ISLAMABAD: Adviser to Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz on Monday said that Afghan refugee camps within Pakistan turned into safe havens for terrorists after the country’s armed forces destroyed the militants’ infrastructure in tribal areas. In an interview with SAMAA TV, he said the issue of Afghan refugees has become a security issue for Pakistan as these refugee camps have become “safe havens for terrorists” due to unregulated movement. “We have re-established our…
Posts published in “Day: June 21, 2016”
HONG KONG — Protesters in a Chinese fishing village that earned renown for its activism have taken to the streets in recent days to call for the release of a detained local leader and the resolution of a long-simmering dispute over land sales, residents said on Monday. The village of Wukan, in the southeastern province of Guangdong, became the focus of attention both in China and abroad in 2011, as villagers angered over the sale…
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Indonesia is holding the crew of a Chinese fishing boat it says was fishing illegally last week in the South China Sea, an official confirmed on Monday. It was the third maritime skirmish — all involving warning shots — between the two countries in the past three months. The latest episode occurred on Friday when Indonesian warships challenged a group of Chinese fishing boats operating within Indonesia’s 200-mile exclusive economic zone off…
The writer is a lawyer, academic and political analyst. Iran was the first country to recognize Pakistan as a sovereign state with the Shah of Iran being the first Head of State to visit Pakistan. The relationship between Iran and Pakistan however, changed with the Islamic Revolution in Iran in 1979. Post Iran-Revolution saw the emergence of a strong Shia regime based on religion that practically remodeled Iran as an Islamic theocratic republic. ‘Designated as…
The First Vice President Abdul Rashid Dostum has said Sirajuddin Haqqani is a key player in the ongoing violence in Afghanistan with the direct support of Pakistani military intelligence, Inter Services Intelligence (ISI). During a meeting with the Afghan armed forces late on Saturday night, Dostum said ISI has been continuously attempting to destabilize Afghanistan and conduct terrorist attacks with the help of Haqqani terrorist network. Dostum further added that the newly appointed leader of…
The author is a research fellow at the Charhar Institute and director of the Center for Indian Studies at China West Normal University. The Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) plenary meeting started Monday and will end Friday in Seoul. In a bid to become a member of NSG, the Indian government has launched a diplomatic offensive and Indian President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have embarked on foreign visits to win support from NSG…
Karachi: The Sindh Assembly unanimously passed a resolution on Friday condemning the federal energy authorities for subjecting the people of the province to power outages of up to 20 hours daily, describing it as a discriminatory attitude on the part of the Centre. Parliamentary affairs minister Nisar Ahmed Khuhro moved and read out the resolution. The lawmakers of the ruling Pakistan People’s Party and the opposition Muttahida Qaumi Movement, the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional, and the…
The writer teaches physics in Islamabad and Lahore. In Pakistan, anger has greeted the killing of Afghan Taliban head, Mullah Mansour, by an American drone on Pakistani territory. When senior US officials visited army chief Gen Raheel Sharif at the Rawalpindi GHQ, he expressed strong displeasure at the violation of Pakistan’s air space and demanded that Tehreek-i-Taliban head, Mullah Fazlullah, together with other TTP militants, be targeted by drones. Linked to Al Qaeda, TTP has…
The writer is an associate researchfellow at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Singapore. Upon assuming office in 2013, maintaining good relations with neighbouring countries through regional economic integration was the mainstay of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s foreign policy. Three years on, however, Pakistan’s relations with all immediate neighbours, barring China, appear to be in tatters – pushing the country towards regional isolation. Despite this grim reality, security, rather than the economy, continues to…
The writer is a freelance journalist based in Peshawar. “THE transition in Afghanistan is moving forward and our troops are finally coming home,” thus spoke President Barack Obama in the White House briefing room in October 2011. A year later, he ran for re-election on the promise that he would bring a responsible end to the war in Afghanistan which was begun by his predecessor. He pledged to end, by 2014, a conflict that has…
Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan hit rock bottom when a military officer, Maj Jawad Ali Changezi, became the first casualty of the latest violence on Torkham border. He was among the 19 other Pakistanis, eight of them security personnel and nine civilians, wounded in the fighting between Pakistan and Afghan security forces. Firing between Pakistani and Afghan forces first broke out on June 11 at the border crossing, about 45 kilometres west of Peshawar, over…