveal facts” on who broke the truce.
“We urge the international community to play it’s role to immediately end the violence and resume diplomatic efforts toward an immediate and lasting peace in Gaza and the Middle East,” the Pakistani foreign office said.
Israel’s war on Gaza began after Hamas’ attack on southern Israel on Oct.7, 2023, which killed 1,200 people and over 200 others were taken into Gaza as hostages. The subsequent Israeli campaign killed around 50,000 Palestinians and displaced almost all of Gaza’s 2 million population, leaving the territory a wasteland.
Both sides agreed to an uneasy, six-week truce on Jan. 19 which paved the way for the release of hostages from both sides.
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan is mulling transaction structure for a second attempt to sale 51-100 percent share of its loss-making national carrier, the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), the Privatization Commission said on Tuesday.
Cash-strapped Pakistan is looking to privatize the debt-ridden PIA to raise funds and reform state-owned enterprises as envisaged under a $7 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) program secured last year.
Late last year, a deal fell through after a potential buyer reportedly offered $36 million for a 60 percent stake in the national flag carrier, a fraction of the asking price of approximately $303 million.
On Tuesday, Muhammad Ali, Pakistan prime minister adviser on privatization, presided over the commission’s board meeting to discuss transaction structure for the divestment of the Pakistan International Airlines Corporation Limited (PIACL).
“The board recommended to CCOP (Competition Commission of Pakistan) the transaction structure proposed for the 2nd attempt of PIACL privatization based on divestment of 51 percent to 100 percent share capital of PIACL together with the management control of PIACL,” the Privatization Commission said.
“The final terms and conditions for the transfer and acquisition of equity stake shall be finalized during course of bidding process and set out in the bid documents for approval by CCOP.”
In June, the government had pre-qualified six groups, but only real-estate development company Blue World City participated in the bidding process to acquire the airline.
Among concerns raised by potential bidders for the PIA stake include policy continuity, honoring contracts, inconsistent government communication, unattractive terms and taxes on the sector, and the flag carrier’s legacy issues and reputation.
Officials say PIA’s cumulative losses alone are close to $3 billion, with the total asset valuation of the airline standing at approximately $572 million.
Earlier this year, PIA resumed operations in Europe, after a 2020 ban by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) over concerns about the ability of Pakistani authorities and its Civil Aviation Authority (PCAA) to ensure compliance with international aviation standards.
EASA and UK authorities both suspended permission for PIA to operate in the region after Pakistan began investigating the validity of pilots’ licenses following a deadly plane crash that killed 97 people. Pakistan hopes new European routes and flying approval to the UK will boost PIA’s selling potential.
