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Food Experts Predict ‘Imminent’ Famine in Northern Gaza

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The acute food shortage in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip has become so severe that “famine is imminent” and the enclave is on the verge of a “major acceleration of deaths and malnutrition,” a report from a global authority on food security and nutrition said on Monday.

The group, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification global initiative, which was set up in 2004 by U.N. agencies and international relief groups, has sounded the alarm about famine only twice before: in Somalia in 2011 and in South Sudan in 2017.

The warning came as Israeli forces again raided Al-Shifa Hospital in the northern part of the enclave on Monday, in an operation that they said had been aimed at senior Hamas officials who had regrouped on the premises, setting off an hourslong battle that both sides said had resulted in casualties.

The raid at Al-Shifa, in Gaza City, raised questions about the level of control that Israeli forces have over northern Gaza. In December, the Israeli military said it was nearing “full operational control” there.

Taken together, the fighting and the severe food shortage underlined the chaos and desperation in Gaza after 23 weeks of war. The United Nations’ secretary general, António Guterres, renewed his call on Monday for “an immediate humanitarian cease-fire” and said that the report on imminent famine was “an appalling indictment of conditions on the ground for civilians.”

As Israeli negotiators arrived in Qatar for a new round of talks on a cease-fire and the release of hostages held by Hamas and its allies, President Biden had a phone conversation with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel on Monday, according to Jake Sullivan, the president’s national security adviser.

Mr. Biden relayed that he was “deeply concerned” about the prospect of Israel’s next phase in the war, an incursion into the southern Gazan city of Rafah, which is filled with families displaced from other parts of the territory, Mr. Sullivan said during a news briefing.

Mr. Netanyahu agreed to send a team of military and humanitarian officials to Washington to hear the administration’s concerns, according to Mr. Sullivan. Mr. Biden, who asked Mr. Netanyahu for the visit, also requested that the Israeli delegation offer an alternative proposal to target senior Hamas leaders without a major invasion.

The call occurred as the global initiative’s report stressed that as many as 1.1 million people in Gaza would most likely experience “catastrophic” shortages of food. The group said the continued fighting and aid organizations’ lack of access to northern Gaza, the first part of the territory that Israeli forces invaded in October after the attack by Hamas, had made conditions particularly acute there.

Eylon Levy, an Israeli government spokesman, pushed back on the report, calling it an “out-of-date picture” that “does not take into account the latest developments on the ground,” including major humanitarian initiatives last week. He also said that Israel was taking “proactive measures” to expand aid delivery in northern Gaza.

In recent weeks, some foreign leaders have been increasingly blunt in blaming Israel for the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza. At the opening of a conference on humanitarian aid for Gaza in Brussels, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell Fontelles, accused Israel of “provoking famine.”

Starvation is being used as “a weapon of war,” he said.

Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, rejected Mr. Borrell’s criticism, saying that the country allowed extensive aid in by air, land and sea.

Across the Gaza Strip, the severe shortages of food and other basic goods come amid Israeli’s bombardment and a near-total blockade. The central and southern parts of the territory also face a risk of famine by July if the worst-case scenarios come to pass, the Integrated Food Security group said.

In December, the group said that famine could occur within six months in Gaza unless the fighting stopped immediately and more humanitarian supplies made it into the territory. “Since then, the conditions necessary to prevent famine have not been met,” the report said.

The vast majority of the people in Gaza have been forced from their homes by the war, and many were once again on the move on Monday after the Israeli military ordered civilians to leave the area near Al-Shifa Hospital.

The military said it had launched the Monday raid on the hospital based on new intelligence that Hamas officials were operating from the facilities. It came four months after Israeli forces stormed the complex and found a tunnel shaft they said supported their contention that the armed group had used it to conceal military operations. Since then, Israel has withdrawn many troops from northern Gaza and has shifted the focus of its invasion to the south.

The military said its forces killed 20 militants during the operations on Monday, including a senior Hamas official it identified as Faiq Mabhouh, the head of operations for the internal security forces of the Hamas government in Gaza. He was “armed and hiding in a compound” at the hospital, Israel said.

