Hakha Town in Myanmar’s Chin State bordering Mizoram was the scene of attacks on the military by rebel fighters on May 5, 2021 How some animals get to sense when earthquakes are imminent remains a mystery. Just before the great Asian tsunami on December 26, 2004, elephants in Sri Lanka moved to high ground …
Continue reading “India will be front-line state in Myanmar civil war”
In a sudden change of heart, US President Biden may relent to lift the ban on export of raw materials for India’s Covid vaccine. In the coming week, the commander of the US Central Command Gen Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr. is expected to provide Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin with options for potential future counterterrorism …
US to withdraw troops from Afghanistan by Sept 11, 2021 The United States and NATO are yet to begin the withdrawal of their forces from Afghanistan but the eyes are cast over the horizon at what lies after the ‘forever war’ formally ends. The US exit strategy in Afghanistan assumes the look of that random …
A high-powered Taliban delegation led by Mullah Baradar arrived in Tehran for consultations on January 26, 2021 A high-level delegation led by Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the senior leader of the Taliban and its chief negotiator at the Doha talks, held consultations in Tehran and Moscow this week through January 26-29 amidst growing uncertainty over …
Continue reading “Taliban risks losing international legitimacy”
Bahrain’s Foreign Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani (R) received External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar, Manama, Dec 24, 2020 The Chinese statement of December 2 at the United Nations General Assembly in New York on the ‘Question of Palestine and the Situation in the Middle East’ should trigger introspection in New Delhi. Without doubt, this …
Continue reading “India’s Gulf strategy is chasing Chinese phantoms”
The Modi government has earned the distinction as the “first non-western” voice to come out in support of French President Emmanuel Macron over the recent horrific killings in that country. This distinction apparently presents itself as too good to miss. The Rajya Sabha TV slotted a programme to castigate “Islamist terrorism” in France. Religious fundamentalism …
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar (L) in conversation with Australian counterpart Marise Payne at Quad ministerial, Tokyo, October 6, 2020 The expectations were that the visiting US Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun would expand from a public platform in Delhi on October 12 on a theme he had audaciously expounded some six weeks ago …
A Sicilian fresco from 1445 on the Black Death that killed a third of Europe’s population in the previous century. The number of people who have died of coronavirus in the United States has crossed 200,000, by far the highest figure for any country in the world. One way of looking at the figure is that …
Continue reading “How’ll Covid-19 end? With a bang or a whimper?”
Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa (R) greeting the newly-elected Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa (L) at the swearing-in ceremony at Kelaniya Buddhist temple in Colombo, Aug 9, 2020 There are three categories of statesmen: those addicted to Twitter (Donald Trump, Narendra Modi, Javad Zarif, et al); those who shun it (Vladimir Putin, Angela Merkel, Xi Jinping, …
Vietnam’s Dy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh chairs a video meeting with ministers from member countries of Association of Southeast Nations, Hanoi, Sept 9, 2020. The meeting between the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Moscow on September 11 took place at a particularly delicate juncture …
