Swāt سوات‬ is a river valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan. It is the upper valley of the Swat River, which rises in the Hindu Kush range. The capital of Swat is Saidu Sharif, but the main city in Swat is Mingora.^[4]It was a princely state, the Yusafzai State of Swat, until 1969, when it was dissolved along with the states of Dir and Chitral and made part of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. With a population of 2,309,570 according to the 2017 census, Swat is the third-largest district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

With 52 lakes, high mountains, green meadows, and clear lakes, it is popular with tourists. QueenElizabeth II during her visit to the Yusafzai State of Swat called it "the Switzerland of the east."^[6]Swat is surrounded by Chitral, Upper Dir and Lower Dir in the West, Gilgit-Baltistan in North Kohistan, Buner and Shangla in the East and south East. The southern tehsil of Buner was granted the status of a separate district in 1991.^[7] Swat is populated mostly by ethnic Pashtunsand Gujjar and Kohistani communities. The language spoken in the valley is Pashto