(Mr. Sullivan, the national security adviser, confirmed on Monday that Israel had also killed Hamas’s deputy commander, Marwan Issa, this month.)

Israel has said that the hospital complex doubles as a Hamas military command center, calling it one of many examples of civilian facilities that the militants use to shield their activities. U.S. spy agencies have said that their own intelligence indicates that Hamas and another Palestinian group used Al-Shifa to command forces and hold some hostages taken during the Oct. 7 attacks.

The hospital and the surrounding area also house about 30,000 patients, medical workers and displaced civilians, and a number of people were killed and wounded in the raid on Monday, the Gazan Health Ministry said.

By midday, about 15 Israeli tanks and several bulldozers were on the hospital’s grounds, said Alaa Abu al-Kaas, who was staying at the hospital with her father, who was being treated.

“The fear and terror are really eating us alive,” she said in a phone call from a corridor of one of the hospital’s buildings where she was hiding. Her voice was barely audible amid loud booms and explosions.

Ms. al-Kaas, 19, said that in the predawn hours Monday, she heard shots and the sound of tanks before Israeli soldiers, using loudspeakers, ordered people in the complex to stay inside and close the windows. She said that Israeli forces told people that they would be moved to the area of Al-Mawasi in southern Gaza, although it was not immediately clear when or how. Israel said it had sought to create a humanitarian “safe zone” in Al-Mawasi, although civilians have found little shelter there.

Ms. al-Kaas said that she had also seen Israeli soldiers holding several people, their hands bound and clothes partly stripped off, in the courtyard of the hospital complex. She added that bodies of people who had apparently been shot were lying in the courtyard. Her account could not be independently confirmed.

“We are just sitting here,” she said, “waiting for them to evacuate us out of here.”

Reporting was contributed by Yan Zhuang, Ameera Harouda, Hiba Yazbek, Myra Noveck, Abu Bakr Bashir and Zach Montague.



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How the uncommitted vote against Biden’s Gaza policy is going ‘national’

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Washington, DC – The organisers of Listen to Michigan — an effort to protest Joe Biden’s policy towards Israel’s war in Gaza — have a message for the United States president: The conflict is not a “niche” issue for only some segments of the political left.

Listen to Michigan emerged earlier this year as a grassroots movement focused on the state’s primary. It called on voters to cast “uncommitted votes” instead of backing Biden’s reelection effort, in an attempt to signal displeasure over the president’s stance on the war.

But that movement has kicked off a domino effect in other key states, with similar “protest votes” emerging. On Monday, Listen to Michigan unveiled plans to take its campaign to the national stage.

“Since we launched our campaign in Michigan, critics have gone out of their way to minimise the momentum of ‘uncommitted’ and Listen to Michigan and what this movement has gained as a niche issue of the left,” Layla Elabed, a key Michigan organiser, said during a news conference on Monday.

“Today, we launched our national movement to let you all know uncommitted voters aren’t going anywhere, and we aren’t backing down until we achieve a permanent ceasefire.”

Organisers said the announcement serves to dispel perceptions that Listen to Michigan was a one-off phenomenon, only applicable to the state where it was founded.

They hope to mobilise voters in other state primaries, to send a strong message before the general election that the war is unacceptable.

A movement born in Michigan

Michigan, itself a key battleground state, is home to large Arab and Muslim populations that have become increasingly politically engaged in recent years.

But the war in Gaza has been a particularly galvanising issue. The death toll in the Palestinian enclave has spiralled to more than 31,700, as Israel continues its months-long bombardment and siege.

United Nations experts have warned that parts of Gaza are on the brink of famine. Still, the Biden administration and other top Washington officials have pledged steadfast support to Israel, despite the human rights concerns its military actions have prompted.

The Listen to Michigan campaign aimed to muster 10,000 “uncommitted” votes in protest of Biden’s support for Israel. Instead, on February 27, Michigan saw 101,000 ballots cast for “uncommitted” in the Democratic primary — smashing the organisers’ goals. “Uncommitted” accounted for 13 percent of the total vote.

