PAKISTAN

The South Asian subcontinent has been threatened by one of the most dangerous conflicts in the world. It has revolved around the territorial dispute between India and Pakistan over the region of Kashmir but encompassed wider differences and disagreements between the two nations. Split into two separate countries at the time of decolonization in 1947, India and Pakistan have fought wars over mountainous Kashmir several times. The United Nations has taken a role in the Kashmir dispute and maintains observers along the cease-fire line (Line of Control) between Pakistan-controlled and India-controlled Kashmir. Since both Pakistan and India have become nuclear powers, a further escalation of the fifty-year conflict between them could have global repercussions. Another conflict that has shaped relations between Pakistan and India surrounded the secession of East Pakistan to form the independent country of Bangladesh in 1971. Domestic problems faced by Pakistan today include the issue of Afghan refugees, relations between Sunni and Shia Muslims, and relations among Pakistan's various ethnic groups. Pakistan's domestic conflicts were greatly complicated in 2001 when forces of the United Nations, led by the United States, invaded neighboring Afghanistan. Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf's support for the Western-supported attack on the Islamic government of Afghanistan's Taliban regime angered many Pakistani Muslims. The question of the role of Islam in Pakistani life is a matter of ongoing debate that is likely to continue into the future, as is the uneasy relationship between military and political power in Pakistan's fragile democracy.

Located in southern Asia, Pakistan is bounded by India, China, Afghanistan, and Iran. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea in the south and some of the world's highest mountains in the north, including peaks in the Himalaya, Karakoram, Pamir, and Hindu Kush ranges. The Indus River and its tributaries form the fertile plains that support the bulk of the Pakistani population and provide for its basic nutritional needs. In 2002 Pakistan had a population of almost 148 million people, the overwhelming majority of whom are Muslims.