Courtesy: Geo News

Post-mortem reveals fractured neck bone, injuries to ribs and hip, heart filled with blood

• Hina’s body found tied to shower in bathroom at home.
• Rope, wire allegedly used in murder recovered from suspects.
• NA offers Fatiha for Hina, refers case to committees.

RAWALPINDI: A domestic worker, who was remanded in police custody a day earlier along with prime suspect Faisal Asghar, confessed to strangling and torturing Hina Javed, a married woman found dead in her home in Rawalpindi’s Lalkurti area, police sources said on Monday.

The arrested worker, identified as Zeeshan, told investigators he had been called during a marital dispute between Hina and her husband Faisal.

He said Hina tried to flee during the altercation, upon which Faisal and he grabbed her. When she resisted, he pressed her throat, he confessed. Zeeshan also admitted to frequently stealing from the household.

According to police sources, Hina’s father-in-law had called police saying thieves had broken into the house. When police arrived, they found Hina’s body tied to a shower in the bathroom. An investigation team headed by SSP Investigation Saifullah is conducting the inquiry.

The development comes a day after a local court sent both suspects — Faisal and Zeeshan — on a three-day physical remand after police produced them before the magistrate.

The investigation officer told the court that a rope and wire allegedly used in the murder had been recovered from the suspects.

Hina had been married to the prime suspect for nine months, according to police officials.

Police had initially told the doctor that Hina was hanged by her husband. Faisal Asghar’s father has also been included in the investigation and his statement recorded, police said.

Post-mortem findings

Hina’s post-mortem report revealed injuries to several parts of her body, including a fractured neck bone and injury marks on her ribs and hip bone. The report also found that the victim’s pericardium and heart were filled with blood.

The post-mortem was conducted by Dr Maria Khalid approximately 12 hours after her death, with Lady Constable Rafia Tabassum collecting samples for forensic examination.

DNA samples collected from the victim’s body were sent to a laboratory, while other samples were also dispatched for forensic examination to determine the cause of death. The report initially said the cause of death could not be clearly determined.

‘Matter will be brought to logical conclusion’

Separately, the murder of the Rawalpindi woman was raised in the National Assembly, where Speaker Ayaz Sadiq said the killing of Hina Javed was a matter of concern and thanked the Women Caucus for raising it.

He noted that Hina had worked in parliament on an NITB project, adding that all support would be provided to the Women Caucus and directing that the Human Rights and Interior committees also examine the matter.

Law Minister Azam Nazir Tarar said he had contacted Punjab officials and police as soon as he became aware of the incident and had obtained details from law enforcement.

“This matter will be brought to its logical conclusion,” he said, adding that the government would extend full cooperation in committee proceedings. He said the Speaker had directed him to provide all possible assistance in the case.

1- Header image: Yellow police tape displayed at a crime scene. — Reuters/File

Courtesy: Dawn News

ISLAMABAD: The National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) has arrested 114 foreign nationals, including 111 Chinese and three Vietnamese citizens, for allegedly running a cyber-romance and sextortion network from a registered IT business in the capital.

According to details released by the NCCIA’s media wing, the accused allegedly used electronic means and online platforms to target individuals in different countries.

The network was allegedly involved in luring foreign nationals into online sexual conversations, including video chats and explicit video calls, and subsequently exploiting the material for criminal and financial purposes.

Officials said the investigation also revealed indicators linking the accused to organised cybercrime activities, including cyber-romance-related financial fraud.

NCCIA Islamabad has registered the case under Sections 14 and 21 of the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (Peca) 2016, read with Sections 419, 420, 34 and 109 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC).

Section 14 of Peca deals with electronic fraud. It criminalises using any information system, device or data to deceive a person for wrongful gain. It covers phishing, online scams and running fraudulent setups online.

Offences under the section are punishable with up to two years’ imprisonment, a fine of up to Rs10 million, or both.

Section 21 deals with offences against the modesty of a natural person and a minor. It covers sexual blackmail, revenge porn, deepfakes and inducing a person to engage in sexually explicit acts online to cause harm, blackmail or extort them.

It also provides for the immediate removal or blocking of such content by the NCCIA upon a complaint.

Offences under the section are punishable with up to five years’ imprisonment and a fine of up to Rs5 million. The punishment is more severe if the victim is a minor.

