AFGHAN REGIME NOW A GLOBAL THREAT, PAKISTAN WARNS AS ISPR EXPOSES TERROR–CRIME NEXUS
g DG ISPR SAYS ABANDONED US WEAPONS FUELING REGIONAL MILITANCY
g SMUGGLING CRACKDOWN, CROSS BORDER TERROR AND ‘FITNA AL-KHAWARIJ’ NETWORK UNDER SPOTLIGHT: DGISPR
g SAYS PAKISTAN CONDUCTED OVER 67,000 IBOS THIS YEAR, KILLED NEARLY 1,900 TERRORISTS
g ISLAMABAD SEEKS VERIFIABLE MECHANISM WITH KABUL, SAYS BLOODSHED AND TRADE ‘ CANNOT COEXIST’: DGISPR
TZardari emphasizes cohesive strategy to confront contemporar y security challenges
Asif Ali Zardari stressed on
the critical need for informed
nationallevel dialogue bolstering institutional capacity and promoting a whole-of-nation approach to security matters Following his address the President awarded graduation certificates to the participants
ISLAMABAD s A l e e m J A d o o n Pakistan has expressed its readiness to contribute troops to the Gaza International Stabilisation Force (ISF), while firmly distancing itself from any role in disarming Hamas Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said on Saturday Speaking at a press conference at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, FM Dar said Pakistan’s participation would be guided strictly by a peacekeeping mandate not enforcement or disarmament operations We are not ready for that This is not our job but of the Palestinian law enforcement agencies Our job is peacekeeping, not peace enforcement We are definitely ready to contribute to the force the prime minister has in
principle already announced after consultation with the field marshal that we will contribute but this decision cannot be taken until it is decided what its mandate and terms of reference (TOR) will be, he said The announcement underscores Islamabad’s commitment to peacekeeping and humanitarian stabilisation in Gaza even as it navigates a complex regional security landscape and balances relations with global partners Pakistan’s Role in the Gaza Peace Effort
The ISF is a key component of the United States-brokered Gaza Peace Agreement which aims to stabilise the Palestinian enclave following years of conflict Composed mainly of troops from Muslim-majority countries, the force has been
authorised by the UN Security Council (UNSC) as part of a broader effort to rebuild Gaza and lay the groundwork for long-term peace
According to officials close to the deliberations, discussions within the federal government and military establishment are at an “advanced stage ” with Islamabad showing inclination to participate FM Dar noted that Indonesia has offered 20 000 troops and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had also indicated in principle support for Pakistan’s contribution
The UNSC resolution, drafted by the United States received 13 affirmative votes including Pakistan s while Russia and China abstained Hamas, however, has rejected the resolution, particularly objecting to any international force
tasked with disarmament of Palestinian resistance groups Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmad emphasised that the ISF could only stabilise the region under a clear UN-consistent mandate, adding that disarmament must be achieved through a negotiated political process under a unified Palestinian Authority The resolution also outlines the establishment of a transitional Board of Peace to oversee reconstruction, economic recovery, and eventual demilitarisation of Gaza Clarifying Pakistan’s Position on Hamas Deputy PM Dar reiterated that Pakistan will not engage in disarming Hamas
ISLAMABAD s tA f f r e p o r t Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Ahmed Mohamed Abdelatty on Saturday arrived in Pakistan on a two-day official visit at the invitation of Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar, according to a statement issued by the Foreign Office (FO)
vitation by Deputy PM
PAKISTAN,
The report stresses that the US, Pakistan s single largest export market, has become increasingly difficult to access due to rigid tariffs, inconsistent
in 2025, driven largely by textiles and leather goods But the report warns that this trajectory may reverse under the tariff regime
The SCCI–SAFA report says India is the most severely affected among Saarc economies facing up to 50% cumulative tariffs on textiles jewellery and pharmaceuticals leading to capital outflows of over $15 5bn and rupee depreciation
landed costs by up to 18% and putting export volumes at risk of falling between 20–30% The report estimates annual revenue losses of up to $490 million, with potential consequences for foreign exchange reserves and the current account The study warns that the shock is likely to hit employment in Faisalabad Karachi and Lahore where Pakistan’s textile and apparel industries are concentrated Thousands of workers could face layoffs as mills contend with reduced US demand
its facilitation of terrorists whose leadership networks and infrastructure including those belonging to al-Qaeda and Daesh remain active inside Afghanistan, armed and financed for operations against Pakistan Islamabad, he said, is ready to accept any “verifiable mechanism,” even if administered by a third party Rejecting Kabul’s
regime’s failure to form an inclusive government after 2021 He emphasised that Pakistan’s dispute is with the Taliban authorities not the Afghan people and criticised Kabul s exclusion of ethnic groups and its denial of rights to women who make up half the population Concluding, the DG ISPR said Pakistan cannot allow trade with Afghanistan to continue while terrorism persists, stressing that “bloodshed and trade cannot go together” and that Pakistan’s foremost responsibility is the protection of its citizens lives and property
tional window Most
