Increasing intolerance towards minorities By: Zafar Aziz Chaudhry on May 12, 2021Earlier this month, a group of Muslim nurses took over a chapel within the grounds of the Punjab Institute of Mental Health. Their sole objective was to raze it and turn it into a mosque. They reportedly began reciting Islamic prayers while threatening their Christian counterparts with (false) charges of blasphemy unless they converted to […]
Firdous-Sonia scuffle and rule of law By: Naveed Aman Khan on May 12, 2021Earlier this month, the special assistant to the Chief Minister Punjab on Information and Culture created a ruckus when she visited a Ramzan bazar in Sialkot. Firdous Ashiq Awan was caught on camera publicly admonishing Assistant Commissioner Sialkot Sonia Sadaf over over the standard of produce being sold. The video went viral and many politicians […]
Continuum of certainty and uncertainty By: Iftikhar Ahmad on May 12, 2021Love and life are born and reborn. Life without sophistication, and culture is no life in the real sense. Rather, it is living at the crossroads of emptiness, torture, within a continuous environment of bigotry and violence. To establish order in society we a need strategy to defuse violence and to create a dynamic balance […]
Has the US killed the peace process? By: Zafar Iqbal Yousafzai on May 12, 2021Afghanistan’s sputtering peace process effectively stalled following President Biden’s announcement of a delayed timetable for US troop withdrawal from the country. And while he failed to acknowledge that this revision violated the US-Taliban Doha agreement — the Taliban, nevertheless, responded by announcing a boycott of all peace talks. Indeed, the Istanbul process scheduled for April […]
Re-setting Pak-Saudi relations? By: Dr Tahir Ashraf on May 11, 2021Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan has just returned from a three-day visit to Saudi Arabia, at the invitation of Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman (MBS). The two countries share a long and historic fraternal relationship. Not least when King Abdullah provided oil to Pakistan for free and on credit to ease the burden of […]
Fallout of US-NATO troops’ drawdown with no peace deal By: Munir Ahmed on May 11, 2021The unilateral decision to drawdown US and NATO troops from Afghanistan was not entirely anticipated by other parties and stakeholders to the decades-old conflict. Even more disconcerting is that this process began on May 1 when the US vacated Kandahar Airfield (KAF), the primary target of Taliban attacks since 2001; sparking clashes between Afghan forces […]
A spiritual journey By: Wardella Doschek on May 11, 2021The entire world is under duress. A global pandemic continues to rage while animosity and misunderstanding towards the “other” are on the rise globally. It is against this backdrop that I would like to share my personal journey; the one that brought me into Islam’s fold. First things first. Wardella Alice Wolford is my maiden […]
Climbing broken ladders By: Mahum Kidwai on May 11, 2021“It isn’t for women”. This is a line is all too familiar to many young women and girls, who are raised to believe that certain career paths just ‘aren’t suitable’ for them. They are taught at a tender age to colour their lives pink while basking in the fantasy of wedding days and magical recipes; […]
Tiny dictators By: Yasser Latif Hamdani on May 10, 2021As a US-returned young Pakistani who got caught up in law I had this unshakeable faith in democracy and civilian constitutional rule. It was because of this feeling that one supported the lawyers’ movement and eventual ouster of the dictator but what do we have to show for it. A hybrid system less transparent that […]
Pakistan should not revert to its 1948 Kashmir policy By: Dr Syed Nazir Gilani on May 10, 2021From a gross and systematic abuse of human rights in Kashmir (Indian occupied), Indian atrocities progressed into the use of pellet guns to maim and blind. India has turned to a new and very sinister policy of using the prisons to kill the Kashmiri leadership. Covid Pandemic provides the best cover to conceal the crime. […]