Turkey's Erdogan gives Nato leaders revolver conundrum after summit

Belgium’s prime minister was a little surprised on landing back home from Wednesday’s North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) summit in Turkey to find that he had a handgun and ammunition in his luggage.

After Nato leaders gathered for Wednesday’s fractious summit in Ankara, their host, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, handed each an unusual parting gift: a vintage revolver, along with live ammunition indicating it was not just for show.

Erdogan wanted to showcase Turkey’s defence industry, which has become a key export and foreign policy tool.

Images shared by the office of Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda showed what appeared to be the Gumusay .357 Magnum, a rare six-shooter produced by Turkish arms maker MKE in the 1990s.

It was set in a wooden display box featuring Turkey’s flag and the Nato logo as well as a placard inscribed “Gumusay, the first revolver-type handgun produced in our country” in Turkish and English.

The pistol gifted by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to Belgium’s Prime Minister Bart De Wever at NATO summit in Ankara. —Handout via Reuters

Engraved Turkish revolvers make unusual gifts

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s spokesperson said all the leaders had been given the same model, engraved with their own names.

The Belgian premier, Bart De Wever, handed his to Brussels’ airport police to be secured in a safe.

An aide to Polish President Karol Nawrocki told Radio RMF FM that his revolver was awaiting customs clearance at Warsaw Airport and would be kept in an appropriate place “so that it is firstly safe and secondly respected as a gift”.

“Certainly no one will be shooting it,” he added.

The offices of the Dutch and Swedish prime ministers said their revolvers had been taken to their respective embassies in Ankara.

The Dutch one was due to be disabled while the Swedish one was awaiting import paperwork.

The gun given to Britain’s Keir Starmer came with a cleaning kit and 500 bullets, a Downing Street source said.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s revolver was already stored at the seat of government, the Palazzo Chigi, along with other state gifts.

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was intending to donate hers to a military museum.

Turkey’s modern handgun industry focuses mainly on semi-automatics, making the Gumusay something of a collector’s curiosity.

Turkish gunmakers have muscled into Europe’s civilian firearms market with inexpensive pistols and shotguns, challenging older Italian and Belgian names long associated with higher-priced sporting and service weapons.

According to the Geneva-based Small Arms Survey, Turkey was the world’s third-largest exporter of small arms between 2019 and 2024, with exports totalling about $3 billion over the period, behind the United States and Italy.

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Man awarded death sentence for 2019 killing of anchorperson Mureed Abbas in Karachi

KARACHI: A sessions court on Thursday sentenced a man to death on two counts in a case pertaining to the 2019 murder of TV anchor Mureed Abbas and his friend.

Prime suspect Atif Zaman and his brother, Adil Zaman, were arrested and booked by the police for killing Abbas and Khizer Hayat, who were their business partners, in Karachi’s Khayaban-i-Bukhari area on the night of July 9, 2019, exactly seven years ago.

Daniyal Muhammad Hussain, who was part of the legal team that represented Abbas’s wife, said that Adil had been declared an absconder in the case after escaping following the cancellation of his bail by the Supreme Court’s Karachi registry.

Abbas was a Bol News anchorperson. In the incident — which at the time was said to be a “personal dispute” — he was gunned down while Hayat also received two bullet wounds.

Hayat was shifted to a private hospital but he succumbed to his wounds, according to the police.

In October 2019, the case was transferred from an anti-terrorism court to a sessions court, with the former ruling that the offence did not fell within its ambit.

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UN inquiry urges release of Gaza doctor held by Israel since December 2024

A United Nations inquiry on Wednesday expressed concern at reports of abuse against a prominent Palestinian doctor seized by the Israeli military in Gaza in December 2024, who is still being held in Israel.

The UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, called for the immediate release of Hussam Abu Safiya, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in the Gaza Strip.

Rights groups and Abu Safiya’s lawyer have said his life is in imminent danger, and he continues to be held without charge, according to the Physicians for Human Rights Israel, an Israeli rights group.

