Dunya TV

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• Pak Navy demands increase in budget
• CNG stations in Sindh to remain closed for 24 hours
• Dry weather likely at most parts of country
• Obama sends Congress $3.8 trillion spending plan
• US expected to increase aid to Syrian rebels
• US, Canada, Jordan, boycott UN meeting on justice
• Police, immigrants clash at Greek detention center
• Aisam to fight Davis Cup case
• Williams sisters to lead US Fed Cup team vs Sweden
• Top-seeded Wawrinka rallies to win Hassan opener
• Messi returns to help Barca reach CL semifinals
• Bayern beat Juventus 2-0 to reach CL semis
• Wrong turn leads Germans from home town to Austria
• Italian man catches a thief, then gives him a job
• Brain scans show what pain looks like

Pak Navy demands increase in budget Posted: ISLAMABAD (Online) - According to documents, the current defence budget is not balanced as share of Pakistan Navy has shrunk from 18.7 percent to 9.6 percent.Pakistan Navy is facing difficulties in its operational matters and defending national assets.According to the document, the rise in the budget has been demanded in as operational responsibilities of Pakistan Navy have increased during recent years.

CNG stations in Sindh to remain closed for 24 hours Posted: KARACHI: The CNG stations across Sindh, including Karachi, will remain closed from 8:00am on Thursday (today) till 8:00am on Friday.According to the Sui Southern Gas Company, the decision has been taken by gas load management.Meanwhile, the schedule of gas supply to different cities of Punjab, including, Lahore, Sheikhupura, Sahiwal, Multan, Gujranwala and Gujrat has been changed.According to Sui Northern Gas Pipeline’s gas load management plan, supply to some Punjab cities will now resume on Friday instead of Thursday.

Dry weather likely at most parts of country Posted: ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) - Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) on Wednesday forecast mainly dry weather for most parts of the country during the next 24 hours. However, there are chances of rain and thunderstorm at few places of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, northern parts of Balochistan, Kashmir and Gilgit Baltistan.According to the synoptic situation, continental air will prevail in most parts of the country on Thursday.The temperatures will rise during day time especially at southern parts of the country which will turn the weather hot.The highest temperature was recorded in Mirpur Khas and Shaheed Benazirabad where mercury rose to 37 degree centigrade.The maximum temperatures recorded in other cities during the last 24 hours were Islamabad, Peshawar and Muzaffarabad 28C, Lahore 32C, Karachi 31, Quetta 20, Gilgit 27 and Murree 15 degree centigrade.

Obama sends Congress $3.8 trillion spending plan Posted: WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama sent Congress a $3.8 trillion spending blueprint on Wednesday that strives to tame runaway deficits, raising taxes on the wealthy and trimming popular benefit programs. In aiming for a compromise between Republicans who refuse to raise taxes and Democrats who are seeking to protect the benefit programs, he managed to make some on both sides unhappy.Battles between the two parties over budgeting priorities have brought the government to the brink of shutdown several times and the latest plan seeks to provide a longer term solution to keep the administration from moving from crisis to crisis.It is unlikely that Congress will get down to serious budget negotiations until this summer, when the government once again will be confronted with the need to raise the governments borrowing limit or face the prospect of a first-ever default on U.S. debt.Obama will have a private dinner at the White House with about a dozen Republican senators Wednesday night as part of efforts to win over the opposition. The budget is expected to be a primary topic, along with proposed legislation dealing with gun control and immigration.The presidents budget proposal includes $1.8 trillion in new deficit cuts as the U.S. tries to wrestle down its enormous debt. The last time the government ran an annual surplus was in 2001, the year of the 9/11 attacks that led to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.On Wednesday, the Treasury Department said the U.S. deficit was on pace to finish below $1 trillion for the first time in five years. The deficit hit a record $1.41 trillion in budget year 2009Obamas 2014 budget blueprint assumes that Washington reverses the recent deep budget cuts that have become a daily reality for the military. It calls for a base defense Department budget of $526.6 billion $52 billion more than the level established by the blunt spending cuts, which had been designed to force the White House and Congress to reach a fiscal deal to avoid them.The budget plan includes an $88.5 billion placeholder for additional war costs in Afghanistan as Obama decides on the pace of the drawdown of U.S. combat troops next year.The presidents spending and tax plan for the budget year that begins Oct. 1 is two months late. The administration blames the delay on the lengthy negotiations at the end of December to avert the so-called fiscal cliff of tax increases and spending cuts and fights over the cuts that eventually took effect March 1.The presidents budget projects deficit reductions of $1.8 trillion over the next decade, achieved with higher taxes, reductions in payments to Medicare health aid providers and cutbacks in the cost-of-living adjustments paid to millions of recipients in Social Security pensions and other government programs.Early indications are that the budget negotiations will be intense. By including proposals to trim Social Security and Medicare, the governments two biggest benefit programs, Obama is hoping to entice Republicans to consider tax increases.But Republicans have been adamant in their rejection of higher taxes, arguing that the $600 billion increase on wealthy earners that was part of the late December agreement is all they will tolerate.House of Representatives Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, last years Republican vice presidential nominee, rejected the administrations argument that the refusal of Republicans to consider further tax increases represented inflexibility.

