KARACHI, Dec 13: An international conference on humour and satire, Almi Jashn-i-Tanz-o-Mazah, opens at 6pm on Saturday here at Shaikh Zayed Islamic Centre, Karachi University.

The inaugural session of the week-long conference would be followed by a humour poetry recital session at 10pm at the same venue. Such sessions would be held at various places from Dec 15 to 20, the organizer of the conference and literary figure, Ziaul Haq Qasmi, said.

The conference would be addressed by prominent men of letters such as Mushtaq Ahmed Yousafi, Ashfaq Ahmed, Dr Jamiluddin Aali, Ahmed Faraz, Mahmood Sham, Col Ashfaq Husain, Dr Muhammad Ali Siddiqui besides Anwar Maqsood, Moeen Akhtar and Bushra Ansari.

Some of the poets expected from abroad are Nasim Sahar (Jeddah), Mumtaz Rashid (Qatar), Azhar Kamal (Kuwait), Shaukat Jamal (Riyadh), Jaffar Rizvi (Riyadh), Masroor Javaid, Abdullah Jaffery, Mehdi Hasnain Moon, Dr Abdur Rahman Abd (USA), Arshad Osmani (Canada), Targheeb Bulund Naqvi (Denmark), Jamshaid Masroor (Norway), Farzana Sahab Mirza (Sharjah) and Dr Osama Munir (Ireland).

Among others Anwar Masud, Sarfraz Shahid, Dr Inamul Haq Javaid, Fazal Elahi from Islamabad, Maulana Akram Awan from Chakwal, Aziz Ahmed, Zahid Fakhri, Talat Jabeen from Lahore, Khalid Masud Khan from Multan, Dr Sabir Afaqi from Azad Kashmir, Inayat Ali Khan, Meem Sheen Alam and Anwar Brailvi from Hyderabad, Mirza Asi Akhtar from Mirpur, Moeen Akhtar Naqvi from Turbat, Shahid Alwari, Athar Shah Khan, Amirus Salam Hashmi, Saeed Agha, Sadia Hareem, Herfun Lakhnavi, Haider Hasnain Jaleesi, Farhat Nadeem Humayun, Abdul Hakeem Nasif, Rafiq Mughal, Rubina Tahseen Beena and Shakila Sarwat from Karachi will recite their verses.

Cartoonists Rafiq Ahmad (Fica) and Javaid Iqbal will also attend the conference.—APP