MQM-P condemns India's actions
India's water terrorism has exposed it as a threat to regional peace, Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan said urging world powers to take notice of atrocities in the illegally Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
MQM-P Chairman Dr. Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, along with senior central leaders including Dr. Farooq Sattar, Nasreen Jalil, Anees Qaimkhani, and Syed Amin-ul-Haq, held a press conference at the party's Bahadurabad center.
Addressing the media, Dr. Siddiqui stated that present-day India is a religiously fanatic state, a reality now evident to the world. He asserted that India poses a threat not only to the region but also to global peace and security.
Condemning India's water aggression, Dr. Siddiqui stated that the Indus Waters Treaty, brokered by the World Bank, is an international agreement that the Modi government does not have the authority to unilaterally terminate.
He affirmed the entire nation's support for the decisions of Pakistan's National Security Committee and lauded the Pakistan Armed Forces as the guardians of the country's internal and external security.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Business Recorder
6 hours ago
- Business Recorder
Pak delegation interacts with Chatham House
LONDON: A high-level Pakistani parliamentary delegation, led by former Foreign minister and Chairman Pakistan People Party Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, engaged with eminent members of the British think tank, academia, and policymaking community at the prestigious Chatham House, one of the UK's leading think tanks focused on foreign and security policy issues. The closed-door discussion was held under the 'Chatham House Rules,' which is used around the world to encourage inclusive and open dialogue in meetings. Bhutto Zardari and other delegation members conveyed Pakistan's perspective on the recent escalation in South Asia while expressing serious concern about India's unprovoked military aggression that resulted in civilian casualties and posed a significant threat to regional stability. They underscored that India's actions constituted a clear violation of Pakistan's sovereignty, international law, and the United Nations Charter. The Pakistan delegation said that Pakistan's armed forces, with the full support of the people of Pakistan, had given a befitting response to India, demonstrating Pakistan's resolve to defend its sovereignty, and thwarting India's ambitions to set any new so-called 'normal' in the region. Bhutto Zardari strongly denounced India's unilateral and illegal suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty. He warned that the weaponisation of water undermines international norms and sets a perilous precedent. He urged the international community to take notice of this alarming development and hold India to account for its actions. The delegation noted that the pending resolution of the Jammu and Kashmir dispute remains the principal stumbling block to lasting peace and stability in the region. They urged the international community to support meaningful dialogue and ensure respect for international commitments and human rights. The other members of the delegation include Minister for Climate Change and Environmental Coordination, Dr Musadik Masood Malik; Chairperson, Senate Standing Committee on Climate Change and Environmental Coordination and former Minister for Information and Climate Change, Senator Sherry Rehman; Chairperson, National Assembly Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and former Foreign Minister, Hina Rabbani Khar; former Minister for Commerce, Defence and Foreign Affairs, Engineer Khurram Dastgir Khan; MQM's Parliamentary Leader in the Senate and former Minister for Maritime Affairs, Senator Syed Faisal Ali Subzwari, Senator Bushra Anjum Butt, former Foreign secretaries, Ambassador Jalil Abbas Jilani and Ambassador Tehmina Janjua. Pakistan's High Commissioner to the UK Dr Mohammad Faisal was also present during the round table conference. Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
Business Recorder
7 hours ago
- Business Recorder
Adviser to KP CM accuses federal govt of manipulating data, misleading public
ISLAMABAD: The adviser to the chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on finance, Muzzammil Aslam, on Monday accused the federal government of manipulating the data presented in the Economic Survey for 2024-25 and misleading the public about the state of the economy. In a video message released to the media shortly after the government unveiled its Economic Survey for 2024-25, Aslam accused Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif's administration of misleading the nation through manipulated figures in an effort to sustain its narrative and hold on to power. He said that the government had used the so-called 'Form 47 approach' – a reference to alleged electoral manipulation – not only to form its administration but also to manage public perception, including during the recent release of the Economic Survey. He rejected government claims of economic stability and recovery, saying that inflation, unemployment and international isolation had worsened. Citing the government's own economic indicators, he said the country's GDP growth had fallen short of targets. 'This year's GDP stands at 2.7%, well below the 3.6% target set last year. I told the prime minister directly last week that this is not something to boast about – it's figure fudging,' he said, recalling a meeting with Sharif. 'Instead of misleading the nation, the government should face economic realities.' Referring to the World Bank, he said 110 million Pakistanis – out of a population of 240 million – were now living below the poverty line, arguing that the government had 'completely crushed the poor.' He also challenged the government's assertion of growth in the livestock and industrial sectors. Further citing official reports, he said agriculture had shrunk by 13.5%, with major crop yields in decline. 'There is no truth in the government's claims of recovery when key sectors are underperforming.' He added that core inflation stood at 11.6%, challenging the government's assertion that inflation had eased. 'Does this look like inflation is going down? Clearly not,' he said. Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
Business Recorder
7 hours ago
- Business Recorder
Why is this budget critical?