US expected to increase aid to Syrian rebels Posted: WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration is expected to give Syrian rebels broader nonlethal military assistance, including body armor and night-vision goggles, while stopping short of providing weapons to forces fighting Syrian President Bashar Assad.The timing and scope of the stepped-up aid package is unclear. President Barack Obama has not given final approval and an announcement is not imminent, according to a senior administration official, who requested anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the internal deliberations.Secretary of State John Kerry, in London on Wednesday to meet with Syrian opposition leaders, hinted this week at quick action, saying broader assistance for the rebels has been front and center in administration discussions in recent days.Im not sure what the schedule is, but I do believe that its important for us to try to continue to put the pressure on President Assad and to try to change his calculation, Kerry said.With Syrias civil war in its third year, the U.S. and its allies are struggling to find ways to stem the violence that, according to the United Nations, has killed more than 70,000 people. Despite growing international pressure, Assad has managed to hang on to power far longer than the Obama administration first expected.Obama has resisted pressure from members of Congress, military leaders and his former secretaries of state and defense to arm the rebels, in part out of fear that the weapons could fall into the hands of fighters who have allied with Islamic extremists.Underscoring that concern, the leader of the most formidable rebel group in Syria pledged allegiance Wednesday to al-Qaida, though he distanced himself from a claim that his Islamic extremist faction had merged with the terrorist networks Iraqi branch.Syrias opposition leaders pressed Kerry and Western diplomats Wednesday for more military equipment, according to a senior State Department official who was present at the talks.Kerry told them that the U.S. was looking at different options to help the rebels, but made no promises about any specific types of future aid, said the official, who wasnt authorized to speak publicly on the meeting and demanded anonymity.The secretary also urged the opposition to organize itself better and said hed attend a meeting April 20 in Istanbul bringing together the Syrian oppositions big donor nations from Europe and the Arab world, the official said.Among those who attended Kerrys meeting in London Wednesday were the Syrian oppositions interim prime minister, Hassan Hitto; Vice Presidents Suheir Atassi and George Sabra; Secretary-General Najib Ghadbian; and the oppositions envoys to the United States and Britain.The new nonlethal assistance package being discussed by administration officials would expand on the $60 million in aid the U.S. announced earlier this year.That aid included meals and medical supplies for the armed opposition. It marked the first direct American assistance to the opposition forces trying to overthrow Assad, but was greeted unenthusiastically by some rebel leaders, who said it did far too little.European and Arab nations have been more aggressive in their assistance to the rebels. Britain and France have been shipping the opposition armor, night-vision goggles and other military-style equipment, and are also open to the possibility or arming the rebels.Arms shipments are also flowing into Syria from Qatar, Turkey and Saudi Arabia.

