GENEVA: In one of the world´s most expensive cities, thousands of people lined up Saturday for free food, as the COVID-19 crisis casts a spotlight on Geneva´s usually invisible poor.In the Swiss city famous for its private banks, luxury watchmakers and fancy boutiques, people began...

DHAKA: Michael Joseph Martin, Bangladesh’s last Armenian, has died aged 89, bringing an end to the more than 300-year presence of the once thriving and powerful minority Christian community.Martin spent decades as custodian of the Armenian Church of the Holy Resurrection which was founded in...

NOUAKCHOTT: Worshippers packed Mauritania’s largest mosque on Friday, mostly ignoring social distancing rules, after the West African state lifted restrictions on public prayers meant to curb coronavirus infections.The government said this week it would "progressively ease" a series of...

GENEVA: In one of the world’s most expensive cities, thousands of people lined up on Saturday for free food, as the Covid-19 crisis casts a spotlight on Geneva’s usually invisible poor.In the Swiss city famous for its private banks, luxury watchmakers and fancy boutiques, people began...

Islamabad : Tarnol Police on Friday raided a fake beverage factory in its area and confiscated thousands of empty and filled bottles of various brands, a police spokesman said on Friday.Following directions and guidance of IGP Islamabad Muhammad Aamir Zulfiqar, the police spokesperson said that...

ISLAMABAD: Senior vice president of the main opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has urged the commission of inquiry on the sugar scam to include Prime Minister Imran Khan and the then finance minister Asad Umar in the investigation to find out the truth.

Talking to reporters after appearing before the commission with another senior party leader and former minister Khurram Dastagir Khan here on Saturday, Mr Abbasi said he had told the commission there would be no worth of its report if it did not summon the prime minister and Mr Umar, the then chairman of the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) that had allowed export of sugar despite knowing it was not available in stock.

“We do not talk politics. We have presented facts before the commission. If the prime minister and the [former] ECC chairman are not called [for interrogation] there will be no worth of the commission’s report,” said Mr Abbasi, who had served as prime minister after disqualification of Nawaz Sharif in July 2017 as a result of the Supreme Court’s verdict in Al-Azizia corruption case.

Mr Abbasi had himself written a letter to the commission and offered his services to it by sharing his experiences in probing the sugar scam. He had stated that he would inform the commission how sugar scandals developed in the light of his experience as a former chief executive of the country.

Mr Abbasi held the prime minister directly responsible for over Rs100 billion sugar scam, saying the inquiry commission should ask him the reason for allowing sugar export despite the fact that the commodity was not available in surplus in the country and for not taking any step to prevent increase in its price. He said the export continued for 16 months with 45 per cent increase in the sugar price in the country, but the government took no notice of it.

The former prime minister alleged that the sugar mill owners earned Rs30 per kilogram extra due to this decision of the government. He said the increase in sugar price proved the decisions of the cabinet and the ECC to export sugar were wrong.

“There can be three factors behind this wrong decision. Either the prime minister is incompetent or corrupt or he is both. The facts prove he is incompetent as well as corrupt and the people of Pakistan are paying the price for it,” he said.

Mr Abbasi said he had told the inquiry commission it would not be able to understand the issue until it would not summon the members of the cabinet and the ECC.

“Is it not a matter of conflict of interests?” he asked, alleging those who made billions through the sugar scam were part of the federal cabinet.

Mr Abbasi said it was a clear, open and shut case as facts showed sugar was exported against the advice of the relevant authorities and continued to be exported for 16 months while prices rose. He said not only that, the government also imposed a special tax on sugar import to ensure the rise in price and exploitation of the people.

Replying to a question, the former prime minister said when the PML-N had left the government in 2018, the sugar price was Rs54 per kg. He said the PML-N had also given huge subsidy of over Rs20bn and even allowed the export, but at the same time it kept check on its price and brought the price down.

Responding to another query, he said they had not given anything in writing or any document, but they were ready to do so, if asked. However, he said, the minutes of the meetings of the cabinet and the ECC would be sufficient as evidence.

