“The deadline for initial nomination will not be extended,” said Ahmad Vahidi on Thursday.
“More than 19,117 nominees had fully completed the procedures for initial registration as of 18:00 yesterday,” he said.
“A week has been allocated for initial nomination for parliamentary elections,” the minister noted.
The parliamentary elections will be held along with the Assembly of Experts vote on March 1, 2024.
The terrorist was identified and taken into custody in the city of Saravan in Sistan-and-Baluchestan Province following an intelligence operation by security forces, said the provincial police chief.
An initial investigation revealed that the detainee has Iranian nationality and had been operating in the area in accordance with a targeted and pre-planned scheme to promote the terrorist group.
The dossier contained biographies of the repentant members of the terrorist organization, details about their special training, organizational skills and weapons used, as well as their nationality, family members, addresses and contacts, according to the report.
The hunt for the database reportedly started with a phone call in the Tajik language wiretapped by the Turkish intelligence agencies. It was revealed that the Daesh was negotiating the sale of some kind of “cargo” and that the exchange would take place in Istanbul.
However, neither the contents of the “cargo” nor when the exchange would take place was known. The “cargo” turned out to be an electronic data carrier containing the biographical data of 9,952 terrorists scattered around the world. These people, who were called “lone wolves,” had not been previously compromised and were able to conduct attacks alone.
Multiple intelligence services, including the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency, the United Kingdom’s MI6 and Israel’s Mossad have been conducting counterintelligence and espionage activities against Daesh for many years with a purpose of infiltration, the daily reported. Dozens of their special agents under various fake names traveled to the mountains of Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Pakistan trying to get access to the dossier.
A spokesman for the Kuwaiti Ministry of Information said late on Wednesday that the film by Warner Brothers, which has topped $1bn in box office ticket sales worldwide since its debut, “promulgates ideas and beliefs that are alien to Kuwaiti society and public order”, according to the official KUNA news agency.
The ministry also banned the Australian supernatural horror film Talk to Me on similar grounds.
In Lebanon, Culture Minister Mohammad Mortada announced on Wednesday that he has asked the Lebanese interior ministry to “take all necessary measures to ban showing” Barbie in the country.
The film “promotes homosexuality and transsexuality … supports rejecting a father’s guardianship, undermines and ridicules the role of the mother, and questions the necessity of marriage and having a family”, he stated.
Following Mortada’s request, Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi asked the country’s censorship committee, which falls under his ministry and is traditionally responsible for censorship decisions, to review the film and give its recommendation.
The film was due to be screened in Lebanon’s cinemas from August 31.
The call to ban the Barbie film comes amid a growing anti-LGBTQ campaign in Lebanon, spearheaded by the powerful Hezbollah group.
In a speech last month, Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, called on Lebanese authorities to take action against materials he deemed to be promoting homosexuality, including by “banning” them. He said homosexuality posed an “imminent danger” to Lebanon and should be “confronted”.
In the case of a homosexual act, Nasrallah added “from the first time, even if he is unmarried, he is killed”.
Ayman Mhanna, executive director at the nonprofit civic Samir Kassir Foundation, told the Reuters news agency that the move to ban the film came amid “a wave of bigotry”.
“This is part of a broader campaign that is bringing together Hezbollah, the Christian far right, and other top religious leaders in a focused campaign against LGBT people,” Mhanna continued.
Barbie, starring Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling as Barbie and Ken, was widely anticipated by LGBTQ communities worldwide, though the film does not contain any overt references to same-sex relationships or queer themes.
It is the first film by a solo female director to surpass the billion-dollar benchmark.
The film has already been banned in Vietnam over a scene with a fictitious world map criticised for allegedly showing China’s claims in the disputed South China Sea.
The Philippines allowed the film to be shown – but asked that the map of the disputed sea be blurred.
The film’s release was delayed in Pakistan’s Punjab province over “objectionable content”, officials said last month, though they did not clarify which content was “objectionable”, nor why.
After being allowed into the Azadi Stadium in Tehran to watch games up close, ladies are now permitted to go to stadiums in other provinces as well.
In a soccer competition n Wednesday, both female and male spectators were watching the game passionately rooting for their favorite team. It was the first time that women were allowed to go to the stadium in the town of Sirjan in southeastern Kerman Province.
“With their orderly, fervid and successful attendance, the ladies of Sirjan paved the way for the attendance of other women in stadiums across the nation,” reported local media.
