May 11, 2013 marks my maiden successful attempt at exercising my adult franchise voting rights. My earlier two efforts in 2002 and 2007 were in vain as despite having registered in a particular polling station, I was informed on my arrival that my name was mysteriously missing from the list. Violence, threats and voter intimidations…
The JF-17 thunder jet fighter is likely to be PAF’s front line combat aircraft for decades to come. Many other countries around the world are keen to testing and buying Joint Fighter JF-17 Thunder fighter jet for their air forces. Developed and manufactured jointly by Pakistan and China, this well designed fighter aircraft has been…
Pak-Afghan relations have an interesting dynamics; just when there is a feeler of improvement, they nosedive into another crisis. Nonetheless, it is encouraging that soon after each crisis, both Islamabad and Kabul resume taking measured steps to bring the ties back on track. Latest rupture came last month when Afghanistan’s presidential spokesperson Aimal Faizi said…
Similar to other Islamists in the several parts of the Muslim world, Pakistani Islamists have also used intolerant and exclusivist rhetoric. They have abused religion in a heavy-handed manner as the dominating tool of their political ideology and have confined religious concepts and values to certain parties and groups, nationalizing, modernizing, Islamizing and politicizing them….
Regard your soldiers as your children, and they will follow you into the deepest valleys; look on them as your own beloved sons, and they will stand by you even unto death. Sun Tzu. Yaum-e-Shuhada is being observed throughout Pakistan on April 30. The purpose of observing this day is that Pakistanis as a nation…
After over sixty six years of independence, some people still raise the fundamental question: Why was Pakistan created? Muslims and Hindus lived in India for centuries relatively peacefully. However despite many cultural, social commonalties both maintained their distinct identity. Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah initially joined Congress and was known as ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity, but…
“A shrewd person sees trouble coming and avoids it; The ignorant walk right into it and pay the price.” King Solomon son of King David Several countries of the Middle East have seen dramatic changes in the last two years; this has changed the strategic environment of Israel. On April 28, 2013, the Jerusalem Post…
Drone is a milder terminology used for the ‘Unarmed Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAV) being employed by the CIA and other clandestine troops on behalf of American Department of Defence. One wonders whether this class of undeclared combatants are covered by the UN mandate that authorised the use of military force in Afghanistan. Surely, there is…
Terrorism is not a new phenomenon. It has had been terrifying the state and people alike around the world in the past. Vested socio-economic, geo-political and geo-strategic conflicting interests have been the main reasons of this menace. It has been projected as struggle between the virtue and vice. It has been persisted battlefield between dragons…
Other than the “electables” of the feudal kind, every Province has its own ethnic, racial and sectarian electoral dynamics, our extremely defective “first past the post” system force-multiplies the problems of governance. Out of the nearly 35 million cast in 2008 (out of nearly 85 million) PPP got a little more than 10 million i.e….
