KABUL: The Afghan cricket team will face Pakistan for a white-ball series in September ahead of the T20 World Cup in 2021, officials at the Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) said on Monday.
The three-match series, which includes three One-Day Internationals (ODI) and an equal number of Twenty20s, will be held in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
“It’s very important for both countries,” Farid Hotak, ACB media officer, told Arab News, saying the winner of the series would have a better ranking in the World Cup.
He said the Pakistan series would be followed by cricket matches against Australia, India, and the West Indies.
“It is part of the ODI league matches to qualify for the World Cup 2021,” ACB Director Raees Ahmadzai said. “We played three matches already with Ireland and won all three.”
Both Hotak and Ahmadzai rejected media reports the cricket matches were a result of a meeting between Afghan cricketer Mohammad Nabi and Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan earlier this year when Khan vowed to ensure a cricket series between the two neighbors.
Several Afghans, residing as refugees in Pakistan for the past few decades, have learnt to play the sport in the neighboring country, enjoying global success in recent years by defeating more experienced and renowned cricketing nations.
Afghan cricket players, especially the likes of Rashid Khan, Mohammad Nabi and Golbadin Naib, have become a source of pride for the war-torn nation, both at home and abroad.
A recent escalation in violence across Afghanistan – part of decades of conflict in the war-ravaged nation – has also impacted the country’s gaming sector, with a number of sporting events, including cricket matches, coming under attack.
In May 2018, at least eight people were killed and dozens injured in a series of blasts during a cricket match in the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad. In September 2017, a suicide bomber blew himself up at a checkpoint near the main cricket stadium in the Afghan capital Kabul, killing at least three people as a tournament was under way.
Afghanistan to play white-ball series against Pakistan in UAE in September
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Afghanistan to play white-ball series against Pakistan in UAE in September
- The three-match series includes three One-Day Internationals and an equal number of Twenty20s
- Pakistan series to be followed by cricket matches against Australia, India, and West Indies
Saudi ambassador gifts Umrah ticket to Pakistani artist who drew portrait of crown prince
- Umar Jarral, 33, suffers from cerebral palsy, a neurological condition that can impact a person’s coordination
- Jarral has drawn other Muslim leaders, including UAE’s prime minister and the crown prince of Dubai
ISLAMABAD: Saudi Arabia’s Ambassador to Pakistan, Nawaf bin Said Al-Malki, on Friday gifted travel tickets to a Pakistani artist who drew a portrait of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman earlier this year.
Umar Jarral, 33, suffers from cerebral palsy (CP), a permanent movement disorder that can impact a person’s coordination, lead to compromised muscle strength, and produce tremors due to the irregular development of certain parts of the brain that control balance and posture.
The young Lahore-based Pakistani artist, who uses computers to communicate, has created portraits of Muslim leaders from around the world, including the Saudi crown prince.
Malki met Jarral during an event in Lahore to celebrate the 93rd Saudi National Day. In a picture shared on social media platform X by an account titled ‘Pakistan in Arabic,’ Malki can be seen standing beside Jarral with the Saudi crown prince’s painting in his hand.
“Omar had drawn a picture of the Saudi Crown Prince, Prince #Mohammed_bin_Salman, and the Saudi ambassador gave him travel tickets to perform Umrah as well,” the account wrote.
Jarral’s brother, Muhammed Ahmed, separately confirmed to Arab News that the meeting with the Saudi ambassador took place.
The Pakistani artist has also created images of United Arab Emirates Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, Dubai’s Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Pakistani PM dismisses as ‘absolutely absurd’ possibility military could manipulate upcoming elections
- Pakistan has been in deepening political turmoil since April 2022 when ex-PM Imran Khan was ousted
- Election regulator said this week that polls, originally scheduled for November, will be held in January 2024
NEW YORK: Pakistan’s interim prime minister said he expects parliamentary elections to take place in the new year, dismissing the possibility that the country’s powerful military would manipulate the results to ensure that jailed former premier Imran Khan’s party doesn’t win.
In an interview with The Associated Press Friday, Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar said it’s the Election Commission that is going to conduct the vote, not the military, and Khan appointed the commission’s chief at the time, so “why would he turn in any sense of the word against him?”
