India | Pakistan

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Wednesday reiterated Pakistan’s willingness for a “meaningful dialogue” with India on all outstanding issues, state media Radio Pakistan reported. The April 22 attack in occupied Kashmir’s Pahalgam killed 26 people, sparking a military confrontation between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan as New Delhi blamed it on Islamabad, which strongly denied the allegations while calling for a neutral investigation. A US-brokered ceasefire ended the war. Pakistan previously invited India to a comprehensive dialogue to address all contentious issues, including the Kashmir dispute and the water distribution. During a meeting with British High Commissioner Jane Marriott today, PM Shehbaz appreciated the UK’s role in de-escalating tensions during the Pakistan-India standoff and reiterated that Pakistan was ready for a meaningful dialogue with India on all outstanding issues. He welcomed the British government’s decision to resume PIA flights to the UK. He said, “This [decision] would go a lo...

India will resume issuing tourist visas to Chinese citizens from July 24 this year, its embassy in China said on Wednesday, the first time in five years as both countries move to repair their rocky relationship. Tensions between the two countries escalated following a 2020 military clash along their disputed Himalayan border. In response, India imposed restrictions on Chinese investments, banned hundreds of popular Chinese apps and cut passenger routes. China suspended visas to Indian citizens and other foreigners around the same time due to the Covid-19 pandemic but lifted those restrictions in 2022, when it resumed issuing visas for students and business travellers. Tourist visas for Indian nationals remained restricted until March this year, when both countries agreed to resume direct air service. Relations have gradually improved, with several high-level meetings taking place last year, including talks between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Russia in October. China...

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Wednesday reaffirmed Pakistan’s willingness to engage in meaningful dialogue with India on all outstanding issues.

Rejecting Indian allegations of cross-border terrorism, Pakistan has asked India to change its behaviour, instead of resorting to its “tired narrative of victimhood and blame-shifting” during a UN Security Council debate on ‘Promoting International Peace and Security through Multilateralism and Peaceful Settlement of.

NEW DELHI: The Indian Air Force (IAF) will retire its remaining fleet of Russian MiG-21s, considered the IAF’s workhorse that showed its vulnerability when Pakistan shot down one of them and captured its pilot in a Feb 2019 showdown. According to the Indian Express, the fleet is scheduled to be retired in Septe­mber after serving the IAF for six decades. Inducted in 1963, at least four MiG-21 squadrons were number-plated or retired from service between 2017 and 2024, the newspaper said, quoting unnamed sources in the military. Its sources said the IAF is set to retire the remaining Russian-origin MiG-21 fleet in a ceremonial decom­m­issioning at Chan­digarh airbase on Sept 19. Two squadrons of MiG-21 Bisons are currently active. India procured more than 700 MiG-21 aircraft of different variants, such as the Type-77, Type-96, BIS and the Bison, since the aircraft’s induction in the IAF in 1963. The phasing out of the aging MiG-21 fleet was originally scheduled to be concluded by 2022, but was held up due to a ...

United States President Donald Trump’s lunch meeting with Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Field Marshal Syed Asim Munir prompted a private diplomatic protest from India in a warning to Washington about risks to their bilateral ties while New Delhi is recalibrating relations with China as a hedge, officials and analysts said. The meeting and other tensions in the US-India relationship, after decades of flourishing ties, have cast a shadow in trade negotiations, they said, as Trump’s administration weighs tariffs against one of its major partners in the Indo-Pacific. India blames Pakistan, especially the military establishment, for supporting what it alleges is cross-border terrorism and has told the US it is sending the wrong signals by wooing Field Marshal Munir, three senior Indian government officials directly aware of the matter told Reuters. It has created a sore spot that will hamper relations going forward, they said. Pakistan has denied accusations that it supports militants who carried out an attack in Ind...

In a shocking disclosure, Indian officials have arrested Abdul Kalam, a Bangladeshi national who had been living in India for 20 years under the fake transgender identity of a woman named Neha Kinnar. The arrest happened in Bhopal after confidential information that led to an undercover police operation. According to reports, Abdul Kalam came to […]

LAHORE - Federal Minister for National Food Security and Research Rana Tanveer Hussain has asserted that India neither has courage nor capability to block Pakistan’s water as the natural flow of rivers favors Pakistan.

