Asia

Afghan official says four Afghan civilians were killed and five others wounded in border clashes.

Talks in Istanbul between Pakistan and Afghanistan are at a deadlock, Islamabad said, a day after both sides accused each other of mounting border clashes that risked breaching a ceasefire brokered by Qatar.

The update on the talks by Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar on Friday came after an Afghan official said four Afghan civilians were killed and five others wounded in clashes between Pakistani and Afghan forces along their shared border despite the joint negotiations.

There was no immediate comment from Kabul about the Pakistani claim.

In a statement thanking Turkiye and Qatar for mediating the talks, Tarar maintained that the Afghan Taliban has failed to meet pledges it made with the international community about curbing “terrorism” under a 2021 Doha peace accord.

Tarar said that Pakistan “will not support any steps by the Taliban government that are not in the interest of the Afghan people or neighboring countries.” He did not elaborate further, but added that Islamabad continues to seek peace and goodwill for Afghans but will take “all necessary measures” to protect its own people and sovereignty.

Ali Mohammad Haqmal, head of the Information and Culture Department in Spin Boldak, blamed Pakistan for initiating the shooting. However, he said Afghan forces did not respond amid ongoing peace talks between the two sides in Istanbul.

Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Tahir Andrabi said Afghanistan initiated the shooting.

“Pakistan remains committed to ongoing dialogue and expects reciprocity from Afghan authorities”, Pakistan’s Ministry of Information said.

The ministry said the ceasefire remained intact.

Andrabi said Pakistan’s national security adviser, Asim Malik, is leading the Pakistani delegation in the talks with Afghanistan. The Afghan side is being led by Abdul Haq Wasiq, director of general intelligence, according to Mujahid.

He said that Pakistan had handed over its demands to mediators “with a singular aim to put an end to cross-border terrorism,” and that “mediators are discussing Pakistan’s demands with the Afghan Taliban delegation, point by point.”

Strained ties

Islamabad accuses Kabul of harbouring armed groups, particularly the Pakistan Taliban (Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP), which regularly claims deadly attacks in Pakistan. The Afghan Taliban deny sheltering the group.

Many Pakistan Taliban leaders and fighters are believed to have taken refuge in Afghanistan since the Afghan Taliban’s return to power in 2021, further straining ties between the two countries.

Turkiye said at the conclusion of last week’s talks that the parties had agreed to establish a monitoring and verification mechanism to maintain peace and penalise violators.

Fifty civilians were killed and 447 others wounded on the Afghan side of the border during clashes that began on October 9, according to the United Nations. At least five people died in explosions in Kabul that the Taliban government blamed on Pakistan.

The Pakistani army reported 23 of its soldiers were killed and 29 others wounded, without mentioning civilian casualties.

US Treasury accuses Pyongyang of stealing $3bn in digital assets to finance its nuclear weapons programme over three years.

North Korea has denounced the latest United States sanctions targeting cybercrimes that the US says help finance its nuclear weapons programme, accusing Washington of harbouring “wicked” hostility towards Pyongyang and promising unspecified countermeasures.

The statement on Thursday by a North Korean vice foreign minister came two days after the US Department of the Treasury imposed sanctions on eight people and two firms, including North Korean bankers, for allegedly laundering money from cybercrime schemes.

The US Treasury accused North Korea of operating state-sponsored hacking schemes that have stolen more than $3bn in mostly digital assets over the past three years, an amount unmatched by any other foreign actor. The Treasury Department said the illicit funds helped finance the country’s nuclear weapons programme.

The department said North Korea relies on a network of banking representatives, financial institutions and shell companies in North Korea, China, Russia and elsewhere to launder funds obtained through IT worker fraud, cryptocurrency heists and sanctions evasion.

The sanctions were rolled out even as US President Donald Trump continues to express interest in reviving talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Their nuclear discussions during Trump’s first term collapsed in 2019 amid disagreements over trading relief from US-led sanctions on North Korea for steps to dismantle its nuclear programme.

“Now that the present US administration has clarified its stand to be hostile towards the DPRK to the last, we will also take proper measures to counter it with patience for any length of time,” the North Korean vice minister, Kim Un Chol, said in a statement.

He said US sanctions and pressure tactics will never change the “present strategic situation” between the countries or alter North Korea’s “thinking and viewpoint”.

Kim Jong Un has shunned any form of talks with Washington and Seoul since his fallout with Trump in 2019. He has since made Russia the focus of his foreign policy, sending thousands of soldiers, many of whom have died on the battlefield, and large amounts of military equipment for President Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine while pursuing an increasingly assertive strategy aimed at securing a larger role for North Korea in a united front against the US-led West.

In a recent speech, Kim Jong Un urged Washington to drop its demand for the North to surrender its nuclear weapons as a condition for resuming diplomacy. He ignored Trump’s proposal to meet while the US president was in South Korea last week for meetings with world leaders attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.

