Pakistan refocuses attention towards Central Asia
Pakistani security personnel walk toward the fire flaring up from the main gas pipeline after a bomb explosion by suspected militants at Dera Murad Jamali in Nasirabad district early February 10, 2011. Militants blew up a key gas pipeline in the insurgency-hit southwestern Pakistani province of Baluchistan on February 10 suspending supplies to tens of thousand of consumers, officials said. (Photo: AAP)

Authors: Sergei DeSilva-Ranasinghe, FDI, James Brazier and Lilit Gevorgyan, IHS Global Insight

Since the Central Asian republics attained independence from the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, Pakistan has entertained serious ambitions of cultivating and strengthening relations with Central Asia.

Unfortunately, strategic myopia has skewed Pakistan’s focus towards securing influence in Afghanistan, limiting its success at building inroads into Central Asia. Read more…