By Yvonne Ridley The only thing that surprised me when I heard that the Algerian kidnappers had called for the release of  Dr Aafia Siddiqui was that it hadn’t happened sooner. Don’t get me wrong, as a former hostage myself, there is no way I condone the actions of what has unfolded in a remote corner of the Algerian desert. And my heart goes out to the families of those who have lost loved ones in the unfo ...

By Sajjad Shaukat After signing of the Islamabad Long March Declaration by the representatives of the coalition government and Dr Muhammad Tahirul Qadri, the chief of Tehrik-e-Minhaj-ul-Quran (TMQ) and Pakistan Awami Tehrik (PAT) on January 17, this year, the five days episode was ended, which started from Lahore on January 13, and continued at the D-Chowk of the federal Capital where thousands of persons c ...

By Zaheerul Hassan On 16 January 2012, Director General of Military Operations (DGMOs) of Pakistan and India established contact with each other on hotline and decided to tone down the tension between the deployed troops on Line of Communication (LoC). Meanwhile Hina Rabbani Kher, Foreign Minister of Pakistan has also spoken to her Indian counterpart to play his positive role for reduction of tension on Kas ...

By Felicity Arbuthnot It is the first genocide of the 21th century. Poor Iraq and Iraqis. The silence of the world pushes me to lose faith in humanity. – Anonymous Incredibly it is twenty two years to the day since the telephone rang in the early hours and a friend said: “They are bombing Baghdad.” It was not alone Baghdad, of course, Iraq was being systematically destroyed, from ancient southern Basra to h ...

By: Shahid Aziz Kargil, like every other meaningless war that we have fought, brings home lessons we continue to refuse to learn. Instead, we proudly call it our history written in the blood of our children. Indeed, our children penning down our misdeeds with their blood! Medals for some, few songs, a cross road renamed, and of course annual remembrance day and a memorial for those who sacrificed their tomo ...

Professor Ali Sukhanver A few weeks back the Pakistan army published its new Green Book which identified internal insurgent forces as the country’s principal national security threat. The book also indicated a shift of concentration of the Pakistan army from Eastern borders to the western front. This doctrinal change was warmly welcomed by various sections of the national and the international society and i ...

Asif Haroon Raja In order to hide their crimes and to distort historical facts, Indian historians and political leaders have chosen to paint Quaid-e-Azam as the ‘villain of the piece’. The Indians propagate the theme that ‘Muhammad Ali Jinnah was a communalist responsible for the bloody break up of Pakistan. He founded a theocratic and non-secular State’. The BJP and other Hindu hardliners even now accuse h ...

By Zaheerul Hassan Top military commanders of India and Pakistan on16 Jaunary 2012 agreed not to allow escalation of tensions along the Line of Control (LoC) with the Pakistan Army asking its troops to observe ceasefire strictly and exercise restraint. The ways to defuse the tension on the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir, which was triggered by the killing of initially one and later on two Pakistani soldiers by th ...