But as primary elections continued in other states, some organisers were sceptical that Michigan’s success could be replicated elsewhere. Would the protest spread beyond Arab and Muslim communities?

The Minnesota primary on March 5 offered an answer. There, a whopping 19 percent of Democratic primary voters — approximately 46,000 people — chose “uncommitted” in the state’s primary.

Activists in the state said the “uncommitted” turnout was all the more impressive because of how little time they had to organise: It was an eight-day, mad-dash effort.

Other states — notably Hawaii, Washington, North Carolina and Massachusetts — have also shown promising turnouts. Write-in and ballot-spoiling efforts have even sprouted in states that do not have an “uncommitted” option.

Michigan organiser Lexi Zeidan estimated that more than half a million “uncommitted” votes have been cast nationwide so far, though it is not possible to determine how many were in protest of Biden’s Gaza policy.

“Michigan led with courage that has inspired the uncommitted movement coast to coast with over 500,000 uncommitted voters,” Zeidan said at Monday’s news conference.

She warned that opposition to the presumptive Republican nominee, Donald Trump, will not be enough to rally Democrats to Biden’s side.

“As we launch the Uncommitted National Movement, we send yet another resounding message that this pressure will continue to be sustained, that you cannot weaponise fear of Trump against the very real actions of Biden.”

Eyes on Wisconsin, DNC

The Uncommitted National Movement will remain focused on the primary season, which runs until the Democratic National Convention in August.

It has also sought to distinguish itself from the Abandon Biden campaign, another grassroots effort to reject the incumbent president’s support for Israel.

Unlike the Abandon Biden campaign — which has pledged to boycott the president in the general election as well — organisers for the Uncommitted National Movement said they have not ruled out eventually supporting Biden.

“Once [Biden] has called for a permanent ceasefire, then we can talk about November,” said Abbas Alawieh, a Michigan organiser and former Congressional staffer.

“Until then, the level of pain that our community is experiencing is so excruciating that it is inappropriate to come and ask us for our votes in November while the blood is still being shed,” he said. “Stop funding the killing, then we can talk about November.”

In the meantime, the Uncommitted National Movement is focusing on the April 2 primary in Wisconsin, another Midwestern state that will be key to Biden’s reelection campaign.

Biden beat Trump in Wisconsin by just 20,682 votes in 2020, one of the slightest margins of any state. Organisers believe a strong “uncommitted” showing could be another resounding example of Biden’s vulnerability in Midwestern swing states.

“As a Palestinian American, a longtime organiser in Milwaukee, and as the former digital organising director of Biden’s 2020 Wisconsin campaign, I led the way for Biden’s victory when he won here by only 20,000 votes,” Heba Mohammad, a spokesperson for Listen to Wisconsin, told reporters.

“As people of conscience and pro-democracy, pro-peace, pro-justice voters, we are going to use this primary to call for an end to the genocide right now.”

A ‘real’ electoral problem

The national “uncommitted” campaign is also seeking to leverage its influence at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

So far, uncommitted votes will be represented at the convention by a total of 20 delegates: 11 delegates from Minnesota, seven from Hawaii and two from Michigan.

Those delegates were won in the state primary votes. Ultimately, the candidate with the most delegates from the state primaries receives their party’s nomination at the convention.

There are about 3,900 delegates available, and Biden has already broken the threshold of 1,968 needed to be named the party’s presidential nominee.

Nevertheless, Alawieh said the movement is working with state-level leadership for the Democratic Party to ensure that the “uncommitted” delegates can represent their message at the convention.

“Our intention is to coalesce and be in a coalition and community come August so that we speak with one loud, antiwar voice,” he said.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, James Zogby, the president of the Arab American Institute in Washington, DC, said that any delegates representing the movement will be largely symbolic, as they will likely be constrained by the convention’s tight rules.