central bank injected another Rs212 billion Banks received Rs200 billion in the seven-day tenor at 11 04 per cent while the remaining amount was accepted in the 14-day tenor at 11 06 per cent Market analysts said the size and structure of the injections reflected aggressive liquidity demand
from banks amid rising government borrowing They noted that rates in the Islamic window remained only slightly above conventional cut-offs consistent with historical trends They said the liquidity situation appeared stable but dependent on regular injections, with markets now focused on the December Monetary Policy Committee meeting The SBP is widely expected to keep the policy rate unchanged at 11 per cent with recent inflation upticks limiting room for further easing
PR OFIT
M o n i to r i n g D e s k
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has raised serious concerns over governance lapses at Pakistan Revenue Automation Limited (PRAL) warning that the Federal Board of Revenue s data arm is hiring staff and outsourcing critical functions without a legally required conflict-of-interest policy, The Express Tribune reported The observations appear in the IMF s Governance and Corruption Diagnostic Assessment released last week According to the IMF
PRAL has not developed a code of conduct or conflict-of-interest rules despite legal obligations The lender said this omission is particularly troubling at a time when PRAL is recruiting staff on marketbased salaries and relying on third parties to carry out some of its core technology functions Government sources said a meeting held at the Prime Minister s Office on Friday discussed how to respond to the IMF s remarks in parliament and the media One proposal under consideration is for Minister of State for Finance Bilal Azhar Kayani to present the government’s position The IMF assessment underscores longstanding
More anti-immigrant steps
Trump’s reac tion to the attack on National Guardsmen shows troubling signs
not so just closing the route to citizenship as reversing it especially for those who are a ;public charge a security risk, or non-compatible with Western civilization The last seems problematic because it is so vague and might be used against opponents of the regime
Dedicated to the legac y of late Hameed Nizami Arif Nizami (Late) Founding Editor
M A Niazi Editor Pakistan Today Babar Nizami Editor Profit
PAKISTAN’S renewed institutional interest in cryptocurrency has been framed as an innovative step toward financial modernization The establishment of a Ministry of Cryptocurrency has given the initiative a symbolic sense of direction Yet the political momentum behind this portfolio often outpaces the economic logic required to sustain it Cryptocurrency continues to sit in a global regulatory grey zone remains non-compliant with most interpretations of Islamic finance and operates within a fragile domestic governance environment that is already struggling with financial oversight In this context, the belief that cryptocurrency can serve as a pathway to economic alleviation reflects a gap between aspiration and institutional reality Supporters of crypto integration often draw on global narratives that frame digital assets as enablers of financial inclusion or engines of domestic innovation These claims overlook the structural constraints within Pakistan’s economy The Auditor General of Pakistan has repeatedly highlighted weaknesses in public financial controls procurement oversight and digital audit trails Introducing a parallel asset class without a robust supervisory mechanism risks amplifying the very vulnerabilities the state is attempting to fix Cryptocurrencies may offer decentralization, but decentralization in a weak regulatory environment can produce opacity, not efficiency There is also the question of religious and policy alignment Pakistan s stated economic trajectory is increasingly centred on Islamic finance The
State Bank of Pakistan’s roadmap for Shariah-compliant banking emphasises asset-backed transactions real-economy linkages and avoidance of speculative instruments Crypto assets however derive value primarily from price volatility rather than physical economic activity Their classification as gharar (excessive uncertainty) by many Islamic finance scholars makes their mainstream adoption difficult to reconcile with the country’s broader institutional commitments Promoting an asset that does not meet the principles of risk-sharing and asset-linkage undermines the coherence of Pakistan s financial reform agenda A second layer of concern relates to
several Gulf states have tightened cryptocurrency regulation due to risks relating to money
Before advancing crypto adoption, Pakistan must ask a fundamental question: does this strengthen the state or weaken it? The answer, at present, remains uncertain And in a fragile economy, uncertainty is not a foundation for reforma
Tak aichi Invents a C hina C risis
Tying Japan to Taiwan
FROM the moment Japanese PM Sanae Takaichi declared to the Diet that a possible Chinese attack on Taiwan could be a survival-threatening situation for Japan the tectonic plates of East Asian security shifted Her words also signalled a step away from Japan s longstanding post-war pacifism and into a far more volatile era of militarised logic The phrase “survival-threatening situation” refers to the controversial 2015 security legislation under Shinzo Abe that permitted Japan s Japan Self Defense Forces to act when Japan s survival was directly endangered even if Japan itself was not under attack Takaichi, widely regarded as Abe’s political heir, now seeks to wrench that framework into a domain far riskier than its original intent
