Sunday, July 26, 2020

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Turkey, Greece in War - of Words - Over Aghia Sophia Mosque

Greece's sniping at Turkey for converting the ancient cathedral of Aghia Sophia in Constantinople into a mosque has drawn return fire as the battle there escalated while it was cooling down over Turkish provocations in the Aegean and East Mediterranean.
After 86 years as a museum – having been a mosque for 481 years after the city the rest of the world now calls Istanbul fell to Turkish invaders – the venerable Orthodox church and symbol of Christianity in the Byzantine world opened to Muslim prayers.
That began July 24 after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in a move his critics was aimed at mollifying his hard-core religious base despite international denunciation, ordered the conversion, backed by the country's high court who deferred to him.
Greece's New Democracy issued hard words over the move but had not forcefully fought it before the change, although now is trying to find some way to respond too late to make it revert to a museum again.
With tension between the countries already rising over Turkish plans to drill for oil and gas off Greek islands, on hold for now, church bells tolled in mourning across Greece as Erdogan joined prayers at the building, the news agency Reuters reported.
“Greece showed once again its enmity towards Islam and Turkey with the excuse of reacting to Aghia Sophia Mosque being opened to prayers,” Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Hami Aksoy said in a written statement, not noting the oddity of using the Greek word for saint in the same title as calling the cathedral a mosque.
The Turkish ministry strongly condemned hostile statements by the Greek government and Parliament members to stir up the public, and the burning of a Turkish flag in the Greek city of Thessaloniki, it said.
The Greek Foreign Ministry, firing back, said, “The international community of the 21st Century is stunned to observe the religious and nationalist fanatic ramblings of today’s Turkey,” Erdogan saying he doesn't care what anyone thinks and no move to stop him.
Thes ceremony sealed Erdogan’s ambition to restore Muslim worship at the site, which most Greeks view as central to their Orthodox Christian religion, the news agency said, after Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis also called Turkey a “troublemaker,” and the conversion of the site an “affront to civilization of the 21st Century.”

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Balochistan: Plain-clothed Iranian officials disappear three Young Baloch in Pahrah

The Iranian plain-clothed officials have arrested and disappeared three Baloch teenagers from the Pahrah region of Iranian Occupied Balochistan on Wednesday 22 July 2020.
The victims include 17-year-old Hafiz Bozrogzadeh son Mohammad Younes, Mohammad Bozrogzadeh son of Abdul Rashid, and Ahmad Bozrogzadeh son MohammadYaqub.
Rasank, a Baloch social media forum vigorously active in reporting human rights violations in the Western part of occupied Balochistan quoted its source of information as saying that Mohammad and Ahmad were arrested from in front of their house while Hafeez was arrested from his workplace at a supermarket.
The sources further said that these young Baloch have been arrested for being part of a WhatsApp group, an allegation that has not been confirmed by the security officials so far.
The whereabouts of the three teenagers remained unknown at the time of filing this news report.
The Islamic regime of Iran continues extrajudicial detentions without considering the age of its victims in Iranian Occupied Balochistan.

What Does a Journalist’s Abduction and Release Portend for Pakistan?

By Mohammad Taqi
It is now clear that the Pakistani Army is going all out to root out even the last vestiges of dissent.






“I do maintain, and I have drunk deep at the fountain of constitutional law, that liberty of a man is the dearest thing in the law of any country, and it should not be taken away in this fashion.”
~ M.A. Jinnah

