ISLAMABAD: New social media rules approved last month will prevent Pakistani citizens from accessing a free and open Internet and shut the country’s digital economy off from the rest of the world, the Asia Internet Coalition, an industry body, has said in a letter to the Pakistani prime minister.
Last month, Pakistan’s government approved new rules for regulating cyberspace that rights groups have said could be used to stifle dissent and free speech.
Under the new regulations, social media companies would be obliged to help law enforcement agencies access data and to remove online content deemed unlawful. Companies that do not comply with the rules risk being blocked online.
The Asia Internet Coalition was (AIC) set up in 2011 by Google, Facebook, Yahoo and eBay to lobby for free and open access to the Internet and to promote e-commerce. It has since expanded its membership.
In a letter by AIC to Prime Minister Imran Khan, dated December 5 and seen by Arab News, web giants said: “We seek your assistance to ensure that your government makes critical changes to the Rules through a credible consultation process.”
“We would request for a credible consultation process where AIC members can provide substantive suggestions. AIC is not against regulation of social media, but we believe that the Rules must address crucial issues such as internationally recognized rights to individual expression and privacy.”
The AIC added: “The Rules, as currently notified and gazetted, would make it extremely difficult for AIC Members to make their platforms and services available to Pakistani users and businesses.”
The AIC said that during bilateral meetings with AIC and its member companies, the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA) had committed to share a draft copy of the rules, but the rules were then updated by the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication on its website without due process.
“Industry stakeholders have therefore lost trust in the consultation process, because it is neither credible nor transparent,” the AIC letter said.
The new rules on social media are described as intended to prevent live streaming of online content relating to “terrorism, extremism, hate speech, defamation, fake news, incitement to violence and national security.”
Social media companies would be obliged within 24 hours to respond to a request to remove “unlawful” material, or six hours in emergency cases. They would also have three months to register with authorities in Pakistan, and must have a physical presence in Pakistan.
When required, the companies would have to provide subscriber information, traffic data, content data and any other information or data that was sought, the regulations stipulate.
The rules also state that interpretations of the regulations by the authorities in Pakistan “shall take precedence over any community standards or rules or community guidelines or policies or any other instruments devised by a social media company.”
In its letter, the AIC said data localization requirements in the rules would prevent Pakistani citizens from accessing a free and open Internet and shut Pakistan’s digital economy off from the rest of the world. It also said the new regulations had expanded PTA’s powers such that the regulator could force social media companies to violate established human rights norms on privacy and freedom of expression.
In terms of takedown requests, social media companies said they needed a reasonable period of time to assess a request once all the required information has been provided by the requesting individual.
“We propose that requests should be responded to within a reasonable timeframe, or without undue delay,” AIC said.
The body also said instead of forcing companies to open local offices, Pakistan should “encourage and facilitate foreign investment through incentives, creating an enabling environment and growing the base of Internet-connected consumers.”
AIC said the effectiveness with which social media companies moderated online content did not depend on having local presence but on having well-established processes and product-specific policies, clear local laws to guide the process, and properly informed and valid requests for takedowns.
“Mr. Prime Minister, we know that you share our vision of a dynamic digital economic ecosystem for Pakistan, where platforms such as those of our members continue to drive substantial economic growth,” the AIC said. “We now need your full and direct support in ensuring that Pakistan does not go down a highly counter-productive path that could derail the efforts that your government and the ICT industry have painstakingly invested in for many years.”
Internet big boys take aim at Pakistan’s new social media rules
https://arab.news/y79yj
Internet big boys take aim at Pakistan’s new social media rules
- Asia Internet Coalition writes letter to PM Khan, says new regulations will stifle free Internet and shut country’s digital economy off from rest of the world
- Urges PM to make changes to new rules which have made it “extremely difficult” for social media firms to continue their services in Pakistan
‘Act of Devotion’: Pakistani artist turns worn Qur’anic pages into works of art
- 28-year-old visual artist Saad Mehmood began restoring Qur’an pages ready for ritual disposal as part of BA final-year thesis
- Renowned artists describe the effort as “positive,” say it is vital to expand ways in which we experience the holy book
LAHORE: For Saad Mehmood, it was a routine visit to a mosque in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore for Friday prayers in 2017 when the then 22-year-old stumbled upon a store room with sheaves of paper stored carefully on a shelf.
