ISLAMABAD: Imran Khan, Pakistan’s most popular politician, is facing a 14-year prison term this month in a case his party says is being used to pressure him into silence.
The former prime minister, long a source of frustration for the powerful military, has been in custody since August 2023 and faces a slew of legal cases he says are politically motivated.
A looming verdict for graft linked to a welfare foundation he set up with his wife, the Al-Qadir Trust, is the longest-running of those cases, with a verdict postponed on Monday for a third time.
“The Al-Qadir Trust case, like previous cases, is being dragged on only to pressure me,” Khan said this month in one of his frequent statements railing against authorities and posted on social media by his team.
“But I demand its immediate resolution.”
Analysts say the military establishment is using the sentence as a bargaining chip with Khan, whose popularity undermines a shaky coalition government that kept his party from power in elections last year.
“The establishment’s deal is he comes out and stays quiet, stays decent, until the next election,” said Ayesha Siddiqa, a London-based author and analyst on Pakistan’s military.
Analysts say the military are Pakistan’s kingmakers, although the generals deny interfering in politics.
Khan said he had once been offered a three-year exile abroad and was also “indirectly approached” recently about the possibility of house arrest at his sprawling home on the outskirts of the capital.
“We can assume from the delays that this is a politically motivated judgment. It is a Damocles sword over him,” Khan’s legal adviser Faisal Fareed Chaudhry told AFP.
“The case has lost its credibility,” he said, adding that Khan will not accept any deal to stay silent.
Khan has been convicted and sentenced four times in other cases. Two cases have been overturned by the Supreme Court, while judges have suspended the sentences from the other two.
The specialist anti-graft “accountability court” is set to announce the verdict and sentence in the welfare foundation case on Friday, two days after government envoys are scheduled to meet leaders from Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party to ease tensions.
The PTI has previously sworn to refuse talks with a government its leaders claim is illegitimate, alleging the coalition seized power by rigging February 2024 polls.
They say they will only take part if political prisoners are released and an independent inquiry is launched into allegations of a heavy-handed response by authorities to PTI protests.
Otherwise, Khan has threatened to pull his party from the negotiations and continue with a campaign of civil disobedience that has frequently brought Islamabad to a standstill.
The most recent protests flared around November 26, when the PTI allege at least 10 of their activists were shot dead. The government says five security force members were killed in the chaos.
“The government would like to appear legitimate, and for that they need PTI to sit down in talks with them,” said Asma Faiz, associate professor of political science at Lahore University of Management Sciences.
“Ideally, they would be looking to offer some relief to Imran Khan and his party to appease the domestic and international criticism,” she told AFP.
For now, it appears to be a stalemate, said Michael Kugelman, South Asia Institute director at The Wilson Center in Washington.
“The army might be willing to give Khan a deal that gets him out of jail, but Khan wouldn’t accept the likely conditions of his freedom,” he told AFP.
“Another problem is I can’t imagine the government agreeing to an investigation of November 26. But PTI won’t budge on that demand.”
A stint in exile is common in the trajectory of political leaders in Pakistan who fall out of favor with the military and find themselves before the courts, only to return to power later.
Three-time prime minister Nawaz Sharif served only a fraction of a sentence for corruption, spending several years in London before returning to Pakistan in late 2023.
Former and current president Asif Ali Zardari moved to Dubai after his party was rebuked by the generals.
Both men are now considered the chief architects of the ruling coalition.
But exile might not fit with the carefully worked image of Khan, whose political rise was based on the promise of replacing decades of entrenched dynastic politics.
“I will live and die in Pakistan,” Khan said in a statement shared by his lawyers. “I will fight for my country’s freedom until my last breath, and I expect my nation to do the same.”
Pakistan’s Imran Khan defiant even as longer sentence looms
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Pakistan’s Imran Khan defiant even as longer sentence looms
- The former prime minister can get 14-year prison term this month in the Al Qadir Trust graft case
- Analysts believe the security establishment is using the sentence as a bargaining chip with Khan
IMF review talks keep stock investors jittery in Pakistan
- Pakistan stock market has seen four bullish runs and as many bearish sessions since an IMF team arrived in Pakistan this month
- Analysts says the talks with the IMF will have a ‘direct impact’ on stocks such as energy, cement and even the cost of borrowing
KARACHI: Stock investors have been trading cautiously since last week when an International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission arrived in Pakistan to review the country’s economic performance under its reforms-oriented, $7 billion loan program, analysts said on Thursday.