Section 419 of the PPC deals with cheating by personation. It prescribes a punishment of up to seven years’ imprisonment, a fine, or both for impersonating another person to cheat. It also covers the use of fake profiles and identities on social media platforms.

Section 420 of the PPC applies when a person is deceived into paying money or handing over property. It covers the financial fraud involved in cyber-romance scams, with the offence punishable by up to seven years’ imprisonment and a fine.

Sections 34 and 109 of the PPC deal with common intention and abetment, respectively, and have been invoked to hold all members of the organised network liable, including planners, facilitators and financiers.

The agency said further investigation was underway to establish the complete role of all those involved, identify additional victims and beneficiaries, and trace the financial and digital infrastructure used in the alleged activities.

The NCCIA has also shared a list of the arrested individuals, along with their passport numbers.

Courtesy: Geo News/AFP/Reuters

Tests will screen for substances and medications prohibited under aviation regulations

• Tests will be conducted alongside training sessions.
• Pilots at budget subsidiary Air India Express will also be tested.
• Rules require airlines to randomly test at least 10% of crew. 

Air India will begin mandatory substance testing for all pilots on Thursday, expanding checks beyond regulatory requirements days after a pilot involved in a serious mid-air incident tested positive for marijuana, according to an internal memo.

The tests will screen for substances and medications prohibited under aviation regulations and will be conducted alongside training sessions at the airline’s Gurugram academy, after flights at briefing centres and offices, or at locations designated by pilots’ home bases.

Pilots at budget subsidiary Air India Express will also be tested.

Air India did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment. Existing rules require airlines to randomly test at least 10% of their flight crew for psychoactive substances each year.

“We nevertheless now feel that it is important to go further,” Air India said in the memo, adding that the initiative was intended to uphold safety standards and provide reassurance to passengers and other stakeholders.

The move comes as authorities investigate an August 4 incident involving an Air India Airbus A320neo flying from Phuket to Delhi that suddenly lost about 300 feet (91 metres) of altitude during cruise.

The flight’s captain tested positive for marijuana in a confirmatory drug test, according to a source familiar with the matter.

1- Header image: A photo of an Air India plane. —AFP/File

Courtesy: Geo News/Reuters

Taliban barred approx 2.4m girls from secondary education since return to power, says Unesco

Half of Afghan women now leave their homes only once or twice a month as Taliban-imposed restrictions curtail their freedom of movement and participation in public life, according to data released by UN Women on Wednesday.

As the Taliban prepare to mark the fifth anniversary of their return to power this week, Afghanistan remains the only country in the world to ban girls from secondary education and women from attending university, stated the UN agency, which promotes gender equality.

“Half a decade after the Taliban takeover in August 2021, Afghanistan has systematically dismantled the rights of half its population, making it a global outlier with no parallel in the modern world,” UN Women said in a statement.

Saif-ul-Islam Khyber, spokesperson for the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, which enforces many of the government’s rules on women, told Reuters that reports of women not feeling safe to leave their homes were false and that women in the country have access to all their rights.

“This is the first time in approximately 50 years that all citizens of Afghanistan feel that they are living in safety and security,” he said, adding that the situation of women’s rights in the country was moving in a “positive direction.”

The Taliban have barred an estimated 2.4 million Afghan girls from secondary education since they regained power in Afghanistan in 2021, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation said on Tuesday.

UN Women said the Taliban authorities have issued more than 100 decrees targeting women and girls since taking power, institutionalising discrimination and deepening what it described as the world’s most severe women’s rights crisis.

The Taliban argue they respect women’s rights in accordance with their interpretation of Islamic law and Afghan culture.

More than half of women surveyed by the UN agency reported leaving home twice a month or less, while nearly three-quarters said they felt unsafe going out without a male guardian, known as a mahram.

The restrictions have also fuelled a worsening mental health crisis, according to the UN agency. Seven in 10 women described their mental health as “bad” or “very bad”, citing isolation, loss of opportunities and limited access to support networks.

New findings from @UN_Women: 7 in 10 women in #Afghanistan describe their mental health as ‘bad’ or ‘very bad’. Five years of restrictions. Five years of invisible wounds. We need more support for Afghan women’s mental health, not more isolation.

The agency warned that recent decrees had further weakened women’s legal protections. Measures introduced this year abolished legal equality between men and women before the law, strengthened men’s authority within marriage and made it more difficult for women to seek divorce, it said.

Women also remain largely excluded from the economy. Only 7% of women are employed compared with 84% of men, according to the UN Women report.

