Latest news with #Balochistan
Arab News
12 hours ago
- Health
- Arab News
Saudi Arabia's KSrelief performs over 4,484 successful eye surgeries in Pakistan
ISLAMABAD: Saudi Arabia's King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center (KSrelief) performed over 4,484 successful eye surgeries across Pakistan under a voluntary program to provide free medical services to the underprivileged, state-run media reported this week. The state-run Pakistan Television (PTV) reported on Thursday that KSrelief successfully concluded 11 comprehensive eye treatment camps in Pakistan under the 'Noor Saudi Volunteer Program 2025.' These camps, PTV said, were organized in collaboration with the Al-Basar International Foundation and Ibrahim Eye Hospital Karachi. The camps were held to provide free medical services to underprivileged individuals suffering from blindness or other eye-related ailments, it added. These camps were organized in both the urban and rural areas of Pakistan's Sindh, Balochistan, Punjab, and Azad Jammu and Kashmir regions where access to quality eye care services remains limited, PTV said. 'During the campaign, medical teams examined a total of 43,294 patients and performed over 4,484 successful surgeries,' the state television said. 'Additionally, 11,050 eyeglasses were distributed free of charge, along with the provision of prescribed medications to deserving patients.' It said these camps were conducted in various Pakistani cities such as Karachi, Matli, Kandhkot, Shikarpur, Hyderabad, Naseerabad, Kharan, Khuzdar, Jhelum and Rawalakot. The camps enabled thousands of patients to benefit from specialized eye treatments due to which many were able to regain their vision. 'This initiative reflects the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's strong humanitarian commitment and its dedication to enhancing the lives of people affected by visual impairments,' PTV said. KSrelief has implemented hundreds of projects in Pakistan worth millions of dollars to improve the lives of vulnerable communities. Efforts include emergency relief for natural disasters, and long-term projects addressing food security, health care, education, and shelter. The Saudi charity organization has one of the largest humanitarian budgets available to any aid agency across the world, which has allowed its officials to undertake a wide variety of projects in more than 80 countries. Pakistan is the fifth largest beneficiary of its aid and humanitarian activities and has greatly benefited from its assistance since the 2022 monsoon floods.
Malay Mail
a day ago
- Politics
- Malay Mail
Homeland insecurity: Expelled Afghans risk reentry to Pakistan to escape Taliban rule
PESHAWAR (Pakistan), June 19 — Pakistan says it has expelled more than a million Afghans in the past two years, yet many have quickly attempted to return — preferring to take their chances dodging the law than struggle for existence in a homeland some had never even seen before. 'Going back there would be sentencing my family to death,' said Hayatullah, a 46-year-old Afghan deported via the Torkham border crossing in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in early 2024. Since April and a renewed deportation drive, some 200,000 Afghans have spilled over the two main border crossings from Pakistan, entering on trucks loaded with hastily packed belongings. But they carry little hope of starting over in the impoverished country, where girls are banned from school after primary level. Hayatullah, a pseudonym, returned to Pakistan a month after being deported, travelling around 800 kilometres south to the Chaman border crossing in Balochistan, because for him, life in Afghanistan 'had come to a standstill'. He paid a bribe to cross the Chaman frontier, 'like all the day labourers who regularly travel across the border to work on the other side'. His wife and three children — including daughters, aged 16 and 18, who would be denied education in Afghanistan — had managed to avoid arrest and deportation. Relative security Hayatullah moved the family to Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and a region mostly populated by Pashtuns — the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan. 'Compared to Islamabad, the police here don't harass us as much,' he said. The only province governed by the opposition party of former Prime Minister Imran Khan — who is now in prison and in open conflict with the federal government — Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is considered a refuge of relative security for Afghans. Samad Khan, a 38-year-old Afghan who also spoke using a pseudonym, also chose to relocate his family to Peshawar. Born in eastern Pakistan's Lahore city, he set foot in Afghanistan for the first time on April 22 — the day he was deported. 'We have no relatives in Afghanistan, and there's no sign of life. There's no work, no income, and the Taliban are extremely strict,' he said. At first, he tried to find work in a country where 85 per cent of the population lives on less than one dollar a day, but after a few weeks he instead found a way back to Pakistan. 'I paid 50,000 rupees (around RM767) to an Afghan truck driver,' he said, using one of his Pakistani employees' ID cards to cross the border. He rushed back to Lahore to bundle his belongings and wife and two children — who had been left behind — into a vehicle, and moved to Peshawar. 