Like many other leaders, Jinnah was a complex man with many contradictions. He stood for many things in different phases of his life, and his legacy, therefore, remains infinitely negotiable. Secularists and communalists both draw legitimacy from his words and actions. But perhaps the only consistent feature of his long legal and political career was standing up for the freedom of expression at the right moment and doing so steadfastly.
Jinnah helped found two phenomenal newspapers, Dawn and Pakistan Times. He presided over the influential Bombay Chronicle’s board of directors and stood by its editor, the Englishman Benjamin Guy “BG” Horniman when the latter took flak from the company and the colonial British government. And when the colonial government deported Horniman from India for opposing the draconian Rowlatt Acts of 1919, Jinnah came to his defence. He pleaded Horniman’s case in the Indian legislative assembly, where he delivered the famous words quoted above.
Little would the founder of Pakistan have known that the country he had carved out of India would eventually become a purgatory for the free press and a hellhole for journalists. Just a decade after Jinnah’s demise, Pakistan Times and its sister Urdu publications Imroze and Lail-O-Nahar were taken over at gunpoint by Field Marshal Ayub Khan’s military regime. And it has been downhill since. Every military regime and even certain civilian governments have tried to muzzle the press in Pakistan.
The most recent addition to the unfortunate tally of media persons who have been targeted professionally and personally is senior journalist Matiullah Jan. A fierce critic of the Pakistani Army, Jan had lost his television show some time back, when the channel’s owners succumbed to pressure from the brass. But that wasn’t enough to cow him down. He was one of the first mainstream media persons to take his show to YouTube, where he has been consistently reporting about what effectively is a menacing hybrid martial regime in Pakistan.
On July 21, around 11 am, Matiullah was sitting in his car after dropping off his wife at the school where she teaches when a posse pounced on him. Several cars with police lights and about 10 men wearing the anti-terrorist police squad’s uniform abducted him in broad daylight, in the federal capital Islamabad. The whole incident was caught on closed-circuit television (CCTV) installed in one of the buildings. But the way the abductors carried themselves suggests that they couldn’t care less.
Matiullah was handcuffed and a hood thrown over his head. He was first driven around, before being taken to a ‘safe house’. Giving details of his ordeal, Matiullah said that the location where he was kept was painted and staged to look like a police lockup. His captors pretended to be policemen, but in all probability were not. He was roughed up and thrown into a lockup blindfolded, where he remained for several hours. The armed men spoke to each other and to Matiullah Jan in broken Pashto, again trying to dupe him into believing they weren’t who they really were.
Later they decided to lug him into a vehicle again and drove him around, before stopping and carrying out a conversation to pretend that they somehow got the wrong man. Matiullah was asked whether he was Zar Khan or Zarak Khan He was eventually released on the Rawalpindi-Peshawar highway, near an army checkpoint, of all places. Apparently, civilian motorists recognised him and he used one of their phones to contact his family. He was subsequently rescued by his family and friends, ending a 12-hour ordeal.
The whole charade has the involvement of the Pakistani Army and its intelligence agencies written all over it.
In Pakistan, the abduction of a fairly high-profile journalist by the police is virtually unheard of. On the other hand, the Army is notorious for abducting writers, journalists, politicians and activists. An after-the-fact directive was issued by the National Counterterrorism Authority about alleged foreign agents entering Pakistan to abduct a prominent personality for ransom. But looking at Matiullah’s beat-up car, no one had any doubt left that the men in boots had taken him away. But why they did it, and why in this fashion is the question.
The Pakistani media had enjoyed a fair bit of freedom after the last restoration of democracy in 2008 and continued to build upon it during the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) dispensations. However, in the second phase of the PMLN government, the Army started to wrestle back the political space it had lost since the ouster of General Pervez Musharraf. And with that, it deemed it necessary to capture control over the media and its narrative.
Interestingly, Musharraf’s regime in its second phase had a rather hands-off approach towards the media. But by 2015, the army, under General Raheel Sharif, was already hounding the dissenters in the media. His director general of Inter-Services Public Relations (DG-ISPR), General Asim Bajwa, was instrumental in both coercing and coopting media outlets. Bajwa helped sire ISPR’s troll farms but avoided public confrontation. His replacement, General Asif Ghafoor, however, acted like a schoolyard bully on social media and his minions at the ISPR openly threatened journalists and gave them directives via WhatsApp and similar portals.
