WORLD IN FOCUS (May – June 2013)

News From National & International Press 

 NATIONAL

May 16: The Higher Education Commission (HEC) cancelled the degree-awarding status of ‘My University (Islamabad), Darul Madina International University (Islamabad), South Asian Strategic Institute University (Islamabad), Capital University (Islamabad), Pakistan Institute of Management (Karachi), Habib University Foundation (Karachi), Nazeer Hussain University (Karachi) and Lal Shahbaz University (Karachi)’ after they failed to meet the set standards.

May 17: Advocate Chaudhry Mohammad Aslam Ghumman, the lawyer who had filed a petition in the judges’ detention case against Musharraf, withdrew his complaint.

May 17: The nationwide voters’ turnout in Elections 2013 stood at 55.83 per cent. Punjab had the highest turnout i.e. 59.02 per cent with Sindh trailing behind with 51.28 per cent, while the turnout in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan was 44.83 per cent and 39.34 per cent respectively.

May 18: Zohra Shahid Hussain, a leader of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI), was shot dead outside her house in Karachi.

May 18: Pakistan is set to become the fifth Asian country, after Thailand, China, Laos and Brunei, to use China’s domestic satellite navigation system, the Beidou or Compass, which was launched as a rival to the US global positioning system. The system is expected to provide global coverage by 2020.

May 19: Charged workers of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) roughed up members of the coordination committee, some lawmakers-elect as well as some journalists during a telephonic address by party chief, Altaf Hussain

May 19: Samina Baig became the first Pakistani woman to summit the Mount Everest.

May 19: Muhammad Abdullah Abid, a Class-IX student at PakTurk School, developed multipurpose computer software keeping in view the growing traffic problems, especially being faced in big cities. The software is named ‘Rush Hour Controller’ and it can change traffic signals according to the number of vehicles on the road after collecting data through a normal webcam.

May 19: Former Pakistani ambassador and noted business and media person, Javid Malik became the President of the Diplomat Business Club based in UAE.

May 20: Former President General (R) Pervez Musharraf was granted bail in the Benazir Bhutto murder case. ATC Judge Chaudhry Habibur Rehman ordered his release on bail on submission of Rs. 2 million surety bonds.

May 20: President Asif Ali Zardari promulgated an ordinance to regulate and implement Surveying and Mapping standards in the country and to enable Survey of Pakistan (SoP) effectively assume its role of National Mapping Organization.

May 21: Malala Yousafzai was selected for the prestigious Global Leadership Award this year. She will receive the award for her role as a global activist in advocating for education and empowerment for girls worldwide.

May 21: Two new districts were created in Balochistan with the names of Sohbatpur and Lehri. Sohbatpur was carved out of Jaffarabad district while Lehri was separated from Sibbi. With the creation of two new districts, the total number of districts in Balochistan has risen to 32.

May 22: Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang started his two-day visit to Pakistan with a pledge to deepen strategic ties irrespective of the international situation.

May 22: President Asif Ali Zardari and Mian Nawaz Sharif, heads of rival political parties, met after a long time in the presidency and vowed to promote reconciliation.

Mr Sharif was invited to the presidency, along with the heads of other political parties, to a luncheon hosted by President Zardari in honour of Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang.

May 22: President Asif Ali Zardari conferred Pakistan’s highest civil award Nishan-e-Pakistan on Chinese Premier Li Keqiang for his outstanding contribution to strengthening Pak-China relations.

May 23: The Supreme Court said that it was not the court of competent jurisdiction to order prosecution of former president Musharraf under treason charges for sacking superior court judges and proclaiming emergency on Nov 3, 2007.

May 23: The PML-N parliamentary committee nominated Shahbaz Sharif for the post of Punjab chief minister.

May 23: Chinese Premier Li Keqiang wrapped up his visit to Pakistan after promising a deeper and more comprehensive strategic engagement and a closer coordination for security and stability in Afghanistan.

Cementing the ‘strategic partnership is the shared objective of both countries’, a joint statement issued at the conclusion of the visit said.

May 23: The visiting Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, keeping in view the difficult economic situation in Pakistan and in the spirit of austerity, directed officials not to arrange any kind of refreshments at the occasion of his address to the Senate.

May 23: The mercury shot up to 47.4 degrees Celsius in Lahore, breaking 59-year-old record of 47 degrees Celsius in May when the City braved its wrath the last time in 1954.

May 24: British police arrested a couple of passengers on suspicion of endangerment of aircraft after forcing Pakistan International Airways (PIA) Flight PK709 to land at Stansted airport following a mid-air alert.

May 24: The fourth plenary and second general assembly of the Centrist Asia Pacific Democrats International (CAPDI) elected Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed as its Secretary General for a term of four years.

May 24: Human Rights activist and former president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, Asma Jehangir was awarded the prestigious Council of Europe North-South Prize for 2012 by President of the Portuguese Republic at a ceremony held at Portuguese Parliament.