That means it will be difficult for them to introduce any positions or to take the stage at the Democratic convention without first gaining wider support from other delegates. Large swathes of the party remain staunchly pro-Israel, although there has been some softening in recent months.

Still, Zogby said the “uncommitted” movement has exposed real vulnerability in Biden’s campaign.

“Uncommitted” votes in Michigan and Minnesota surpassed the margin of victory in those states in recent presidential races. Polls currently show a close race between Biden and Trump, with just a handful of states likely to make the difference.

The situation is indicative of a larger problem for the Democratic Party, Zogby added, saying it had pivoted away from “bread-and-butter, household and community-based issues”.

“We are losing — as we see in the polls — a percentage of Black, Latino, Asian and young voters because of Gaza,” he said, “and because they have other issues that we’re not addressing”.

“If you lose two-thirds of the Arab vote, that’s one thing. That’ll only kill you in Michigan,” Zogby added. “But you lose 5, 10 percent of these minority voters or young voters nationally, then you’re dead in the water.”



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Who was Marwan Issa, the Hamas commander killed by Israel?

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Marwan Issa, the deputy commander of Hamas’s military wing in Gaza and a presumed mastermind of the Oct. 7 assault on southern Israel, was confirmed dead on Monday by a senior U.S. official after an Israeli airstrike more than a week ago.

Jake Sullivan, the U.S. national security adviser, told reporters that Mr. Issa, one if the highest-ranking officials in Hamas, had been killed. Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said on March 11 that Israeli military warplanes had targeted Mr. Issa and another senior Hamas official in an underground compound in central Gaza.

With his death, Mr. Issa, who had been among Israel’s most wanted men, became the senior-most Hamas leader to be killed in Gaza since the start of the war. Israeli officials have characterized the strike as a breakthrough in their campaign to wipe out the Hamas leadership in Gaza.

But experts cautioned that his death would not have a devastating effect on Hamas’s leadership structure. Israel has killed Hamas’s political and military leaders in the past, only to see them quickly replaced.

Here is a closer look at Mr. Issa and what his death means for Hamas and its leadership.

Mr. Issa, who was 58 or 59 at the time of his death, had served since 2012 as a deputy to Mohammed Deif, the elusive leader of the Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s military wing. Mr. Issa assumed the role after the assassination of another top commander, Ahmed al-Jabari.

Mr. Issa served both on Hamas’s military council and in its Gaza political office, overseen by Yahya Sinwar, the group’s highest-ranking official in the enclave. Mr. Issa was described by Palestinian analysts and former Israeli security officials as an important strategist who played a key role as a liaison between Hamas’s military and political leaders.

Salah al-Din al-Awawdeh, a Palestinian analyst close to Hamas, described Mr. Issa’s position in the group as “part of the front rank of the military wing’s leadership.”

Maj. Gen. Tamir Hayman, the former Israeli military intelligence chief, said Mr. Issa was simultaneously Hamas’s “defense minister,” its deputy military commander and its “strategic mind.”

Experts described Mr. Issa as an important associate of Mr. Deif and Mr. Sinwar, though they said his death did not represent a threat to the group’s survival.

“There’s always a replacement,” Mr. Awawdeh said. “I don’t think the assassination of any member of the military wing will have an effect on its activities.”

Michael Milshtein, a former Israeli military intelligence officer and an expert on Palestinian affairs, said Mr. Issa’s death was a significant blow to the Qassam Brigades, though he conceded it wasn’t “the end of the world” for Hamas.

“He had a lot of experience,” Mr. Milshtein said. “His death is a big loss for Hamas, but it isn’t a loss that will lead to its collapse and it won’t affect it for a long time. In a week or two, they’ll overcome it.”

Mr. Milshtein added that even though Mr. Issa’s opinion was valued at the highest levels of Hamas, the fact he did not directly command fighters meant his death did not leave a gaping hole in Hamas’s operations.

Mr. Issa was a lesser-known member of Hamas’s top brass, maintaining a low profile and rarely appearing in public.