Takaichi tied Taiwan explicitly into that formula: if China moved by warships or other force to bring Taiwan under its control, that would, in her view, meet the threshold for Japan’s intervention Japan’s Security Council would thereby be triggered Until then, Tokyo had maintained the diplomatic stance of “strategic ambiguity But instead of nuance a red line was drawn China s response was immediate Its foreign ministry called the remarks crude interference in its internal affairs, asked Japan to retract the comments or “bear all consequences,” and even issued a travel caution for Japan Meanwhile the Japanese public is sharply divided: according to a recent poll by Kyodo News 48 8 percent said Japan should exercise collective self-defence in the event of a China–Taiwan conflict, while 44 2 percent opposed such ac-
tion Notably 60 4 percent supported Takaichi’s drive to raise Japan s defence spending to two percent of GDP ahead of schedule The ripple effects extend far beyond Tokyo and Beijing Already, the Senkaku Islands (known in China as the Diaoyu) are once again flashing as potential flash-points On 16 November a Chinese Coast Guard formation sailed through the waters near the islands citing a rights enforcement patrol The timing was no accident: the patrol followed Takaichi s remarks by days What is unfolding is a brave-yet-reckless recalibration of Japan’s role Takaichi is tackling the undeniable fact that Japan’s western flank now faces a giant neighbour gathering forces asserting its claims and threatening to change the status quo Taiwan lies just 110 km from Japan s Yonaguni island A Chinese move across the Taiwan Strait would have direct implications for Japanese sea lanes of communication and defence However, by linking Japan’s survival to Taiwan’s fate she is converting longdormant capabilities into forward-leaning military logic well beyond the classic self-defence posture Under her leadership Japan is moving on several vectors immediately Within weeks of taking office she has floated raising defence spending relaxing arms an-export controls and revisiting Japan’s long-sacrosanct “three nonnuclear principles The contours of Japan s strategic transformation are visible: from selfdefence to power projection There could be, however, a miscalculation The architecture of Japan–China relations is still underpinned by four political documents and the one-China policy Takaichi’s invocation of Taiwan as an existential threat in Beijing s eyes tears at those threads The Xinhua commentary argued that this was not prudent defence policy but militaristic adventurism masquerading as legitimacy Plainly not a country with close ties to Japan,” the commentary said of Taiwan and therefore ineligible under Japan’s survival threshold
wrestling with the new narrative Many recall that when Japan permitted limited collective self-defence in 2015, public protest rose at the idea of rewriting Article 9 which renounces war A decade later, the argument is no longer about whether Japan can defend itself it is whether Japan should prepare to intervene aggressively alongside the USA or even inde-
If this moment is mishandled, we may witness not just a rhetorical shift, but a strategic pivot and the region may find itself drawn into a wider conflict far sooner than anyone anticipated Japan might believe it is merely upgrading its defences; in reality it could be lifting the stage curtain on a return to great-power warfare
traditional myth of “Japan as pacifist by default is fading Globally the USA is watching nervously Washington values Tokyo as its most reliable ally in the Pacific, but historically the USA has maintained strategic ambiguity over Taiwan Japan’s embedding of Taiwan into its own survival equation complicates that US position and may lead to Tokyo being the flashpoint for US–China escalation Beijing certainly interprets it that way: Japan is taking up the role of dragging the United States into confrontation, the Xinhua commentary stated Should this drift continue, the region faces multiple fault-lines First Japan may formalise new policy that treats Taiwanese contingencies as threats to its own survival with equal standing to attack on Japan s home islands Second, Japan may give its SDF an expeditionary capability suited for overseas intervention not only in support of allies, but under Japan’s own mandate Third, diplomatic and economic fallout with China would accelerate Already tourism from China to Japan is threatened; trade ties and investment flows could follow Yet there remains an alternative route: a recalibration rather than escalation Domestic push-back and regional concerns may force Tokyo to clarify its position and restrain from pushing the Taiwan threshold too far The USA may pull Tokyo back into alignment on ambiguity But whether that happens is uncertain and delayed action risks slipping Japan into a once-avoided diplomacy of force
The irony is sharp: Japan, whose devastation at Hiroshima and Nagasaki shaped a postwar constitution grounded in pacifism and relief by American defence guarantee now appears poised to raise its military profile not simply for defence but for intervention The shadow of its prior militarism, which invaded and colonized other nations, looms large The question Japan must answer is whether its patriotic defence is a shield or a spear
In the end Takaichi’s gambit is a crossing of the Rubicon By pulling Taiwan inside her survival-threatening situation framework she has torn away the last veil of ambiguity Japan has claimed the right to act not in defence of its own soil but of a regional ally whose fate it now says is its own That claim may win some admiration in Tokyo; in Beijing it is seen as provocation And in the wider region it raises a chilling possibility: that the next crisis will not be Taiwan s alone but Japan s too If this moment is mishandled, we may witness not just a rhetorical shift, but a strategic pivot and the region may find itself drawn into a wider conflict far sooner than anyone anticipated Japan might believe it is merely upgrading its defences; in reality it could be lifting the stage curtain on a return to greatpower warfare