May 25: The Jinnah Terminal Flyover in Karachi was named after former Sindh governor Mahmoud A. Haroon and will be called Mahmoud Haroon Bridge.

May 25: As many as 16 children and their female teacher were burnt alive and eight others suffered severe injuries in Gujrat when their school van caught fire due to a gas cylinder blast.

May 26: The MQM chief Altaf Hussain relieved some senior leaders of their responsibilities and appointed a 23-member coordination committee.

Prominent among those are Dr Farooq Sattar, Anis Kaimkhani, Senator Syed Mustafa Kamal, Salim Shahzad, Raza Haroon, Anis Advocate, Kanwar Khalid Younus, Waseem Aftab, Iftikhar Randhawa and Ashfaq Mangi.

May 26: PML-N nominated Mian Nawaz Sharif for the post of prime minister.

May 25: Two Pakistani girls who married each other under new British laws applied for political asylum in the UK claiming their lives would be in danger if they returned to Pakistan.

May 27: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) filed a reference in one of the cases of Rental Power Projects (RPPs) scam. The reference did not carry the name of former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf.

May 27: Nearly 19 million more voters used their right to vote on May 11 compared to 2008 polls, hiking the turnout to 55 % from 44 %, throwing the new PTI as the second largest political party with over 7.68 million votes as against 6.91 of PPP and 14.9 million votes of the winner PML-N.

May 27: The EXIM Bank of China signed an agreement with the government of Pakistan to provide $448 million for the strategically important 969MW Neelum-Jhelum Hydropower Project.

May 28: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) issued a notification, confirming the victory of Sardar Akhtar Jan Mengal, the president of the Balochistan National Party-Mengal, in the election for PB-3 (Khuzdar-III) seat.

May 28: Pirates hijacked a fuel tanker off the coast of Nigeria’s oil-rich delta, taking Pakistani and Nigerian sailors hostage in the latest attack targeting the region.

May 28: The Supreme Court set aside the appointment of National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Chairman retired Admiral Fasih Bokhari on a petition filed by former opposition leader in the National Assembly, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan.

May 28: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) announced the names of candidates selected on seats reserved for women and minorities in the National Assembly.

May 29: A front-rank leader of Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan and its commander-in-charge for South Waziristan, Waliur Rehman, was killed in a US drone attack in the North Waziristan tribal region.

May 29: The newly-elected members of the Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhawa assemblies took oath. Only 154 of the 158 members of the Sindh Assembly took the oath that was administered by Nisar Khuhro. Of the 124 members of the Khyber Pakhtunkhawa Assembly, 121 took oath.

May 29: Prime Minister Justice (R) Mir Hazar Khan Khoso accorded approval to the first-ever National Policy for Overseas Pakistanis for their welfare and protection of their assets.

May 29: Saudi Arabian government declared 30,000 Pakistanis as illegal immigrants. According to the new law, the Saudi Kingdom has declared that any work or job, which is other than the occupation written on visa, would be considered as illegal.

May 30: Sindh Governor Dr Ishratul Ibad administrated oath of office to Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah. Mr Shah was earlier elected leader of the house for the third time. He secured 86 of the 151 votes cast.

May 30: Agha Siraj Durrani was elected the 16th speaker of the Sindh Assembly while Syeda Shehla Raza was re-elected as the deputy speaker.
Syeda Shehla Raza, who is the third woman deputy speaker of the Sindh Assembly, has set a new record by becoming the first lawmaker of the provincial legislature to clinch the coveted post in two consecutive terms.

May 30: Asad Qaisar and Imtiaz Shahid Qureshi were elected unopposed speaker and deputy speaker of the Khyber Pakhtunkhawa Assembly.

May 31: Pervez Khattak of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf was elected as Chief Minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to head the first-ever PTI government in the country’s history.

May 31: Famous educationist and literary figure Syed Azfar Rizvi, the deputy secretary general of Anjuman-e-Taraqqi-e-Urdu Pakistan, was shot dead in Karachi.

Jun 01: The newly-elected National Assembly formally born with an oath.

Jun 01: The inaugural session of the Balochistan provincial assembly was held in which newly-elected members of the house took oath.

Jun 01: Three hundred and forty-one-newly elected members of the Punjab Assembly were administered oath by outgoing Speaker Rana Muhammad Iqbal.

Jun 01: A Sikh representative, for the first time since 1947, took oath as a member of the provincial assembly in Punjab.

Jun 02: Mian Nawaz Sharif nominated Dr Abdul Malik, the president of National Party, for the post of chief minister Balochistan.

Jun 02: The caretaker government ordered restoration of the Prime Minister’s Polio Monitoring and Coordination Cell.

Jun 03: Fareed Khan, a newly-elected MPA from Hangu was assassinated. Hangu Deputy Commissioner Tahir Zafar Abbasi handed over the control of the district to police and army.

Jun 03: The new National Assembly elected nominees of the Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) as house speaker and deputy speaker.  Sardar Ayaz Sadiq was elected speaker and Murtaza Javed Abbasi as deputy speaker by securing 258 votes.

