India-US relations, like Rome, were not built in a day, nor can they be demolished in a day.
All said and done, when the new global order emerges, India can only remain with the democracies, asserts Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
The Pakistan Taliban is rapidly making inroads into the Punjab province despite contradictory claims by the Shahbaz Sharif government.
These releases are in addition to 26 Taliban detainees freed last year by Pakistan.
The Taliban will view India through the eyes of the ISI and can be relied upon to undertake hostile actions against this country, warns Virendra Kapoor.
Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, the spokesperson for the Pakistan Army, is the son of a nuclear scientist who was sanctioned by the United Nations and the US for providing information and expertise to al-Qaeda, according to Indian officials. Chaudhry's father, Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood, allegedly provided insights into nuclear weapons infrastructure and raised funds for a fundamentalist organization linked to the Taliban. Mahmood was arrested in 2001 after admitting to meeting Osama bin Laden but was later released.
Asim Malik's shift to the important DG, ISI post comes as something of a surprise now, but it indicates the army chief's confidence in him, notes Rana Banerji, who headed the Pakistan desk at RA&W.
Pakistan's national flag carrier on Thursday suspended flight operations to Afghanistan due to what it called "security concerns", hours after the Taliban government threatened to ban the airline unless it reduced the fare on the Kabul-Islamabad route to previous levels.
'Trump will absolutely back New Delhi on its position that Pakistan must do more to crack down on terrorists that threaten India.'
Although the United States have denied confirmation, but it's apparent that Tehrik-e-Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud has been killed in a recent US drone attack in South Waziristan, Pakistan. Mehsud's death signifies tremendous implications, and was possibly a result of intelligence penetration. Explains security expert B Raman
'It will remain hostile to Indian interests owing to its close proximity to China.'
In the wake of the recent hostilities, both sides have moved from weapons to words, with India dispatching several delegations to visit more than 30 capitals across the world. A similar effort by Pakistan is set to start on Jun 2.
Top military officials from India and Pakistan highlighted their views at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, billed as Asia's premier defence forum, amid heightened tensions between the two sides following last month's military confrontation.
The Taliban's rise will see an increase in infiltration on India's western border and terrorist groups in Pakistan will get funding from the Taliban, warns Brigadier Rajamani Kannan (retd).
'The struggle of insurgents and pro-independence political activists is fuelled by a deep conviction that not only is a free Balochistan possible, but they also believe that Pakistan will inevitably break apart, leading to Balochistan's independence.'
Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan chief Hakimullah Mehsud and three others were killed in the US drone attack in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal area near the Afghan border on Friday.
A delegation led by J P Singh, joint secretary (Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran) at the ministry of external affairs, visited Kabul on Thursday, June 2, 2022, to to survey Indian developmental projects in Afghanistan.
Pakistan, in recent months, has been increasingly frustrated by the Taliban government's reluctance to eliminate the terrorist groups, including the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).
'This strike has certainly enhanced your image.' 'Otherwise, people would have called you a damp squib, capable of doing nothing except talking big.'
But why should India be talking to the Taliban in the first place? There is no love lost there. India will never forget or forgive the humiliation to which the Taliban subjected it in the IC-814 hijack, notes Shekhar Gupta.
Pakistan's Taliban leader Maulana Sufi Mohammed has indicated that Tehrik Nifaz Shariat-e-Mohammedi, which signed a peace deal with Pakistan government in restive Swat region, would not wage a struggle for Kashmiris.
It is important for India to pay close attention to both the tone and substance of authoritative remarks coming out of Pakistan, explains former foreign secretary Shyam Saran.
'I can see the world's concern. I am concerned. I have daughters who play cricket.'
Pakistani Taliban militants based in Afghanistan have threatened fresh attacks in Pakistan that will target anyone supporting the United States and promoting American interests in the region.
Pakistan was waiting for an opportunity to bring the Jammu and Kashmir issue to the global agenda and resorted to the terrorism route to provoke India, observes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
'We are too important to want to be paired with Pakistan but too intensely connected to it to successfully detach ourselves,' asserts Aakar Patel.
'Every decision India makes along the LoC, it must also consider implications along the LAC.'
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has held both India and Pakistan responsible for the 'unrest in Kashmir' and has vowed to liberate and establish Islamic Shariah there.
'We've moved from thousands killed yearly in Jammu and Kashmir to 127 last year.' 'Cross-border terrorism in Kashmir is being solved. We are winning it.'
While the United States has already shown dissatisfaction over Pakistan's claims that Dr Shakil Afridi, the Pakistani physician who helped the Central Intelligence Agency track down and kill Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, had relation with militants, the Pakistan Taliban have not only rejected the reports of any links with him, but has also said that the imprisoned doctor is 'wajib-ul-qatal' (one that deserve death penalty), as he helped the US to kill bin Laden
A senior Afghan interim government official on Monday confirmed that strikes in the Afghanistan provinces of Paktika and Khost along the Pakistan border have taken place.
The Taliban knows that Washington holds the key, points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan chief Hakimullah Mehsud has warned that his fighters were planning orchestrated attacks against the government and the military to wrest control of areas that they had lost in the country's northwest.
Pakistan on Tuesday said it had freed 26 Afghan Taliban prisoners, including former ministers Mullah Nooruddin Turabi and Maulvi Allah Dad, since last month as part of its efforts to give impetus to the reconciliation process in Afghanistan.
Pakistan has too much at stake to allow even an iota of rapprochement between India and the Taliban, says Vivek Gumaste.
'It was such a joy for me to return there today -- after 13 long years -- to be surrounded by the mountains, dip my hands in the cold river and laugh with my beloved cousins.'
'Pakistan's only concern has been while they were on the FATF watch list was to distance their State institutions and organs from any direct connection with the actual execution of militancy inside Kashmir.'
New Tehrik-e-Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud surfaced on Monday and vowed to strike United States and Pakistani interests -- to avenge the killing of his slain leader Baitullah Mehsud and American drone attacks on the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan. His appearance in front of a select group of reporters in the South Waziristan tribal area ended speculation over his reported death in a contest for leadership of the Pakistan Taliban, sparked by Baitullah's killing.
'India won't take anything from Pakistan lying down.'
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said the 2008 Mumbai terror attack marked a turning point in relations with Pakistan when Indians collectively felt that such behaviour from a neighbouring country could no longer be tolerated. Speaking at Charotar University of Science and Technology, Jaishankar acknowledged India's transformation under Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the last decade, while Pakistan has remained unchanged, continuing with what he termed as its "bad habits."
'It is high time that the 'war on terror' is removed from our diplomatic toolbox.' 'Certainly, our parliamentarians have no role in it,' asserts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
