India | Pakistan

Following new visa rules by the Trump administration, the United States Embassy in India on Monday asked all applicants for F, M, or J nonimmigrant visas to make their social public accounts public for vetting. US President Donald Trump’s administration on Wednesday ordered the resumption of student visa appointments but significantly tightened its social media vetting in a bid to identify any applicants who may be hostile towards the country, according to an internal State Department cable reviewed by Reuters. US consular officers are now required to conduct a “comprehensive and thorough vetting” of all student and exchange visitor applicants to identify those who “bear hostile attitudes toward our citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles”, said the cable, which was dated June 18 and sent to US missions on Wednesday. In a post on X today, the US Embassy in India said: “Effective immediately, all individuals applying for an F, M, or J nonimmigrant visa are requested to adjust the pr...

India’s counter-terrorism agency said on Sunday it has arrested two men in Indian-Occupied Kashmir for allegedly harbouring gunmen behind a deadly attack on civilians that sparked a days-long conflict between the two countries. India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) claimed the two suspects were from the Pahalgam area, where gunmen killed 26 people two months ago. “The two men had provided food, shelter and logistical support to the terrorists, who had… selectively killed the tourists on the basis of their religious identity,” a statement by NIA said. The agency identified the two men as Parvaiz Ahmad Jothar and Bashir Ahmad Jothar, claiming the duo “have disclosed the identities of the three armed terrorists involved in the attack”. New Delhi accused Pakistan of backing the attack without making public any evidence — an allegation that Islamabad denies. The April 22 killings triggered a series of tit-for-tat diplomatic measures by the nuclear-armed countries and led to intense exchanges of missile, dron...

The Indian Ministry of Civil Aviation has introduced Aircraft Demolition Rules 2025 to indicate and remove structures, such as tall buildings, towers, or trees, that could be a threat to flight operations near airports. This decisive step has been taken to strengthen flight safety in the wake of the Ahmadabad Air India crash on June […]

Shubman Gill to lead India in Test series against England

Amazon will invest more than $233 million in India in 2025 to expand and update its operations infrastructure, develop new technology for its fulfilment network and improve delivery safety, it said on Thursday. The investment builds on top of Amazon’s prior investments for the creation of an operations network to deliver to all serviceable PIN-codes in the country, it added. In June 2023, the e-commerce major — which competes with Walmart’s Flipkart and billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Retail in India — had said it will take its investments in the country to $26 billion by 2030, without providing a breakdown. The new investment will be used to launch new sites and upgrade existing facilities across its fulfilment and delivery network, improving speed and processing capacity, it said. Additionally, Amazon plans to use technology to alert delivery associates about unsafe speeds and ensure equitable distribution of delivery routes. Some of the funds will also be used to expand initiatives to improve the heal...

India will send the black box recovered from the recent fatally crashed Air India plane to the US for analysis, local newspaper Economic Times reported on Thursday, citing people aware of the development. “The recorder sustained heavy external damage from post-crash fire making it impossible to extract data in India,” the ET report said, citing people aware of the development. India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment. Indian authorities are investigating the crash of an Air India Boeing Dreamliner, which last week killed 241 people on board and at least 30 on ground, marking the world’s worst aviation disaster in a decade. The black box consists of two components — the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder (CVR). It provides crucial insights for crash investigators, including altitude and airspeed data and pilot conversation records that help determine probable causes of crashes. Data from the flight data recorder will be extra...

India is a perpetrator of foreign interference, Canada’s intelligence agency said in a report published on Wednesday, just after India’s and Canada’s prime ministers vowed to strengthen ties at a global summit hosted by Canada. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi held what both sides called productive talks on Tuesday at the G7 summit in Alberta and agreed to reinstate top diplomats they had withdrawn last year. Carney drew outrage from some members of Canada’s Sikh community when he invited Modi to the G7. Canada-India relations have been tense since former prime minister Justin Trudeau in 2023 accused India’s government of involvement in the June 18, 2023, murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Sikh separatist leader in Canada. Modi’s government has denied involvement in Nijjar’s killing and has accused Canada of providing a safe haven for Sikh separatists. The intelligence report noted transnational repression “plays a central role in India’s activity in Canada”, though i...

At least 18 people have died since Monday as torrential rains lashed parts of India’s western Gujarat, state officials said. Disaster response teams have been deployed to help residents in the south of the state, who are bracing for more heavy monsoon rainfall. “Eighteen people have lost their lives in rain-related incidents, while dozens have been rescued across low-lying areas by disaster response teams,” the state government said late on Tuesday. The worst-hit areas included Palitana and Jesar towns, which on Tuesday registered 867 millimetres of rain over the past 24 hours. State relief commissioner Alok Kumar Pandey said the 18 deaths were the result of storms, lightning strikes and structural collapses due to rough weather. “The state is fully geared to handle the situation, and inter-departmental coordination is being intensified to ensure swift relief and rescue operations,” Pandey said. Those rescued included 18 farm labourers who were trapped in mango orchards in the Gadhada area and 22 people in Su...

India’s aviation safety watchdog has asked Air India for the training records of the pilots and dispatcher for the plane that crashed last week as part of its investigation into the incident that killed at least 271 people, government memos showed. The directorate general of civil aviation also asked all flying schools to conduct training compliance checks, according to the confidential memos, seen by Reuters. The DGCA said the requests were part of a “regulatory” review of the accident, and also sought details of action taken following the watchdog’s audits of Air India in the last few months. It asked for the details to be provided by Monday. It was not clear whether Air India had complied with the directive. The Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner bound for London with 242 people on board began losing height seconds after take-off in Ahmedabad on Thursday before crashing into nearby buildings. Everyone on board was killed, bar a single passenger, along with about 30 on the ground. Sumeet Sabharwal, who the Indian gove...

