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A near-bankrupt Pakistan has only two choices. It can go to the IMF and suffer reforms. Or it can carry on with its lies, vagaries and economic wet dreams

There is increasing recognition that, given India shares land borders with nuclear-armed countries like Pakistan and China, it was imperative for Indi

It would be a mistake to assume that the US has changed its policy towards the region. It may have changed its style or the way it wishes to handle India and Pakistan but not its overall interests. The US wants to have a stronger presence in India without losing the hold it has on the military rulers in Pakistan.

While India’s missile thought is certainly evolving, it is yet to be seen if its flagship nuclear-oriented ballistic missiles are meant to further i

Election Commission of Pakistan’s disqualification of highly popular former Prime Minister Imran Khan will have far-reaching consequences for the co

ACT 1: March 2002. Abu Zubaidah, a Palestinian member of Al Qaeda, was arrested in Faislabad in Pakistani Punjab by the Pakistani authorities and handed over to the USA's Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He was the operational chief of Al Qaeda; his arrest was a major breakthrough, we were told. This is hardly supported by the report of the 9/11 Commission.

How big a catch is Abu Faraj al-Libbi, a 40-year-old Libyan married to a Pakistani, fluent in Urdu and Arabic and suffering from lucoderma, whose arrest was announced by the Pakistani authorities at Islamabad on May 4,2005?

The amendment of Article 370 in August 2019, which effectively nullified the special status of Jammu and Kashmir, was a watershed moment in the history of the region that went largely uncontested by the international community. Besides China and Pakistan, most countries were unwilling to openly criticise India’s actions in Kashmir. The limited international response to India’s actions largely focused on the humanitarian situation in t

The West has finally woken up to something that strategic analysts in India have been saying for decades: Saudi Arabia funded the Pakistani nuclear programme. In this connection, we have three questions to analyse; First, how valid is this information? Second, how is it then that Saudi Arabia gets away with so much? Third, why is Nato and Israeli intelligence taken seriously but not the Indians?

Even though the tale of Chinese munificence is marred by unsavoury ground realities, all eyes will be on the future of the Belt and Road Initiative

With growing water scarcity across many parts of the world, competition over access to this vital resource has been known to spark conflict. Following the September 2016 Uri attack in India, the government made plans to retaliate against its neighbour by exercising its right to use water of the western rivers—allocated to Pakistan under the Indus Waters Treaty—by building dams, canals and reservoirs. This paper aims to address the legal, econ

Russia’s policy towards South Asia has been the subject of much speculation lately. With closer cooperation between Russia and China and the former’s warming up to Pakistan, it is becoming increasingly evident that Russia is moving away from its India-centric approach in the region. This brief studies the changes, and continuity, in Moscow’s foreign policy towards South Asia as it transitioned from the Soviet Union into the Russian Federati

The harsh response by the Pakistani state towards the ongoing Baloch protests will only alienate people further and deepen the existing crisis

If the Obama Administration avoids the temptation of returning to business as usual with Rawalpindi, it has an opportunity to get both Afghanistan and Pakistan right.

Dealing with the complex Afghan situation and the slippery Pakistanis will not be any easy task for the Chinese.

While West Asia is volatile, the Chinese are beginning to get more active in Afghanistan, retain their pre-eminence in Pakistan and strengthen ties with Iran. In fact, Iran is the third leg of China?s policy in our immediate western neighbourhood. The Chinese are obviously making preparations for the time when peace returns to the Arab world, which might leave a stronger Iran.

Many in the Chinese strategic circles believe that although West Asia is significant for China, it should lay low and let US get embroiled in the regi

‘Ghazwa-e-Hind’ has made a noisy return, especially after the government’s action on Article 370 and Pakistan’s isolation in the international theatre.

ISIS, as an ideology and group, has also attracted many crossovers: ideologically radicalised, predominantly youth, leaving behind more regional and hyper-local entities to join ISIS’s brand of pan-globalist jihad is a trend that continues even today.

Fifty-six years after the ceasefire line was drawn between the Indian and Pakistan occupied Kashmir, the underlying seismic fault lines have made a mockery of this line. This map delineation, which was renamed as Line of Control after the 1971 Indo Pak war, has gone out of control, at least temporarily, by the fury of the nature when the earthquake struck this area on 8 October.

On top of the violence and upheaval of Partition, the integration of more than 550 princely states, and a war with Pakistan over Kashmir, the British

The ‘deep state’ has always worked with a king’s party, and there have always been politicians willing to oblige.

