FORMER PAKISTANI OFFICIAL RECANTS POLL RIGGING ALLEGATIONS

A former senior bureaucrat in Pakistan, Liaquat Ali Chattha, who previously alleged that 13 candidates from Rawalpindi were forcefully declared winners in elections, retracted his accusations on Thursday. Chattha stated that he had made false charges after being offered a "lucrative position" by ex-prime minister Imran Khan’s party. He took full responsibility for his actions and expressed readiness to face legal consequences.

Earlier, Chattha had resigned from his position, citing his role in manipulating election results and accusing Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa and Chief Election Commissioner Sikander Sultan Raja of facilitating vote rigging. However, in his recent letter to the Election Commission, he revealed that after the February 8 elections, he met with a PTI leader in Lahore on February 11, where he was offered a position in exchange for supporting PTI's narrative of election rigging and maligning state institutions. The PTI leader claimed that the plan had been approved by the party's senior leadership.

BIDEN'S CONTROVERSIAL PUTIN REMARK SPARKS DIPLOMATIC SPAT

US President Joe Biden's recent comment referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin as a "crazy SOB" during a public event has ignited a diplomatic row between the two countries. Biden's remark, made at a fundraising event, was swiftly criticized by the Kremlin as "shameful" and "boorish."

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov condemned Biden's language, calling it inappropriate for a president. He suggested that Biden's comments were aimed at domestic political gain, likening them to "Hollywood cowboy behavior."

In response, Putin ally Dmitry Medvedev criticized Biden, labeling him and other leaders as "useless old geezers." However, Putin himself responded with sarcasm, saying Russia is ready to work with any president. He implied that Biden's comments may have been intended to benefit Russia, suggesting that Biden is a more preferable president for Russia based on his remarks.\

HOUTHIS USING SUB-WEAPONS IN RED SEA ATTACKS

Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis will escalate their attacks on ships in the Red Sea and other waters and has introduced “submarine weapons”, in continued solidarity with Palestinians in the Gaza war, the group’s leader said. “Operations in the Red and Arabian Seas, Bab alMandab Strait, and the Gulf of Aden are continuing, escalating, and effective,” Abdulmalik al-Houthi added in a televised speech. He gave no details of the sub-weapons. The speech came the same day the Houthis sent shippers and insurers formal notice of what they termed a ban on vessels tied to Israel, the US, the UK from sailing in surrounding seas, seeking to reinforce their military campaign.

ISRAEL STRIKES GAZA’S RAFAH AS CEASEFIRE TALKS ARE UNDER WAY

Israel launched air strikes on Thursday on southern Gaza’s Rafah after threatening to send troops against Hamas militants in the city where around 1.4 million Palestinians have sought refuge.

Global powers trying to find a way to end the Israel-Hamas war have so far failed, but a U.S. envoy was expected in Israel on Thursday in the latest attempt to secure a truce deal.

The war has also triggered mounting violence in the occupied West Bank, where three Palestinian gunmen opened fire on Thursday on cars in a highway traffic jam, killing one and wounding eight, including a young pregnant woman.

The attackers were shot dead at the scene, near a Jewish settlement east of Jerusalem. Israeli far-right politicians quickly called for more citizens to carry weapons and for even greater restrictions on Palestinian West Bank residents.

Israel has warned that, if Hamas does not free the remaining hostages held in Gaza by the start of Ramzan, it will keep fighting during the Muslim holy month, including in Rafah.

Israel has already been bombing targets in Rafah, which was again hit overnight and where early Thursday multiple air strikes were heard.

Israel’s campaign has killed at least 29,410 people, mostly women and children.

‘TWO-STATE SOLUTION ANSWER TO GAZA WAR’

Foreign Ministers at the G-20 group of nations meeting in Brazil were nearly unanimous in their support for a two-state solution as the only path to peace in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Brazilian minister hosting the event said on Thursday.

“There was virtual unanimity in the two-state solution as the only solution to the conflict,” Brazil’s Foreign Minister, Mauro Vieira, said at the close of the two-day meeting.

Mr. Vieira said all members of the group of the world’s largest economies highlighted concerns about the war in Gaza and the risk of the conflict’s spreading in the West Asia.

There were calls for a ceasefire and access to Gaza for humanitarian aid, while “many” countries criticised Israel’s military offensive in Rafah, he said.

The meeting, which set the agenda for the G-20 group presided by Brazil this year, discussed current tensions in the world, mainly focused on the fighting in Gaza and Ukraine. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said earlier that there was consensus on need for a two-state solution in Israel, supported by every speaker who addressed the conflict.

MASSIVE LEAK SHOWS CHINESE FIRM HACKED FOREIGN GOVTS.

