Pakistan climber cleanses K2 as shrine to fallen father

This picture taken on July 15, 2023, shows Sajid Ali Sadpara holding his climbing gear at K2 Basecamp, world’s second tallest mountain in the Karakoram range of Gilgit–Baltistan, Pakistan. (AFP/File)
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Updated 10 August 2023
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Pakistan climber cleanses K2 as shrine to fallen father

  • Sajid Sadpara and his team have picked some 200 kilograms of litter from K2
  • Move is tribute to deceased father Ali Sadpara who died during 2021 expedition

K2 BASECAMP, Pakistan: Gazing up from K2 Basecamp, Sajid Ali Sadpara sees Earth's second-highest mountain, his father's final resting place, and a blight of litter on the furthest reaches of the natural world.
Sajid dons a down coverall stitched with Pakistan's green flag to scale the 8,611-metre (28,251-foot) spur of rock, clearing an icebound grotesquerie of spent oxygen canisters, mangled tents and snarled rope discarded over decades by climbers questing for the summit.
Over a week some 200 kilograms (400 pounds) of litter is hacked from the pinnacle's frozen grip by his five-strong team and ferried precariously back down, he says, a rare act of charity in one of Earth's most unforgiving environments.




This picture taken on July 5, 2023, shows a mural of Pakistani mountaineer Ali Sadpara, center, in the town of Skardu, Gilgit–Baltistan in Pakistan. (AFP/File)

It is a high-altitude tribute to Sajid's father, legendary climber Ali Sadpara, honouring the place where they bonded in nature and where his body remains after a 2021 father-son expedition fell foul of the "savage mountain".
"I'm doing it from my heart," Sajid told an AFP team at K2 Basecamp, where 5,150 metres of elevation labours breathing and avalanches tremor off an amphitheatre of surrounding slopes.
"This is our mountain," the 25-year-old said, sizing up the task above. "We are the custodians."

K2 was forged when India collided with Asia 50 million years ago, sprouting the Karakoram range of mountains across Pakistan's present-day northeastern Gilgit-Baltistan region.
It was named by British surveyors in 1856 -- denoting the second peak in the Karakoram range. Over time nearby mountains with alphanumeric designations became better known by names used by locals.
But sequestered up a glacial cul-de-sac on the Chinese border -- days from the faintest suggestion of human settlement -- K2 kept its foreboding moniker, stoking a reputation as a more wild, untamable, and technically demanding ascent than Nepal's Everest, which stands 238 meters higher.
First conquered by Italians in 1954, its winter winds scourge up to 200 kilometers per hour and temperatures plunge to minus 60 degrees Celsius (minus 76 Fahrenheit).
But it also ignites primal passions with its archetypical triangular silhouette -- the shape of a peak a child might draw.
After two days on paths slit through valleys and four more across the Baltoro Glacier -- a 63-kilometer hulk frozen in a permanent storm swell and seamed with crevasses -- K2's first glimpse ripples frisson through hikers.
It stands like an altar at the end of a colossal aisle. Sundown deepens its rocky reliefs and burnishes snowy slopes to rose gold. Pilgrim paragliders come to whirl in its shadow.
One renowned wilderness photographer labeled this vista "the throne room of the mountain gods".
"We love it more than life itself because there's no place of such beauty on Earth," said Central Karakoram National Park (CKNP) warden Muhammad Ishaq.
Against this sublime backdrop, Ali Sadpara stood out among a majority white, Western mountaineering elite as a domestic hero who rose from humble roots to scale eight of the world's 14 "super peaks" above 8,000 meters.
"Pakistan's name was raised high because of Ali," said 48-year-old Abbas Sadpara, an unrelated veteran mountaineer who guided the AFP team to K2.
Two years ago Sajid was attempting a perilous winter ascent of K2 with his father and two foreigners when illness forced him back.
The three men who carried on were later discovered dead below the "bottleneck" -- an overhang that looks like a frozen tidal wave on the final stretch before the summit.
Sajid recovered his father's body and performed Islamic rites at an improvised grave near Camp Four -- the last stop off before the top.
He marked the spot with GPS coordinates before the mountain enveloped the remains at a height of more than 23 Eiffel Towers.




