Tremors from an earthquake centred near the China–Tajikistan border were felt in several parts of Pakistan, including the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi, on Friday.

According to the National Seismic Monitoring Centre of the Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD), the earthquake registered a magnitude of 5.8 on the Richter scale.

The quake struck at a depth of 159 kilometres beneath the surface, the NSMC said, adding the epicentre was located in the border region between Tajikistan and China. 

Apart from the federal capital and the neighbouring city of Rawalpindi, tremors were also felt in parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), including Swat, Shangla, Buner and surrounding districts, where people felt buildings shake and many stepped outside as a precaution.

There were no immediate reports of deaths or significant damage.

The tremor originated from an earthquake in the Tajikistan–Xinjiang border area which measured 6.1 on the Richter scale. 

• Senators vote 52 to 47 to advance war powers resolution.
• Republicans blocked last resolution by just two votes.
• Maduro’s capture led to fears of prolonged Venezuela campaign.

WASHINGTON: The US Senate advanced a resolution on Thursday that would bar President Donald Trump from further military action against Venezuela without congressional authorization, a rare rebuke of the Republican leader.

The vote on a procedural measure to advance the war powers resolution was 52 to 47, as five of Trump’s Republicans voted with every Democrat in favour of moving ahead. One Republican senator did not vote.

The vote took place days after US forces captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in a dramatic military raid in Caracas on Saturday. The rebuke for Trump, a day after senior cabinet members briefed every member of Congress about its Venezuela policy, marked a shift in the 100-member Senate.

It was a significant victory for lawmakers who have been arguing that Congress, not the president, should have the power to send troops to war, as spelled out in the Constitution.

However, the resolution faces steep hurdles before going into effect.

Even if it passes the Senate, the resolution must also pass the Republican-led House of Representatives and garner two-thirds majorities in both the House and Senate to survive an expected Trump veto.

Trump’s Republicans had blocked two previous attempts to advance similar resolutions in the Senate last year, as the administration ramped up military pressure on Venezuela with attacks on boats in the southern Caribbean and eastern Pacific.

However, the vote blocking the last resolution in November was only 51-49, just after top Trump advisors told lawmakers they did not plan to change the government or conduct strikes on Venezuelan territory.

After Maduro’s capture, some lawmakers accused the administration of misleading Congress, including Democrats publicly and some Republicans behind the scenes. Maduro’s capture and Trump’s rhetoric have also raised concerns of military action to capture Greenland, an Arctic island that is a territory of Denmark, or against Colombia, Cuba or Iran.

Thursday’s vote paved the way for Senate debate and a vote on final passage in the Senate next week.

Republican misgivings

Senator Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican who co-sponsored the resolution, had said some of his fellow Republicans were considering supporting the measure.

“I can’t guarantee you how they vote, but at least two are thinking about it, and some of them are talking publicly about their misgivings over this,” Paul told a press conference on Wednesday with Democratic Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia, another co-sponsor.

Both senators are members of the Foreign Relations Committee.

After the vote, Kaine said it was a “big victory,” telling reporters: “None of us should want this president, or any president, to take our sons and daughters to war without notice, consultation, debate and vote in Congress.”

The five Republicans who voted to move ahead were Paul, Susan Collins of Maine, Josh Hawley of Missouri, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Todd Young of Indiana. Trump’s party holds a 53-47 majority in the Senate.

Trump said the five “should never be elected to office again.” He said on his Truth Social website: “Republicans should be ashamed of the Senators that just voted with Democrats attempting to take away our Powers to fight and defend the United States of America.”

‘Endless war’

Backers acknowledge the hurdles facing the measure, but said many Republicans may be wary of a prolonged and expensive campaign of government change in Venezuela, as the U.S. faces vast budget deficits.

Trump on Wednesday called for a huge increase in US military spending, to $1.5 trillion from $1 trillion.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York noted months of US strikes on Venezuelan boats, and Trump’s statement in a New York Times interview that the US would be involved in Venezuela for more than a year.