The Pakistani Army is many things but one thing it is not: ill-disciplined. There is no way that the ISPR could have gone on with its shenanigans without Raheel Sharif or the incumbent Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Qamar Javed Bajwa’s knowledge and approval. In fact, General Asim Bajwa was rewarded when he was appointed as chief of the China-Pakistan Economy (CPEC) Corridor Authority, and also serves as media advisor to Prime Minister Imran Khan currently. General Ghafoor is now serving as the general officer commanding an infantry division and was replaced by Major General Babar Iftikhar.
While General Iftikhar has kept a low public profile, the army’s project to root out even the last vestiges of dissent continues relentlessly. In fact, with the army-installed Imran Khan regime turning out to be a disaster, the junta has become more sensitive to criticism and more inclined to shoot the proverbial messenger.
The owner of the country’s largest media house, the Jang/Geo Group, languishes in prison over a decades-old charge because his outlet still manages to air programming critical of the Imran-Bajwa regime. The group’s leading anchorperson Hamid Mir, who himself survived an assassination attempt, went on record to say that sections of his show covering Jan’s abduction were censored at the behest of (the army’s) intelligence agencies. Mir clearly stated that civilian authorities had nothing to do with the abduction. Why were the intelligence agencies so brazen in this abduction? The simple answer is because they could. They knew very well that Jan was scheduled to appear before the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SCP), in a contempt case the next day and his disappearance would invariably raise questions. But they wanted to send a message not just to Jan, but any other journalist who dares to cover the Army’s encroachment into politics and businesses.
In fact, Jan has been covering in detail the SCP proceedings involving Justice Faez Isa, who is in line to become the chief justice of Pakistan (CJP) and whose name was referred to the Supreme Judicial Council for investigation by the president of Pakistan, presumably at the behest of the establishment. Isa is widely seen as a fair-minded judge who had chastised the army’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Directorate, over its role in orchestrating protests against Nawaz Sharif’s elected government in 2017. In the army’s calculus, Justice Isa could be a wild card when he becomes the CJP in 2023, which is also the year for general elections if the current parliament completes its term. The SCP took suo motu cognizance of a tweet by Jan in which he had hit out at the seven judges of the court who wanted Isa to be probed by the Federal Board of Revenue .
The shoddy attempts at plausible deniability notwithstanding, the army’s thugs weren’t really trying to hide their actions. They wanted to make an example out of Jan.
The instant chorus of support – from rights activists, journalist organisations, politicians, diplomats, and common people – predominantly on social media, for the abducted journalist, along with the CCTV footage, may have put a damper on his captors’ designs. Justice Isa broke from convention and visited Jan’s family while he was still in captivity. The chief justice of the Islamabad high court, Justice Athar Minallah, took cognizance of the abduction and put the civilian authorities on notice.
Whether his captors had plans to hold him longer or even harm him, we don’t know. But the concerted condemnation definitely helped the release. This, however, is neither the first instance of its kind nor would it be the last. A similar reaction, minus the judges acting, after the abduction of columnist and rights activist Gul Bukhari two years, had led to her swift recovery. But it was only a reaction and did not turn into a cohesive action plan for the future.
A year ago, several western law enforcement agencies had warned over 20 Pakistani dissidents that the ISI had plans to physically harm them. Earlier this month a document surfaced through social media, which named five journalists and writers, including me, to be monitored. Ostensibly an internal memorandum of Pakistan’s Ministry of Interior, called for monitoring activities of one Afghan and four Pakistani-origin writers and attempts to stop their “rhetoric against Pakistan” in the future. It prompted Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF) to warn Pakistani authorities against threatening these writers.
After his release, Jan has conducted himself with even more poise. He appeared before the SCP in stride, to face the contempt charges against him. He has eloquently put his version of events on record. But unless everyone who spoke in support of him comes together to proactively hold the Pakistani Army’s feet to the fire, it will continue to hound dissenters. The mealy-mouthed condemnations by certain politicians, especially those of the PMLN that claims Jinnah’s mantle today, are not enough. Unless the army is named as the tormentor, its impunity won’t end. The media and rights activists can raise awareness, but the heavy lifting has to be done by the political parties. Makers of the law are also supposed to be its defenders. They can’t shirk this duty.
https://m.thewire.in/article/south/pakistan-media-freedom-matiullah-jan/amp?__twitter_impression=true