Women’s presence in stadiums has become a controversial issue in recent years in Iran.
While many women have longed to watch football matches in stadiums, they were not allowed to do so. Authorities attributed this problem to the lack of technical preparations.
The International football federation, FIFA, has recently warned the Iranian Football Federation that not allowing women to attend stadiums will have serious consequences for Iran.
Sharif Anees Sheikh Al-Eid and Ibrahim Nidal Sheikh Al-Eid, both aged 20 and from the Palestinian Bedouin town of Rahat, were driving on Route 40 near the Lehavim Junction in southern Israel when suspects opened fire from another moving vehicle.
They were taken to Beersheba’s Soroka Medical Centre in critical condition before being declared dead at dawn on Wednesday morning.
The number of Palestinians killed in Israel this year has now reached 144, a record high. This is in contrast to 2022, when 116 were killed and 2021, when 126 Palestinian citizens of Israel were killed.
In recent months, Palestinian citizens of Israel have denounced police “complicity” amid a record-high murder rate in their community.
Israeli police have opened an investigation into the murders but have so far made no arrests. Police told local media that their initial findings indicated that the shooting was the result of a long-running dispute between gang families in Rahat.
Palestinians in Israel have long complained of discrimination and police inaction against violence and crime that disproportionately affects their communities.
Palestinian citizens of Israel are the descendants of the native population displaced by Zionist militias as part of the creation of Israel in 1948.
For decades, they have suffered under discriminatory laws and practices imposed by the Israeli state.
According to the Abraham Initiatives, crime and violence in the community are a result of “under-policing and tense relations with the Israeli police”.
The non-profit organisation says 50 percent of overall violent crime in the country affects Palestinians, even though they comprise only 20 percent of Israel’s population.
The presence of illegal weapons in Palestinian towns is rampant, with gangs – involved in the drug and arms trade, prostitution and other crimes – taking advantage.
Representatives of the Palestinian population say they have seen enough evidence to suggest that Israeli police deliberately turn a blind eye to the illegal smuggling of arms.
A statement from Alvi’s office said he acted on the advice of the country’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in disbanding the lawmakers as the assembly’s five-year term is ending.
Usually, such a step is a formality and a general election would typically have to be held within 90 days. But this year there’s a twist. A delay until the spring is possible if Pakistan’s election commission opts for redistricting ahead of an election, based on the results of a recent census.
The uncertainty over the election date coincides with the legal and political drama surrounding Sharif’s predecessor and national cricket hero, Imran Khan. The 70-year-old popular opposition leader was convicted by an Islamabad court on Saturday of concealing assets and was sentenced to three years in prison.
Khan has appealed the conviction, which effectively removes him from the election campaign at a time when his party seemed to be doing well in the polls.
The Islamabad High Court, where his appeal is being heard, said Wednesday that it wants to hear from the government and Pakistan’s election commission before making a decision on whether to overturn the conviction and order Khan’s release.
The commission last year disqualified Khan from holding public office for five years, accusing him of unlawfully selling state gifts and concealing assets as premier. Khan was notified of his disqualification again on Tuesday, following his sentencing.
The court adjourned on Wednesday without setting a date for the next hearing, dealing a blow to Khan’s legal team which has argued he is being held in unacceptably tough conditions at Attock prison, about an hour’s drive from Islamabad. The court’s eventual ruling could be appealed and heard by Pakistan’s Supreme Court.
Since his arrest at his home in the eastern city of Lahore on Saturday, Khan met only once with one of his lawyers, Naeem Haider Panjutha, at Attock. Panjutha and other lawyers represented Khan in court Wednesday while the ex-premier remained in prison.
Arguing for Khan’s release, Panjutha said Khan did not violate any laws and that his arrest was illegal. “We were not properly heard today,” he later told reporters.
In a separate petition Monday, Khan’s team asked for his transfer to a prison with special cells for high-profile detainees, including politicians.
Khan, who was ousted in a no-confidence vote in April 2022 but remains a popular figure in the country, has denied the charges.
Meanwhile, Sharif addressed his last Cabinet meeting Wednesday. He stated he had faced multiple challenges, including the country’s worst economic crisis and devastating floods which killed 1,739 people and caused $30 billion in damage in Pakistan last summer.
Pakistan was able to negotiate a 3 billion bailout package with the International Monetary Fund, potentially saving the country from defaulting on its debt repayments.