“The president is openly signaling a long-term military and financial commitment abroad with no authorisation, with no plan, another endless war,” Schumer told a press conference.

Senators who opposed the resolution said Maduro’s seizure was a law enforcement operation, not a military action. Maduro faces trial in a US court on drug and gun charges, to which he has pleaded not guilty.

Opponents also said Trump is within his rights as commander-in-chief to launch limited military actions.

“The purpose of this resolution is to slap the president in the face. It will do nothing that it purports to do because it can’t stop something that isn’t going on right now,” Senator Jim Risch of Idaho, the Republican foreign relations chairman, said in a Senate speech before the vote.

• Federal officers jostled with large crowd of protesters.
• Several detained including one who struck agent with cardboard.
• Protests grew after Governor Walz called it “patriotic duty”.

Protesters clashed with law enforcement officers in Minneapolis on Thursday after the fatal shooting of a woman by an immigration agent triggered outrage fueled by the Trump administration’s insistence she was guilty of “domestic terrorism.”

Federal officers armed with pepperball guns and teargas jostled with a large crowd of protesters beside a government facility in Fort Snelling just outside Minneapolis, an AFP photographer saw.

The noisy crowd chanted slogans attacking the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency as officers pushed against protesters, detaining several including one who struck an agent with a cardboard sign.

The victim of Wednesday’s shooting, identified as 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good, was hit at point-blank range as she apparently tried to drive away from agents who were crowding around her car, which they said was blocking their way.

Footage of the incident shows a masked ICE agent attempt to open the woman’s car door before another masked agent fired three times into the Honda SUV.

The vehicle then hurtled out of control and smashed into stationary vehicles, as horrified onlookers hurled abuse at the federal officers.

Her bloodied body is then seen slumped in the crashed vehicle.

President Donald Trump and senior officials quickly claimed Good was trying to kill the agents, an assertion Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey called “bullshit.”

“I want to see nobody get shot. I want to see nobody screaming and trying to run over policemen either,” Trump said in an interview with The New York Times.

He earlier said that the shooting was self-defence.

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) chief Kristi Noem called the incident “domestic terrorism.”

Minneapolis police chief Brian O’Hara told CNN that Good was not the target of immigration enforcement action and that she was only suspected of blocking traffic.

Vice President JD Vance described the victim on social media as “a deranged leftist.”

Immigrant deportations

Protests grew after Minnesota’s Democratic Governor Tim Walz called it a “patriotic duty” to demonstrate for justice.

“But it needs to be done safely,” Walz said.

ICE federal agents have been at the forefront of the Trump administration’s immigrant deportation drive, despite the objections of some state officials.

DHS launched a recruitment campaign last summer to add 10,000 additional ICE agents to the existing 6,000-strong contingent.

That sparked criticism that new officers in the field were insufficiently trained.

Wednesday’s incident came during protest action against immigration enforcement in the southern part of Minneapolis.

Witness Brandon Hewitt said he heard three shots.

“I got a bunch of video of them carrying the body to the ambulance,” he told MS NOW.

Another witness interviewed by local station FOX9 described a grisly scene, saying “the surviving passenger got out of the car covered in blood.”

He recounted seeing a man who identified himself as a doctor attempting to reach Good but being refused access by officers.

There have been widespread protests against immigration operations of the Trump administration, which has vowed to arrest and deport what it says are “millions” of undocumented migrants.

The victim’s mother, Donna Ganger, told the Minnesota Star Tribune that her daughter “was probably terrified.” Good was “not part of anything like” challenging ICE officers, Ganger added.

Good was a mother and a poet who studied creative writing at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, US media reported.

US authorities said up to 2,000 officers were in Minneapolis for immigration sweeps.

An officer shot dead an undocumented immigrant in Chicago in September after authorities alleged the man tried to resist detention by driving his car into the official.