Significance of Diamer-Bhasha dam highlighted

By Masood Sattar Khan

(Pakistan News & Features Services)

Pakistan's newly posted Ambassador to China, Moin-ul-Haq has highlighted the importance of construction of the Diamer-Bhasha dam which is expected to bring about across the board benefits in socio-economic sectors of the country. 

The Ambassador in his twitter account highlighted the significance of the project apparently following the publication of an article in ‘The Global Times’ acclaimed as one of the most popular English newspapers in China. 

"The key project is yet another concrete example of close Pak-China Friendship" the Ambassador reckoned. 

The newspaper article titled ‘China aids construction of Pakistan’s ‘Three Gorges Dam’ despite pandemic’ had pointed out that despite the novel coronavirus pandemic, China and Pakistan were stepping up efforts on committed projects focusing on cooperation in industrial development, agriculture and the improvement of people's livelihoods. 

The Diamer-Bhasha Dam and Power Project, also referred to as the ‘Three Gorges Project’ joined a long list of bilateral cooperation efforts between the two countries. 

“As a country with an agricultural population accounting for about 60 percent of its total population and agriculture accounting for more than 20 percent of its GDP, the construction of the Diamer-Bhasha Dam remained of great strategic significance for improving Pakistan's water security and sustainable development and it has therefore been supported by successive governments,” Wang Zhihua, economic and commercial minister counsellor at the Chinese Embassy in Pakistan, told the Global Times. 

"The Diamer-Bhasha Dam and Power Project, being the third largest dam in Pakistan, will achieve multipurpose objectives. It will increase the water storage capacity of Pakistan from 30 to 48 days. The people of Pakistan are grateful to China, which has once again decided to help Pakistan secure and ensure its strategic water security in the 21st century," Syed Hasan Javed, director of the Chinese Studies Center of Excellence at the National University of Science and Technology in Islamabad (NUST), remarked. 

The dam is scheduled to be completed by 2029. During the construction 16,500 jobs will be directly created.

ML-1 project’s approval lauded

By Masood Sattar Khan

(Pakistan News & Features Services)

The Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan, Yao Jing, held a meeting with the Federal Minister for Railways, Shaikh Rashid Ahmed, and exchanged views on the implementation of the ML-1 upgrading project. 

Yao expressed appreciation to the Pakistani government for attaching great importance to the China-Pakistan relations and the implementation of the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). 

He also lauded the Pakistani government's approval of the ML-1 upgrade project according to a communication of the Chinese Embassy, released in Islamabad on August 7. 

“The CPEC project is based on the principle of extensive consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits, and has been reached on the basis of full consultation and expert scientific demonstration by the relevant departments of the two countries,” he reckoned.

 Ambassador Yao Jing assured that China will continue to support Pakistan in the spirit of win-win cooperation and ultimate success of the project. 

The minister pointed out that the ML-1 upgradation was one of the most important projects in the history of the CPEC.

“Passing through the severe test of the current COVID-19 pandemic, the Pakistani government fully supports the construction of various projects under the auspices of the CPEC,” Shaikh Rashid remarked 

“The ML-1 project will bring about system reforms and upgrades Pakistan's railway network, provide around 150,000 local jobs besides bringing huge social and economic improvement. The Pakistani side will actively cooperate with the Chinese team and strive to cooperate and implement the project to ensure the timely completion,” he added.

Coronavirus Update: Static infection rate in Sindh

By Mukhtar Alam

(Pakistan News & Features Services) 

Sindh witnessing a gradual increase in its number of daily COVID-19 tests in recent days, with an almost static infection rate, reported 386 new cases on August 6, with five new related fatalities.

The designated COVID-19 laboratories tested 8,723 samples during the last 24 hours ending August 6 afternoon, in comparison to 4,536 of August 5, 3,922 of August 4, 4,484 of August 3 and 5,272 on August 2. 

Taking the doubling in the number of tests on August 6 as a good development, keen observers reckoned that the increase was expected following the Eid holidays. 

The encouraging thing is that Sindh’s daily infection rate remained consistent, ranging from 4 to 5% during the last couple of days, like that in other provinces, said an observer adding it will relatively be a phase of relief both for the health managers and the public in the province, if the trend of infection and deaths continued passively. 

Sindh’s COVID-19 fatality tally, meanwhile, has increased to 2,250 (1.8%) on August 6 but there are signs that it will fall down in the coming days.

The Sindh Chief Minister, Syed Murad Ali Shah, in his diseases related daily statement, shared that as many as 795,549 samples were tested since the outbreak of COVID-19 in the province, with a positivity rate of 15%. 

He disclosed that 5,991 patients were still receiving treatment at homes (5,653 patients), isolation centres (nine), and hospitals (329). The condition of 250 patients was stated to be critical, while 49 were put on ventilators as on August 6. 

The district-wise breakdown of new infection came as: Karachi (226), Umerkot (20), Sanghar (16), Badin (10), Shikarpur (10), Thatta (10), Hyderabad (7), Tando Mohammad Khan (7), Ghotki (6), Khairpur (6), Jamshoro (5), Mirpurkhas (4), Kambar Shahdadkot (4), Sujawal (4), Sukkur (4), Tando Allahyar (4), Shaheed Benazirabad (3) and Dadu (2). 

Of the 8,723 tests performed during the last 24 hours, 760 were found positive for COVID-19, including 386 new infections across the province. As many as nine laboratories did not perform any test. 

An official report said that 414 patients occupied the intensive care unit beds at different hospitals across the province on August 6. 

In the meantime, another report said that as of August 5, 71% of the patients (6,035), having died of COVID-19 in the country, had co-morbidity.

The co-morbidities death distribution remained as: Diabetes mellitus-23.9% (935), Hypertension-22.2% (866), both Diabetes mellitus and Hypertension-23% (896), Cardiovascular disease-9.93% (387), Malignancies-1.3% (51) and other diseases-19.6% (763).