ISLAMABAD: The federal cabinet on Tuesday retained the status of the Gilgit-Baltistan Council as an advisory body of the federal government.

It was informed that with the devolution of greater administrative and financial powers to the government of Gilgit-Balitistan, all those rights would be available to the people of GB that were available to people in the provinces of Pakistan.

The cabinet approved an agreement between Pakistan and Bosnia and Herzegovina on cooperation in the sphere of defence industry. It also approved the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the Board of Investment of Pakistan and Business France. Another MoU between Educational Scientific Productive Complex International of Kyrgyzstan and Allama Iqbal Open University was approved.

The meeting approved the appointment of District and Sessions Judge (D&SJ) Ashtar Abbas as Judge of Banking Court-IV, Lahore. Repatriation of Banking Court-IV Karachi Judge Syed Zulfiqar Ali Shah to the Sindh High Court was also approved and Ijlal Hyder Memon, D&SJ Tando Muhammad Khan, was appointed in his place.

The cabinet approved extension in tenure of D&SJ Obaid Ahmed Khan as judge of Special Court (Control of Narcotics Substance-II) Karachi for a further period of two years with effect from May 7.

Appointment of retired Justice Chaudhry Shahid Saeed as chairman of Copyright Board in IPO-Pakistan was approved. The meeting approved re-constitution of the board of directors of the Pakistan National Shipping Corporation and granted ex-post facto approval for appointment of its chairman.

Maximum retail prices of different drugs were also approved during the meeting.

Published in Dawn, May 23rd, 2018