The worn pages were fragments from everyday copies of the Qur’an, which were awaiting ritual disposal. In Pakistan, pages of the holy book that are disposed are often called shaheed, or martyred, copies.
In Islam, widely accepted methods of disposing worn pages of the holy book are to wrap them in a cloth and bury them, ideally in a mosque, or to burn them respectfully.
But Mehmood, at the time a final year student of fine arts at the Beaconhouse National University (BNU), was inspired by the worn copies and decided to restore them as part of his thesis.
“Saad asked for some of these pages that were torn or worn out, and started to restore the ordinary, mass-printed sheets with gold paper and the finest ink — bringing that which was ‘martyred’ back to life,” the artist’s statement accompanying an ongoing exhibition of his works in Lahore reads.
The effort is “an act of artistic devotion,” Mehmood told Arab News at the exhibition last week, saying all his work now revolved around restoring the holy pages and turning them into artforms.
“This work started in 2017,” Mehmood, now a 28-year-old visual artist, said. “I collect the pages of the Qur’an that are shaheed, then there’s an entire process to their restoration, I fill in the damaged parts so that the pages are readable again.”
Mehmood said he had done extensive research on damaged Qur’anic pages and what happened to them and where they went from storerooms of mosques and homes.
“I saw that they’re buried in graveyards, or floated in clean and flowing water. Sometimes, I even saw the pages being burned and their ashes buried in some corner of a graveyard,” he explained.
This got Mehmood thinking: instead of disposing of the sacred texts, he could restore them.
The process of restoration was a difficult one, as many Qur’an pages Mehmood came across had no references.
“When we open these [Qur’anic] collections… there are [some] smaller pages which don’t have any references [which ayat, surah, what page number],” he said. “So, this was a conundrum… how do I restore them when there’s no reference to work with?“
Mehmood decided to make a collage of such pages.
“So, at least they are still visible, still accessible,” he said. “So, we don’t accidentally disrespect the words, they will remain in front of our eyes, and then turn them into art to be appreciated.”
Mehmood has also visited multiple religious scholars to present his idea and his work.
“There are a lot of organizations in Pakistan like Tahaffuz-e-Auraq [who dispose of pages in the prescribed manner],” Mehmood said. “I restored them and then I started showing people that basically this is the work I’m doing.”
The idea found wide acceptability, he said.
“GOLD LEAF”
The ongoing exhibition in Lahore, organized by the Pakistan Art Forum, includes collages of restored Qur’anic fragments, concentric circles around Islamic calligraphy, decorative additions like gold leaves, and paintings with Arabic diacritics on Vasli and white paper. And this is all by design.
Mehmood said he wants to further explore this Islamic art form and create something new, like his painting of the diacritics without any words, or of punctuation marks without any sentences.
“The Qur’an came to us from Arabia, and the diacritics were added later, so that non-native Arabic speakers [Ajmi] could understand the text,” he said. “[Helping] in how to pronounce and enunciate it, zeir, zabr, that is also something I’ve worked on, and will continue to work on.”
There is also a reason why Mehmood uses gold leaf so often.
“When you look at my work… I have used gold leaf on the shaheed [damaged] Qur’anic pages,” he said.
“I used that gold leaf specifically and consciously, because gold is considered a divine material. And where the words are missing, pages torn, I’ve also used gold leaf to show the preciousness of the lost words, using a precious material.”
“EXPAND WAYS TO EXPERIENCE QUR’AN”
The visual artist has held a number of group exhibitions at the Alhamra Arts Center in Lahore and Sanat Gallery in the southern port city of Karachi. Last week, he held his second solo show in Lahore, titled Al-Qadr, referring to the night when Muslims believe the Qur’an was first revealed.