A Chinese tech security firm was able to breach foreign governments, infiltrate social media accounts and hack personal computers, a massive data leak analysed by experts this week revealed.

The trove of documents from I-Soon, a private company that competed for Chinese government contracts, shows that its hackers compromised more than a dozen governments, according to cybersecurity firms SentinelLabs and Malwarebytes.

I-Soon also breached “democracy organisations” in China’s semi-autonomous city of Hong Kong, universities and the NATO military alliance, SentinelLabs researchers wrote in a blog post on Wednesday.

The leaked data was posted last week on the online software repository GitHub by an unknown individual.

“The leak provides some of the most concrete details seen publicly to date, revealing the maturing nature of China’s cyber espionage ecosystem,” SentinelLabs analysts said.

I-Soon was also able to breach government offices in India, Thailand, Vietnam and South Korea, among others, Malwarebytes said in a separate post on Wednesday.

PUTIN IN HOT SEAT

Russian President Putin on Thursday took a test ride on supersonic military plane Tu-160M, the state media reported. The show of strength comes just two days before Moscow marks the second anniversary of its military assault on Ukraine. The flight took only 30 minutes, the Kremlin said, but the range of the wide-wing Tu-160M, also known as a White Swan in Russia, allows it to reach the US with two dozen nuclear weapons aboard. The Tu-160M is a modernised version of a Sovietdesigned strategic bomber. A part of the Russian nuclear triad, the Tu-160M’s primary mission is to deliver N-bombs at long distances in case of a nuclear war. In 2005, Putin took a flight in an older version of the bomber.

RUSSIA’S WAR HAS INFLICTED ‘HORRIFIC HUMAN COST’: UN

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk described Russia's war in Ukraine as inflicting a terrible human cost and causing immense suffering to millions of civilians. He called on Russia to immediately stop the war, emphasizing that its full-scale invasion has led to widespread human rights violations, including displacement, destruction of homes, and damage to hospitals and schools.

Turk highlighted the need for thorough investigations into all violations in the conflict, ensuring accountability and reparations for victims. His office documented various abuses by Russian armed forces, including torture, arbitrary detention, summary executions, and repression of freedom of expression and assembly in occupied territories.

While acknowledging violations by Ukrainian forces, Turk noted they were significantly fewer than those by Russian forces. He warned that the long-term impact of the war would be felt for generations, underscoring the urgent need for a resolution to the conflict.

TALIBAN CARRY OUT PUBLIC EXECUTION

The Taliban carried out a double public execution at a stadium in southeastern Afghanistan on Thursday as thousands watched the killing of two convicted men as their victims’ relatives fired the gunshot.

The Taliban’s Supreme Court had ruled that the pair were responsible for the stabbing deaths of two victims in separate attacks, according to a court statement.

It identified the two as Syed Jamal from central Wardak province and Gul Khan from Ghazni — though it was unclear who did the stabbing, the two convicted men or others.

The statement also said that three lower courts and the Taliban’s supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, had ordered the executions in retribution for their purported crimes.

The killings were the third and fourth public executions since the Taliban seized power in 2021 amid the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

NAVALNY’S MOTHER SAYS SHE IS BEING PRESSURED INTO ‘SECRET’ BURIAL

MOSCOW: The mother of Alexei Navalny, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s main opponent who died in an Arctic prison last week, said on Thursday officials are pressuring her into a “secret” burial for her son. She said she was shown his body in the morgue in Salekhard, after several days of being barred from seeing her son.

PAKISTAN BLOCKS X FOR THE SIXTH DAY AS ACTIVISTS CRITICISE THE SHUTDOWN

Pakistan’s media regulators have blocked the social media platform X, with users across the country on Thursday enduring the sixth day of partial and complete shutdowns. There was no comment on the outage by the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority. Human rights activists have demanded a full restoration of Internet services.

CHATGPT CRANKS OUT GIBBERISH FOR 16 HRS, BUG FIX ENDS ‘HAUNTED’ PHASE

San Francisco : ChatGPT experienced a glitch, generating nonsensical responses for about 16 hours before OpenAI fixed the bug. Developers reported receiving strange answers, including made-up words and incomplete sentences. The issue was traced to a software tweak that affected the model's language processing.

After identifying the problem, OpenAI rolled out a fix, resolving the incident. Users expressed frustration during the glitch, with one likening it to a "haunted" experience. OpenAI confirmed that ChatGPT was back to normal operations after the bug was addressed.

This incident comes at a time when OpenAI recently secured a deal with investors, potentially valuing the company at over $80 billion. OpenAI's ChatGPT, released in late 2022, has been instrumental in showcasing the capabilities of generative AI, sparking significant interest in the technology. Microsoft, among others, has heavily invested in OpenAI, integrating its technology into services like Bing.