The agency said its report was based on a door-to-door survey of 2,190 people in February to March 2025 and telephone surveys of 2,811 people conducted in April to May 2026.

1- Header image:  Afghan women in burqas walk towards a safer place after their house was damaged following a deadly magnitude 6 earthquake that struck Afghanistan. — Reuters

Courtesy: Dawn News

AUG 11 occupies a special place in our history because it was on this day in 1947 that Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah set out what citizenship in the new state ought to mean. Addressing the Constituent Assembly, he spoke of a country in which people were free to go to their temples, mosques or other places of worship, and where religion, caste or creed would not determine their standing before the state.

He insisted that citizens should enjoy equal rights, privileges and obligations, and that discrimination between communities had no place in the order Pakistan was attempting to build. These remarks formed part of a wider vision of government based on law, impartiality, protection of life and property, and the safeguarding of religious belief.

It is fitting, then, that minority rights activists will gather outside Mazar-i-Quaid in Karachi today to recall that promise and demand that it be honored. The Minority Rights March has put forward 11 demands, including stronger safeguards against forced conversions, protection from the misuse of blasphemy laws, greater political representation, removal of discriminatory material from textbooks, protection of minority properties and places of worship, and expanded access to education and employment.

Organizers have also called for constitutional amendments allowing non-Muslim citizens to qualify for the offices of president and prime minister. Whether every demand commands consensus is a matter for democratic debate. But the principle from which they proceed — that citizenship should not be graded according to faith — should not be controversial in a republic that continues to invoke Jinnah as its founding authority. The delay in a written NOC for the march deserves attention. Peaceful assembly is a right, not a favor.

The gap between Jinnah’s principle of equal citizenship and present realities cannot be ignored. It is especially troubling because these protections were articulated at the birth of Pakistan itself. Religious minorities continue to face mob violence, attacks on their places of worship, forced conversions and social and economic exclusion.

Laws intended to protect religion have at times been weaponized through false accusations, with consequences extending far beyond the courtroom. Even where the state guarantees equality, social prejudice and institutional barriers make that guarantee fragile in practice. National Minority Rights Day must be more than a ceremonial observance.

It should prompt the state to examine where law, policy and public culture continue to fall short of the standard articulated on Aug 11, 1947. Jinnah did not ask minorities to be grateful for protection; he described equal citizenship as a fundamental principle. Pakistan cannot honor that principle through speeches alone. It will honor it when every citizen, regardless of faith, can claim the same dignity, security and political belonging.

Courtesy: Geo News/AFP/Reuters

“The USA has total control over the Strait of Hormuz,” claims US president

• Trump says Iran helpless against US naval blockade.
• US president says Iran has no navy and air force.
• Iranian leadership is “uncertain”, claims Trump.
  

President Donald Trump on Wednesday said the United States is in control of the strategic Strait of Hormuz and will “keep it.”

“The USA has total control over the Strait of Hormuz. I THINK WE WILL KEEP IT!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “Our Naval Blockade is being called, by everyone, ‘A WALL OF STEEL,’ and there is nothing Iran can do about it.”

Trump has repeatedly claimed the United States controls the strait, which is vital for the flow of energy and other commodity shipping through the Middle East.

However, Iran says it effectively controls much of the waterway and intends to impose a toll system in response to the US war launched by Trump on February 28.

Late Tuesday, Trump told reporters: “We have total control over the Hormuz Strait right now. They don’t have control. We have total control. We own it.”

US and Israeli forces have heavily bombed Iran’s military and killed a swath of the country’s leadership so far in the nearly six-month war, launched initially with goals including forcing Tehran to abandon its nuclear power programme and regime change.

Iran has resisted with missile attacks on US bases in the region, Israel and targets in US-allied Gulf countries.

Its most effective response has been to strike shipping in Hormuz, effectively snarling the trade route, rattling the world economy.

With his political popularity sinking at home ahead of the November midterm congressional elections, Trump has backed off threats to escalate the war in search of a decisive victory.

That leaves the war in a standoff.

However, the Republican says that the United States is prepared to focus on blockading Iranian ports in a strategy that he told Axios was “low-keying.”

“We are only semi-negotiating with them. We are just watching Iran with its huge inflation and the fact they have no money,” Trump told Axios on Sunday.

1- Header image: US President Donald Trump gestures during an event in Arizona, US, on December 22, 2024. — Reuters