Pakistan has been in deepening political turmoil since April 2022 when Khan was removed from office following a no-confidence vote in Parliament. He was arrested in early August on corruption charges and sentenced to three years in prison, later suspended though he still remains in jail. The country is also facing one of the worst economic crises in its history and recovering from last summer’s devastating floods that killed at least 1,700 people and destroyed millions of homes and farmland.
The commission announced Thursday the elections would take place during the last week in January, delaying the vote which was to be held in November under the constitution.
Kakar resigned as a senator last month after outgoing Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and opposition leader Raza Riaz chose him as caretaker prime minister to oversee the elections and run the day-to-day affairs until a new government is elected.
Kakar said that when the commission sets an exact election date his government “will provide all the assistance, financial, security or other related requirements.”
Asked whether he would recommend judges overturn Khan’s conviction so he could run in the elections, the prime minister said he wouldn’t interfere with decisions by the judiciary.
He stressed that the judiciary should not be used “as a tool for any political ends.”
“We are not pursuing anyone on a personal vendetta,” Kakar said. “But yes, we will ensure that the law is appropriate. Anyone, be it Imran Khan or any other politician who violates, in terms of their political behavior, the laws of the country, then the restoration of the law has to be ensured. We cannot equate that with … political discrimination.”
He said fair elections can take place without Khan or hundreds of members of his party who are jailed because they engaged in unlawful activities including vandalism and arson, in reference to the violence that rocked the country following Khan’s initial arrest in May. He added that the thousands of people in Khan’s party who didn’t engage in unlawful activities, “will be running the political process, they will be participating in the elections.”
The Pakistani military has been behind the rise and fall of governments, with some of Khan’s supporters suggesting there is de facto military rule in Pakistan and that democracy is under threat.
Kakar, who reportedly has close ties to the military, said those allegations are “part and parcel of our political culture,” to which he pays no attention. He called his government’s working relationship with the military “very smooth,” as well as “very open and candid.”
“We do have challenges of civil-military relationships, I’m not denying that,” he said, but there are very different reasons for the imbalance. He said he believes, after one month leading the government, that civil institutions in Pakistan have “deteriorated in terms of performance for the last many decades” while the military is disciplined, has organizational capabilities and has improved over the past four decades.
The solution, Kakar said, is to gradually improve the performance of the civilian institutions “rather than weakening the current military organization, because that’s not going to solve any of our problems.”
One major problem is Kashmir, which has been a flashpoint for India and Pakistan after the end of British colonial rule in 1947. They have fought two wars over its control.
In 2019, India’s Hindu nationalist government decided to end the Muslim-majority region’s semi-autonomy, stripping it of statehood, its separate constitution and inherited protections on land and jobs.
Kakar said India has sent 900,000 troops to Kashmir and its people are living in “a large imprisonment” with no political rights, in violation of the United Nations Charter’s right to self-determination and the resolution calling for a UN referendum.
While the world focuses on Ukraine, he said, Kashmir “is a crisis which primarily has a wrong geography.”
If Kashmir were in Europe or North America, would there still be what he called a “callous attitude” toward resolving it, he asked.
“The most important player in this dispute is the Kashmir people,” Kakar said. “It is neither India or Pakistan,” but the Kashmiri people who “have to decide about their identity” and their future.
India boasts of being the largest democracy, he said, but it “is denying the basic, democratic principle to have a plebiscite. ... So what sort of a democracy they are boasting about?”
As for Pakistan’s relations with neighboring Afghanistan — under the Taliban rule since 2021 following US and NATO withdrawal — Kakar said “there are some serious security challenges” from the Afghan side, pointing to the Pakistani Taliban, or TTP, Daesh and other extremist groups, who at times vie for influence with each other.
When asked whether the government had requested the Taliban to extradite the leadership and fighters from the TTP, he said they are in contact with authorities in Kabul, “but there is nothing specific which I can share with you.”
The international community has withheld recognition of the Taliban-led government in Afghanistan.
