M WAQAR.....
"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary.Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."
--Albert Einstein !!!
NEWS,ARTICLES,EDITORIALS,MUSIC... Ze chi pe mayeen yum da agha pukhtunistan de.....(Liberal,Progressive,Secular World.)''Secularism is not against religion; it is the message of humanity.''
تل ده وی پثتونستآن
The Central Secretariat of Pakistan Christian Congress PCC in a press note here today have wished “Merry Christmas” and prayed that “Lard may bless mankind around globe with Peace, Love and Harmony in this season of happiness because Jesus Christ loved humanity”
In this message, Central Executive Council leaders of Pakistan Christian Congress PCC vowed to expedite their struggle for equal basic democratic rights of poor Christians in Pakistan.
Dr. Nazir S Bhatti, President of Pakistan Christian Congress, Mr. Raymond Wallace Durrani, President of PCC Canadian Chapter, Professor Majid Zia Gill, President of PCC South East Asia, Mr. Pervez Iqbal, President of Holland Chapter of PCC, Mr. Morris Sadiq, Secretary General of PCC, Bishop Dr. FS Bhatti, Vice President of PCC, Mr. Akram Waqar Gill, Chief Organizer of PCC and Mr. Daud Sohatra President of Punjab Council of PCC have congratulated Pakistani Christians on celebrating feast of Christmas. - See more at: http://www.pakistanchristianpost.com/detail.php?hnewsid=6240#sthash.kg9m9swV.dpuf
As churches around the country prepare to celebrate the birth of Christ, with peace and goodwill toward men, spare a thought for those who must live out their faith in a foreign land.
This will be the seventh consecutive Christmas mother-of-five Asia Bibi will spend in solitary confinement within the Islamic Republic of Pakistan - a country that has what the United Nations describes as "one of the worst situations in the world for religious freedom".
A member of the Christian minority, just 1.6% of the population, 45-year-old Asia Bibi was jailed after being found guilty of breaching Pakistan's strict blasphemy laws.
Her case has provoked global protests, with supporters accusing the judiciary of fabricating the charge to persecute a Christian. There have been no fewer than three attempts at appealing against the verdict.
There's also been a direct intervention by Pope Francis, who received a delegation of family and friends at the Vatican. But still she languishes in a small cell as the world awaits a final decision from the Supreme Court in Lahore.
Image copyrightARIF ALI/AFP/GETTY IMAGESImage captionPakistan's Christian Democratic Alliance has called for Asia Bibi's release
"The case of Asia Bibi is precisely the reason why I continue to fight for religious minorities around the world," says crossbench peer Baroness Cox, who recently returned from visiting oppressed Christians in Nigeria.
"Only those of us in open and free societies can be a voice to the voiceless and Christmas is the perfect season for us to renew our appeal for humanity and tolerance."
The original incident, which occurred in June 2009, centred around Asia Bibi sharing a bowl of water with fellow workers in a field, about 30 miles (48km) from Lahore, where they were working as farm labourers.
It's alleged that an argument erupted after some of the women felt it was sacrilegious for Muslims to share the cup with a Christian. Within weeks, the allegations had escalated to the charge of blasphemy, with some fellow workers accusing her of insulting the Prophet Muhammad. She was arrested and imprisoned.
Despite reports of inconsistent witness testimony and fragmentary evidence, she was found guilty in November 2010. Large crowds gathered to celebrate her sentencing, and there soon followed a trail of death and destruction.
Image copyrightFAROOQ NAEEM/AFP/GETTY IMAGESImage captionSalman Taseer was killed after saying blasphemy laws had been misapplied in Asia Bibi's case
A month after sentencing, Asia Bibi was visited by the Governor of Punjab, Salman Taseer. He emerged from jail and stated that the blasphemy laws had been misused and wrongly applied in her case. Within days, he was murdered by his bodyguard, Mumtaz Qadri.
Two months later, in March 2011, the Federal Minister for Minorities Affairs, Shahbaz Bhatti - the only Christian in the Pakistan cabinet - criticised the country's blasphemy laws as being open to abuse and manipulation.
After leaving his mother's house, his car was sprayed with bullets: a second assassination in a matter of weeks and both apparently linked to the case of Asia Bibi.
