The United States and Iran are, by all credible accounts, about to sit down face to face for the first time since this war began. Germany’s foreign minister, Johann Wadephul said a direct meeting is expected “very soon” in Pakistan. Hours earlier, President Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff confirmed that Pakistan had delivered Washington’s 15-point peace plan to Tehran. These are not rumors; they are the first concrete signs that diplomacy may still have a chance to end a conflict that has already killed thousands, closed the Strait of Hormuz – the lifeline of global economy and pushed the Middle East to the brink of a wider conflagration.
Op-Ed
India’s Problem With Peace
The news from Islamabad this week should have registered as standard middle-power diplomacy in a region on fire. Pakistan, citing its long border with Iran, its ties to both Washington and Tehran, and its newly burnished personal relationship between its army chief and President Donald J. Trump, has positioned itself as a potential host and facilitator for direct talks aimed at ending the fighting between the United States, Israel and Iran.
Trump’s Iran Reversal: Diplomacy, Delay or Market Calculus?
When President Trump took to Truth Social on Monday morning and announced that he was extending his 48-hour ultimatum to Iran by five full days, citing “very good and productive conversations” with Tehran, the global financial markets did exactly what they have learned to do under his leadership: they rallied.
Floggings, Executions, Legalised Abuse: The Taliban’s Vision of Justice
Four years after the Taliban seized power, Afghanistan is no longer sliding backward. It is hurtling into a deliberate abyss of codified cruelty, where the state’s highest authorities have decided that beating women, flogging citizens and executing dissenters in public stadiums constitutes governance.
Why Pakistan Can’t Afford Another Mideast Mess
Let’s not mince words: Pakistan is getting hammered by the US-Israel-Iran war, and the fallout could shove this perpetually precarious economy right back into the abyss. Oil at $100 a barrel? That’s not a blip—it’s a body blow. And if this mess drags on, as former Finance Minister Hafiz Pasha grimly predicts, Pakistan’s GDP could shrink by 1% to 1.5%, with the rot setting in deeper after six months. We’ve seen this movie before, and it doesn’t end well.
When Global Oil Surges, Pakistan’s Poor Pay First — and Keep Paying
Pakistanis are feeling the first raw edge of a conflict they did not choose. On Friday the government raised the price of petrol and high-speed diesel by 55 rupees a liter — the largest single-day increase in memory. Petrol now costs 321.17 rupees a liter, diesel 335.86 rupees. Kerosene, the lifeline of the poorest households, has nearly doubled.
Iran Can’t Win This War. It Can Make Everyone Else Lose.
The Islamic Republic is not trying to win this war. It is trying to survive it by making everyone else lose. That distinction explains why, even as American and Israeli strikes have shattered its nuclear sites, missile factories and the leadership circle around Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran keeps expanding the fight. Its missiles and drones are no longer aimed only at Israel or American bases; they are hitting oil terminals in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, probing the Strait of Hormuz and forcing Persian Gulf air defences to burn through interceptors at a rate Tehran knows its enemies cannot sustain forever. The strategy is brutally simple and brutally effective: raise the global price of oil, spike inflation, inflict American casualties and exhaust the patience of a president who has never liked long wars.
Why Pakistan Is Collateral Damage in the Hormuz Shock
The Strait of Hormuz never had to be formally blockaded. Risk aversion did the job anyway. In the 48 hours since US and Israeli attacks escalated against Iran, global oil markets have lurched higher by as much as 13%, Brent crude has traded near $78-$79 a barrel, and tanker traffic at the world’s most critical energy chokepoint has simply frozen in place.
Hindutva Meets Zionism: Modi’s Dangerous Ideological Bond
When Narendra Modi stood in Israel’s Knesset last week and received a standing ovation, the timing could scarcely have been more revealing. Just days later, joint US-Israeli strikes assassinated Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in an attack on his compound in downtown Tehran. India’s prime minister, fresh from hugs with Benjamin Netanyahu and the signing of a sweeping new “Special Strategic Partnership”, offered little more than a muted call for “early cessation of hostilities” and a phone conversation expressing “concerns”.
Pakistan Decides It Has Had Enough
The explosions that shattered Kabul before dawn on Friday were not the opening shots of an unprovoked war. They were the sound of a neighbour’s patience finally snapping – and the first ominous notes of a conflict that could spiral far beyond anyone’s control. Residents described up to eight powerful detonations starting at 1.50am local time, homes shuddering, fighter jets roaring low overhead, then nearly an hour of gunfire echoing through the capital’s central districts. Similar strikes hit Kandahar – the spiritual heartland of the Taliban movement, where supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada is believed to keep his austere court – and the southeastern province of Paktia.