Political Analysis and Global Affairs

   Step-by-step guide to filing your FBR Income Tax Return yourself for Tax Year 2026 in Pakistan, including income reporting, wealth reconciliation, tax payment, and final submission. Updated: 23 August 2026 I have watched people open IRIS, start typing figures from memory, and reach the wealth statement only to discover that nothing reconciles. The salary looks right. The tax deducted looks right. Then a bank balance, property purchase, foreign remittance, or vehicle appears and the numbers stop making sense. There is a better way. For many salaried Pakistanis and people with straightforward income, filing an income tax return without a tax consultant is possible. The real work does not begin with pressing buttons in IRIS. It begins with collecting the right information and understanding how income, assets, expenses, and taxes already paid fit together. This guide covers Tax Year 2026 , which means income and financial activity from 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026 . FBR's normal...

  A JFK-to-Istanbul family flight and my Karachi experience show what first-time Turkish Airlines passengers should expect. A Turkish Airlines Boeing 787-9 journey from JFK to Istanbul, showing the airport check-in process, cabin experience, and Economy Class amenities. I stopped the Khiz & Eesa video at a small detail near the Turkish Airlines counter at JFK: the cabin-bag sizer also worked as a scale. Their Turkish Airlines Economy Guide 2026 was not presented as a formal guide, yet the narration answered the question that worries many first-time flyers. What happens next? I kept watching because each small airport step led naturally to the next one. Khiz & Eesa, who publish on YouTube as @KhizEesa , documented a family journey from New York to Istanbul on a Turkish Airlines Boeing 787-9. They began at check-in and stayed with the journey until Istanbul. Their video gave me a sequence rather than a sales pitch. I found that sequence useful because a nervous traveller us...

  Israel can strike farther from its borders than it could before October 7. Yet Iran remains unresolved, Gaza has no settled political end-state, and a new Israeli doctrine of forward defence may create security problems of its own. Israel enters 2026 with greater military reach and stronger defensive capabilities, yet unresolved threats from Iran, Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria continue to test its long-term security. By Munaeem Jamal Originally published August 7, 2023. Substantially updated August 23, 2026. I wrote this page before October 7. It reads differently now I reopened this article in Karachi three years after I first published it. The old version, written on August 7, 2023, described Hezbollah on Israel's northern border and Iran's nuclear programme as major threats. It also treated Israel's technological superiority and military strength as important measures of its security. Exactly two months later, Hamas attacked southern Israel on October 7, killing about 1,200...

Originally published: December 31, 2025 Substantially updated: August 23, 2026 Editor’s note: I substantially revised this article to correct the original description of the European Union’s €90 billion Ukraine financing decision and to incorporate subsequent Euroclear and European Central Bank data. Brussels Chose Borrowing, Not Confiscation On December 18, 2025, European leaders met in Brussels with an awkward financial problem. Ukraine needed substantial support for 2026 and 2027, while roughly €210 billion in immobilised Russian sovereign assets remained inside the European Union. The political temptation was obvious: why borrow more European money when Russian reserves were already sitting inside the Western financial system? Europe stopped short of taking that step. The European Council instead agreed to provide Ukraine with a €90 billion loan for 2026 and 2027 , financed through EU borrowing in capital markets and backed by the EU budget. Russian sovereign assets would remain im...

  Jazz leads for multi-country data, while narrower trips can make Ufone or Zong more practical. akistani SIM roaming options for Europe in 2026, comparing Jazz, Ufone and Zong for data, coverage and keeping a Pakistani number active abroad. At Jinnah International Airport, I make one small check before boarding. My phone is still in Pakistan. I now judge the Best Pakistani SIM for Europe in 2026 partly by whether that number can remain useful after the aircraft lands thousands of kilometres away. Price comes second. A bank message may matter more than a gigabyte. My 2023 roaming comparison treated the market mainly as a contest over packages and coverage. By August 2026, that approach misses important changes in Pakistani telecom and ignores what travellers actually need abroad. I have changed my test. Best Pakistani SIM for Europe in 2026 For multi-country European travel, Jazz currently comes first in my comparison. The reason is fairly narrow. I give the most weight to geograp...

  Imran Khan's hospital dispute exposes the gap between constitutional responsibility and visible operational authority. Imran Khan’s hospital-transfer dispute has raised a larger question about where constitutional responsibility ends and operational authority begins in Pakistan. On Saturday evening in Karachi, I kept returning to one line in the contempt petition rather than the medical details around Imran Khan. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif appears among the respondents. Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi does not. Pakistan's Split Chain of Command suddenly looked less like a constitutional phrase and more like a live administrative problem. The omission invites an easy conspiracy theory. I think the harder question carries more weight: why can legal responsibility reach the prime minister while the public still struggles to identify who made the operational decision? A hospital transfer has opened a file on how authority actually travels through Pakistan's state. Pakistan...