“The actions of the Israeli Prison Service guards towards Palestinian detainees raise grave concerns of violations of international law that likely amount to international crimes.

“Dr Abu Safiya’s medical condition is the direct result of these actions,” the UN inquiry said in a statement.

An Israel Prison Service (IPS) spokesperson said on Wednesday, “The allegations and characterisations described are false, outrageous, and entirely without factual basis.”

The spokesperson did not name Abu Safiya, but the IPS has previously rejected allegations that he and other doctors have been mistreated in prison.

On Monday, Abu Safiya’s lawyer alleged that his health was in danger and that he had been subjected to abuse daily.

In June, Abu Safiya attended a Supreme Court hearing in Jerusalem via video link and appeared noticeably thinner in the face and around his abdomen.

The UN inquiry said the reported conduct of the Israeli authorities towards Abu Safiya reflects a broader pattern of violations that it identified in previous reports.

In September 2025, it said the Israeli authorities had committed genocide by targeting the healthcare system and medical professionals in Gaza since October 2023, an accusation that Israel described as scandalous.

Israel has accused the inquiry of having a political agenda against the country and of diverging from its mandate while declining to cooperate with it.

On Monday, a separate UN rights body called Israel’s detention of Abu Safiya arbitrary and called for his immediate release.

In its finding, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention said Israel’s actions contravened multiple articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as well as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

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China warns of 'security backdoor' in Anthropic AI coding tool

A Chinese industry regulator warned users on Wednesday of a “security backdoor” embedded in versions of US artificial intelligence company Anthropic’s coding tool, Claude Code.

The alleged backdoor could allow the software to “transmit sensitive information”, including users’ locations and identity-related identifiers, back to Anthropic’s servers without users’ consent, said China’s National Vulnerability Database (NVDB), a cybersecurity platform.

Claude Code is an AI coding agent that can generate computer code, debug software and review code based on user prompts.

San Francisco startup Anthropic blocks users and companies in China and other nations it deems adversarial from accessing its products, but it is still possible to use them in the country through a VPN or third-party proxy services.

The NVDB, which is affiliated with China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said on its website that it had recently “detected that the AI coding tool Claude Code contains security backdoor risks, posing a severe threat”.

Anthropic has not responded to AFP requests for comment on the allegations, which first emerged in specialist tech media last week.

The NVDB advised relevant institutions and users “to conduct a comprehensive check immediately” and “promptly uninstall or upgrade to the latest secure version from which the relevant backdoor code has been removed”.

It also urged organisations to strengthen network traffic monitoring to prevent the unauthorised leakage of sensitive data.

Chinese tech giant Alibaba told employees last week that the use of Claude Code would be banned from July 10 due to security concerns, people familiar with the matter said.

Anthropic has previously accused Alibaba of reverse-engineering its AI models to mimic their abilities in a process known as “distillation”.

Claude Code engineer Thariq Shihipar responded in an X post last week to reports alleging that the tool was tracking certain data from Chinese users.

“This is an experiment we launched in March that was meant to prevent account abuse from unauthorised resellers and protect against distillation,” Shihipar wrote.

“The team has landed stronger mitigations since then and we’ve actually been meaning to take this down for a while… this should be fully rolled back in tomorrow’s release.”

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Coordinator to PM demands reversal of KP law expanding MPAs' privileges

Prime Minister’s Coordinator for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Affairs Ikhtiar Wali Khan on Wednesday demanded the reversal of laws enacted by KP that expand MPAs’ powers and immunities.

The KP Assembly passed three acts on April 30, which pertained to immunities and privileges of MPAs, the speaker and the deputy speaker, as well as salaries and allowances of lawmakers.

Although KP Gov­ernor Faisal Karim Kundi assen­ted to the laws on May 6, the legislation has remained under wraps. The Acts and the gazette notifications have yet to be uploaded to the KP Assembly website.