Beyond the application of blasphemy laws, 2016 has also witnessed the continued targeting of Christian minorities by militant groups in Pakistan.
The most severe attack was launched on Easter Sunday in Lahore. A large number of the Christians had chosen to visit a neighbourhood park following morning worship. Spirits were naturally high.
"Things were going well," said the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Lahore, the Most Reverend Sebastian Shaw, "but it was very cautious. A priest called us and told us that we must be alert all the time."
Image copyrightAFP/GETTY IMAGESImage captionPeople grieve after the March 2016 Taliban suicide bomb attack in Lahore
As parents pushed their children on swings and enjoyed the company of friends, two suicide bombers entered the park. Within minutes, the hum of children's voices was overwhelmed by the sound of tragedy. More than 340 people were injured and 75 died. The vast majority were women and children.
"It was very difficult," said Archbishop Shaw, who rushed to several medical facilities where the injured had been taken. "Even in the corridors of the hospital, at the entrance [there were] so many people. It was very difficult to console people.
"I visited a lady. She came from Hyderabad. Her husband and two children were killed and another cousin was also killed. So the lady was totally out of her senses and didn't know what had happened."
Within hours a group affiliated to the Pakistan Taliban, Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, said it had carried out the bombing and was reported to have deliberately targeted Christians.
Ban Ki-moon, Secretary General of the United Nations, condemned the attack and urged the Pakistan government "to do its utmost to put in place protective measures to ensure the personal security of all individuals, including religious minority communities living in the country".
But Pakistan is not alone.
Earlier this month, an individual wearing a suicide vest attacked a Coptic Christian church in Cairo, during Sunday morning prayers. There are conflicting reports about whether this was a man or a woman.
But the effect was unequivocal: at least 25 people were killed and a further 45 injured. Orthodox Copts comprise just 10% of Egypt's 90 million people but are the Middle East's largest Christian community.
The latest attack followed complaints by Christians in the town of Minya, about 140 miles (225km) south of Cairo, where several buildings were burned after they were suspected of hosting prayer meetings.
Christian worship in countries such as Pakistan and Egypt remains the most dangerous practice and this year of horrifying attacks could yet end with further bloodshed.
If Asia Bibi's appeal is rejected by the Supreme Court, she will become the first woman in Pakistan to be executed for blasphemy. Christians throughout Pakistan are praying for a miracle this Christmas.
At least nine children, including four girls, died as a new wave of measles hit Balochistan’s Zhob district on Saturday.
District Vice Chairman Zhob district Maulvi Jarullah said that the disease broke out in the Tansara Union Council and affected the areas of Bayan Zai, Zakariya Zai and Kakshaim. Immediate measures are required to contain the epidemic, he added.
District Health Officer (DHO) Zhob Dr Muzaffar Shah also confirmed the spread of the disease.
Outbreak: Three children contract measles in Mohmand Agency
Earlier, provincial secretary health Noorul Haq Baloch dispatched teams of experts to the affected district. The department also said that all necessary measures were being taken to overcome the disease as the district administration has been asked for their cooperation to identify the areas affected by the epidemic.
On Friday, doctors initiated preventive measures when the disease also broke out in Awaran area of the province.
In September 6, three children contracted measles in Safi tehsil, Mohmand Agency, Fata. According to the official, another child, identified as Rizwan, was rushed to a hospital in Peshawar in critical condition after he contracted measles. The health official revealed there were no vaccines for measles at basic health units in Safi.
http://tribune.com.pk/story/1273859/nine-children-die-measles-hits-balochistan/
Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Friday warned that the countdown has begun for ruling party after his father Asif Ali Zardari’s return from self-exile.
Zardari arrived in Karachi to a resounding welcome and vowed to take hold of the power again after the party badly performed in the last general elections.
Sources said that Zardari may not stay in Pakistan for long as he was expected to fly back to Dubai on December 30 but was likely to return soon.
During his week-long stay in Pakistan, Zardari will jointly preside over a meeting of the PPP Central Executive Committee at Naudero with Bilawal.
Bilawal, who accompanied his father from Dubai was confident the government will be under pressure after Zardari’s return. “Aik (one) #Zardari, Sab pay bari (beats all). Countdown for Riawind starts from today. #GoNawazGo,” he tweeted.