Karar said a meeting of regional leaders to discuss what incentives and changes of behavior the Taliban would need to undertake for recognition to be considered hasn’t been finalized, but “I think we’re heading toward that milestone.”
Kakar was a little-known first-time senator from Pakistan’s least-populated, least-developed province when he was tapped to be the caretaker prime minister.
“It’s a huge privilege,” he said. “I feel I never deserved it. It’s just a divine blessing.”
By law, he can’t contest the elections when he’s interim prime minister, but Kakar said in the future he hopes “to play a constructive political role in my society.”
Pakistani FM ‘hopeful’ flood aid promises will be fulfilled
- Floods last year inflicted over $30bn in damage, economic losses on Pakistan
- While donors have pledged around $10bn in aid, it has yet to be disbursed
NEW YORK: Pakistan is “hopeful” that pledged reconstruction funding to rebuild parts of the country damaged by floods last year will be disbursed soon, Foreign Minister Jalil Abbas Jilani said on Friday.
At a press conference during the UN General Assembly in New York, he told Arab News: “Pakistan is one of the worst affected as far as climate change is concerned because it has affected about 33 million people.
“One-third of the country was inundated with water, and about $30 billion worth of losses were suffered.”
Pakistan was devastated by the 2022 floods, which were the world’s deadliest since those in southern Asia in 2020.
About a month after last year’s disaster, Pakistan and other countries attending the UN Climate Change Conference in Egypt decided to establish the Loss and Damage Fund to assist countries in dealing with the effects of climate change.
Many donors have pledged funds to help Pakistan rebuild flood-affected areas. The Islamic Development Bank pledged more than $4 billion, the World Bank $2 billion and Saudi Arabia $1 billion.
“So far, there has been very little which has trickled down from the international community as far as the rehabilitation and reconstruction work that has to be carried out. Pakistan is doing that from its own resources,” Jilani told Arab News.
“Our banks are issuing loans on easy terms to all those people who were affected. But then obviously, there are limits to what the banking industry can do.
“This is the kind of situation we’re in. I think we’re hopeful that most of the promises which were made by the donors will be fulfilled shortly.”
Regarding foreign policy, Jilani described the formation of new blocs and rivalries in the Asia-Pacific region as “a very uncomfortable situation” for Pakistan.
“Asia-Pacific has been a very peaceful region, a prosperous region, and it has made great economic strides in the last 40-50 years. Any tension within the Asia-Pacific region, from our point of view, is certainly not good for peace and stability in the region,” he said, adding that Pakistan prioritizes good relations with all countries, specifically mentioning China and the US.
When asked about Islamabad’s potential to confront the Pakistani Taliban, which operates along the border with Afghanistan, Jilani said: “Afghanistan is a sovereign country. Pakistan follows a policy of non-interference … while respecting the sovereignty of other countries.
“At the same time, we have expectations that the Afghan side would take action against all groups who are violating Afghanistan’s soil to carry out terrorist activities against other countries.”
Jilani added that during a meeting between the foreign ministers of China, Pakistan and Afghanistan in May, “there was a reiteration of this commitment by the Afghan side that they won’t allow Afghan soil to be used against other countries.”
Jilani also praised Pakistan’s commitment to democracy and free elections. “We’re a democratic country. There’s absolutely no doubt about it. In Pakistan, when parliament has completed its full term, it’s a constitutional requirement that there’s a caretaker setup which is meant to ensure neutrality in the next elections,” he said.
“This is meant to ensure that the elections are free and fair, and is meant to ensure that people are able to participate in the voting process without any violence.”
Jilani said Pakistan is heavily involved in efforts to tackle Islamophobia in Europe, and had made a case for the criminalization of religious-based hate speech in the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation’s Contact Group on Muslims in Europe.
“We also appreciated the introduction of a bill by the government of Denmark which would criminalize such offenses, either the burning of holy books or insulting the prophets of any religion. I think this is a good step they’ve taken,” he added, saying he is hopeful that if such a bill passed in Demark, other European nations may follow suit.