The federal cabinet in its meeting on April 28 had allowed three more weeks to the Sugar Forensic Commission (SFC) to compile its report on last year’s food crisis after the expiry of the April 25 deadline given for the task.

The commission headed by Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) Director General Wajid Zia had reportedly made a formal request to the federal government to grant it more time citing multiple reasons, including the situation created by coronavirus.

The commission had been constituted by the government in the first week of April following the release of two separate inquiry reports of the FIA on the issue of artificial shortage of sugar and wheat in the country and sudden increase in their prices last year.

The inquiry report on sugar had revealed names of many bigwigs, including Jahangir Tareen, former secretary general of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and a close confidant of Prime Minister Imran Khan, who had allegedly obtained benefit during the crisis.

The report had showed in the past few years sugar production was historically more than the local requirement and said therefore it was imperative to include this aspect related to export of sugar, including any subsidy given, its impact on local sugar prices and eventually major beneficiaries of such export subsidies, if any. The inquiry committee had found the sugar export was not justified as sugarcane production was expected to be low in harvesting season 2018-19 and with the export of sugar in Jan 2019, the prices of sugar sharply increased.

After the release of the report, the opposition had demanded that the PM take stern action against those who had been declared responsible for the crisis by the FIA committee.

PM Khan had vowed to take action, but said he would do so after receiving the forensic audit report from the commission he had constituted on the recommendation of the ‘initial’ reports. The commission comprises officials from a number of agencies and departments, including Intelligence Bureau and the Federal Board of Revenue.

Published in Dawn, May 10th, 2020

Foreign Office spokesperson Aisha Farooqui on Sunday said that Pakistan rejects the "baseless and inaccurate" allegations by Harish Salve, India's legal counsel in the Kulbushan Jadhav case.

In an online lecture on May 3, Salve, who had represented India in the case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), alleged that Pakistan refused to respond to Indian queries about how it would carry out the ICJ's judgement and review and reconsider Jadav's case.

"We have written four to five letters to Pakistan [...] but they just keep on denying. I think we have reached a point where we have to now decide whether we want to go back to ICJ for consequential directions because Pakistan has not moved ahead," Tribune India quoted Salve as saying.

He also alleged that Pakistan granted consular access to Jadhav "too late" and refused to share details of the case with India.

The Foreign Office, while refuting the allegations, said that Pakistan has "fully complied" with the international court's judgement. "Pakistan has granted India consular access to commander Jadhav and is processing measures for effective review and reconsideration as per the guidelines provided by ICJ in its judgment," a statement from the FO read.

The Foreign Office also said that Salve's statements were "regrettable and a misrepresentation of facts", adding that Pakistan followed "all its international obligations".

Read: Timeline: How the Kulbhushan Jadhav saga unfolded

The ICJ in its verdict in July 2019 had ruled that Jadhav be allowed consular access immediately and asked Pakistan to ensure "effective review and reconsideration of his conviction and sentences".

The ICJ had, however, rejected all other remedies sought by India, which included the annulment of the military court decision convicting Jadhav, restricting Pakistan from executing the sentence, securing Jadhav's release and ordering his return to India.

Arrest of Indian spy

Jadhav — a serving commander of the Indian Navy associated with Indian spy agency Research and Analysis Wing — was arrested on March 3, 2016, from Balochistan on allegations of espionage and terrorism.

Read: Transcript of RAW agent Kulbhushan’s confessional statement

In his subsequent trial at a military court, Jadhav had confessed to his involvement in terrorist plots.

The spy was subsequently sentenced to death in 2017. However, India insisted that Jadhav was not a spy and said he was kidnapped from Iran.

On April 10, 2017, Army Chief Gen Qamar Bajwa had endorsed the death penalty for Jadhav. In June 2017, the Indian spy had filed a mercy petition against the death penalty, in which he again confessed to his involvement in terrorist activities.

However, before Pakistani authorities could make a final decision, the ICJ, after being approached by India, had ordered a stay in his execution through an interim order.

