These releases are in addition to 26 Taliban detainees freed last year by Pakistan.
A UN Security Council report states that The Resistance Front (TRF) claimed responsibility for the Pahalgam terror attack and published a photograph of the attack site. The report also cites assertions that the attack could not have happened without the support of Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LeT).
Former Indian ambassadors urge New Delhi to closely monitor the unfolding political crisis in Nepal, citing regional instability and potential implications for India's interests.
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.
Pakistan is "in an active counterterrorism fight right now and they have been a phenomenal partner in the counterterrorism world", the general said.
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.
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.'
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.
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.
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).
'Trump will absolutely back New Delhi on its position that Pakistan must do more to crack down on terrorists that threaten India.'
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.
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.
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.
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).
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.
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.
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.
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
'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.'
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.
The Taliban knows that Washington holds the key, points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
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.
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.
Pakistan has too much at stake to allow even an iota of rapprochement between India and the Taliban, says Vivek Gumaste.
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.
Pakistan would want to take full advantage of the situation to direct Taliban trained terrorists into the Kashmir Valley, alert Lieutenant General Ashok Joshi (retd) and Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'This strike has certainly enhanced your image.' 'Otherwise, people would have called you a damp squib, capable of doing nothing except talking big.'
'I can see the world's concern. I am concerned. I have daughters who play cricket.'
Ahmed Shah Massoud's assassination, 9/11 and the defeat and ejection of the Taliban suggested a break in Afghanistan's history, but the events of August 2021 and the Taliban's return shows how deeper continuities remained in place, points out T C A Raghavan, former Indian high commissioner to Pakistan.
The maiden meeting between the Pakistan government and a Taliban-nominated committee to frame a roadmap for peace talks was postponed on Tuesday, with representatives of the banned group claiming state negotiators had pulled out under "pressure".
"Our role (in the Afghan peace process) will remain that of a facilitator and not a leader... allowing the Taliban to open an office in Pakistan will be contrary to our principled position," Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was quoted as saying by an unnamed aide.
Though the Taliban have mercilessly targeted CIA's spies, locals living in the desperately poor border region between Afghanistan and Pakistan still provide information to the American agency to earn some money, reports Tahir Ali
Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik has rejected offer of a ceasefire by the Taliban. The Pakistani Taliban's spokesman outlined conditions for a ceasefire, which said the country must stop its involvement in the war pitting Afghan insurgents against the Kabul government and refocus on a 'war of revenge' against India.
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.
