Indo-China relations
For quite some time, the Chinese top leadership seems to have made it a point – as much as is possible – to visit India and Pakistan back-to-back. In 2006,…
Invisible enemy
Pakistan Information Security Association (PISA) recently held a Cyber Security Conference at Islamabad. This paper analyzes key aspects of the discourse, captures important observations and recommends action points for securing…
Institutions and economic performance: Election Outlook-XIX
There is a long list of economists-from Adam Smith to W Arthur Lewis and from Douglas C North to Niall Ferguson-who have strongly highlighted the importance of institution building for…
Pakistan and leadership transition in China
Since the 1990s, China's top leaders serve a maximum of two five-year terms. With the last batch of leaders having reached the end of their second term last year, there…
A changed man?
Millions of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s supporters woke up on election day to what legendary cricket commentator (late) Omer Qureshi would have described as “...it is a bright sunny day here and…
From Astana to Amritsar
On April 26, Kazakhstan hosted the third Ministerial Conference of neighbours and ‘near-neighbours’ of Afghanistan (somewhat awkwardly designated as the ‘Heart of Asia’ countries) within the framework of the so-called…
Global offshore money maze
All responsible governments in recent years have shown commitment to retrieving looted money by their citizens, but in Pakistan the PPP-led government during its five-year-tenure (2008-2013) acted as the main…
Is Pakistan sinking?
The question of Pakistan’s viability as a state is at least as old as the country itself. Recently a sobering article written by a former American ambassador to Pakistan has…
Everything’s almost free in Spain’s parallel barter economy
There are neither salespeople nor cash counters in the "free shop" in an abandoned block of flats in Madrid. Anyone can walk in, drop off goods they no longer use,…
The rise of India
Can India become a great power? This question is taken up by the weekly Economist in its March 27 edition. New Delhi, as the weekly sees it, has the potential…
