Anxiety as Donors Chart Aid for Afghanistan Beyond 2014

A key United Nations official on Friday urged the international community to match security funding for Afghanistan with economic and development funding after 2014, when most international – particularly U.S. – forces will leave the country.

New U.S.-Pakistani Supply Accord Seen as Tenuous

As NATO supply convoys began crossing from Pakistan into Afghanistan for the first time in more than seven months Thursday, analysts here warned that the reopening of the key route does not necessarily signal a new dawn in the fraught relations between Washington and Islamabad.

Q&A: Sustainable Development Key to Reducing Drug Use

"Drugs and crime threaten one of our most important goals - to ensure sustainable development around the world," United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stated on Jun. 26, during a General Assembly debate on drugs and crime  as a threat to development.

Pakistanis Blame CIA for Fresh Polio Cases

Pakistan’s efforts to contain polio in areas bordering Afghanistan may have received a setback following the conviction of a doctor who allegedly ran a fake vaccine programme to locate Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

U.S.-Pakistan Talks on NATO Supply Lines Stopped

Six weeks of talks between Pakistan and the United States have been halted, a Defence Department official stated here on Monday.

Vaccination – Pakistan’s Missing Shots

The deaths of 20 children in an outbreak of measles in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Agency (FATA) are raising concerns over the state of immunisation in the conflict-ridden areas along the Afghanistan border.

U.S.: Growing Pessimism on Afghanistan After Quran Burning

While top officials in the Barack Obama administration insist that U.S. strategy in Afghanistan is working, the violent aftermath of last week's apparently inadvertent burning of copies of the Quran at a military base is fuelling growing pessimism about the U.S. and NATO mission there.

Afghan Refugees Hounded in Pakistan

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government recently launched a harsh crackdown on illegal Afghan immigrants who have been pouring across the border into Pakistan, going so far as to request federal government permission to deal with the situation, which has deep social and economic implications for the host country.

Afghan Refugees Hounded in Pakistan

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government recently launched a harsh crackdown on illegal Afghan immigrants who have been pouring across the border into Pakistan, going so far as to request federal government permission to deal with the situation, which has deep social and economic implications for the host country.

Karzai Demand on Night Raids Snags U.S.-Afghan Pact

Nearly a year after the Barack Obama administration began negotiations with the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai on a U.S. military presence in Afghanistan beyond 2014, both sides confirmed last week that the talks are still hung up over the Afghan demand that night raids by U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF) either be ended or put under Afghan control.

Death Penalty Returns to Haunt Afghanistan

While Afghanistan’s violent decades-long war has claimed thousands of lives, the last known state-sanctioned execution was in June under the direct order of President Hamid Karzai.

RIGHTS: West Turns Blind Eye to Torture in Uzbekistan

Despite its formal adoption of due-process reforms in 2008, the government of Uzbekistan under President Islam Karimov continues to practice torture routinely, and the situation may be worsening, according to a major new report released here and in Berlin Tuesday.

PAKISTAN: Soldiers’ Families Demand Revenge Against U.S.

As Islamabad and Washington wrangle over responsibility for the Nov. 26 cross-border airstrike that killed 24 Pakistani troops, families of the dead soldiers are demanding revenge on the United States.

AFGHANISTAN: The Pressure Is Now on Central Asian Supply Route

The Northern Distribution Network, the key re-supply route for U.S. and NATO forces fighting in Afghanistan, is set to experience a spike in traffic due to the closure of the Pakistani-Afghan border. But it will take several weeks for the United States and NATO to work out the logistics of rerouting cargo.

AFGHANISTAN: Land Triggers New Conflicts

A small plot of urban land has pitted Assadullah, 55, against an unwelcome neighbour in a bitter personal property dispute that has stretched on for almost a decade.

Rejecting Apology, U.S. May Hasten End of Pakistan as Client

President Barack Obama has sided with U.S. military and Defence Department officials in rejecting a proposal by the U.S. ambassador to Pakistan for a U.S. apology for last weekend's attack on two Pakistani border posts, and approving an investigation into the attack that won't be completed until Dec. 23 at the earliest.

Taliban Slide ‘From Hero to Zero’

Religious and political forces in Northern Pakistan, which hitherto drew strength from their association with the Taliban have begun to distance themselves from the militants, as the latter’s legitimacy plummets in the border regions.

PAKISTAN: DNA Lab Comes to Track Terrorists

A much-needed DNA laboratory is to be set up at the Forensic Science Department of the Khyber Medical College in Peshawar, capital of the violence- battered Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region in Pakistan.

Pak Border Post Attack a Big Loss for U.S. War Policy

The U.S. military and the Barack Obama administration have been thrown into confusion by the attack on two Pakistani military posts near the border with Afghanistan Saturday morning, even as the attacks provoked the Pakistani government and military leadership into much stronger opposition to U.S. policy in the region.

Pakistan Calls NATO Raid ‘Act of Aggression’

The Pakistani military has called the NATO cross-border air attack on a military checkpoint that killed 24 soldiers a deliberate act of aggression.

AFGHANISTAN: False Intelligence, True Tragedies

A night raid in Hakimabad in the heart of eastern Nangarhar province shows the face of U.S.-led presence in Afghanistan, and what it means to local people.