Dengue: Woman dies in Lahore

Staff Report

LAHORE: A woman with dengue positive symptoms died on Friday while the figure of patients has crossed 850 in Punjab.

Gul Shireen, 25, resident of Shalimar Link Road was admitted in a private hospital but the doctors did not diagnose her properly, he relative complained.

On the other hand, the ratio of dengue patients is increasing day by day and according to the recent details, the figure crosses more than 850 patients in the province.

The health department said that 82 confirmed patients have been found in Lahore. SAMAA

Over 60,000 IDPs arrive in Karachi

KARACHI: More than 60,000 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from flood-stricken areas of Sindh have arrived in Karachi for taking shelter in relief camps set up by the government.

Six more relief camps were set up in the city to accommodate the influx of IDPs from the flood-affected areas of interior Sindh.

The addition of new camps has raised the number of relief camps set up by the City District Government Karachi (CDGK) across the city 0to 47 while the figure of IDPs has exceeded 60000 after addition of 4000 new comers.

Pakistan wins more flood aid

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan won more aid pledges Tuesday as UN officials warned money needs to come through faster to help 20 million people hit by disastrous floods and stave off a ‘second wave of death’ from disease.

Torrential monsoon rain triggered catastrophic floods which have affected a fifth of the country, wiping out villages, rich farm land, infrastructure and killing an estimated 1,600 people in the nation’s worst natural disaster.

The United Nations last week launched an immediate appeal for 460 million dollars to cover the next 90 days and UN chief Ban Ki-moon visited Pakistan at the weekend, calling on the world to quicken its aid pledges.

In Geneva on Tuesday the UN said just 40 percent of this figure had been reached, but noted that was double the figure of 24 hours earlier.

Zamir Akram, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva,

Thailand King Sees Influence Fade as Crisis Intensifies

By SETH MYDANS and THOMAS FULLERA battle over Thailands future is raging, but the one man who has been able to resolve such intractable conflicts in the past has been notably silent: King Bhumibol Adulyadej, long a unifying father figure for his nation.

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Thailand King Sees Influence Fade as Crisis Intensifies

Longest Solar Eclipse of The Century Enthrals World

KARACHI, Pakistan News: The longest partial solar eclipse of this century occurs in half of the world including Pakistan today.
The eclipse was visible in Karachi at 10:45am, in Lahore it was seen at around 11:24am. Meanwhile, to ward off the evils such an eclipse brings along, Salatul Kasoof was performed in Masjid-al-Harram, Saudi Arabia, which was attended by a large number of people.
The eclipse hit India at 11:00am and would continue till 3:30pm. Started from Chad, Africa at 9:00am and moving from Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, China and Myanmar, the eclipse would conclude at Shandong at around 2:00am in night in Pakistan Standard Time. The next such eclipse would occur on December 23, 3043.

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Longest Solar Eclipse of The Century Enthrals World was first posted on January 15, 2010 at 2:11 pm.

40,000 to 50,000 killed in Haiti Earthquake

PANAMA CITY: Between 40,000 and 50,000 people were killed in the Haiti quake.

“The main figures have been given by the Haiti government, and they are talking about 40,000 to 50,000 people having been killed,” Head of the Americas zone of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

“The scale of this event means the toll will be high and the figure given by the government is likely the right one,” he said.

Castellanos added that “at least three million people had been directly affected. That’s to say a third of the population.”

Haitian officials had earlier warned that the overall death toll from the 7.0-magnitude earthquake that ripped across the poorest nation in the Americas on Tuesday may top 100,000.

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40,000 to 50,000 killed in Haiti Earthquake was first posted on January 15, 2010 at 2:23 pm.

Bomb Explodes in Seoul, 1 Dead

SEOUL: An explosion during a bomb test killed one person and injured five others Thursday at a government-affiliated testing site north of Seoul, officials said.

Researchers were testing an experimental explosive when the bomb blew up, said Choi Joong-ki.

One person was killed and five injured at the testing site in Pocheon, about 30 miles (45 kilometers) north of Seoul, said Kim Young-san, a spokesman for the Defense Acquisition Program Administration.

The cause of the explosion remained under investigation, officials said.

Earlier reports put the casualty toll at three dead, but local media later revised the figure downward.

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Bomb Explodes in Seoul, 1 Dead was first posted on December 3, 2009 at 11:41 am.

European Stocks Edge Up

LONDON: Europe’s main stock markets edged upwards on Wednesday, after slim gains overnight on Wall Street, as investors examined the latest corporate results for clues about a possible global economic recovery.

In late morning trading, London’s FTSE 100 index of top shares added 0.28 percent to 4,684.47 points.

The Paris CAC 40 gained 0.62 percent to 3,497.62 points and Frankfurt’s DAX 30 rose by a marginal 0.08 percent to 5,421.78 points near the half-way stage.

On the foreign exchange market, the European single currency sank to 1.4384 dollars.

“Weighing on the UK’s leading index were the miners, but these losses were counter balanced by gains in the banks, led by Lloyds,” said IG Index trader Phlip Gillet.

He added: “There is an air of stability across the markets in the UK at the moment.”

In London, Britain’s state-controlled Lloyds Banking Group said on Wednesday that it plunged into a first-half net loss of 3.124 billion pounds, rocked by soaring bad debts from the takeover of HBOS.

The loss, equivalent to 3.7 billion euros, 5.3 billion dollars, contrasted with a net profit of 1.954 billion pounds in the first half of 2008.

However, Lloyds shares rocketed 13.38 percent to 95.49 pence after it also predicted that loan impairments had likely peaked — and added that the second half looked “tough but manageable”.

In Paris, the AXA insurance multinational reported a 38-percent drop in first-half net profit on Wednesday to 1.323 billion euros (1.9 billion dollars) but earnings were twice the figure expected by analysts. In reaction, the price of its shares leapt 5.45 percent to 16.14 euros.

Across in Frankfurt, German chemicals giant Henkel said on Wednesday that net profit in the second quarter had leapt nearly four-fold owing to exceptional items in the figure 12 months earlier.

The maker of Persil washing powder revealed that profit surged to 143 million euros (206 million dollars), whereas the 2008 second quarter figure had been hit by charges linked to a restructuring plan. The group’s share price rallied 6.35 percent to 27.13 euros.

Meanwhile, German sports equipment group Adidas posted a 93-percent drop in second-quarter profit which swamped losses elsewhere in the country’s retail sector.

Adidas said net profit in the three months from April to June dropped to nine million euros (13 million dollars) from 116 million in the same period one year earlier.

But the result was better than a forecast loss of 2.2 million euros by analysts polled by Dow Jones Newswires.

Adidas stock was 6.47 percent higher at 32.4 euros.

Back in London, loss-making airline British Airways jumped 7.45 percent to 161.4 pence on hope of an end to the worldwide slump in air travel.

“British Airways (has been) given a much needed boost by US-based airlines figures, suggesting that possibly the worst of the aviation travel slump is over,” said IG Index trader Philip Gillet.

US stocks had ended with slim gains Tuesday in choppy trade as strong underlying momentum limited profit taking and kept Wall Street’s sizzling summer rally on track.

The modest rise kept a three-week uptrend intact and pushed the main indexes to fresh 2009 highs.

The broad-market Standard & Poor’s 500 managed a gain of 0.30 percent to 1,005.65 after topping 1,000 on Monday for the first time since November 4.

In Asia on Wednesday, Tokyo share prices shed 1.18 percent as investors took profits a day after the market touched a 10-month high on mounting hopes of an economic recovery.

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European Stocks Edge Up