This picture taken on July 16, 2023, shows a man collecting litter from K2 at Basecamp, world’s second tallest mountain in the Karakoram range of Gilgit–Baltistan, Pakistan. (AFP/File)

Sajid bears that loss with soft-spoken grace.
His voice, unbruised with emotion, is hard to make out in blaring Islamabad restaurants or the resort town of Skardu where a mural of his father looks on as expeditions jump off in growling jeeps.
But in the nearby village of Choghoghrong -- an oasis of golden cropland blotched with lavender bushes -- it resonates as he recounts the uncommon appreciation of the natural world his father handed down while they worked the land between summit pushes.
"This simple life and this natural life we spent here," Sajid said. "This whole world was my village."
"I am most connected with nature in this village," he said.
But K2 exerts a gravitational pull: a place of extreme risk but also the promise of absolute zen in the curious, adrenaline-addled climber's psyche.
"We want to be on mountains just for mental peace," Sajid said. "If we see any rubbish the feeling is totally different."
Abbas Sadpara said "K2 is no longer as beautiful as it once used to be. We have destroyed its beauty with our own hands."
But Sajid has climbed half the 8,000-metre peaks without supplemental oxygen, a daredevil undertaking, and holds no ill will towards those who jettison gear on the slopes.
"After a summit, you are totally exhausted," he said. "The main thing is survival."
But there is a saying in Islam he is fond of recalling: "Cleanliness is half of faith."
"Climbing to the top is a different thing," he explains. "Cleaning is something that you feel personally from the heart."


In 2019, plastic waste was discovered 11 kilometers below the sea in the Mariana Trench, the deepest point on Earth.
With commercialized mountain tourism conveying growing numbers of tourists to the summit, Everest is also growing notorious for vast blemishes of trash.
K2 witnessed a record of some 150 summits last season prompting concern the same ironic dynamic -- of climbers leaving trails of waste while pursuing the world's most untouched vistas -- has crept into play in Pakistan.
"There's two mountains that the trash has been a problem and that's K2 and Everest," said Norwegian climber Kristin Harila, 37, whose summit of the Pakistan peak last month sealed a record-quick ascent of all 8,000-metre mountains in three months and a day.
"Commercial companies, they take in more equipment," explained CKNP ecologist Yasir Abbas, who oversaw a campaign pulling 1,600 kg of refuse off the mountain in 2022. "If more people go to climb there will be more waste."
"What goes up must come down," he says. "The people who are cleaning K2 are risking their life for the environment."
But the clean-up mission goes beyond the environmental, spilling into the code of fellowship climbers abide by at altitude -- beyond the earthbound crutches of rescue services and emergency rooms.
Cast-away ropes can mislead teams with minds clouded by altitude sickness towards oblivion. Abandoned tents force other campers out into more exposed spots at the mercy of the elements. Each tossed O2 canister is another hefty hazard at the whim of gravity and wind.
"It's not my trash or your trash, it's our trash," Harila told AFP in Islamabad.
"Here in K2 if there's some mistake you fall down. If you fall down, all the way you come down," said Mingma David Sherpa, 33, who led a Nepalese team with the Nimsdai Foundation also clearing some 200 kilograms from K2 before passing the baton to Sajid in mid-July.
One day before that moment, the young Sadpara sets eyes on the mountain after days of trekking through glacial wilderness. "I see K2 and I think a different way," he says. But "from a distance you can't see the garbage".
"K2 is more than a mountain for me."


Trafficking of NATO, Soviet arms continues in Afghanistan, Pakistan years after Taliban takeover — report

Updated 04 April 2025
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Trafficking of NATO, Soviet arms continues in Afghanistan, Pakistan years after Taliban takeover — report

  • While weapons management practices have improved over the past three years, their application remains inconsistent across Afghan provinces and communities, monitor says
  • The statement comes months after Islamabad voiced ‘profound concern’ over the presence of advanced US weapons in Afghanistan amid a surge in militancy in Pakistan’s border areas