Palo Alto, CA – Aha™ by HARMAN announced today that it has partnered with Fishidy and has rolled out ParkVisitor’s services, expanding its already robust content pipeline. Aha uses the HARMAN Cloud Platform to enable Web-based entertainment and information in vehicles using a radio-like format that is familiar to drivers. More than 40,000 music and non-music programs that span from live radio stations to podcasts and audiobooks from the Web are delivered straight to the car's dashboard through a seamless connection with an Aha smartphone app for iOS and Android systems.

Palo Alto, CA – HARMAN announced today that its Aha Radio service will be a standard feature in all Subaru models and trims starting with the 2015 Legacy. Subaru of America, Inc. was one of the first automotive manufacturers to integrate the Aha Radio service into its vehicles. A partnership that was established through the availability of the service in 2014 Subaru Forester’s top trim levels has been consistently growing since then.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau warned on Saturday that if provinces move too quickly to reopen their economies, a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic could send Canada "back into confinement this summer."

Venezuela's military said it seized three abandoned Colombian light combat vessels that soldiers found on Saturday while patrolling the Orinoco river, several days after the government accused its neighbor of aiding a failed invasion.

Former President Barack Obama described President Donald Trump's handling of the coronavirus pandemic as "chaotic" in a conference call with former members of his administration, a source said on Saturday.

Former President Obama, who has largely kept out of the fray even as President Trump has blamed his Democratic administration for a variety of problems related to the pandemic, described Trump's handling of the coronavirus pandemic as "chaotic" on a call, a source said. Colette Luke has more.

The Memorial Tournament in Dublin, Ohio, will use high-tech radio frequency identification (RFID) chips in tournament badges to ensure social distancing is maintained at the July 16-19 PGA Tour event, Golf Digest reported on Saturday.

A shy village boy who could not bear to leave his parents' bed, Andres Iniesta may have seemed an unlikely candidate to become one of the best footballers of all time, but anyone who saw him play rarely had serious doubts.

How do we get the world's largest economies on the same page moving forward with regulation? CFTC Commissioner Jill Sommers outlines some of the progress and challenges the U.S. has had and Thomson Reuters CEO Tom Glocer touts Canada as a template for a great country in which to do business in.

Nov. 14 - Tulsi Tanti, the chairman and managing director of Suzlon Energy, sits down with Chrystia Freeland to discuss the global economy and how India will not be affected like European countries have been.

Former President Obama, who has largely kept out of the fray even as President Trump has blamed his Democratic administration for a variety of problems related to the pandemic, described Trump's handling of the coronavirus pandemic as "chaotic" on a call, a source said. Colette Luke has more.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau warned on Saturday that if provinces move too quickly to reopen their economies, a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic could send Canada "back into confinement this summer."

Brazil's Economy Minister Paulo Guedes on Saturday said the country's central bank is likely to shower the economy with money in case of an economic depression.

Brazil's Economy Minister Paulo Guedes on Saturday said the country's central bank is likely to shower the economy with money in case of a depression due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Ever wanted a hard drive you could access from anywhere? Well Network-Attached Storage might be just right for you!

The former president was also critical of the Justice Department directing prosecutors to drop their case against Michael Flynn, warning that the “rule of law is at risk.”

"With his exuberance, his creativity, and his refusal to be anything other than himself, Little Richard laid the foundation for generations of artists to follow," Michelle Obama tweeted.

"I'm so honored to be your validictator," he says.

I know you would do anything to protect your own child, so let’s make sure every mama has the same opportunity and resources to protect theirs.

Former President Barack Obama on Friday said that the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic has been an “absolute chaotic disaster” and blamed it on a “selfish” and “tribal” mindset that has become operationalized in government.

It would be "abominable" if the Obama White House was behind the FBI's controversial interview of former national security adviser Michael Flynn, a former assistant director of intelligence for the bureau said Friday night.

Sean Hannity blasted the Obama administration and Democrats on Saturday night for the Russia investigation and targeting of former White House national security adviser Michael Flynn. 

State leaders across the U.S. moved to expand testing for the new coronavirus, while lifting some restrictions on travel and business that have crippled the nation’s economy.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver is cautiously optimistic about finishing out the season in a two-site plan which will likely not include fans -- a condition that may carry into next season. 

