“Opinion | What Pakistan-Brokered Islamic State & Lashkar-e-Taiba Nexus Means For India”, News 18, October 08, 2025
“In a worrying development with direct implications for India’s security, Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) has reportedly orchestrated an alliance between two of the region’s deadliest terror groups the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP)-to execute a new phase of proxy warfare in Balochistan.. Intelligence sources suggest Islamabad’s objectives are to suppress the Baloch insurgency, reinforce control over Afghanistan’s borderlands, and revive terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir while maintaining plausible deniability.
Once ideological rivals, the LeT and ISKP are now collaborating under ISI oversight. A recently surfaced photograph showing ISKP coordinator Mir Shafiq Mengal presenting a pistol to LeT chief Rana Mohammad Ashfaq, symbolising a formal alliance. Analysts interpret this as an extension of Pakistan’s “strategic depth” policy, combining ISKP’s transnational jihadist branding with LeT’s operational expertise.
Widely condemned across the Islamic world, the ISKP is now reportedly being repurposed by Pakistan’s military establishment to target Baloch nationalists and Taliban factions defying Islamabad. Recent propaganda in ISKP’s magazine Yalgaar also signals its intent to expand operations into the Kashmir Valley, for which it requires support from Pakistan-backed LeT networks…….”
Read full article at news18.com
