International Features

The New Year is just a week away and it promises little hope for a better tomorrow or a world without conflicts, a world where the common good will prevail over self-interest. This is no attempt to paint a bleak picture of the future, but only an analysis of the year that is bidding farewell and would go into history …

Where in the world is Osama bin Laden The first year of the Obama Administration is almost over, yet many mysteries surrounding the so-called “dark side” of the “war on terror” remain unsolved. Here are ten: Did former Vice-President Cheney know the full, clinical details of the Bush Administration’s interrogation and detention program for terror suspects? Did he have a …

Efforts by human rights organizations, lawyers and activists in Palestine and Europe to hold Israeli war crimes suspects to account have gained momentum over the past few years. Last week, former Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni cancelled a visit to the UK over threats of a lawsuit under the country’s universal jurisdiction laws. The Goldstone report on the UN Fact …

The Islamic Counselling Association based in London has denounced the recent Swiss referendum on the ban on minarets — a decision leading to the spread of Islamophobia and more Muslim hatred of the West. Fathi Abdul, director of the Muslim association, told IRNA that the decision by the Swiss government to hold a referendum on a basic right of humans …

December 16 marks the 38th anniversary of the breakup of Pakistan when the Eastern wing of the country emerged as Bangladesh after an India-backed secessionist movement. The occasion calls for highlighting the plight of about 250,000 so-called Biharis or stranded Pakistanis still languishing in unsanitary camps in Bangladesh. Who are the so-called Biharis or stranded Pakistanis? In pre-independence India, the …

Many people say Pakistan is a failed state; others say no it is not. Some Jihadi groups and right wing people call Pakistan a ‘fort of Islam’; and a ‘successful’ state, as it made a valuable contribution in the collapse of one Superpower; and has virtually bankrupted the other Superpower in a ‘war on terrorism’. They make these lofty and …