Jun 03: The Pakistan Army started war games codenamed Azm-i-Nau (New Resolve) IV to update its readiness strategy for dealing with the complex security threat environment.

Jun 03: Mir Jan Mohammad Khan Jamali of the PML-N and Mir Abdul Qudoos Bizenjo of the PML-Q were elected unopposed as speaker and deputy speaker of Balochistan Assembly.

Jun 03: Rana Muhammad Iqbal Khan and Sher Ali Gorchani were elected Punjab Assembly speaker and Deputy Speaker for a second term.

Jun 03: The Abu Dhabi Music and Arts Foundation (ADMAF) donated 368,000AED to UNESCO, to support the Malala Fund for Girls’ Education in Egypt.

Jun 03: China and India appointed new ambassadors/high commissioners to Pakistan. Ambassador Sun Wei Dorg of China replaced Liu Jian. Dr TCA Raghavasn, who was previously India’s high commissioner for Singapore, replaced Sharat Sabaharwal.

Jun 04: Iran and Pakistan signed anagreement for strengthening cooperation at sea and ocean. The agreement was signed by the head of Iran’s Oceanology Institute Vahid Chegini and his Pakistani counterpart Ali Rashid Tabriz.

Jun 04: Pakistan was re-elected as member of the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) at the 25th meeting of States Parties of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. Pakistan’s Ambassador Anwar Kemal secured 128 votes.

Jun 05: Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif was voted prime minister by the new National Assembly for a record third term.

Jun 05: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) declared illegal the appointment of Ali Arshad Hakeem as chairman of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).

Jun 05: Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif renamed the Prime Minister’s Secretariat as Prime Minister’s Office.

Jun 05: Nawaz Sharif’s first decision as the prime minister was the appointment of Nasir Mahmood Khosa as a secretary to premier. Former Secretary Health Punjab, Fawad Hassan Fawad, was appointed as the additional secretary to the prime minister.

Jun 05: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif approved the appointment of Brigadier Muhammad Akmal as his Military Secretary (MS).

Jun 06: PML-N’s Mian Shahbaz Sharif became the chief minister of Punjab for the third time. Governor Makhdoom Ahmad Mahmood administered the oath to him.

Jun 06: Pirates released five Pakistani crew members that they kidnapped from an oil tanker off the Nigerian coast.

Jun 06: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif appointed Aftab Sultan, a BS-22 officer of the Police Services of Pakistan (PSP), as DG intelligence bureau. Former P&D Chairman Javaid Aslam was appointed new Punjab chief secretary.

Jun 06: Pakistani lawyer Zarrar Sehgal was named among the top 10 leading lawyers in the world in ‘Asset Finance’ by Legal 500. He was earlier named as one of the top ten lawyers in ‘Aviation Transportation Finance’ in the US by Chambers USA.

Jun 06: Around 1.2 billion people residing on this planet, almost equal to the population of India, have no access to electricity, says World Bank’s ‘Global Tracking Framework’ report on the subject.
The figure of 1.2 billion without power means that approximately 17 per cent of the 7.09 billion humans on Earth are virtually living in the Stone Age.

Jun 07: An antiterrorism court sentenced to death two young men for murdering 20-year-old Shahzeb Khan in December 2012.

Jun 07: The process of transfer of power from one civilian government to another was completed with President Asif Ali Zardari swearing in the cabinet of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

Jun 07: National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq notified Syed Khurshid Shah of the PPP as the Leader of Opposition in the house.

Jun 07: Former president Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) Munir A. Malik was appointed as the Attorney General of Pakistan (AGP).

Jun 07: Dr Fehmida Mirza, the former Speaker of National Assembly was allowed to retain her former position as Chairperson Women’s Parliamentary Caucus (WPC).

Jun 08: Pakistan and Afghanistan resumed their military contacts under the rubric of Afghanistan-Pakistan-Isaf Tripartite Commission.

Jun 08: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan appointed Shah Mahmood Qureshi as deputy parliamentary leader of the party.

Jun 08: Britain and America shocked Pakistan and its allies at the 23rd regular session of the United Nations Human Rights Council’s general debate in Geneva on 7 June when the two countries clearly supported nationalist leader Mehran Marri, Balochistan’s representative to the UN.

Jun 09: Dr Abdul Malik Baloch took oath of office as the 15th Chief Minister Balochistan.

Jun 10: First time in the country’s medical history, the Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC)’s cardiac surgeons conducted a successful by-pass operation of a two-and-a-half year old boy.

Jun 10: President Asif Ali Zardari spoke to parliament and advised them to devise an ‘appropriate and wise policy’ about punishing those who subverted the constitution.

Jun 10: The 21-member Punjab cabinet took oath at Governor’s House.

Jun 10: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s Senator Raja Zafar-ul-Haq was notified as leader of the house in Senate.

Jun 11: The Economic Survey 2012-13 was launched by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar.

Jun 11: President of Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) Pervaiz Shaukat was elected advisor to International Federation of Journalists (IFJ).