United States President Donald Trump’s tariffs are headed to the Supreme Court, as Washington and New Delhi pursue a trade deal. On the ground in India, export hubs are seeing cancelled orders, layoffs, and falling pay rates. As uncertainty deepens, what does this mean for factory workers?

Pakistan has welcomed Sikh pilgrims from India in the first major crossing since their deadly conflict in May closed the land border between the nuclear-armed neighbours.

More than 2,100 pilgrims were granted visas to attend a 10-day festival marking 556 years since the birth of Guru Nanak, founder of the Sikh faith, a decision that was in line with efforts to promote “interreligious and intercultural harmony and understanding”, Pakistan’s high commission in New Delhi said last week.

In May, Islamabad and New Delhi engaged in their worst fighting since 1999, leaving more than 70 people dead. The Wagah-Attari border, the only active land crossing between the two countries, was closed to general traffic after the violence.

On Wednesday, the pilgrims will gather at Nankana Sahib, Guru Nanak’s birthplace west of Lahore, before visiting other sacred sites in Pakistan, including Kartarpur, where the guru is buried.

The Kartarpur Corridor, a visa-free route opened in 2019 to allow Indian Sikhs to visit the temple without crossing the main border, has remained closed since the conflict.

Four days of conflict erupted in May after New Delhi accused Islamabad of backing a deadly attack on tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir, allegations Pakistan denied.

Sikhism is a monotheistic religion founded in the 15th century in Punjab, a region spanning parts of present-day India and Pakistan. While most Sikhs migrated to India during partition, some of their most revered places of worship are in Pakistan.

A magnitude 6.3 earthquake has shaken northern Afghanistan, killing at least 20 people and injuring more than 500, a health official says, adding that the numbers could increase.

The quake’s epicentre on Monday was located 22km (14 miles) west-southwest of the town of Khulm, and it struck at 12:59am (20:29 GMT on Sunday) at a depth of 28km (17 miles), the United States Geological Survey said.

Sharafat Zaman, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Public Health, said 534 injured people and 20 bodies had been brought to hospitals in Balkh and Samangan provinces. Rescuers were on the scene and the figures were changing, he added.

In the nearby province of Badakhshan, the quake damaged or destroyed 800 houses in one village in the Shahr-e-Bozorg district, said Ihsanullah Kamgar, spokesperson for the provincial police headquarters.

However, due to a lack of internet service in the remote area, there were still no accurate casualty figures, he added.

Yousaf Hammad, a spokesperson for the Afghanistan National Disaster Management Authority, said most of the injured suffered minor wounds and were discharged after treatment.

In the Afghan capital, Kabul, the Ministry of Defence announced that rescue and emergency teams had reached the quake-affected areas in Balkh and Samangan, which suffered the most damage, and were transporting the injured and assisting others.

The Defence Ministry said a rockslide briefly blocked a main mountain highway linking Kabul with Mazar-i-Sharif but the road was later reopened. It said some people who had been injured and trapped along the highway were transported to hospital.

India is celebrating after winning a first women’s World Cup title, drawing comparisons to the men’s memorable 1983 triumph.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi led the tributes to India’s women cricketers following their “historic” triumph in the World Cup final on Sunday, while team captain Harmanpreet Kaur hoped it would be a watershed moment for the women’s game in the country.

After suffering heartbreak in the final of the 2005 and 2017 editions of the 50-overs showpiece, India beat South Africa by 52 runs to secure their first title in front of 40,000 delirious home fans at Navi Mumbai’s DY Patil Stadium.

Three defeats in a row earlier in the tournament had nearly derailed India’s campaign before they bounced back to storm into the semifinals, where they pulled off a record chase to eliminate seven-time champions Australia.

‘Dream big and chase those dreams’

“The team showed exceptional teamwork and tenacity throughout the tournament. Congratulations to our players,” Prime Minister Modi said on social media. “This historic win will motivate future champions to take up sports.”

The Indian cricket board announced the team would receive a reward of 510 million Indian rupees ($5.8m) for their title triumph, a victory which the Indian Express newspaper termed “Herstoric” on its front page.

Harmanpreet said it could be a turning point for the women’s game in the cricket-mad country.

“We have been talking about this for many years – we’ve been playing good cricket, but we had to win one big tournament,” the batter said.

“Without that, we couldn’t talk about change. At the end of the day, fans and the audience want to see their favourite team win.

“It’s not that we weren’t playing good cricket, but we were waiting badly for this moment, and today we got a chance to live it.”

The fairytale triumph of the Indian men’s team at the 1983 World Cup is considered the catalyst for the country’s rise to becoming a powerhouse of the game, both on and off the pitch, and batting great Sachin Tendulkar said Sunday’s win was “a defining moment in the journey of Indian women’s cricket”.

“1983 inspired an entire generation to dream big and chase those dreams,” he wrote on social media.