The writer retired as Press Secretary the the President and is former Press Minister at Embassy of Paikistan to France and former MD Shalimar Recording & Broadcasting Company Limited
Deadly habit
Jobless nation
suleman Zia
Qamar Bashir
Setting the world on fire
Twith urgency but with boilerplate lines about Israel’s “right to defend itself ” ignoring the disproportionate destruction and the mounting accusations of war crimes In moments demanding leadership he has chosen political expediency reassuring his domestic base and donors rather than asserting even the faintest humanitarian restraint on the USA’s closest Middle Eastern ally The consequence of this moral retreat has been devastating: Washington is now viewed not as a mediator but as an enabler of civilian suffering As Europe fractures over its own Gaza policies, as global protests intensify, and as the Arab world grows more disillusioned with the USA, Trump has allowed US credibility to erode to the point where even longstanding partners question whether Washington is still capable of playing any constructive diplomatic role This vacuum of leadership has also emboldened Israel s escalating confrontation with Iran In recent months, as Israeli military operations expanded from Gaza and southern Lebanon into direct strikes inside Iran including attacks on strategic Iranian infrastructure the Trump Administration not only failed to restrain the escalation but actively participated Rather than using US influence to prevent what analysts warned could become a region-wide war Trump authorised US military support for Israeli strikes framing it as a show of deterrence In reality it hardened Iranian resolve and pushed Tehran to retaliate, unleashing a spiral of strikes that destabilised the region and brought global oil markets to the brink Instead of brokering de-escalation as previous administrations attempted Trump positioned the USA as an active party to the
conflict destroying any pretence of neutrality and placing US forces and civilians at heightened risk Allies in the Gulf already wary of being dragged into a direct confrontation have openly expressed concerns that Washington s impulsiveness is pushing the Middle East toward a catastrophic multi-front war For Iran this was not a deterrent signal it was confirmation that diplomacy with the USA is meaningless under Trump Qatar once one of Washington s most reliable partners and the host of the largest US airbase in the region, has also found itself on the receiving end of Trump’s erratic foreign policy Doha, which has consistently acted as an intermediary in hostage exchanges ceasefire negotiations and backchannel talks with multiple regional actors was stunned when Israeli warplanes pounded the building where Hamas negotiators were engaged in peace talks
Rather than accusing Israel for sabotaging peace talks Trump publicly questioned Qatar ’s reliability and accused it again without evidence of not doing enough to pressure H amas or Iran The remarks ignored Qatar s central diplomatic role and alienated one of the few states still willing to rescue the USA from its self-inflicted diplomatic paralysis For Gulf partners, Trump’s statements signalled not strength but strategic incoherence It is not only the Middle East where Trump s impulsiveness is reshaping global instability His recent retreat when Chinese President Xi Jinping announced a halt in the export of key rare-earth minerals exposed the fragility behind Trump’s tough-talk trade posturing For years he portrayed himself as the only leader willing to confront Beijing but when China cemented its dominance over rare-earth supply chains materials essential for US defence systems, electronics, and advanced manufacturing Trump folded
boasts of unpredictability mistaking it for strength but unpredictability without coherence is indistinguishable from incompetence and rivals have learned to exploit it Meanwhile, Trump s handling of Russia remains one of the strangest contradictions in modern US diplomacy Though he theatrically criticises Moscow when pressed his administration continues to send confused signals about US commitments in Eastern Europe Allies in NATO increasingly doubt Washington s willingness to uphold collective defence obligations, especially as Trump repeatedly questions NATO’s value and accuses Europeans of “freeloading ” At a moment when Russia is probing for weakness wherever it can find it Trump is providing it Global problems require foresight but Trump governs through impulse They require
r e m e t w i t h i n d i f f e r e n c e H e o n c e p r o m i s e d t o e n d “ f o r e v e r w a r s , ” y e t h i s d e c i s i o n s a r e h e l p i n g i g n i t e n e w o n e s w a r s w i t h f a r g r e a t e r p o t e n t i a l t o r e s h a p e t h e g l o b a l o r d e r T r u m p i s s t i l l i n o f f i c e , a n d t h e w o r l d w i l l c o n t i n u e t o f e e l t h e i m p a c t o f h i s d e c i s i o n s f o r m o n t h s , p e r h a p s y e a r s , t o c o m e B u t t h e d a m a g e i s a l r e a d y v i s i b l e : a w o r l d l e s s s t a b l e l e s s s e c u r e a n d l e s s h o
history as usual, a third world war would have occurred But it would have been fought with nuclear weapons It could have
Instead of mobilising a coordinated economic response investing in domestic alternatives or working with allies to secure supply diversification he simply scaled back his rhetoric and quietly softened his stance, revealing that his economic nationalism was more performance than policy This moment encapsulated the broader truth: Trump’s foreign policy is reactive not strategic; transactional not principled He
