The British Prime Minister, David Cameron, is in the middle of negotiations with the other member states of the European Union (EU) to try and negotiate terms favourable to the UK, on Welfare, Immigration and Sovereignty issues, that will persuade UK voters to remain in the EU in the promised referendum.  One of Cameron promises when re-elected in 2015 was ...

Toor Pekai grew up without having been to school but is now getting an education thanks to her inspirational daughter THE MIRROR: As a child, Toor Pekai would drip ink on her clothes, pretending she was at school, because like most girls in her Pakistani village, she was never taught to write or read. Fast-forward three decades, and a 15-year-old girl also desperate ...

PESHAWAR: Blue Veins with the support of Canada Fund for Local initiatives (CFLI) organized a Multi-stakeholder’s consultation in Peshawar to review the latest available provincial drafts of Child Marriage Restraint Bill 2016 and develop a consensus based best amended pro-girls and women marriage restraint act draft to be presented in the KP Assembly. The consultation aimed to reduce ideological conflict ...

A report published by the Voice of America (VOA) reveals that the loyalists of the Islamic State (IS) who have named Afghanistan and Pakistan region as the province of Khorasan are involved in timber smuggling. Local officials and tribal elders in the eastern region of the country have told VOA that the terrorist group has imported tree-cutting machines to their ...

KABUL – Announcing a long-term commitment to Afghanistan will be a better option for the United States in the given circumstances, America’s outgoing military says. Gen John Campbell, commander of the Resolute Support mission, believes such a step would keep the Taliban, who are hedging their bets on the US troop withdrawal, under pressure. “It sends a message to Pakistan, ...

IRELAND (DUBLIN): On Saturday 6th February 2016 a group of Pukhtun people gathered to protest in front of the Pakistan embassy in Dublin, Ireland. The event was organized by Angelina Merisi (an Irish citizen and PhD scholar at University College Cork), and Zaib Khan Esapzai who hails from the Swat region of Pakhtunkhwa and is the chief coordinator of Afghan ...

AFGHANISTAN: The former Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said that the key regional countries, including Iran, India and Russia should be part of the Afghan reconciliation process with the Taliban group. The remarks by Karzai comes amid ongoing efforts by the Quadrilateral Coordination Group, involving Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and United States to revive stalled peace talks. “If absence of peace ...

Ajmal Khattak, the veteran Pashtun politician, poet, writer and former president of Awami National Party, died in penury on 7 February 2010, after six decades of unremitting political struggle in Pakistan for the political and economic autonomy of the Pashtun people, sliced off by the British-Indian Empire in 1893 from Afghanistan.  Ajmal Khattak was politically active during his student life. ...

The direct talks date between the Afghan government and Taliban group representatives is expected to be ascertained by the end of this month. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) said the participants of the Quadrilateral Coordination Group (QCG) agreed to continue joint efforts for setting a date for direct peace talks between the representatives of the Afghan government and Taliban ...

Defending traditional values ingrained in society versus accepting new trends and norms is a hidden war in Pakistan. The mainstream media of Pakistan is not ready to take part in this debate openly due to threat of social uproar from the society Just like in Pakistan, same-sex marriages are considered immoral or contrary to the local customs in China. However ...