Saturday Night Live season finales tend to be elaborate, star-studded affairs. And they managed to make that the case even this year with all of the cast members still broadcasting from their respective homes, along with guests stars like Kristen Wiig, Martin Short and more.

Two weeks after Brad Pitt debuted his effortlessly charming Dr. Anthony Fauci impression, the final—with any luck—episode of SNL at Home opened with a Zoom graduation featuring a commencement address from Alec Baldwin’s Donald Trump, who somehow got ahold of a “Make America Great Again” hat at his Hamptons house.

“I’m so honored to be your vale-dictator,” he told the students. “But today’s not about me. It’s about you. Although I should spend a little time on me first, because I’ve been treated very poorly, even worse than they treated Lincoln.” 

Read more at The Daily Beast.

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In 1994, Marcus Robinson, who is black, was convicted of murder and sentenced to death for the 1991 killing of Erik Tornblom, a white teenager, in Cumberland County, North Carolina. He spent nearly 20 years on death row, but in 2012 his sentence was changed to life without a chance of parole. He was one of four death row inmates whose sentences were commuted by a judge who found that racial discrimination had played a role in their trials.

The reason their cases were reviewed at all was because of a 2009 North Carolina law known as the Racial Justice Act, which allowed judges to reduce death sentences to life in prison without parole when defendants were able to prove racial bias in their charge, jury selection, or sentence.

"The Racial Justice Act ensures that when North Carolina hands down our state's harshest punishment to our most heinous criminals," former Gov. Bev Perdue said when she signed the bill into law, "the decision is based on the facts and the law, not racial prejudice."

At 21, Robinson was the youngest person sentenced to death in North Carolina. When he was three, he was hospitalized with severe seizures after being physically abused by his father and was diagnosed with permanent brain dysfunction. However, those weren't the only troubling aspects of his case.

Racial discrimination in jury selection has been prohibited since it was banned by the Supreme Court in its 1986 Supreme Court decision Batson v. Kentucky, but Robinson's trial was infected with it. The prosecutor in the case, John Dickson, disproportionately refused eligible black potential jurors. For example, he struck one black potential juror because the man had been once charged with public drunkenness. However, he accepted two "nonblack" people with DWI convictions. Of the eligible members of the pool, he struck half the black people and only 14 percent of the nonblack members. In the end, Robinson was tried by a 12-person jury that included only three people of color—one Native American individual and two black people.

Racial discrimination in jury selection was not uncommon in the North Carolina criminal justice system. A comprehensive Michigan State University study looked at more than 7,400 potential jurors in 173 cases from 1990 to 2010. Researchers found that statewide prosecutors struck 52.6 percent of eligible potential black jurors and only 25.7 percent of all other potential jurors. This bias was reflected on death row. Of the 147 people on North Carolina's death row, 35 inmates were sentenced by all-white juries; 38 by juries with just one black member.

Under the Racial Justice Act, death row inmates had one year from when the bill became law to file a motion. Nearly all the state's 145 death row inmates filed claims, but only Robison and three others—Quintel Augustine, Tilmon Golphin, and Christina Walters—obtained hearings. In 2012, Robinson's was the first. At the Superior Court of Cumberland County, Judge Gregory Weeks ruled that race had played a significant role in the trial and Robinson was resentenced to life without parole. North Carolina appealed the decision to the state's Supreme Court.

An immediate outcry followed the decision. The North Carolina Conference of District Attorneys issued a statement saying, "Capital cases reflect the most brutal and heinous offenders in our society. Whether the death penalty is an appropriate sentence for murderers should be addressed by our lawmakers in the General Assembly, not masked as claims (of) racism in our courts."  

The ruling attracted lots of publicity from across the country and North Carolina lawmakers were outraged. "There are definitely signs in the legislative record that there were some [lawmakers] that really wanted to see executions move forward," Cassandra Stubbs, the director of the ACLU Capital Punishment Project who also represents Robinson, says. Legislative staffers circulated talking points for lawmakers with arguments that the RJA turns "district attorneys into racists and convicted murderers into victims," describing the law as "an end-run around the death penalty and an indefinite moratorium on capital punishment."