published a landmark essay titled “The Long Peace ” It had been 42 years since the end of World War II an era of stability comparable
THE past eight decades have been the longest period without a war between great powers since the Roman Empire This anomalous era of extended peace came after two catastrophic wars each of which was so much more destructive than prior conflicts that historians found it necessary to create an entirely new category to describe them: world wars Had the rest of the twentieth century been as violent as the preceding two millennia, the lifetimes of nearly everyone alive today would have been radically different
The absence of great-power wars since 1945 did not happen by accident A large measure of grace and good fortune is part of the story But the experience of catastrophic war also compelled the architects of the postwar order to attempt to bend the arc of history American leaders’ personal experiences of winning the war gave them the confidence to think the unthinkable and to do what previous generations had dismissed as undoable by constructing an international order that could bring peace To ensure that this long peace continues, American leaders and citizens alike need to recognize what an amazing achievement it has been to realize how fragile it is and to begin a serious debate about what will be required to sustain it for another generation A MIRACULOUS ACHIEVEMENT
Three numbers capture the defining features and successes of the international security order: 80 80 and nine It has been 80 years since the last hot war between great powers This has enabled the global population to triple life expectancy to double and global GDP to grow 15-fold If, instead, post–World War II statesmen had settled for
been the war to end all wars It has also been 80 years since nuclear weapons were last used in war The world has survived several close calls most dangerously the Cuban missile crisis, when the United States faced off with the Soviet Union over nuclear-tipped missiles in Cuba and during which President John F Kennedy estimated the odds of nuclear war to be between one in three and one in two More recently, in the first year of Russia s full-scale war on Ukraine, which began in 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin seriously threatened to conduct tactical nuclear strikes
According to reporting in The New York Times the CIA estimated the odds of a Russian nuclear strike to be 50-50 if Ukraine s counteroffensive were about to overrun retreating Russian forces In response, CIA director Bill Burns was dispatched to Moscow to convey American concerns Fortunately, imaginative collaboration between the United States and China dissuaded Putin but it served as a reminder of the fragility of the nuclear taboo the unstated global norm that the use of nuclear weapons should be off the table In the 1950s and 1960s, world leaders expected countries to build nuclear weapons as they acquired the technical capability to do so Kennedy predicted that there would be 25 to 30 nuclear-armed states by the 1970s which led him to promote one of the boldest initiatives of American foreign policy Today, 185 states have signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty forswearing nuclear weapons Remarkably only nine countries have nuclear arsenals
Like the 80 years of peace and the absence of nuclear wars the nonproliferation regime of which the treaty has become the centerpiece is also a tenuous achievement
More than 100 countries now have the economic and technical base to build nuclear weapons Their choice to rely on the security guarantees of others is geostrategically and historically unnatural Indeed a 2025 Asan Institute poll found that three-quarters of South Koreans now favor acquiring their own nuclear arsenal to protect against North Korea’s threats And if Putin is able to advance his war aims by ordering a tactical nuclear strike on Ukraine other governments will likely conclude that they need their own nuclear shield THE END OF AN ERA In 1987, the historian John Lewis Gaddis
to that between the Congress of Vienna in 1815 and the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, and the decades after that until the outbreak of World War I in 1914 Gaddis argued that the foundation of this modern long peace was the Cold War In structural conditions that would in earlier eras almost certainly have led to a third world war the United States and the Soviet Union confronted each other with arsenals sufficient to withstand a nuclear strike and retaliate decisively Nuclear strategists described this as mutually assured destruction or MAD In addition to the establishment of the United Nations the UN Declaration of Human Rights, the multilateral arrangements that eventually developed into the European Union, and the fierce ideological dimension of the U S -Soviet rivalry, the central causal factor for peace Gaddis argued was the mutual judgment that systemic interests trumped ideological ones The Soviets hated capitalism and Americans rejected communism But their desire to prevent mutual destruction was more important As he explained, the moderation of ideologies must be considered, then along with nuclear deterrence and reconnaissance as a major self-regulating mechanism in post-war politics
As Gaddis recognized the world had split into two camps in which each superpower sought to attract allies and aligned countries around the globe The United States launched the Marshall Plan to rebuild Western Europe established the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to promote global development and pushed for the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade to set the rules of economic exchange to promote economic growth
