Over the past couple of decades, Pakistan has steadily lost favours it once enjoyed with key allies, including the US, for its incessant instrumentalisation of terrorism as state policy. As the post 9/11 world increasingly adopted global norms on no tolerance for terrorism, Pakistan remained stuck in its tactics of viewing militant networks as strategic assets, particularly deployed against India.

Embarrassingly exposed time and again, the country currently finds itself amid multiple crises at once, from a precarious economic state to existentially threatening insurgencies, all exacerbated by a severely weakened global standing. This was laid bare during its recent hostilities with India, following the blood-curdling Pahalgam attack of April 22, as countries that have traditionally aligned with Pakistan refused to come to its aid.

Pakistan’s role in the proliferation of global terrorism began with its alliance with the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in arming the Afghan Mujahideen against the erstwhile USSR in the 1980s. However, this policy of using militant proxies for geopolitical ends was soon institutionalized by the Pakistani establishment which then deployed the same tactics to undermine India, and specifically stir up Islamist militancy in Kashmir.

Even as it projected itself as a US ally in the global war on terror, it continued to shelter and support radical elements, reflected in its infamous

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