ISLAMABAD: Federal Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi rejected backdoor diplomacy with India, declaring that no secret discussions are ongoing between the two nations, ARY News reported. In a casual discussion with journalists, Mohsin Naqvi discussed the openness in Pakistan’s foreign policy and highlighted the country’s moral stand on regional matters. Addressing domestic affairs, Mohsin Naqvi said […]

Pakistan on Friday beat India 3-0 in the Asian Men’s U-16 Volleyball Championship semi-final being held in Nakhon Phanom, Thailand. “Team Pakistan U-16 Men’s Volleyball continues its dream run at the 2nd Asian Men’s U-16 Volleyball Championship 2025 in Thailand by defeating arch-rivals India in the semi-final,” the Pakistan Volleyball Association announced in a post on Instagram. Pakistan beat India with a clean sweep by winning three straight sets (25-16, 25-19, 25-12). View this post on Instagram “Stellar performances from Junaid, Faizan, Irfan, and Talha powered the Green Shirts into the Final and one step closer to glory,” the association said. With this victory, Pakistan qualifies for the final, where they will face Iran on July 19 at 3:30pm PKT. On Wednesday, Pakistan secured a place in the semi-finals of the Asian U-16 Volleyball Championship and booked their berth in next year’s FIVB U-17 World Championship after defeating Indonesia in straight sets in the quarter-final. The national side had register...

Lightning strikes during monsoon storms in eastern India this week killed at least 33 people and injured dozens, officials said on Friday. The deaths in Bihar occurred during fierce storms between Wednesday and Thursday, a state disaster management department statement said, with the victims mostly farmers and labourers working in the open. More heavy rain and lightning are forecast for parts of the state. Bihar state’s disaster management minister, Vijay Kumar Mandal, told AFP that officials in vulnerable districts had been directed to “create awareness to take precautionary steps following an alert on lightning”. The state government announced compensation of 4 million Indian rupees ($4,600) to the families of those killed by lightning. India’s eastern region, including Bihar, is prone to annual floods that kill dozens and displace hundreds of thousands of people during the peak monsoon season. South Asia’s annual monsoon season from June to September offers respite from the intense summer heat and is cruci...

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Monday that Beijing and New Delhi should work towards mutual trust and “win-win” cooperation, after talks with his Indian counterpart Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, state news agency Xinhua reported. China and India should “adhere to the direction of good-neighbourliness and friendship” and “find a way for mutual respect and trust, peaceful coexistence, common development and win-win cooperation”, Wang said, according to Xinhua. The two foreign ministers met in Beijing on Monday as the two rivals seek to repair ties following a 2020 clash on their border. The world’s two most populous nations are intense rivals competing for strategic influence across South Asia, and their 3,500-kilometre frontier has been a perennial source of tension. The 2020 clash between their troops led to a four-year military standoff, but they agreed in October on patrols in disputed areas. India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi and China’s President Xi Jinping met for the first time in five years late...

Tesla unveiled its first showroom in India on Tuesday, marking its entry into the world’s most populous country, as Elon Musk’s electric vehicle company seeks new customers amid sagging sales in the United States and Europe. The store opened its doors to select visitors after its inauguration by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis in India’s financial capital Mumbai. Tesla has for years signalled its interest in India but held back due to the country’s steep tariffs on electric vehicles. Musk, who once described India as having “more promise than any large country”, has also criticised its import duties, calling them among the “highest in the world”. New Delhi has offered to cut import taxes on electric vehicles for global automakers only if they commit to investing hundreds of millions of dollars and make cars locally. Tesla has yet to announce plans to set up a plant in India. For now, local media reports say, the company will likely sell cars imported from China, with deliveries projected to start...