US, Canada, Jordan, boycott UN meeting on justice Posted: UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The United States, Canada and Jordan boycotted a controversial meeting on international criminal justice organized by the Serbian president of the General Assembly on Wednesday because it didnt includeBosnias war victims and attacked the U.N. war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.To protest the victims exclusion, Jordans U.N. Ambassador Prince Zeid al Hussein and Liechtensteins U.N. ambassador Christian Wenewaser hosted a press conference for two victims groups the Mothers of Srebrenica and the Association of Witnesses and Survivors of Genocide while assembly president Vuk Jeremic, the former foreign minister of Serbia, presided over the assembly meeting.Munira Subasic, president of the Mothers of Srebrenica, who lost 22 close family members in the 1995 massacre by Bosnian Serbs, said she was allowed into the assembly meeting as a silent observer but felt the same way she did after losing her husband, sons and other loved ones I had no right to anything.She listened as Serbias ultranationalist President Tomislav Nikolic, the main speaker, criticized the Yugoslav tribunal.She believed that Nikolic was denying the genocide in Srebrenica, so she said she put on a T-shirt she had brought as a gift for Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon which said: Justice Is Slow But Its Reachable.All of a sudden I was surrounded by security of Vuk Jeremic and escorted out of the conference room, Subasic said.She said that the United Nations, which had failed to protect the men and boys of Srebrenica, appeared not to learn from its past, and she urged her own descendants and people everywhere to learn from the past and love other people and dont hate anyone.In a lengthy speech soon after, Serbias Nikolic protested against the lynch-mobbing of Serbia and accused the Yugoslav tribunal of selective justice by seeking to punish Serbs while overlooking the crimes of Bosniaks and Croats.Jordans Zeid, who was a U.N. peacekeeper in Bosnia and served from 2002 to 2005 as the first president of the Assembly of States Parties for the International Criminal Court, said Tuesday he was encouraging other countries in the 193-nation General Assembly to boycott the meeting.He expressed indignation at the way the president of the General Assembly has exploited his position and this important theme, which is the Role of International Criminal Justice in Reconciliation, for the purposes we suspect of launching an unmerited attack by the Serbian Radical Party against the International Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia.We believe it is our duty to create a space so the voices of the victims of the Bosnian war could also be heard, Zeid said.Liechtensteins Wenewaser expressed concern that Jeremic is exploiting the General Assembly to pursue his own political goals, which is clearly not what he ought to do as the president of the General Assembly.He has refused to make this a comprehensive event that covers international criminal justice in all its aspects. Hes interested in one tribunal and thats a complete distortion of whats been happening over the last 20 years, said Wenewaser, who also served as president of the Assembly of States Parties for the International Criminal Court.

Police, immigrants clash at Greek detention center Posted: ATHENS (AP) - Police and detainees clashed Wednesday at a former military base in southern Greece where foreign nationals suspected of violating immigration laws are held pending deportation.Financially struggling Greece is the main gateway for Asians and Africans trying to illegally cross into the European Union.Most end up stuck in the country, up to 10 percent of whose population is now of foreign origin.A police statement says officers fired tear gas at detainees alleged to have thrown roof-tiles at them. It also said detainees set fire to buildings in the complex outside the town of Corinth.Police arrested 47 Afghans suspected of taking part in the clashes.Immigrant rights groups, including the Movement United Against Racism and the Fascist Threat, claimed the trouble on the fringes of Corinth started after police beat up a detainee who had refused food to protest the extension of his detention. In a joint statement, the groups, among them one representing the Pakistani community, also said the fires were started by tear gas canisters fired by police.More than 5,000 people are held in similar complexes across Greece, and rights groups say hundreds are refusing to eat in reaction to the prolongation of their detention, which under Greek law can reach a maximum 18 months. Human rights groups have repeatedly criticized the detention conditions.The unchecked wave of illegal immigration in recent years, which coincided with a spike in crime, contributed to the meteoric rise of a once-marginal extreme right-wing party with neo-Nazi leanings that entered Parliament last year.The Golden Dawn party, whose supporters have repeatedly been linked with violent attacks on immigrants, is currently Greeces third most popular, polling at around 10 percent.

