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During his visit to Islamabad last week,Gen.Colin Powell, US Secretary of State, announced the decision of the Bush Administration to designate Pakistan as a Major Non-NATO Ally (MNNA) of the US. The decision would become effective 30 days after a notification in this regard has been sent by the President to the Congress.
Well known Pakistani economist Akbar Zaidi discussed various aspects of Pakistan?s economy with special emphasis on the period since the 1980s, at a round table conference at Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi, on February 23, 2004.
Is Pakistan's economy really at the verge of a collapse? Let us look at the facts at first. Last year, the GDP grew by 2.4 per cent; the service sector marked a growth of 4.1 per cent, the agricultural sector 1.2 per cent and remittances topped $11,201 million.
In November this year, the world will witness one of the most keenly awaited presidential elections in Pakistan with President Pervez Musharraf seeking a second term from the existing parliament without giving up his uniform. A few months later, in early 2008, will follow the general elections for the National Assembly. Contrary to perceptions, the road to re-election may not be smooth. There are chances that the situation in Balochistan and Wazi
Pakistan's PPP-led government failed to end the domination of the military over the government, much less bring the military machine, particularly the army, under the government's control. A huge percentage of the country's budget is allocated to the military.
Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari is due to complete his term in office after the elections later this year. The role of General Kayani, the Army Chief who is due to complete his extended term this year, remains to be seen. It is to be noted that the ISI is also under the Army.
n July 2018, Pakistanis voted in what was the third consecutive transfer of power from one civilian government to another in the country’s 71-year history. The elections may be called a success in that winners had been declared. However, the months leading up to the elections demonstrated the power of the military, and its ability to influence election outcomes and control sections of the media. As Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leader Imran Khan see
In well-functioning democracies where those who lose elections live to fight another day, the forthcoming general elections in Pakistan is a battle for survival for many of the main political players in the country. To begin with, the brazen intervention by the military establishment in the political process has left the polls little credibility. In many ways, the elections will set the future trajectory of politics in Pakistan. While the deck se
The outcome of Pakistan's elections has not been particularly surprising. Nawaz Sharief's PML-N is likely to form government soon. Having a trusted hand like Sharif at the helm is a plus point, but he would have to undertake a herculean labour to transform Pakistan's condition. If he fails, there will only be despair.
The 12-point resolution approved by Pakistan's Parliament said that Islamabad must maintain "neutrality" in the Yemen conflict. Pakistan has good reasons to have rejected what could have become a quagmire for its forces. But, it has angered Pakistan's friends, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Emirates.
The more the nation gets isolated, especially in the international financial system, the greater its dependence on the Chinese.
With Saudi Arabia now so fearful of a rising Iran, it is quite clearly Pakistan's payback time. And Yemen could mark the beginning of a new and more significant phase in Pakistan's involvement in the security politics of the Gulf.
Field Marshal Asim Munir has been pivotal to this, taking advantage of the prevailing geopolitical situation
The superciliousness of western media is surpassed only by Pakistan's unabashed statements on CAA and preaching secularism to India.
Some years ago when Karan Thapar interviewed Pervez Musharraf, the general was self-assured and voluble. That was before 9/11 but after Kargil. Last fortnight, he was once again voluble, and when not talking about himself, he was talking about Kashmir. But his body language showed nervousness, impatience, an edginess and even tiredness. And Thapar drove a hard bargain.
All is not lost for Pakistan's Imran Khan. He may not have succeeded in "sweeping the elections" but his performance was a significant improvement from his previous outings. From having secured only one seat in 2002, his party emerged with a plurality in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Pakistan's rational options now are severely limited. However, expecting the rational from Pakistan might be expecting too much. Here's what India needs to be prepared for.
In the Afghanistan peace process, Pakistan's significance lies more in its capability to play a destructive role than a constructive one. It is capable of scuttling the peace process and can stoke violence by supporting groups like the Haqqani network and engineer attacks against the government or foreign troops in Afghanistan.
Pakistan would continue to grapple with political instability, economic crisis and resurgence in radicalism even after the exit of former President Pervez Musharraf, leaving Pakistan Army in a jockeying position.
Since 1991, India has pursued a policy of engaging Pakistan, regardless of what the latter has thrown at us - bombs, terror assaults, fedayeen. Maybe the time has come to change course ? not by reaching out to the military or taking recourse to tit-for-tat covert war. But by encouraging the peaceful breakup of Pakistan.
Ethnic divisions will deepen in Pakistan along with popular sentiments against the military in the near future, says renowned area specialist Dr Selig Harrison. "In 10 years, there will be a different landscape in Pakistan," he said addressing the faculty members of Observer Research Foundation here on February 6.
The Pakistani Army is keen to repair its image after the battering it has taken following the discovery that Osama bin Laden was ensconced in a mansion in Abbotabad. And while US criticism has made international headlines,
Saudi Arabia's recent $1.5 billion grant to Pakistan re-affirms the depth of the relationship that the two countries share. It has also brought into focus their expanding defence ties and raised concerns about Pakistan's possible role in the Syrian civil war.
