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Washington tightens visa rules for foreign students

• DHS limits stays to four years under new framework, citing ‘abuse of immigration system’ • Move likely to deter thousands of foreign students from applying to American universities WASHINGTON: Foreign students will now face stricter immigration requirements in the United States under a new rule that ends the decades-old “duration of status” system, which allowed them to remain in the country as long as they maintained their student status. The US Department of Home­land Security (DHS) announced the new regulation on Thursday, a move that could have a significant impact on thousands of students from countries such as India and Pakistan who travel to the US each year for higher education. The final rule replaces the existing arrangement, under which international students could remain in the US as long as they maintained their academic status, with a fixed period of admission for holders of F, J and I category visas. Under the new system, foreign students on F visas and exchange v...
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Messi eyes glorious farewell as Spain, Argentina clash in World Cup final

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Spanish elan meets Argentinian steel in a historic World Cup final on Sunday which sees the reigning champions of Europe and South America battle for football’s ultimate prize. Holders Argentina are bidding to become the first team in 64 years to successfully defend the title , in what is almost certainly the final World Cup match of captain Lionel Messi’s career. Spain are aiming to thwart those ambitions by clinching the country’s second World Cup crown following their maiden victory in 2010. US President Donald Trump will be among a star-studded crowd of just over 80,000 spectators at the MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford as the largest World Cup in history reaches its climax. World Cup officials have said they are “monitoring closely” air quality from Canadian wildfires affecting the region around the final, which kicks off at 12am PST. The final will also see an unprecedented 25-30 minute half-time interval for a Super Bowl-style concert featuring the likes of Madonna, Shak...
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Barren reforms

PRIME Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s assertion that agriculture and livestock hold the key to Pakistan’s quick economic revival is spot-on. The sector contributes almost a quarter of GDP, employs well over a third of the labour force and remains the largest source of livelihoods. Livestock alone accounts for more than 60pc of agriculture’s value addition, while Pakistan ranks among the world’s largest milk producers, and possesses considerable untapped potential in both milk and meat exports. Few sectors offer comparable opportunities to generate growth, reduce poverty, improve food security and earn foreign exchange simultaneously. But the PM’s declaration that the economy can be revived within a year through agriculture highlights the gap between ambition and policy execution. The agricultural crisis has never been about the absence of potential. It is the consequence of decades of policy neglect and inconsistency, institutional decay and distorted incentives. ...
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Gaza reconstruction plan under Trump’s Board of Peace reduced to pilot project: British publication

The recovery plan for war-battered Gaza, under US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace (BoP), has been significantly scaled back and, instead of reconstructing the entire territory, now envisions a small pilot project in the south of the besieged territory, the British publication The Guardian reported on Thursday. The board was initially proposed in September 2025 and formally established in January. Under its charter, the US government serves as its official depository and Trump has designated the Donald J Trump Institute of Peace in Washington as the Board’s headquarters. A UN Security Council resolution adopted in mid-November last year authorised the board, along with cooperating states, to establish an international stabilisation force in Gaza following a ceasefire that began in October under a Trump-backed plan accepted by Israel and Hamas. According to the publication, the new pilot project now aims to construct a small temporary camp for a fraction of Gaza’s populat...
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Generative AI’s power sparks fears of dumbing humans down

• Studies suggest memory, decision-making, critical thinking are most at risk • Experts say artificial intelligence removes ‘learning opportunities’ • Studies suggest AI boosts short-term gains, but weakens long-term learning • Long-term impact on human brain remains unclear PARIS: Generative AI chatbots capable of writing emails and computer code, translating, organising a trip or coming up with gift ideas are now readily available, prompting some to ask whether human brainpower could suffer for lack of use. A simple natural-language prompt is usually enough to draw a useable response from a service like ChatGPT or Claude, with the effects making themselves felt in schools and universities, workplaces from offices to courtrooms and our personal lives. Recent scientific studies suggest there could be harmful consequences to farming out cognitive tasks to AI. They highlight memory, decision-making and critical thinking as particularly at risk. One American-British study of 1,222 pe...
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Frontline communities face longer wait for funds

• FRLD board defers funding decisions till December, receives 176 requests from 119 states • Pakistan submits three proposals on agriculture, health, flash flood losses • Civil society concerned over ‘lack of transparency’, red tape ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and other climate-vulnerable countries will have to wait longer for disbursements from the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD) after its board decided to allow more time to assess an overwhelming number of funding proposals amid limited financial resources. The ninth meeting of the FRLD Board, held in Manila from July 8 to 10, ended without making any significant headway — a development that drew criticism from civil society groups, which said the Fund was failing vulnerable communities increasingly expo­sed to climate-related disasters. The Fund was established at COP27 in Egypt in 2022. A decision to operationalise it was taken at COP28 in Dubai, followed by its full operationalisation at COP29 in Azerb­aijan. With nearly...
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Holders of invalid, expired NICOPs barred from boarding flights to Pakistan: official

ISLAMABAD: Pakistanis residing abroad who hold an invalid, expired or cancelled National Identity Card for Overseas Pakistanis (NICOP) will no longer be allowed to board flights to Pakistan, official sources said on Wednesday. According to official sources, the government has issued immediate directives to all zonal directors of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to convey the decision to every airline operating inbound flights to Pakistan. A government official told Dawn that the practice of allowing travel on invalid NICOPs had been going on for a long time and that it had been decided to stop it with immediate effect. “Airlines should be instructed to verify the validity of NICOPs prior to boarding and refuse carriage to any passenger presenting an invalid, expired or cancelled NICOP,” the official said. He added that passengers travelling on a foreign passport with an expired or otherwise invalid NICOP would not be allowed to board flights to Pakistan unless they held a va...
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