Pakistan’s geopolitical position is best described as unenviable.

The nation sits sandwiched between two rising powers: India, looking Northwest with simmering hostility and China, looking southwest with avarice. Pakistan’s north-western marches along the Durand line with Afghanistan have, to put it mildly, descended into chaos alongside the Pakistani regimes’ relationship with the Taliban. Pakistani airstrikes have struck Kabul, including hitting a drug-rehabilitation centre in March this year and border clashes have flared up repeatedly alongside intensifying insurgent warfare within Pakistan from the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), whom Islamabad accuses Kabul of supporting.

This is perhaps somewhat ironic, given Pakistan’s alleged under-the-table support for the Afghan Taliban during NATO’s failed intervention there. It is hypothesised that Pakistan hoped that the once the Taliban regained power they would be happy to act as, if not a full client state, then at least a friendly one. This has clearly not gone Islamabad’s way, so far in fact that the Taliban are allegedly increasingly engaging with the Indian government.

Finally, Pakistan’s economy has long struggled. While recent macroeconomic outlooks do show that it has managed to serve away from the cliff-edge. The IMF’s latest assessment published earlier this month show a forecasted growth of 3.5% for 2027 (below the 4% target) while inflation remains high at 10.3% and the country continues to rely on international financial assistance.

The wider geopolitical chaos embroiling the world also presents a number of challenges, along with potential opportunities. The Trump administration’s disastrous war against Iran is a rather neat case study. Oil prices have spiked as around a fifth of the world’s oil trade remains throttled by Iran’s on-and-off closure of the Strait of Hormuz alongside drone and ballistic missile attacks against the US’ Middle Eastern partners. Russia’s imperialist invasion of Ukraine grinds on, occupying near every waking thought of European leaders as the US appears to change sides.

In this melee, caught as it is between two rising powers and an insurgency somewhat of its own making, Pakistan is angling to fill a Geostrategic niche in the hope that it may take advantage of some of the opportunities presented and answer some of its more intractable challenges in particular: the economy and the Afghan insurgency.

This is perhaps why Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is due to visit Moscow for talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The predicted agenda says quite a bit about Pakistan’s position with two of the main talking points likely to be Afghanistan and energy. Russia is one of the few countries to recognise the Taliban government and has expanded its security arrangements there. It is positioned as a potential mediator between Islamabad and Kabul. From Russia’s perspective, they’re searching for more open markets for oil and natural gas to fund their war in Ukraine. There is a potential for a quid pro quo of sorts: Russia assists Pakistan in negotiations with Kabul while Pakistan further opens its markets for Russian energy.

The fact that Pakistan is well known to have also supplied Ukraine with 122mm Grad rockets, 155mm shells and 122mm missiles, in 2023, as reported in The New Voice of Ukraine early last year does not appear to be a major sticking point between the two nations.

This highlights how Pakistan is envisioning its future role. As with its Southern neighbour, it appears determined to maintain neutrality. This has been put into practice in the mediating role it has taken between Iran and the United States in their conflict. This may work well for Islamabad. As reported in The Diplomat: “countries are increasingly seeing the value in deepening ties with a state like Pakistan that has maintained working relationships across multiple camps”

Pakistan has also engaged in a flurry of mutual defence and military industry pacts, especially within the Muslim world. On October 21st Pakistan, Türkiye, Qatar and Indonesia signed the Badr pact. In September 2025 Pakistan signed the Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement with Saudi Arabia. In August 2026 Pakistan, Türkiye and Saudi Arabia created the Makkah Joint Defense Agreement. Also in August Pakistan signed a protocol agreement with Kuwait around military cooperation. Pakistan’s good performance in 2025’s clashes with India and its significant defense industrial base have proved excellent PR that has allowed her to double down on the pursuit of joint defense production and investment in Pakistan’s defence industry.

These deepening agreements offer solutions to three problems: It allows Pakistan to diversify defence procurement away from China and achieve greater strategic autonomy, the mutual defence pacts, provide an additional layer of deterrence against any conflict with India and may do the same if activated against the Taliban (It has to be noted here that sometimes these pacts do not live up to the promises made, look to Russia ignoring Armenia’s triggering of the CSTO’s mutual defence pact in its war with Azerbaijan) and finally, they may provide a significant boost to Pakistan’s economy, the recently signed pacts could increase defence exports to around $650 million by 2027, up from $280 million in 2024.

This three-pronged approach: mediator status, mutual defence with other Muslim powers and a defence-led economic boost, if done correctly, could leave Pakistan relatively well positioned in the growing new Cold War.

However, all this may not answer perhaps the most significant challenge facing the Pakistani regime. It has a significant legitimacy-debt following the ousting and imprisonment of former Prime Minister Imran Khan. Couple this with endemic corruption, increasing restrictions on freedom of speech, alleged political disappearances and systematic transnational repression and you don’t have an easy path to true political legitimacy.

To meet that challenge it needs to be able to sell itself not only to other powers on the international stage but to the Pakistani people. To do so it needs to be able to provide an affirmative answer to that most important of all questions that people ask of their governments “Will you help my children’s lives be better than mine?”

If Sharif and the generals behind him are unable to give the right answer to that question, then no amount of glamourous summits, on-paper economic growth and popularity amongst leaders of nations will be enough. Given the regime’s seemingly intractable corruption, scoring a measly 28/100 on Transparency International’s corruption perception index, ranking 136th of 182 countries listed and seeming dedication to an authoritarian path, it is reasonable to be sceptical of success.