Granada’s President, Sophia Yang, has admitted to being a Manchester United fan, after agreeing another transfer deal with the English side.
In an interview with AS the Chinese businesswoman admitted to being a supporter of the Red Devils many years ago.
When responding to a question of whether she continues to watch football she retorted, “years ago the Premier League was what was watched the most in China and I was a fan of Manchester United, but now it is only La Liga and Granada.”
As of late, United and the Andalusian side have enjoyed a fruitful relationship and this may well be connected to the club president’s past affection for the Mancunian side.
The Red Devils sent youth product Alvaro Fernandez in the summer to the La Liga side to gain some valuable experience.
Despite some promising first appearances, the Spaniard failed to regularly make the first team and his parent club eventually cancelled the deal and sent him to Benfica in January.
Where this experience may have resulted in most clubs looking elsewhere, United and Granada were happy to do business again when Uruguayan attacker, Facundo Pellistri was sent on loan to the Liga strugglers.
Having such open channels of communication can only be a good thing for both clubs.
Granada get high-level youth talents that can theoretically make a positive contribution to the club’s escape efforts.
And for United’s part, they get to ensure that their young players who are not ready for the first team can get much needed experience in a top league like La Liga.
Furthermore, were Granada to produce a world-class talent in the future, it never hurts to have a strong connection with the club that could see United gain an advantage over their rivals.
Both the Old Trafford side and the Andalusians will be hoping that Pellistri can make a greater impact to their season than Fernandez did.
Naivasha, Kenya – Caroline Njau comes from a family of farmers who tend to fields of maize, wheat, and potatoes in the hilly terrain near Nyahururu, 180 kilometres (112 miles) north of the capital Nairobi.
But Njau has chosen a different path in life.
These days, the 30-year-old lives in Naivasha, a scenic town at the centre of Kenya’s flower industry and midway between Nyahururu and Nairobi. Seated in her living room with a cup of milk tea, she labels data for artificial intelligence (AI) companies abroad on an app. The sun rises over the unpaved streets of her neighbourhood as she flicks through images of tarmac roads, intersections and sidewalks on her smartphone while carefully drawing boxes around various objects; traffic lights, cars, pedestrians, and signposts. The designer of the app – an American subcontractor to Silicon Valley companies – pays her $3 an hour.
Njau is a so-called annotator, and her annotation of data compiles the building blocks that train artificial intelligence to recognise patterns in real life, in this case, with self-driving cars.
“My parents have not fully embraced technology because they find it hard to learn. But I always loved science. Data annotation creates opportunities, and you do not need a degree to do this – just your phone and an internet connection,” says Njau who studied teaching but has been annotating since 2021.
Kenya is emerging as a hub for such online work, rising to compete with countries like India and the Philippines. The birth of tech start-ups since the late 2000s, followed by the entry of tech outsourcing companies, along with business-friendly policies, skilled labour and high-speed internet have all led to an economy where digital jobs are the bread and butter for a large portion of the youth. In 2021, a survey by Kenya Private Sector Alliance (KEPSA) showed that at least 1.2 million Kenyans are working online, most of them informally.
But Nairobi’s data annotators have recently revealed a less rosy side to this industry. In a Time article from last year, workers at an outsourcing firm in Nairobi described the “torture” they went through while labelling pieces of texts drawn from the darkest corners of the internet – all in a quest to make OpenAI’s ChatGPT able to recognise harmful content. According to the piece, the workers were paid less than $2 an hour to do this.
In Kenya, most data annotators are freelancers, often working from their homes. Riziki Ekaka, 45, labels data for an American AI company in her bedroom. Her young daughter looks on while playing with a feature phone [Anne Kidmose/Al Jazeera]
AI in the countryside
Despite these stories, the annotation industry has continued to spread far beyond the cramped office spaces in Nairobi.
In mid-January, when Kenya’s President William Ruto launched a government-sponsored tech hub in Kitale – an agricultural town near the border with Uganda – a young ICT student explained how he had earned $284 in three weeks by training AI for Silicon Valley companies. He had been using Remotasks, an American website where freelancers get paid for labelling data.
The video clip from the tech hub – one among a series of facilities designed to equip learners with marketable tech skills – spread like wildfire on social media and made young Kenyans rush to create Remotasks accounts.
“Many young people are jobless. Even people who graduated in computer science cannot find jobs. The government is doing right by helping young people access online work,” says Kennedy Cheruyot, 24, a recently graduated nurse from Eldoret in western Kenya.