“Today, our women’s cricket team has done something truly special. They have inspired countless young girls across the country to pick up a bat and ball, take the field and believe that they too can lift that trophy one day …”

Mithali Raj, who led India to the 2017 women’s final, said the victory for Harmanpreet’s side had made her dreams come true.

“I’ve seen this dream for over two decades, to watch the Indian women lift that World Cup trophy,” she wrote on X.

“Tonight, that dream finally came true. From the heartbreak of 2005 to the fight of 2017, every tear, every sacrifice, every young girl who picked up a bat believing we belong here, it all led to this moment.”

A spectacular win by the Indian team in the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup 2025 Finals. Their performance in the final was marked by great skill and confidence. The team showed exceptional teamwork and tenacity throughout the tournament. Congratulations to our players. This…

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) November 2, 2025

Cricket fans have been celebrating across India after the women’s team claimed their first ever World Cup, defeating South Africa in the final in Mumbai.

Video shows damage to Afghanistan’s shrine of Mazar-i-Sharif, also known as The Blue Mosque, after a 6.3 magnitude earthquake. Officials in the area say at least seven people have been killed and 150 injured.

The earthquake comes two months after the deadliest quake in recent Afghan history, which killed thousands of people.

A powerful 6.3 magnitude earthquake has struck northern Afghanistan, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS), two months after a quake killed thousands of people in the impoverished nation’s east.

The USGS said overnight Sunday into Monday that the quake hit at a revised depth of 28km (17 miles) in Kholm, near the city of Mazar-i-Sharif in the Hindu Kush region, at 12:59 am local time (20:29 GMT). It was felt by correspondents with the AFP news agency based in the capital Kabul.

The agency had initially given the depth as 10km (6 miles).

Local authorities broadcast emergency telephone numbers for people to call, but did not immediately report any deaths or injuries.

In Mazar-i-Sharif, many people ran into the street in the middle of the night, fearing their homes might collapse, an AFP correspondent observed.

The Taliban authorities have had to deal with several major quakes since returning to power in 2021, including one in 2023 in the western Herat region on the border with Iran that killed more than 1,500 people and destroyed more than 63,000 homes.

A shallow 6.0-magnitude quake struck this year on August 31 in the country’s east, killing more than 2,200 people – the deadliest tremor in recent Afghan history.

Earthquakes are common in the country, particularly along the Hindu Kush mountain range, near where the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates meet.

Afghanistan is contending with multiple crises after decades of war: endemic poverty, severe drought and the influx of millions of Afghans forced back home by neighbouring Pakistan and Iran.

Many modest Afghan homes are shoddily built and poor infrastructure hampers rescue efforts after natural disasters like quakes.

Since 1900, northeastern Afghanistan has been hit by 12 earthquakes with a magnitude above 7.0, according to Brian Baptie, a seismologist with the British Geological Survey.

India’s women post 298-7 in Navi Mumbai before bowling South Africa out for 246 to claim the 2025 Cricket World Cup.

India’s women have lifted the Cricket World Cup for the first time after beating South Africa by 52 runs in Navi Mumbai, India.

Reaching the final for a third time, Harmanpreet Kaur’s side dominated the contest from the off at DY Patil Stadium on Sunday, although South Africa captain Laura Wolvaardt did her best to spoil the hosts’ party in the run chase.

Replying to India’s 298-7, Wolvaardt led from the off and totalled 101 off 98 when she was eventually caught in the deep off the bowling off Deepti Sharma, who finished with 5-39.

The support was not there for Wolvaardt, unlike that enjoyed throughout a team effort with the bat by India, as South Africa regularly lost wickets at the other end before being bowled out for 246 in the 46th over.

Wolvaardt’s heroic effort added to the century she scored in the semifinal win against England on Thursday. She is only the second player to achieve the feat of the back-to-back centuries at this stage of the competition after Alyssa Healy did so in Australia’s victorious run in the 2022 edition.

Neither team has lifted the trophy; indeed, this was South Africa’s first final.

India had come close twice before, reaching the final in 2005 and 2017, losing to Australia and England, respectively.

This was also the first women’s World Cup final that did not involve either Australia or England, the former being the record winners with seven victories to their name.

Having been put in, after a long delay due to rain, India posted the second-highest total in a women’s World Cup final. But they will feel they should have comfortably cleared 300, having reached 151-1 at the halfway stage of their innings.

Opener Smriti Mandhana’s 45 meant the India batter finished with 434 runs for the tournament.

It puts her top of India’s list of run scorers at a World Cup ahead of Mithali Raj, who registered 409 in the 2017 edition.

The limelight on the day belonged to her opening partner, however, as Shafali Verma struck 87 off 78.

Deepti Sharma’s run-a-ball 58 kept the momentum going through the middle over, while Richa Ghosh thumped two sixes in an innings of 34 off 24 late on that marked the best strike-rate of the innings.

