Good afternoon and Happy Sunday,

New year, so much news! Get the run-through of this week’s most important news from Pakistan and around the globe. Plus, our recommendations for the week.

☕ Grab your chaye, let’s go.

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🌍 What in the World

🇻🇪 US President Donald Trump said that Washington will run Venezuela until a political transition can take place, hours after US forces bombed the South American country. The Trump administration launched attacks on Venezuela’s capital and seized Maduro and his wife in the early hours of Saturday. Venezuela has announced a state of national emergency and denounced the military aggression. Trump also said that US oil companies would also fix Venezuela's broken infrastructure and start making money for the country. Live updates here.

🇮🇷 Protests in Iran that started in Tehran last Sunday due to the ailing economy and sharp downturn in Rial currency have spread nationwide, with running battles reported between security forces and demonstrators. At least 10 people have also been killed during the demonstrations. The US and the government, meanwhile, have been baiting each other.

🇸🇾 The UK and France jointly struck an underground facility in Syria that had likely been used by the ISIL (ISIS) to store weapons, as the group appears to be resurgent after a period of relative dormancy in the region.

🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia's foreign ministry has invited Yemen's southern factions for a dialogue, after KSA and UAE faced an unprecedented confrontation last week. Both Gulf powers intervened on behalf of Yemen's government in the long-running civil war, but a fracturing of the alliance saw them backing different rival groups on the ground.

🇸🇴 Most United Nations Security Council (UNSC) members slammed Israel’s formal world-first recognition of the breakaway region of Somaliland, which they say threatens to fragment Somalia and destabilise the wider Horn of Africa and the Red Sea regions. Somaliland unilaterally declared independence in 1991 as a successor to the former British protectorate, but has failed to gain international recognition.

🗽 Zohran Mamdani was sworn in as the first Muslim mayor of New York City, after campaigning on addressing affordability with changes like free buses and child care.

🇧🇩 Khaleda Zia, Bangladesh's first female prime minister and an arch-rival of ousted leader Sheikh Hasina, died from a prolonged illness on Tuesday. She was 80 years old.

🇵🇰 Home ground

📉 Pakistan’s headline inflation clocked in at 5.6% on a year-on-year (YoY) basis in December 2025, according to Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) data on Thursday. Meanwhile, Pakistan’s YoY trade deficit significantly increased by nearly 24% to $3.7 billion in December 2025. The trade balance, the gap between exports and imports, was recorded at a deficit of $2.99 billion in December 2024.

💰The Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) announced on Wednesday that it has acquired 100% shares of Telenor Pakistan (Private) Limited for about $400 million.

🔎Amidst rising complaints of human trafficking and corruption, the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has punished 214 officials in total during the last four months of 2025. The FIA reportedly introduced a strict accountability mechanism in the aftermath of the boat incidents in Europe and Africa, in which a large number of Pakistanis lost their lives.

🧑‍⚖️ An Islamabad court on Saturday issued non-bailable arrest warrants for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi over his repeated absences in a case registered against him under the cybercrime law for allegedly making online remarks against state institutions.

📋 The governments of Pakistan and India on Thursday exchanged lists of their nuclear installations and prisoners in each other’s custody in line with existing bilateral treaties.

Biscuitt recommends…

Reading:

💸 NVIDIA’s AI empire: A look at top startup investments by the world’s leading high-performance GPU maker. Read here.

📚 What’s Happening to Reading? Read here.

Watching:

📱 Being offline is cool now? Watch here. 

🥩 Why the Halal Meat Industry is $1T and owned by Brazil, Australia & India. Watch here. 

👀Four stories to watch out for in 2026. Watch here.