Sharif then spoke to parliament, saying he would ask the president to approve the dissolution of the lower house which could pave the way for a parliamentary election by mid-November, but the government could delay the vote by several months if it decides to redraw constituencies first.
After the parliament is dissolved, the next step is for a caretaker government to be installed to run day-to-day affairs until the next election. Sharif exerts some influence over the selection of the caretaker prime minister but has not revealed his top choice. He will continue to work as premier until the caretaker prime minister is sworn in, likely this week.
Sharif’s ruling Pakistan Muslim League party is expected to face tough competition from Khan’s party — though Khan himself would be unable to take part unless his conviction is overturned. Under Pakistan’s laws, no one with a criminal conviction can lead a party, run in elections or hold public office.
Khan was previously arrested in May on corruption charges, triggering a wave of violent protests across the country. Pakistan’s Supreme Court ordered his release days later, saying his arrest was illegal.
Khan, since his ouster, has insisted that his removal from power was a conspiracy by Washington, Sharif and the Pakistani military — accusations that all three have denied.
White House spokesperson John Kirby said on Wednesday that Riyadh and Tel Aviv have not agreed on a shared framework for negotiations, playing down speculation over a possible deal that news outlets have reported could include a US security guarantee for Saudi Arabia.
“There’s still a lot of discussing to happen here,” Kirby told reporters.
“There is no agreed-to set of negotiations, there’s no agreed-to framework to codify normalisation or any of the other security considerations that we and our friends have in the region,” he added.
Fostering stronger ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel – two top US allies in the Middle East – has become a central focus of the Biden administration’s policy in the region.
While Washington has not commented on the specifics of a potential Israeli-Saudi normalisation agreement, US officials have said they are seeking such a pact.
But critics have questioned whether making concessions to move a deal forward is in the US interest and whether an agreement would include significant gains for the Palestinians.
Kirby stated on Wednesday that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet Biden “somewhere in the US” later this year, but did not specify whether a meeting would take place at the White House.
US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller also said on Wednesday that there had been “productive conversations” on a possible Israeli-Saudi deal and he expected more talks to take place in the coming weeks.
“We’ve made progress on a number of issues. I’m not going to get into what the progress is, but it is still a long road to go, with an uncertain future,” Miller added.
In the past, the possibility of normalisation with Arab countries was seen as a form of leverage that could be used to extract concessions from Israel towards the creation of an independent Palestinian state.
But Palestinians, citing the hardline policies of Netanyahu’s far-right government, have expressed little confidence that closer ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel will translate into significant changes to their situation.
Israel has continued to expand illegal settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories, and Palestinians in the West Bank have been hit by the deadliest wave of Israeli military violence in years.
Still, the US has made promoting so-called Israeli “normalisation” deals a key plank of its Middle East policy.
And the Biden administration has thrown its support behind what are known as the Abraham Accords, a series of agreements that were brokered between Israel and Arab countries under Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump.
During a visit to Washington, DC last month, Israeli President Isaac Herzog thanked the US “for working towards establishing peaceful relations between Israel and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia — a leading nation in the region and in the Muslim world”.
“We pray for this moment to come,” Herzog said during an address to the US Congress.
For its part, the Saudi government has not officially changed its position in support of the Arab Peace Initiative, which conditions recognition of Israel on establishing a Palestinian state and finding a “fair solution” for Palestinian refugees.
It remains unclear what would be included in a potential Israeli-Saudi normalisation deal.
In late July, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman said Biden was pursuing a plan that involves giving Saudi Arabia NATO-like security guarantees and helping the Persian Gulf kingdom kick-start a civilian nuclear programme.
Axios journalist Barak Ravid also reported on Wednesday that Netanyahu is seeking a US security guarantee as part of the push for normalisation.
“The exact parameters of Neyanyahu’s proposed agreement are not known,” Ravid reported, but he stated Israeli officials have said the proposal will focus on US security guarantees around perceived threats from Iran.
Shercliff on Tuesday posted a tweet asking the Iranian government to “release all arbitrarily detained individuals, including all journalists.” He was referring to journalists detained in Iran in the wake of last year’s riots in the country. Some are currently being held and investigated for potential links to rioters.
A statement by the ministry said Iran strongly objected to Shercliff’s remarks, which were against diplomatic norms.