Gerhard Conrad, a former German intelligence officer who met Mr. Issa more than a decade ago, described him as a “decisive and quiet” person lacking charisma. “He was not very eloquent, but he knew what to say, and he was straight to the point,” Mr. Conrad said in an interview.

Mr. Conrad said he met Mr. Issa, Mr. al-Jabari and Mahmoud al-Zahar, another senior Hamas official, about ten times between 2009 and 2011 in Gaza City. The men met as part of an effort to broker a prisoner swap between Israel and Hamas.

“He was the master of the data on the prisoners,” Mr. Conrad said of Mr. Issa. “He had all the names to be negotiated on.”

Mr. Conrad, however, said it was apparent at the time that Mr. Issa was a subordinate to Mr. al-Jabari. “He was a kind of chief of staff,” he said.

It was only after Mr. al-Jabari’s assassination that Mr. Issa’s prominence grew, but he still was keen to stay out of view. Few images of Mr. Issa are in the public domain.

Mr. Awawdeh, the analyst, called Mr. Issa a man who liked to “remain in the shadows” and who seldom granted interviews to the media.

In one of those rare interviews, Mr. Issa spoke in 2021 about his role in the indirect talks that resulted in Israel exchanging more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners for a single Israeli soldier, Sgt. First Class Gilad Shalit, and his hopes for a future conflict with Israel.

“Even if the resistance in Palestine is monitored by the enemy at all hours, it will surprise the enemy,” he told Al Jazeera at the time.

In a separate interview with a Hamas publication in 2005, Mr. Issa lauded militants who raided Israeli settlements and military bases, calling the actions “heroic” and an “advanced activity.”

Mr. Issa was born in the Bureij area of central Gaza in 1965, but his family hails from what is now the Ashkelon area in Israel.

A Hamas member for decades, he was involved with the militant group involved pursuing Palestinians who were believed to have collaborated with Israel, according to Mr. Awawdeh.

Mr. Issa spent time in prisons operated by both Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

Admiral Hagari has said that Mr. Issa helped plan the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack. Mr. Issa is also thought to have planned operations aimed at infiltrating Israeli settlements during the second intifada in the 2000s, Mr. Milshtein said.



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Tuesday Briefing: Putin’s Victory Spectacle

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A day after he was declared victor in Russia’s rubber-stamp presidential election, Vladimir Putin used a celebration yesterday to signal that the war against Ukraine would continue to dominate his rule — and that his fight to add territory to Russia wasn’t over.

At the celebration held in Red Square, Putin highlighted Russia’s control of Crimea. He stood in front of a banner celebrating the 10th anniversary of the peninsula’s annexation, and spoke about bringing the people of eastern Ukraine “back to their home family.”

Repeating a warning he made last summer, Putin said that Russia could seek to create a “security zone” on Ukrainian territory that Russia does not currently control.

Russians are now bracing for what might come next. For many, the big worry is of another military draft. And analysts believe that creating such a buffer zone would require capturing parts of the Kharkiv region of Ukraine — which could require a new mobilization.

Election results: The authorities said that Putin had won more than 87 percent of the vote. Here are takeaways.

Polls: The Kremlin may have felt more comfortable orchestrating such a large margin of victory because Putin’s approval rating has climbed during the war in independent polls. But a poll from late January also found that more than half of respondents supported restoring relations with Western countries and a truce with Ukraine.

Other updates:


Gambian lawmakers voted yesterday to revoke a ban on female genital cutting. If the bill passes the final stages, which analysts said is likely, the country would be the first nation to roll back the protections for girls that were enacted in 2015.

An influential imam in Gambia, a Muslim-majority country in West Africa, led calls to repeal the ban, claiming that cutting is a religious obligation and is important culturally. The practice is internationally recognized as a gross violation of human rights and is a leading cause of death in the countries where it is practiced.


Israeli forces used tanks and bulldozers yesterday in an attack on Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza. The facility, the largest hospital in Gaza, has been a flashpoint of the war: Israel and U.S. spy agencies believe Hamas has used the hospital as a command center, which Hamas denies.

