ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan will visit Saudi Arabia next week, Pakistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed to Arab News on Thursday.
“It’ll be either on Sept. 17-18 or Sept. 18-19. The details (of the visit) are being finalized,” said Dr. Mohammad Faisal, spokesperson for Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
He said the prime minister will travel to Saudi Arabia with a small entourage, as per the government’s austerity drive.
Arab News learned that the agenda of his meetings with Saudi dignitaries was being finalized. The prime minister will discuss “financial support to Pakistan and the wellbeing of hundreds of thousands of Pakistani workers (in Saudi Arabia).”
The development comes just days after a three-day visit of Saudi Arabia’s Media Minister Dr. Awwad bin Saleh Al-Awwad to Islamabad, during which he held meetings with Imran Khan and other top civil-military leaders. The minister passed on greetings from Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to the prime minister and invited him to visit Saudi Arabia.
In his victory speech on July 26, Imran Khan said: “Saudi Arabia is a friend who has always stood by us in difficult times.”
King Salman, in a telephone call on Aug. 12, congratulated Imran Khan on his party’s victory in the country’s parliamentary elections.
Pakistan is an important ally of Saudi Arabia, King Salman had said, adding that Saudi Arabia wants to maintain cordial relations with the country. He extended an invitation to Imran Khan, who had accepted.
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman also telephoned Khan and expressed the Kingdom’s desire to invest heavily in the country to strengthen its trade and bilateral ties with Pakistan.
“Pakistan considers Saudi Arabia’s security to be of crucial importance and safety of the holy sites in the kingdom was part of their faith,” the PTI said in a statement after Khan spoke to King Salman.
Imran Khan to visit Saudi Arabia next week, says Pakistan Foreign Ministry
Imran Khan to visit Saudi Arabia next week, says Pakistan Foreign Ministry
- It’ll be either on Sept. 17-18 or Sept. 18-19 — Dr. Mohammad Faisal
- The prime minister will travel with a small entourage, as per the government’s austerity drive
French publisher recalls dictionary over ‘Jewish settler’ reference
- The entry in French reads: “In October 2023, following the death of more than 1,200 Jewish settlers in a series of Hamas attacks”
- The four books are subject to a recall procedure and will be destroyed, Hachette said
PARSI: French publisher Hachette on Friday said it had recalled a dictionary that described the Israeli victims of the October 7, 2023 attacks as “Jewish settlers” and promised to review all its textbooks and educational materials.
The Larousse dictionary for 11- to 15-year-old students contained the same phrase as that discovered by an anti-racism body in three revision books, the company told AFP.
The entry in French reads: “In October 2023, following the death of more than 1,200 Jewish settlers in a series of Hamas attacks, Israel decided to tighten its economic blockade and invade a large part of the Gaza Strip, triggering a major humanitarian crisis in the region.”
The worst attack in Israeli history saw militants from the Palestinian Islamist group kill around 1,200 people in settlements close to the Gaza Strip and at a music festival.
“Jewish settlers” is a term used to describe Israelis living on illegally occupied Palestinian land.
The four books, which were immediately withdrawn from sale, are subject to a recall procedure and will be destroyed, Hachette said, promising a “thorough review of its textbooks, educational materials and dictionaries.”
France’s leading publishing group, which came under the control of the ultra-conservative Vincent Bollore at the end of 2023, has begun an internal inquiry “to determine how such an error was made.”
It promised to put in place “a new, strengthened verification process for all its future publications” in these series.
President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday said that it was “intolerable” that the revision books for the French school leavers’ exam, the baccalaureat, “falsify the facts” about the “terrorist and antisemitic attacks by Hamas.”
“Revisionism has no place in the Republic,” he wrote on X.
Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people, with 251 people taken hostage, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
Authorities in Gaza estimate that more than 70,000 people have been killed by Israeli forces during their bombardment of the territory since, while nearly 80 percent of buildings have been destroyed or damaged, according to UN data.
Israeli forces have killed at least 447 Palestinians in Gaza since a ceasefire took effect in October, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