South Africa started the chase solidly enough, the opening pair bringing up the fifty partnership in the 10th over. The loss of Tazmin Brits, run out by a brilliant piece of fielding by Amanjot Kaur for 23, started a wobble, though.

Anneke Bosch pushed back a painful six-ball duck before being trapped LBW by Sree Charani.

Verma then came to the party with the ball, picking up Sune Luus and Marizanne Kapp to leave South Africa reeling on 123-4 in the 23rd over.

When Sinalo Jafta fell in the 30th with her side 148-5, it was difficult to see a way back for a team hoping to be the first senior side from their country to lift a major International Cricket Council (ICC) title.

By the time Wolvaardt’s innings was done, India’s women knew they were about to go one better than their male counterparts, who similarly hosted the 2023 edition only to be denied by Australia in the final.

Follow our live build-up, team news, score and text commentary stream from the final in Navi Mumbai at 09:30 GMT.

Follow our live build-up, with toss and team news, ahead of our full text commentary stream of cricket’s World Cup warm-up.

Announcing the move, staff at the outlet said ‘authoritarian regimes are already celebrating’ its potential demise.

Radio Free Asia (RFA) will shut down its news operations on Friday, citing the government-funded news outlet’s dire financial situation caused by funding cuts under President Donald Trump’s administration and the ongoing US government shutdown.

Bay Fang, RFA’s president and CEO, said in a statement that “uncertainty about our budgetary future” means that the outlet has been “forced to suspend all remaining news content production”.

“In an effort to conserve limited resources on hand and preserve the possibility of restarting operations should consistent funding become available, RFA is taking further steps to responsibly shrink its already reduced footprint,” she said on Wednesday.

Fang added that RFA would begin closing its overseas bureaus and would formally lay off and pay severance to furloughed staff. She said many staff members have been on unpaid leave since March, “when the US Agency for Global Media [USAGM] unlawfully terminated RFA’s Congressionally appropriated grant”.

On March 14, Trump signed an executive order effectively eliminating USAGM, an independent US government agency created in the mid-1990s to broadcast news and information to regions with poor press freedom records.

Alongside RFA, USAGM also hosts sister publications Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE) and Voice of America (VOA).

Following March’s executive order, RFA was forced to put three-quarters of its US-based employees on unpaid leave and terminate most of its overseas contractors.

Another round of mass layoffs followed in May, along with the termination of several RFA language services, including Tibetan, Burmese and Uighur.

Mass layoffs also took place at VOA in March when Trump signed another executive order placing nearly all 1,400 staff at the outlet – which he described as a “total left-wing disaster” – on paid leave. It has operated on a limited basis since then.

Trump has said operations like RFA, RFE/Radio Liberty and VOA are a waste of government resources and accused them of being biased against his administration.

Since its founding in 1996, RFA has reported on Asia’s most repressive regimes, providing English- and local-language online and broadcast services to citizens of authoritarian governments across the region.

Its flagship projects include its Uighur service – the world’s only independent Uyghur-language outlet, covering the repressed ethnic group in western China – as well as its North Korea service, which reports on events inside the hermit state.

An announcement penned by RFA executive editor Rosa Hwang, published on the outlet’s website on Wednesday, said, “Make no mistake, authoritarian regimes are already celebrating RFA’s potential demise.”

“Independent journalism is at the core of RFA. For the first time since RFA’s inception almost 30 years ago, that voice is at risk,” Hwang said.

“We still believe in the urgency of that mission – and in the resilience of our extraordinary journalists. Once our funding returns, so will we,” she added.

RFE/Radio Liberty, which went through its own round of furloughs earlier this year, said this week that it received its last round of federal funding in September and its news services are continuing for now.

“We plan to continue reaching our audiences for the foreseeable future,” it said.

It’s not immediately clear why RFA and RFE/Radio Liberty – which share the same governing and funding structure, but are based in the US and Europe, respectively – are taking different approaches.

India reached 97-1 in the 10th over against hosts Australia when rain fell in Canberra in the first T20 of the series.

The first Twenty20 between Australia and India was washed out by the Canberra rain, with the tourists able to bat for less than half of their allocated tally of overs for a total of 97 for one.

Shubman Gill was 37 not out and skipper Suryakumar Yadav unbeaten on 39 when the first clash in a five-match series was stopped for the second and final time after 9.4 overs on Wednesday.

India opener Abhishek Sharma had already toe-ended a Nathan Ellis delivery to Tim David at mid-off for 19 when drizzle brought play to an end for the first time and the match was reduced to 18 overs aside.

Gill and Yadav at least gave the Manuka Oval crowd some entertainment when they smashed 54 runs in 4.4 overs before the rain swept over the Australian capital again.

India, who are favourites to retain the T20 World Cup on home soil early next year, were looking to maintain the momentum after a consolation win in the final match of the one-day international series on Saturday.

