Pakistan Journal of International Affairs

BRIDGING THE DIGITAL DIVIDE: POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE SOCIAL REINTEGRATION OF ELDERLY CITIZENS IN CHINA

Hadi Imran — Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

In the twenty-first century, due to innovations in medicine, transformed medical procedures, and drastic changes in lifestyle, the average lifespan has increased compared to that of previous generations. In the Asian context, China has been no exception. Its high percentage of elderly citizens is largely attributed to its one-child policy, and the country currently has more than 250 million elderly citizens, whose living conditions are deteriorating.

World-class healthcare facilities, entertainment, and financial security are not enough to ensure a fulfilling life for senior citizens. They need social connections — to bond with others and remain part of society. Yet the rapid digitization of society has excluded older adults from active social participation. Older adults are not comfortable using technology to meet their daily needs. Something as routine as paying taxes online or video calling their grandchildren leaves them excluded from an increasingly digital world. This gap represents a clear opportunity for services tailored to their needs.

This brief outlines the problem landscape, draws on evidence from comparable economies, and proposes strategic recommendations for policy interventions and service models that can bridge the digital divide for the elderly population in China.

ASSESSMENT OF HUMAN AND ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS OF SHIPBREAKING IN PAKISTAN AND ITS ADHERENCE TO ILO AND HGC GUIDELINES

Ahmad Talha, Sehla Noor, Hafiz Muhammad Usama Hanif — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

South Asia is currently the largest center of shipbreaking throughout the world, which focuses on the intertidal beaching method because of cost efficiency and weak regulatory oversight. Pakistan's Gadani yard - whose yard, once one of the largest in the world - is an example of the juggling that takes place between international maritime law, environmental governance, and labor rights. This study seeks to present a compliance gap analysis of the ship recycling practices of Pakistan as compared to Hong Kong International Convention for the Safe and Environmentally Sound Recycling of Ships (HKC), Basel Convention, UNCLOS Part XII and ILO Labor Standards. Using doctrinal legal review, systematic analysis of literature, and secondary quantitative analysis of data, the study evaluates the ecological and occupational impacts. Findings show significant environmental degradation, such as cadmium in soil 12mg/kg, total petroleum hydrocarbons 3500 μg/L, or mercury and methylmercury in sediments, and elevated atmospheric PAHs and PCBs. Labor violations are still widespread, however, with sub-living wages, high fatality rates, and informal contracting. While accessions of Pakistan's HKC in 2023 and the inaugurating of the first compliant yard in 2026 are steps ahead, gaps in progress remain owing to the prevalence of low levels of mechanization, unregulated practices of labor-based operations and incomplete infrastructure of downstream of hazardous waste management. The study concludes that in the absence of a robust domestic regulatory and enforcement, Pakistan's stance in global standards will be more in name than reality leaving human and environmental weak links unattended.

CHINA`S XINJIANG PROBLEM– THE EVOLUTION OF COUNTER INSURGENCY STRATEGY

Muhammad Irfan Magray — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

This paper case studies the Chinese counterinsurgency (COIN) operations in Xinjiang and the dynamics behind the Uighur protests in an effort to evaluate the future path of the region and determine the fundamental principles of the Chinese COIN strategy. In Xinjiang, the situation has been somewhat in the shadow of the world, both because of the global emphasis on the situation in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Afghanistan, South Asia, and the Far East, and partly due to the lack of official information and the inability of the Chinese military and government to publicly actively frame the issue. It is against this background that the study will attempt to answer some of the main questions: how the Xinjiang conflict actually came into being; the initiatives that were taken by the Chinese government to deal with the instability; whether a clear and distinct Chinese COIN doctrine exists; and what the underlying principles of its application.

THE INFLUENCE OF FOREIGN POLICY ON TRADE AND ECONOMICS OF PAKISTAN: REVISITING ITS GEOPOLITICAL RELATIONS THROUGH DIPLOMATIC TIES WITH SUPERPOWERS

Dr.Farkhanda Warsi, Dr Asma Bano, Dr. Annam Inayat — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Pakistan, a South Asian country, is crucial to international trade networks. Yet it continues to be a defensive state, its danger perceptions always guiding the foreign policy. This security-driven trajectory for foreign policy may be attributed to a variety of factors, as it may result in multiple repercussions. The primary goal behind this descriptive study aims to rethink Pakistan's foreign policy with the intent to move its commercial and economic goals off of a secure community as well as towards a welfare society. The conditions underlying world relations have evolved towards security-based coalitions towards financial reliance. The CPEC, which stands for the China-Pakistan Economic offers Islamabad a tremendous chance to use their geo-economic as well as diplomatic influence along with income possibilities. Pakistan has transformed into a nation of welfare as well as a powerful nation as a result of a foreign strategy based upon financial as well as business relationships in neighbouring nations along with areas. In a nutshell, Pakistan may turn out to be similar Germany, who transitioned being a state of safety to an autonomous state of welfare.

IMAGINING CLIMATE WARS: WATER SECURITIZATION AND THE INDUS WATERS TREATY IN SOUTH ASIA

Hadiqa Mir, Prof. Dr. Muhammad Umer Hayat — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Water governance in South Asia has entered a period of acute politicisation. This paper examines the 2025 abeyance of the Indus Waters Treaty as a case of water securitisation shaped by the discourse of “climate wars.” Employing a single-case qualitative design, the study integrates process tracing, theory-driven discourse analysis, and empirical hydrological contextualisation with few expert interviews. The empirical corpus is explicitly bounded to official speeches, ministerial statements, policy notifications, and publicly reported dam operations between 2014 and 2025 that directly reference the treaty, security, or water management. Discourse analysis is operationalised through securitisation indicators: existential-threat framing, identification of the target audience, and justification of extraordinary measures beyond normal politics. These speech acts are traced against subsequent policy actions to assess coherence between rhetoric and implementation. Basin flow patterns, glacier dependence, and climate-stress projections are incorporated to evaluate the material feasibility of water coercion. The findings demonstrate that while structural and hydrological constraints limit large-scale flow denial, political rhetoric, particularly under Narendra Modi, reframed river governance from a technocratic regime into a domain of strategic signalling, intensifying mistrust between India and Pakistan under conditions of environmental stress.