Aisam to fight Davis Cup case Posted: LAHORE (AFP) - Pakistan tennis star Aisam-ul Haq Qureshi Wednesday said he would fight Pakistans case after a referees decision to award a Davis Cup tie to New Zealand because of an unplayable court surface at a neutral venue.Qureshi, 33, the countrys first player to reach a Grand Slam doubles final, was part of the squad that faced New Zealand in an Asia Oceania group II tie, which was shifted to Myanmar over security fears in Pakistan.Pakistan were leading 1-0 on Friday and Qureshi was ahead in the second singles match when Sri Lankan referee Ashita Ajigala stopped the match and awarded the tie to New Zealand, as the courts were Pakistans responsibility.The Pakistan Tennis Federation had already announced it was lodging a protest with the International Tennis Federation (ITF), but Qureshi said he would meet Davis Cup officials in London to present the teams case.I am leaving for London and will meet Davis Cup officials on Friday to put Pakistans case before them and I am positive of a solution as the tie was unfairly awarded against us, Qureshi told a press conference.It seemed the referee was not working for the ITF but for New Zealand and he was clearly partial and unjust.The area declared unplayable was outside the lines of the court, he added.Qureshi paired with Indias Rohan Bopanna, dubbed the Indo-Pak express, to reach the final of US Open doubles in 2010, where they lost to the American Bryan brothers.

Williams sisters to lead US Fed Cup team vs Sweden Posted: DELRAY BEACH (AP) - Serena and Venus Williams will lead the U.S. Fed Cup team against Sweden in its World Group playoff at the Delray Beach on April 20-21.The team announced Wednesday for the matches on hardcourts will also include No. 16-ranked Sloane Stephens and No. 27 Varvara Lepchenko.The winner will advance to the 2014 World Group and have a chance to compete for the Fed Cup title next year. The losing team will be relegated to World Group II in 2014.Swedens team will consist of No. 54 Sofia Arvidsson, No. 65 Johanna Larsson, No. 425 Hilda Melander and No. 489 Sandra Roma.Serena Williams, who is ranked No. 1, is 8-0 in Fed Cup singles play and 3-0 in doubles. Venus is 14-2 in singles and 4-2 in doubles.

Top-seeded Wawrinka rallies to win Hassan opener Posted: CASABLANCA (AP) - Top-seeded Stanislas Wawrinka rallied to beat 85th-ranked Blaz Kavcic of Slovenia 4-6, 6-2, 6-1 in the second round of the Grand Prix Hassan II on Wednesday.The 17th-ranked Wawrinka, who won this clay-court event in 2010, served seven aces to Kavcics none.Its Wawrinkas third clay-court tournament this year, having reached the final before losing to David Ferrer in Buenos Aires then opening with a loss to Fabio Fognini in Acapulco, Mexico, in February.In first-round action, seventh-seeded Robin Haase of the Netherlands and Kenny De Schepper of France advanced and will next play each other.Haase beat Roberto Bautista Agut of Spain 6-3, 2-6, 7-5, and De Schepper eliminated Steve Darcis of Belgium 6-3, 6-4.Also reaching the quarterfinals were fourth-seeded Benoit Paire, former top-five player Tommy Robredo and Guillermo Garcia-Lopez of Spain.Paire rallied past Aljaz Bedene of Slovenia, 4-6, 6-4, 6-3; Robredo beat Tobias Kamke of Germany 6-4, 7-5; and Garcia-Lopez defeated Edouard Roger-Vasselin of France 6-7 (4), 7-6 (3), 6-2.

Messi returns to help Barca reach CL semifinals Posted: BARCELONA (AP) - Lionel Messi came off the bench to help Barcelona come from a goal down to draw 1-1 with Paris Saint-Germain on Wednesday and reach the Champions League semifinals for the sixth year in a row.Barcelona advanced on the away goals rule after its 2-2 draw in Paris last week meant the contest finished 3-3 on aggregate.Messi, who had injured his hamstring a week earlier, was only cleared to play an hour before kickoff. He went on in the 62nd minute with his team losing 1-0 after Javier Pastores opener.It took him nine minutes to start the decisive move that Pedro Rodriguez finished off to keep Barcelona in the hunt for its fourth Champions League title in seven years.

