Category: South East Asia

Pakistani politician calls for mechanism to solve issues with Afghanistan

Pakistan’s Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam political party chief, Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman, has said that a mechanism should be created to address the issues between Pakistan and Afghanistan. In an interview with Geo TV, Fazl-ur-Rehman said that Pakistan had been hoping that the Islamic Emirate would be a good friend for the country, but the recent events disappointed Islamabad. He considered his recent visit […]

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Borderline Conflict: Unpacking The Iran-Pakistan Crisis Of 2024 – Analysis

On January 15, 2024, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards initiated a missile attack on a purported Mossad spy base in northern Iraq and targeted “anti-Iran terror groups” in Syria, intensifying ongoing hostilities and escalating the risk of a wider regional conflict. Subsequently, Iran acknowledged launching a missile and drone assault on western Pakistan on January 16, claiming it was aimed at the […]

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The Great And The Good In Davos Ignore Afghanistan At Their Peril – Analysis

The world’s leaders, policymakers, commentators, and other movers and shakers gathered in the Swiss mountain town of Davos last week for the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum. On top of the agenda were some of the world’s most pressing geopolitical issues: Ukraine and Russia, Israel and Hamas, China and Taiwan, trade and economics, energy security, and global shipping. […]

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Iran And Pakistan: Another Front For An Already Embattled Islamabad – Analysis

The badlands that form the Iran-Pakistan border have for years been notorious for smuggling, human trafficking, narcotics trade, and of course, movement of insurgents and terrorists. It is anything but a tranquil frontier because skirmishes, shallow incursions and raids, and even occasional mortar shelling are fairly routine. But both countries have somehow managed to keep things from spiralling out of […]

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Iran-Pakistan flare-up rooted in restive borderlands, not Mideast strife

An Iranian strike on Pakistan this week that drew a rapid military riposte and raised fears of greater regional turmoil was driven by Iran’s efforts to reinforce its internal security rather than its ambitions for the Middle East, according to three Iranian officials, one Iranian insider and an analyst. Both the heavily-armed neighbours, oftentimes at odds over instability on their […]

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The TTP’s Terrorist Threat To Pakistan Is Metastasizing

The challenge ahead is a formidable one that will require the military-intelligence services to fully focus on this newly metastasized terrorist threat in order to emerge victorious, which in turn necessitates their top brass giving them the order to abandon the all-out nationwide crackdown against the opposition. Pakistan’s prior large-scale anti-terrorist operations succeeded precisely because those carrying them out weren’t […]

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The Optics & Timing Of Iran’s Strikes In Pakistan Are More Important Than The Military Impact

The impression that Iran regards Pakistan as a serious security threat on par with the Israeli spy base in Iraq and ISIS ones in Syria that it also struck in sequence. With all three taking place as the latest Israeli-Hamas war escalates into a regional proxy war between Israel-US and Iran, the innuendo is that Pakistan is aligned with them […]

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The Global Consequences Of South Asia’s Grand Strategic Reorientation

While it remains to be seen whether Pakistan will grotesquely transform from the “Zipper of Eurasia” into the “Faultline of Eurasia” like is feared, that scenario is still credible enough to seriously concern all stakeholders. South Asia’s Central Role In The Great Bifurcation The global systemic transition to multipolarity is leading to profound changes across the world, most notably the […]

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Pakistan militant Sunni group targets minorities

A Sunni militant group known for targeting rival Muslims has emerged as a dangerous new player in Pakistan, sending a pair of suicide bombers this week to detonate themselves inside a church in the deadliest ever attack against Pakistani Christians. The brutal assault, which killed 85 worshippers during Sunday services, was the first time that a militant group has taken […]

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Pakistani retaliatory strikes in Iran kill at least 9, raising tensions along border

Pakistan launched airstrikes against alleged militant hideouts inside Iran on Thursday, killing at least nine people as it retaliated for a similar attack days earlier by Iran and raising tensions with its neighbor as conflict across the region escalates. The unprecedented attacks by both Pakistan and Iran on either side of their border appeared to target Baluch militant groups with […]

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