KABUL: As their flight to Islamabad was finally about to take off, Somaya took her husband Ali’s hand, lay her head back and closed her eyes. Tension had been building in her for weeks. Now it was happening: They were leaving Afghanistan, their homeland.
The couple had been trying to go ever since the Taliban took over in mid-August, for multiple reasons. Ali is journalist and Somaya a civil engineer who has worked on United Nations development programs. They worry how the Taliban will treat anyone with those jobs. Both are members of the mainly Shiite Hazara minority, which fears the Sunni militants.
Most important of all: Somaya is five months pregnant with their daughter, whom they’ve already named Negar.
“I will not allow my daughter to step in Afghanistan if the Taliban are in charge,” Somaya told The Associated Press on the flight with them. Like others leaving or trying to leave, the couple asked that their full names not be used for their protection. They don't know if they'll ever return.
Ask almost anyone in the Afghan capital what they want now that the Taliban are in power, and the answer is the same: They want to leave. It’s the same at every level of society, in the local market, in a barbershop, at Kabul University, at a camp of displaced people. At a restaurant once popular with businessmen and upper-class teens, the waiter lists the countries to which he has applied for visas.
Some say their lives are in danger because of links with the ousted government or with Western organizations. Others say their way of life cannot endure under the hard-line Taliban, notorious for their restrictions on women, on civil liberties and their harsh interpretation of Islamic law. Some are not as concerned with the Taliban themselves but fear that under them, an already collapsing economy will utterly crash.
Tens of thousands of people were evacuated by the United States and its allies in the frantic days between the Aug. 15 Taliban takeover and the official end of the evacuation on Aug. 30. After that wave, the numbers slowed, leaving many who want to leave but are struggling to find a way out. Some don’t have the money for travel, others don’t have passports, and the Afghan passport offices reopened only recently.
The exodus is emptying Afghanistan of many of its young people who had hoped to help build their homeland.
“I was raised with one dream, that I study hard and be someone, and I’d come back to this country and help,” said Popal, a 27-year-old engineer.
“With this sudden collapse, every dream is shattered. … We lose everything living here.”
When Popal was 5 years old, his father sent him to Britain with relatives to get an education. Growing up, Popal worked low-skill jobs, sending money back to his family, while studying engineering. He eventually gained British citizenship and worked in the nuclear sector.
A few weeks before the Taliban takeover, Popal returned to Afghanistan in hopes of getting his family out. His father once worked at a military base in Logar Province, where his mother was a teacher. His sisters have been studying medicine in Kabul.
The recent weeks have been tumultuous. His family’s home in Logar was destroyed by the Taliban, and they moved to Kabul. They believe it was because they refused to give information to relatives who are linked to the Taliban. One of his sisters went missing as she commuted between Kabul and Logar, and has not been heard from in weeks. The family fears it could be connected to warnings they received from relatives to stop the daughters from studies, Popal told the AP.
Popal has been in contact for weeks with British officials trying to arrange evacuations. But he said they told him he could not bring his parents and siblings. In early October, Popal managed to get out to Iran. Complaining that he's had no help from the British Foreign Office, he is making his way back to Britain, where he will try to find a way to bring out his family.
The British Foreign Office said in a statement that it is working to ensure British nationals in Afghanistan are able to leave.
A former adviser to a senior Cabinet minister in Afghanistan’s ousted government said he was searching for a way out. The decision came after years of sticking it out through mounting violence. He survived a 2016 suicide bombing that hit a protest march in Kabul and killed more than 90 people. Friends of his were killed in an attack later that year on the American University of Afghanistan, killing at least 13.
In the past, he had opportunities and offers to go to the United States or Europe. “I didn’t take them because I wanted to stay and I wanted to work and I wanted to make a difference,” he said, speaking on condition he not be named for his protection.
Now he is in hiding, waiting for his opportunity to escape.
The American University of Afghanistan, a private university in Kabul, is arranging flights out for many of its students.
One student, a 27-year-old, recounted one attempt by the school to get evacuees to Kabul airport on Aug. 29, the second-to-last day when U.S. troops were there. In the chaos, buses carrying the students drove for hours around the capital, trying to find a route to the airport, he said. They couldn’t make it.