'I started a second-hand shoe business with the support of a friend. The police here don't harass us like they do in Lahore, and the overall environment is much better,' he told AFP. Afghan refugees wait in a queue at a registration centre, after arriving from Pakistan, in Takhta Pul district of Kandahar province on April 13, 2025. It's hard to say how many Afghans have returned to Pakistan, as data is scarce. — AFP pic 'Challenging' reintegration It's hard to say how many Afghans have returned, as data is scarce. Government sources, eager to blame the country's problems on supporters Khan, claim that hundreds of thousands of Afghans are already back and settled in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — figures that cannot be independently verified. Migrant rights defenders in Pakistan say they've heard of such returns, but insist the numbers are limited. The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) told AFP that 'some Afghans who were returned have subsequently chosen to remigrate to Pakistan'. 'When individuals return to areas with limited access to basic services and livelihood opportunities, reintegration can be challenging,' said Avand Azeez Agha, communications officer for the UN agency in Kabul. They might move on again, he said, 'as people seek sustainable opportunities'. — AFP
Arab News
a day ago
- Politics
- Arab News
Missiles in the sky, prayers in their hearts: Pakistanis recount perilous journey home from Iran
ISLAMABAD: Hundreds of Pakistani pilgrims, students and workers have finally made it back home from Iran this week, telling stories of tense roads, sleepless nights and missiles flashing overhead as the conflict between Israel and Iran pushes the region to the brink of wider war. A week of Israeli air and missile strikes against its major rival that started on June 13 has wiped out the top echelon of Iran's military command, damaged its nuclear capabilities and killed hundreds of people, while Iranian retaliatory strikes have killed two dozen civilians in Israel. In the immediate aftermath of Friday's attacks, Iran closed its airspace to commercial traffic, leaving hundreds of expats, including Pakistani pilgrims, students and workers, stranded. For Hassan Raza, a 22-year-old student at Al-Mustafa International University in Qom, the abrupt closure of the skies turned an ordinary day into a marathon journey through the heart of a country on edge. 'When Israel attacked Iran on 13th June, I was at Tehran International Airport, and after a few moments, all flights were canceled and we entered Pakistan from the border of Rimdan by road,' Raza told Arab News on Wednesday in a telephone interview. Pakistan and Iran share a 909-kilometer (565-mile) border, which separates Balochistan from the Iranian province of Sistan-Baluchestan. Forced to abandon plane tickets, many stranded Pakistanis like Raza pooled resources to travel by bus, heading south from Tehran toward the remote border at Rimdan. The bus route took Raza and his group past Natanz, a name known worldwide for being the site of Iran's main uranium enrichment facilities and one of the prime targets of repeated Israeli attacks since Friday. 'We passed by Natanz, which is a nuclear power plant in Iran and has been targeted multiple times by Israel,' Raza said. As they continued, they witnessed firsthand the flashes and arcs of missiles fired in retaliation. 'We saw that many missiles were launched from Iran toward Israel and made videos of this as well,' he said. 'After 20 to 22 hours, we reached the Rimdan border crossing and entered Pakistan.' Along the road journey, Raza added, despite the echo of distant missile exchanges, daily life seemed remarkably calm. 'JUST IN TIME' Syed Nadeem Abbas Shirazi, a pilgrim from Mandi Bahauddin in Punjab province, had arrived in Mashhad, a sacred city for Shiite Muslims, to visit holy shrines when the attack threw the region into uncertainty. 'When Iran was attacked, I was in Mashhad. We went out and interacted with the local people, and they showed no signs of fear. In fact, they were very emotional,' Shirazi said. 'They were chanting slogans against Israel and the United States, and many said they had no fear of martyrdom, they desired it,' he added. As the situation remained tense, Shirazi and his group decided to return by road rather than wait for flights to resume. 'From Mashhad, we boarded a bus at 1pm and reached Chabahar at noon the next day,' he said. The group then hired a taxi for the final stretch to the Pakistan border near Gwadar. For others, the trip home meant navigating jam-packed highways and rationed fuel in a country bracing for more strikes. Syed Ali Hassan, an electrician from Layyah who worked near Tehran, said he felt the atmosphere change instantly when the attacks began on Friday. 'People were not openly panicking, but you could feel the fear in the air, everyone seemed to be preparing for the worst,' Hassan said. Amid the quiet fear, Hassan and a handful of other Pakistanis found a bus heading west toward the Taftan border in Pakistan's Balochistan province. 'The journey wasn't easy. Highways were packed with vehicles, fuel stations had long lines, and we traveled all night with brief stops, mostly in silence,' he said. Some passengers were worried about possible airstrikes or roadblocks, but the group managed to reach the border without incident. At Taftan, exhausted and emotionally drained, many Pakistanis breathed a sigh of relief as they stepped back onto home ground. 'It felt like we had made it out just in time,' Hassan said.
