Iran’s accusation that the United States violated the April 8 ceasefire after fresh American strikes in Hormozgan has complicated an already fragile peace push, even as Secretary of State Marco Rubio says negotiators may need “a few days” to settle the language of an initial framework. The American position is that the strikes were defensive, […]
Gunman killed after opening fire near White House
A suspected gunman was shot dead by US Secret Service officers on Saturday evening after he opened fire near a White House security checkpoint, wounding a bystander and briefly placing the presidential complex under lockdown, security officials said. The shooting took place shortly after 6 pm near 17th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, a busy […]
Iran Talks Enter Decisive Phase as Pakistan Emerges Key Backchannel
The United States and Iran are said to have agreed in principle to a framework that could wind down the Middle East war by reopening the Strait of Hormuz and committing Tehran to dispose of its highly enriched uranium, a senior US official told reporters on Sunday. Another American official went further, saying Washington believed […]
Pakistan honours the Aga Khan family. It should learn from them, too.
When Pakistan’s Senate rose on Friday to honour the Aga Khan family, it was doing more than greeting Prince Rahim al-Hussaini Aga Khan V on his first official visit since becoming the spiritual leader of the Ismaili Muslim community. It was acknowledging a relationship that has lived through Pakistan’s politics, disasters and quiet acts of […]
Bangladesh shifts civil servant training from Mussoorie to Lahore
The sight of 12 senior Bangladeshi civil servants walking into Pakistan’s Civil Services Academy in Lahore this month was bound to travel beyond the gates of a training institution. One additional secretary and 11 joint secretaries from Dhaka attended what officials describe as the first such institutional exchange in more than five decades: a three-week […]
Trump’s Beijing Bargain: What Xi Gave Him, and What China Kept
At first glance, it had the staging of an old wartime rendezvous: two leaders moving through guarded grounds, the cameras held at a careful distance, the gardens doing the work of diplomacy before the documents could. One could almost imagine a distant echo of Roosevelt and Churchill, except that this was not an alliance being […]
Pakistan’s Peace Role Faces NarrativeTest
Pakistan’s rejection of the CBS News report about Iranian aircraft at Nur Khan Airbase has pushed Islamabad’s mediation role into the centre of a manufactured controversy, with officials and analysts arguing that ordinary ceasefire logistics are being distorted to cast doubt on a country that has kept a difficult US-Iran diplomatic channel open when others […]
IMF tranche buys time as Iran war tests Pakistan’s reform claims
Pakistan has secured another IMF tranche at a moment when the country badly needs reassurance, and the approval confirms that stabilisation has moved from promise to measurable compliance. The Fund’s board has cleared immediate access to about $1.32 billion, including around $1.1 billion under the Extended Fund Facility and about $220 million under the Resilience […]
The Long Night of Marka-e-Haq
With repeated chants of “Pakistan Zindabad” rolling through Jamshed Marker Hall for nearly three hours this Friday, the Pakistan Embassy in Washington briefly ceased to look like a diplomatic mission and became something closer to a national courtyard: crowded, loud, restless, emotional, defiant, and alive with the old ache of belonging. The ceremony had been […]
World comes alive on Washington’s embassy row as Pakistan draws thousands
The sound of dhol could be heard before the gates of the Pakistan Embassy came into view, cutting through the usual quiet of International Drive as thousands of visitors poured into Washington’s diplomatic enclave on Saturday for the annual Passport DC “Around the World Embassy Tour.” By noon, the street had the bustle of a […]