He opened a Remotasks account in 2021 and has continued to work online while looking for a job in hospitals. Some of his friends have entirely left other careers to focus on digital tasks.
“Previously, boys in our culture were supposed to go to the farm, herding the cattle. Now, they stay inside to do online work,” Cheruyot says when we meet at a cafe overlooking Eldoret’s business district. Hardware and agricultural supply stores blend with bright yellow signs advertising internet cafes, so-called “cybers”.
Although Cheruyot’s dream is to own a ranch “like in the Western movies”, he currently spends most of his time looking for more online gigs to pay for rent, food, electricity, water and transport.
Commodity prices in Kenya have soared since 2022, attributed to a prolonged drought that year and the Russia-Ukraine war. Meanwhile, the Kenyan shilling has continued to depreciate due to demand for dollars from the energy and manufacturing sectors. As the shilling weakens, import prices increase and with them the cost of goods for consumers like Cheruyot.
He expects that, should he land a job as a nurse, he will continue to work online in his spare time, earning from $5 to $20 an hour depending on the task.
“I do not care if the AI companies in the West grow rich because of our work. As long as we are paid. It may not seem like much, but it goes a long way in Kenya,” he says.
A new generation of scientists
But for Njau, the monotonous online tasks are a gateway to something bigger.
“Right now, Kenyan annotators water someone else’s garden. The flowers begin to bloom, but we are not even there to see it,” she says, gesturing towards the green grass outside her brick house.
“I do not want to stay in data annotation, my goal is to advance in technology. I want to know where the data go and how AI is programmed. Technology is taking over whether we like it or not, and us Kenyans should become data scientists,” says Njau who has already trained people with disabilities and young women in data annotation together with the Nairobi-based non-profit Next Step Foundation. Recently, she was awarded a scholarship in AI and data science by the Ministry of Investments, Trade and Industry.
Programmes like these aim to make Kenya a frontrunner in the technological revolution, explains Nickson Otieno, training manager at Next Step Foundation.
“I will not be surprised if a Kenyan comes up with the next big AI invention. We have an innovative generation and there are many problems to solve. For example, how can AI be used to inform Kenya Power and Lighting Company about blackouts by feeding it with complaints about power cuts posted on social media?” asks Otieno.
Still, there are bumps on the road to make Kenya – and other African countries – stand out as AI innovation hubs. According to Professor Tshilidzi Marwala, a South African scholar of AI and the Rector of the United Nations University, the education systems need an overhaul.
“Africans often receive quite specialised education, which is the case in countries like Kenya and South Africa that have British-oriented education systems. However, specialised education is outdated in a multidisciplinary world,” he argues and brings up an example: to create an AI platform that analyses x-ray images, one must master both medical and computer science.
Much of the conversation regarding AI, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, has focused on the human jobs that risk redundancy, and this is also a real concern in African countries. Marwala, however, believes that many people have “overplayed the significance of AI and confused it with normal automation”. Furthermore, AI might help small-scale businesses thrive.
“If a flower farmer in South Africa uses AI to analyse the soil quality using a camera rather than paying a scientist to do it, this could make the flower production cheaper for the farmer. I foresee AI providing much more efficiency and cost reduction,” he says.
AI apps that rely on data labelled by Kenyans, such as the chatbot ChatGPT, are already popular with young people like Njau and Cheruyot. He finds it “really useful” when in need of recipes or travel itineraries. But it cannot do his work for him.
Israel confirmed this week that its troops are pumping seawater into a network of tunnels in Gaza, a method environmentalists say could violate international law and cause dire, long-term consequences in the besieged Palestinian enclave.
Media reports have for weeks speculated that the pumping was under way, though Israeli and US officials, including President Joe Biden, did not confirm them when questioned.
But on Wednesday, in a short statement on X, the Israeli military said it is using “new capabilities” in its war on Gaza and on Hamas’s labyrinth of tunnels, “including by channeling large volumes of water into them”.
The IDF has implemented new capabilities during the war, with the aim of neutralizing underground terrorist infrastructure, including by channeling large volumes of water into them.
This method was developed in cooperation with the @Israel_MOD, and is only utilized in locations…
“This is a significant tool in combating the threat of Hamas’s underground terrorist infrastructure,” the statement said.
The confirmation came nearly four months into the continuous bombardment of the strip that has killed nearly 27,000 people. Israeli authorities have for long aimed to destroy Hamas’s infrastructure, and have argued that the tunnels hold ammunition and captives taken there by the armed group on October 7.
But the plan to pump seawater into the tunnels raises questions about Israel’s plans to rescue those captives, and could add to the lasting devastation of Gaza, including the enclave’s water supply:
How is the flooding done?
