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In 2024, Pakistan’s internal security landscape became more volatile, fluid and complex. As militant attacks surge by 70 percent as compared to 2023, four trends have crystallized which will remain major security challenges for Pakistan in 2025.

First, Pakistan’s internal security challenges are linked to its immediate neighbors, Afghanistan, Iran and India. The two main threat groups, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) are getting some form of external support and assistance to sustain their violent campaigns. While BLA has sanctuaries in Iran, TTP enjoys Taliban’s patronage in Afghanistan. A recent report by the Washington Post has also revealed how an Indian-funded terror network has been involved in covert assassination campaigns in Pakistan. In 2024, Pakistan twice carried out airstrikes in Afghanistan against TTP’s hideouts and also engaged in tit-for-tat missile exchanges with Iran. Externally enabled insurgencies and violent campaigns persist longer and are hard to eliminate unless their hideouts and leaders are neutralized.

Against this backdrop, Pakistan’s kinetic operations inside its borders will be only tactically effective in the absence of proactive diplomacy with Afghanistan and Iran to address the challenge of militant sanctuaries. In other words, Pakistan’s security and diplomatic responses have to work in tandem to create the required momentum for lasting peace and security.

Second, militancy in Pakistan is likely to........

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