Pak Institute For Peace Studies Pvt Ltd. (PIPS)

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Pips consultation-10 on afghan peace & reconciliation

Pak Institute for Peace Studies organized 10th quarterly consultation on “Afghan peace and reconciliation: Pakistan’s interests and policy options” in Islamabad on November 16, 2023. The main themes of the consultation included ‘Rising terrorism threat from TTP, IS-K (Islamic State Khorasan) and other groups’ and ‘Emerging Pak-Afghan ties: Dynamics and projections.’ The event was attended by academics, politicians, journalists, religious scholars, human rights activists, and experts on Afghan affairs, from Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The experts urged the caretaker federal government to carefully deal with the issue of repatriation of illegal Afghan immigrants as their expulsion in haste would make them susceptible to radicalization due to almost no opportunities of livelihood in neighbouring Afghanistan.
They warned that Pakistan needed a long-term political strategy and should revisit its entire Afghan policy by making it civilian-led, otherwise the country faces the threat of another conflict.

AFGHAN PEACE AND RECONCILIATION: PAKISTAN’S INTERESTS AND POLICY OPTIONS 9

There is a complete political deadlock and the leaderships in Afghanistan and Pakistan apparently also do not seem very much interested in getting out of it. At the same time, no one appears convinced to recognize the Taliban’s de facto government including Pakistan. The biggest bilateral problem, which concerns Pakistan the most, is the banned TTP and its cross-border terrorist attacks inside Pakistan. Pakistan’s current stance is that it will not talk to the TTP, but to the Afghan government; the country lays the responsibility of checking the TTP incursions on the Afghan Taliban. However, the Taliban see the TTP as Pakistan’s internal issue, which not only adds to Pakistan’s frustration but also emboldens the militant group, which has already increased its terrorist attacks in Pakistan manifold.

These are some of the findings of the PIPS-led 9th consultation on Afghan peace and reconciliation held on August 10, 2023 in Islamabad.

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Islam in China: Exploring History, Culture, And Relations

Pak Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS) organized a full-day in-house roundtable discussion on “Islam in China: Exploring History, Culture, and Relations” on September 19, 2023. The talk was divided into several sub-themes, which included “understanding the historical journey of Islam in China and its current state”, “analyzing the cultural interactions and intersections between Islam and Chinese society”, and “exploring the role of Islam in promoting social harmony and understanding in the Chinese context”. Islamic scholars and experts on China participated in the talk. The key speakers in the event were two prominent Islamic scholars and Intellectuals, Dr. Qibla Ayaz, and Muhammad Israr Madni. These individuals had recently returned from an extensive tour of China.

PIPS Holds its 8th Consultation on Afghan Peace & Reconciliation

Pak Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS) organized a seminar on ‘Navigating challenging times: US-China relations and Pakistan’ on July 19, 2023, in Islamabad. The event brought together lawmakers, diplomats, retired military officers, academics, and experts on regional trade and international relations.

Speakers at the seminar said that Pakistan should not miss a huge opportunity arising out of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) despite the fact that the country’s ruling elite had strong social and economic links with the West – a reason that hampered progress on the multi-billion-dollar programme in the past. They said that the CPEC project had the potential to trigger modernization in agriculture and industrial sectors of Pakistan, but this did not happen because those at the helm of affairs resisted the much-needed transformation.

Charter of Peace

This report entails details on and endorsements by political, religious leaders, civil society, and others of the Charter of Peace developed by PIPS. The Charter of Peace includes recommendations on bringing sustainable peace in Pakistan. It is built on a positive concept of peace with a vital role of softer approaches. It mentions all key drivers of violence and extremism in the country be it weak democratic structure, socioeconomic inequality, gender discrimination, unavailability of economic opportunities, and others. The need for adopting and endorsing the documents like the Charter of Peace has only grown more urgent with the Taliban regaining power in Afghanistan and a clear uptick in security-related incidents in Pakistan in recent months. The Charter of Peace has been built in light of the Charter of United Nation and other global and regional peace initiatives endorsed by Pakistan. It can be adopted as a comprehensive policy document that guides Pakistani policymakers on key changes and main focus areas to connect Pakistan’s efforts for peace with the established global norms and policies.