مردِ حُر آصف علی زرداری - ايک زرداری سب پر بھاری

تحریر: آفتاب احمد گورائیہ

‏مرد حر آصف علی زرداری ضمیر کا وہ قیدی ہے جس نے اپنی عظیم اہلیہ شہید محترمہ بینظیر بھٹو سے شادی کے موقع پر کیا جانے والا عہد کہ آج کے بعد محترمہ جیل نہیں جائیں گی بلکہ ان کی جگہ میں جیل جاؤں گا کو نبھاتے نبھاتے ساری جوانی کسی بھی مقدمے میں سزا نہ ہونے کے باوجود جیل میں گزار دی. جیل میں گزارے گئے ساڑھے گیارہ سال کا ایک ایک دن زرداری صاحب کی استقامت، ہمت و حوصلے، بہادری اور جوانمردی کی الگ الگ داستان لئے ہوئے ہے. جیل میں ہونے والے تشدد، زبان کاٹے جانے اور عدالتوں کی جانب سے مقدمات کو التوا میں ڈالنے کے لئے دی جانے والی لمبی تاریخوں کے باوجود زرداری صاحب کو ہمیشہ مسکراتے ہی دیکھا گیا. بڑے سے بڑا ظلم اور ناانصافی بھی زرداری صاحب کی مسکراہٹ نہ چھین سکی. زرداری صاحب کی یہی مسکراہٹ ان کے مخالفین کے لئے سب سے بڑا ڈر اور خوف کی علامت بن گئی. زرداری صاحب کی یہی ہمت اور بہادری تھی کہ بدترین مخالف نوائے وقت کے مدیر مجید نظامی نے زرداری صاحب کو مرد حر کا خطاب دیا جو آج زرداری صاحب کے نام کا حصہ بن چکا ہے.
‏کون سا الزام ہے جو زرداری صاحب پر نہیں لگایا گیا، کون سا مقدمہ ہے جو زرداری صاحب پر نہیں بنایا گیا؟ لیکن کوئی بھی الزام یا جھوٹا مقدمہ زرداری صاحب کی ہمت اور حوصلے کو شکست نہ دے سکا. جھوٹے مقدمات بنانے والوں نے بعد میں جھوٹے مقدمات پر معافی بھی مانگی. نواز شریف دور کے چیرمین احتساب کمیشن سیف الرحمن کی جانب سے زرداری صاحب کے پاؤں پکڑ کر معافی مانگنے والے واقعے کو کون بھلا سکتا ہے. ٹیپس سکینڈل جس کے نتیجے میں جسٹس قیوم اور جسٹس راشد کو استعفی دینے پڑے وہ بھی جھوٹے مقدمات کا ایک اور ثبوت ہے. نواز شریف کے طویل انٹرویو پر مبنی سہیل وڑائچ کی کتاب “غدارکون” میں نواز شریف کا زرداری صاحب کے مقدمات کے بارے اعتراف بھی تاریخ کا حصہ ہے کہ یہ تمام مقدمات جھوٹ پر مبنی تھے اور ان مقدمات کا مقصد محترمہ بینظیر بھٹو شہید کو دباؤ میں لانا تھا.
‏زرداری صاحب کی شخصیت کا ایک اور نادر پہلو یہ بھی ہے کہ تمام تر جھوٹے مقدمات اور مسلسل پروپیگنڈہ کے باوجود جب بھی قومی معاملات پر اتفاق رائے کی ضرورت پیش آئی تو زرداری صاحب نے کبھی بھی ذاتی رنجش اور انا کو آڑے نہیں آنے دیا اور قومی ایجنڈے پر سب جماعتوں کو اکٹھا کرنے کے لیئے ہمیشہ اپنا کردار ادا کیا. اٹھارویں ترمیم اور این ایف سی ایوارڈ پر تمام جماعتوں کا اتفاق اس کردار کا منہ بولتا ثبوت ہے.
‏محترمہ بینظیر بھٹو کی شہادت کا موقع جہاں زرداری صاحب کے لئیے ذاتی طور پر نہایت غم کا وقت تھا وہاں زرداری صاحب کی قائدانہ صلاحیتوں کا بھی بہت بڑا امتحان تھا. ایک ایسے وقت میں جب پوری قوم غم و اندوہ کے سمندر میں ڈوب چکی تھی وہیں کچھ لوگوں نے جب پاکستان کے خلاف نعرہ لگایا تو زرداری صاحب نے جواب میں پاکستان کھپے کا نعرہ لگا کر ان آوازوں کو فوراً خاموش کروا دیا.
