Zafar Hilaly

It is not brass hats but brass heads that are a danger to Pakistan. It is another matter that our brass hats have brass heads and, along with hatless and (real) hairless politicos, are equally responsible for the plight of this country. But then they are all that we have unless, of course, one turns […]

One has the unmistakable feeling that if Mr Zardari had not been born Asif Zardari he would have liked to be an Asif Zardari. Think of the advantages. For a start, his adversaries expect the worst of him and all he has to do to come out ahead is not oblige. Nor does he have […]

Better-known Pakistan watchers like Stephen Cohen give Pakistan, at best, another six years before it disintegrates. The Indians are already celebrating our impending demise and do not really think we are worth engaging any longer. Manmohan Singh recently stated that “it is wishful thinking” to hope for improved relations, in a conversation with a columnist […]

Every evening in Karachi we hear bursts of gunfire. We sleep armed behind locked doors with guards and guard dogs patrolling the ‘moat’, which separates the house from the street. ‘Brinks’ alarms and ‘panic’ buttons in each room add not to the sense of security, but rather the contrary. Police patrols pass by now and […]

This time it is not in the jungles of Vietnam but the hills of the Hindu Kush that the Americans are likely to meet their Waterloo. Like in Vietnam, where they won all the battles but lost the war, so too in Afghanistan, the writing is on the wall. What was accomplished by a few […]