The dialogue is being held at a crucial juncture, when Pakistan is poised to play a critical role in Afghanistan where US-led international troops are battling a determined Taliban insurgency.

India and Pakistan are set to revive their bilateral hockey Test series after four years with the two national federations agreeing on Thursday to start an annual series for men and women from this year. The series will be for both men and women teams and junior teams will also be a part of it.

The Indian government should get a cue from the views of its former diplomat and make concerted effort to return to talks with Pakistan on all issues, including Kashmir and water terrorism, which are and have been the bone of contention between the two countries

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is visiting Pakistan, and one of the issues on the table is a rather audacious Pakistani offer to train the Afghan National Army. The Pakistani and Afghan security establishments have had a rather uneasy relationship, stemming from Pakistan’s long-running ties to the Taliban.

Salman Ahmad, founder of South Asia’s most successful rock band Junoon, has been on a rock and roll jihad (struggle) ever since his first concert at 18 – a medical school talent show in Lahore, Pakistan. Eyes closed, emotions pumped, he was ripping through Van Halen’s ‘Eruption’ on his guitar, mesmerized by the crowd’s screams, only to discover that the yelling was coming from a group of bearded students from a religious group outraged by music they considered un-Islamic.

If Pakistan were a person, who would it be? Would it be Odysseus, undergoing a series of grueling tests in order to claim its true heroic identity? Would it be a hapless Sancho Panza, looking on with alarm as it’s dragged into ruin by the misadventures of those around it?

One of the mysteries of our day is that American hard power has been so ineffective for so many years in apprehending Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden (and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri), leaving the group free to use public diplomacy to speak to Muslim publics — especially to a Pakistani nation that distrusts the United States.