‏دو ہزار آٹھ کے انتخابات کے بعد زرداری صاحب جب صدر مملکت منتخب ہوئے تو مشرف دور میں ہونے والی ترامیم کے باعث آئین کا حلیہ بگڑ چکا تھا. تمام تر اختیارات صدر کو منتقل ہو چکے تھے. صدر منتخب ہونے کے بعد پارلیمنٹ سے اپنے پہلے خطاب میں زرداری صاحب نے اپنے اختیارات پارلیمنٹ کو واپس منتقل کرنے کا اعلان کیا اور اگلے ایک سال کے دوران اٹھارویں ترمیم کے زریعے اپنے اس وعدے کو پایہ تکمیل تک پہنچا دیا. اٹھارویں ترمیم کے زریعے نہ صرف اختیارات پارلیمنٹ اور وزیراعظم کو منتقل کئے گئے بلکہ محترمہ بینظیر بھٹو شہید کے ویژن کو عملی جامہ پہنچاتے ہوئے بہت سے اختیارات صوبوں کو منتقل کر دئیے گئے. اٹھارویں ترمیم کے زریعے ہی پختون قوم کا دیرینہ مطالبہ پورا کرتے ہوئے صوبہ سرحد کو خیبرپختونخواہ کانام دیا گیا. کسی طاقتور صدر کی جانب سے اپنے اختیارات پارلیمنٹ کو منتقل کرنے کا یہ ایک منفرد واقعہ ہے.
‏صدر مملکت آصف علی زرداری کی قیادت میں پیپلز پارٹی کی حکومت نے دہشت گردی اور نامساعد حالات کے باوجود بہت سے ایسے کام سر انجام دئیے جن کے پیچھے زرداری صاحب کی زیرک قیادت اور ویژن بھرپور طریقے سے موجود ہے. آئین کی بحالی، سوات آپریشن، سوات آپریشن کے مہاجرین کی کامیابی سے اپنے گھروں کو واپسی، دو بڑے سیلابوں کی تباہ کاریوں سے کامیابی سے نمٹنا، تھر کول جیسے گیم چینجر پراجیکٹ کا اغاز، تھر ڈویلپمنٹ پراجیکٹس، بینظیر انکم سپورٹ پروگرام، سرکاری ملازمین اور پنشننرز کی تنخواہوں میں اضافے، صوبہ سندھ میں صحت کے شعبے میں ہونے والے انقلابی اقدامات، پاکستان ایران گیس پائپ لائن منصوبہ اور سی پیک کی بنیاد رکھنے جیسے ان گنت منصوبے ہیں جن کے پیچھے زرداری صاحب کی بھرپور حکمت اور سوچ کارفرما نظر آتی ہے.
‏آصف علی زرداری پاکستان کی سیاست کا وہ کردار ہیں جن کے خلاف مسلسل پروپیگنڈہ کیا گیا جھوٹے الزامات اور مقدمات کی بھرمار کی گئی لیکن زرداری صاحب آج بھی پاکستان کی سیاست میں ایک مرکزی کردار کی حیثیت رکھتے ہیں. پیپلز پارٹی کے بدترین نقاد حسن نثار کے مطابق آصف علی زرداری پاکستان کی سیاست کا مظلوم ترین کردار ہے جس کی مسلسل کردار کشی کی گئی. آج چار چھ مہینے کی قید گزار کر آنے والے سیاسی رہنماؤں کی جانب سے سوال کیا جاتا ہے کہ جیل میں گزارے گئے ان کے چند ماہ کا حساب کون دے گا؟ زرداری صاحب کی ساری جوانی بیوی بچوں سے دور جیلوں میں گزر گئی اور وہ سب مقدمات میں باعزت بری ہوئے سارے مقدمات جھوٹے ثابت ہوئے. کیا کبھی کسی نے سوچا ہے کہ زرداری صاحب کے جیل میں گزرے ماہ و سال کا حساب کون دے گا؟