Addressing a press conference in Islamabad on Wednesday, Khan said, “No law of this country applies to them. They can fire at anyone or hit anyone, but they are not answerable to anyone.”

Under Section 10 of the legislation, provincial assembly members have been granted blanket immunity from preventive detention. Under Section 11, authorities will now have to seek the speaker’s prior permission before arresting a member on a criminal offence.

“Under the umbrella of freedom of expression, [an MPA] can do anything and the speaker will be the custodian and he will be the only person to give permission to arrest a member of the assembly,” Khan said, contending that it was unlikely that the PTI speaker would allow so in any case.

Under Section 14, which deals with additional privileges, MPAs will be entitled to licences for eight non-prohibited bore weapons, including four free licences and four issued on payment of a notified fee.

Under the repealed law, they were entitled to four free lifetime licences for weapons.

Khan questioned those changes in his press briefing: “If someone has the licence to own eight Kalashnikovs, what will he do?”

The prime minister’s coordinator called for deweaponisation across Pakistan, adding that the responsibility for security should rest with the government, the armed forces and police.

The new laws also permit lifetime official passports for assembly members and their spouses.

Khan said, “Blue passport for life means that these people will leave on their passport and surrender it, and then get political asylum. […] They want to insult Pakistan globally.”

He further criticised the jab at press freedom in the recently enacted laws, which he said allowed the speaker and the KP government to bar specific journalists and publications from covering assembly sessions.

The KP Assembly pass­ed the KP Provincial Assembly (Powers, Immu­nities and Privileges) Act 2026 on April 30.

On the same day, it also passed two other laws: the KP Province Speaker and Deputy Speaker (Powers, Immunities and Privil­eges) Act 2026, and the KP Province (Salaries and Allowances of Mem­bers) Act 2026.

A statement issued by the office of KP Assembly Speaker Babar Saleem Swati had denied that any new or extraordinary privileges have been introduced for lawmakers.

It explained that nearly 99pc of the powers and facilities being discussed already existed in the 1988 law, with recent amendments further clarifying those.

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Italy's Meloni seeks to avoid escalation after Trump revives personal feud

Italy will not respond further to US President Donald Trump’s attacks on Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, ministers said, pledging to protect bilateral ties that have come under strain in recent weeks after the two leaders traded accusations.

Meloni was once seen as a close ally of Trump, but the relationship faltered last month when he told Italian TV channel La7 that she had “begged” him to take a photo with her at a G7 summit in France.

She denied the claim and accused him of fabricating the story.

With the two leaders due to attend the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) summit in Ankara on Tuesday and Wednesday, Trump appeared to reignite the dispute when he posted on Truth Social a picture of Meloni looking up at him with the caption “RESTRAINING ORDER NEEDED”.

US President Donald Trump shared a doctored picture with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on July 6, 2026. —Truth Social/@realDonaldTrump

The latest provocation raised questions about how Meloni would react, potentially raising tensions among allies at the closely watched NATO gathering.

Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said Rome had no plans to take the bait and wanted to maintain good relations with the US regardless of who was president.

“Trump speaks for himself. We have a US president who loves to provoke, especially on social media. We have decided to stop responding to these remarks,” Tajani told La Stampa newspaper.

Say hello with a smile

Other senior government figures, including Defence Minister Guido Crosetto, struck a similar tone when asked about a possible response, while Meloni’s office declined to comment on how she would behave when meeting Trump in Ankara.

However, a source close to her, who declined to be named, ruled out the possibility that the Italian leader would snub Trump, saying she knew how to handle such situations and would instead greet him “with a smile”.

Meloni was once a vocal supporter of Trump and was the only European leader to attend his inauguration in 2025, hoping to forge close ties with him on the back of their shared right-wing political outlook.

However, she criticised him this year for lashing out at Pope Leo over his condemnation of the Iran conflict.

That, in turn, prompted a blunt rebuke from the US president, who accused her of lacking courage.