The second match in the T20 series takes place at Melbourne Cricket Ground on Friday.

The tourists earlier suffered another injury blow when all-rounder Nitish Kumar Reddy was ruled out of the first three T20s after suffering from neck spasms as he recovered from a quadriceps injury sustained in the ODI series.

Batsman Shreyas Iyer suffered a lacerated spleen that required treatment in hospital when he fell awkwardly taking a catch in the Sydney ODI last weekend.

Follow our live build-up, with toss and team news, in the run-up to our full text commentary stream.

Islamabad, Pakistan – After three days, talks between Pakistan and Afghanistan in Istanbul, aimed at ending a tense and violent standoff between the South Asian neighbours, appeared to have hit a wall in Istanbul on Tuesday.

Mediated by Qatar and Türkiye, the negotiations followed an initial round of dialogue in Doha, which produced a temporary ceasefire on October 19 after a week of fighting that left dozens dead on both sides.

But even though officials and experts said that “last-ditch” efforts were expected to continue to try to pull the two countries back from a full-fledged conflict, the prospects of new hostilities between them loom large after their inability, so far, to build on the Doha truce, analysts say.

Pakistani security officials said that on Monday, talks went on for nearly 18 hours. But they accused the Afghan delegation of changing its position on Islamabad’s central demand – that Kabul crack down on the Pakistan Taliban armed group, known by the acronym TTP. One official, speaking to Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the dialogue, alleged that the “instructions received from Kabul” for the Afghan team were complicating negotiations.

Kabul, however, blamed the Pakistani delegation for a “lack of coordination,” claiming the Pakistani side was “not presenting clear arguments” and kept “leaving the negotiating table”, Afghan media reported.

The Afghan team is being led by the deputy minister for administrative affairs at the Ministry of Interior, Haji Najib, while Pakistan has not publicly disclosed its representatives.

Recent cross-border attacks between the militaries of the two countries have killed multiple people, troops and civilians, and injured many more in both Pakistan and Afghanistan.

United States President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly sought credit for resolving global conflicts, also waded in, saying he would “solve the Afghanistan-Pakistan crisis very quickly”, while speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Nations (ASEAN) summit in Malaysia earlier in the week.

Yet, any long-term settlement appears difficult due to the two nations’ “profound mutual distrust and conflicting priorities”, said Baqir Sajjad Syed, a former Pakistan fellow at the Wilson Center and a journalist who covers national security.

Syed added that their historical grievances and Pakistan’s past interventions in Afghanistan make concessions politically risky for the Afghan Taliban.

“In my view, the core issue is ideological alignment. The Afghan Taliban’s dependence on TTP for dealing with internal security problems [inside Afghanistan] makes it difficult for them to dissociate from the group, despite Pakistani concerns,” he told Al Jazeera.

A fraught friendship

Historically, Pakistan was long perceived as the primary patron of the Afghan Taliban. Many in Pakistan publicly welcomed the Taliban’s return to power in August 2021 after the withdrawal of US forces.

But relations have sharply deteriorated since, largely over the TTP, an armed group that emerged in 2007 during the US-led so-called “war on terror”, and which has waged a long campaign against Islamabad.

The TTP seeks the release of its members imprisoned in Pakistan and opposes the merger of Pakistan’s former tribal areas into its Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Although independent from the Afghan Taliban, the two groups are ideologically aligned.

Islamabad accuses Kabul of providing sanctuary not only to the TTP but to other groups, including the Balochistan Liberation Army and the ISIL (ISIS) affiliate in Khorasan Province (ISKP), charges Kabul denies.

The Afghan Taliban have insisted that the TTP is a Pakistani problem, repeatedly arguing that insecurity in Pakistan is a domestic matter. And the Taliban have themselves long viewed the ISKP as enemies.

Mullah Yaqoob, Afghanistan’s defence minister who signed the ceasefire in Doha with his Pakistani counterpart, Khawaja Asif, last week, said in an interview on October 19 that states sometimes used the label “terrorism” for political ends.

“There is no universal or clear definition of terrorism,” he said, adding that any government can brand its adversaries as “terrorists” for its own agenda.

Meanwhile, regional powers including Iran, Russia, China, and several Central Asian states have also urged the Taliban to eliminate the TTP and other armed groups allegedly operating from Afghanistan.

That appeal was renewed in Moscow in early October, in consultations also attended by Afghan Minister of Foreign Affairs Amir Khan Muttaqi.

Rising toll, rising tensions

In recent days, several attacks have killed more than two dozen Pakistani soldiers, including officers.

The year 2024 was among Pakistan’s deadliest in nearly a decade, with more than 2,500 casualties recorded, and 2025 is on track to surpass that, analysts say.

Both civilians and security personnel have been targeted, with most attacks concentrated in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. TTP operations have increased sharply in both frequency and intensity.