Israel said that it was targeting top Hamas officials who had regrouped at Al-Shifa, and that its soldiers returned Hamas’s fire. Gazan health authorities said Israel had launched missiles at the complex and fired into surgery rooms. Details of the fighting could be verified. Both sides said combatants had been killed.

Background: Evidence examined by The Times suggested Hamas used the hospital for cover and maintained a tunnel beneath it, but Israel has struggled to prove that it is a command center.

The cryptocurrency market crashed two years ago. But it makes for a booming industry at internet cafes in the Philippines, where people can make around twice the nation’s minimum wage by playing crypto-earning games.

Shakira has had a rough couple of years.

After decades of hit singles and groundbreaking Latin-pop crossovers, she broke up with her partner of 11 years, the father of her two sons. She helped her father through hospitalizations and brain surgery and settled a Spanish tax evasion case, paying a fine of about $8.2 million.

The breakup and the dissolution of her family form the backbone of her first album in seven years, “Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran,” which translates to “Women No Longer Cry.” Our critic spoke with Shakira about her new album, which comes out on Friday.

“If life gives you lemons, you make lemonade,” she said. “That’s what I did with this album — use my own creativity to process my frustration and my anger and my sadness. I transmuted or transformed pain into productivity.”



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Punjab presents Rs4.48 trillion budget for last quarter of fiscal year 2023-24

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Punjab Finance Minister Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman presented the provincial budget for the last quarter of the fiscal year 2023-24 worth Rs4.48 trillion in today’s Punjab Assembly session.

During his budget speech, Rehman said the estimate for total income is Rs3331.7 billion. He said that Punjab will get Rs2706.4 billion from the Federal Divisible Pool Under the NFC Award.

He said that provincial revenue has been estimated at Rs625.3 billion, which is 25 percent higher than the previous fiscal year. Out of this, the Punjab Revenue Authority will generate Rs240 billion, Board of Revenue Rs99.2 billion and the Excise Department Rs45.5 billion.

The finance minister said that under the Rs30 billion Ramadan Package, special hampers are being delivered at the doorsteps of deserving families for the first time in the province’s history. He said that Rs10 billion have been allocated for Pakistan’s largest Nawaz Sharif IT City in Lahore and Rs4 billion for the IT Infrastructure Investment Programme. He said the Provincial Database Authority is being set up at a cost of Rs500 million.

Rehman said that for the education sector, a total allocation of Rs595.8 billion has been made and it makes 26 percent of the total non-development provincial budget. He said the new government is going to launch a five year Health Reforms Programme and a grant allocation of Rs473.62 billion has been made for the health sector during this fiscal year.

The finance minister said that four overhauling programmes for improvement of Rural Health Centers and Basic Health Units have been launched which will cost Rs40 billion. He said the Nawaz Sharif Institute of Cancer Treatment and Research is being set up in Lahore with an estimated cost of Rs30 billion.

He said that Rs320 billion has been allocated for construction and repair of 80 roads and highways throughout the province.





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UN-backed report says famine ‘imminent’ in northern Gaza

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UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called a report on hunger in Gaza from the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification global initiative ‘an appalling indictment’ of conditions in Gaza and called for an immediate ceasefire.



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Punjab presents Rs4,480.7 billion budget for fiscal year 2023-24

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Punjab Finance Minister Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman presented the provincial budget for the fiscal year 2023-24 worth Rs4,480.7 billion in today’s Punjab Assembly session.

During his budget speech, Rehman said the estimate for total income is Rs3331.7 billion. He said that Punjab will get Rs2706.4 billion from the Federal Divisible Pool Under the NFC Award.

He said that provincial revenue has been estimated at Rs625.3 billion, which is 25 percent higher than the previous fiscal year. Out of this, the Punjab Revenue Authority will generate Rs240 billion, Board of Revenue Rs99.2 billion and the Excise Department Rs45.5 billion.