Pakistan’s stocks turned green on Thursday after losing more than 300 points in the last three sessions, with the benchmark KSE-100 index gaining 0.9 percent to close at 115,094.23 points. The stocks, which have gained about 3 percent since March 3 when the IMF experts landed in the country, have been fluctuating and witnessed four bull-runs and as many bearish sessions.
While the IMF and the government remain tightlipped about what they are discussing behind the closed doors, local media reports claim that the two sides are not on the same page over issues relating to Pakistan’s revenue shortfall, debt sustainability, and the resolution of the country’s power sector debt. The central bank unexpectedly maintaining the interest rate at 12 percent this week is being seen as another negative for stocks investors.
“The stock market is jittery because of the IMF review along with other factors,” Sana Tawfik, head of research at Karachi-based Arif Habib Ltd., told Arab News.
She said the market was mainly reacting to news reports about the IMF expressing concern over Pakistan’s tax shortfall of around Rs600 billion ($2.1 billion) and rejecting the government’s plans to resolve the lingering circular debt that was expected to increase to as much as Rs1 trillion by June.
The IMF wants Pakistan to increase its tax-to-GDP ratio, which is the lowest in the region, to 13 percent by taxing incomes from agriculture, real estate and retail sectors. Pakistan, however, fell short of the IMF-backed tax collection target this year.
“There is a concern in the market that this tax shortfall may upset the review,” Tawfik said, adding that the selling pressure and a lack of a proper trigger were other drags on the stock index.
Ahsan Mehanti, chief executive officer at Arif Habib Commodities Ltd., said the issues being discussed with the IMF would have a “direct impact” on stocks, including energy, cement and even the cost of borrowing that is directly related to economic growth.
“Generally higher interest rates are negative for the stocks and we believe the IMF certainly does play a role in the central bank’s decisions,” Mehanti told Arab News.
Pakistan’s policymakers avoid squeezing the interest rate much at a time when the IMF is reviewing the release of its first tranche under the $7 billion program.
“The market expects IMF’s proposal may be growth negative owing to higher interest rates to check inflation risks, thin LSM (large-scale manufacturing) growth in case of a cut in the PSDP (public sector development program) or refusals of circular debt plans,” the commodity analyst said.
But Amjad Waheed, chief executive officer at the NBP Fund Management Ltd., held a different view and said the recent fluctuation looked more like a case of profit-taking as investors booked handsome profits during the last couple of years, when the stock market rose as much as 84 percent.
“The IMF talks are ongoing stable and as per routine. I haven’t heard of any tough conditions that the IMF is going to set,” said Waheed, who manages billions of rupees of investor savings.
“People have earned enough and some people now booking profit is normal. The market corrects a bit because of profit-taking.”
The fund manager said some investors might be selling their stocks as their expectation for a rate cut of as much as 1,500 basis points could not materialize because of Monday’s decision by the central bank.
“As an investor I am very conscious at the moment. I am holding on to my stocks. I am holding on to my investments. I am very careful with that,” Isra Ghous Rasool, a 22-year-old stock investor from Karachi, told Arab News in a recent interview.
German coach hopes more teams tour Pakistan to make hockey ‘bigger’ in country
- Germany’s U-21 team clean sweep Pakistan in four-match series played in Lahore, Islamabad
- The visit marks first time in 21 years any German hockey team toured the South Asian nation
ISLAMABAD: Impressed with the hospitality extended by Pakistani fans during the German junior hockey team’s first tour to Pakistan in 21 years, the visiting team’s coach Mirko Stenzel hoped on Thursday that more international teams would tour the South Asian country to make the sport “bigger” here.
Germany’s Under-21 hockey team, current world champions, arrived in Pakistan last week to play a four-match series in the country. This marked the first time an international German hockey team visited Pakistan in 21 years, and the return of international hockey to the country after nearly a decade and a half.
Since the September 11 attacks in the United States, foreign teams have been reluctant to travel to Pakistan in many sports and the South Asian country was left completely isolated as a sporting venue after militants attacked the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore in March 2009.
The visiting world champions beat Pakistan 4-0 in the four-match series, three of which were played in the eastern city of Lahore while the final fixture was played in Pakistan’s capital Islamabad on Thursday. Germany outclassed Pakistan 4-1 to win the final match and lift the trophy.
“I can imagine that once the first start [of an international tour] has taken place with us here, then a lot of other countries will think about it,” Stenzel told Arab News.