It would not be fair to term Syed Salahuddin's statements on Kashmir as the official Pakistan policy. But the fact that Salahuddin has been making, rather freely, statements on Kashmir, which seem to be contrary to the stance taken by Islamabad-at least for the time being-is a clear pointer to Pakistan's strategy on Kashmir.
It is possible that, unable to control the various jihadis in their country or control events in Afghanistan, Pakistan's military rulers will first try to blame India for all its troubles and then launch a diversionary jihadi attack to provoke a reaction from the Indians and bring the whole world into play.
Kashmir is in trouble. Several incidents in quick succession that shattered peace in the State over the past few weeks are ominous. Trouble brewing in the Middle East, the regrouping of the Al Qaeda and various elements of terror groups, their re-emergence from the badlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan and the rising crescendo of bickering within Pakistan-all of this poses a serious threat to peace and stability in the region and elsewhere.
When the world attention was riveted by the US-choreographed peace moves between New Delhi and Islamabad early this month, a South African Jewish businessman, Asher Karni, 50, was being trapped in a sting operation launched by the US Commerce Department and other federal investigating agencies. On January 2,
As tensions between Kabul and Islamabad threaten the fragile peace process in Afghanistan, the Taliban's role as a proxy for Pakistan's interests has come back into sharp focus again.
A reasonably objective assessment of Pakistan's War on Terror can only begin with acknowledging two facts. First, there has been an unprecedented level of terrorist violence in Pakistan for the past three years.
India cannot ignore what is happening in its North-West. It is not clear what is going to be Indian policy to protect its political, strategic and economic interests in Afghanistan. May be the Indian policy-makers will have to sit back and think of ways to ensure that India's role in Af-Pak region doesn't become minimal.
If the reports that Narendra Modi has sent emissaries to Pakistan are true, they indicate a recognition of the need to reassure leaders across the border that, were he to become prime minister, he would not be throwing a grenade at the bilateral relationship.
After the horrific attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar in December last year by Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militants, Pakistan is trying to crack down on militancy in the country.
Although concrete evidence about Saudi intentions to acquire nuclear weapons' capabilities is not there the story continues to attract international commentary
That is, in short, the general Israeli reaction to the initiative recently taken by General Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan to bring into the open Pakistan's hitherto clandestine relations with Israel. Nobody denies the previous existence of clandestine contacts between the two countries, which recently culminated in an open,
The continuing ceasefire violations on the India-Pakistan border could become a stumbling block in the renewed attempts by the leadership of the two neighbours to improve their relationship.
For Pakistan and its army, the year 2014 is crucial as the NATO troops withdraw from Afghanistan. There are fears in Pakistan of an Afghan civil war. There is also the long pursued Pakistani strategy of supporting the Afghan Taliban which may backfire.
India's interest lies in peace, not in coddling Pakistan, not necessarily in pursuing "most favoured nation" status, trade and visa issues with that country, but in ensuring it remains irrelevant in Kashmir and realises it is irrelevant. This will not happen by our mere say-so.
The enthusiasm bordering on euphoria generated by the talks of Ms.Condoleezza Rice, US Secretary of State, with Indian leaders during her recent visit to New Delhi has been somewhat dissipated by the announcement of the decision of President George Bush to clear the sale of the latest version of the F-16 aircraft to Pakistan.
On June 2, 2012, The News International reported, that in the Dera Ismail Khan district of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Province in Pakistan the 11-year-old Niazmina and her two-year-old sister Bakhtawar were given as compensation to the house of Juma Khan for the crime that their uncle, Muhammad Ikram, had committed.
It is becoming clear even to President Pervez Musharraf, Chief of Army Staff, Pakistan, that he will have to step down sooner than later. This brief discusses three immediate reasons to make such an assumption.
The rapidly-approaching March 16 deadline for the dissolution of the Government led by Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf, ahead of scheduled May elections, is an occasion worthy of note and reflection for Pakistan.
Recent political moves by the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) in Sindh reflect more desperation than confidence, while the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM) is doing what every political party in Pakistan excels in - crying foul for having been deprived of effective power by a stronger adversary.
The UPA government needs to inject some boldness into its Pakistan policy. A.B. Vajpayee, representing the "communal" BJP, visited Pakistan twice during his six-year tenure as PM. Manmohan Singh representing the "secular" Congress has been too timid to go across the border.
Of the many pressing challenges and crises facing Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the one which is perhaps the most difficult to address is the sectarian blood-letting that has been tearing the social fabric of Pakistan for decades now.
Pakistan's first democratic transfer of power should have been a moment of hope and triumph. But, as it stands, widespread violence has marred the historic elections and all but halted the public campaigning by several prominent parties outside of Punjab.
Justice Iftikhar Chaudhary, who retired on December 12 after heading Pakistan's apex court for seven years, has left behind a contentious legacy of judicial activism, in many senses unprecedented and extraordinarily difficult to follow.