“Our data show that the TTP engaged in at least 600 attacks against, or clashes with, security forces in the past year alone. Its activity in 2025 so far already exceeds that seen in all of 2024,” a recent Armed Conflict Location & Event Data (ACLED) report said.

Ihsanullah Tipu Mehsud, an Islamabad-based security analyst, says that Pakistani negotiators must recognise that ties between the Taliban and the TTP are rooted in ideology, making it hard for Afghanistan’s government to give up on the anti-Pakistan armed group.

Journalist Sami Yousafzai, a longtime observer of Pakistan-Afghanistan relations, agreed, saying that the prospects of a détente now look increasingly remote.

Both Mehsud and Yousafzai pointed to the Taliban’s history of sticking by allies even in the face of international pressure, and even military assault.

“We have seen this same attitude from the Afghan Taliban in 2001, when, after the 9/11 attacks, they continued to remain steadfastly with Al al-Qaeda,” Mehsud said.

According to Yousafzai, “the Afghan Taliban are war veterans, and they can withstand military pressure”.

Failed diplomacy?

In recent months, both sides have pursued diplomacy, nudged also by China, which has mediated talks between them, in addition to Qatar and Turkiye.

Yet, analysts say Islamabad might soon conclude that it has few nonmilitary options to address its concerns.

Syed pointed to Pakistani Defence Minister Asif’s recent threat of an “open war” and said that these comments could presage targeted air strikes or cross-border operations against alleged TTP sanctuaries in Afghanistan.

“That said, mediators, particularly Qatar and Turkiye, are expected to make a last-ditch push to revive dialogue or shift it to another venue. There is also a small possibility of other countries joining in, especially after President Trump’s latest signal of readiness to step in and de-escalate the crisis,” he said.

Syed said that economic incentives, including aid, in exchange for compliance with ceasefire provisions could be one way to get the neighbours to avoid a full-fledged military conflict.

This is a tool Trump has used in recent months in other wars, including in getting Thailand and Cambodia to stop fighting after border clashes. The US president oversaw the signing of a peace deal between the Southeast Asian nations in Kuala Lumpur last weekend.

Unintended consequences

While Pakistan has far superior military capabilities, the Taliban has advantages, too, say analysts, cautioning against overconfidence on the part of Islamabad.

Yousafzai argued that the crisis with Pakistan had helped bolster domestic support for the Taliban, and military action against it could further elevate sympathy for the group.

“The response by the Afghan Taliban of attacking the Pakistani military on [the] border was seen as a forceful response, increasing their popularity. And even if Pakistan continues to bomb, it could end up killing innocent civilians, leading to more resentment and anti-Pakistani sentiment in [the] public and among [the] Afghan Taliban,” he said.

This dynamic, according to Yousafzai, should be worrying for Islamabad, particularly if the Taliban’s supreme leader, Haibatullah Akhunzada, steps in.

“If Akhunzada issues an edict, declaring Jihad against Pakistan, many young Afghans could potentially join the ranks of [the] Taliban,” Yousafzai warned. “Even if it will mean a bigger loss for Afghans, the situation will not be good for Pakistan.”

The only beneficiary, he said, would be the TTP, which will feel even more emboldened “to launch attacks against the Pakistani military”.

Iyer suffers injury while attempting a catch in third and final ODI of India’s tour of Australia.

India batsman Shreyas Iyer is in stable condition and recovering well from spleen injury, Twenty20 captain Suryakumar Yadav says.

Iyer suffered a lacerated spleen on Saturday during India’s victory over Australia in their third one-day international (ODI) when he fell awkwardly while making a catch.

The 30-year-old was admitted to hospital, and Indian media reported that his condition was life-threatening.

“We spoke to him,” Suryakumar told reporters on Tuesday before India’s five-match Twenty20 series against Australia beginning in Canberra on Wednesday.

“When we got to know about his injury, I called him. Then I realised Shreyas doesn’t have his phone on him, and I called our physio, Kamlesh Jain, who told us he’s stable.

“He’s looking good 1761653559. We’ve been in touch for two days, he’s replying. If he’s able to reply on the phone, then he’s stable.”

How did Iyer sustain freak injury?

The 30-year-old sustained an impact injury in his left lower rib cage region as he pulled off a sensational backpedalling catch to remove Alex Carey, a key moment in the third ODI of the series, which India won by nine wickets.

Iyer, who is also the vice captain of the ODI team, was forced off the field after the injury and did not return for the rest of Australia’s innings.

“He was taken to the hospital for further evaluation,” the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) said in a statement.

“Scans revealed a laceration injury to the spleen. He is under treatment, medically stable, and recovering well.”

He remained hospitalised in Sydney, where the BCCI medical team closely monitored him in consultation with specialists from Australia and India.

It was not clear when Iyer could return to action.

Despite the victory on Saturday, India lost the series 1-2 after suffering defeats in the first two games in Perth and Adelaide.