Separately he said: “If Zardari is in Pakistan, our four demands will be fulfilled soon”.
Bilawal had earlier announced that if his four demands were not met by December 27, the party would launch an “anti-government drive”. The four demands include the appointment of a full-time foreign minister, implementation of the decision of a multi-party conference chaired by Zardari on the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, the formation of a parliamentary committee on national security and adoption of a PPP-drafted bill on Panama Leaks probe.
Earlier, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif welcomed Zardari’s return and advised him to take reign of the PPP – ostensibly pointing to the hostile attitude of Bilawal.
Zardari had been a strong advocate of reconciliation in the past, but, the PPP sources said that he had changed his mind and agreed to follow Bilawal’s aggressive policy, a year before the general elections – to be held in 2018.
Former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf told The Nation that the PPP would be much more active in 2017 than the last couple of years. “We are entering the election year, so this is time to mobilise workers. We don’t want to topple the government but they forced us to end the politics of reconciliation,” he said.
Ashraf said a final strategy of the PPP would be finalised on December 27 after the CEC meeting. He said that Zardari and Bilawal were “completely on the same page” over running the party affairs.
On his return, Zardari addressed a welcome rally and criticised the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz. “I am confident the PPP will rise to power again,” he said. “The political actors must know I had not fled. We are Bhuttos, we will live here and die here,” he said.
Zardari, who is likely to announce the party’s decision to launch Bilawal in the National Assembly through a by-election in the coming weeks, said the PPP would start a “democratic struggle” inside the parliament as the work supporters chanted “Go Nawaz Go” slogans.
Bilawal will possibly replace Khurshid Shah as the opposition leader in the National Assembly to give a tough time to the government.
PPP leader Senator Rehman Malik told The Nation that Zardari and Bilawal would jointly lead the PPP’s revival in Punjab and other provinces. “Bilawal’s policies are backed by Zardari, there are no differences between them on how to prepare for the elections and how to run the party,” he said.
The lawmaker said that Zardari’s return had mobilised the workers. “Our activists and leaders are charged. We will not let that momentum go down,” he said.
The sources said the government was trying to convince Zardari to accept an offer where the majority of the PPP demands will be met immediately. But this offer had been on the table for a few weeks and Bilawal had rejected it.
A sixth grader in Pakistan, through his father, has sued officials at the President House at the Islamabad High Court, accusing them for plagiarising and using his speech without his consent. Eleven-year-old Mohammad Sabeel Haider, a student of Islamabad Model College for Boys, said on Friday that he was chosen to deliver a speech at the President House in Islamabad on December 22, reports the Dawn.
The ceremony was recorded and is supposed to be aired on Pakistan Television on December 25, marking the 141st birth anniversary of Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan. However, when Sabeel arrived at the President’s House, he was informed he will no longer be delivering the speech.
He said in his petition that a tenth-grader delivered the speech he had written and prepared, alleging that his intellectual property was stolen. According to Sabeel’s lawyer, as per Section 3 of Intellectual Property and Copyrights Ordinance 1967, a literary piece that the person has produced themselves cannot be used by a third party without their consent.
The court’s judgement in this regard has been reserved.
A fake news article led to gunfire at a Washington pizzeria three weeks ago. Now it seems that another fake news story has prompted the defense minister of Pakistan to threaten to go nuclear.
The defense minister, Khawaja Muhammad Asif, wrote a saber-rattling Twitter post directed at Israel on Friday after a false report — which the minister apparently believed — that Israel had threatened Pakistan with nuclear weapons. Both countries have nuclear arsenals.
“Israeli def min threatens nuclear retaliation presuming pak role in Syria against Daesh,” the minister wrote on his official Twitter account, using an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. “Israel forgets Pakistan is a Nuclear state too.”
Mr. Asif appeared to be reacting to a fake news article published on awdnews.com.
That story, with the typo-laden headline “Israeli Defense Minister: If Pakistan send ground troops to Syria on any pretext, we will destroy this country with a nuclear attack,” appeared on the website on Dec. 20, alongside articles with headlines like “Clinton is staging a military coup against Trump.”
