Animal experts will decide in the coming days whether an ailing elephant at a zoo in Pakistan needs to be euthanized after it collapsed in its pen last week and has since failed to stand up, officials said.
The 17-year-old African elephant underwent emergency treatment for a tumor in Karachi on April 5, but collapsed days later and has since lain stricken on its side.
The pitiful plight of Noor Jehan is being shared by animal rights activists on social media in Pakistan and abroad, prompting calls for the zoo to be shut down.
Pakistan's zoos are frequently accused of disregarding animal welfare, and in 2020 a court ordered the only facility in the country's capital to close because of its decrepit state.
Noor Jehan's fate now lies with a committee waiting for the arrival of Amir Khalil, the Austria-based chief vet of animal charity Four Paws International.
Khalil, who led the team that treated Noor Jehan for the tumor, told AFP he wanted to have "one last try" at helping the pachyderm recover.
"We will fight till the last for her recovery, and the rest is in the hands of Allah," said Kanwar Ayub, the director of Karachi Zoo.
"We are diligently following Four Paws instructions for Noor Jehan's treatment."
Noor Jehan is still eating despite being on her side, pin-pricked by drips, and regularly doused with water to cool her down.
"Her condition remains critical and uncertain," Four Paws said.
Vet Khalil said the focus would likely shift to Noor Jehan's pen pal, Madhubala, with the hope of finding her better accommodation.
"We will do what we can for Noor Jehan but really we need to move the other animal," he said.
In 2019 Islamabad's zoo was shut down after drawing international condemnation for its treatment of an Asian elephant named Kaavan.
Kavaan was later airlifted to retirement in Cambodia in a project spearheaded by US popstar and actor Cher and carried out by Four Paws.
Ailing Pakistan elephant Noor Jehan may be euthanized after collapsing
https://arab.news/9qwn6
Ailing Pakistan elephant Noor Jehan may be euthanized after collapsing
- Noor Jehan underwent emergency treatment for a tumor in Karachi on April 5 but collapsed just days later
- Four Paws chief vet Amir Khalil is returning to Pakistan, says wants to have "one last try" to save Noor Jehan
Pakistani politicians urge dialogue with Imran Khan’s party as PM offers talks
- National Dialogue Committee group organizes summit attended by prominent lawyers, politicians and journalists in Islamabad
- Participants urge government to lift alleged ban on political activities and media restrictions, form committee for negotiations
ISLAMABAD: Participants of a meeting featuring prominent politicians, lawyers and civil society members on Wednesday urged the government to initiate talks with former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, lift alleged bans on political activities after Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif recently invited the PTI for talks.
The summit was organized by the National Dialogue Committee (NDC), a political group formed last month by former PTI members Chaudhry Fawad Husain, ex-Sindh governor Imran Ismail and Mehmood Moulvi. The NDC has called for efforts to ease political tensions in the country and facilitate dialogue between the government and Khan’s party.
The development takes place amid rising tensions between the PTI and Pakistan’s military and government. Khan, who remains in jail on a slew of charges he says are politically motivated, blames the military and the government for colluding to keep him away from power by rigging the 2024 general election and implicating him in false cases. Both deny his allegations.
Since Khan was ousted in a parliamentary vote in April 2022, the PTI has complained of a widespread state crackdown, while Khan and his senior party colleagues have been embroiled in dozens of legal cases. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif last month invited the PTI for talks during a meeting of the federal cabinet, saying harmony among political forces was essential for the country’s progress.
“The prime objective of the dialogue is that we want to bring the political temperatures down,” Ismail told Arab News after the conference concluded.
“At the moment, the heat is so much that people— especially in politics— they do not want to sit across the table and discuss the pertaining issues of Pakistan which is blocking the way for investment.”
Former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, who heads the Awaam Pakistan political party, attended the summit along with Jamaat-e-Islami senior leader Liaquat Baloch, Muttahida Quami Movement-Pakistan’s Waseem Akhtar and Haroon Ur Rashid, president of the Supreme Court Bar Association. Journalists Asma Shirazi and Fahd Husain also attended the meeting.
Members of the Pakistan Peoples Party, the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and the PTI did not attend the gathering.
The NDC urged Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, President Asif Ali Zardari and PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif to initiate talks with the opposition. It said after the government forms its team, the NDC will announce the names of the opposition negotiating team after holding consultations with its jailed members.
“Let us create some environment. Let us bring some temperatures down and then we will do it,” Ismail said regarding a potential meeting with the jailed Khan.
Muhammad Ali Saif, a former adviser to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chief minister, told participants of the meeting that Pakistan was currently in a “dysfunctional state” due to extreme political polarization.
“The tension between the PTI and the institutions, particularly the army, at the moment is the most fundamental, the most prominent and the most crucial issue,” Saif noted.
‘CHANGED FACES’
The summit proposed six specific confidence-building measures. These included lifting an alleged ban on political activities and the appointment of the leaders of opposition in Pakistan’s Senate and National Assembly.
The joint communique called for the immediate release of women political prisoners, such as Khan’s wife Bushra Bibi and PTI leader Yasmin Rashid, and the withdrawal of cases against supporters of political parties.
The communiqué also called for an end to media censorship and proposed that the government and opposition should “neither use the Pakistan Armed Forces for their politics nor engage in negative propaganda against them.”
Amir Khan, an overseas Pakistani businessperson, complained that frequent political changes in the country had undermined investors’ confidence.
“I came here with investment ideas, I came to know that faces have changed after a year,” Amir Khan said, referring to the frequent change in government personnel.
Khan’s party, on the other hand, has been calling for a “meaningful” political dialogue with the government.
However, it has accused the government of denying PTI members meetings with Khan in the Rawalpindi prison where he remains incarcerated.
“For dialogue to be meaningful, it is essential that these authorized representatives are allowed regular and unhindered access to Imran Khan so that any engagement accurately reflects his views and PTI’s collective position,” PTI leader Azhar Leghari told Arab News last week.