Media reports from early December said that Israeli forces were planning to flood tunnels with seawater in Gaza using about five to seven large water pumps.
According to The Wall Street Journal, the Israeli army installed the pumps north of the Shati refugee camp, a beach settlement that housed previously displaced Palestinians located in the northern Gaza Strip. The machines, the report said, could pump thousands of cubic metres of seawater.
By mid-December, the WSJ, quoting unnamed US officials, reported again that the pumping had begun. Another US-based media publication, ABC News, reported that the scale of initial flooding was limited as the Israeli army assessed how effective the method was.
Hamas, which claims its tunnels run for about 300-500km (186-310 miles), has used the underground passage to break the Israeli siege on Gaza. Palestinians use the network of tunnels to smuggle food, goods, medicines and even weapons. The Palestinian territory has been under Israeli air, land and sea blockade since 2007 and Tel Aviv decides what goes in and out of the narrow strip that is 10km (6 miles) wide and 41km (25 miles) long.
The pumping could take weeks and thousands of cubic metres of water to completely fill and destroy such a network.
(Al Jazeera)
Could flooding the tunnels affect Gaza’s water supply?
Environmental analysts warn that flooding the tunnels could damage the aquifer that holds Gaza’s groundwater which the strip’s 2.3 million people largely depend on.
Mark Zeitoun, a professor at the Geneva Graduate Institute, told Al Jazeera that pumping seawater into hundreds of kilometres of tunnels embedded in Gaza’s sandy and porous soil is highly likely to see saltwater seep into water sources, destroying water that’s usually used for drinking, cooking and irrigation.
Zeitoun, who once worked as a water engineer in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, said Israel is weaponising water in a “dark” way. The engineer is among many who have been warning since December that there could be “catastrophic” consequences, should the Israeli military’s plans be confirmed.
“My first reaction was profound distress,” Zeitoun said, referring to the Israeli army’s Wednesday statement. “Injecting saltwater will definitely contaminate the aquifer and this will have long-term consequences,” he said.
“It would ruin the conditions of life in Gaza. If we don’t react to this kind of behaviour, what’s to stop any other country from doing this to another group of people in the future?”
What water risks do Palestinians already face?
Water infrastructure in Gaza and the West Bank has long been fragile. Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant ordered a “total blockade” of Gaza, including a ban on food and water on October 9 as part of its military offensive.
For decades, Israel has controlled water supply to the occupied territories, cutting off or turning it on at will. Palestinians in the occupied West Bank are not allowed to construct new water wells or any water installations without obtaining a licence from the Israeli authorities – which is often hard to do. Even rainwater collection is monitored in the West Bank. Moreover, Israeli soldiers and settlers attack infrastructure supplying water to Palestinians.
Hemmed in by an Israeli wall to its east and the sea to its west, getting useable water for drinking, cooking and hygiene in the Gaza Strip has always been even more complicated. Residents there rely on a combination of three seawater desalination plants, three pipes running directly from Israel, a host of wells and boreholes pulling untreated water from the ground, and imported water packs from Egypt. In a pre-war setting, those resources were barely enough for the densely populated region.
Adding to the problems is sewage contamination. Gaza’s authorities usually use about four wastewater treatment plants to keep groundwater from mixing with the sewers. Even then, an Amnesty International report in 2017 declared the aquifer overexploited and said 95 percent of the water supply in the strip was contaminated with sewage.
Since October 7 though, sewage has become unmanageable, spilling into the streets. Water scarcity too, has worsened. At least two of the desalination plants have shut down, damaged from Israeli shelling. Israel has also cut off some of the water from its pipes, and many of the boreholes no longer work because of a lack of fuel and electricity to pump.
Gaza, one of the most climate-vulnerable regions in a polluted and warming world, has been exposed to even more toxins, sais Amali Tower, director of non-profit Climate Refugees.
“Tens of thousands of unrecovered bodies are decomposing under rubble,” Tower said. “Thousands of explosives from the current and previous wars have polluted the air and ground, including highly incendiary white phosphorus, leaving another toxic layer of chemicals in Gaza’s air and soil.”
What’s next for Gaza’s water security? Although water has been used as a tool in many conflicts, including in the Russia-Ukraine war, the case in Gaza is an exception, said Zeitoun, and violates multiple international laws, including possibly the UN Genocide Convention.
The law criminalises intentional actions inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction, in whole or part, of a distinct ethnic group like the Palestinians.
