ISLAMABAD: Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, the son of Pakistan’s assassinated premier Benazir Bhutto, has urged military action against the Taleban as the country debates how to respond to a surge in militant attacks.
Zardari, the patron-in-chief of the main opposition Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), told the BBC that Pakistan must “wake up” to the threat posed by militancy.
Pakistan, battling a homegrown Taleban insurgency since 2007, has endured a bloody start to the year with 110 people killed in attacks in January, according to an AFP tally.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s government has been under fire for failing to make a strong response to the upsurge in violence.
The government has for months said it favoured talks with the Taleban but Zardari, 25, said he would only be willing to negotiate terms for the militants’ surrender.
“I think we’ve exhausted the option of talks. Dialogue is always an option but we have to have a position of strength,” he told the BBC.
“How do you talk from a position of strength? You have to beat them on the battlefield. They’re fighting us.”
Ministers held talks on Monday to discuss how to deal with the growing militant threat, nearly a week after air force jets bombarded suspected Taleban hideouts in North Waziristan tribal district.
North Waziristan is a major stronghold for groups linked to the Taleban and Al-Qaeda, and debate is raging about whether a full-scale military ground offensive should be launched to rid the area of militants once and for all.
The United States has long pressured Pakistan to do more to wipe out militant strongholds, saying insurgents were using rear bases in North Waziristan to mount attacks on US troops in Afghanistan.
Benazir Bhutto was assassinated in December 2007 after leaving a PPP campaign rally. Her husband and Bilawal’s father Asif Ali Zardari was president from 2008-2013.
Bhutto’s son urges military action against militants
Bhutto’s son urges military action against militants
South Korea will boost medical school admissions to tackle physician shortage
- Jeong said all of the additional students will be trained through regional physician programs
SEOUL: South Korea plans to increase medical school admissions by more than 3,340 students from 2027 to 2031 to address concerns about physician shortages in one of the fastest-aging countries in the world, the government said Tuesday.
The decision was announced months after officials defused a prolonged doctors’ strike by backing away from a more ambitious increase pursued by Seoul’s former conservative government. Even the scaled-down plan drew criticism from the country’s doctors’ lobby, which said the move was “devoid of rational judgment.”
Kwak Soon-hun, a senior Health Ministry official, said that the president of the Korean Medical Association attended the healthcare policy meeting but left early to boycott the vote confirming the size of the admission increases.
The KMA president, Kim Taek-woo, later said the increases would overwhelm medical schools when combined with students returning from strikes or mandatory military service, and warned that the government would be “fully responsible for all confusion that emerges in the medical sector going forward.” The group didn’t immediately signal plans for further walkouts.
Health Minister Jeong Eun Kyeong said the annual medical school admissions cap will increase from the current 3,058 to 3,548 in 2027, with further hikes planned in subsequent years to reach 3,871 by 2031. This represents an average increase of 668 students per year over the five-year period, far smaller than the 2,000-per-year hike initially proposed by the government of former President Yoon Suk Yeol, which sparked the months long strike by thousands of doctors.
Jeong said all of the additional students will be trained through regional physician programs, which aim to increase the number of doctors in small towns and rural areas that have been hit hardest by demographic pressures. The specific admissions quota for each medical school will be finalized in April.