The finance minister said that under the Rs30 billion Ramadan Package, special hampers are being delivered at the doorsteps of deserving families for the first time in the province’s history. He said that Rs10 billion have been allocated for Pakistan’s largest Nawaz Sharif IT City in Lahore and Rs4 billion for the IT Infrastructure Investment Programme. He said the Provincial Database Authority is being set up at a cost of Rs500 million.

Rehman said that for the education sector, a total allocation of Rs595.8 billion has been made and it makes 26 percent of the total non-development provincial budget. He said the new government is going to launch a five year Health Reforms Programme and a grant allocation of Rs473.62 billion has been made for the health sector during this fiscal year.

The finance minister said that four overhauling programmes for improvement of Rural Health Centers and Basic Health Units have been launched which will cost Rs40 billion. He said the Nawaz Sharif Institute of Cancer Treatment and Research is being set up in Lahore with an estimated cost of Rs30 billion.

He said that Rs320 billion has been allocated for construction and repair of 80 roads and highways throughout the province.





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Gunmen in Nigeria kidnap at least 87 people in new attack

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The attack comes days after an armed gang seizes 286 students and staff from a school.

Gunmen in Nigeria have kidnapped at least 87 people in a new attack, residents and police say, after an armed gang seized 286 students and staff from a school earlier this month.

Officials on Monday said the attack took place in the Kajuru area of Kaduna state and the abducted included women and children.

Bandits routinely loot villages and carry out mass kidnappings for ransom in northwest and north-central Nigeria, where the violence has displaced about one million people, according to the United Nations.

Authorities have seemed powerless to stop the near-daily attacks, piling pressure on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

On Monday, Kaduna police spokesperson Mansur Hassan said the Kajuru incident happened on Sunday night, adding that security agents have been deployed to rescue the villagers.

“They went and removed people from their homes at gunpoint,” local official Ibrahim Gajere told the Agence France-Presse news agency.

Residents said armed men dressed in army uniforms arrived in the village undetected because they had parked their motorbikes away from the village.

Village head Tanko Wada Sarkin said 87 people were taken.

“We have so far recorded the return of five people back home who fled through the bush. This attack makes it five times that these bandits have attacked this community,” Sarkin told the Reuters news agency.

Aruwa Ya’u, another resident, said he was captured but later released by the gunmen because he struggled to walk due to his poor health. He was receiving treatment at a local government clinic, he said.

“We were outside our homes chatting around 10:30pm [21:30 GMT], and suddenly bandits appeared, beating and shooting,” Haruna Atiku said. His wife and two daughters are missing.

On Saturday, 16 people were kidnapped in the Dogon Noma area, about 10km (6 miles) away, officials said.

On March 7, gunmen kidnapped more than 250 students from a school in Kuriga village, about 150km (93 miles) from Kajuru in one of the biggest attacks in years.

Kidnappings at schools in Nigeria were first carried out by the Boko Haram group, which seized more than 200 students from a girls school in Chibok in Borno state a decade ago. But the tactic has since been adopted by criminal gangs who do not have any ideological affiliations but are seeking ransom payments.

Kidnapping victims in Nigeria are often freed after negotiations with the authorities although a 2022 law bans handing money to kidnappers and officials deny ransom payments are made.

The kidnappings are tearing apart families and communities who have to pool their savings to pay the ransoms, often forcing them to sell prized possessions like land, cattle and grain to secure the releases of loved ones.

The Nigerian risk consultancy SBM Intelligence said it has recorded 4,777 people abducted since Tinubu took office in May.



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Former ISI chief Faiz Hamid’s brother sent on judicial remand in graft case

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Naib Tehsildar Najaf Hamid appears before court on March 18, 2024 in this still taken from a video. — X/@MurtazaViews 

Naib Tehsildar Najaf Hamid, brother of ex-spymaster retired Lieutenant General Faiz Hamid, was sent to Adiala Jail on a 14-day judicial remand by a local court in Rawalpindi on Monday in a corruption case.

The development comes as the suspect moved the court of Senior Civil Judge Waqar Hussain Gondal seeking pre-arrest bail after a special anti-corruption court threw out his post-arrest bail plea.