While most of the visitors to the Lahore exhibition said they had come out of curiosity, they left with admiration for the intricate work and beautiful calligraphy or collage technique that Mehmood uses.
“Calligraphy is a part of [what I do], but this is something else [entirely],” he explained. “You can call it a collage. You can call it an installation. You can call it painting, you can call it artwork.”
Shahid Rassam, a famous Pakistani painter and sculptor, described Mehmood work as “positive,” saying he had seen other works, though rare, in which worn Qur’an pages were restored as a form of art.
Rassam, who has himself made contemporary forms of the Qur’an, including one in which he used metal engravings, said it was “vital to expand the ways in which we experience the sacred text, even as art installations.”
“I think what this young man [Saad Mehmood] is doing is objectively a positive thing,” the artist said. “He’s taking sacred pages and giving them their rightful respect, instead of just letting them lie in poorly-kept stores and boxes.”
Beijing backs Pakistan to bring perpetrators of attack on Chinese nationals to justice
- Five Chinese nationals were killed on Tuesday in northwestern Pakistan when a bomber targeted their vehicle
- Pakistan has since then enhanced security for Chinese personnel in the country, vowed to punish culprits of the attack
ISLAMABAD: China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Lin Jian said on Thursday his government believes Islamabad will hold accountable the perpetrators of a deadly attack on Chinese nationals in Pakistan this week, vowing that Beijing was ready to step up cooperation with the international community against militancy.
Five Chinese nationals and their Pakistan driver were killed on Tuesday in Shangla, located in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, when a bomber rammed his explosive-laden car into their vehicle.
The attack occurred in an area vital to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which encompasses various mega projects crucial for Pakistan’s economy. The victims were en route to Dasu Dam, Pakistan’s largest hydropower project, when they were targeted.
“The Pakistani side is working intensively to investigate and handle the aftermath and has taken concrete steps to enhance security for Chinese personnel, projects and institutions,” Jian told reporters during a press briefing.
“We believe Pakistan will get to the bottom of the attack and bring the perpetrators to justice as soon as possible.”
No group had claimed responsibility for the attack but suspicion was likely to fall on separatists and the breakaway Gul Bahadur faction of the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP, and is a separate group, but a close ally of the Afghan Taliban.
The TTP denied being behind the suicide bombing in a statement Wednesday, saying: “We are in no way related to the attack on the Chinese engineers.”
Tuesday’s attack came less than a week after Pakistani security forces killed eight Balochistan Liberation Army separatists who opened fire on a convoy carrying Chinese citizens outside the Chinese-funded Gwadar port in the volatile southwestern Balochistan province.
Pakistan, Iran agree to strengthen bilateral ties to tackle regional militancy
- Pakistan’s planning minister meets Iran’s Ambassador to Pakistan Dr. Raza Amiri Moghaddam
- Pakistan, Iran both blame each other for not doing enough to root out militancy in border areas
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal and Iran’s Ambassador to Pakistan Dr. Raza Amiri Moghaddam on Thursday agreed to strengthen bilateral relations between their countries to reduce militancy in the region, state-run media reported.
Pakistan and Iran are often at odds with each other over instability on their shared border. Both countries have routinely blamed each other for not rooting out militancy. Small separatist groups in Pakistan have been behind a long-running insurgency, calling for gas and oil-rich Balochistan’s independence from the central government in Islamabad.
Pakistani anti-Iran militants have also targeted the Iranian border in recent years, increasing friction between the countries.
“Pakistan and Iran have agreed to strengthen bilateral relations to reduce tendencies of terrorism and extremism in the region,” the state-run Radio Pakistan said.
Radio Pakistan said the agreement to bolster bilateral ties was reached between Moghaddam and Iqbal during a meeting in Islamabad.
“The Planning Minister emphasized the importance of enhancing connectivity through trade routes, considering the 900-kilometer shared land and maritime border,” he said.
Tensions reached a head in January between Pakistan and Iran after they exchanged airstrikes against alleged militant targets in each other’s territories. Both countries since then have made efforts to ease tensions and promote bilateral trade with each other.
