Tag: Says

LAHORE: The flood tax will be levied for a six-month initiatory period and the government has redressed all reservations of the provinces over the Reformed General Sales Tax (RGST) before presenting the bill in parliament, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said on Saturday.
He was talking to the media here Saturday in a private hospital after visiting Pakistan People's Party (PPP) veteran leader and Senator Gulzar Ahmed Khan. Gilani said that there was no foreign pressure on the

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court (LHC) Justice Sheikh Azmat Saeed on Friday issued notices to the federal and Punjab governments and sought a detailed report until November 22 on a petition challenging the excessive increase in sugar prices across the country.
Due to supply shortage, the commodity was being sold for Rs 130 per kilogramme in the retail market. Justice Saeed observed that the supply shortage was created by the sugar hoarding mafia, which had made money by selling the

QUETTA: Balochistan Assembly Speaker Muhammad Aslam Bhotani said that Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani was influencing the Balochistan government in the allotment of land along the coastal highway to Arabs and warned that Balochis would resist if they were deprived of their land.
Addressing a press conference at the Quetta Press Club, Bhotani said that the previous government had allotted 70,000 acres along the coastal highway of Balochistan to a federal institution, which

LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz Secretary Information MNA Ahsan Iqbal has said that Reformed General Sales Tax (GST) will be a disaster for the national economy.
He told Pakistan Today on Friday that GST imposition would entail another wave of price hike and the PML-N would never allowed the enforcement of this tax. He said the government was trying to achieve a revenue boost by imposing a repressive tax but it was mistaken because such an objective could not be achieved in

LAHORE: Pakistan wicketkeeper Zulqarnain Haider has claimed to turn down lucrative offers from the media to give details of his decision to desert his team in Dubai midway through an ODI series and flee to London after receiving death threats for refusing to fix matches.
The 24-year-old wrote on his Facebook account that the News of the World tabloid had offered him lots of money for an interview but he spoke to them without taking a penny.
"They offered me lots of money

ISLAMABAD: The federal government had assured the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) that sugar prices would be brought back to their previous position within three days, Overseas Pakistanis Minister Dr Farooq Sattar said on Thursday.
He made these remarks in a press conference. "After our opposition to the Revised General Sales Tax (RGST) and Flood Surcharge bills in the federal cabinet's meeting, two cabinet members, Naveed Qamar and Hafeez Shaikh, held a meeting with us and

ISLAMABAD: As the government blocked a joint resolution by the Pakistan Muslim League-N and the PML-Q in the National Assembly against spiraling prices, Opposition Leader Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan vowed on Wednesday that the opposition would not let the PPP-led government pass any bill to impose more taxes on the people.
The house was up in arms when the government went out of its way to block the resolution which the opposition parties were pushing through. Realizing that things

ISLAMABAD: Adviser to the prime minister Senator Mian Raza Rabbani on Wednesday briefed the parliament on decisions taken by the Implementation Commission on the 18th Amendment, saying during or after the process of devolution of functions to the provinces, the existing employees of these ministries or divisions would not be laid off.
"Rather, it would be ensured that terms and conditions of the service of those employees shall not be varied to their disadvantage. It was further

NEW YORK: Former president Pervez Musharraf on Tuesday said India was trying to create a hostile state in Afghanistan as he hit back at criticism of his country's role in fighting extremists.
Musharraf, who is touring the United States as part of a comeback bid, said he has seen photographs of Kabul-based "Pakistan terrorists" - a likely reference to Balochistan separatists - meeting in India with intelligence agents.
"If I'm allowed to be very, very frank, India's role in

LAHORE: Pakistan People's Party (PPP) believes in serving the masses and not in acquiring power or amassing wealth, Federal minister for Law and parliamentary affairs Babar Awan said while talking to reporters after visiting PPP's Malik Mushtaq Awan on Tuesday
People were sick of the Punjab government and were resorting to suicide, he alleged, adding that 1000 had already taken their lives. "I fear the day when Punjabis will start committing collective suicides because of the

KUALA LUMPUR: The US has the resources and allies needed to combat Al Qaeda as it expands beyond its base in Afghanistan and Pakistan to places like Yemen, Defence Secretary Robert Gates said on Tuesday.
Al Qaeda-affiliates in troubled states like Yemen, Somalia and elsewhere are proving a growing threat to the US and its allies, nine years after the Sept. 2001 attacks by Al Qaeda's central leadership. Al Qaeda's Yemen-based branch, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, has taken

LAHORE: The Managing Director of Pakistan Electric Power (PEPCO) Rasul Khan Mahsud has said that the industry is not suffering from load-shedding and their entire power requirements are being met by PEPCO.
He was talking to an eleven member delegation of Steel Melters Association led by Masood Gul, who called on him at the WAPDA house today.
Dilating on the present power situation in the country, the MD PEPCO expressed the need to realistically deal with the crisis and

TEHRAN: Iran reiterated on Tuesday that the nuclear fuel swap issue was separate from its overall atomic programme for which the six world powers and Tehran are expected to hold talks later this month.
"We have said from the beginning that these two issues are independent from one another," Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast told AFP. "The issue of fuel swap is an independent issue and the issue of dialogue with 5+1 is another independent issue.
If the

ISLAMABAD: Emphasising the need for good governance in the country, Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) President Asma Jahangir on Sunday said good governance was also needed in the judiciary where some petitions were taken up speedily while others were neglected.
"Good governance is not only needed in the executive but also to be followed in the judiciary. Why are some petitions taken speedily and others neglected, and a few disappear with the passage of time," she said while

MUMBAI: US President Barack Obama on Sunday urged arch-rivals India and Pakistan to work together to resolve their differences, while pushing Islamabad to do more to tackle extremism.
Speaking to college students in Mumbai, Obama said the US "could not impose" a partnership between the two countries, but added fast-growing India would benefit more than any other nation from better ties with Pakistan.
"I am absolutely convinced that the country that has the biggest stake in

Hollywood actress Julianne Moore has vowed never to undergo cosmetic surgery to change her look as she thinks it won't make her feel any younger. The 49-year-old actress insists she would still feel her age, regardless of how her appearance changes.
"First and foremost, I'm an actor and so I don't want to do anything to my face. I can do whatever I want, and I'm still going to be 49 years old, it's not going to change anything," she said. "I don't know that I'm going to look any

PHNOM PENH: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday hailed the work of a Khmer Rouge war crimes tribunal as "painful but necessary", despite Cambodian opposition to pursuing more regime leaders.
Clinton praised the nation for confronting its dark past after an emotional visit to Phnom Penh's genocide museum, where she saw photos of gaunt-faced prisoners, dozens of skulls of victims and paintings of people being tortured. The court "is bringing some of the people who