India’s next one-day outing is a home series against South Africa, starting on November 30.

Iyer has scored 2,917 runs from 73 ODIs at an average of 47.81.

A five-match T20 series between the two cricketing powerhouses begins on Wednesday, but Iyer is not a part of that squad.

Fighting comes as Taliban submits proposal at Pakistan-Afghanistan talks in Turkiye, while Islamabad warns of ‘open war’ if deal fails.

Fresh clashes near the border with Afghanistan have killed at least five Pakistani soldiers and 25 fighters, Pakistan’s army says, even as the two countries hold peace talks in Istanbul.

The Pakistani military said armed men attempted to cross from Afghanistan into Kurram and North Waziristan on Friday and Saturday, accusing the Taliban authorities of failing to act against armed groups operating from Afghan territory.

It said on Sunday that the attempted infiltrations raised questions over Kabul’s commitment to tackling “terrorism emanating from its soil”.

Afghanistan’s Taliban government has not commented on the latest clashes, but has repeatedly rejected accusations of harbouring armed fighters and instead accuses Pakistan of violating Afghan sovereignty with air strikes.

Delegations from both countries arrived in Istanbul, Turkiye on Saturday for talks aimed at preventing a return to full-scale conflict. The meeting comes days after Qatar and Turkiye brokered a ceasefire in Doha to halt the most serious border fighting since the Taliban takeover of Kabul in 2021.

The violence earlier this month killed dozens and wounded hundreds.

‘Open war’

Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif said the ceasefire remains intact and that Kabul appears interested in peace, but warned that failure in Istanbul would leave Islamabad with “open war” as an option.

Pakistan’s military described those involved in the weekend infiltrations as members of what it calls “Fitna al-Khwarij”, a term it uses for ideologically motivated armed groups allegedly backed by foreign sponsors.

United States President Donald Trump also weighed in on Sunday, saying he would “solve the Afghanistan-Pakistan crisis very quickly”, telling reporters on the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit in Malaysia that he had been briefed on the ongoing talks.

Separately, Taliban-controlled broadcaster RTA said on Sunday that Kabul’s delegation in Turkiye had submitted a proposal after more than 15 hours of discussions, calling for Pakistan to end cross-border strikes and block any “anti-Afghan group” from using its territory.

The Afghan side also signalled openness to a four-party monitoring mechanism to supervise the ceasefire and investigate violations.

Afghanistan’s delegation is led by Deputy Interior Minister Haji Najib. Pakistan has not publicly disclosed its representatives.

Analysts expect the core of the talks to revolve around intelligence-sharing, allowing Islamabad to hand over coordinates of suspected Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) fighters for the Taliban to take direct action, instead of Pakistan launching its own strikes.

Oct. 26 (UPI) — President Donald Trump landed in Malaysia on Sunday and presided over the signing of a peace declaration between Thailand and Cambodia amid a flurry of news related to trade deals with Asian nations and ahead of a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

The text of the joint declaration, which seeks to end recent conflict between Thailand and Cambodia over a long-running border dispute, was released by the White House and said its signing was witnessed by Trump.

“We committed to de-escalating tensions and restoring confidence and mutually beneficial relations between the Kingdom of Cambodia and the Kingdom of Thailand,” the declaration reads.

Thailand and Cambodia said they agreed to remove heavy weapons systems and de-mine along the border, as well as release prisoners of war and refrain from disseminating “harmful rhetoric” to “foster an environment conducive to peaceful dialogue.”

Additionally, the White House announced that it had separately reached nonbinding understandings with Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia to cooperate and expand U.S. access to rare earth minerals.

It also announced a framework for new reciprocal trade deals with each of the countries.

Thailand, for example, has agreed to eliminate tariffs on 99% of goods from the United States while the United States said it would maintain 19% tariffs imposed on the Asian country while granting tariff-free access for certain products.

The agreements included a pledge by Malaysia to invest $70 billion in the United States over the next decade while Thailand promised to buy 80 U.S. aircraft for $18.8 billion and Air Cambodia committed to working with Boeing to boost the development of its aviation industry.

The White House later announced that it had reached framework for a similar trade agreement with Vietnam, which would “provide preferential market access” for U.S. industrial and agricultural exports. The United States will maintain 20% tariffs on Vietnamese imports.

Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has been meeting with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in Kuala Lumpur ahead of the Trump-Xi meeting in South Korea.

“I think we reached a substantial framework for the two leaders who will meet in Korea next Thursday,” Bessent said on ABC News’ “This Week” on Sunday.

“The president had given me maximum leverage when he threatened 100 percent tariffs if the Chinese impose their rare earth global export controls. So, I think we have averted that. So, the tariffs will be averted,” he said.

Trump also met with Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on the sidelines of the ASEAN summit Sunday, stating afterward that he believed they would eventually reach a trade deal.