The fake story about Israel even misidentified the country’s defense minister, attributing quotations to a former minister, Moshe Yaalon. Israel’s current minister of defense is Avigdor Lieberman.
The Israeli Defense Ministry responded on Twitter to say the report was fictitious.
“The statement attributed to fmr Def Min Yaalon re Pakistan was never said,” the ministry wrote in Twitter post directed at Mr. Asif. The Israeli ministry added in a second post: "Reports referred to by the Pakistani Def Min are entirely false.”
@KhawajaMAsif U R A DEFENSE MINISTER,THAT MEANS U VE A VERY IMPORTANT JOB,NEXT TIME CHECK THE SOURCE OF THE NEWS, DON'T JUMP TO GUNS STUPID
Mr. Asif did not respond to the Israelis on Twitter, and as of Saturday his message had been reposted nearly 400 times. Many of the people reacting to Mr. Asif on Twitter mocked him for his mistake.
The proliferation of fake news stories — spread on social networks and produced by a variety of sources including pranksters, foreign governments and enterprising individuals who hope to receive advertising revenue by driving traffic to their websites — has become an increasingly serious problem.
A North Carolina man was arrested on Dec. 4 after firing a gun at a Washington pizza parlor, because investigators said he was investigating claims in fake news articles that the pizzeria was at the center of a child sex slave ring linked to Hillary Clinton.
“On the eve of Quaid’s anniversary, today let us pledge to remain focused on the central principles for which the country was created by its founding fathers,”.
Islamabad December 24, 2016: “A central thought of the Father of the Nation Mohammed Ali Jinnah in creating Pakistan was that it will be a democratic and progressive state and not a theocratic one in which thoughts and actions of individuals are controlled by a few in the name of ideology”. This has been stated by former President Asif Ali Zardari in a message on the eve of the 140th birth anniversary of father of nation, Quaid-e-Azam Mohammed Ali Jinnah on Sunday December 25. On the eve of Quaid’s anniversary today let us pledge to remain focused on the central principles for which the country was created by its founding fathers, he said. Constitutionalism, rule of law and equality of all citizens and equal opportunities to all citizens without any prejudice of religion, cast and creed are the guiding principles behind the creation of Pakistan, he said. There is a need for introspection in the direction the state has taken; whether ideology and religion are being misused to negate the pristine principles of the state and to stifle dissent and free expression. We need to ask ourselves whether course correction is needed, he said and called for review of administrative and legislative structures that militate against the principle of equality of all citizens, he said. The nation will slip into the quagmire of instability and if the founding principles were disregarded, he warned. On this occasion we also reiterate our resolve to fight the enemies within who seek to destroy the state in the name of ideology or religion. The Pakistan People’s Party reiterates its resolve to defend the founding principles of Pakistan and to fight extremism and militancy to the finish. On this occasion we also pay homage to all those in the armed forces, the police, the civilian law enforcing agencies and the people who have made huge sacrifices in the fight against extremists and militants, Asif Zardari said.
“PPP is the political home for every Pakistani irrespective to their religion. We celebrate and mourn together as an integrated nation. Like Eid and Diwali, we will celebrate Christmas also together and share each other’s festivities,”: Chairman PPP
KARACHI, December 24: Chairman Pakistan Peoples Party Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has extended greetings to the Christians living in Pakistan and across the world on the eve of holy annual festival of Christmas being celebrated tomorrow to commemorate the birth of Jesus Christ.
“PPP is the political home for every Pakistani irrespective to their religion. We celebrate and mourn together as an integrated nation. Like Eid and Diwali, we will celebrate Christmas also together and share each other’s festivities,” he added.
PPP Chairman said his Party is true the torch-bearer of the vision of the founding fathers of Pakistan and founders of democracy in the country. “An egalitarian society with equal opportunities and justice for all is our dream,” he said and assured every Pakistani, including the Christian community that Party’s struggle to make this dream come true will continue unabated.
Bilawal Bhutto Zardari appealed the Christian brothers and sisters to pray for peace, tranquility and progress of Pakistan and its people on this holy festival.
ARIF ALI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
FAROOQ NAEEM/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
AFP/GETTY IMAGES
Mwaqar 