“And hopefully for Pakistan and for hockey as well, I hope it is going to get bigger and bigger.”
Field hockey, Pakistan’s national sport, once propelled the country to Olympic gold and global glory, but the game has waned in popularity and participation over the past two decades. Poor management, lack of infrastructure and the rise of cricket has contributed to the decline.
The failure to adapt to modern demands, including fitness and artificial turfs, has further deepened the crisis.
Stenzel said the experience for the German players in the U-21 squad was “really amazing” as most of them had not traveled outside Europe ever.
“It’s been very interesting for them to see what Pakistan is like, the love for hockey, the hospitality,” he said.
German skipper Johan Wehnert was all praises for the Pakistan team, saying that despite the 4-0 series sweep, the green shirts are a “pretty good team.”
“They are pretty strong in counter-attacks and technically they are very, very strong,” Wehnert said. “It was very difficult for us to defend against them.”
About Pakistan’s chances in the upcoming Men’s Junior Hockey World Cup tournament, the German skipper said the green shirts can play for “good places” in the tournament.
Wehnert praised the hospitality extended by fans in Pakistan, noting that the German side had many opportunities to see the country.
“The people are very friendly, not cheering always [only] for Pakistan but also for Germany,” he said. “We are very happy about it.”
Like Stenzel, Wehnert was all praises for Pakistan’s spicy cuisine.
“We tasted some Pakistani dishes, I liked very much the chicken biryani,” the German skipper said, smiling. “I think it was very nice and everyone liked it here.”
Fasting on the frontline: Karachi ambulance driver navigates chaos to save lives during Ramadan
- For Ghulam Nabi and hundreds of other Edhi ambulance drivers, Ramadan does not change their daily duties
- Nabi says his iftar often consists of just dates and water, eaten on the road between emergencies
KARACHI: In Karachi, where traffic is relentless and sirens are a constant, 63-year-old Ghulam Nabi has spent the past 14 years behind the wheel of an Edhi Foundation ambulance, responding to emergencies in a city where every second can mean the difference between life and death.
The Edhi Foundation, one of the world’s largest charities, operates nearly 1,800 ambulances, including over 200 in Karachi, where it was founded by the late veteran philanthropist Abdul Sattar Edhi, who passed away in July 2016. Nabi is one of the hundreds of drivers keeping the wheels of these ambulances going.
Even during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, he remains committed to his duty. Often, his iftar — the evening meal to break the fast, which most people share with their families at home — happens on the road, between dispatches.
“Whether it’s sunny, hot, stormy, rainy, Ramadan or Eid, no matter what, we have to do our duty and serve humanity,” he said in a recent conversation with Arab News.
Living in an old apartment in the city’s historic Kharadar area, he begins his day by walking to the Edhi headquarters nearly a kilometer away. From there, his shift unfolds unpredictably, sometimes requiring him to attend to road accidents, rush cardiac arrest patients to hospitals or transport the deceased to their final resting places.
“Just yesterday, it was time to break the fast. Five to ten minutes before iftar, we were informed that an accident had occurred on Mai Kolachi Road,” Nabi recalled, adding that he had to leave iftar and rush to the spot.
“On the way, someone gave us dates, and we broke our fast with them,” he added.
Nabi recalled that at one point during Ramadan, he was asked to pick up a corpse from a house where it had remained unattended for nearly a week. As he reached the place, he realized it was decomposed and in such a condition that no one wanted to go near it.
But Nabi handled it, giving it to the relatives in a casket after completing the required legal procedures.
“We had to carry the body while fasting,” he said.
‘FRONTLINE HEROES’
Muhammad Amin, who oversees the Karachi Control Room at the Edhi Foundation, holds his team, particularly Nabi, in high esteem.
“He is an excellent driver, and all the qualities required in his job are found in him,” he told Arab News. “From keeping the ambulance clean to its general upkeep, following driving protocols and handling emergencies, Ghulam Nabi excels in all these aspects.”
Amin noted Ramadan always brought unique challenges to the drivers since their workload never decreased.
“There was a fire near Chakar Hotel on the Super Highway [yesterday], where our team, which included the drivers, went,” he said. “The drivers were fasting, but they worked through the fire and performed their duties.”
“If you look at it, these drivers can truly be called our frontline heroes,” he added.
Nabi said his entry into this line of work was unexpected. He used to run a small business that suffered losses, forcing him to shut it down. As he started looking for employment opportunities, a friend referred him to Edhi in 2010.
“Since that day, I have been engaged in humanitarian work,” he said.
