Author: Saifullah

Pakistan’s Information Ministry has flatly rejected claims from the Afghan Taliban that its so-called “air force” carried out strikes against Islamic State (IS) hideouts inside Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, calling the assertions outright fabrications. In a statement posted on X, the ministry said the Taliban’s claims about conducting operations against IS hideouts on Pakistani soil simply don’t hold up — and pointed out the obvious problem with the story itself. A claim with a glaring hole The Afghan Taliban’s defence ministry had announced earlier on Friday that its “air force” struck militant hideouts in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa overnight Thursday.…

The dust from the Israel-US-Iran conflict hasn’t even fully settled, and already the Middle East’s strategic map is being redrawn. What’s striking isn’t loud declarations of new alliances it’s the quiet recalibration happening across the Gulf, where states that once leaned almost entirely on Washington are now hedging, diversifying, and rethinking who they can really count on. Neutral, but not naive The Gulf states have played this conflict with notable restraint. Despite being targeted repeatedly by Iran, they chose not to retaliate — a calculated move that speaks more to long-term economic diversification goals than to weakness. It’s a delicate…

Iran’s top negotiator, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, has made it clear that Tehran is walking into the next round of talks with Washington on its own terms. Diplomacy is on the table, he says — but not at the cost of Iran’s principles or national interests. The statement comes as both countries gear up for the next phase of negotiations following the landmark Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding, signed earlier this week with Pakistan playing mediator. The deal is designed to de-escalate the standoff between Washington and Tehran and pave the way for a more permanent settlement. Speaking to Iran’s…

There is something fundamentally dissonant about a British Member of Parliament using the floor of Westminster to pass judgment on administrative decisions made in Azad Jammu & Kashmir — a territory he does not govern, has no constitutional authority over, and whose ground realities he is unlikely to have independently verified. MP Imran Hussain’s legislative interventions and digital lobbying campaigns around AJK paint a picture of arbitrary state repression. What they omit is the other half of every law enforcement equation: what provoked the response in the first place. The Framing Problem When local agitation escalates into violence — when…

There is a particular kind of truth that only gets spoken when the speaker has stopped caring about diplomatic niceties. Donald Trump’s remark at the G7 in France that Afghanistan is “kissing our ass” was not a gaffe. It was a window into something the Taliban has spent five years desperately trying to conceal: that international isolation is slowly strangling a regime that projected itself to the world as the force that humbled a superpower. The immediate context was the $7 billion in military equipment left behind during the 2021 withdrawal. Trump called the Biden-era exit a “horrible retreat,” contrasted…

When historians look back at this moment, they may well mark it as the day Pakistan graduated from regional actor to global diplomatic player. The signing of the “Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding” between the United States and Iran — with Pakistan as mediator — is not just a ceasefire document. It is a statement about where Islamabad now stands on the world stage. Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif electronically signed the MoU alongside US President Donald Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, formalising a framework that both Washington and Tehran had resisted for years. The agreement came into force immediately…

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held a telephone conversation on Tuesday, focusing on the regional situation in the Middle East, civilian protection, and ongoing diplomatic efforts to restore stability. According to Al Jazeera, Araghchi briefed Lavrov on the details of a recently signed memorandum of understanding and developments related to a draft agreement between Iran and the United States. The two ministers exchanged views on regional security and emphasized the role of diplomacy in resolving conflicts and addressing humanitarian concerns. Both sides stressed the urgent need to protect civilians amid escalating regional tensions. The…

South Asia is once again entering a phase where old disputes are no longer confined to history books or diplomatic statements. They are being reshaped into modern instruments of pressure, perception, and strategic signaling. At the center of this evolving reality lie three interconnected fault lines: water security, Kashmir, and the expanding dimensions of hybrid conflict. Water in South Asia is no longer just an environmental or resource issue. It has increasingly become a strategic variable in interstate relations, especially between India and Pakistan. Any disruption, perception of restriction, or unilateral maneuvering related to shared river systems is instantly absorbed…

For decades, Pakistan’s national debates about freedom have been driven either by political rhetoric or international rankings. One side insists the country is moving toward greater openness, the other argues civic space is shrinking under institutional pressure. Between those competing narratives, ordinary Pakistanis have rarely been asked a simple question: what does freedom actually feel like in their daily lives? The newly released State of Freedom Report: Pakistan 2026 attempts to answer that question for the first time in the country’s 78-year history. Produced by MISHAL Pakistan and presented at the Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad, the report is more…

Five years into one of the most documented human rights catastrophes of the modern era, the international community has mastered one skill above all others: the art of the strongly worded statement. Summits have been held. Resolutions have been passed. Diplomats have expressed “deep concern” in carefully measured language from comfortable conference rooms in Geneva, New York, and Brussels. And in Afghanistan, across all 34 provinces, women and girls have continued to be systematically erased from public life with a precision that only an ideologically committed state apparatus can maintain. But here is what the headlines have consistently failed to…