Simranjit Singh Mann Interview Patiala ...

By David Ignatius The Iran nuclear negotiations may not be headed toward a dead end in Moscow next week, as feared. Iran’s top negotiator has said he is ready to “engage on the proposal” from Western nations for Iran to export its supply of 20 percent-enriched uranium as a first step toward a broader nuclear deal. Saeed Jalili, the Iranian chief representative in the talks, made the comment in a phone conve ...

More than 70 people are feared to have been killed in Afghanistan after a landslide triggered by a double earthquake buried homes under earth and rock, officials said Tuesday. Two shallow quakes less than half an hour apart shook the mountainous Hindu Kush region on Monday, starting a slide of debris that smashed into a remote village, burying mudbrick houses to a depth of up to 100 metres (300 feet). In Bu ...

In a move that may rattle India’s neighbours, the Indian Air Force (IAF) has decided to convert the Kargil airstrip into a full-fledged air force base by 2016. The strip lies close to the Line of Control (LoC) with Pakistan. The IAF is planning to operate medium, heavy-lift and combat aircrafts from Kargil in the near future. The Kargil War of 1999 saw significant shelling and damage to the airstrip, and co ...

By Shaiq Hussain A three-member judicial commission has concluded that Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s former ambassador to the United States, was behind a memo indirectly sent to a senior U.S. military official last year seeking Washington’s help in averting a military coup. The report, submitted to Pakistan’s Supreme Court for review, found that Haqqani was “not loyal” to the Pakistani state while serving as i ...

Last week, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen announced that NATO had inked a deal to move its equipment and vehicles out of Afghanistan via the so-called “Northern Distribution Network,” or NDN. NATO thinks this northern evacuation route gives them a way to wind down the war without having to rely on Pakistan. NATO is overselling this new deal. While the NDN certainly lessens the need for Pakista ...

Asif Haroon Raja [caption id="attachment_1569" align="alignright" width="221" caption="Pak-US Relations"][/caption] The US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta has emerged as the chief basher of Pakistan. He has been spewing venom against Pakistan from the time he took over as Director CIA. He was the one who advocated making drone as a choice weapon in war on terror and in accelerating drone war in Pakistan sinc ...

Momina Ashier A significant increase in the recent Pakistani defense budget is greatly in focus. The argument raised by various groups of society criticizes the leadership approach towards the model of guns and butter. If we scrutinize defense budgets of other states, a striking increase in the defense budgets can be seen all around the world due to an increase in traditional and non-traditional security co ...