Bangladesh & 1971 syndrome
Bangladesh is again plunging itself into another phase of political turmoil and violence. The decision by the Dhaka-based International Criminal Tribunal (ICT) to award capital punishment to two key leaders…
How to build a state
In a statement released to the press in the wake of the gruesome massacre of Shia Hazaras in Quetta, Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif declared, rather ominously, that Pakistan was…
Viewpoint: Old Thinking, New Realities
Conspiracy hatchers and theorists have always abounded in the murky politics of this country: politicians conspiring with the establishment for the overthrow of their rivals, with foreign powers to keep…
Arab Spring’s first hope Tunisia rocked by assassination
The assassination of opposition politician Chokri Belaid has plunged Tunisia, poster child for the Arab Spring, into its worst crisis since police opened fire two years ago on pro-democracy protesters.…
Harsh lessons from regime change
Although the event went largely unreported in Pakistan and elsewhere, a Coptic church was burned down in the Libyan city of Benghazi on March 4. Earlier, there was an assassination…
It’s our country
The last few months have given us the feeling that it is indeed our own country we are living in. Had this not been so, we would not have appreciated…
Checks on immigration
Immigration has been a highly emotive issue in British politics since Enoch Powell made his famous 1968 “rivers of blood” speech which sketched a picture of Britain inundated with immigrants.…
Sethi’s oath
Born with a controversial mandate, this nation has behaved like a horde of political gypsies – wandering from democracy to dictatorship to socialism to obscurantism to fake enlightenment to real…
Public-speaking judges
A Cursory look at the daily print and electronic media reveals that judges no longer speak only through their judgments. In addition to the regular publication and broadcasting of Supreme…
The frenzy
Talk now is firmly focused on the election, which is less than two months away. So far, the PPP and the PML-N remain the two most potent forces in the…