Bayern beat Juventus 2-0 to reach CL semis Posted: TURIN (AP) - Bayern Munich continued its march toward a second consecutive Champions League final with a 2-0 win at Juventus on Wednesday, securing a 4-0 win on aggregate and a place in the semifinals.Mario Mandzukic all but killed off the tie in the 64th minute, heading in a rebound to leave Juventus needing to score four goals in 26 minutes.Claudio Pizarro added Bayerns second in stoppage time.Arjen Robben also hit the post for Bayern.The only sour note for the German side was a booking for Mandzukic after a clash with Giorgio Chiellini. The striker will miss Bayerns next match.Bayern is bidding for a treble after winning the Bundesliga with a record six games to spare on Saturday. It has also reached the semifinals of the German Cup.

Wrong turn leads Germans from home town to Austria Posted: VIENNA (AP) - Instead of a five-minute trip home, a wrong turn led to an all-night drive for a pair of Germans that ended when police stopped their car in far-away Austria for heading the wrong way on a six-lane bridge.A police statement says the couple ended up more than 250 kilometers (150 miles) away from their Bavarian hometown.They were stopped early Tuesday after their car grazed three other vehicles while on the wrong side of a busy bridge in Linz, Austrias third-largest city.The two told police they apparently took a wrong turn after attending a funeral Monday evening and couldnt find their way back.Wednesdays statement says the drivers son picked up the unnamed Germans his 77-year old father and his aunt, 70 and drove them home.

Italian man catches a thief, then gives him a job Posted: ROME (AFP) - The caretaker of a housing complex near Florence in Italy used a knife to scare off a thief trying to steal copper wiring and called in the police to arrest him.The next day, he offered the same man a job.What kind of thief steals using his wifes car for a loot of 60 euros ($78), said Paolo Pedrotti, 62, the victim-turned-benefactor.Pedrotti caught Marcello Mucci, 54, on Monday but the next day found out that the hapless thief was unemployed and living on his wifes monthly invalidity pension of 250 euros ($327).The heart-warming story was widely reported in Italian media as the country endures its worst recession since the Second World War, biting austerity measures and an unemployment rate at record highs.Pedrotti wrote to the local paper, Il Tirreno, offering Mucci a job mowing the lawn and cleaning inside the apartments, which are on the market but failing to sell, for eight euros an hour.Mucci said he had immediately accepted the job.I was stealing the copper to make it into bowls and chandeliers that I sold door-to-door, said Mucci, a former gardener sacked from his job.Pedrotti began his letter with Dear Thief and ended it saying: I am waiting for you. In any case, you know the address.

Brain scans show what pain looks like Posted: WASHINGTON (AFP) - Scientists said Wednesday they have figured out how to recognize pain in brain scans, possibly paving the way for future tests that could accurately gauge its severity.Right now, theres no clinically acceptable way to measure pain and other emotions other than to ask a person how they feel, said Tor Wager, lead author of the paper, published in the New England Journal of Medicine.For the study, magnetic resonance imaging brain scans were performed on 114 volunteers as heat was applied to the left forearm, ranging from warm to hot.Researchers thought they would find a unique pain signature in each individual, since pain is measured differently among people and some are more sensitive than others.However, they were surprised to find that the signals they found in the brain were transferable across different people, allowing scientists to predict how much pain a person was feeling with 90-100 percent accuracy.We found a pattern across multiple systems in the brain that is diagnostic of how much pain people feel in response to painful heat, Wager said.A subset of participants who had recently gone through a romantic breakup and were still heartbroken were shown an image of their ex.Although past studies have suggested that the brain activity of a spurned lover is similar to a person experiencing physical pain, this study found that the heat-pain signature was absent in the lovelorn people.Researchers also found that the brain signatures for pain decreased in patients who had been pretreated with painkillers.While the technology is not yet widely available, researchers hope that in the coming years it could lead to the development of the first objective tests of pain, and perhaps help study and alleviate chronic pain.The research was led by Wager, an associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at University of Colorado at Boulder, along with colleagues from New York University, Johns Hopkins University and the University of Michigan.

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