‘SAVING HUMANITY’
Karachi, a megacity with over 20 million people, suffers from broken roads, congested streets and widespread disregard for traffic rules. These conditions significantly increase the challenges of Nabi’s job, making him fear that he might not be able to reach people in need on time.
Despite such hardships, he said he was proud of his work and found fulfillment in transporting patients and the injured to hospitals for treatment.
“Whoever saves a life, saves all of humanity,” he said, his eyes shining.
To Nabi, his work is a continuation of the legacy of Abdul Sattar Edhi, the late humanitarian whose foundation has provided free ambulance services for decades.
“Here, we are carrying forward Edhi Sahib’s mission,” he said. “Humanitarian work will never stop.”
As dusk falls and families across Karachi gather for iftar at home, Nabi finds himself away from his loved ones.
“Our hearts also long to break our fast with our children, but our iftar is often on the road or in the ambulance, and we have to break our fast with dates or water,” he said, as he opened his fast with the evening prayer call while sitting on a roadside bench in a Karachi street.
Pakistan revises solar net-metering buyback rate to ease burden on grid consumers
- Economic Coordination Committee allows power regulatory authority to revise electricity buyback rate periodically
- Committee says decision taken due to “significant increase” in solar consumers, financial burden on grid consumers
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) on Thursday revised the buyback rate for solar net-metering electricity from Rs27 per unit to Rs10 per unit, saying the move was intended to ease the burden on grid consumers.
The net-metering policy approved in 2017 allows homeowners and businesses to generate electricity using solar panels and export any excess to the national grid. In Pakistan, it is a billing system where consumers receive credits or monetary compensation for the surplus electricity they send to the grid.
Pakistan’s energy ministry said in April 2024 that the subsidy burden due to the net-metering policy is being shared by the government, domestic and industrial electricity consumers for other affluent consumers who are capable of generating power from solar panels.
The ECC met under Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb to approve a set of amendments to the existing net-metering regulations, a press release from the Finance Division said.
“As part of the approved changes, the ECC has revised the buyback rate from the National Average Power Purchase Price (NAPP) to Rs 10 per unit,” the Finance Division said.
“Furthermore, the committee allowed the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) to revise this buyback rate periodically, ensuring that the framework remains flexible and aligned with evolving market conditions.”
It added that the new framework would not apply to existing net-metered consumers who have a valid license, concurrence or agreement under the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Alternative & Renewable Energy) Distributed Generation and Net Metering Regulations, 2015.
“Any such agreements will remain effective until the expiration of the license or agreement, whichever occurs first,” it said, ensuring the rights and obligations of these consumers, including agreed-upon rates, will continue as per existing terms.
The statement said the ECC also approved an updated settlement mechanism, under which exported electricity units would be purchased at the new buyback rate of Rs10 per unit, while imported units would be billed at the applicable peak and off-peak rates, inclusive of taxes and surcharges.
The ECC said that these amendments were made after a record decline in solar panel prices that led to a sharp increase in the number of solar net-metering consumers.
“As of December 2024, solar net-metering consumers had transferred a burden of Rs 159 billion to grid consumers,” it said.
The statement also highlighted the need for regulatory reforms to ensure balance in the energy distribution system, noting that 80 percent of net-metering consumers are concentrated in nine major cities.
Pakistan has ideal climatic conditions for solar power generation, with most areas receiving over nine hours of sunlight daily. According to the World Bank, using just 0.071 percent of the country’s land for solar photovoltaic (solar PV) power could meet its electricity demand.
With a population of 241 million, Pakistan aims to transition to 60 percent renewable energy by 2030 and reduce projected emissions by 50 percent. Despite recent growth in solar power adoption, the country is still far from achieving these goals.
Pakistan says train hijacking ‘orchestrated’ from Afghanistan, urges Kabul to rein in militants
- Separatist Baloch Liberation Army outfit stormed train in Balochistan on Tuesday, held over 400 passengers hostage
- Analysts say attack reflects “strategic shift” in BLA’s approach of moving away from just military targets to civilians
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Foreign Office spokesperson Shafqat Ali Khan said on Thursday a train hijacking by separatist militants in southwestern Balochistan was orchestrated from neighboring Afghanistan, calling on Kabul to crackdown on insurgents operating from its soil.
Militants blew up the rail tracks and opened fire on the Jaffar Express as it made its way to Peshawar in the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa from Quetta, the capital of mineral-rich Balochistan, on Tuesday.