“What we see happening in Gaza is beyond the pale,” Zeitoun said. “With the definition of the Genocide Convention in mind, I think salinating the aquifer, which is the main source of water, will bring about its partial destruction. Part of it could collapse and become unusable.”
Just last week, the International Court of Justice ruling in South Africa’s landmark genocide case against Israel, ordered Tel Aviv to take all measures to prevent genocidal acts – but there have been little to no changes in Israeli military’s scorched-earth tactics in the strip.
Meanwhile, nearly two million Palestinians in Gaza are being forced to drink brackish, untreated water. Women are taking pills to delay their menstruation due to lack of water and sanitary pads.
Waterborne diseases too, are skyrocketing. The number of Palestinians in Gaza suffering from dysentery multiplied 25 times between mid-October and December, with more than 100,000 cases recorded, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). Children make up half of the cases since toddlers are more susceptible to a disease that causes extreme dehydration and, possibly, death.
These women are already celebrating a lifetime’s worth of wins.
For stars like Ayo Edebiri, awards season has been nothing short of golden, as The Bear actress continues to scoop up trophy after trophy for her role in the FX comedy. It’s a feat she can hardly believe is unfolding—especially since her younger self may have had different aspirations.
“She didn’t dream of nights like this,” the 28-year-old told Live From E! on the red carpet at the 2023 Emmys. “She sort of dreamed of dental insurance. We got dental, we eyes, we got ears. We can go to the dermatologist.”
But of course, she would go on to much higher places, especially considering that at the Jan. 15 ceremony—which was delayed due to the Hollywood strikes—night, she received her first Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for The Bear.
And the wins that night stayed within the family, so to speak, as her Abbott Elementary costarQuinta Brunson also nabbed an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress In A Comedy Series, marking the first time that two Black women won in those respective categories within the same year.
OnePlus Nord Buds 3, expected to succeed the OnePlus Nord Buds 2, will likely grace the Indian market soon. Although the company has not confirmed anything yet, details about the purported true wireless earphones have surfaced online recently. A leak shows CAD renders of the earphones alongside the case, which will likely come with a design revamp over the preceding model. The earphones are also expected to launch with upgraded features over the OnePlus Nord Buds 2. A pair of OnePlus TWS earphones, speculated to be the Nord Buds 3, have now been reportedly spotted on an Indian certification site.
A 91Mobiles report claimed that the a pair of new OnePlus buds with the model number E512A were spotted on the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) website, hinting at an imminent India launch. These earphones may be introduced in the country with the OnePlus Nord Buds 3 moniker. The OnePlus Nord Buds 2 carried the model number E508A, whereas the OnePlus Nord Buds 2R had the model number E510A. No further details about the purported earphones have been found in the listing.
However, leaked CAD renders of the OnePlus Nord Buds 3 had surfaced online recently. The earbuds were seen in a black colour option and the charging case was seen with an oval design in a similar shade. The shape of the case is significantly different from the boxy case of the OnePlus Nord Buds 2.
The leaked renders showed the case of the OnePlus Nord Buds 3 with a glossy lid on top and the rest of the body with a matte finish. The earbuds appear to sport a half-in-ear design with silicone earplugs. They have been tipped to offer touch controls to answer or reject calls, adjust volume, control music, and more.
Notably, the OnePlus Nords 3 were launched in India in April 2023 at Rs. 2,999 and are offered in grey and white colour options. The IP55-rated ANC (active noise cancellation) supported earphones carry 12.4mm dynamic drivers and support Bluetooth 5.3 connectivity.
Samsung launched the Galaxy Z Fold 5 and Galaxy Z Flip 5 alongside the Galaxy Tab S9 series and Galaxy Watch 6 series at its first Galaxy Unpacked event in South Korea. We discuss the company’s new devices and more on the latest episode of Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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At least 10 people have died and the blaze in the tourist region of Valparaiso has forced many to flee their homes.
Chile has declared a state of emergency as it battles spreading forest fires in the centre of the country that have so far killed at least 10 people.
“All forces are deployed in the fight against the forest fires,” President Gabriel Boric posted on X as he announced the measure, adding that emergency services would meet on Saturday to assess the situation.
The fires have ravaged thousands of hectares of forest since Friday, cloaking coastal cities in a dense fog of grey smoke and forcing people to flee their homes in the central regions of Vina del Mar and Valparaiso.
At least 10 people have died, according to a state representative of Valparaiso.
“We have winds of close to 40 or 50km [25-31 miles] per hour,” said Leonardo Moder, the director of Valparaiso’s national forestry corporation.