The student has been waiting for the past month for a spot on another flight arranged by the university for himself, his wife and two young children. He hopes that once out, he can apply for visas to the United States. His family has packed up everything in their house, covering their furniture with sheets to protect it from the dust. His parents are trying to get to the United Arab Emirates.
In Pakistan, at the Islamabad airport, a group of American University students, freshly arrived from Kabul, waited to cross through immigration. They will go on to sister schools in Central Asia.
But their families could not come with them, so they face the uncertain future alone for the moment.
Without her family for the first time ever, Meena, a 21-year-old political science student, cringed with humiliation as an airport official shouted rudely at the students.
“I don’t know my future. I had a lot of dreams, but now I don’t know,” she said, starting to cry.
She showed the school pen she brought with her because it has the flag of her country on it, the one now replaced in Afghanistan by the Taliban flag.
“We just burned our dreams ... we are just broken people.”
Many Afghans pack their bags, hoping for the chance to leave
Many Afghans pack their bags, hoping for the chance to leave
- Some are not as concerned with the Taliban themselves but fear that under them, an already collapsing economy will utterly crash
- The British Foreign Office said in a statement that it is working to ensure British nationals in Afghanistan are able to leave
UK government to take control of British Steel under emergency law
- The Chinese owners of British Steel have said it is no longer financially viable to run the two furnaces at the Scunthorpe site, where up to 2,700 jobs have been at risk
- Jingye bought British Steel in 2020 and says it has invested more than £1.2 billion ($1.5 billion) to maintain operations but is losing around £700,000 a day
A view of British Steel's Scunthorpe plant in north Lincolnshire, northeast England, on April 10, 2025. (AFP)
LONDON : The UK government said it was taking control of Chinese-owned British Steel on Saturday after rushing an emergency law through parliament to avert the shutdown of the country’s last factory that can make steel from scratch.
The struggling plant in northern England had faced imminent closure and Prime Minister Keir Starmer said his government “stepped in to save British Steel” with legislation to prevent its blast furnaces going out.
At a rare weekend session, parliament approved the law without opposition to take over the running of the Scunthorpe site, which employs several thousand people and produces steel crucial for UK industries including construction and rail transport.
The government saw its possible closure as a risk to Britain’s long-term economic security, given the decline of the UK’s once robust steel industry.
Officials were poised to take over the site after the emergency bill passed into law on Saturday evening, according to UK media reports.
Following its approval Starmer said his administration was “turning the page on a decade of decline” and “acting to protect the jobs of thousands of workers.”
He insisted “all options are on the table to secure the future of the industry,” after a government minister indicated nationalization could be a likely next step.
Earlier, as MPs debated in parliament, the prime minister made a dash to the region where he told steelworkers gathered in a nearby village hall that the measure was “in the national interest.”
He said the “pretty unprecedented” move meant the government could secure “a future for steel” in Britain.
“The most important thing is we’ve got control of the site, we can make the decisions about what happens, and that means that those blast furnaces will stay on,” he said.
It came after protests at the plant and reports that workers had stopped executives from the company’s Chinese owners Jingye accessing key areas of the steelworks on Saturday morning.
The Times newspaper said British Steel workers had seen off a “delegation of Chinese executives” trying to enter critical parts of the works.
Police said officers attended the scene “following a suspected breach of the peace,” but no arrests were made.
State ownership considered
Facing questions about nationalization in parliament, business and trade secretary Jonathan Reynolds said state ownership “remains on the table” and may be the “likely option.”
But he said the scope of Saturday’s legislation was more limited — it “does not transfer ownership to the government,” he explained, saying this would have to be dealt with at a later stage.
Ministers have said no private company has been willing to invest in the plant.
The Chinese owners have said it is no longer financially viable to run the two furnaces at the site, where up to 2,700 jobs have been at risk.
Jingye bought British Steel in 2020 and says it has invested more than £1.2 billion ($1.5 billion) to maintain operations but is losing around £700,000 a day.
Reynolds said “the effective market value of this company is zero,” and that Jingye had wanted to maintain the operation in the UK but supply it with slab steel from China to keep it going.
The Labour government came under fire from the opposition Conservative party for its handling of the negotiations and faced calls from some left-wing politicians to fully nationalize the plant, while unions also urged the government to go further.
