Kashmir is the northernmost geographical region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term "Kashmir" denoted only the Kashmir Valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal Range. The term has since come to encompass a larger area that includes the India-administered territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, the Pakistan-administered territories of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan, and the Chinese-administered territories of Aksai Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract.
The Islamic Republic of Pakistan emerged as an independent country through the partition of India in August 1947 and was admitted as a United Nations member state in September 1947. It is currently the second-largest country within the Muslim world in terms of population, and is also the only Muslim-majority country in possession of nuclear weapons. De facto, the country shares direct land borders with India, Iran, Afghanistan, and China.
Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri, is a Pakistani politician and writer who served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan between November 2002 until November 2007. He is the Senior Advisor on Political and International Affairs and Chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's Task Force on Kashmir and a member of the Core Committee of the Party. He is also the author of 'Neither a Hawk Nor a Dove'.
Kasur is a city to the south of Lahore, in the Pakistani province of Punjab. The city serves as the headquarters of Kasur District. Kasur is the 16th largest city in Punjab and 24th largest in Pakistan, by population. It is also known for being the burial place of the 17th-century Sufi-poet Bulleh Shah. It is farther west of the border with neighboring India, and bordered to Lahore, Sheikhupura and Okara Districts of Punjab. The city is an aggregation of 26 fortified hamlets overlooking the alluvial valleys of the Beas and Sutlej rivers.
Operation Gibraltar was the codename of a military operation planned and executed by the Pakistan Army in the territory of Jammu and Kashmir, India in August 1965. The operation's strategy was to covertly cross the Line of Control (LoC) and incite the Muslim-majority Kashmiri population's uprising against the Indian Government. The military leadership believed that a rebellion by the local Kashmiri population against Indian authorities would serve as Pakistan's casus belli against India on the international stage.
The Pakistan Institute of International Affairs (PIIA) is a non-profit, non-governmental organization based in Karachi whose mission is to analyse and promote the understanding of major international issues and current affairs.
Khurshid Hasan Khurshid (Urdu: خورشید حسن خورشید) pronounced [xu:r'ʃi:d ɦəsəɳ xu:r'ʃi:d], popularly known by his acronym, K. H. Khurshid, was the Private Secretary of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the first Governor-General of Pakistan. He served Jinnah from 1944 until his death in 1948. Khurshid was the first elected President of Azad Jammu and Kashmir from 1959 to 1964. He was also the instigator of the Constitution of Azad Kashmir.
Sardar Asif Ahmad Ali Daula was a Pakistani politician who served as the 18th Foreign Minister of Pakistan from 1993 to 1996. He was a senior member of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf and Pakistan Peoples Party. On 25 December 2011, he joined PTI but resigned when party awarded Khurshid Kasuri National Assembly ticket instead of him. He was elected to the National Assembly of Pakistan from Kasur in 1994 and again in 2008 by an impressive margin of ten thousand votes. He has also served as the Minister for Education and Federal Minister of Information Technology and Telecommunication between 2008 and 2010. He rejoined Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf on 10 November 2017 during a press conference with Imran Khan in Lahore.
Abdul Sattar, was a Pakistani political scientist, career foreign service officer, diplomat, author of foreign policy, and nuclear strategist.
The 2007 Samjhauta Express bombing was a terrorist attack that occurred around midnight on 18 February 2007 on the Samjhauta Express, a twice-weekly train service connecting Delhi, India, and Lahore, Pakistan. Bombs were set off in two carriages, both filled with passengers, just after the train passed Diwana near the Indian city of Panipat, 80 kilometres (50 mi) north of New Delhi. 70 people were killed in the ensuing fire and dozens more were injured. Of the 70 fatalities, most were Pakistani civilians. The victims also included some Indian civilians and three railway policemen.