Arab News
a day ago
- Politics
- Arab News
Homeland insecurity: Expelled Afghans seek swift return to Pakistan
PESHAWAR, Pakistan: Pakistan says it has expelled more than a million Afghans in the past two years, yet many have quickly attempted to return — preferring to take their chances dodging the law than struggle for existence in a homeland some had never even seen before. 'Going back there would be sentencing my family to death,' said Hayatullah, a 46-year-old Afghan deported via the Torkham border crossing in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in early 2024. Since April and a renewed deportation drive, some 200,000 Afghans have spilled over the two main border crossings from Pakistan, entering on trucks loaded with hastily packed belongings. But they carry little hope of starting over in the impoverished country, where girls are banned from school after primary level. Hayatullah, a pseudonym, returned to Pakistan a month after being deported, traveling around 800 kilometers (500 miles) south to the Chaman border crossing in Balochistan, because for him, life in Afghanistan 'had come to a standstill.' He paid a bribe to cross the Chaman frontier, 'like all the day laborers who regularly travel across the border to work on the other side.' His wife and three children — including daughters, aged 16 and 18, who would be denied education in Afghanistan — had managed to avoid arrest and deportation. Hayatullah moved the family to Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and a region mostly populated by Pashtuns — the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan. 'Compared to Islamabad, the police here don't harass us as much,' he said. The only province governed by the opposition party of former Prime Minister Imran Khan — who is now in prison and in open conflict with the federal government — Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is considered a refuge of relative security for Afghans. Samad Khan, a 38-year-old Afghan who also spoke using a pseudonym, also chose to relocate his family to Peshawar. Born in eastern Pakistan's Lahore city, he set foot in Afghanistan for the first time on April 22 — the day he was deported. 'We have no relatives in Afghanistan, and there's no sign of life. There's no work, no income, and the Taliban are extremely strict,' he said. At first, he tried to find work in a country where 85 percent of the population lives on less than one dollar a day, but after a few weeks he instead found a way back to Pakistan. 'I paid 50,000 rupees (around $180) to an Afghan truck driver,' he said, using one of his Pakistani employees' ID cards to cross the border. He rushed back to Lahore to bundle his belongings and wife and two children — who had been left behind — into a vehicle, and moved to Peshawar. 'I started a second-hand shoe business with the support of a friend. The police here don't harass us like they do in Lahore, and the overall environment is much better,' he told AFP. It's hard to say how many Afghans have returned, as data is scarce. Government sources, eager to blame the country's problems on supporters of Khan, claim that hundreds of thousands of Afghans are already back and settled in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — figures that cannot be independently verified. Migrant rights defenders in Pakistan say they've heard of such returns, but insist the numbers are limited. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) told AFP that 'some Afghans who were returned have subsequently chosen to remigrate to Pakistan.' 'When individuals return to areas with limited access to basic services and livelihood opportunities, reintegration can be challenging,' said Avand Azeez Agha, communications officer for the UN agency in Kabul. They might move on again, he said, 'as people seek sustainable opportunities.'
Arab News
2 days ago
- Health
- Arab News
Pakistan reports first Congo virus death of 2025 in Karachi
KARACHI: A 42-year-old man lost his life after contracting the Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever (CCHF), marking the first confirmed fatality from the virus in Pakistan's southern Sindh province this year, the health department said on Wednesday. The fatality rate for the Congo virus ranges from 10 percent to 40 percent, depending on the quality of health care, timeliness of treatment and the patient's overall health, according to the World Health Organization. The virus, which is endemic in parts of Africa, Europe and Asia, is primarily transmitted through tick bites or contact with the blood or tissues of infected animals. 'First case of Congo virus [has been] reported in Sindh,' the Sindh Health Department said in a statement on Wednesday. '42-year-old male was a resident of District Malir,' it continued. 'The test report came out positive on June 16 and the patient passed away on June 17.' Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province reported 23 Congo virus cases in 2024, with five deaths since January last year. Local medical practitioners said most cases were diagnosed during the summer, when the likelihood of the virus spreading increases, particularly around the Eid Al-Adha festival. The Islamic holiday, marked by the mass slaughter of animals, typically leads to greater human-animal interaction and exposure to infected livestock. Pakistan witnessed its first case of Congo virus in 1976 and remained a major victim for years, according to the National Library of Medicine. The country faces major challenges in combating Congo virus every year due to its specific geographical position and a majority of the population being involved with animal husbandry, it added. There is no approved vaccine for its prevention. The European Medicines Agency in May 2024 approved a Phase I clinical trial in Sweden for a DNA-based vaccine candidate, N-pVAX1, targeting the Congo virus. Separately, the University of Oxford in August 2023 launched a Phase I trial of its ChAdOx2 CCHF vaccine, based on the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 platform, to assess safety and immune response.
