Pakistan had assiduously sought to acquire “strategic depth” against India in Afghanistan by installing the Taliban, but that has now becomes its “terror depth,” security analysts say. They lament that the western border has become "riskier" than the eastern one with India.
Every chance for Pakistan to swiftly achieve stability and peace is lost due to excessive external dependency on foreign aid, vulnerability to domestic political crisis and shortage of good governance in both vision and practice. It would be unrealistic to expect Pakistan to make the best out of its foreign relations at the geopolitical and international stage in the absence of internal stability.
In post-colonial South Asia, the British who ruled and plundered the region also sowed the seeds of ‘divide and rule’, dividing the people along Hindu-Muslim or Sinhala-Tamil lines. Partition of the subcontinent was also a result of the same policy.
With India's pluralist traditions coming increasingly under question under a Hindu majoritarian dispensation, and a vicious call-out culture directed insidiously against Muslim stars and their films from Bollywood, the overwhelming popular response to the film - with social media images of people dancing in the aisles and in front of the screen across cinema theatres - has given a resounding thumbs-down to the growing cancel culture and redeemed the country's secular credentials that the world has long known and admired.
Today the international image of India, courtesy the RSS-BJP, is a Hindu supremacist one where minorities are insecure, where identity issues are getting precedence over the issues of livelihood. RSS is the fountainhead of this politics; it needs introspection if it is serious about the process of dialogue and reconciliation.
India could reset its approach by engaging with Sri Lanka as a country in the Indo-Pacific region and not just as a neighbour.
For India, global governance reform starts with Security Council reforms and here New Delhi got support across blocs at the General Assembly meeting from both the US and Russia, as well as other countries. It is the only country to get the backing of both Washington and Moscow.
In a broadcast on Wednesday, Bangladesh Army Chief General S M Shafiuddin Ahmed stated that his troops were prepared to respond against Myanmarese provocations if necessary.
Building a reservoir on the Teesta will help Bangladesh create a climate-resilient infrastructure which will be useful in better managing the common river water.
Functioning trade unions, decreasing number of child labourers and the introduction of labour courts and foundations are demonstrations of the extraordinary achievements of Bangladesh in ensuring labour rights.
Today, several other countries are gaining greater respect and acceptability in the comity of nations. India, certainly, is one of them. What is perhaps likely to happen is that global leadership would be a shared responsibility.
For a country that embraces the principle of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam (“The World is One Family”), and is often referred to by Prime Minister Narendra Modi as Vishwaguru (“Teacher of the World”), the discriminatory and hostile treatment meted out to the Rohingya is not only against its ethos but also makes for bad optics on the world stage.
Resurgent and dynamic, a young nation, old in history and culture is finally coming to terms with the painful legacy of slavery, colonialism and the pain of partition
India may consider quickly extending lines of credit to Sri Lanka and Bangladesh on softer terms than IMF loans as we have enough forex reserves at present to cope with their small needs to prevent economic collapse. This will result in consolidation of South Asian economies around the Indian one and allow us as Big Brother to lift our smaller siblings out of trouble
India's provision of tariff-free transit facilities to Bangladesh for exports to Nepal and Bhutan is considered a major step in bilateral cooperation. Also, since India can use Chittagong seaport, not only the "Seven Sisters" of Northeast India will benefit from it, but Dhaka will also benefit
Political instability is a perennial phenomenon in Pakistan but the present one appears to be more damaging as it has occurred at a time when the country is also experiencing one of the worst economic crises in decades
It is quite possible that the Indian side conveyed to Beijing that with China’s rigid stance on the border standoff, Prime Minister Narendra Modi may consider it difficult to attend the summit, and more importantly, a one-to-one meeting between PM Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping may not be possible unless Beijing shows some progress on further disengagement
Cooperation during the visit extended to all fields, including trade and commerce, power and energy, transport and connectivity, science and technology, rivers, and maritime affairs
These fault lines can be repaired by greater societal interaction – holding roadshows to attract tourists is one thing, but arranging inter-community interactions between Kashmiris and social groups in the rest of the country to dispel the mutual distrust is quite another one. The work is yet to begin on this front