Following the public spat, Italian media speculated that the government could boycott a traditional US Independence Day celebration.

But in a sign of goodwill, several senior government figures attended the event at the ambassador’s residence in Rome last week.

Trump’s remarks drew strong condemnation in Italy, with some opposition parties also expressing solidarity with Meloni.

Italy’s Il Foglio newspaper mocked Trump’s jibe on its front page on Tuesday, publishing a picture of the US president with Russia’s Vladimir Putin under the same caption: “RESTRAINING ORDER NEEDED”.

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ECP warns KP, Islamabad again over delays in local govt polls

ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Tuesday again warned the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government and the federal authorities against delaying local government (LG) elections, directing them to submit all pending delimitation notifications ahead of the next hearing on July 28.

The tenure of LGs in KP ended on March 15 this year. According to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Local Government Act, 2013, local representatives are elected for a four-year term.

The term of the last local government in Islamabad expired in February 2021, and since then, elections have been delayed under various pretexts. As a result, around 2.5 million residents of Islamabad continue to face issues ranging from water shortages to unpaved streets.

The ECP took up separate cases regarding the conduct of LG polls in KP and the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT).

In the KP case, the KP chief secretary and LG secretary appeared before a four-member bench headed by Member Sindh Nisar Ahmed Durrani. In the Islamabad case, the Islamabad chief commissioner and deputy commissioner were present.

On July 1, the commission had censured both governments for “unnecessarily delaying” polls, warning that “creating hurdles in the way of local government polls may attract serious consequences”.

In a five-page order, the bench noted that KP was not providing “meaningful assistance” as mandated by Article 220 of the Constitution (Executive authorities to assist Commission, etc.). Citing Supreme Court judgments 2014 SCMR 1 and 2021 SCMR 714, it said that non-assistance would amount to a constitutional violation.

The ECP recalled that on April 22 it had sought three documents for delimitation in 15 districts: tehsil-wise Neighbourhood Council (NC)/Village Council (VC) notifications, category-wise reserved seats, and authenticated maps. A reminder on May 15 drew an “unsatisfactory” reply.

As of July 1, KP had provided NC/VC numbers and reserved seats for only seven districts: Khyber, Bajaur, Mansehra, Upper Chitral, Shangla, Malakand and Kurram.

Notifications for the remaining eight — Karak, Hangu, D.I. Khan, Paharpur, Upper South Waziristan, Lower South Waziristan, Swat and Buner — were pending provincial assembly legislation. Four newly created districts also require inclusion in the Ninth Schedule of the KP LG Act, 2013.

Briefing the commission on Tuesday, the KP chief secretary said maps of 23 districts had already been provided and delimitation had been completed. In compliance with the July 1 order, he said maps of the remaining 15 districts had now been submitted.

He added that notifications for seven districts had been provided, while those for the remaining eight districts would be submitted after provincial approval.

The ECP directed that notifications for the eight pending districts be submitted before July 28 so that delimitation could begin in all districts and timely polls could be ensured.

Regarding Islamabad, the chief commissioner said a summary seeking notification of the town corporation limits and the number of union councils (UCs) in each had been sent to the Prime Minister’s Office. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Monday allowed the summary to be circulated for cabinet approval.

The commission noted that three key documents were still awaited for the ICT: the notification of the town corporation limits along with maps, the notification of the UCs in each town corporation, and legislation under the ICT Local Government (Amendment) Ordinance, 2026.

The ECP had earlier directed the chief statistician of the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) to provide maps and data to KP and to appear on July 7 (Tuesday). It also ordered the DCs of all 15 KP districts to submit maps and data before this date under Article 220 read with the Elections Act, 2017.

Noting that delimitation in 23 KP districts was complete, the commission ordered a consultative meeting on July 14 under Section 219(3) of the Elections Act to announce the poll date.

The hearing of both the KP and Islamabad cases was adjourned until July 28.

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