Reynolds explained the government had sought to buy raw materials to keep the furnaces running with “no losses whatsoever for Jingye,” but met with resistance.
Instead Jingye demanded the UK “transfer hundreds of millions of pounds to them, without any conditions to stop that money and potentially other assets being immediately transferred to China,” he said. “They also refused a condition to keep the blast furnaces maintained.”
Saturday’s legislation allowed for criminal sanctions and gave the government powers to take over assets if executives fail to comply with instructions to keep the blast furnaces open.
Trump tariffs partly to blame
MPs had left for their Easter holidays on Tuesday and had not been due to return to parliament until April 22 when the rare session was called.
MPs last sat on a Saturday recall of parliament at the start of the Falklands War between Britain and Argentina in 1982.
Scunthorpe in northern England hosts Britain’s last virgin steel plant — which produces steel from raw rather than recycled materials — after Indian firm Tata’s Port Talbot site shuttered its blast furnace last year.
British Steel has said US President Donald Trump’s recent tariffs on the sector were partly to blame for the Scunthorpe plant’s difficulties.
However, fierce competition from cheaper Asian steel has heaped pressure on Europe’s beleaguered industry in recent years.
British Steel has its roots as far back as the Industrial Revolution but took shape in 1967 when the Labour government nationalized the industry, which at the time employed nearly 270,000 people.
One million Bangladeshis make public pledge to boycott Israel-linked products
- Dhaka protest was the largest Palestine solidarity rally in Bangladesh’s recent history
- Protesters call for reinstating the ‘except Israel’ clause in Bangladeshi passports
DHAKA: More than 1 million Bangladeshis assembled on the streets of Dhaka on Saturday to join the country’s largest Gaza solidarity rally and take a public oath to boycott products and entities linked to Israel.
Waving the flags of Bangladesh and Palestine and chanting “Free Palestine,” “Stop the Israeli aggression,” and “Boycott Israeli products,” residents of the country’s capital flocked to the Suhrawardy Udyan — the main public space — for the “March for Gaza” demonstration.
Organized by the Palestine Solidarity Movement Bangladesh, the event featured politicians, celebrities, artists, poets and popular social media influencers, who joined in a call on world leaders to bring to justice Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and others responsible for Israel’s mass killing of Palestinian civilians.
FASTFACT
The protesters called on the Bangladesh government to reinstate the ‘except Israel’ clause in Bangladeshi passports, which had barred nationals from traveling to Israel.
Political leaders present at the event called for international accountability and immediate action to end Israel’s deadly onslaught on Gaza, where over 50,900 people have been killed, 116,000 wounded, and 2 million others face starvation after Israeli forces destroyed most of the region’s infrastructure and buildings, while blocking humanitarian aid from entering.
A joint declaration read during the rally called on the international community to “take effective and collective action to end the genocide,” and especially on Muslim countries to immediately sever all economic, military, and diplomatic relations with Israel and to “impose commercial blockades and sanctions on the Zionist state” and begin active diplomatic efforts to isolate it on the international stage.
“We will boycott every product, company, and force that sustains Israel’s occupation ... We will start from our own homes, leaving an imprint of this pledge in language, history, education, economy, and society,” said the declaration read by Mahmudur Rahman, editor of the Amar Desh daily newspaper, who helped organize the event.
It was the largest Palestine solidarity rally in Bangladesh in recent history.
“More than a million people actually gathered today. According to the police, they have said probably it was 1.1 million,” Rahman told Arab News.
“It was a huge gathering, but it was so peaceful ... This is some sort of example for the entire world. It was peaceful and it was in favor of humanity. Because it’s not only a question of Islam — we were protesting against the inhuman genocide (perpetrated by) the Israeli regime. So, this protest is for the humanity. We have asked the Muslim Ummah to get united to free Palestine.”
The protesters also called on the government to reinstate the “except Israel” clause in Bangladeshi passports, which had barred nationals from traveling to Israel. Even though Bangladesh has no diplomatic relations with Israel, the clause was removed in 2021 by the previous administration of Sheikh Hasina, who was ousted in a popular uprising last year.
Participants at the rally said they already follow many aspects of Saturday’s declaration — especially the boycott call.
