By Sudha Ramachandran

May 26, 2020, the CACI Analyst

The Covid-19 crisis is widely expected to have devastating impact on war-ravaged and resource-scarce Afghanistan, and could even extract a human toll that exceeds that on account of decades of fighting in the country. However, the pandemic has the potential to bring positive change. It provides space to the main conflict actors to co-operate in providing treatment to people in parts of the country that are under Taliban control and thus beyond the reach of government health workers.  It will require the conflict actors to silence their guns and at least temporarily put aside their decades-old hostility.

By Umair Jamal

April 13, 2020, the CACI Analyst

Pakistan’s Corona virus cases have doubled over the past few days after hundreds of pilgrims returning from Iran tested positive. In response to the Pakistani government’s attempt to impose a lockdown on thousands of Shias at the Iran-Pakistan border, the community has vowed to start a mass movement against the state. Pakistan’s Iran border has become its single biggest security threat with regional and global implications. Given that Pakistan is a nuclear-armed state with a weakening economy, a weak health care system, a controversial regional security policy and a blooming militant landscape, the region and the world at large should follow developments in the country closely.