In a video released on April 5, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri praised an Indian Muslim female student for defying a local ban on students wearing hijab to school. Calling on Muslims to “stop being deceived by the mirage of the pagan Hindu democracy of India,"... MORE

Pakistan is no stranger to suicide terrorism. However, suicide attacks witnessed in 2021 and the first quarter of 2022 point to its revival and expansion from jihadist to Baluch ethno-separatist militants. Alongside representing the resilience of Pakistan’s asymmetric conflicts, the re-emergence of suicide attacks also... MORE

Allah Nazar is the leader of the Baluchistan Liberation Front (BLF), a banned militant group engaged in a war against Pakistan and seeking the independence of Baluchistan province. As a separatist Baluch leader, Allah Nazar’s BLF has thus far carried out hundreds of terrorist attacks on... MORE

Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost, a founding member of Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP), surrendered to the Afghan Taliban on March 4 and pledged allegiance to the group’s emir, Hibatullah Akhundzada (Twitter/Ab. Sayed, March 4). Dost appeared on March 4 in the capital city of... MORE

On April 11, five policemen were killed when their patrol vehicle was ambushed by militants in Dera Ismail Khan in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province (The News , April 12). On the same day, in a separate incident, two soldiers were killed when terrorists attacked... MORE

The Russo-Ukraine war, the extensive Western sanctions against Russia, and the growing possibility that European border states will block east-west transit corridors traversing Russian territory into Europe are having far-reaching implications for the landlocked countries of Central Asia, which have historically relied on road and... MORE

Introduction During Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s visit to Kathmandu on March 25-27, China and Nepal signed nine agreements covering an array of fields including a technical assistance for a cross-border railway feasibility study, economic, and technical cooperation, and COVID-19 vaccine assistance to Nepal (Kathmandu... MORE

Introduction The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is closely monitoring the rapidly developing political crisis in Pakistan. The current upheaval stems from the introduction in Parliament of a no-confidence vote against Prime Minister Imran Khan, and his subsequent allegation that the motion is due to... MORE

India and the Taliban: Is a ‘Soft Power’ Opening Emerging? Sudha Ramachandran On February 22, a convoy of 50 trucks carrying a consignment of 2,500 tons of wheat set off from India via Pakistan to Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan. The consignment, which is the first... MORE

Introduction In March 2022, Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP) highlighted the story of Najeeb al-Hindi, the group’s latest recruit from the southern Indian state of Kerala, from its latest flagship publication, Voice of Khurasan, (Hindustan Times, March 11). The decision to feature an Indian... MORE