Najaf is facing charges of accumulating assets beyond his known source of income, corruption and misconduct.

In his order, the senior civil judge stated: “Investigation officer/case officer has requested to send the above accused to the judicial lockup.”

Former ISI chief Faiz Hamids brother sent on judicial remand in graft case

“Record reflects that offences allegedly levelled against the accused are non-bailable in nature. Therefore, as per the request of I.O./C.O. accused person is sent to judicial lock up and be produced along with report [challan] under Section 173 Cr.P.C before the concerned court on April 1, 2024,” read the order.

Earlier in the day, Najaf appeared before the court of anti-corruption judge Ali Nawaz Bhakar seeking an extension to his pre-arrest interim bail. The officials of the Anti-Corruption Establishment (ACE) Rawalpindi circle taken him into custody as the court rejected his request.

Meanwhile, the suspect filed a post-arrest bail in the same court, which was also rejected by the judge.

On the other hand, the anti-corruption department Punjab confirmed that Najaf was arrested after his interim bail was dismissed by the court.

The former spymaster’s brother was arrested after allegations against him were proved during the investigations, the officials said.



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US envoy Blome, FM Dar discuss economy, regional security

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ISLAMABAD: US Ambassador to Pakistan Donald Blome called on Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar and reiterated Washington’s resolve to work with Islamabad. 

During the meeting on Monday, they discussed matters of mutual interest including economy, trade and regional security with Blome stating that Pakistan’s security and prosperity is a top priority of the US.

The two officials also exchanged views on US support for economic reforms, according to an official statement.

They also discussed enduring significance of the US-Pakistan Green Alliance framework.

In a statement on X, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Blome assured FM Dar of his and his mission’s full support in further strengthening bilateral relations with Islamabad.

“Progress made in diverse fields and ways and means to further enhance the bilateral ties were also discussed,” it added.

Separately, the US envoy also met President Asif Ali Zardari and underlined the need to enhance trade and investment relations with the USA, besides exploring collaborative opportunities in diverse sectors.

President Zardari said that American enterprises should be encouraged to invest in the Pakistan Stock Exchange as well as bring innovative business ideas to the country’s economy.

Ambassador Blome called on the president at Aiwan-e-Sadr, the President Secretariat Press Wing said in a statement.

During the meeting, the president said that Pakistan had enjoyed a long-standing and broad-based relationship with the US spanning over seven decades, which needed to be further strengthened.

He said the top priority of Pakistan was to put its economy on the right track and overcome economic and security challenges.

President Zardari also highlighted that climate change was a global issue, and Pakistan was among the countries most vulnerable to its adverse impacts.

He said that Pakistan wanted to improve its agricultural sector by adopting modern irrigation techniques to conserve water and reduce reliance on flood irrigation.

Ambassador Blome said that Pakistan and the US could enhance bilateral collaboration in the fields of trade and investment, climate change, renewable energy, agriculture and security.

He informed that the US had completed the Sindh Basic Education Programme to build climate-resilient schools to strengthen Pakistan’s education sector.

He also congratulated the president on assuming the office for a second time.

Since the formation of the new government at the Centre following the February 8 elections, the US envoy has been holding meetings with top newly-elected officials.

Last week, Ambassador Blome met National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and discussed strengthening bilateral relations and parliamentary cooperation for mutual gains.

In his interaction with the premier, the US top diplomat discussed the economic reforms through the International Monetary Fund (IMF) alongside other key issues.

PM Shehbaz had expressed satisfaction on the present state of bilateral relations between Pakistan and the United States, according to Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).

He emphasised the need to maintain the positive momentum by regular convening of existing dialogue mechanisms, focused on trade, investment, energy, health, defence, education, agriculture and climate change.

The premier had also highlighted the role of the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC) that has been established to fast-track foreign investments in priority sectors in Pakistan.

A number of issues of bilateral and regional significance were also discussed during the meeting, including the situation in Gaza and the Red Sea, developments in Afghanistan, as well as the case of Dr Aafia Siddiqui, which was raised forcefully by PM Shehbaz.



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