Pakistan and state-sponsored terrorism refers to the involvement of Pakistan in terrorism through the backing of various designated terrorist organisations. Pakistan has been frequently accused by various countries, including its neighbours Afghanistan, Iran, and India, as well as by the United States,International Terrorism: Threats and Responses: Hearings Before the Committee on the Judiciary By United States Congress House Committee on the Judiciary, , 1996, pp. 482. the United Kingdom, Germany, and France, of involvement in a variety of terrorist activities in both its local region of South Asia and beyond.Back to Camp-Dawn July 2005 Pakistan's northwestern tribal regions along the Afghanistan–Pakistan border have been described as an effective safe haven for terrorists by Western media and the United States Secretary of Defense, while India has accused Pakistan of perpetuating the insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir by providing financial support and armaments to militant groups, as well as by sending state-trained terrorists across the Line of Control and de facto India–Pakistan border to launch attacks in Indian-administered Kashmir and India proper, respectively.
According to an analysis published by the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution in 2008, Pakistan was reportedly, with the possible exception of Iran, perhaps the world's most active sponsor of terrorist groups, aiding groups that pose a direct threat to the United States. Pakistan's active participation has caused thousands of deaths in the region; all these years Pakistan has been supportive to several terrorist groups despite several stern warnings from the international community. Daniel Byman, a professor and senior analyst of terrorism and security at the Center For Middle East Policy, also wrote that Pakistan is probably 2008's most active sponsor of terrorism. In 2018, the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif, suggested that the Pakistani government (see The Establishment) played a role in the 2008 Mumbai attacks that were carried out by Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan-based Islamist terrorist group. In July 2019, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan, on an official visit to the United States, acknowledged the presence of some 30,000–40,000 armed terrorists operating on Pakistani soil. He further stated that previous administrations were hiding this truth, particularly from the United States, for the last 15 years during the war on terror.
The United States' State Sponsors of Terrorism designation list describes Pakistan as a terrorist safe haven where individual terrorists and terrorist groups are able to organise, plan, raise funds, communicate, recruit, train, transit, and operate in relative security because of inadequate/supportive governance, political will, or both. Osama bin Laden, the leader of al-Qaeda and mastermind behind the September 11 attacks on the United States in 2001, was killed by U.S. Navy SEALs during Operation Neptune Spear at his compound near the Pakistan Military Academy in Abbottabad, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.
A terror attack claimed by The Resistance Front (who later retracted the claim) killed at least 26 civilians in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir on 22 April 2025. India accused Pakistan of involvement, while Pakistan denied any such backing.
In 2025, Khwaja Muhammad Asif, Pakistan's Defence Minister, admitted in an interview with a Sky News journalist Yalda Hakim that his country had supported terrorist groups for more than three decades, saying that Pakistan has been doing the "dirty work" of the western nations when asked about supporting and financing terrorism.
Background Until Pakistan became a key ally in the war on terrorism, the US Secretary of State included Pakistan on the 1993 list of countries which repeatedly provide support for acts of international terrorism. In fact, many consider that Pakistan has been playing both sides in the fight against terror, on the one hand, demonstrating to help curtail terrorist activities while on the other, stoking it. Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid and author Ted Galen Carpenter had accused Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) of providing help to the Taliban and separatists in Kashmir.
Allegations of state-sponsored terrorism
Author Gordon Thomas states that whilst aiding in the capture of Al Qaeda members, Pakistan still sponsored terrorist groups in the Indian union territory of Jammu and Kashmir, funding, training and arming them in their war of attrition against India. Journalist Stephen Schwartz notes that several terrorist and criminal groups are backed by senior officers in the Pakistani army, the country's ISI intelligence establishment and other armed bodies of the state. According to Ted Galen Carpenter, a senior fellow for defence and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, without the active support of the government in Islamabad, it is doubtful whether the Taliban could ever have come to power in Afghanistan. Pakistani authorities helped fund the militia and equip it with military hardware during the mid-1990s when the Taliban was merely one of several competing factions in Afghanistan’s civil war. Only when the United States exerted enormous diplomatic pressure after the 11 September attacks did Islamabad begin to sever its political and financial ties with the Taliban. Even now it is not certain that key members of Pakistan’s intelligence service have repudiated their Taliban clients.
Afghanistan is not the only place where Pakistani leaders have flirted with terrorist clients. Pakistan has also assisted rebel & jihadist forces in Kashmir, having committed terrorist acts against civilians. A disproportionate number of the extremist madrassa schools funded by the Saudis operate in Pakistan. Pakistan's former ambassador to the U.S., Husain Haqqani has said Pakistan sponsors terrorism.