Jun 12: The PML-N government unveiled its first budget which tried to tackle the economic and energy mess the country is facing with ambitious moves on revenue expansion, expenditure cuts and populist incentives for the youth and business.

As a result, in one go it set an ambitious target of reducing fiscal deficit by 2.5 per cent of GDP or Rs375 billion bringing down subsidies by Rs127bn, additional tax measures of Rs205bn and austerity measures of about Rs41bn in the fiscal year 2013-14.

Jun 13: Mohammad Khan Achakzai was sworn in as the governor of Balochistan.

Jun 13: After the Islamabad High Court, the Peshawar High Court, too, has declared the levy of Gas Infrastructure Development Cess (GIDC) by the federal government for the execution of gas projects, including Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline scheme, as unconstitutional.

Jun 13: Governor of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Shaukatullah administered oath of office to 12 ministers of the provincial government.

Jun 13: Chief of the Air Staff, PAF, Air Chief Marshal Tahir Rafique Butt, was presented with the Honorary Pilot Badge at Royal Thai Air Force Headquarters in Bangkok.

Jun 14: The Ministry of Water and Power and a Chinese firm signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in the fields of energy, mass transit, industrial cities and road projects.

Jun 15: Militants carried out a symbolic and audacious attack on Pakistan, its history and the federal structure when they blew up the Ziarat residency, the building in which the Quaid-i-Azam spent the last days of his life in 1948. The Balochistan Liberation Army claimed responsibility for the strike.

Jun 15: At least 25 people, including the deputy commissioner of Quetta, 14 students of a women’s university and four nurses were killed when a bomb tore through a bus.

Jun 15: After massive criticism, the ruling PML-N announced a raise of 10 percent in the salaries of government employees.

Jun 15: The US House of Representative passed an amendment linking the American military aid with the human rights in Pakistan.

INTERNATIONAL

May 16: Google’s Northern Europe boss, Matt Brittin, was called back to testify to parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) after a Reuters investigation showed the company employed staff in sales roles in London.

May 16: Bollywood star Sanjay Dutt surrendered to serve three-and-a-half years in jail for illegal possession of weapons.

May 16: President Barack Obama named Danny Russel as the top US diplomat for East Asia charged with handling relations with the vast and growing region.

May 16: The Islamic Development Bank (IDB), a Jeddah-based multilateral institution, called for the creation of a global sharia advisory board that can offer greater uniformity for the Islamic finance industry.

May 18: The International Labour Organisation and World Bank refused to let Bangladesh join a textile industry monitoring programme until the country overhauls its labour laws and conditions for unions improve.

May 18: French President Francois Hollande signed into law a bill allowing same-sex marriage, making France the 14th country to legalise gay weddings.

May 18: North Korea fired three short-range guided missiles into its eastern waters, a South Korean official said.

May 18: A Saudi woman, Raha Muharraq, reached the summit of Mount Everest, the world’s highest peak, in a first for the conservative kingdom.

May 19: Bill Gates became the world’s richest man for a second time. The software mogul snatched the title from Mexican mobile phone tycoon Carlos Slim after Bloomberg revealed his personal fortune had blossomed to an eye-watering $72.7billion.

May 19: Chinese Premier Li Keqiang arrived on a three-day visit to deepen friendship with New Delhi.

May 19: North Korea test-fired a short-range missile off its east coast despite pleas from South Korea and the UN chief to halt the launches. The guided missile was fired into the East Sea (Sea of Japan).

May 20: Several tornadoes ravaged parts of the American heartland. The storms concentrated damage Wichita, Kansas and in Oklahoma.

May 22: Al-Jazeera became the Middle East and North Africa’s most-watched Arabic-language television channel, according to an independent survey, the Qatar-based broadcaster said.

May 22: President Robert Mugabe signed Zimbabwe’s new constitution into law, clearing the path to crucial elections later this year.

May 23: German Chancellor Angela Merkel topped Forbes’s list of the world’s most powerful women for the third consecutive year, followed by Brazil’s Dilma Rousseff, Melinda Gates, US First Lady Michelle Obama and former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

May 23: An 80-year-old Japanese, Yuichiro Miura, , who began the year with his fourth heart operation and who had previously climbed the Mount Everest, the 29,035 foot mountain, aged 70 and 75 became the oldest conqueror of the World’s highest peak.

May 23: American short story writer Lydia Davis won the fifth Man Booker International Prize for fiction for a body of work that includes some of the briefest tales ever published.

Davis, a professor of creative writing at the University of Albany, is best known for work that Observer critic William Skidelsky once said `redefines the meaning of brevity`.

May 23: US teen births have dropped to a record low, but the country still has one of the highest rates among developed nations, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. ‘The overall rate declined 25 per cent from 41.5 per 1,000 teenagers aged 15-19 in 2007 to 31.3 in 2011 – a record low.’

May 23: President Obama outlined plans to limit the use of US drone strikes against extremists abroad and took steps aimed at breaking a deadlock on closing the Guantanamo Bay military prison.