ISLAMABAD: Trafficking and illegal sale of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and Soviet arms have continued in Afghanistan and Pakistan’s border regions more than three years after the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul and their seizure of the previous regime’s stockpiles, a Geneva-based monitor Small Arms Survey has said in its recent report.
The report, titled “Documenting Arms Availability in Afghanistan,” said as of August 2021, Afghanistan had 258,300 rifles, including M4, M16 and AK-variants, 64,300 pistols, 63,000 sniper rifles, 56,155 light, medium and heavy machine guns, 31,000 grenade launchers, 9,115 shotguns, 1,845 rounds of 60-82mm, as well as hundreds of thousands of accessories and munitions.
The paper reviewed field investigations conducted from 2022 to 2024 into the availability and prices of small arms, light weapons, accessories, and ammunition at informal markets in the Afghanistan–Pakistan border areas. It found that cross-border trafficking was more of a “slow drip” than a flood, with both newer NATO- and older Soviet-pattern weapons still accessible in Afghanistan’s eastern provinces and Pakistan’s tribal districts.
While weapons management practices have improved over the past three years, their application remains inconsistent across provinces and communities, with institutional weaknesses, including limited technical capacity and reliance on paper-based systems, undermining the Taliban’s control efforts, according to the report. Diversion to illicit markets and the “deliberate provision of weapons to various non-state armed groups” remain significant concerns.
“More than three years after the Taliban’s takeover and their seizure of the previous regime’s weapons stockpiles, the de-facto authorities have strengthened control over commanders and restricted civilians’ and private businesses’ access to arms,” the report, published late last month, read.
“Arms trafficking has continued — likely with at least the tacit approval of low-level Taliban officials — and evidence suggests the continued arming of UN Security Council-designated terrorist groups, including the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and Al-Qaeda, alongside efforts to acquire conventional weapons systems on international markets.”
Many local commanders in Afghanistan view weapons obtained during the insurgency as personal property, or property of their respective fighting group, and therefore resist efforts to register and manage these arms centrally, according to the report.
Additionally, internal divisions within the Taliban, along with the personal networks of commanders, provide informal pathways to acquire weapons, bypassing formal approval processes. These challenges led to significant variations in control practices from province to province based on the influence of local commanders and their relationship with Afghan central authorities.
“When comparing prices in Pakistan with those in Afghan border provinces, US M4 rifles cost between USD3,325 and USD 3,700 in Pakistan, making them cheaper than in Khost and Nangarhar on the Afghan side but slightly more expensive than in Kunar, Paktia, and Paktika,” it read.
“In general, the wide variety in price is likely indicative of the condition of the weapons and their origin; sophisticated replicas may have also accounted for some of the lower-priced models. M16 rifles, however, are significantly less expensive in Pakistan, at an average price of between USD1,245 and USD1,400, compared to USD1,824–3,065 in Afghanistan... Conversely, Russian AK-pattern rifles are notably more expensive in Pakistan.”
In Jan. this year, Pakistan voiced “profound concern” over the presence of advanced US weapons in Afghanistan, which Washington has sought to be returned by Kabul’s Afghan Taliban rulers.
“The presence of US advance weapons in Afghanistan, left behind in the aftermath of the withdrawal of its troops in August 2021, has been an issue of profound concern for the safety and security of Pakistan and its citizens,” the Pakistani foreign office said in a statement.
“These weapons have been used by terrorist organizations, including the TTP [Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan], to carry out terrorist attacks in Pakistan.”
The statement came months after Pakistani security officials said custom authorities had seized a large cache of US-made weapons and ammunition worth approximately Rs35 million ($125,000) at a border crossing between Pakistan and Afghanistan. The weapons seized at the Torkham border crossing in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province included M4 rifles and magazines, security sources said in Oct. last year.
Pakistan has struggled to contain surging militancy in KP since a fragile truce between the Pakistani Taliban, or the TTP, and the state broke down in November 2022.
The TTP and other militant groups have frequently targeted security forces convoys and check-posts, besides targeted killings and kidnappings of law enforcers and government officials in recent months. In 2024 alone, the Pakistani military reported that 383 soldiers and 925 militants were killed in various clashes.
Islamabad has frequently blamed the surge in militancy on Afghanistan, accusing it of sheltering and supporting militant groups that launch cross-border attacks. Afghan officials deny involvement and insist that Pakistan’s security issues are an internal matter of Islamabad.


