03-03-2023 Bureau Report NEW DELHI: India’s Supreme Court has ordered the setting up of a bipartisan panel that will include the prime minister and the chief justice to select the country’s election commissioners, ending a practice of the government effectively choosing them. The Election Commission of India is an autonomous …

03-03-2023 COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s economic meltdown has spiralled into a full-blown hunger crisis, with half of the families in the island nation forced to reduce the amount they feed their children, according to a child rights charity. The Sri Lankan government and the international community must act now to prevent …

03-03-2023 DAMASCUS/ IDLIB: Lying on his hospital bed in a room full of other patients, Mustafa Eid looks from the intravenous solution entering his body, seemingly counting the drops, to the people around him, each with a needle in their arm delivering the medicines hanging next to them. Eid, from …

03-03-2023 TEHRAN/ QOM: Dozens of Iranian schoolgirls needed hospital treatment after another mysterious poisoning, a news agency reported, the latest in a spate of suspected attacks in the country. Hundreds of cases of respiratory distress have been reported in the past three months among schoolgirls mainly in the holy city …

03-03-2023 Bureau Report NEW DELHI: India’s top court has asked the market regulator to investigate any possible lapses in securities law or other regulatory disclosures by the Adani Group which has been accused of business malpractice by a United States-based short seller. The Supreme Court on Thursday also ordered the …

03-03-2023 PENNSYLVANIA: Federal agents arrested a Pennsylvania man this week after he allegedly tried to bring explosives in his suitcase on a flight from Lehigh Valley International Airport to Florida. According to court documents, an alarm alerted that the baggage belonging to Marc Muffley contained explosives. Transportation Security Administration agents …

02-03-2023 Bureau Report NEW DELHI: The Indian government granted an extraordinary favor to controversial tycoon Gautam Adani, boosting his coal business, documents reveal. After Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s office had ascertained that a particular regulation handing over coal blocks to the private sector was ‘inappropriate’ and lacked transparency, his government …

02-03-2023 ROME: At least 36 people were killed and dozens more injured after a passenger train carrying hundreds of people collided at high speed with a freight train in northern Greece, officials said Wednesday. Around 350 passengers were on board the Hellenic Train headed from the capital Athens to popular …

02-03-2023 WASHINGTON: FBI Director Christopher Wray says his agency has assessed that a leak from a laboratory in Wuhan, China, was the likely cause of the COVID-19 pandemic. Wray’s comments follow a Wall Street Journal report on Sunday that the US Energy Department had assessed with low confidence the pandemic …

02-03-2023 By SJA Jafri + Bureau Report ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Supreme Court has ruled that elections for the provincial assemblies in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa must be held within 90 days. The five-member top court bench, led by Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, on Wednesday gave a split 3-2 decision. “Parliamentary …