The United States even abandoned its prior strategy of trying to avoid entangling alliances an idea that dates back to George Washington s presidency by embracing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and a treaty commitment to Japan It pursued any option available to build an international security order that could counter the threat of Soviet communism As one of us (Allison) explained in Foreign Affairs Had there been no Soviet threat there would have been no Marshall Plan and no NATO After the fall of the Soviet Union, in the early 1990s, triumphalists hailed a new unipolar era in which only the United States remained as a great power This new order would bring a peace dividend in which countries could flourish without worrying about great-power conflict The dominant narratives of the first two decades after the Soviet Union s collapse even declared the end of history ” In the words of the political scientist Francis Fukuyama, the world was witnessing “the end point of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government Using the example of McDonald s restaurants, Thomas Friedman s Golden Arches Theory of Con-
flict Prevention” argued that economic development and globalization would ensure an era of peace These ideas informed the U S invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq which left the United States bogged down in endless winless wars for two decades Creative diplomacy was also an essential strand in this chapter of the story The disintegration of the Soviet Union and the emergence of Russia and 14 newly independent Eastern European states should have meant a surge of nuclear-armed countries More than 12 600 nuclear weapons were left outside of Russia when the Soviet Union collapsed It took an extraordinary partnership between the United States and Russian leader Boris Yeltsin’s democratizing Russia funded by a cooperative denuclearization program spearheaded by U S Senators Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar to ensure that these weapons did not fall into the wrong hands By 1996, teams had removed every nuclear weapon from former Soviet territory and either returned them to Russia or dismantled them The geopolitical changes after the fall of the Soviet Union had reset U S relations with both its former adversaries and its growing challengers In 2009, when Barack Obama was inaugurated as U S president, both Russia and China were characterized as “strategic partners ” This remained the dominant view But by the time Donald Trump became U S president in 2017 the reality of an ambitious rapidly rising China and a resentful revanchist Russia led to the recognition that the United States had entered a new era of great-power competition DANGERS AHEAD Before his death in 2023 Henry Kissinger repeatedly reminded colleagues that he believed these eight decades of greatpower peace were unlikely to reach a full century Among the factors that history shows contribute to the violent end of a major geopolitical cycle, five stand out that could bring the ongoing long peace to a close
At the top of the list is amnesia Successive generations of American adults including every serving military officer have no personal memory of the horrible costs of a great-power war Few people recognize that, prior to this exceptional era of peace, a war in each generation or two was the norm
Many today believe that a great-power war is inconceivable failing to recognize that this is not a reflection of what is possible in the world but of the limits of what their minds can conceive
e e m i n e n c e , e c h o i n g t h e t y p e o f f i e r c e r i v a l r y b et w e e n a n e s t a b l i s h e d a n d a r i s i n g p o w e r t h a t t h e a n c i e n t G r e e k h i s t o r i a n T h u c yd i d e s w a r n e d w o u l d l e a d t o c o n f l i c t A t t h e b e g i n n i n g o f t h e t w e n t y - f i r s t c e n t u r y, t h e U n i t e d S t a t e s d i d n o t g i v e m u c h t h o u g h t t o c o m p e t i n g w i t h C h i n a , w h i c h w a s f a r b e h i n d e c o n o m i c a l l y m i l i t a r i l y a n d t e c h n o l o g i c a l l y N o w C h i n a h a s c a u g h t u p o r e v e n s u r p a s s e d t h e U n i t e d S t a t e s i n n u m e r o u s a r e a s i n c l u d i n g t r a d e , m a n u f a c t u r i n g , a n d g r e e n t e c hnologies, and is rapidly advancing in othe r s A t t h e s a m e t i m e , P u t i n , w h o p r e s i d e s o v e r a w e a k e n i n g c o u n t r y b u t s t i l l c o m m a n d s a n u c l e a r a r s e n a l c a p a b l e o f d e s t r o y i n g t h e U n i t e d S t a t e s h a s d e m o n s t r a t e d h i s r e a d i n e s s t o
forces in Iraq and Afghanistan and the military’s inability to focus on more pressing challenges Narrowly concentrating resources on these extended conflicts drew the United States attention away from improving its defense capabilities against increasingly sophisticated and more dangerous adversaries Of even greater concern is the extent to which the U S national security establishment has fallen into a vicious cycle supported by Congress and the defense industry in which it demands more means increased funding rather than looking for more strategic ways to address grave threats to its national interests Finally, and most concerning, the tendency of an established power to descend into bitter political divisions at
Mian abrar
SOUTHEAST ASIA FLOODS KILL AT LEAST 321 AS RESCUES AND RECOVERY EFFORTS INTENSIF Y
How to Increase Pace on Doc umented & D igitized Economy in Pakistan?