“This wind is hard because it carries lit leaves, branches or pieces of wood, and each creates a new little fire that grows into more fires,” he added.
The blaze is being driven by a summer heatwave and drought affecting the southern part of South America caused by the El Nino weather phenomenon, as scientists warn that a warming planet has increased the risk of natural disasters such as intense heat and fires.
In the towns of Estrella and Navidad, southwest of the capital, the fires have burned nearly 30 homes and forced evacuations near the surfing resort of Pichilemu.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” 63-year-old Yvonne Guzman told the AFP news agency. When the flames started to close in on her home in Quilpue, she fled with her elderly mother, only to find themselves trapped in traffic for hours.
“It’s very distressing because we’ve evacuated the house but we can’t move forward. There are all these people trying to get out and who can’t move,” she said.
Firefighters try to put out a blaze in Vina del Mar, Chile, February 2, 2024 [Javier Torres/AFP]
About 7,000 hectares (17,300 acres) have already been burned in Valparaiso alone, according to CONAF, the Chilean national forest authority, which called the blazes “extreme”.
Images filmed by trapped motorists have gone viral online, showing mountains in flames at the end of the famous Route 68, a road used by thousands of tourists to get to the Pacific coast beaches.
On Friday, authorities closed the road, which links Valparaiso to the capital, Santiago, as a huge mushroom cloud of smoke “reduced visibility”.
As Chile and Colombia battle rising temperatures, the heatwave is also threatening to sweep over Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil in the coming days.
The overnight air raids killed at least 18 Iran-aligned fighters, according to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The death toll could not be independently verified, and US officials only said the attack resulted in causalities.
The White House said it informed Iraq before carrying out its air raids inside the country. The Iraqi military called the attack “a violation of Iraqi sovereignty”, adding it could “lead Iraq and the region into dire consequences”.
Human impact and fighting
Almost all of Gaza’s 1.2 million children are in need of mental health support, UNICEF said.
More than one million displaced Palestinians fear a new Israeli military onslaught after the Israeli defence minister pledged to attack Rafah, an area once described as a “safe zone”.
The United Nations said 112 Palestinians were killed and 148 injured between Thursday and Friday afternoon in Gaza.
Palestinian officials said at least 27,131 people have been killed and 66,287 wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7. The revised death toll in Israel from the October 7 Hamas attacks stands at 1,139.
Diplomacy
Osama Hamdan, a senior Hamas official in Beirut, said the multistage proposal that officials from Qatar, Egypt, Israel and the United States put forward this week is unacceptable because it does not include a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Israel, the occupied West Bank, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Qatar, and is expected to push for the release of captives held in Gaza and a pause in hostilities.
Germany’s foreign minister warned Israel over its planned military offensive in Rafah, the dpa news agency reported.
The US has announced new sanctions and charges targeting the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Some 800 European and US officials have written a letter to their governments denouncing Israel’s war on Gaza as “one of the worst human catastrophes of this century”.
Occupied West Bank
Two Palestinian men in their 20s were hospitalised after being beaten by Israeli forces during a raid near the city of Jenin in the occupied West Bank, the Wafa news agency reported.
Israeli raids were also reported in the Balata refugee camp east of Nablus, in the towns of Rujib and Burqa in the Nablus governorate, Tubas city, northeast of Nablus, in the villages of Beit Tamar and al-Aruj, located east of Bethlehem.
When it comes to fashion, I’m always down for an “ugly” trend. There’s just something about an obnoxiously weird design that makes me go, “I need that.” We’ve seen plenty of controversial sneaker trends over the past few years, from dad-inspired styles to chunky soles galore, some even becoming necessities in our forever wardrobes. (I wear my grandpa-esque shoes almost daily.) As trends always come back in rotation, 2000s platforms have reappeared on the fashion scene, taking on sandals and everyday sneakers. At 5’3″, I’m not mad, as I could use the additional height.
Even as someone who embraces “weird” pieces, I know all too well a platform heel can be a little tricky to style. So if you’re looking to incorporate the Y2K trend but don’t want to look too over the top, white platform sneakers are for you. They look clean and crisp without being too much. I’ve rounded up 17 of the best below, from Nike to Converse, along with some outfit imagery for styling inspiration.
Suspicion of foreign espionage, cursive messages in ancient Chinese, a sensitive microchip — and a suspect that could not be stopped at the border.
Ravindar Patil, the assistant Mumbai police sub-inspector assigned to the case, was scratching his head for answers. But first, he had to find a place to lock up the unusual captive.