“I stopped buying Israeli products from the very beginning of this latest round of Israeli aggression, which started about a year and a half ago. I even stopped buying Coca-Cola, though it’s a very popular and well-known drink here. This is my personal way of protesting against Israel — as an individual,” said Arman Sheikh, a businessman in Dhaka.
“This kind of boycott can definitely make a difference. There’s nothing stronger than the power of the masses.”
Nasrin Begum, a teacher, said she has been trying to avoid global brands for their possible links with Israel, instead choosing local alternatives.
“Before purchasing cosmetics, now I always google about their origin. If anything in my search shows a connection to Israel, I avoid those products,” she said.
“It’s not very difficult to find a suitable substitute for Israeli-linked goods. It’s an open market economy. We can get any products from anywhere in the world. It’s all about our mindset and determination. I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself if I continued purchasing Israeli-linked goods after all the atrocities they are committing.”
Asiatic Society employs AI to decipher ancient Indian manuscripts
- Society has 52,000 rare manuscripts, many of which still have not been deciphered
- Project Vidhvanika in collaboration with Centre for Development of Advanced Computing
NEW DELHI: The Asiatic Society in Kolkata is using AI transcription and machine learning to decipher ancient manuscripts in its archives and make them accessible to scholars worldwide.
Founded in 1784, during British colonial rule, the Asiatic Society is one of India’s oldest research institutions and is dedicated to the study and preservation of history, culture, and languages.
Many of the society’s more than 52,000 rare manuscripts and historical documents have not previously been deciphered. The society launched its Vidhvanika (“decoding knowledge”) project in December to digitize them and to develop language models for ancient scripts.
“Work needs to be done on the majority of the manuscripts,” Anant Sinha, administrator of the Asiatic Society, Kolkata, told Arab News. “We are working with three scientists. Besides that, I have my reprography team involved in the scanning, and then there’s the expert team, which includes specialists in different languages, scripts, and subjects.”
The project is also being supported by the Center for Development of Advanced Computing, India’s premier IT research and development organization.
The society’s manuscript collection spans a wide range of subjects — including Indian history, literature, philosophy, religion, astronomy, mathematics, medicine, and art — and of languages, including Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, Tamil, Bengali, and other regional languages of India.
Decoding the manuscripts requires an understanding of the scripts, their language, the styles used in historical documents, the historical context, and the subject matter. There are few active, specialized paleographers and manuscript scholars conducting such work and research, not only in India but across the world.
“The motive behind this project is very simple and clear: the language, the script and the subject — generally you require knowledge of these three to understand a manuscript, (and) the people who have (that) knowledge are very few. We are developing machine language (models), so that you can use software or an app to read the manuscripts,” Sinha said.
He estimated the current accuracy of the models at about 40 percent, as the machine learning process continues.
“Our plan is to take it to 90 percent to 95 percent. It will never have 100 percent accuracy,” Sinha said. “It is a machine, it’s not a human. It’s learning what you are teaching it, so you have to give that leeway ... It will be an ongoing process because the machine language (model) keeps improving itself.”
The Vidhvanika project was launched on the 225th anniversary of the birth of James Prinsep, an English scholar and a former secretary of the society who is credited with deciphering the Kharosthi and Brahmi scripts of ancient India.
That feat played a crucial role in uncovering the history of the ancient Mauryan Empire that ruled over much of the Indian subcontinent during the 4th century BCE.
Vidhvanika, Sinha believes, may help save other languages that played a role in the region’s history from being forgotten.
“We must make an effort to understand what is in those manuscripts and what our ancestors have left for us,” he said. “Brahmi and Kharosthi are languages of this continent, and we ourselves have forgotten that. If we (are again at risk of losing) some script or some language, then we will require another James Prinsep to decipher it.”
Indian army officer, 3 suspected militants killed in Kashmir fighting
- India says militants were trying to infiltrate from Pakistan’s Azad Kashmir
- India, Pakistan each administer parts of Kashmir but claim territory in entirety
SRINAGAR, India: Three suspected militants and an army officer have been killed in two separate gunbattles in Indian-controlled Kashmir, the Indian army said Saturday.
