Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar travelled to Islamabad this week for a high-level Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit-marking the first time an Indian foreign minister has travelled to Pakistan since 2015 and the first time any Indian minister has visited the country since Defense Minister Rajnath Singh in 2016. During his roughly 24-hour visit, Jaishankar participated in meetings and other activities with Pakistani officials present, but there were no bilateral engagements.

However in his address at the meeting, Jaishankar was said to be hinting at India's relations with Pakistan in particular, as he talked about friendship falling short and good neighbourliness missing. "If trust is lacking or cooperation inadequate, if friendship has fallen short and good neighbourliness is missing somewhere, there are surely reasons to introspect and causes to address. Equally, it is only when we reaffirm our commitment most sincerely to the Charter that we can fully realise the benefits of cooperation and integration that it envisages," he said.

Qatar's ruling emir said his small, energy-rich nation will hold a referendum on ending a short-lived experiment in electing members of the country's advisory Shura Council. Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani offered no immediate timeline for the referendum in an annual address to the Shura Council, which drafts laws, approves state budgets, debates major issues and provides advice to the ruler. The body does not have sway over matters of defence, security and the economy.

However, it marks yet another rollback in the hereditarily ruled Gulf Arab states in its halting steps to embrace representational rule, however tentative, after hopes for democracy in the region rose in the wake of the 2011 Arab Spring. From its perspective, Qatar saw the one-time 2021 vote likely as increasing tensions between tribes and families in the country just months after a diplomatic crisis between Doha and four Arab nations ended. "We are all one family in Qatar," Sheikh Tamim said.

North Korea confirmed that its recently revised constitution defines South Korea as "a hostile state" for the first time, two days after it blew up front-line road and rail links that once connected the country with the South. The back-to-back developments indicate North Korea is intent on escalating animosities against South Korea, increasing the danger of possible clashes at their tense border areas, though it's highly unlikely for the North to launch full-scale attacks in the face of more superior US and South Korea forces.

The official Korean Central News Agency said that the recent demolition of parts of the northern sections of the inter-Korean road and rail links was "an inevitable and legitimate measure taken in keeping with the requirement of the DPRK constitution which clearly defines the ROK as a hostile state." South Korea's Unification Ministry condemned North Korea's constitutional reference to South Korea as a hostile state, calling it "an anti-unification, anti-national act."

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine told lawmakers that his country's Western partners are increasing pressure to negotiate with Russia, but he hinted such talks would be unfavourable to Kyiv as he unveiled what he called his "victory plan" for the war. Major points of the plan include an invitation for Ukraine to join NATO and permission to use Western-supplied longer-range missiles to strike military targets deep inside Russian territory - steps that have been met with reluctance by Kyiv's allies so far.

"If we start moving according to this victory plan now, it may be possible to end the war no later than next year," Zelenskyy told the Verkhovna Rada, the parliament. He was set to later present the five-point plan to the European Council. Zelenskyy also said that in private communications with Ukraine, its partners are increasingly mentioning "negotiations" and much less frequently using the word "justice."