England beat India by 22 runs to win a thrilling third Test at Lord’s on Monday as they went 2-1 up in a five-match series. India were on the brink of defeat at 147-9, still needing a further 46 runs to reach a victory target of 193, when last man Mohammed Siraj joined Ravindra Jadeja in the middle. Nevertheless, the pair batted on until after tea on the final day to give India hope of an improbable win. But with India in sight of just their fourth win in 20 Tests at Lord’s, Siraj played on to off-spinner Shoaib Bashir — off the field for much of the match with a finger injury — with the ball just dislodging the leg bail to the batsman’s visible despair. Jadeja was left stranded on 61 not out — the all-rounder’s fourth consecutive fifty this series — after taking India to within sight of what would have been a stunning success before they were all out for 170. England captain Ben Stokes bowled two lengthy spells today on his way to an innings return of 3-48, with fast bowler Jofra Archer — in his first Test a...

India on Monday ordered its airlines to examine fuel switches on several Boeing models, while South Korea said it would order a similar measure, as scrutiny intensified of fuel switch locks at the centre of an investigation into a deadly Air India crash involving a Boeing 787. The moves by India and South Korea came despite the planemaker and the US Federal Aviation Administration telling airlines and regulators in recent days that the fuel switch locks on Boeing jets are safe. The locks have come under scrutiny following last month’s crash of an Air India jet, which killed 260 people. A preliminary report found that the switches had almost simultaneously flipped from run position to cutoff shortly after takeoff. The report noted a 2018 advisory from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which recommended, but did not mandate, operators of several Boeing models, including the 787, to inspect the locking feature of fuel cutoff switches to ensure they could not be moved accidentally. India’s Directorate...

India and China must resolve friction along their border, pull back troops and avoid “restrictive trade measures” to normalise their relationship, India’s foreign minister told his Chinese counterpart in Beijing on Monday. Subrahmanyam Jaishankar met Wang Yi in Beijing during his first trip to the country since 2020, when a deadly border clash between their troops led to a four-year military standoff and damaged ties until a thaw began in October, when they agreed to step back. “Good progress” made by the countries in the past nine months for normalisation of relations is a result of the resolution of friction along their border, Jaishankar told Wang. India and China share a 3,800-kilometre border that is poorly demarcated and has been disputed since the 1950s. They fought a brief but brutal border war in 1962, and talks over the decades to settle the border dispute have made slow progress. Last month, Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh told his Chinese counterpart that the two countries should seek a “per...

Separatist militants in northeastern India said the Indian army carried out cross-border drone strikes on the group’s camps in neighbouring Myanmar on Sunday, killing three of its leaders. Some separatist groups in northeastern India have ethnic, linguistic and cultural ties with minorities across the border in Myanmar and maintain a presence there. Three commanders of the United Liberation Front of Asom-Independent (ULFA-I) were killed and 19 others wounded in a drone attack in Myanmar near the border, the separatist group said in a series of statements. According to Indian outlet The Hindustan Times, the ULFA-I claimed that three of its members were killed in the attack that used over 150 Israeli-made drones. In a statement, the ULFA-I claimed that the attack by “Indian occupational forces” took place at several camps from the border with Myanmar near Longwa in Nagaland till Pangsai Pass in Arunachal Pradesh between 2am (1:30am PKT) and 4am (3:30am PKT) on Sunday. The outfit claimed that nearly 150-plus dro...

The succession of Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, is a thorn in China-India relations, the Chinese embassy in New Delhi said on Sunday, as India’s foreign minister prepares to visit China for the first time since deadly border clashes in 2020. Ahead of celebrations this month for his 90th birthday that were attended by senior Indian ministers, the head of Tibetan Buddhists riled China again by saying it had no role in his succession. Tibetans believe the soul of any senior Buddhist monk is reincarnated after his death, but China says the Dalai Lama’s succession will also have to be approved by its leaders. The Dalai Lama has been living in exile in India since 1959 following a failed uprising against Chinese rule in Tibet, and Indian foreign relations experts say his presence gives New Delhi leverage against China. Yu Jing, a Chinese embassy spokesperson, said on X that some people from strategic and academic communities in India had made “improper remarks” on the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama. Yu...

Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi has said that former US President Donald Trump’s offer to mediate the Kashmir dispute opened a window for peace, but India shut it by refusing to engage.

Tailender Carse frustrates India with 56; Archer strikes