Army soldiers laid a cordon in a forested area in southern Kishtwar district on Wednesday following a tip that a group of insurgents was operating there, an army statement said.
A search in the area by soldiers led to a firefight with militants, initially leaving one militant dead late Wednesday, the statement said.
It added that despite inclement weather, troops maintained their cordon in the area, triggering more exchanges of gunfire that resulted in the killing of two more militants on Saturday.
The army did not report any casualties on its side.
However, in another incident, the Indian army said its soldiers in southern Akhnoor area intercepted a group of militants close to the heavily militarized Line of Control dividing the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir between India and Pakistan late Friday.
Fighting ensued during which one army officer was killed, it said.
The statement said militants were trying to infiltrate into the Indian side from Pakistan’s Azad Kashmir.
There was no independent confirmation of either of the incidents.
Nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan each administer part of Kashmir, but both claim the territory in its entirety.
Militants in the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir have been fighting New Delhi’s rule since 1989.
Many Muslim Kashmiris support the rebels’ goal of uniting the territory, either under Pakistani rule or as an independent country.
India insists the Kashmir militancy is Pakistan-sponsored “terrorism.”
Pakistan denies the charge, and many Kashmiris consider it a legitimate freedom struggle. Tens of thousands of civilians, rebels and government forces have been killed in the conflict.
The territory has simmered in anger since 2019 when New Delhi ended the region’s semi-autonomy and drastically curbed dissent, civil liberties and media freedoms while intensifying counterinsurgency operations.
Bomb strikes near the Athens offices of the Greek railway company. No injuries reported
- The explosion comes amid widespread public anger over a 2023 railway disaster, Greece’s worst, in which 57 people were killed
ATHENS: A bomb planted near the offices of Hellenic Train, Greece’s main railway company, exploded Friday night in a busy district of central Athens, authorities said. There were no reports of injuries.
The explosion comes amid widespread public anger over a 2023 railway disaster, Greece’s worst, in which 57 people were killed and dozens more injured when a freight train and a passenger train heading in opposite directions were accidentally put on the same track.
Local media said a newspaper and a news website had received an anonymous call shortly before Friday’s blast, with the caller warning that a bomb had been planted outside the railway company offices and would explode within about 40 minutes.
In a statement, Hellenic Train said the explosion had occurred “very close to its central offices” and said the blast had caused limited damage and no injuries to any employees or passers-by.
It said authorities had acted immediately upon receiving information about the warning call, and that the company was cooperating fully with authorities and ensuring the safety of its staff.
Police cordoned off the site along a major avenue in the Greek capital, keeping residents and tourists away from the building in an area with several bars and restaurants. Officers at the scene said a bag containing an explosive device had been placed near the Hellenic Train building on Syngrou Avenue.
Police forensics experts wearing white coveralls were collecting evidence at the scene.
Criticism over the government’s handling of the Feb. 28, 2023 collision at Tempe in northern Greece has mounted over the last few weeks in the wake of the second anniversary of the disaster, which killed mostly young people who had been returning to university classes after a public holiday.
The crash exposed severe deficiencies in Greece’s railway system, including in safety systems, and has triggered mass protests — led by relatives of the victims — against the country’s conservative government. Critics accused authorities of failing to take political responsibility for the disaster or holding senior officials accountable.
So far, only rail officials have been charged with any crimes. Several protests in recent weeks have turned violent, with demonstrators clashing with police.
Earlier Friday, a heated debate in Parliament on the rail crash led to lawmakers voting to refer a former Cabinet minister to judicial authorities to be investigated over alleged violation of duty over his handling of the immediate aftermath of the accident.
Hellenic Train said it “unreservedly condemns every form of violence and tension which are triggering a climate of toxicity that is undermining all progress.”
Greece has a long history of politically-motivated violence dating back to the 1970s, with domestic extremist groups carrying out small-scale bombings which usually cause damage but rarely lead to injuries.
While the groups most active in the 1980s and 1990s have been dismantled, new small groups have emerged. Last year, a man believed to have been trying to assemble a bomb was killed when the explosive device he was making exploded in a central Athens apartment. A woman inside the apartment was severely injured. The blast had prompted Minister of Citizen Protection Michalis Chrisochoidis to warn of an emerging new generation of domestic extremists.
