(Special counsel Robert Mueller walks with his wife, Ann, in Washington, D.C., on Sunday.) The big news from Washington is that special counsel Robert Mueller’s inquiry into President Donald Trump’s ‘Russia collusion’ is unfounded. Attorney General William Barr’s communication to the US Congress says, “The special counsel’s investigation did not find that the Trump campaign …
Italy takes Belt and Road to the heart of Europe
(Italy receives Chinese president Xi Jinping in Rome with stately pageant.) ‘Xi in Rome: The escort fit for kings’ — that was the headline of one of Italy’s oldest and most read newspaper Corriere della Sera. The Chinese president Xi Jinping was greeted at the presidential Quirinale Palace by guards on horseback — an honour …
Continue reading “Italy takes Belt and Road to the heart of Europe”
Trump’s Golan move shows US contempt for international law and rules-based order
(Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, seized from Syria in 1967) The US President Donald Trump’s tweet on Thursday that the United States should back Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, seized from Syria in 1967, didn’t quite come like a bolt from the blue. There has been talk about such a thing for sometime. Last December, the …
Continue reading “Trump’s Golan move shows US contempt for international law and rules-based order”
With eye on US, Iran revs up ‘resistance front’
(Major-General Qassem Soleimani, head of Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ Quds Force visiting the frontline somewhere in Iraq.) A new phase is beginning in Iran’s approach to the situation since last May when the US withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal. Tehran had thus far prioritised the consolidation of Western opinion against President Trump’s decision with a …
Continue reading “With eye on US, Iran revs up ‘resistance front’”
India shouldn’t undermine Afghan peace talks
(Handout picture of US officials at peace talks with Taliban, Doha, Qatar) The Press Trust of India has reported on the discussions regarding Afghanistan in Washington last week between the visiting Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale and the US special representative Zalmay Khalilzad. The report carries New Delhi dateline and is attributed to ‘official sources’. According …
Continue reading “India shouldn’t undermine Afghan peace talks”
The West broke Syria and should own it
Abu Omar, 70, smokes his pipe as he sits in his destroyed bedroom listening to music on his gramophone in the neighbourhood of al-Shaar in Aleppo, Syria. As Syria’s war enters its ninth year on March 15, many questions arise as to how it began and what it morphed into, but the most pressing one …
Spectre of Afghan quagmire haunts US
The Afghan national security advisor Hamdullah Mohib, while on a visit to Washington, tore into the US’ peace talks with Taliban in remarks to the American media on Thursday. Mohib alleged that US special representative Zalmay Khalilzad is keeping the Afghan govt in Kabul in the dark about the negotiations with the Taliban and that …
Dump Masood Azhar project. Life is real.
(The United Nations Security Council in session in New York) The Chinese reservation about placing a technical hold on the listing of the chief of Jaish-e-Mohammed Masood Azhar as a ‘global terrorist’ by the United Nations Security Council does not come as surprise. The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman in the recent days had made it …
Pakistan becomes pivotal to Afghan peace
(A view of the Taliban’s office in Doha, Qatar) The marathon talks between the US officials and the Taliban representatives at Doha through a 16-day period ending yesterday can be seen as a defining moment in the endgame in Afghanistan. Both the US special representative Zalmay Khalilzad and the Taliban have signalled that progress has …
Iran trusts Imran Khan but will verify the promise
Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani received a phone call from Pakistan PM Imran Khan late in the evening on March 9, which was their first contact after the fedayeen attack near the southeastern Iranian city of Zahedan on February 13 that Tehran alleged as having been executed by terrorists from across the border. Twenty-seven soldiers of …
Continue reading “Iran trusts Imran Khan but will verify the promise”