Pakistan stocks hit all-time intraday high after power tariff cuts, favorable IMF review

Updated 04 April 2025
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Pakistan stocks hit all-time intraday high after power tariff cuts, favorable IMF review

  • A day ago, the South Asian country announced more than Rs7 cut in domestic and industrial power tariffs
  • Pakistan last week reached a staff-level agreement with IMF for the first review of its $7 billion loan program

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) gained more than 1,800 points in an all-time high in intraday trade on Friday, with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif attributing the bullish sentiment to his government’s economic policies.
The benchmark KSE-100 index surged by 1,855 points, or 1.56 percent, to reach 120,793 points at 10am on Friday, compared to the previous close of 118,938 points.
The development comes a day after Pakistan announced more than Rs7 cut in domestic and industrial power tariffs and nearly a week after it reached a staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for the first review of its $7 billion loan program secured last year.
“Positive trend in business at the Pakistan Stock Exchange reflects growing confidence of traders and investors in government’s economic policies,” PM Sharif said in a statement.
“A major reduction in electricity tariffs has been made, which will not only provide relief to domestic consumers, but it is also welcoming for the business community and industries.”
Ahsan Mehanti, chief executive officer of the Karachi-based Arif Habib Corporation brokerage house, said the industrial power tariff cut and the year-on-year drop in consumer price index (CPI) inflation rate to 0.7 in March, which has led to expectations of a policy rate cut, were key factors behind the bullish trend.
“Institutional support on the IMF deal and speculations over the government negotiations on [US President Donald] Trump tariff played a catalyst role in bullish activity at the PSX,” he said.
Raza Jafri, head of research at Intermarket Securities, said Pakistani equities have been performing well after the Eid Al-Fitr break, in sharp contrast to world markets, as the South Asian country appears to be better placed than competing textile exporters such as Bangladesh and Vietnam when it comes to reciprocal tariffs.
“[But] domestic developments such as the ongoing IMF program and cut in electricity tariffs seem to hold more importance for Pakistan which is relatively insulated from global developments and arguably a net beneficiary if the reduction in international oil prices more than offsets the impact on exports,” he added.


Pakistan Super League 10th edition tickets go up for sale online

Updated 04 April 2025
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Pakistan Super League 10th edition tickets go up for sale online

  • The Twenty-20 tournament is set to begin from Apr. 11 and will feature over 30 matches
  • Online tickets can be collected from designated TCS pick-up centers or delivered to home

ISLAMABAD: Online sale of tickets for the 10th edition of the Pakistan Super League (PSL) began on Thursday, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) said.
The 10th edition of the PSL beginning on Apr. 11 will host 34 matches in Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi and Multan, with the final scheduled for May 18 at Lahore’s Qaddafi Stadium.
This season will feature top local and international players, following the usual format with group stages and knockout rounds, according to the PCB.
Tickets booked online can be collected from designated TCS pick-up centers or delivered directly to home.
“HBL PSL X tickets online sale has commenced from 3pm PKT today as the marquee event is all set to begin from Apr. 11,” the PCB said in a statement on Thursday.


Physical tickets for the tournament will go up for sale at designated TCS centers across the country at 4pm on Apr. 7 onwards, according to the board.
The stadium seating for each match is divided into four categories: General Enclosure, Premium, First-Class and VIP Stands, along with the exclusive HQSP PCB Gallery.
Ticket prices start at $2 (Rs650) for the general category. Regular match tickets can go up to $21 (Rs6,000) for VIP categories, while playoffs and finals may cost as much as $35 (Rs10,000) for VIP stands.
The PCB said it will also hold a ticket raffle at every match, with exciting prizes such as motorcycles, smartphones and gift hampers to enhance fan engagement and offer a unique match-day experience.


PM Sharif forms committee to probe Pakistan’s failure to utilize Hajj 2025 private quota

Updated 04 April 2025
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PM Sharif forms committee to probe Pakistan’s failure to utilize Hajj 2025 private quota

  • Committee to probe why Kingdom’s Hajj policy was not implemented by Pakistan’s religion ministry through private Hajj operators
  • Inquiry committee would also ‘fix the responsibility for this serious lapse, depriving thousands of Pakistani pilgrims from Hajj 2025’

