Is a third party always necessary to resolve a conflict? It’s a question that repeatedly haunts the corridors of smaller states, especially those caught in the undertow of recurring crises. From Africa to Asia, and across the Global South, developing nations have often found themselves stalled in their tracks—unable to identify the real obstacles to their progress. In such uncertainty, third-party "mediators" have emerged like self-appointed lifeguards, though more often than not, they have stirred the waters rather than calmed them.

But what if the core premise is flawed? What if there truly is no such thing as an unsolvable problem—and that solutions, in their rawest and most honest form, can only emerge from direct dialogue between the disputing parties themselves?

Take the Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict or the ever-smoldering tensions between Pakistan and India. In both cases, the fault lines trace territorial claims, but foreign interference has long redrawn and distorted those lines. Like puppet strings attached to sovereign wrists, the motives and movements of regional actors are often manipulated from afar.

The Kashmir dispute, for example, is not just a product of rivalry but a deep-rooted vine growing from the imperial........

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