The State of Israel and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan have never had formal diplomatic relations. In 1947, Pakistan voted against the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine, and currently does not recognize Israeli sovereignty. Despite the Pakistani position on the Arab–Israeli conflict, there have been multiple instances of the two countries closely cooperating during events such as the Soviet–Afghan War and the Black September conflict. With regard to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, Pakistan supports the Palestinian Arabs and endorses the two-state solution. The Pakistani government has maintained that it will not pursue a normalized relationship with Israel until the establishment of an independent Palestinian state within the pre-1967 borders and with East Jerusalem as the Palestinians' capital city. Nevertheless, with Turkey serving as their middle ground, Israel and Pakistan have used their embassies and consulates-general in the cities of Ankara and Istanbul to communicate and exchange necessary information with each other. In 2010, the Pakistani newspaper Dawn reported that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence, following up on reports received in Washington, had gone through Ankara to pass on newly discovered information to Israel's Mossad about an upcoming terrorist attack in Mumbai, India, where a Jewish cultural centre was listed as a major target; this information first surfaced on WikiLeaks one year after the 2008 Mumbai attacks were carried out by Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan-based terrorist organization.
Gehlan Hithar is a town and Union Council of Kasur District, situated some 65 miles south west of Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan. It is located at 30°52'0N 74°1'60E with an altitude of 174 metres (574 feet) and lies on the main Kasur-Okara road.
Afghanistan–Pakistan relations refer to the bilateral ties between Afghanistan and Pakistan. In August 1947, the partition of British India led to the emergence of Pakistan along Afghanistan's eastern frontier, and the two countries have since had a strained relationship; Afghanistan was the sole country to vote against Pakistan's admission into the United Nations following the latter's independence. Territorial disputes along the widely known "Durand Line" and conflicting claims prevented the normalization of bilateral ties between the countries throughout the mid-20th century. Various Afghan government officials and Afghan nationalists have made irredentist claims to large swathes of Pakistan's territory in modern-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Pakistani Balochistan, which complete the traditional homeland of "Pashtunistan" for the Pashtun people. Afghan territorial claims over Pashtun-majority areas that are in Pakistan were coupled with discontent over the permanency of the Durand Line which has long been considered the international border by every nation other than Afghanistan, and for which Afghanistan demanded a renegotiation, with the aim of having it shifted eastward to the Indus River. During the Taliban insurgency, the Taliban has received substantial financial and logistical backing from Pakistan, which remains a significant source of support. Nonetheless, Pakistan's support for the Taliban is not without risks, as it involves playing a precarious and delicate game. Further Afghanistan–Pakistan tensions have arisen concerning a variety of issues, including the Afghan conflict and Afghan refugees in Pakistan, water-sharing rights, and a continuously warming relationship between Afghanistan and India, but most of all the Taliban government in Afghanistan providing sanctuary and safe havens to Pakistani Taliban terrorists to attack Pakistani territory. Border tensions between Afghanistan and Pakistan have escalated to an unprecedented degree following recent instances of violence along the border. The Durand Line witnesses frequent occurrences of suicide bombings, airstrikes, or street battles on an almost daily basis. The Taliban-led Afghan government has also accused Pakistan of undermining relations between Afghanistan and China and creating discord between the neighbouring countries.
Gilgit-Baltistan, formerly known as the Northern Areas, is a region administered by Pakistan as an administrative territory and consists of the northern portion of the larger Kashmir region, which has been the subject of a dispute between India and Pakistan since 1947 and between India and China since 1959. It borders Azad Kashmir to the south, the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to the west, the Wakhan Corridor of Afghanistan to the north, the Xinjiang region of China to the east and northeast, and the Indian-administered union territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh to the southeast.
Sartaj Aziz was a Pakistani economist and strategist, who had previously served as the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission of Pakistan, member of the federal cabinet as the de facto Minister for Foreign Affairs, a Federal Senator as well as the National Security Advisor.
Indians in Pakistan typically refers to Indian nationals working, studying or generally residing in Pakistan as expatriates. It also includes Indian emigrants to Pakistan, Indian spouses married to Pakistanis and Muhajirs.
Pakistan and the Soviet Union had complex and tense relations. During the Cold War (1947–1991), Pakistan was a part of Western Bloc of the First World and a close ally of the United States.
The Kheshgi or Khaishgi is a prominent Sarbani Pashtun tribe and Imperial dynasty in South Asia, mainly in India and Pakistan.
Inking or ink throwing is the act of throwing ink at people, or cars. It has been used as a form of political protest in India.
Myra MacDonald is a Scottish journalist and author. She is an expert on South Asian politics and security, and has written three books on India and Pakistan.
