By Nafees Takar VOA News July 25, 2024 Washington — Militant attacks in Pakistan’s northwest have plagued the region for years, leading to tensions between some of the region’s civilian leaders and the Pakistani military. Last month, the military announced the Azm-e-Istehkam or “Resolve for Stability” offensive would be an operation that cracks down on militants,
By Tahir Khan Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty July 23, 2024 Maulana Fazlur Rehman, leader of the largest Islamist party in Pakistan, has voiced his opposition to a planned operation by the military to root out militants along the Afghan border. In an interview with RFE/RL’s Radio Mashaal on July 22, the controversial cleric called for peace talks between
Ariana: Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khwaja Asif said Monday Islamabad needs to rethink its stance of extending hospitality to the people from Afghanistan – claiming they are ungrateful. “You see how thankless these people are. We fought a war with them. We fought a war for them. We became a US ally and fought a war
By RFE/RL’s Radio Mashaal July 21, 2024 Pakistan on July 21 reopened a key border crossing point with Afghanistan after a nine-month closure following complaints by residents. Pakistan in October closed the Chaman-Spin Boldak border that runs through Pashtun communities, ending the century-old Easement Rights, which had allowed certain communities along the 19th-century Durand Line border
By RFE/RL’s Radio Mashaal January 28, 2024 Police in the Pakistani city of Lahore have detained several members of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM) who were protesting the continuing detention of group leader Manzoor Pashteen, who has campaigned for the country’s Pashtun minority. The movement has pressed since 2018 for the rights of Pakistan’s estimated 35
VOA News December 5, 2023 The leader of a Pakistan ethnic group has been detained after authorities said armed men in his vehicle opened fire on police. Raja Athar Abbas, the deputy commissioner of the northcentral city of Chaman, which sits on the border with Afghanistan, said that Manzoor Pashteen was arrested in connection with
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty September 16, 2023 Abubakar Siddique Majeed Babar A middle-aged lawyer, Nia Beg, is anxious after a large incursion by Islamist militants rattled his homeland in northwestern Pakistan this month. Beg is Kalash, and he follows the ancient pagan religion practiced in Bumburet and other remote valleys collectively called Kalash in
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Abubakar Siddique Azmat Ali Shah July 9, 2023 PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Pakistan is the only country Gul Mohammad, a 42-year-old Afghan refugee, knows. He was born in a refugee camp in the teeming, sizzling northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar. Eighteen years ago, he married a Pakistani woman, hoping to settle down
Pir Zubair Shah VOA News April 23, 2023 WASHINGTON — Pakistan is bracing for a new military offensive that is expected to target militants in the northwest as ethnic Pashtuns in the area say they are still looking for accountability for the army’s last offensives in the region, in 2014 and 2017. The country’s national security
Khaama: Malala Yousafzai, the Nobel Peace Prize winner says that Pashtuns across Afghanistan and Pakistan have been the victims of ‘terrorism’, and have suffered discrimination, displacement, and death for long enough. Malala says, as a Pakistani Pashtun Muslim woman, she seriously opposes the remarks of Pakistan’s Representative to the United Nations about the Pashtuns. Click