Pakistan’s stock exchange closes at all-time high amid expectations of fresh IMF deal
- Pakistan Stock Exchange closes at all-time high of 67,142.12 points, registering an increase of 594.34 points from Wednesday
- Analysts link recent surge to possibility of Pakistan reaching another bailout agreement with IMF, privatizing national airline
ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) witnessed its highest closing in history on Thursday as the benchmark KSE-100 index closed at 67,142.12 points, with analysts linking the recent surge to market expectations of the possibility of a successful deal with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for another bailout program.
The benchmark index settled at 67,142.12 points on Thursday at the close of trading, registering an increase of 594.34 points or 0.89 percent. This makes it the stock market’s highest closing in history, the previous highest being 66,547.78 points a day earlier.
Pakistan and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) reached a staff-level agreement last Wednesday which would pave the way for the release of $1.1 billion for the cash-strapped South Asian country. Pakistan has expressed its interest in securing a new loan under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) program with the IMF.
Financial expert and journalist Faseeh Mangi said the Pakistan Stock Exchange is one of the best performers in the world “in a rally that started last year after Pakistan avoided a default.”
“The latest surge is on possible IMF deal, PIA sale,” Mangi wrote on X on Wednesday, referring to the government’s plans to privatize Pakistan International Airlines, its national airline.
Topline Securities’ Deputy Head of Sales Ali Najib said the index had finally breached the 66,000 barrier, saying it could be attributed to “positive vibes from the IMF, rejuvenated foreign interest at historically low valuations and progress on SOE privatization.”
Shehbaz Sharif, who was elected prime minister for a second term earlier this month, faces the daunting challenge of negotiating a long-term financial bailout program with the IMF. Pakistan’s fragile $350-billion economy is in desperate need of external financing to shore up its foreign exchange reserves and escape a looming macroeconomic crisis.
For Pakistan, committing to a new IMF program, however, will mean committing to steps needed to stay on a narrow path to recovery. This would limit policy options to provide relief to a deeply frustrated population and cater to industries that are looking for government support to spur growth.
Inflation touched a high of 38 percent with record depreciation of the rupee currency under Sharif’s last government from April 2022 to August 2023, mainly due to structural reforms necessitated by the IMF program. Pakistan continues to be enmeshed in economic crisis with inflation remaining high, hovering around 30 percent, and economic growth slowing to around 2 percent.
Tickets for Pakistan’s home series against New Zealand to go on sale from today
- Pakistan will play against New Zealand in Rawalpindi and Lahore venues from April 18-27
- Series will help prepare both sides for the upcoming T20 World Cup 2024 in USA and West Indies
ISLAMABAD: The tickets for Pakistan’s upcoming T20I home cricket series against New Zealand will go on sale from tooday, Friday, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) said in a statement on Thursday.
The five-match series is scheduled to be played in Rawalpindi on April 18, 20 and 21 and in Lahore on April 25 and 27.
“In the first phase, the pre-booking of the online tickets will start on Friday at 5pm at pcb.tcs.com.pk,” the PCB said. “The sale of physical tickets along with outlet addresses will be announced in due course.”
The PCB said tickets for the Rawalpindi leg of the matches will be available at a minimum cost of Rs500 ($1.80) and the maximum will be available for Rs7,500 ($26.98) for the VVIP Gallery. Additionally, hospitality seats will be available at a maximum amount of PKR 15,000 ($53.97) except for the first T20I where the hospitality seats will be available for PKR 12,000 ($43.17).
For the Lahore leg, ticket prices start at Rs300 ($1.08) for the general seats while the maximum ticket prices will be Rs6,000 ($21.59) for the fourth T20I while Rs7,000 ($25.19) for the fifth T20I (VVIP Gallery).
The series will be important for both sides as they gear up for this year’s ICC T20 World Cup 2024 which is scheduled to be held in June in the USA and West Indies.
Pakistan will lock horns with arch-rivals India on June 9 for a big-ticket clash at New York.