May 25: Guatemala extradited former president Alfonso Portillo to the United States to face charges of laundering $70 million of swindled government funds through US banks.
Portillo, president 2000-2004, thus becomes the first former Latin American leader ever to be extradited to the United States.

May 26: A clutch of awards at the Cannes Film Festival has given global prominence to what insiders say is a bold era in Asian filmmaking, where China is emerging as a creative power.

Directors from China, Japan, Singapore and Cambodia took to the stage at the Palais des Festivals where the world’s most prestigious movie bash ended.

May 27: The Colombian government and leftist Fare rebels announced a major breakthrough in peace talks aimed at ending nearly half a century of conflict.

May 27: A British Pakistani, Councilor Nadeem Ali, became the youngest-ever Pakistani mayor in Britain after being elected as Mayor for the London Borough of Waltham Forest.

May 27: Saudi King Abdullah upgraded the National Guard, the kingdom’s parallel army seen as a pillar of the ruling royals, to ministry to be headed by his son Prince Mitab.

May 28: Japan’s first ‘4D’ theatre opened at Nagoya’s Nakagawa Korona World cinema complex. In addition to a 3D presentation, the 4D theatre combines physical effects for an immersive experience.

May 29: To help keep the peace at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, FIFA decided to go high-tech by enlisting military robots for security. iRobot recently announced that it will outfit Brazil with 30 PackBot robots units similar to those that have been deployed in Afghanistan, Iraq and inside Japan’s Fukushima nuclear power plant.

May 29: Australia is the best place in the world, for the third year running, to live and work, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

The UK, by contrast, comes 10th in the OECD’s Better Life Index, behind the US, Canada and the Scandinavian countries.

May 29: Buddhist mobs armed with sticks and machetes burned Muslim homes for a second day in the northern Myanmar city of Lashio, contradicting claims in state media that soldiers and police had restored calm.

Scores of young men and boys, on motorbikes and on foot, were marauding through the city of 130,000 people in a mountainous region about 700 km from the commercial capital Yangon.

May 29: Former Bosnian Croat president Jadranko Prlic and five co-defendants were jailed for between 10 and 25 years for murdering and deporting Muslims in Bosnia in the early 1990s to create a ‘greater Croatian state’.

May 29: Turkey held a groundbreaking ceremony for the construction of a third bridge over the Bosporus Strait connecting the Asian and European sides of Istanbul. The eight-lane motorway and two-lane railway bridge is expected to be one of the word’s widest suspension bridges.

May 30: Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was elected to the Rajya Sabha for a fifth consecutive term.

May 30: Iran amended its law on stoning convicted adulterers to death to allow judges to impose a different form of execution.

June 01: Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed to press ahead with a controversial plan to redevelop an Istanbul park, calling for an immediate end to the violent protests against the project.

June 01: Russia’s ambitious smoking ban, which aims to cut the number of smokers in half and improve public health, went into effect.

June 02: The Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas appointed Rami Hamdullan, a little-known academic, as his new prime minister.

June 02: A court imposed a six-month publishing ban on a state-owned newspaper for its allegedly false reporting. The semi-official Mehr news agency reported the suspension of IRAN, which is under the administration of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

June 02: Egypt’s top court ruled that parliament’s Muslim Brotherhood-led upper house was illegal but could stay on until elections.

June 03: More than 62 countries signed a landmark arms trade treaty at the United Nations. The United States is so far holding back from joining at the first go as Germany, Britain and France joined in. However, Russia and China are not expected to sign on.

June 05: President Barack Obama chose close confidante Susan Rice as his new national security adviser. The hard-charging Rice, selected to replace low-key Tom Donilon in the post, is expected to play a high-profile role in defending Mr Obama’s foreign policy, particularly on the civil war in Syria.

June 06: The UN food agency and the OECD said in a joint report that agricultural production is expected to slow down over the next decade, largely because of limited expansion of arable land, rising production costs, environmental pressures and resource constraints.

June 06: A.M. Homes became the fifth American in a row to be named winner of the 30,000 pounds Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction, formerly known as the Orange, for her sixth novel, May We Be Forgiven.

June 06: Russian President Vladimir Putin and his wife, Lyudmila, announced their divorce after 20 years of marriage on state television.

June 06: It was revealed that the National Security Agency (NSA) of the United States was collecting the telephone records of millions of customers of Verizon, one of the country’s largest telecoms providers, under a top secret court order.

June 07: Queen Elizabeth made a show-stopping appearance live on the BBC news as she opened the corporation’s new headquarters.

June 08: The World Food Programme (WFP) executive board approved a new two-year operation for North Korea worth $200 million of food aid starting on July 1.

June 08: The United Nations launched a record aid appeal for Syria, warning of a regional ‘explosion’ if the fighting does not stop, as regime forces sought to capitalise on recent victories over the rebels.

June 08: President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping tackled the contentious issue of cyber security at their summit and tried to forge closer ties between the leaders of the world`s largest economies.