“[Issuing] imprudent and irresponsible remarks that are contrary to diplomatic norms is a clear example of interference in the internal affairs [of Iran] and is unacceptable,” the statement quoted the director general of the Western Europe bureau at the foreign ministry as telling Shercliff in a meeting at the ministry.
The diplomat added Britain “is in no position to make statements” on Iran, given its “indefensible” policy towards the Iranian people.
The British envoy, in response, stressed his country’s will to keep respectful relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran, the ministry’s statement said.
Iran says the 2022 riots in the country were the result of foreign-backed elements exploiting the unfortunate death of a young girl named Mahsa Amini to wreak havoc across the country.
Tehran has over the past months summoned the British envoy several times to protest the UK’s support for rioters.
Iranian officials say London-based media, including BBC Persian and Iran International, have engaged in “media terrorism”, inciting violence and acts of vandalism in the country.
According to the document, US State Department officials used threats and promises to encourage Khan’s removal as the prime minister.
The US State Department encouraged the Pakistani government in a March 7, 2022, meeting to remove Khan as prime minister over his independent foreign policy regarding Russia, according to the text of the Pakistani cable, produced from the meeting by the Pakistani ambassador and transmitted to Pakistan.
The classified cable, known internally as a “cypher,” reveals both the carrots and the sticks that the State Department deployed in its push against Khan, promising warmer relations if Khan was removed, and isolation if he was not, The Intercept reported.
“The document, labeled “Secret,” includes an account of the meeting between State Department officials, including Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs Donald Lu, and Asad Majeed Khan, who at the time was Pakistan’s ambassador to the US, it added.
The State Department expressed strong “encouragement” to those in power in Pakistan to take steps towards removing Khan from his position.
This encouragement was primarily motivated by concerns over Khan’s perceived lack of alignment with the US and NATO’s proxy war in Russia and Ukraine.
Khan did not support the proxy war so moves were made to take him out.
The Intercept reported that the document was provided to it by an anonymous source in the Pakistani military who said that they had no ties to Khan or his party.
The publication added US officials threatened Pakistan with isolation if Khan was to remain in power and promised “all will be forgiven,” if he were removed.
It reported that the encouragement came during a meeting between the Pakistani ambassador to the United States and two State Department officials back in March 2022.
One month after the meeting, a no-confidence vote was held in the Pakistani parliament which led to Khan’s removal from power.
“I think if the no-confidence vote against the Prime Minister succeeds, all will be forgiven in Washington because the Russia visit is being looked at as a decision by the Prime Minister,” Lu told Ambassador Majeed before the vote, according to the document.
“Otherwise,” he continued, “I think it will be tough going ahead.”
Days before his ouster on April 9, 2022, Khan accused an unnamed “foreign power” – in a clear reference to the United States – of funding a “conspiracy” to topple his democratically-elected government.
Addressing a large rally in the capital Islamabad, Khan said the “foreign power” sent millions of dollars to opposition parties to launch a no-confidence vote against him in the parliament.
“The move to oust me is (a) blatant interference in domestic politics by the United States,” Khan added during his next rally.
The day before the meeting of US and Pakistani diplomats in Washington, DC, Khan addressed a rally and responded directly to European calls that Pakistan rally behind Ukraine. “Are we your slaves?”
Khan thundered to the crowd. “What do you think of us? That we are your slaves and that we will do whatever you ask of us?” he asked. “We are friends of Russia, and we are also friends of the United States. We are friends of China and Europe. We are not part of any alliance.”
According to the document, in the meeting, Lu spoke about Washington’s displeasure with Pakistan’s stance in the Ukraine conflict.
The document quotes Lu saying that “people here and in Europe are quite concerned about why Pakistan is taking such an aggressively neutral position (on Ukraine) if such a position is even possible. It does not seem such a neutral stand to us.”
Lu added that he had held internal discussions with the US National Security Council and that “it seems quite clear that this is the Prime Minister’s policy.”
Khan was removed from power in the no-confidence vote which is believed to have been organized with the backing of Pakistan’s powerful military.
Since his removal from power about 200 court cases have been lodged against Khan by the military-backed government.
The former prime minister has maintained that the cases against him are politically motivated to keep him out of power. He says the country’s powerful military is behind these cases.
Pakistan has been in the midst of a crisis after a district court sentenced Khan to three years in jail and barred him from politics for five years.
Khan was arrested at the weekend and sent to jail.
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