India dethrone Pakistan to become top-ranked ODI side ahead of World Cup
- India become top-ranked side in all three formats of cricket after beating Australia by 5 wickets
- Pakistan slump to number 2 rankings after losing to Sri Lanka, India in Asia Cup’s Super Four clashes
ISLAMABAD: India brushed aside Pakistan to claim the top spot in the One Day International rankings this week, the International Cricket Council (ICC) said on Saturday, with the development taking place less than two weeks before the World Cup kicks off.
India scripted history on Friday after beating Australia in the first of the three-match ODI series between the two sides. After beating Australia by five wickets in what was a one-sided match, India became only the second team in history to top all cricket formats. South Africa were the only side to have achieved the feat in 2012.
Rohit Sharma’s side were already the top-ranked team in Test and T20 formats of cricket before climbing to the top in the ODI format. Pakistan had regained the top ranking in ODIs after losing to India and Sri Lanka in the Asia Cup after India lost to Bangladesh in the Super Four stage of the tournament.
“India have become the No.1 ranked team across all formats in the
@mrfworldwide ICC Men’s Team Rankings,” the International Cricket Council (ICC) said on X, formerly known as Twitter.
India’s win over Australia in Mohali took them to 116 rating points, one ahead of Pakistan, who have now slumped to number 2 in the ranking.
Sharma’s side, however, could slump down the table if Australia— on 111 points— win the remaining two matches in the series against India.
If India win the series, they will head into the showpiece tournament as the world’s top-ranked ODI team.
Pakistan, meanwhile, head into the World Cup at the back of a disappointing performance in the Asia Cup tournament and injury woes.
Chief Selector Inzamam-ul-Haq on Friday announced the 15-man World Cup squad for the Babar Azam-led side, which included pacer Hassan Ali instead of ace bowler Naseem Shah.
Shah has been ruled out of the upcoming tournament due to a shoulder injury he suffered during the Asia Cup. Pacer Haris Rauf also sat out part of Pakistan’s match against India after he suffered discomfort in his right flank.
Pakistan open their World Cup campaign against the Netherlands on October 6.
Pakistan PM says Sikh separatist leader’s killing, linked to India, ‘jolted’ West
- Canada’s PM said last week his government has ‘credible intelligence’ Indian agents were involved in Sikh activist’s killing
- Pakistan’s Caretaker PM Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar says an alliance should be formed to check India’s ‘rough behavior’
ISLAMABAD: Caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar said the “gruesome murder” of a Sikh separatist leader in Canada months ago had jolted the West, which was now questioning the involvement of the Indian state in the incident, the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan (APP) said in a report on Saturday.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last Monday infuriated New Delhi when he said his country had “credible intelligence” Indian agents were involved in Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar’s killing in June this year.
Trudeau’s comments sparked off a diplomatic row between Ottawa and New Delhi, with both states expelling senior diplomats from each other’s countries following the accusations. Pakistan’s foreign ministry said on Wednesday that Nijjar’s killing was a violation of international law and showed New Delhi’s “network of extra-territorial killings” had gone global.
“Caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar on Friday said that the gruesome murder of Khalistan Movement Sikh leader in Canada had jolted the West that raised serious questions about the role of Indian state,” the APP said, adding that the prime minister was speaking at the Pakistan Mission in New York.
Kakar said Pakistan had been a victim of such “state-sponsored terrorism” and that he had shared evidence of the same at different global and multilateral fora. The Pakistani prime minister said it was probably the first incident of its kind after World War I in which an Asian country had staged a “physical murder” on European soil.
The Pakistani premier said the killing’s impact was being felt across Western countries which were now realizing the extent to which India targets its minorities.
“The prime minister opined that an alliance should be formed to check such ‘rough behavior’ of India,” APP said.
During his address to the UN General Assembly on Friday, Kakar spoke about Pakistan’s relations with its nuclear-armed neighbor, saying that his country desired “peaceful and productive” relations with all neighbors including India.
“Global powers should convince New Delhi to accept Pakistan’s offer of mutual restraint on strategic and conventional weapons,” he said, adding that the disputed Kashmir region provided the key to peace between the two neighboring states.
He also spoke about the rising threat posed by “far-right extremist and fascist groups such as Hindutva inspired extremists threatening genocide against Indian Muslims and Christians alike.”
