Posts published in “Day: September 30, 2016”

The top US general in Afghanistan General John Nicholson agrees with the US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter who said Pakistan is not enforcing sufficient pressure on Haqqani terrorist network. In his press briefing to the US Department of Defense, Gen. Nicholson, said “As far the strength of the Haqqanis, we, as you know, the Secretary of Defense in August in his response to Congress as a result of the National Defense Act and Authorization…

The writer is a retired lieutenant general of the Pakistan Army and a former federal secretary. Tensions between India and Pakistan have taken a turn for the worse after the attack on the army base in Uri in India-held Kashmir. The Indians without any solid evidence have branded Pakistan military and the ISI as accomplices. And military experts and certain elements among the Indian media have been calling for retaliatory strikes against militant camps. Modi…

The writer is an author and journalist. THE Indian prime minister has laid bare his strategy of what some analysts describe as a ‘vertical and horizontal escalation’. He apparently seeks to encircle and bleed Pakistan dry by intensifying cross-border covert operations while keeping the option of military strikes open. He vows to internationally isolate Pakistan and wants to cripple it economically. He even threatens to use water as a weapon in the conflict. He feels…

The writer is a lawyer Pak-India military tension has visibly escalated after the death of 18 Indian soldiers in the recent Uri terror attack in IHK. As per usual, India’s knee-jerk reaction has been to blame Pakistan for this attack without even sharing any credible evidence, or holding any reliable inquiry into it. Immediately after this attack, Indian PM Narendra Modi vowed action to ‘teach Pakistan a lesson’. Indian DG Military Operations also maintained that…

The writer is a legal research analyst based in Islamabad. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif used very specific language in his address before the UN General Assembly on Wednesday. He stated that the struggle of the Kashmiri people is a “legitimate one for liberation from alien occupation”. This phrasing has immense legal significance, perhaps not fully understood by the domestic audience. Let us examine it from an international law perspective. ‘Legitimate’: the word is premised on…

The writer is a freelance columnist and political analyst associated with a Pashto TV news channel. Though Uri is not going to mark the start of a war between India and Pakistan, such an occurrence down the road has all the potential to trigger a nuclear holocaust. This is what Uri has taught us. Uri has shown us four cruel realties; 1) you can’t maintain a status quo in Kashmir forever, 2) India has changed…

No army, with bombs and shellfire, could be devastated by the simple expedient of India’s permanently shutting off the sources of water that kept the fields and the people of Pakistan alive,” was the quote sent by Eugene Black, president of the World Bank, to PM Liaqat Ali Khan in 1951. It is true. Without the Indus and its tributaries, Pakistan would turn into a desert, and India can make this happen. But while it…

The Indus Waters Treaty of 1960, which devised a water-sharing formula between Pakistan and India, was a high mark of diplomacy between the two countries, showing that they could put their enmity aside in a mutually-beneficial manner. Even though the treaty has come under strain in recent years, it still remains the best mechanism for resolving water disputes since the World Bank and the International Court of Arbitration can step in if the two countries…

A DAY after urging a joint India-Pakistan war against poverty, unemployment, illiteracy and infant mortality, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi executed his latest about-turn by implicitly threatening to use water as a weapon against Pakistan — this in a region where great swathes of humanity eke out a subsistence living and are wholly dependent on agriculture and the agrarian chain for their livelihoods. By suspending the biannual Indus water commissioners’ meeting, ordering that India expedite…

The Indus Waters Treaty of 1960, which devised a water-sharing formula between Pakistan and India, was a high mark of diplomacy between the two countries, showing that they could put their enmity aside in a mutually-beneficial manner. Even though the treaty has come under strain in recent years, it still remains the best mechanism for resolving water disputes since the World Bank and the International Court of Arbitration can step in if the two countries…