So he turned to a veterinary hospital in the Indian metropolis, asking it to retrieve a list of “very confidential and necessary” information about the suspect — a black pigeon caught lurking at a port where international vessels dock.
“The police never came to check the pigeon,” said Dr. Mayur Dangar, the manager of the hospital.
After eight months, the bird was finally set free this week, its innocence of spying for China long confirmed through crack detective work, but the jail doors flung open only after a newspaper report, repeated letters to the police by the veterinary hospital, and intervention from an animal rights group.
The group, PETA India, celebrated what it called the end of a “wrongful imprisonment.”
“PETA India handles 1,000 calls a week of animal emergencies, but this was our first case of a suspected spy who needed to be freed,” said Meet Ashar, who leads the organization’s cruelty response division.
Mr. Ashar said the case had put the hospital’s staff members in a dilemma: They didn’t want to expose a healthy bird to the sick and injured, but they also couldn’t set it free because “it was such a high-profile case and the charge was so serious.”
It is not the first time that India has feared feathered infiltration, but the latest case was a sign of changing times and threats.
In 2014, the authorities in the Himalayan region of Kashmir, at the center of tense relations between India and Pakistan, arrested a pigeon near the border on similar charges.
The bird in Mumbai suggested new twists — it had appeared in a city nowhere near a contested border, and the Chinese writing inked on its wings pointed to a more sophisticated and powerful rival that India has been grappling with in recent years.
Mr. Patil, the 39-year-old sub-inspector, had dealt with two animal cases before in his 12-year career: the death of two dogs, one in a suspected poisoning that required a postmortem, and the other in a road accident. Neither case had geopolitical ramifications.
This time, however, “I had to ask advice from our intelligence colleagues,” he said in a phone interview.
The bird had been spotted by guards with the Central Industrial Security Force, which watches over government facilities like ports. Not the first to cast a critical eye on a pigeon, the duty officer saw this one loitering alone — “it was just sitting there, and it all looked suspicious to them — chip, and ring on the feet,” Mr. Patil said. The guards informed the police.
Once Mr. Patil found a place to lock up the bird, the slow work of investigation began. And he started piecing together clues.
The rings on the bird’s legs, including one that had a chip, were sent to the forensic sciences lab.
“The chip had details of the location coding — what it is, where it has come from,” he said.
“Nothing else turned out suspicious,” he added.
He cross-checked the details with information online and concluded that the pigeon was a racing bird from Taiwan. In speaking to the guards at the port, which mostly receives oil vessels bringing crude for refining, he learned that Taiwanese ships were among those that docked there. He deduced that the bird had probably reached Mumbai on one of the ships.
“It may have been weak and injured, and boarded the ship and off-boarded here,” he said.
As for the cursive Chinese writing on the wings?
“It was not readable,” he said. “Because it came by sea, it may have faded.”
Just why the bird remained in lockup for several months after Mr. Patil had completed his investigation is a matter of disagreement. The hospital and PETA say the police were not responsive and had essentially forgotten about the bird. Mr. Patil said the hospital had misread instructions that the pigeon should be freed once in good enough health.
The pigeon “looked no different from our pigeons,” Dr. Dangar said, and had done well on a local diet of wheat, millet and rice. So after the police finally responded to inquiries from the hospital and PETA with a “no objection” letter, it was set free on Tuesday.
Asked what he would say if the pigeon’s Taiwanese owners came to claim it, Mr. Patil said the bird had a new home in Indian skies.
On Thursday, Pakistan, a nation of nearly 250 million people, will vote to elect a national government and members of the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament.
The vote comes amid a crackdown on former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), and a fluid political climate.
Like most major democracies, Pakistan’s political parties span a spectrum of ideologies.
Here are the country’s major parties — including those that have been in power nationally, others that have significant regional or local influence and still others that are smaller yet reflect the diverse issues and challenges that Pakistan confronts.
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN)
Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, centre, addresses a campaign rally in Hafizabad, Pakistan [KM Chaudary/AP Photo]
The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, a centrist party led by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, came to power for the third time in 2013 with a clear majority.
But Sharif, 74, was removed from office in 2017, unable to complete his term in office due to an array of corruption charges against him. Along with his daughter, Maryam, he was sentenced to jail for 10 years in 2018, days before the last national election.
Shehbaz Sharif, 72, Nawaz’s younger brother and former chief minister of the party’s political stronghold, Punjab, took office as prime minister in 2022. That was after the PMLN, as part of an alliance known as the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), toppled Khan and his government in a vote of no-confidence. Khan had come to power in 2018.