June 08: Flag-waving Swedes and royals celebrated as Sweden’s Princess Madeleine, the youngest child of King Carl XVI Gustaf, married New York businessman Chris O’Neill.

June 09: Government delegates from North and South Korea held a marathon session of preparatory talks at a ‘truce village’ on their heavily armed border. The meeting at Panmunjom, where the agreement ending fighting in the 1950-53 Korean War was signed, is the first of its kind on the Korean Peninsula in more than two years.

June 10: Edward Snowden, the whistleblower behind the most significant US intelligence leak in modern times broke cover, saying he had decided to leave his position at a National Security Agency (NSA) contractor.

June 14: The UN General Assembly elected John Ashe of Antigua and Barbuda as president of its 68th session. Ashe, 59, who has served in diplomatic posts at the United Nations for nearly 25 years, was elected by acclamation by the 193-member world body.

June 14: Europe’s newest jetliner, the Airbus A350, successfully completed its maiden flight, stepping up the battle with arch-rival Boeing for sales of a new generation of sleek, lightweight passenger aircraft.

June 15: Britain struck a deal with its overseas territories clamping down on tax evasion, giving Prime Minister David Cameron a stronger hand.

SPORTS

May 17: James Anderson became only the fourth England bowler to take 300 Test wickets when he dismissed New Zealand’s Peter Fulton on the second day of the first Test at Lord’s.

May 19: Rafael Nadal thrashed Roger Federer in the 30th meeting between the two as he won his seventh Rome Masters title. Nadal improved to 20-10 in his career against Federer.

In the women’s final, Serena Williams won her fourth consecutive tennis tour title when she routed former world number one Victoria Azarenka.

May 19: Olympic champion Kirani James, a Grenadian athlete, won the 400m race at Shanghai’s Diamond League meet. American athlete Lashawn Merritt got the second place.

May 23: Promising Talha Zubair Surmawala and Maheen Dada lived up to their billing while capturing the respective under-18 singles titles in the second National Bank of Pakistan Open national juniors and seniors tennis championship.

May 23: Pakistani umpire Asad Rauf was withdrawn from the Champions Trophy (CT) tournament amid media reports he is under Indian police investigation for spot-fixing.

May 24: Liaqat Ali (Army) became the fastest man in the Pakistan, winning gold in the 100m sprint at the National Athletics Championship.

May 25: Former India cricketer and a member of parliament, Kirti Azad, said that Rs. 40,000 crore from cricket fixing lands in Pakistan to fund anti-terror activities in India.

May 25: Pakistan’s ladies tennis champion Ushna Suhail won the Spanish Monty Tennis Tournament in Barcelona, Spain outclassing her Spanish opponent Ester Valles.

May 26: Nico Rosberg became the first son of a former Monaco Grand Prix winner to triumph on the streets of the Mediterranean principality when he drove his Mercedes to an accomplished victory.

May 26: World No. 1 Nicol David suffered her most surprising defeat in four years when she lost her British Open title with a second successive defeat against England’s Laura Massaro.

May 27: Italy’s Matteo Manassero became the youngest ever winner of the BMW PGA Championship at the age of 20 on the fourth hole of a sudden-death play-off.

May 27: Ramy Ashour broke a 47-year jinx when he became the first Egyptian player since 1966 to capture the British Open title, winning a sparkling and unpredictable final against Gregory Gaultier, the former champion from France.

May 27: Mumbai Indians outplayed the Chennai Super Kings to lift their first IPL title at the Eden Gardens.

May 27: England was confirmed as the host country for the 2019 Cricket World Cup.

May 27: Pakistan’s world amateur snooker champion Mohammad Asif defeated Iran’s Aamir Sarkosh to clinch the second 6-Red Asian Snooker Championship in Doha, Qatar.

May 28: A court ordered the suspension of the head of Pakistan’s Cricket Board (PCB) over what it called the ‘dubious’ and ‘polluted’ process to elect him.

May 29: Secretary of the Services Sports Control Board (SSCB), Col Mohammad Asif Zaman, was honoured with a ‘Grand Knight’ award by Conseil International Du Sport Militaire (CISM) in recognition of his meritorious services to sports and the military.

May 31: Two top BCCI officials Secretary Sanjay Jagdale and Treasurer Ajay Shirke resigned from their posts.

May 31: Burundi’s Lydia Nsekera made history when she became the first woman to be elected to the Executive committee of football’s world governing body FIFA for a full term.

Jun 01: Rajiv Shukla resigned as IPL chairman, following the scandal over alleged corruption in the league.

Jun 02: New Zealand won the second one-day international against England by 86 runs at Southampton to take an unbeatable 2-0 lead in the three-match series.

Jun 04: Pakistan Football Federation (PFF) official Syed Nayyar Haider’s group was elected to the Disciplinary Committee of the world’s football governing body in the recent FIFA Congress in Mauritius.