The day Judge Weeks resentenced Robinson, the Senate president pro tempore for the state Legislature, Phillip Berger, expressed concern that Robinson could be eligible for parole. He suggested Robinson—who had just turned 18 when he committed the crime and would not have been considered a juvenile—would be ineligible for life in prison without a chance of parole, citing a US Supreme Court ruling that prohibited juveniles from receiving life sentences without parole. "We cannot allow cold-blooded killers to be released into our community, and I expect the state to appeal this decision," he said. "Regardless of the outcome, we continue to believe the Racial Justice Act is an ill-conceived law that has very little to do with race and absolutely nothing to do with justice."

The state Legislature took on the challenge and voted to repeal the Racial Justice Act in 2013. This made it impossible for those on death row to even attempt to have their sentences reviewed for racial bias, but it left the fates of the four who had been moved to life imprisonment unclear. "The state's district attorneys are nearly unanimous in their bipartisan conclusion that the Racial Justice Act created a judicial loophole to avoid the death penalty and not a path to justice," Gov. Pat McCrory said in a statement at the time.

Even though the law was still in effect when the four inmates' sentences were reduced, they weren't safe from death row just yet. Robinson's sentenced had been legally reduced, but the legal battle was just beginning.

In 2015, after nearly two years from the initial hearing, the North Carolina Supreme Court ordered the Superior Court to reconsider the reduced sentences for Robinson, Augustine, Golphin, and Walters, saying the judge failed to give the state enough time to prepare for the "complex" proceedings.

This past January, Superior Court Judge Erwin Spainhour ruled that because the RJA had been repealed, the four defendants could no longer use the law to reduce their sentences. "North Carolina vowed to undertake an unprecedented look at the role of racial bias in capital sentencing," says Stubbs. But now, "the state Legislature explicitly turned from its commitment and repealed the law."

Robinson is back on death row at Central Prison in the state's capital of Raleigh. In the petition to the state Supreme Court, Robinson's lawyers point out that the Double Jeopardy Clause—the law that prevents someone from being tried twice for the same crime—bars North Carolina from trying to reimpose the death penalty because the 2012 RJA hearing acquitted him of capital punishment.

"He's never been resentenced to death," Stubbs says. "They have no basis to hold him on death row."

President Donald Trump began the week with a barrage of early-morning tweets blasting the courts for blocking his travel ban executive order. But in doing so, he may have just made it more likely that the courts will keep blocking the ban.

People, the lawyers and the courts can call it whatever they want, but I am calling it what we need and what it is, a TRAVEL BAN!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017

The Justice Dept. should have stayed with the original Travel Ban, not the watered down, politically correct version they submitted to S.C.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017

The Justice Dept. should ask for an expedited hearing of the watered down Travel Ban before the Supreme Court - & seek much tougher version!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017

In any event we are EXTREME VETTING people coming into the U.S. in order to help keep our country safe. The courts are slow and political!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017

These tweets followed upon several from over the weekend about the ban and the terrorist attack in London, including this one from Saturday evening:

We need to be smart, vigilant and tough. We need the courts to give us back our rights. We need the Travel Ban as an extra level of safety!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 3, 2017

In January, Trump signed an executive order banning nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for 90 days, as well as halting the refugee resettlement program for 120 days (and indefinitely for Syrian refugees). When the courts blocked it, rather than appeal to the Supreme Court, Trump signed a modified version of the order. The new ban repealed the old one, reduced the number of banned countries from seven to six, and added exceptions and waivers. Still, federal courts in Maryland and Hawaii blocked it, and now the Justice Department has appealed to the Supreme Court to have this second version of the ban reinstated.

The biggest question in the litigation over the ban is whether the courts should focus solely on the text of the order or also consider Trump's comments from the campaign trail, and even during his presidency, to determine whether the order uses national security as a pretext for banning Muslims from the country. The president's lawyers argue that the courts should focus on the text of the order and defer to the president's authority over national security. Trump's tweets Monday morning and over the weekend make it harder for the courts to justify doing that.

The travel ban is supposed to be a temporary remedy until the government can review its vetting procedures. But Trump's tweets make it appear that the ban itself is his goal. Trump repeatedly and defiantly uses the word "ban" when his administration has instead sought to call it a pause. 