Shehbaz’s supporters often call him “Shehbaz speed” for his energy and fast delivery style on infrastructure projects, such as Lahore’s Metro Bus project.
However, his 16 months as prime minister saw hyperinflation and protests led by Khan’s PTI.
Meanwhile, Nawaz returned to Pakistan in October from four years of self-imposed exile in the United Kingdom. Within weeks, corruption charges against him were overruled in the courts, leading to suggestions from analysts that he had been handpicked by the powerful military as the nation’s next prime minister.
The biggest challenge before the Sharifs will be to wrestle back their support base from Khan, who despite being in jail under multiple sentences, remains a popular force, especially among urban youth with a strong digital presence.
The PMLN is still the clear frontrunner heading into the elections. While the elder Sharif is the party’s supremo, it’s unclear which of the brothers may lead the National Assembly if the PMLN secures enough seats.
Seats won in 2018: 64
Seats won in 2013: 126
PTI affiliates
Supporters of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, the political party of former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan, hold a rally against the decision of the Election Commission to bar the party from using its electoral symbol of a cricket bat on January 14, 2024 [Fareed Khan/AP Photo]
The PTI, founded by cricketer-turned-politician Khan and currently led by Gohar Ali Khan, leans more to the centre right.
Khan came to power with a victory in the 2018 elections. But within years, the military establishment, which appeared to have backed him in that vote, turned against him as Khan was deposed from office by a no-confidence vote in parliament, the first in Pakistan’s history.
Khan accuses the United States of conspiring with Pakistan’s military and his political rivals to throw him out, a charge they all deny. After his dismissal, Khan’s party led demonstrations across the country, demanding early elections.
However, the protests took an ugly turn when Khan was arrested in May on charges of corruption. His supporters went on a rampage, targeting civilian and military installations.
The unrest resulted in a brutal retaliation from the state. Hundreds of party leaders were forced to quit the PTI, thousands of its workers were arrested, and the party faced suppression.
Khan, who has more than 150 cases filed against him, has now been convicted of corruption as well as disclosing state secrets and faces 14 years in jail.
His party was stripped of its electoral symbol, the cricket bat, and its candidates are now forced to run as independents.
Despite the obvious hurdles in its way, the PTI enjoys vast popular support across the country, which could work to its advantage.
Seats won in 2018: 116
Seats won in 2013: 28
Pakistan People’s Party (PPP)
Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, chairman of the Pakistan People’s Party, addresses supporters at a campaign rally in Bhalwal [Anjum Naveed/AP Photo]
The centre-left Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), led by Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and his father, Asif Ali Zardari, is striving to return to power for the first time since 2008.
The party was founded by his maternal grandfather and former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, then led by his mother, two-time Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. The 35-year-old Bhutto Zardari has big boots to fill.
The scion of the Bhutto dynasty will be competing in his second election. He was foreign minister under PDM rule after Khan’s ouster in 2022.
Bhutto Zardari stands out as a young leader in an even younger nation — the median age is 20 in a country otherwise dominated by men in their 70s.
But he faces challenges, including criticism of his party’s governance of Sindh for the past four terms, especially after cataclysmic 2022 flooding, which destroyed much of the province.
His manifesto and campaign are focused on connecting with the youth of the country, and he has ambitious plans to combat climate change.
If he does become prime minister in a significant upset, he would be following in the footsteps of his mother, who first took the country’s top executive office in 1988 at the same age.
Seats won in 2018: 43
Seats won in 2013: 34
Awami National Party (ANP)
The Awami National Party, an ethnic Pashtun nationalist party based mainly in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, seeks to replace the PTI in the provincial government there.
The centre-left party, led by Asfandyar Wali Khan, takes progressive, secular positions on policy but has been dogged by corruption allegations and has been out of power for nearly two decades.
The ANP was part of the 11-party PDM alliance.
Seats won in 2018: 1
Seats won in 2013: 2
Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan (MQM-P)
Supporters of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan attend a campaign rally in Karachi [Fareed Khan/AP Photo]
The Muttahida Qaumi Movement was the most powerful political force in Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city and economic backbone, for nearly three decades.
In the past, the MQM-P has always formed alliances with the parties leading the country nationally. It was in coalition with the PTI after the 2018 elections but switched loyalties over to the PDM after April 2022.
The MQM-P split in August 2016 into a London faction and a Pakistan faction after an incendiary speech by its exiled leader Altaf Hussain.
Yet when the chance to join the PDM alliance arose, the split factions and offshoots of the MQM-P reunited.
Past paramilitary operations targeting the party and its alleged connections to criminal enterprises in Karachi have broken its popularity Sindh province.