Jun 04: Former Bangladesh captain Mohammad Ashraful confessed to match-fixing.

Jun 05: Tim May quit as head of cricket’s international players’ union after eight years.

Jun 06: The general council of the Pakistan Gymnastics Federation (PGF) elected Ahmed Ali Rajput as the federation’s new president in place of Khawaja Farooq Saeed.

Jun 06: Former Pakistani asylum-seeker Fawad Ahmed was included into the Australia ‘A’ squad for their tour of Britain.

Jun 06: Raj Kundra, co-owner of the Rajasthan Royals franchise and husband of Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty, was ordered to hand over his passport to police probing illegal betting and alleged corrupt links between players and organised crime syndicates.

Jun 06: The UN Secretary General was awarded an honorary 10th degree black belt in the Korean martial art of taekwondo.

Jun 08: Serena Williams won her second French Open title when she defeated title-holder Maria Sharapova in final. It was the 31-year-old American’s 16th Grand Slam title win.

Jun 09: Rafael Nadal thrashed Spaniard David Ferrer to win French Open final and become the first man to win eight singles titles at the same tournament.

Jun 09: Bob and Mike Bryan of the US defeated France’s Nicolas Mahut and Michael Llodra in the men’s doubles final at the French Open. The Brayan twins won a record-extending 14th Grand Slam doubles title.

Jun 10: Teenager Matthew Fisher, aged 15 years and 212 days, became the youngest cricketer in 91 years to play in a competitive English county match.

Jun 10: A Delhi court granted bail to S Sreesanth, Ankeet Chavan and 17 others in the IPL spot-fixing case.

Jun 10: Sebastian Vettel claimed the 29th victory of his record-breaking career when he triumphed for Red Bull at the Canadian Grand Prix.

Jun 12: Pakistan women’s bridge team created history when they beat favourites India in Ahmedabad to win the first ever 17th Bridge Federation of Asia and Middle East (BFAME) for their country.

Jun 13: Indonesia’s former Olympic and world champion Taufik Hidayat bid an emotional farewell to a colourful career that made him one of badminton’s biggest stars in front of a roaring home crowd.

EVERYDAY SCIENCE

May 16: US researchers at the Oregon National Primate Research Center reported a breakthrough in stem cell research, describing how they have turned human skin cells into embryonic stem cells for the first time. The method would not likely be able to create human clones.

May 18: Scientists scoping out dolphins off the coast of Namibia found a gray whale. The confirmed sighting marks the first time such a whale has been spotted south of the Equator.  Gray whales are typically found in the north Pacific and have been extinct in the Atlantic since the heyday of 18th-century whale hunts.

May 19: The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) recreated the world’s tiniest droplets of a primordial state of matter that last existed moments after the Big Bang, some 13.82 billion years ago.

May 21: An 18-year-old Californian student Eesha Khare created a supercapacitor that could recharge a cellphone battery in 30 seconds. The invention won her $50,000 in the Society for Science & the Public’s huge international science fair.

May 23: The Ring Nebula’s unique shape makes it extremely popular with astronomers, but NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope recently revealed the nebula’s true shape. According to C. Robert O’Dell of Vanderbilt University, the Ring Nebula’s true shape is more like a jelly doughnut than a bagel, because it contains material in the middle.

May 23: Frogs, toads and salamanders have been in trouble for decades, but a new US government study shows just how quickly many amphibians are disappearing from ponds and creeks across the United States.

May 23: A small Ecuadoran satellite collided in orbit with the remains of a Russian rocket, but it is too soon to know how much damage it might have sustained, Quito’s space agency said.

May 28: Three US scientists, Jeffrey Hall, Michael Rosbash and Michael Young, received the $1 million Shaw Prize ‘for their discovery of molecular mechanisms underlying circadian rhythms’. Their groundbreaking studies using fruit flies helped to uncover the workings of the human biological clock.

June 02: Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology created the world’s two most accurate atomic clocks. The next time they’ll need to be reset’ for a mere one-second delay’ is in 50.8 billion years.

June 06: A special delivery of peanut butter, pyjamas and parmesan cheese was blasted into the cosmos to bring some Earthly indulgences to the astronauts on board the International Space Station (ISS). The items were in a cargo capsule launched on the European Space Agency’s Ariane 5 rocket.

Jun 08: Some of the world’s busiest oceans are hotspots for shipwrecks, often caused by adverse weather that will only increase with climate change, according to a new study. The South China Sea and East Indies, the East Mediterranean and Black Sea, and the North Sea and British Isles had the most accidents between 1999 and 2011. There were 293 accidents in the South China Seas and East Indies, where more than 70 percent of the world’s corals thrive. The area is known for its marine biodiversity.

June 09: Rising carbon emissions will place parts of India, China, Southeast Asia, East Africa and the northern Andes at a higher risk of extreme floods, a study said. Global warming will boost the frequency at which exceptional floods occur in these regions, while Eastern Europe, parts of Scandinavia, Chile and Argentina will have fewer such events.