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has formed a three-member inquiry committee to investigate why Pakistan had failed to utilize the private Hajj 2025 quota by not complying with certain requirements of the Kingdom’s Hajj policy, a notification by the Cabinet Division said on Thursday.
Pakistan and Saudi Arabia signed the Hajj Agreement 2025 in January, according to which 179,210 Pakistanis were expected to perform the annual pilgrimage this year. The quota was divided equally between government and private schemes.
However, the South Asian country failed to fully avail the private Hajj quota and the inquiry committee, led by the Cabinet Division secretary, would investigate the reasons behind the lapse. The probe panel also includes the chairman of Pakistan’s Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and the Gilgit-Baltistan chief secretary.
“The Prime Minister, while taking serious notice for non-availing of the private Hajj quota for Hajj-2025 due to non-compliance of the requirements of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, has been pleased to constitute an inquiry committee on ‘Hajj Arrangements,’” the notification said, without specifying the number of private Hajj scheme seats that could not be filled.
It said the committee’s terms of reference would include inquiring why Saudi Arabia’s Hajj policy, revised in 2025, was not implemented by Pakistan’s Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony through private Hajj operators.
The notification said the committee would also probe the ministry’s efforts to get the pre-requisite formalities completed by private Hajj operators by the target date set by the Kingdom.
The committee would also “fix the responsibility for this serious lapse, depriving thousands of Pakistani pilgrims from Hajj 2025,” it added.
Speaking to a private news channel, Pakistan Ulema Council Chairman Tahir Ashrafi praised Sharif’s move, describing it as a “step in the right direction.”
“Due to this, matters related to private Hajj pilgrims will improve in future and the current situation will also come to light, as to what happened and why did the delay take place,” Ashrafi told Express News. 
In January, the Pakistani prime minister had chaired a meeting to review Hajj 2025 preparations, during which he had warned officials the government would not tolerate any negligence in their duties related to the annual pilgrimage.


Nationalist party supporters to march toward Balochistan’s capital for release of Baloch rights activists

Updated 04 April 2025
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Nationalist party supporters to march toward Balochistan’s capital for release of Baloch rights activists

  • The Balochistan National Party-Mengal has been staging a sit-in in Mastung for the last one week to demand release of Dr. Mahrang Baloch and other activists
  • Provincial minister Zahoor Buledi admits two rounds of talks with the protesters have failed to yield results, but says they will continue to negotiate

QUETTA: The Balochistan National Party-Mengal (BNP-M) on Friday announced a march toward the capital of Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province on April 6, amid a deadlock with authorities over the release of Dr. Mahrang Baloch and other Baloch ethnic rights activists.
Baloch and a few other activists were arrested on March 22 after they took part in a sit-in protest outside the University of Balochistan to demand the release of some members of her Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC) rights group, whom they allege have been detained by security agencies. They have since been charged with terrorism, sedition and murder after the demonstration ended in the death of three protesters, according to police documents.
The Pakistan army and the government have in the past variously referred to Baloch and her BYC as “terrorist proxies” who they say are allied with militant separatist groups like the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA). Baloch and her group deny the charge and say they lead peaceful protests for the rights of the ethnic Baloch people.
On Friday, the BNP-M, which led supporters out of its chief Akhtar Mengal’s tribal heartland of Wadh in Balochistan’s Khuzdar district on March 28 to stage a sit-in at Lak Pass near the Mastung district, said its two-day ultimatum for the authorities to release Baloch and other activists had ended and it would now move toward the provincial capital of Quetta.
“We are standing on our demands for the release of detained Baloch women activists, but the government committee is not listening to us seriously,” Sanaullah Baloch, a senior BNP-M member, told Arab News, accusing authorities of “digging trenches” at the Quetta-Karachi highway to keep them from reaching the provincial capital.
“We have decided to march toward the capital for another round of sit-in and protests.”
At least two rounds of talks between the government and BNP-M chief Mengal have failed to yield any result, while provincial authorities have suspended mobile Internet in Quetta for the last three days, citing “serious security threats.”
Zahoor Buledi, a senior Balochistan minister who is part of the negotiations, said the government is fully engaged in a dialogue with the BNP-M.
“Though we held two rounds of talks with Mr. Mengal, they didn’t bore any result,” he told Arab News. “Talks will continue.”
Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest province by landmass and rich in mineral resources, has been the site of an insurgency for the last two decades. The separatists accuse Islamabad of exploiting the province’s natural resources, such as gold and copper. Successive Pakistani governments have denied the allegations.
Police actions against Baloch rights activists have intensified after Baloch separatists last month staged a dramatic train siege that officials said ended in around 60 deaths, half of whom were separatists behind the assault.
More than a dozen United Nations experts demanded last week that Pakistan immediately release detained Baloch rights defenders and halt its crackdown on peaceful protests.