Mushtaq Khan, a 48-year-old bank manager, used to enjoy his nightly jog in Islamabad’s huge Fatima Jinnah Park – until worsening power cuts two years ago began plunging him into darkness mid-stride, forcing him to run in the morning instead.

Now, however, new large-scale solar lighting for the Pakistani capital’s largest public park has let Khan return to his old schedule – and he no longer worries about running into porcupines or wild boar in the dark.

“After learning that a new solar system now provides uninterrupted power to the entire electric system round-the-clock, I have swapped back the jogging schedule from morning to evening,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation during a brief pause in his evening run.

In December, city authorities installed 3,400 solar panels on a 2.5-hectare parcel of the 300-hectare (750-acre) park, at a cost of $4.8 million.

The system aims to provide a constant power supply to one of the city’s key recreational attractions at a time when power cuts remain a major problem due to shortfalls on the grid.

The solar installation, which produces 870 kilowatts of electricity – enough to power the equivalent of 450 homes – runs water pumps and sprinkler systems for the park, and provides power for the offices of the Islamabad Metropolitan Corporation (IMC) and Capital Development Authority (CDA), both located within the park.

The initiative, financed with a grant from China, uses batteries to store solar energy to meet lighting and other electricity needs 24 hours a day, said IMC chairman Anser Aziz Sheikh.

Less work, more visitors

As solar energy extends the hours the park can be used – and powers irrigation to keep its flowers and other plants in top condition, as well as rides in the children’s playground – officials say visitors who had abandoned it are returning.

“We are seeing more and more visitors coming back to the park for recreational and physical fitness activities,” Sheikh said, noting that solar power “has restored life to the park.”

Around 50,000 people come to the open space weekly for exercise, sports, flower exhibitions and the panoramic view of the lush green Margalla hills nearby, CDA officials said.

Park gardener Karam Ali said solar power has made his job much easier, particularly now that the water pumps and sprinklers are no longer shut down by persistent power cuts.

“The new solar energy system is really marvelous and no less than a good friend,” he said. Power outages used to force employees to stay after hours to get their work done, without payment, he said, but that problem is now solved.

Similar solar installations could potentially play a wider role in Pakistan, which struggles with severe power shortages, particularly in the hot summer and cold winter months when air conditioning or heating are in demand and power cuts can last up to 20 hours a day, researchers say.

Only about two-thirds of the country’s nearly 200 million people have access to electricity, according to the World Bank.

To expand access and keep pace with economic and population growth, Pakistan needs to invest between 3.7 percent and 5.5 percent of its GDP each year in electricity generation, the bank says.

Putting money into renewable energy could reduce blackouts, improve health, boost the economy and help the country meet its goals to cut poverty and climate-changing emissions, energy researchers say.

Pakistan could produce as much as 2.9 million megawatts of power from solar, 340,000 megawatts from wind and 100,000 megawatts from hydropower if funds were available to build the infrastructure, according to Pakistan’s Alternative Energy Development Board (AEDB) and World Bank studies.

With the costs of renewable energy falling fast, Pakistan’s Planning, Development and Reforms Ministry late last year announced plans to boost wind and solar power generation by the end of 2018.

Fast track for solar

“These energy plans are being implemented on a fast-track basis in Sindh, Punjab and Baluchistan provinces, which account for 80 percent of the total solar and wind energy generation potential,” said Amjad Ali Awan, chief executive of the AEDB.

The longer-term aim is to boost renewable energy from 5 percent to 25 percent of the country’s energy mix by 2030, he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Ahsan Iqbal, federal minister for planning, development and reforms, said the government hoped to replicate solar projects like that in Fatima Jinnah Park.

The project “is convincing us to work with provincial governments to provide solar power to similar public parks, to lessen the load on the national grid and save the budget spent on hefty electricity bills in these public parks,” he said.
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After years of delays, China’s first large homemade passenger jetliner will take to the air for its maiden flight in the first half of this year, state media reported Monday.

State-owned aircraft maker Commercial Aircraft Corp. of China Ltd., or Comac, based in Shanghai, has nearly completed work on the 175-passenger C919, the ruling Communist Party newspaper People’s Daily reported.