Jun 11: China began its longest manned space mission with the launch of the Shenzhou-10 rocket. The rocket ascended above the Jiuquan space centre in the Gobi Desert trailing a vast column of flame.

Jun 11: Computer giant Apple unveiled its ‘Tunes Radio’ music streaming service, saying it will personalise listeners’ music based on what they bought and previewed on iTunes.

Jun 14: Scientists discovered a sixth layer in the eye’s cornea, which was previously believed to have just five layers. The new layer, which researcher Harminder Dua has dubbed Dua’s layer, is only 15 microns thick, Popular Science reports. For comparison, Discovery News reports the layer is ‘smaller than beach sand and mist’ the entire cornea measures 550 microns thick.

ECONOMY

May 17: Meeting for a summit in Moscow, heads of tax administrations from 45 members of the Forum on Tax Administration (FTA) reaffirmed their commitment to fight together against tax crimes and develop a system for automatic exchange of information. The summit was organised by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

May 17: The number of delisted companies increased to an all time high of approximately 70 companies in 2012.

May 17: The Ministry of Commerce decided to set up six sectoral committees to obtain reservations and suggestions from the stakeholders on liberalisation of trade with India.

May 20: The US drugs company Actavis agreed to buy Irish peer Warner Chilcott for $8.5 billion including debt.

May 21: The board of directors of Hub Power Company Limited appointed Khalid Mansoor as chief executive officer of the company.

May 21: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) introduced new features in the Web-Based One Customs (WeBOC), the software for customs auto-clearance, wherein exporters would have access to their profile.

May 23: Online retail titan Amazon announced it is expanding sales of its Kindle tablet computers to ‘over 170 countries and territories around the world,’ and its Appstore in nearly 200 countries.

May 24: China signed an agreement with the United States to share company audit files, paving the way for more probes into accounting scandals involving Chinese firms listed in the US.

May 27: A majority of EU governments oppose a plan to impose hefty duties on solar panel imports from China, a survey of member states showed, undermining efforts by Brussels to pressure Beijing over its trade practices.

May 29: Switzerland accepted a US-proposed settlement to a dispute over its banks’ alleged complicity in tax evasion by Americans.

Jun 05: Western sanctions drove Iran’s crude exports to the lowest in decades in May, according to tanker tracking data, even before Washington toughens measures aimed at squeezing oil sales further.

Jun 07: India’s billionaire Ambani brothers announced a $2.1 billion deal to share telecom tower infrastructure.

Jun 07: The Sindh Women Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SWCCI) and the Women Entrepreneur Association (WEA) of China signed a Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) to promote bilateral cooperation between women entrepreneurs of the two neighbouring countries.

Jun 13: The KSE-100 index surged by 433.15 points to settle at the new all-time high level of 22,757.72 points.

Jun 15: The EU trade ministers have finally thrashed out a deal on how to negotiate for a free trade deal with the United States, after meeting a French demand to exclude the key audiovisual sector.

OBITUARIES

May 17: Jorge Rafael Videla, an army commander who led Argentina during the bloodiest period of a ‘dirty war’ dictatorship died at age 87.

May 18: A prominent advocate and Pakhtun nationalist leader Barrister Baachaa expired. He was 72.

May 21: Ray Manzarek, the man who brought together one of the most successful bands in the ’60s, The Doors; passed away.

May 22: Henri Dutilleux, one of France’s leading 20th century composers, died in Paris at the age of 97.

May 23: French singer and composer Georges Moustaki, who sang in several languages and whose romantic ballads won him global fame, died at the age of 79.

May 24: Former Pakistan football player Choudhary Mohammad Amjad died. He was 50.

May 24: Actor Steve Forrest, who was best known for his lead role in the short-lived ’70s television drama S.W.A.T., died at the age of 87.

May 25: Haynes Johnson, a pioneering Washington journalist who won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the civil rights movements and migrated from newspapers to television, books and teaching, died. He was 81.

May 30: Filmmaker Rituparno Ghosh, known for his sensitive portrayal of interpersonal relationships, died. He was 49.

Jun 01: Renowned lyricist and scriptwriter Riazur Rehman Saghar died after a protracted illness. He was 72.

Jun 04: The 25-year-old Bollywood actress Jiah Khan, who made her debut starring opposite acting legend Amitabh Bachchan, died in an apparent suicide.

Jun 07: Former director board operations of the Pakistan Cricket Board Abbas Zaidi died.

Jun 08: Indonesian lawmaker Taufiq Kiemas, whose political career was crushed under long-time dictator Suharto, died at age71.

Jun 10: Mohammad Idrees Kamal, a leading peace activist of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and member of National Party, died. He was 50.

Jun 12: Former PTV senior producer Yaqoob Nasik died.

Jun 12: Japan’s Jiroemon Kimura died after living longer than any man in recorded history. The 116-year-old was born in 1897.

Jun 14: The world’s oldest Jewish person, Evelyn Kozak, whose family fled Russia to escape anti-Semitism, has died at age 113.