An IndiGo flight travelling from Oman’s Muscat to New Delhi made an emergency landing in Nagpur city of India’s Maharashtra state on Tuesday after receiving a bomb threat, according to Indian media. The flight left India’s Kochi city, where it had a layover, for the Delhi airport carrying 157 passengers and six crew members at 9:31am IST (9:01am PKT). The Cochin International Airport Ltd. (CIAL) said the threat was received on its official email address, Press Trust of India reported. All passengers of the IndiGo flight had been safely disembarked, according to Nagpur Deputy Commissioner of Police Lohit Matani. While an investigation was underway, preliminary checks did not find anything suspicious, officials said. After the bomb threat was received by the CIAL airport, a Bomb Threat Assessment Committee (BTAC) was convened and the threat was declared as “specific”. As per ANI, a similar incident happened on Monday, where a Lufthansa flight LH752 scheduled to fly from Frankfurt to India’s Hyderabad, was force...

• New Delhi possessed 172 warheads in 2024, 180 in 2025 • SIPRI data says Pakistan continues development of new delivery systems, accumulation of fissile material ISLAMABAD: India is adding to its nuclear stockpile, while Pakistan continues the development of new delivery systems, according to an annual report by a Swedish armament watchdog. The arms race in South Asia is a microcosm of the “dangerous new nuclear arms race” that is emerging across the globe, as nearly all nuclear-armed states continued to modernise their arsenals in 2024, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said. In its annual yearbook, SIPRI warned that the nine nuclear powers — the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel — are not only upgrading existing stockpiles, but also developing new nuclear weapons, amid the steady erosion of international arms control agreements. The report highlights the continuing deterioration of global security, exacerbated by war...

Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has issued a stark warning to India, stating that Pakistan will treat war as the only remaining option if New Delhi attempts to block its water supply.

India’s latest attempt to diplomatically isolate Pakistan suffered a setback after it failed to convince the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) to place Pakistan back on the grey list.

ISLAMABAD - The head of the Pakistan parliamentary delegation and former foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari called on the international community Friday to engage with India and emphasize that military confrontation is not a solution to the Kashmir dispute or terrorism, stressing that dialogue is the only way forward.

India and China have agreed to expedite the resumption of direct air services and step up communication, the two countries’ foreign ministries said on Friday, as Beijing and New Delhi continue to mend bilateral ties. The ministries’ statements came after a meeting on Thursday of Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri and Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Sun Weidong, who is visiting India. The two countries reached an agreement in October regarding patrolling along their Himalayan border, thawing a standoff that began in 2020 and had strained bilateral ties, impacting areas from trade to technology to air travel. Sun said in the meeting that the two sides should properly handle disputes and differences, and jointly play a constructive role in maintaining international and regional peace and stability, according to the Chinese ministry’s statement. The two sides agreed to continue to stabilise and rebuild ties, the Indian ministry’s statement said. In January, the neighbours agreed to work on resolving trade and ec...

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Thursday thanked the leadership of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for its “constructive role” in helping defuse tensions during the recent conflict between Pakistan and India. During a meeting with UAE President and Ruler of Abu Dhabi Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, PM Shehbaz appreciated the Gulf state’s consistent efforts in promoting peace, dialogue and stability in the region. The high-level engagement took place as part of the prime minister’s day-long official visit to Abu Dhabi, aimed at reaffirming Pakistan’s gratitude to friendly nations that supported Islamabad’s position during its recent standoff with New Delhi. Tensions flared following what Islamabad termed a “false flag operation” by India in the mountainous resort town of Pahalgam. In the wake of the incident, both countries carried out missile and air strikes. According to Pakistan’s military, India lost six aircraft in the exchange, including a Rafale fighter jet. According to the Prime Ministe...

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) senior leader and head of the Senate parliamentary party, Senator Irfan Siddiqui, on Thursday strongly condemned India’s allegations against Türkiye and its recent actions targeting Turkish companies.

Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has warned of grave consequences if India attempts to block Pakistan’s water supply.

The Foreign Office (FO) on Wednesday slammed remarks by India’s Minister for External Affairs Subhramanyam Jaishankar regarding how India had the “right to strike Pakistan”, stating that New Delhi’s “bellicose punchlines” showed its “sheer frustration following an unsuccessful military adventure”. The Indian minister’s comments come in the wake of a four-day military conflict between the nuclear powers last month. Speaking in Brussels on Tuesday, Jaishankar said when India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi maintained that ‘Operation Sindoor’ was not over, it was a clear message that “we reserve the right to go after terrorists anytime, anywhere if they have done harm to us”. According to the FO statement, Pakistan rejected Jaishankar’s comments, stating that top diplomats should aim to promote peace and harmony rather than producing “bellicose punchlines”. Criticising his conduct, the FO said the tone and tenor of a foreign minister “should be commensurate with his dignified status”. The FO further said: “For th...

Former foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari on Wednesday lambasted India for attempting to “sabotage President Donald Trump’s peace efforts” in South Asia, stressing that Pakistan was willing to solve all issues through dialogue. His statement came against the backdrop of Pakistan’s recent conflict with India triggered by a deadly April 22 attack on tourists in Occupied Kashmir’s Pahalgam. New Delhi, without evidence, accused Islamabad of backing the attackers — an allegation that led to a four-day military escalation between the two nuclear-armed countries before the United States brokered a ceasefire on May 10. To present Pakistan’s stance on the escalation and dismiss Indian propaganda, the government constituted a high-level delegation, chaired by Bilawal, to visit major world powers. After holding meetings in the US, the delegation is now in the United Kingdom, after which it will head to the Belgian capital of Brussels to hold talks with the members of the European Commission. Addressing a press conf...