Shortly before Eid, our defense forces, valiantly and with tactical brilliance, established our territorial security. Soon after Eid, Finance Minister Aurangzeb will present the federal budget today and the expectation is that it will put us on the path to economic security. Thus, this auspicious Eid-ul-Adha would be the harbinger of enduring National Security. Economic vulnerabilities have accumulated over the last three decades leading to balance of payments crises, disruption of growth and poor job creation. This has reversed our excellent achievements in improving living standards and poverty reduction. It is time to correct this. The core vulnerabilities are: a chronic fiscal deficit financed with expensive and unsustainable domestic and foreign borrowing; and an economic structure that produces a surge in imports as growth recovers. Together, they cause repeated balance of payments crises. We should expect the budget to address these vulnerabilities. Fiscal consolidation must remain a top budget priority. The IMF programme hinges on this. On the expenditure side, we should expect no untargeted, underfunded subsidies and see continued reduction in waste. On revenue, we should expect fairness, i.e., more untaxed and undertaxed activities brought into the tax net and treated on par with those already paying taxes. This should reduce undue burden on the corporate sector, including on salaries. The strategic shift we should expect in the budget is a credible programme to address the most damaging structural weakness of the economy: declining productivity and loss of international competitiveness in both manufacturing and agriculture. This is documented well in national and multilateral research. It is the primary reason for poor employment creation and our boom-and-bust cycle of growth and balance of payments crises. There are multiple reasons for declining productivity; the most frequently mentioned are high energy cost, high taxes, regulatory burden, etc. To compensate for the high cost of doing business, well connected business houses successfully lobbied the government to give them protection from international competition in the shape of high tariffs on imports. The government was a willing partner for three reasons. High import tariffs (that include regularity duties and 'additional' customs duties, also known as para tariffs) brought in additional revenue to plug the fiscal deficit. Import tariffs rewarded the favoured business houses with protection (according the World Bank, Pakistan is the second most protected economy in the World after Egypt), and they remained well-disposed to the elected government. The politically difficult problem of fixing the energy sector, bringing the untaxed/undertaxed (retail, real estate) into the tax net and improving governance could be postponed to another day/government. The protection route to solving the problems of low profits of business houses has inflicted a heavy cost on the economy. In the production chain (for example, plastics), it raises the cost of inputs for the entire downstream industry rendering it uncompetitive. Consumers pay higher prices for poor copies of the same product available in the global market (for example, motor vehicles). Importantly, protected local manufacturers producing for the local market have no incentive to invest in processes and technologies to make them efficient. This approach to doing business has rendered key government ministries partners in perpetuating inefficiency and low productivity. They see their job as ensuring that business houses remain protected to enjoy high profits rather than incentivizing them to become internationally competitiveness and export. The media campaign of business houses benefitting from protection claims that they create jobs that would be lost if protection is removed. The reality is that the protected firms have created a tiny fraction of the jobs needed, given the growth in labor force. Most jobs are still created by small informal firms. Thus, in the absence of protected profits in the auto sector, the small auto parts manufacturers would create far more jobs selling to internationally competitive local or global firms, producing for the much larger global market. The textiles chain is a good example. More protected yarn and gray cloth manufacturers use capital intensive technologies and produce far fewer jobs than less protected readymade garments producers who create a lot of employment producing for the global market. Therefore, high protection tends to undermine the ultimate policy goal of creating productive jobs via exports and thus contribute to strengthening national security. The budget is expected to announce many measures focused on the supportive pillars that reverse productivity decline viz., competitive energy and tax regime, reduced regulatory burden, strengthened agriculture, adaptation to climate change, and robust social protection. The bottom line, however, is this: we should thus expect to see in this budget a credible programme of reduced protection. A medium-term horizon for making the transition would be needed, but we should see a resolute commitment to the direction of change. We should be confident (based on international experience, our own past experience of liberalization, and rigorous modeling) that this is the path to economic recovery. The smart business houses will adapt successfully to become export oriented and will emerge as players in the global market. Many will team up with strategic foreign investors to take advantage of our core factor of comparative advantage: our workers producing for the global market. Let us seize the moment and partner with our defense forces towards rock-solid national security! Dr Ijaz Nabi (The writer is Executive Director, CDPR and former Dean and Professor of Economics, Lahore University of Management Sciences) Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