nearly
the system and limiting her access to credit A truck operator running an entire transport business in cash loses out on subsidies insurance and tax benefits that could come automatically through e-invoicing and digital payments These examples illustrate a national reality: most economic actors are not unwilling to comply they simply lack simple accessible systems that make compliance worth their time Accelerating digitization requires making financial tools userfriendly, multilingual, and widespread while simplifying tax filing promoting QR payments expanding instant payment platforms like RAAST and linking subsidies
and loans to documented economic activity Affordable POS systems, digital education in schools, and fully digitized land and property records would significantly reduce corruption and procedural delays Other countries have shown how fast this transformation can happen India s UPI now handles more than 13 billion transactions a month; Turkey digitized 95% of land records and integrated its national ID across tax and business systems; Brazil s Pix brought 140 million people into digital payments within three years; and Rwanda digitized 90% of its government-to-person payments In Pakistan responsibility rests with multiple stakeholders The government must create simple registration portals run awareness campaigns, and provide incentives for taxpayers, especially since only 18% of registered businesses can currently file digital taxes independently Banks and fintechs must design easy digital accounts and mobile apps in local languages addressing the needs of the 55 million unbanked adults Citizens, too, have a role to play: asking for receipts, choosing digital payments, and filing tax returns even when incomes are low The results of a fully documented and digitized economy would be transformative
SOHAIL MALIK
PEC Chairman, Sindh CS discuss ongoing reforms for strengthening engineering profession
Pakistan Engineering Council (PEC), Engr Waseem Nazir, called on Chief Secretary Sindh Syed Asif Haider Shah in Karachi to discuss ongoing reforms for strengthening the engineering profession in the province The Chairman briefed the Chief Secretary on PEC s initiatives including the Graduate Engineer Trainee (GET) Placement Program aimed at developing a skilled, industryready workforce The Chief Secretary appreciated PEC’s efforts and assured the provincial government’s full support for the program’s implementation in Sindh Matters relating to the Technical Allowance for engineers serving in Sindh also came under discussion, with the Chief Secretary assuring that the issue will be reviewed for an early resolution Expressing concern over quality lapses and reported instances of malpractice by some engineers the Chief Secretary emphasized the need for strict regulatory oversight
IGP orders toughest implementation of amended
Naqvi vows to end ‘unjust offloading’ of travellers with valid documents
Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi has pledged that
uine and complete documentation will be barred from travelling
addressing a rising
of complaints from passengers being offloaded at airports in recent months During a visit to Islamabad International Airport on Saturday the minister personally listened to the concerns of travelers and mandated immediate corrective actions at immigration counters He emphasized the need for a strict crackdown on visa agents who are reportedly exploiting citizens Naqvi confirmed he had taken “serious notice of a complaint lodged on
November 7 regarding insufficient staffing at immigration In response he has initiated an inquiry, which includes a thorough review of CCTV footage from the airport
“No passenger with genuine and complete documents should ever be stopped from travelling the interior minister stated on the social media platform X He clarified, however, that individuals attempting to travel with fake or unverified documents will not be allowed under any circumstances, as such actions damage Pakistan’s reputation ” Wa
futures of people for financial benefit
He declared that the government would exercise “zero tolerance” towards these
leader and former National Assembly speaker Asad Qaiser on Saturday said that it is not possible for the incumbent government to keep former prime minister Imran Khan in jail any more Talking to the media in Swabi the PTI stalwart asserted that meeting Imran Khan is our right He warned the government stating If the government were pushed to the wall and would not allow [us] to live, then you will not be able to live ”Asad Qaiser claimed that the government is no longer in a position to detain Imran Khan, adding that “if Imran Khan were harmed then no one will be able to pass life here He suggested that being released from custody is not an issue for Imran Khan implying that if Imran Khan were willing to compromise, he could be freed from jail The PTI leader maintained that his party members are not terrorists but “peace-loving people,” adding, “We have had enough of the wars; we are tired after lifting dead bodies again and again ” He concluded by saying that we can t afford any war and he demanded that peace must be given a chance In related development Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Political Affairs, Rana Sanaullah Speaking