Separatist groups are fighting a decades-long insurgency to win secession of the southwestern mineral-rich province, home to major China-led projects such as a port and a gold and copper mine. Balochistan is also home to key other mining projects, including Reko Diq, run by mining giant Barrick Gold, and believed to be one of the world’s largest gold and copper mines. Though Pakistan’s largest province by area, Balochistan is the smallest by population. Balochistan also has a long Arabian Sea coastline, not far from the Gulf’s Strait of Hormuz oil shipping lane.
The decades-old insurgency has continued to keep the province of some 15 million people unstable and created security concerns around Pakistan’s plans to access untapped resources.
A total of 21 hostages and four security troops were killed in the latest standoff, according to the military, but the BLA — the largest of Balochistan’s armed ethnic groups battling the government, which claimed the attack — said 50 hostages were executed.
On Wednesday night, the military said the day-long rescue operation had ended, with 21 hostages and four security troops killed.
“The latest terrorist attack against Jaffar Express near Sibi, Balochistan, was also orchestrated and directed by terrorist ringleaders operating from abroad,” Khan said in a weekly press briefing.
“Terrorists were in direct communications with Afghanistan-based planners throughout the incident.”
The spokesman said Pakistan had repeatedly asked the interim Afghan government to deny the use of its soil to terror groups.
“We urge Afghanistan to hold perpetrators, organizers, financiers of this reprehensible acts of terrorism accountable and cooperate with the government of Pakistan to bring all those who are concerned with this attack, including the real sponsors of terrorism, to justice.”
Khan added that the government remained determined to take care of the problem of terrorism “aggressively.”
“STRATEGIC SHIFT?”
The BLA is the strongest of a number of insurgent groups long operating in Balochistan, bordering Afghanistan and Iran. The insurgents have been fighting to lay a claim to local resources which they say belong to their people.
Balochistan’s mountainous and remote border regions serves as a safe haven and training ground for the Baloch island other militants.
The BLA shocked the country’s security establishment when it stormed army and navy bases in 2022. Last August it conducted a series of coordinate attacks in Balochistan in which over 50, including troops, were killed. It has deployed women suicide bombers in recent years, including in an attack on Chinese nationals at a university in Karachi and a bombing in southwest Balochistan. An umbrella group of several Baloch ethnic groups said last week that it had convened all factions in a bid to unite them under a unified military structure. A dormant BLA splinter group called BLA (AZAD) became active in recent weeks.
Hundreds of Baloch activists, many of them women, have protested in Islamabad and Balochistan over alleged abuses by security forces — accusations the government denies.
Islamabad accuses India and Afghanistan of backing the militants to damage Pakistan’s relations with China, a charge both countries deny.
Speaking to Arab News, security analysts described Tuesday’s hijacking of the train as a “strategic shift” by the BLA in terms of moving away from just military targets to unarmed civilians.
“This may give them instant public and media attention but will weaken their support base within the civilian population which is their ultimate objective,” Syed Muhammad Ali, an Islamabad-based security analyst, told Arab News. “This attack on train passengers will reduce sympathy for BLA and improve public support for military action against terrorists.”
Another security analyst, Dr. Qamar Cheema, Executive Director at the Sanober Institute, said the real challenge was the vast and mountainous terrain of Balochistan, which militant organizations were able to exploit.
He said Pakistan needed to invest in more technology including drones, artificial intelligence and other advanced systems, to monitor and manage remote areas in Balochistan where there was little to no population presence.
Dr. Talat Shabbir, director of the China Pakistan Study Center at the Institute of Strategic Studies, said the BLA’s attack on a passenger train is a reflection of its increasing capacity to carry out acts of “terrorism” and killing people on a larger scale.
“This also speaks of some gaps somewhere due to which terrorists could have that intelligence to carry out such an operation,” he told Arab News.
However, Shabbir acknowledged that Pakistan’s security forces also responded swiftly to effectively manage the situation.
He said the train hijacking would not only impact investor confidence in Balochistan, but also create a “ripple effect” across the country.
“The solution to this problem lies in simultaneously implementing security measures to suppress terrorist attacks and politically engaging with the people of Balochistan,” he added.
Brig. (Retd.) Masud Ahmed Khan, a defense analyst, said the main target of the attacks was the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a multi-billion-dollar infrastructure project in Balochistan with Chinese investment.
“The real target is CPEC and Chinese investment, with an aim to destabilize Balochistan and target Chinese interests in the province,” Khan said.
With inputs from Reuters
