Current Analysis Disaster Strikes the Indus River Valley The flooding of most of the Indus River valley in Pakistan has the makings of a history-altering catastrophe. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimates that 20 million Pakistanis are in dire need, many of them homeless or displaced, others cut off from help by falle The Editors • 11 min read
Current Analysis Catcher's Mitt Pakistan lies at the heart of President Barack Obama’s plan to wind down America’s war in Afghanistan. If -- as he avers -- the “overarching goal” is to “disrupt, dismantle and defeat al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan,” the war will be fought mainly in Pakistan. With fewer than a hundred fighters Graham Usher • 10 min read
MER Article The Bitter Harvest Quetta, the capital of Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province, is a nervous city. In the past, Quetta was a provincial capital where people were accustomed to taking leisurely walks on Jinnah Road, the main boulevard of the city, gazing at shop windows and haggling over the goods on display. Young Stephen Dedalus • 14 min read
MER Article Struggling for the Rule of Law In March 2007, when President (and General) Pervez Musharraf suspended Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, Pakistani lawyers took to the streets in large numbers. It was a dangerous street where they were met with batons, barbed wire, tear gas, bullets and bombs. If their immediate demand Daud Munir • 12 min read
MER Article Media Matters in Pakistan Imran Aslam, a senior Pakistani journalist, is president of Geo TV Network, where he oversees content for Geo News, Geo Entertainment, Aag (a youth channel) and Geo Super (sports). In 1983, he became the editor of The Star, an evening newspaper that blazed a trail in investigative journalism during the Kamran Asdar Ali • 11 min read
MER Article Pakistan’s Collateral Damage from the Wars in Afghanistan In late November 2008, international media attention was riveted by a series of highly orchestrated attacks across India’s financial capital, Mumbai, which left at least 173 people dead and hundreds more injured. The only attacker taken alive by Indian security forces disclosed his membership in Lashkar-e-Tayaba, the militant wing Humeira Iqtidar • 9 min read
MER Article The Afghan Triangle The Pakistani army’s operation in the Swat Valley in northwest Pakistan is the most sustained in five years of selective counterinsurgency against the local Taliban. The toll already is immense: 1.9 million internally displaced, including tens of thousands housed in tents on parched plains; 15,000 s Graham Usher • 13 min read
MER Article From the Editors (Summer 2009) At least 60 people were killed in the South Waziristan region of Pakistan on June 23 by a US drone attack. The dead were among those attending a funeral for a suspected Taliban commander who, along with six other people, had been killed by a drone earlier that day. Since The Editors • 5 min read
Current Analysis Pakistan’s Troubled “Paradise on Earth” Tens of thousands of people have fled their homes in areas of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province (NWFP) as the army has launched ground operations and air raids to “eliminate and expel” the Islamist militant groups commonly known as the Tehreek-e Taliban or the Taliban in Pakistan (TIP). The ta Kamran Asdar Ali • 12 min read
Current Analysis Dangerous Liaisons The day after Christmas, the wires buzzed with reports that Pakistan was moving 20,000 troops from its western border with Afghanistan to locations near the eastern border with India. The redeployment, said Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Qureshi, came in response to “certain developments” on the In Graham Usher • 11 min read
Current Analysis Pakistan Amidst the Storms Less than three months after being formed, Pakistan’s coalition government is in trouble. The leader of one of its constituent parties, Nawaz Sharif of the Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N), is awaiting a decision from the country’s Supreme Court about whether he can run in parliamentary by-elections t Graham Usher • 13 min read
MER Article A Letter Misaddressed Benazir Bhutto, Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West (New York: Harper Collins, 2008). Kamran Asdar Ali • 6 min read
