The recently released World Bank report on Conflict, Security, and Development upholds the popular view that political instability and violence have serious repercussions on peace, progress, and prosperity. Violence, the World Development Report (WDR) 2011 asserts, poses the greatest threat to development. While poverty is on the decline for much of the world, WDR (2011) observes, countries affected by violence are lagging behind. The multidimensional consequences of violence include human and socio-economic aspects. The costs can be both direct - loss of life, disability, and destruction and indirect - prevention from participation in economic activities, social and political instability, and massive displacement. The most vulnerable groups in society, tied to...

Brig Retired Shaukat Qadir’s article—No need for NWA operations—in an esteemed daily on June 3 had all the ‘relevant’ arguments against the likely military operation in NWA which our establishment still carries regarding the militancy and its use as strategic policy. Like him I am also against the military operations but my observations would be of a common Pakistani who knows nothing of the much assured importance of the use of religion in the contours of national security, which in theory is supposed to be the sole responsibility of those whom the nation nourishes on their national exchequer either in the form of higher inflation, ignorance or national disintegration. Before going further we should ask ourselves: are real and effective military...

Dear Mr. Shahbaz Sharif!  A few days back you announced that “the nation should refuse to accept foreign aid as it had been proved to be a “poison” for the national sovereignty and its integrity. We have mortgaged our sovereignty by accepting foreign aid; therefore the nation had to break the “begging bowl” to live as an independent nation”.
Your words sound music to my ears, and I am much happy with your “radical position”. I respect your good intention, but do these really mean something more than usual political rhetoric as your party record speaks something different from your latest position. I still remember the qarz otaroo, mulk soonwaroo (repay debts to mend the country) campaign, launched by your party soon after the Atomic blasts in 1998. Many people contributed to this campaign by donating their meager savings. We never heard much about this campaign later.

Recent events have caused the army and its intelligence wing to be exposed to criticism in a manner never seen before in this country. This estrangement does not apply to the religious right alone anymore, who were already angry because of their one dimensional view on the war on terror. Both the religious and the left wing parties have felt emotions of betrayal and anger towards the army for different reasons. The liberal intellectuals who support the army in the war on terror, have expressed concerns about the duplicity and the modus operandi of the intelligence agencies. Usama Bin Ladin's death in Abbottabad, Mehran Base Attack, successive drone attacks, and now the killing of a youth by the Rangers in Karachi in public, has caused the decibel levels to rise as never before. The less than complimentary views about the army expressed by Asma Jahangir...

Imam ul Ummat, the chosen of God and the leader of the faithful, Sheikh Mikhael Timofeyevich Kalashnikov was born in the sacred region of Altai, in the Vilayat of Russia in 1919. He saw action on the Western front, against the infidel Panzer division, which led to confusion and catastrophe in the legions of the Faith. He retired therefore to his Black Sea dacha to ponder over the grave challenges facing the Ummah. After deep reflection and intense meditation, he was led by the God Almighty to the path of success and salvation. He became the inventor of the AK 47 sub machine gun. This epochal invention has become the most prized possession of the Ummah over the years. East of Urals, it has achieved an iconic status among countless believers in the Hindukush, Gandhara and...

Honesty is the soul of credibility while truth is credibility personified. Credibility for any media outlet is what faith is to a believer. It is a battle media have to continuously fight. Nothing damages the credibility a free media like covert relationships with the corridors of power. However, not in the Absurdistan of a country we call Pakistan. Here, credibility is the first virtue sacrificed at the altar of motivation. Counting on audience’s gullibility, Pinocchio School of journalism believes that conspiracy theories would hide anchorpersons’ long noses only if the theory is fantastic enough. Pakistani media, print as well as electronic, cut a sorry figure after the Bombay attacks. They have become an even...

For almost fifty days, Karachi has played host to a trenchant display of working-class militancy. 4,500 workers from the Karachi Electricity Supply Corporation (KESC) have found themselves waging a rearguard battle against management’s decision to sack them from jobs many have held for decades. A twenty-day hunger strike has been followed by days of continuous protests, one city-wide strike, and, since Thursday, an open-ended protest camp on the road ringing the corporation’s head office. KESC, controversially privatized by the Musharraf dictatorship some six years ago after over fifty years of public ownership, has been run since 2008 by a management team appointed by Abraaj Capital, a UAE-based private equity firm. And despite lofty proclamations that competent, foreign investors...

After the brutal murder of Shahbaz Bhatti, Ms. Asiya Nasir, a Christian member of Pakistani National Assembly, made a courageous and passionate speech in the national assembly. [The speech can be viewed using this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=cT4oGIWXfQ4]. I have watched this speech numerous times, for in its tragic appeal also lies an incipient hope for a better Pakistan. In the wake of Shahbaz Bahtti’s murder, Ms. Nasir puts the very question of what constitutes a Pakistani under a serious challenge. This question about the nature of a Pakistani identity is crucial, for it can decide the fate and future of Pakistani nation-state. Ms. Nasir, one could say, in her historical retrieval of the contributions and sacrifices...

Below is a Punjabi poem by Dr Mohammad Ayub. English translation is by Hakim Hazik from justicedeniedpk.com. This poem is in the memory of Nazir Abbasi, who was martyred resisting the tyranny of Zia ul Haq.