The Centre for Aerospace & Security Studies (CASS), Islamabad, convened a
Roundtable Conference on ‘Weaponising Information: Media Strategies in Modern
Warfare’ on 27th August 2025. The discussion highlighted the rising significance of
information as a weapon in contemporary conflicts, especially in the wake of the May
2025 India–Pakistan escalation. The event was attended by members of academia and
intellectuals. CASS is an independent think tank that continues to arrange academic
events for academia and practitioners interested in National Security in its wider context.
The moderator of the conference, Air Marshal Zahid Mehmood (Retd), Senior Director
at CASS Islamabad, set the tone by underscoring the centrality of media in modern
warfare and its decisive impact on public perception and battlefield outcomes. Stressing
the need for moving beyond reactive responses, he emphasised the importance of
proactive media strategies to strengthen Pakistan’s resilience against future crises.
Mr Amer Zafar Durrani, Founding President of Reenergia and keynote speaker,
highlighted the weaponisation of information as a decisive factor in modern conflict,
operating across content, distribution, and cognition. He called for a Joint Information
Operations Coordination Cell under the National Security Council, supported by AIpowered detection systems tailored to local contexts. Stressing the importance of
verification, provenance tagging, and pre-bunking, he urged policies that counter foreign
influence operations while safeguarding civil liberties. He concluded by emphasising
digital literacy, regional alliances, and stress-tested protocols as the foundations of
Pakistan’s resilience in the information domain.
The second keynote speaker, Mr Rehman Azhar, journalist and anchor at Express News,
traced the role of media in the recent Indo-Pak May 2025 conflict, highlighting the Indian
media’s reliance on sensationalism under the patronage of the far-right BJP government.
He observed that Indian media, unlike its Pakistani counterpart, is not war-savvy and thus
resorted to exaggerated false claims of victory in the recent conflict. Pointing to the rapid
evolution of tools such as bots and deepfakes, he stressed that information warfare is
highly dynamic and demands a proactive approach. He concluded by stressing the
importance of the media taking an active role in the pre-bunking stage, rather than playing
only a reactive role once crises unfold.
In his concluding remarks, Air Marshal Javaid Ahmed (Retd), President CASS, thanked
the speakers for their practical and academic insights. He stressed that while India had
invested heavily in media preparations to project a narrative of dominance in the May
2025 conflict, it was Pakistan’s tactical performance in the one-hour aerial combat and
the professional press briefings by the Pakistan Armed Forces that decisively shifted the
information battle. He emphasised that this experience underlines the need for Pakistan
to institutionalise media preparedness as a core element of national security strategy
Roundtable Conference on ‘Weaponising Information: Media Strategies in Modern
Warfare’ on 27th August 2025. The discussion highlighted the rising significance of
information as a weapon in contemporary conflicts, especially in the wake of the May
2025 India–Pakistan escalation. The event was attended by members of academia and
intellectuals. CASS is an independent think tank that continues to arrange academic
events for academia and practitioners interested in National Security in its wider context.
The moderator of the conference, Air Marshal Zahid Mehmood (Retd), Senior Director
at CASS Islamabad, set the tone by underscoring the centrality of media in modern
warfare and its decisive impact on public perception and battlefield outcomes. Stressing
the need for moving beyond reactive responses, he emphasised the importance of
proactive media strategies to strengthen Pakistan’s resilience against future crises.
Mr Amer Zafar Durrani, Founding President of Reenergia and keynote speaker,
highlighted the weaponisation of information as a decisive factor in modern conflict,
operating across content, distribution, and cognition. He called for a Joint Information
Operations Coordination Cell under the National Security Council, supported by AIpowered detection systems tailored to local contexts. Stressing the importance of
verification, provenance tagging, and pre-bunking, he urged policies that counter foreign
influence operations while safeguarding civil liberties. He concluded by emphasising
digital literacy, regional alliances, and stress-tested protocols as the foundations of
Pakistan’s resilience in the information domain.
The second keynote speaker, Mr Rehman Azhar, journalist and anchor at Express News,
traced the role of media in the recent Indo-Pak May 2025 conflict, highlighting the Indian
media’s reliance on sensationalism under the patronage of the far-right BJP government.
He observed that Indian media, unlike its Pakistani counterpart, is not war-savvy and thus
resorted to exaggerated false claims of victory in the recent conflict. Pointing to the rapid
evolution of tools such as bots and deepfakes, he stressed that information warfare is
highly dynamic and demands a proactive approach. He concluded by stressing the
importance of the media taking an active role in the pre-bunking stage, rather than playing
only a reactive role once crises unfold.
In his concluding remarks, Air Marshal Javaid Ahmed (Retd), President CASS, thanked
the speakers for their practical and academic insights. He stressed that while India had
invested heavily in media preparations to project a narrative of dominance in the May
2025 conflict, it was Pakistan’s tactical performance in the one-hour aerial combat and
the professional press briefings by the Pakistan Armed Forces that decisively shifted the
information battle. He emphasised that this experience underlines the need for Pakistan
to institutionalise media preparedness as a core element of national security strategy