Most of its support is in Karachi and neighbouring cities, which have large pockets of people who fled there after the subcontinent’s partition in 1947.
The MQM-P will battle PTI-affiliated independents, Jamaat-e-Islami, the PPP and young independent candidates to try and regain their base.
Seats won in 2018: 6
Seats won in 2013: 18
Jamaat-e-Islami (JI)
Supporters of the Pakistani religious party Jamaat-e-Islami attend a campaign rally in Karachi [Fareed Khan/AP Photo]
Led by Siraj ul Haq, Jamaat-e-Islami is a right-wing party with its manifesto centred around religion.
One of Pakistan’s oldest political parties is well known for its strong party organisation, but it has failed to do well at the ballot box.
It has been out of power for decades, and its last success of any note was in the 2002 elections under the rule of President Pervez Musharraf, a general who took power in a coup.
The JI is targeting Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and heavily focusing on Karachi with its relatively young leader, Hafiz Naeem.
Having done well in recent local elections in Karachi, the religious party is trying to promote a more moderate, development-centric agenda that it hopes will attract voters.
Seats won in 2018: 12 (in an alliance of religious parties)
Seats won in 2013: 2
Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam (JUI-F)
The right-wing Jumiat-e-Ulema Islam, led by Fazal-ur-Rehman, is also aiming to regain lost ground, particularly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which it lost to the PTI.
The Muslim leader was head of the PDM alliance and is looking to use his vast network of religious seminaries to help him win votes.
With a wealth of political experience in Pakistan, Rehman is an astute political operator who could also forge alliances when the new government is being formed.
Seats won in 2018: 12 (in an alliance of religious parties)
Seats won in 2013: 11
Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP)
The Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party is a Pashtun nationalist group, mainly active in Balochistan province, where it was part of the ruling alliance in the last provincial government.
Led by Mahmood Khan Achakzai, PkMap is considered a progressive centre-left party in Pakistan’s most impoverished province, which also has the least number of national assembly seats (16).
The party seeks greater provincial autonomy and enhanced powers for the Senate, where all the provinces have equal representation.
Seats won in 2018: 0
Seats won in 2013: 3
Balochistan Awami Party (BAP)
The Balochistan Awami Party was formed in 2018 with current interim Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq one of its founders.
The party, since its inception, was seen as a group of disparate politicians belonging to various tribes of Balochistan, towing the line of Pakistan’s powerful military establishment. In the 2018 elections, the BAP formed an alliance with the PTI.
The party will contest at least 10 National Assembly seats, all from Balochistan, and is expected to be a powerbroker if major parties need partners to form a coalition government.
Seats won in 2018: 4
Seats won in 2013: n/a
Awami Workers Party (AWP)
The left-wing Awami Workers Party is a relatively newer and smaller movement in comparison to the other mainstream groups. It is campaigning on an anti-austerity plank.
While it provides an option to voters disillusioned with the existing political system in the country, it has just three candidates contesting National Assembly seats across the country, which limits its impact.
Seats won in 2018: 0
Seats won in 2013: 0
Haqooq-e-Khalq Party (HKP)
A new entrant in the 2024 polls, the socialist Haqooq-e-Khalq Party is fielding young candidates in PMLN strongholds in Lahore.
Similar to the AWP, the HKP struggles with financial resources to put up candidates in more constituencies and will be contesting from one city only with two National Assembly candidates and one provincial candidate.
Seats won in 2018: n/a
Seats won in 2013: n/a
Istehkam-e-Pakistan Party (IPP)
Formed in June, the Istehkam-e-Pakistan Party was founded by Jehangir Tareen, one of the richest businessmen in Pakistan and a close confidante and financier of Khan in the past.
The centrist party came into being just a month after Khan’s PTI faced a state crackdown in the aftermath of the May 9 unrest.
A large number of PTI leaders, who announced their resignations from the party, soon emerged from the shadows and announced they were joining the IPP.
The party is seen as being made up of a large number of electable candidates with strong personal influence in their native areas. It hopes to win enough seats in the elections to play a part in the formation of the next government.
Seats won in 2018: n/a
Seats won in 2013: n/a
Independents
While the candidates remaining in the PTI have to run as independents due to legal woes afflicting the party, these polls will also see a large number of independents who are not linked to any party.
Some of those contestants have been part of the PTI in the past, but this time are choosing to participate on their own. Others are young independent candidates without mainstream political affiliations.
Historically, independent candidates have almost always ended up joining the party with the largest number of seats in the National Assembly.
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