The C919 was originally due to fly in 2015, but has been beset by delays blamed on manufacturing problems. It is now scheduled to enter service in 2019, aimed at competing with the Airbus A320 and Boeing 737, along with the Russian Irkut MC-21.

Airbus and Boeing say the market for new aircraft will be worth more than $5 trillion over the next 20 years. Industry experts say China faces a tough slog capturing a significant share of that market, even with government support. Comac has 517 orders for the C919.

Company officials couldn’t immediately be reached.

The C919 is part of China’s efforts to develop a homegrown aviation industry in one of the world’s biggest and fastest-growing air travel markets. China currently relies heavily on foreign-made aircraft.

Last June, the ARJ21-700, China’s first homemade regional jet, made its debut flight carrying 70 passengers. The jet is one of a series of initiatives launched by the party to transform China from the world’s low-cost factory into a creator of profitable technology in aviation, clean energy and other fields.

The ARJ21, also made by Comac, is a rival to aircraft made by Bombardier Inc. of Canada and Brazil’s Embraer SA.

 
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The corruption investigation into a former Chinese deputy intelligence chief is proceeding, prosecutors said Monday, signaling President Xi Jinping’s determination to continue targeting high-level officials as part of his sweeping anti-graft campaign.

The supreme state prosecutor’s office said that Ma Jian, a former vice minister of state security, has been placed under “compulsory measures.”

The term can refer to arrest, detention, bail pending trial or house arrest. The proceedings in such investigations are shrouded in secrecy and Ma is believed to have already been under initial investigation for about two years.

Prosecutors say Ma, who was in charge of counterespionage, is suspected of having taken bribes in return for favors and abusing his position to help his relatives’ businesses. He’s also accused of interfering with law enforcement and judicial activities, secreting away money and property relating to his case, and arranging for exit permits for his family members.

Reports in the widely respected Chinese magazine Caixin, which were later reprinted by state media, said investigators found that Ma had been keeping six mistresses with whom he’d had a pair of sons, and owned a half-dozen mansions in Beijing.

Ma, who had worked in the Ministry of State Security for three decades, was expelled from the ruling Communist Party in December, placing him in line for prosecution and almost certain conviction.

High-level officials such as former Communist Party Politburo Standing Committee member Zhou Yongkang have received sentences of up to life in prison as President Xi seeks to purge the ruling party of corrupt officials seen as diminishing its standing among the public and weakening its mandate to rule.

Though broadly popular among the public, the campaign is seen by some as a tool for Xi to eliminate political rivals and strengthen his hold on power.

 
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A Qatar Airways jet touched down in Auckland, New Zealand Monday,  shattering the record for the world’s longest flight by distance.

The Boeing 777 took off from Doha, Qatar and was in the sky for 14,535 kilometers before landing in New Zealand.

The old record was set by an Emirates Airlines Dubai to Auckland flight, a 14,200 kilometer journey.

Qatar Airways Chief Executive Officer Akbar Al Baker called his company’s flight “an important milestone.”

The jet was in the sky for 16 hours, 23 minutes. It carried four pilots and 15 cabin crew members who served the passengers 1,100 cups of tea and coffee, 2,000 cold drinks and 1,036 meals.

As is the custom with inaugural flights, the plane was greeted in Auckland with water cannons.

The Qatar Airways record may be short-lived. Singapore Airlines has said it plans to institute non-stop service between Singapore and New York — a distance of 15,323 kilometers.
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An Afghan diplomat was shot and killed by his security guard inside the consulate in the Pakistani port city of Karachi on Monday, officials said.

Mohammad Zaki Abdu, the third secretary at the consulate, died of his wounds shortly after the shooting, according to the consulate’s spokesman, Haris Khan.

“We were working at our office when we heard gunshots,” he said. “Everybody was running in panic.”

The guard, identified only as an Afghan national named Rahatullah, was taken into custody, said Pakistani police official Azad Khan.

Both officials said the motive behind the killing was not yet known.

Pakistan has long been a hotbed of Islamic militancy. Foreign missions are provided extra security and also frequently hire their own private guards.

Rahatullah was the slain diplomat’s personal bodyguard, and it wasn’t clear whether the Afghan Consulate had hired him officially, said Khan, the police official.