With the territorial defeat of ISIS in Iraq and Syria, analysts are pondering the kind of organisational form the group would take next. The influence of the so-called Islamic State in South Asia may be minimal, but India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan, have all had the shadow of ISIS’ global footprint land on their doorstep. This brief sheds light on how the influence of ISIS spread across South Asia, specifically after 2014, when pro-I

The success of the Indian covert actions in 1971 that led to the liberation of Bangladesh has a legendary place in India’s security consciousness. This paper retells the story of India’s covert actions in East Pakistan between January and December 1971. It lays down some essential rules and principles for successful covert actions that remain applicable even today. These include the need for a culture of covert action that guides the developm

A New Silk Road is magical thinking, given that Afghanistan remains a hotbed of instability plagued by daunting challenges. Lack of security has already delayed Tapi, the natural gas pipeline linking Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.

Two immediate observations can be made from Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf's address to the nation on July 22, 2005. One, he is not willing to take strong and decisive action against extremist and terrorist groups in Pakistan. Two, he cannot take such an action.

A survey shows wide youth support for the Modi government’s foreign policy.

Closer home, the Great Power Game will be played in the unstable fields of Ayatollahs' Iran, a Talibanised Afghanistan, whose leaders have their own world view, and a Sunni radicalised nuclearised Pakistan. The main contestants will be China and the US and our strategic planners may have to start planning for an uncertain future.

To safeguard Chinese interests in Gwadar, the Pakistani government gives in to demands placed by the local population

While the Afghan government has begun the release of Taliban prisoners and the US prepares for a drawdown in troop numbers, the Taliban’s ties to th

While New Delhi is getting more diplomatic support for its position, it is doing little to change the threat Pakistan poses.

Any solution to the Kashmir issue requires a two track process involving the domestic separatists and the Pakistanis.

With an increasingly belligerent China having demonstrated its hypersonic capabilities and the distinct possibility of proliferation to Pakistan, Indi

As the International Court of Justice at The Hague moves forth with proceedings on the cases involving India and Pakistan, it is worth considering whether a decision in favour of the Republic of Marshall Islands would truly be the beginning of a new era.

New Delhi, having sent a tough message, will hopefully, be working along a coherent policy perspective. Relations with Pakistan are too important to be left hostage to knee-jerk reactions.

Pakistan's offensive against terrorists may have come just too late. Because today, violent Islamic extremism has spread across the country, and is not something that can be tackled by the army alone. But the tragedy of the killing of school children could be the opportunity for Pakistan to make that strategic shift away from using violent Islamic extremists against its neighbours.

This brief examines the Kashmir conflict from the perspective of the young population who have grown up in tumultuous times in the Valley. It builds on findings of field surveys conducted by the author across the Kashmir Valley over the last two years, covering issues that remain unanswered three decades since the start of the insurgency. These topics include Kashmiriyat, the exodus of pandits, governance and administration, the post-2016 unrest

Since 1947, parts of Jammu and Kashmir have been under Pakistan’s illegal occupation, with India referring to the area as ‘Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK)’. The stolen region comprises two ethnically and linguistically different regions: what Pakistan calls, ‘Azad Jammu and Kashmir’ or AJK, which includes parts of Kashmir and Jammu; and Gilgit Baltistan, which is the northern most tip of Kashmir and covers parts of Ladakh. While Gilgit

This paper dissects the history and politics of Gilgit-Baltistan, a part of Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK), from the 1980s to the present day. It analyses the policies implemented by Pakistani leaders in the region and how successive political parties have attempted to justify Pakistan’s administrative control of it while disregarding any democratic, secular or moral principles in the ruling of its supposed subjects. The pap

Jadhav’s case is a resounding victory for India and provides clarity to a country’s obligations under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.

The Haqqani Network, operating out of Pakistan's North Waziristan, with vast training and material resources at its disposal, is likely to step in as a 'service provider' to the groups re-launching terrorist activities in Kashmir.

Thankfully the accidental firing of an Indian missile into Pakistani territory did not lead to escalation, but many questions remain unanswered about what happened.

Is Pakistan simply incapable in securing terrorists or are they hand-in-glove with them?

The strong showing of the six religious party¿s alliance, Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) in the October 2002 general elections in Pakistan has led to apprehensions among the tribe of Pakistan watchers worldwide about the inexorable slide of a nuclear-armed Pakistan towards ¿talibanisation¿.

Major global powers like Russia and China and regional powers like Iran are now ready to embrace the Taliban — in their own interest, but ostensibly

The most pertinent question after Naikoo’s death is whether Hizbul Mujahideen as an outfit matters anymore.

On the eve of his recent visit to India, in an interview to an Indian newspaper, King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia remarked that "India should have an observer status in the Organisation of the Islamic Conference similar to that held by Russia." He added it would be "beneficial" if India's entry was proposed "by a nation like Pakistan."

Many commentators feel that there is new awakening among the Pashtun. The Pashtun Long March and the ten-day sit-in outside the Islamabad Press Club was meant to kindle that awakening.

While it is imperative to address the vulnerabilities exposed by past terrorist attacks — it is even more critical is to anticipate and game the nex