The tweets "undermine the government's best argument—that courts ought not look beyond the four corners of the Executive Order itself," Stephen Vladeck, an expert on national security and constitutional law at the University of Texas School of Law, says via email. "Whether or not then-Candidate Trump's statements should matter (a point on which reasonable folks will likely continue to disagree), the more President Trump says while the litigation is ongoing tending to suggest that the Order is pretextual, the harder it is to convince even sympathetic judges and justices that only the text of the Order matters." And once the courts start looking at the president's statements, it's not hard to find ones that raise questions about anti-Muslim motivations.

Even the president's allies acknowledge his tweets are a problem. George Conway, the husband of top Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway, responded to Trump on Twitter by pointing out that the work of the Office of the Solicitor General—which is defending the travel ban in court—just got harder.

These tweets may make some ppl feel better, but they certainly won't help OSG get 5 votes in SCOTUS, which is what actually matters. Sad. https://t.co/zVhcyfm8Hr

— George Conway (@gtconway3d) June 5, 2017

Conway, who recently withdrew his name from consideration for a post at the Justice Department, then followed up to clarify his position.

2) ... and of course, my wonderful wife. Which is why I said what I said this morning. Every sensible lawyer in WHCO and every political ...

— George Conway (@gtconway3d) June 5, 2017

3) ... appointee at DOJ wd agree with me (as some have already told me). The pt cannot be stressed enough that tweets on legal matters ...

— George Conway (@gtconway3d) June 5, 2017

4) ... seriously undermine Admin agenda and POTUS--and those who support him, as I do, need to reinforce that pt and not be shy about it.

— George Conway (@gtconway3d) June 5, 2017

Trump may soon see his tweets used against him in court. Omar Jadwat, the ACLU attorney who argued the case before the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, told the Washington Post this morning that the ACLU's legal team is considering adding Trump's tweets to its arguments before the Supreme Court. "The tweets really undermine the factual narrative that the president's lawyers have been trying to put forth, which is that regardless of what the president has actually said in the past, the second ban is kosher if you look at it entirely on its own terms," Jadwat told the Post.

Anti-quarantine protesters jumped onto other social platforms after being shut down by Facebook, Amazon Vice President Tim Bray said Amazon is designed to create a climate of fear and quits the company, Apple releases new MacBook 13 with an improved keyboard and more storage.   Anti-quarantine protesters are being kicked off Facebook and quickly finding…

The high cost and short life of baby supplies inspired new dad Matt Cass to create a company. His novel leasing service is saving parents money, time and space on everything from cribs to toys.   When Matt Cass and his wife had their first child 2½ years ago, they had to stock up on…

WeWork’s ex-chief sues SoftBank, a popular children’s computer game gets hacked, and IBM’s Think conference goes virtual this week. WeWork cofounder and former chief executive Adam Neumann has filed a suit against Japanese conglomerate SoftBank for abandoning a $3 billion tender offer to the startup’s shareholders. The money is part of a $9.6 billion rescue…

As companies re-open, employees may don wearable tech to prevent the spread of COVID-19

A unique drone design promises aircraft payload with helicopter precision

Team Sonnenwagen from RWTH Aachen University race in the Bridgestone World Solar Challenge, in Australia.

Former President Barack Obama described President Donald Trump's handling of the coronavirus pandemic as "chaotic" in a conference call with former members of his administration, a source said on Saturday.

Hyderabad (Telangana)/ Kuwait, May 10 (ANI): India has continued to repatriate its people from aboard on the third day also. On May 09, an Air India flight brought back 163 Indians to Hyderabad from Kuwait under ‘Vande Bharat Mission’. Indian ambassador in Kuwait, K Jeeva Sagar said, “Vande Bharat Mission has taken off very, we are looking forward for its success.” The Vande Bharat Mission started on May 07 to bring back Indian nationals from aboard.

Are online classes and assignments proving to be the last stubby pencil on the camel’s back?

Later, it was reported that the owner of the bakery located in T Nagar in Chennai was arrested.