Noor Wali Khan Noor, a Foreign Ministry official in Kabul, said a delegation from the Afghan Embassy in Islamabad has been dispatched to Karachi to investigate the incident.

Pakistan’s Foreign Office said police intervened immediately after the shooting, which took place in the lobby of the consulate.

It said Pakistan’s Foreign Secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry spoke by phone with the Afghan ambassador to offer condolences and assistance in the investigation.

Afghanistan and Pakistan have long accused each other of tolerating Islamic militants who operate along their porous border.

 
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Asia faces a growing burden in treatment costs due to rising numbers of patients diagnosed with cancer, as well as those suffering from stroke and dementia over the next decade.

While Asia’s economic progress has led to sharply lower levels of poverty, it has resulted in social and lifestyles changes ranging from diets to increasing urban pollution, that extract an increasing toll on communities.

The World Health Organization (WHO) says in Southeast Asia, late treatment of cancer results in 1.3 million deaths a year. WHO says of the 8.8 million deaths from cancer annually, two thirds are in Africa and Asia.

Cancers, along with diabetes, cardiovascular and chronic lung diseases, were responsible for 40 million – or 70 percent of the world’s 56 million deaths in 2015, WHO said.

But globally treatment costs are rising. In 2015, the spending on cancer drugs rose by 11.5 percent to $107 billion, and is forecast to rise to $150 billion by 2020 – due largely to the expense of newer and more specialized drugs.

The Boston Consulting Group said in a recent report the “cancer burden in developing countries is reaching pandemic proportions,” seen as a leading cause of death in India with some 2.5 million patients. They forecast that India has “a chance of the disease rising five-fold by 2025”.

China reported four million new cancer cases in 2016, with the national health bill set to soar “fourfold” to 12.7 trillion yuan ($1.84 trillion) by 2025, the consultants said.

Increased costs

Gregory Winter, a Cambridge University professor leading a research team in antibody engineering and modification technology for the treatment of degenerative diseases and several types of cancer, said while scientific progress has been made, treatment costs remain prohibitive for most populations.

“The challenges are much more in costs than in feasibility. I’m not saying everything is possible but I think in rolling [treatments] out to populations in general we will be struggling with cost problems.  The cost of antibody treatment can be in the order of $15 to $75,000 per year and that’s a lot for anybody,” Winter said.

In China, reports say cancer patients and family care givers faced with the high cost of approved drugs lead to them seeking out generic drugs on the grey market to save costs. But the drugs may also be ineffective or fake.

Delays in China’s drug approval process has sometimes led to drugs coming onto the Chinese market up to 10 years after they appeared in the U.S. market. Winter says a similar story of delay is also found in India, and says a solution may require some countries in Asia to “take more risks during the drug approval process”.

“My own view is they should consider having a different drug approval process that is not so onerous and in return this should enable costs to be brought down for launching drugs in these markets,” Winter said.

Stroke and dementia

Asia is also facing rising health costs in the treatment of growing numbers of patients in Asia affected by strokes and dementia.

The WHO, in a 2012 report, estimated globally 35.6 million people worldwide living with dementia – with the numbers forecast to reach 65.7 million in 2030 and 115.4 million by 2050.

The report said nearly 60 percent of the burden of dementia is concentrated in low and middle income countries, and is expected to increase in the years ahead.

“The catastrophic cost of care drives millions of households below the poverty line,” with the numbers and economic burden making it a “public health priority,” the WHO said.

Canadian, Vladimir Hachinski, a leading global specialist in stroke and vascular dementia, at the University of Western Ontario, said a growing bank of evidence links high rates of pollution, evident across Asia, with strokes and dementia.

In 2016, research by Valery Feigin, a director of the National Institute for Stroke and Applied Neurosciences at Auckland University of Technology, set a clear link between air pollution and strokes.

Air pollution

The research found air pollution in the form of fine particulate matter ranked seventh in terms of impact on healthy lives.

The findings found the impact of air pollution in causing harm to the lungs, heart and brain had previously been underestimated.

“This is a global problem because there are currents between the continents. There are currents in the atmosphere that carry air from one continent to another and also within the continents. So what happens in Beijing matters in Bangkok because the whole atmosphere is one in the biosphere,” Hachinski said.