exclusively on a TV channel, said that protests inside the Senate have no connection to arrangements for prison meetings stressing that Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) must pursue its demands regarding Imran Khan through the proper legal forum rather than staging sitins outside Adiala Jail He said the issue of PTI s meeting requests with Imran Khan will continue until the party raises its grievances before the correct authority,” instead of trying to force outcomes through agitation He said sitting outside Adiala Jail in protest “will achieve nothing” and that PTI should present its concerns to the jail authorities and follow the law Rana Sanaullah questioned whether any court decision allows visitors to hold long press conferences after meeting the PTI founder, Imran Khan
illicit operations
The minister s intervention follows heightened scrutiny at airports as part of a nationwide campaign against migrant smuggling
This campaign was launched after the tragic Greece boat incident in 2023 where many Pakistani nationals lost their lives Since the crackdown began numerous reports have surfaced alleging that even passengers with valid travel papers were being prevented from boarding their flights
Naqvi vows stern action against fraudulent visa agents tarnishing national image Meanwhile Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi has directed law enforcement agencies to initiate a stringent crackdown on visa agents engaged in illicit activities, warning of severe conse-
quences for those who defraud unsuspecting citizens with false promises of overseas employment
The directive was issued Saturday during an unscheduled inspection at Islamabad International Airport where the minister addressed the growing problem of fraudulent travel schemes
Naqvi condemned what he described as an agent mafia, stating that these unscrupulous individuals, motivated by greed, are jeopardizing the futures of innocent people and causing significant damage to the country’s international standing
The Interior Minister also highlighted that individuals attempting to travel abroad using counterfeit documents or other illegal means are contributing to the tarnishing of the nation”s reputation
S upreme Cour t says state c annot esc ape duty to prevent c ustodial killings
The Supreme Court has reaffirmed that the state carries an unambiguous constitutional duty to protect the right to life of all citizens and prevent custodial violence, as it dismissed appeals filed by two Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) officials accused in a 2020 custodial death case The ruling authored by Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail in a seven-page judgment dated August 21 pertains to the killing of Zaryab Khan who was detained in Dera Ghazi Khan and later died in police custody Although the accused FIA officials were acquitted by a criminal court, they were dismissed from s e
Court has now upheld “The Constitution imposes a duty upon the State to protect the right to life of every citizen and to prevent custodial violence and killings the judgment states underscoring that the right to life is recognised globally as the supreme human right codified across major human rights treaties Justice Mandokhail stressed that constitutional guarantees against illegal detention, torture, brutality and extrajudicial killings are foundational and “neither encouraged nor justified under any circum-
stances Torture or any form of degrading treatment, he wrote, is incompatible with human dignity and the rule of law The court observed that torture is sometimes employed as a means of achieving “extrajudicial killings by the police presuming de facto impunity
To counter this pattern the judge said Pakistan urgently needs an effective dedicated external oversight mechanism for police accountability
Citing international standards including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the ruling emphasised that every individual is entitled to liberty security and protection from torture and degrading treatment
Domestically Articles 4 10 and 14 of the Constitution collectively ensure that no person may be harmed detained or treated inhumanely except strictly in accordance with the law Justice Mandokhail noted that the police, as custodians of law, are bound to uphold these guarantees and protect the dignity and liberty of citizens Any violation of due process by state officials he wrote not only breaches fundamental rights but also constitutes a criminal offence and misconduct
The court held that the officials involved in Zaryab Khan s illegal detention and torture committed misuse of authority amounting to grave misconduct under the Civil Servants (Efficiency and Discipline) Rules, 1975
Pakistan pledges suppor t to Sri Lanka amid deadly floods and landslides
PTI to hold protest outside IHC after repeated denial of
SC upholds wife’s right to withdraw divorce under delegated powers
contended that ongoing custody proceedings in New York demonstrated mala fide intent but the Supreme Court rejected this argument clarifying that foreign litigation had no bearing on the revocation s legality under Pakistani law The bench affirmed that the only relevant consideration was whether the withdrawal occurred within the prescribed
ISLAMABAD