IMRAN KHAN SENT TO 8-DAY REMAND AMID VIOLENT PROTESTS ACROSS PAKISTAN

Chaos prevailed for the second straight day in Pakistan since the country's former Prime Minister Imran Khan was arrested on Tuesday, 9 May.

An anti-corruption court in Pakistan on Wednesday sent Khan on an eight-day physical remand to the National Accountability Bureau while a sessions court in Islamabad indicted him in a separate graft case.

Outside the courtroom, protests staged by Khan's supporters continued to grow violent. Enraged over the arrest, the supporters of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chief on Tuesday stormed the general headquarters of the army. They set the residence of the Lahore Corps Commander on fire while attacking military vehicles and installations. Other government buildings and assets have been attacked and set ablaze by protesters. At least five people have died in the violent protests that have continued to simmer into Wednesday Mobile data services were shut for a second day.

The Pakistan army on Wednesday warned former prime minister Imran Khan’s supporters of “severe retaliation” in the wake of attacks on its installations, asserting that it will not allow anyone to take the law into their hands while describing May 9as a “black chapter” in the country’s history. The comments by Pakistan’s most powerful institution mark an escalation of political tensions following Khan’s dramatic arrest on Tuesday, which led to violent clashes and prompted his supporters to breach the military headquarters.

The law enforcement agencies have arrested 1,150 PTI supporters including women, in Punjab, alone so far. Two top leaders —PTI Secretary General Asad Umar, former Punjab governor Omar Sarfraz Cheema and PTI Vice Chairman Shah Mahmood Qureshi were also arrested on Wednesday.

Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned the deadly protests by the supporters of Khan. “Attack on public property is an act of terrorism and enmity towards the country,” Sharif said, adding that those taking the law into their own hands would be dealt with an iron fist.

Khan’s supporters attacked the Lahore residence of Sharif. According to the police, over 500 miscreants from the PTI party reached the Model Town Lahore residence of the Prime Minister in the early hours of Wednesday and set ablaze vehicles parked over there. “They also threw petrol bombs inside the premiere’s house,” a senior police officer said.

BABY BORN FROM THREE PEOPLE'S DNA IN UK FIRST

Britain’s fertility regulator on Wednesday confirmed the births of the UK’s first babies created using an experimental technique combining DNA from three people, an effort to prevent the children from inheriting rare genetic diseases. Britain’s human fertilization and embryology authority said fewer than five babies have been born this way in the UK but did not provide further details to protect the families’ identities.

In2015, the UK became the world’s first country to adopt legislation specifically regulating methods to help prevent women with faulty mitochondria — the energy source in a cell — from passing defects on to their babies. The genetic defects can result in diseases such as muscular dystrophy, epilepsy, heart problems and intellectual disabilities. About one in 200 children in Britain is born with a mitochondrial disorder. To date, 32 patients have been authorised to receive such treatment.

For a woman with faulty mitochondria, scientists take genetic material from her egg or embryo, which is then transferred into a donor egg or embryo that still has healthy mitochondria but had the restof its key DNA removed. The fertilised embryo is then transferred into the womb of the mother. The genetic material from the donated egg comprises less than 1% of the child created from this technique.

CHINA OBJECTS TO INDIA’S BID TO BLACKLIST SENIOR JEM LEADER AT THE UN

China has objected to a proposal by India to blacklist senior Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) terrorist Abdul Rauf Azhar at the United Nations Security Council.

Brother of JeM chief Masood Azhar, Abdul Rauf has been involved in planning and executing numerous terror strikes in India including the hijacking of Indian Airlines aircraft IC814 in 1999, the attack on Parliament in 2001 and the targeting of the IAF base in Pathankot in 2016.

It is learnt that China objected to the proposal from India to add Abdul Rauf of the JeM to the UN Security Council’s 1267 ISIL and Al Qaida Sanctions list.

Beijing had last year put holds on proposals to blacklist Pakistan-based terrorists Hafiz Talah Saeed, Lashkar-e-Taiba leader Shahid Mahmood and Lashkar-e-Tayyiba terrorist Sajid Mir.

CANADA PM SLAMS FB FOR THREATENING TO BLOCK NEWS OVER ‘PAY FOR CONTENT’

Ottawa : PM Justin Trudeau Tuesday slammed Meta after executives said it would block news for Canadian Facebook and Instagram users in response to a proposed law that would require digital giants to pay for local journalism content.