Author Daniel Byman states, "Pakistan is probably today's most active sponsor of terrorism."Deadly Connections: States That Sponsor Terrorism By Daniel Byman, , 2005, Cambridge University Press, pp 155 Writing in an article published by The Australian he stated, "Following the terror massacres in Mumbai, Pakistan may now be the single biggest state sponsor of terrorism, beyond even Iran, yet it has never been listed by the US State Department as a state sponsor of terrorism".Asia's Islamism engine , The Australian, 4 December 2008
Former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf has conceded that his forces trained militant groups to fight India in Indian-administered Kashmir. He confessed that the government turned a blind eye because it wanted to force India to enter into negotiations, as well as raise the issue internationally. He also said Pakistani spies in the Inter-Services Intelligence directorate (ISI) cultivated the Taliban after 2001 because Karzai's government was dominated by non-Pashtuns, who are the country's largest ethnic group, and by officials who were thought to favour India.
Pakistan has been included in the FATF greylist many times for its financial support to terrorist activities, and the last removal from it was in 2023. However, the Financial Action Task Force has warned Pakistan among other countries in 2025 and stated that it may still be subject to scrutiny over money laundering and terror financing since its removal from the greylist.
Inter-Services Intelligence and terrorism The ISI, has often been accused of playing a role in major terrorist attacks across India including terrorism in Kashmir, the July 2006 Mumbai Train Bombings, the 2001 Indian Parliament attack, the 2006 Varanasi bombings, the August 2007 Hyderabad bombings, and the 2008 Mumbai attacks.
The ISI is also accused of supporting Taliban forces and recruiting and training mujahideen to fight in Afghanistan and Kashmir. Based on communication intercepts, US intelligence agencies concluded Pakistan's ISI was behind the attack on the Indian embassy in Kabul on 7 July 2008, a charge that the governments of India and Afghanistan had laid previously.
The ISI, is believed to be aiding these organisations in eradicating perceived enemies or those opposed to their cause, including India, Russia, China, Israel, the United States, the United Kingdom and other members of NATO. Satellite imagery from the FBI suggest the existence of several terrorist camps in Pakistan, with at least one militant admitting to being trained in the country as part of the going Kashmir Dispute, Pakistan is alleged to be supporting separatist militias Many nonpartisan sources believe that officials within Pakistan's military and the ISI sympathise with and aid Islamic terrorists, saying that the ISI has provided covert but well-documented support to terrorist groups active in Kashmir, including the al-Qaeda affiliate Jaish-e-Mohammed.
President of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai has regularly reiterated allegations that militants operating training camps in Pakistan have used it as a launch platform to attack targets in Afghanistan. He has also urged Western military allies to target extremist hideouts in neighbouring Pakistan.Karzai wants action by allied forces in Pakistan 11 August 2008 Dawn, Pakistan In response to the militants from Afghanistan hiding in the mountainous tribal region of Pakistan, the US and Pakistan agreed to allow US Drone Strikes in Pakistan.
Several detainees at the Guantanamo Bay facility told US interrogators that they were aided by the ISI for attacks in the disputed Kashmir Region."ISI allowed terrorists to attack India, says WikiLeaks." Press Trust of India, 9 May 2011.
ISI has been accused of backing criminal organisations like Shahzad Bhatti Network to fuel terror activities in Indian Punjab. In 2025, multiple arrests were made in Delhi and Punjab linking the network to planned attacks. In August 2026, more than 250 alleged network associates were detained and weapons, IEDs, grenades, and live ammunition were seized.
Alleged Pakistani Army support of terrorists
Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has admitted that Pakistan supported and trained terrorist groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) in 1990s to carry out militancy in Kashmir. "From 1979 Pakistan was in favour of religious militancy. The Kashmiri "freedom fighters" including Hafiz Saeed and Zaki ar-Rahman Lakhvi were our heroes at that time. We trained Taliban and sent them to fight against Soviet Union. Taliban, Haqqani, Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri were our heroes then (during the Soviet-Afghan war). Later they became 'villains'." said Pervez Musharraf.
According to Pervez Hoodhboy, "Bin Laden was 'The Golden Goose' that the army had kept under its watch but which, to its chagrin, has now been stolen from under its nose. Until then, the thinking had been to trade in the Goose at the right time for the right price, either in the form of dollars or political concessions".
During the raid on bin Laden's Abbottabad compound, US Navy SEALs were able to recover some 470,000 computer files from a trove of ten hard drives, five computers and around one hundred thumb drives and disks. The documents recovered from the compound contained nothing to support the idea that bin Laden was protected by Pakistani officials or that he was in communication with them. Instead, the documents contained criticism of Pakistani military and future plans for attacks against Pakistani military targets.