Pakistan appears to have caught the geopolitical winds good. Final month, Pakistan signed a defence settlement with Saudi Arabia. Beneath this daring pact, an assault on one shall be considered an assault on each, a dramatic escalation of safety ensures in a area already crowded with rivalries. On the identical time, Islamabad has quietly dispatched uncommon earth mineral samples to america and is exploring deeper export agreements. Washington, for its half, seems newly enthusiastic about treating Pakistan as greater than a peripheral irritant.
These strikes counsel momentum. Commentators in Islamabad and Riyadh name it a renaissance of Pakistani overseas coverage, a belated recognition of the nation’s strategic indispensability. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s presence on the Gaza peace summit solely strengthened the impression of a nation returning to centre stage within the Muslim world.
However that is no in a single day miracle. It’s the product of necessity, stress and shifting alignments in a unstable area. Behind the optics lie more durable realities.
The primary driver of Pakistan’s overseas coverage push is the US withdrawal from Afghanistan. Washington’s abrupt exit left a vacuum it nonetheless struggles to fill. With a hostile Iran and an entrenched Taliban, the US wants a counterweight within the area. Pakistan, with its geography, intelligence networks and lengthy entanglement in Afghan affairs, out of the blue issues once more.
US President Donald Trump’s demand that the Taliban hand over the Bagram airbase, 5 years after signing the deal that paved the way in which for the US withdrawal, underscores America’s seek for leverage. If that gambit fails, Pakistan turns into the plain fallback: the one state with each logistical capability and political connections to assist Washington keep a presence within the area.
The second issue is the uneasy US-India relationship. Over the previous decade, Washington has drawn New Delhi deeper into its Indo-Pacific technique, strengthening its international profile in methods Pakistan sees as threatening. But US-India friction has grown. Disputes over visas and tariffs have festered. India’s embrace of Moscow has raised eyebrows in Washington.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s August go to to Beijing despatched a transparent sign that India is prepared to hedge its bets with China. Economically, his “Make in India” programme, modelled on East Asia’s low-cost export methods, might undercut US manufacturing. For Trump, keen to keep up steadiness in Asia, Pakistan seems helpful once more as a counterweight to India’s flirtations with Beijing.
The third and most precarious driver is mineral diplomacy. Islamabad’s outreach to Washington centres on guarantees of entry to uncommon earth minerals, lots of that are situated within the restive area of Balochistan. On paper, this appears to be like like a win-win: Pakistan good points funding, and the US secures vital assets. However the actuality is darker. Balochistan stays Pakistan’s poorest province regardless of a long time of extraction. Infrastructure initiatives stand underused, airports lie empty and unemployment stays stubbornly excessive.
The Balochistan Mines and Minerals Act 2025, handed by the provincial legislature in March, has solely deepened discontent. Beneath the act, Islamabad is formally empowered to advocate mining insurance policies and licensing selections in Balochistan, a transfer that has provoked opposition throughout the political spectrum. Critics argue it undermines provincial autonomy and recentralises management in Islamabad. Even right-wing spiritual events, such because the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (JUI-F), seldom aligned with nationalist teams, have expressed opposition, portraying the regulation as yet one more try to dispossess native communities of their rightful stake within the province’s assets.
This backlash underscores a harmful development. Useful resource exploitation with out native participation fuels resentment and insurgency. By opening mineral wealth to overseas traders with out social safeguards, Islamabad dangers deepening the alienation of a province already scarred by battle and militarisation. What appears to be like like salvation in Islamabad can appear to be dispossession in Quetta.
Taken collectively, these drivers present that Pakistan’s overseas coverage shift is much less a renaissance than a calculated pivot underneath stress. The Afghan vacuum, the recalibration of US-India ties and the lure of mineral diplomacy all clarify Islamabad’s newfound prominence. However none erases underlying fragilities. Washington might as soon as once more deal with Pakistan as disposable when its priorities change. India’s weight in US technique is just not going away. And Balochistan’s grievances will solely deepen if useful resource offers stay extractive and exclusionary.
The applause in Riyadh, the visibility on the Gaza summit and the well mannered handshakes in Washington shouldn’t be mistaken for a strategic rebirth. Pakistan is manoeuvring rigorously, improvising underneath stress and looking for to show vulnerabilities into alternatives. However the actual take a look at lies at house. Except Islamabad can confront governance failures, regional inequalities and political distrust, overseas coverage good points will stay fragile.
In the long run, no defence pact or minerals deal can substitute for a steady social contract inside Pakistan itself. That’s the true renaissance Pakistan nonetheless awaits.
The views expressed on this article are the writer’s personal and don’t essentially replicate Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
