Author and analyst Husain Haqqani says that both India and Pakistan are mired in a hyper-nationalist frenzy right now by Elizabeth Roche New Delhi: There is a perception in Pakistan that 69 years after Partition, India still wants to punish Pakistan for parting as a separate nation, says Pakistani author and analyst Husain Haqqani. In India to promote his book India vs […]
by ALOK MUKHERJEE On a recent trip, our young taxi driver hailed from Turkey. Inevitably, our conversation turned to recent events there. My wife and I love that beautiful country, which we have visited twice. With our own origins in India, we find the cultural and linguistic connections fascinating. Our driver was extremely worried about the safety of his family […]
by Deeyah Khan ‘It looked like the apocalypse,’ said one observer. The massacre in Nice began shortly before 11pm on Thursday 14 July, as a 19-tonne white Renault lorry sped down the promenade and began mowing down men, women and children who were celebrating Bastille Day – an event symbolic of France’s most sacred values, commemorating the first act of […]
Patrick Cockburn In Istanbul As crowds chant calls for the execution of those involved in the failed coup in Turkey, there are fears that this once-secular country is decisively turning the corner towards full scale Islamisation. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is using the attempted military takeover to justify a purge of state officials and army officers who do not give him […]
By AP A lawyer for the Turkish government, Robert Amsterdam, said that “there are indications of direct involvement” in the coup attempt of Fethullah Gulen, a Muslim cleric who is living in exile in Pennsylvania. He said he and his firm “have attempted repeatedly to warn the U.S. government of the threat posed” by Gulen and his movement. According to […]
by Khaled Ahmed Nation states were sought to be superceded through the EU, ASEAN, EAC (Africa) and SAARC partly because they tended to designate external enemies and go to war with them in order to attain internal cohesion. But there was another fatal defect equally in evidence: Once internally united, they embarked upon an even more lethal process, exclusion, that […]
BY MOHAMMAD TAQI The elimination of Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Akhtar Mansour in a US drone attack inside Pakistan last month has once again raised questions about Pakistan’s nexus with, and seriousness to eliminate, jihadist groups on its soil. Instead of serious introspection about why an Afghan jihadist was found inside Pakistan and apparently carrying that country’s passport, the Pakistani civilian and military leadership […]
A new study of Pakistani school textbooks backed by a US government commission has concluded their contents will make it virtually impossible for a new generation of Pakistanis to envision a peaceful future with Hindu-majority India. The report “Teaching intolerance in Pakistan: Religious bias in public school textbooks”, released this week and sponsored by the US Commission on International Religious […]
By Khaled Ahmed Novelist Nisar Aziz Butt is one of those who challenged the ideologies invented by men Islamabad celebrated novelist Nisar Aziz Butt, 89, on May 30. Her brother Sartaj Aziz, adviser to the prime minister on foreign affairs, talked about Nisar, revealing details about this extraordinary woman who wrote four great novels in Urdu. She was born in […]
In a meeting with Pakistan’s army chief Raheel Sharif in Berlin, German FM Steinmeier praised Islamabad’s role in fighting terrorism. Analysts argue that Germany should be cautious while commending Pakistan’s military. Pakistan’s army chief General Raheel Sharif is probably the most powerful person in his country. The Islamic country’s military has more influence on foreign affairs and security matters than […]
By Tim Craig After terrorists killed more than 100 Pakistani school children 18 months ago, the country’s leaders vowed to crack down on religious seminaries that are recruiting grounds for domestic and international Islamist militant groups. U.S. officials have also continued to pressure Pakistan in their decade-long effort to get the government to deny safe-havens to insurgent groups destabilizing Afghanistan, […]
by M.Sheharyar Khan The US took another scalp from its enemy on May 21 when its drones incinerated the new Taliban chief Mullah Mansour on Pakistani soil. This is another dead leader on Pakistani soil. The presence of its enemies in Pakistan frustrates the US since it pays Pakistan to take action against them. Americans keep asking Pakistan to ‘do […]
Kamran Siddiqui The rise of religious extremism in Muslim youth is a serious concern and has become a rising issue in Western countries. Often, these youth blame the West for the sufferings of the Muslim world and take actions in an emotional and irresponsible way. Ultimately, this results in the development of misconceptions in Western communities about Islam and Muslims. […]
Strangely, Pakistan is not into navel-gazing after the latest death. It is busy getting angry with America and its rascally ally in the region, India. by Khaled Ahmed On May 21, an American drone killed the Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Akhtar Mansour after he had crossed into Pakistan’s Balochistan province from Iran. Washington said he was killed because he blocked […]
Kamal Alam Since Pakistan’s founding, religion, namely Islam, has fundamentally defined its political affairs. Despite this reality, however, Pakistan has historically accommodated its rich and long-standing history of Buddhist and mystic cultures, both of which predate the arrival of Islam around 720 CE. Indeed, for the first few decades of its existence, Pakistan was largely tolerant of its religious minority […]
The Chabahar port deal has the potential to alter the “great game” in Afghanistan for good. By Siddhartha Srivastava The historic pact between India and Iran recently to build Chabahar port in Iran has the potential to alter the dynamics of “The Great Game” for good. The pact, which will kick off a transport-and-trade corridor linking India to Afghanistan via Iran, dramatically adds new players […]
By The Editorial Board, Newyork Times The United States has for years held off targeting senior Taliban leaders while they were inside Pakistan’s Baluchistan Province, where Pakistan’s powerful army has long protected them. But President Obama crossed that line by authorizing the drone strike that killed the Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansour on Saturday. Calling the killing“an important milestone,” Mr. Obama said he had acted […]
Sources close to the Taliban claim that Pakistan-backed militant Sirajuddin Haqqani could likely succeed Mullah Mansour, who was killed in a US drone strike. Experts say it could be a “nightmare scenario” for the US. After the assassination of Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour, US Secretary of State John Kerry expressed hope for Afghanistan’s long-stalled peace talks. Mansour had demanded […]
Despite a lifetime of “shaming” the system, NOAM CHOMSKY, America’s foremost “engagé” intellectual, remains an unrepentant left anticommunist. By Michael Parenti In the United States, for over a hundred years, the ruling interests tirelessly propagated anticommunism among the populace, until it became more like a religious orthodoxy than a political analysis. During the Cold War, the anticommunist ideological framework could […]
By Thomas Erdbrink TEHRAN — Iran’s judiciary unleashed one of its periodic crackdowns on social media permissiveness on Sunday, announcing the arrest of eight people involved in online modeling without a mandatory head scarf and questioning another woman, a former model, live on state television on Sunday. A blogger, Mehdi Abutorabi, 53, who managed a publishing tool called Persian Blog, was […]
