Pakistan - Page 16

Tensions between nuclear-armed regional foes New Delhi and Islamabad have intensified in recent days, triggering more deadly clashes in the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir and prompting the Indian Air Force to scramble its warplanes to tackle four jets flown by Pakistan near their mutual border.

MPs are debating whether to raise the legal age of marriage in the United Kingdom in order to try and tackle the problem of forced marriages. The current legal age of marriage is 18 but 16- and 17-year-olds can get married with their parents’ permission.

China and its all-weather ally Pakistan are reportedly furious with the United States for pushing a draft resolution this week to outlaw the Pakistan leader of an anti-India U.S.-designated terrorist group directly to the United Nations Security Council, bypassing established procedures.

A dispute erupted on Twitter this week between rival neighbors Pakistan and Afghanistan over U.S.-led peace talks with the Taliban, prompting the Pakistani minister for human rights to dismiss the American ambassador in Kabul as “little pigmy.” 

Politicians in northwestern Pakistan have denounced the women’s marches that took place around the country earlier this month as “anti-Islamic,” after people took to the streets to celebrate International Women’s Day.

A top Indian official on Tuesday suggested New Delhi is planning to take more military action against Pakistan in retaliation for the terrorist attack in the disputed region of Kashmir controlled by India that triggered reciprocal air operations by the two nuclear-armed neighbors earlier this year and prompted concerns of another war between the two rivals.

A Pentecostal Christian with a mental disability was beaten up by a Muslim crowd in Pakistan last week, after a neighbor accused him of blasphemy against the prophet Muhammad.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration is expected to tell Saudi Arabia’s top diplomat during his visit to New Delhi on Monday that the recent crackdown by the Sunni kingdom’s ally Pakistan against its domestic Islamic extremists remains “inadequate,” the Economic Times (ET) reports.

China argued on Friday that it played a “constructive role” in de-escalating simmering tensions between nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan that last week triggered concerns of another war between the two neighbors over the disputed Muslim-majority region of Kashmir, home to competing territorial claims by Beijing, Islamabad, and New Delhi.

Widespread support for terrorist groups across Pakistan is complicating a government-led crackdown against militants in the wake of a military stand-off with India over the recent suicide attack in Kashmir. 

Pakistan is beginning to combat terrorist havens on its soil after years of refusing to do so, a top U.S. commander told lawmakers on Thursday as Islamabad intensified its efforts against banned domestic Islamic extremist groups, seizing 182 religious schools and arresting more than 100 suspected terrorists.

The government of Pakistan announced on Tuesday it has commenced a promised crackdown on Islamist militants, detaining dozens of suspects – including members of the group that attacked an Indian convoy last month – and implementing policies that should make it easier to seize the assets of banned organizations. Indian officials expressed skepticism that this crackdown will be more effective than any of Pakistan’s previous efforts to control terrorism after intense international pressure.

Comedian Trevor Noah apologized over the weekend after he was accused of racism on social media after he offensively mocked an Indian accent.

The U.S. is reportedly trying to verify New Delhi’s claim that Pakistan used American-made F-16 jets to shoot down an Indian warplane over the disputed Kashmir region last week, potentially marking a violation of United States military sales restrictions, the U.S. embassy in Islamabad revealed on Sunday.

The Pakistani government has pledged to take crack down on the various militant groups operating across the country following a military escalation with India over violence in the disputed area of Kashmir.

If nothing else comes of it, the latest round of Pakistani aggression against India served as yet another signal to the U.S. that the time has come to cut its losses and walk away from Afghanistan.

Twitter has been warning users from around the world, including conservative writer and commentator Michelle Malkin, that their posts on the platform violate Pakistan’s Sharia law, and that they “may wish to consult legal counsel.”

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said on Thursday that he would release a captured Indian jet fighter pilot in a bid to reduce tensions between the two nations over the disputed border region of Kashmir.

Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States Asad Khan on Wednesday warned that the most-serious clashes in decades between nuclear-armed neighbors and regional rivals New Delhi and Islamabad in the disputed Muslim-majority region of Kashmir could escalate further, telling Breitbart News, “We don’t want to have war,” but will strike back if necessary.

A Pakistan-India war would lead to a refugee crisis in the tens of millions. We know this because even without the handy excuse of a war, migrants from Pakistan and India are already being smuggled into Europe via the Balkan route.

The conflict between India and Pakistan in Kashmir apparently escalated significantly overnight, as Pakistan claims it shot down two Indian warplanes, captured two pilots, and conducted six airstrikes against ground targets on the Indian side of the Line of Control (LOC). As with Tuesday’s Indian airstrikes on Pakistani territory, both sides dispute many of the details of these aerial engagements.

Indian warplanes struck what India described as a “terror training camp” in Pakistani territory in the early hours of Tuesday morning, moving the nuclear nations closer to a military confrontation.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) met with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Friday, capping a tour of Asia that was widely seen as the Saudis “pivoting to the East” after losing Western friends over the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. MBS also visited India and Pakistan on his way to China.

A Chinese corporation in a statement on Wednesday dismissed Islamabad’s accusation of corruption in connection to one of the largest transportation infrastructure projects in Pakistan under Beijing’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) as “groundless.”

The United Nations-backed Global Polio Eradication Initiative attributed a recent resurgence of the potentially deadly disease in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region, home to the one the debilitating virus’ last remaining bastions in the world, to the “unchecked” flow of people across their mutual border, the Guardian reported Wednesday.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, in remarks to reporters in India on Wednesday, described terrorism and extremism as a common threat and offered intelligence sharing and other cooperation with India in combating the menace.

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan on Tuesday cautioned fellow nuclear power India against taking any action over the deadly attack in Kashmir, telling India he is willing to act if it can provide “actionable evidence” that Islamabad was behind the attack.

Troops from India and its regional rival China appear to be preparing for potential consequences from a possible U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan stemming from peace negotiations between the Taliban and the United States, some news outlets revealed this week.

Croatian police have discovered several dozen migrants hidden in a truck and detained two suspected people smugglers.

American taxpayers are continuing to fund border security measures and border walls in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Egypt, and Lebanon with President Trump’s signing of a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spending bill. 

In the context of the western demographic crisis and the booming developing world, free trade creates an incentive for corporate cooperation with authoritarian societies.

India accused its fellow nuclear power Pakistan of being behind a terrorist suicide bomb attack in Kashmir that killed at least 44 Indian security officers on Thursday, reportedly marking the deadliest attack in the disputed region in decades.

Pakistan confirmed on Thursday that it would host the next round of peace talks between the Afghan Taliban and the United States on February 18 as part of efforts by U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration to end the more than 17-year-old war with a political settlement.

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) in Muslim-majority Pakistan on Tuesday sustained its decision to outlaw Valentine’s Day celebrations and the promotion of the February 14 Christian holiday across the country, ordering authorities to take action on revelers.

On February 14, 1989 Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini called for British writer Salman Rushdie to be killed for writing “The Satanic Verses”, which the cleric said insulted Islam.

A prominent Muslim cleric has defended Pakistan’s harsh blasphemy laws, insisting that they actually have saved the lives of “thousands” of people from public lynching.