A recent report by the environmental group Greenpeace said as many as 1.2 million deaths occurred each year in India due to air pollution, just a fraction less than deaths from tobacco usage.

In China, cities such as Beijing continued to face regular bouts of choking smog during the current winter season amid high reported levels of harmful particle matter.

Studies indicate that smog leads to more than a million premature deaths in China each year, cutting life expectancy by two to five years.

Hachinski said Asia has to confront the issues of pollution as it faces a significant rise in pollution induced strokes, as well as dementia in increasingly ageing populations.

“At the rate we are going, we cannot afford more patients having strokes, more patients having dementia – particularly Asia – 61 percent of the world’s population is on Asia.”

“In some countries like China, stroke is the leading cause of death and in Japan, of course, you have an aging population, you have high rates of stroke and dementia,” he said.
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The United Nations recorded an alarming 24 percent spike in conflict-related child casualties in Afghanistan and a three percent rise in total civilian casualties in 2016 compared to the year before. 

The violence caused more than 11,400 civilian casualties, including around 3,500 deaths last year, according to the annual report by the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, or UNAMA, released in Kabul Monday.  

Report blames Taliban for most civilian deaths

It attributed 61 percent of civilian deaths and injuries to anti-government elements, mainly the Taliban. UNAMA blamed pro-government forces for causing 24 percent of the casualties, saying it reflected a 46 percent increase compared to 2015. 

The report could not ascertain responsibility for 10 percent of the casualties caused by the fighting, while the remaining five percent resulted mainly from explosive remnants of war.  

Most child casualties ever recorded by UNAMA in one year

“UNAMA recorded 3,512 child casualties (923 deaths and 2,589 injured), a 24 percent increase from 2015, and the highest number of child casualties recorded by UNAMA in a single year,” it said.

UNAMA Chief, Tadamichi Yamamoto, while launching the report called on Afghan warring sides to take urgent steps to halt “the preventable harm” to civilians.

“What they must do is clear; cease fighting in civilian populated areas, and stop using civilian space such as schools, hospitals and mosques for military objectives,” emphasized Yamamoto.

“Notwithstanding these efforts, parties to the conflict must demonstrate commitment and resolve to reach a politically negotiated solution to this needlessly protracted conflict that has destroyed lives, broken families, induced displacements, caused trauma and sufferings beyond imagination.” lamented Yamamoto.

The disproportionate rise in child casualties across Afghanistan last year resulted mainly from a 66 percent increase in civilian casualties from explosive remnants of war, and most of those civilians were children, UNAMA explained.  

The report noted an overall deterioration in civilian protection and the highest number of civilian casualties recorded since 2009, when UNAMA began its systematic documentation of civilian casualties. 

Ground fighting caused most civilian casualties

Ground engagements between warring sides, particularly in areas populated or frequented by civilians, were the leading cause of civilian casualties, followed by improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, suicide and complex attacks and targeted and deliberate killings.  

“The intensification of efforts by Taliban and other anti-government element groups to seize or maintain territory led to a correlated increase in civilian casualties from ground engagements,” said UNAMA. 

It added that airstrikes carried out by Afghan and international forces also caused more civilian casualties than in 2015.  

Civilian casualties caused by IS also increase 

The report noted the number of civilian casualties caused by extremists linked to the so-called Islamic State in Afghanistan increased nearly ten times in 2016 compared to the previous year. 

“UNAMA documented 899 civilian casualties (209 deaths and 690 injured) in comparison to 82 civilian casualties (39 deaths and 43 injured) in 2015,” according to the report.  

It added that extremists linked to the Middle East-based terrorist group used suicide attacks and targeted killings as primary tactics against civilians, particularly targeting members of the Shia Muslim religious minority.  

IS loyalists conducted extremist activities in Afghanistan under its local name, Islamic State Khorasan Province or ISKA. They are mostly operating in the eastern Afghan province of Nangarhar and in parts of neighboring Kunar province, both sharing a border with Pakistan.  

The armed conflict in Afghanistan has claimed the lives of around 25,000 Afghan civilians and injured more than 45,000 since 2009, according to UNAMA.
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