In February, Google announced it also tested restricting Canadians’ access to news in preparation for the passing of the Online News Act, which is currently before the Senate. The two tech giants have criticised as overbroad the bill meant to help a news sector a government official has said “is in crisis” after hundreds of news publications closed in the last decade. Their position and news blocking plans were outlined again by a Meta Canada executive in testimony this week at a Commons committee.

Trudeau said their arguments against the proposalsare “not just flawed, it’s dangerous to our democracy, economy”. “Woodward and Bernstein weren’t influencers,” he said, in reference to Washington Post journalists who led reporting on the Watergate scandal that saw President Richard Nixon resign in 1974.

“Someone reporting on thehorrors in Bucha (in Ukraine) is not trying to get likes on their Facebook page,” he said. “Rigorous, challenging, independent journalism is essential and the fact Facebook is still saying it doesn’t want to pay journalists for the work they do shows how deeply irresponsible and out of touch they are. ”

The new law would require digital giants to make fair commercial deals with Canadian outlets for the news and information that is shared on their platforms, or face binding arbitration. It builds on Australia’s New Media Bargaining Code aimed at making Google and Meta pay for news content on their platforms.

Australian regulators too had accused the companies of draining cash away from the traditional news organisations while using their content for free.

US BORDER CRISIS: EL PASO BRACES FOR WORST AS TITLE 42 DEADLINE LOOMS

A record number of migrants - more than 10,000 - were recently apprehended at the US-Mexico border in a 24-hour period, fuelling fears over what comes next when a controversial immigration policy expires this week.

Nowhere are the realities of what some have termed a border "crisis" more evident than in the Texas city of El Paso.

Here, migrants - many of them confused about the impending rule changes - have been left sleeping rough in makeshift campsites on city streets over the last several days.

Several thousand were camped out earlier this week around a single church in the city centre.

"We've never seen this before," Mayor Oscar Leeser said at a border security expo just streets away from the campsite on Wednesday. "Something has to change. As a community, we can't do this forever."

The worst, officials say, may be yet to come.

US President Joe Biden earlier this week acknowledged that the border would be "chaotic for a while" despite the best efforts of authorities.

First implemented in 2020, Title 42 allows US authorities to swiftly expel would-be migrants attempting to cross the border from Mexico - including those seeking humanitarian asylum - using the Covid-19 pandemic as justification.

But with the policy due to expire a minute before midnight on 11 May, officials fear border authorities may be overwhelmed by an influx of migrants even as record numbers in recent years have already strained resources and left border towns scrambling for solutions.

Mr Leeser warned that across from El Paso alone, an estimated 10,000 migrants were "lined up at the border, waiting to come in".

ISRAELI AIR STRIKE KILLS MISSILE COMMANDER IN GAZA

A pre-dawn Israeli air strike on an apartment in the Gaza Strip has killed a top Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) commander and one other person.

A warplane attacked an apartment on the fifth floor of a building in Hamad Residential City, near Khan Younis in the south of the strip.

Wednesday saw militants in Gaza firing more than 460 rockets at Israel.

The Israeli military hit more than 130 militant targets in Gaza, in the heaviest fighting in nine months.

Palestinian medical sources estimate the death toll from fighting this week is now at least 24, including three other PIJ commanders.

Several people were hurt in Israel rushing to shelters as the rockets were fired from Gaza.

The armed wing of the PIJ confirmed that the head of its missile unit, Ali Hassan Ghali, also known as Abu Muhammad, had died in Thursday morning's attack.

The PIJ is the second biggest militant group in Gaza after Hamas, and it has sworn to avenge the deaths of Palestinians killed.

Israel's military confirmed it had targeted Ghali and what it called two "other Islamic Jihad operatives in Gaza".

They described the commander as a central figure in the PIJ who had been "responsible for the recent rocket barrages launched against Israel".

IRAN HANGS 7 FOR RAPE, DRUGS; TOTAL 64 EXECUTIONS IN 12 DAYS: REPORT

Paris : Iran executed seven men in two prisons outside Tehran on drugs and rape charges Wednesday, a rights group said, accelerating what activists describe as a hanging spree over the past two weeks.

The UN had warned on Tuesday of a “frighteningly” high number of executions in the country after a rare execution on Monday of two men on blasphemy charges. Three men were executed on drug-related charges in Ghezal Hesar prison in the city of Karaj, the Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) NGO said. It added that four other men were hanged on rape charges in Rajai Shahr prison, also in Karaj. The judiciary’s Mizan Online website confirmed the three executions on drug charges. There has been no official confirmation of the four executions on rape charges. IHR said the latest hangings mean Iran has seen at least 64 executions in the last 12 days alone. IHR said 218 executions have been carried out so far this year.