Hello and welcome to the Intelligence from the Economist. I'm your host, Jason Palmer.

Every weekday we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world.

This week new restrictions will clamp down on the makers of Internet porn, but they're

not being imposed by a government. It's credit card and financial companies that are increasingly

reluctantly plugging the gaps left by regulators. And if you haven't heard of Squid Game yet,

you soon will. The series' wild success shows that Netflix can give local productions

of global audience how resonant the topic of social inequality is and just how much cultural

kashay South Korea has. But first, a suicide bomber struck on Friday at a Shia mosque in the

northern Afghan city of Konduz. The attack killed more than 50 people, making it the deadliest

since American forces withdrew from the country in August. Islamic State took responsibility

for the atrocity, suggesting that the Taliban's grip on power isn't as strong as it might

have hoped. That power vacuum poses real problems for lots of interested parties, not least

neighboring Pakistan. Its prime minister Imran Khan said instability across the border

worried him. That too will impact Pakistan. It will mean an unstable, chaotic Afghanistan,

ideal place for terrorists. And that is our worry. Pakistan's international relations are

complicated. They partnered with America for much of the past two decades, helping with

logistics and intelligence in Afghanistan's war. But at the same time, it provided a

haven and training to leaders of the Taliban, a point that John Simpson of the BBC pressed

last month when speaking with Prime Minister Khan.

But the Taliban are really a Pakistani creation, aren't they?

Absolutely not. Taliban were creation of the environment after the Soviets left. The

warlords started fighting each other. And in that chaos emerged Taliban. And why did

...