The news came after Trump imposed a 50% tariff on Brazil in August after former President Jair Bolsonaro, a Trump ally, was sentenced to prison for plotting a coup.

“I think we’ll make a deal with Brazil. We get along very well,” Trump said, as reported by CNN. “We have a lot of respect for your president, as you know, a lot of respect for Brazil. So we’ll see. We’ll probably work out some deals.”

Top trade negotiators for the U.S. and China said they came to terms on a range of contentious points, setting the table for Presidents Trump and Xi Jinping to finalize a deal and ease trade tensions that have rattled global markets.

After two days of talks in Malaysia wrapped up Sunday, a Chinese official said the two sides reached a preliminary consensus on topics including export controls, fentanyl and shipping levies.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, speaking later in an interview with CBS News, said Trump’s threat of 100% tariffs on Chinese goods “is effectively off the table” and he expected Beijing to make “substantial” soybean purchases as well as offer a deferral on sweeping rare-earth controls. The U.S. wouldn’t change its export controls directed at China, he added.

“So I would expect that the threat of the 100% has gone away, as has the threat of the immediate imposition of the Chinese initiating a worldwide export control regime,” Bessent said. He separately told ABC News he believed China would delay its rare-earth restrictions “for a year while they reexamine it.”

Bessent telegraphed a wide-ranging agreement between Trump and Xi that would extend a tariff truce, resolve differences over the sale of TikTok and keep up the flow of rare-earth magnets necessary for the production of advanced products from semiconductors to jet engines. The two leaders are also planning to discuss a global peace plan, he said, after Trump said publicly he hoped to enlist Xi’s help in ending Russia’s war in Ukraine.

The encouraging signals from both sides of the negotiations were a marked contrast from recent weeks, when Beijing’s announcement of new export restrictions and Trump’s reciprocal threat of staggering new tariffs threatened to plunge the world’s two largest economies back into an all-out trade war.

Staving off China’s rare-earth restrictions is “one of the major objectives of these talks, and I think we’re progressing toward that goal very well,” U.S .Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said on “Fox News Sunday.”

Trump predicted a “good deal with China” as he spoke with reporters on the sidelines of the Assn. of Southeast Asian Nations summit in Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian capital, saying he expected high-level follow-up meetings in China and the U.S.

“They want to make a deal, and we want to make a deal,” Trump said.

Still, markets will be closely watching the details of the ultimate agreement, after nearly a year of head-spinning changes to trade and tariff policies between Washington and Beijing.

Chinese trade envoy Li Chenggang said he believes that the sides had reached consensus on fentanyl — suggesting the U.S. might lift or reduce a 20% tariff it had imposed to pressure Beijing to halt the flow of precursor chemicals used to make the deadly drug. He said the nations would also address actions the Trump administration took to impose port service fees on Chinese vessels, which prompted Beijing to put retaliatory levies on U.S.-owned, -operated, -built or -flagged vessels.

Li, whom Bessent called “unhinged” just days ago, described the talks as intense and the U.S. position as tough, but hailed the signs of progress. Both sides will now brief their leaders ahead of a planned summit between Trump and Xi on Thursday.

“The current turbulences and twists and turns are ones that we do not wish to see,” Li told reporters, adding that a stable China-U.S. trade and economic relationship is good for both countries and the rest of the world.

The reopening of soybean purchases, if realized, could provide a significant political win for Trump.

China imposed retaliatory tariffs on U.S. farm goods in March, effectively slamming the door shut on American soybeans before the harvest even began. The Asian nation last year purchased $13 billion in U.S. beans — more than 20% of the entire crop — for animal feed and cooking oil, and the freeze has rocked rural farmers who represent a key political base for the president.

Perhaps more important is resolving the the U.S.’ rare-earths tussle with China, which fought back against Trump’s trade offensive earlier this year by cutting off supplies of the materials. Although flows were restored in a truce that saw tariffs lowered from levels exceeding 100%, China this month broadened export curbs on the materials after the U.S. expanded restrictions on Chinese companies.

The negotiations took place at the skyscraper Merdeka 118 as Trump met with Southeast Asian leaders at a nearby convention center, where he discussed a series of other framework trade agreements, seeking to diversify U.S. trade away from China.

The Chinese delegation was led by He, China’s top economic official, and included Vice Finance Minister Liao Min. Greer, the U.S. trade representative, was also part of the talks.

Trump’s meeting with Xi this week will be their first face-to-face sit-down since his return to the White House. The U.S. leader has said direct talks are the best way to resolve issues including tariffs, export curbs, agricultural purchases, fentanyl trafficking and geopolitical tinderboxes such as Taiwan and the war in Ukraine.

“We’ll be talking about a lot of things,” he said. “I think we have a really good chance of making a very comprehensive deal.”

Flatly and Xiao write for Bloomberg. Bloomberg writers Sam Kim and Tony Czuczka contributed to this report.