KARACHI: A two-day conference on Saturday shed light on the difference between world orders of the past and the present specially challenges the world is facing today including injustice, new international economic order, global peace, modern technologies and promises of the past.

The conference — Seventy Years after Bandung: the Struggle Continues — was organised by the Pakistan Institute of International Affairs (PIIA).

Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed inaugurated the conference, which was attended by local and foreign delegates, scholars and diplomats.

The Bandung Conference, hosted in Indonesia in 1955, had set a new course for a divided world, igniting the spirit of solidarity, non-alignment and a collective desire to break the shackles of colonisation.

The PIIA conference brings together scholars, diplomats and experts to discuss the major issues in international political in the 21st Century. By exploring the shared experience of global majority, the conference seek to foster dialogue, identify pathways for cooperation and develop strategies that champion justice, equality and sovereignty.

The conference is featuring many sessions on themes including decolonisation, challenges of the global south, human rights, environmental degradation, multipolarity, and global peace. Speaking on the occasion, Mushahid Hussain expressed his deep concerns over the ongoing conflicts around the world in particular tragedy in Gaza and India-held Jammu and Kashmir.

He said that the resistance to colonialism, solidarity among nations, and the pursuit of sovereignty was more relevant today than ever.

Senior PPP leader Senator Sherry Rehman, in her keynote address, stressed the need for paying attention to clean environment and other challenges being faced by the world.

Published in Dawn, April 27th, 2025