…At Bandung 60 years ago, the rhetoric about creating a new Asia-centric world order was a catchphrase of Bandung 2015. However, the difference is that 60 years ago India was at the forefront of efforts to build that world order and now that role is very much being played by China. Nehru’s vision of India […]
In writing about a country like Pakistan, it is a hard task to determine who its three greatest leaders were. Unlike India, which had a stable political system, Pakistan has often swung from a presidential system to a parliamentary system to military dictatorship. Almost all its leaders, even great ones, had many flaws. Nonetheless, here […]
Sri Lanka is a strategically vital island nation lying off southern coast of India, and its recent shifts away from China under President Sirisena, who won a surprise victory on campaign promises to balance away from China, could be a big blow against China’s “string of pearls” strategy. Read Here – The American Interest
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry championed the new Sri Lankan government’s push for democratic reform and promised closer ties with the strategically located Indian Ocean nation. Read Here – The Guardian
THE formal launch of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) during the recent visit of President Xi Jinping has understandably generated a lot of euphoria in Pakistan. With a planned portfolio of projects totalling around $45 billion, the size of the ‘investment’ in the CPEC over the next 15 years, if materialised, will equal the cumulative […]
The 19th Amendment to the Constitution puts Sri Lanka well on the road to meaningful democratic reform and signalled the return of a vibrant parliamentary democracy. For a President who has just completed 100 days in office, it is a shining moment. Read Here – Daily FT
It could be expected that military cooperation between the US and Japan could become more focused on containing the rise of China. The more comprehensive their collaboration is, the stronger backlash it will trigger from China, leaving Asia in jeopardy. Read Here – Global Times
Signalling that Afghanistan is upset with Pakistan over its refusal to allow direct trade with India via the Wagah border, President Ashraf Ghani says that if the deadlock continues, “We will not provide equal transit access to Central Asia [for Pakistani trucks].” Read Here – The Hindu
The implications of the Pakistani refusal to help Saudi Arabia in Yemen should not be underestimated. If China is Islamabad’s “all-weather friend”, former Saudi intelligence chief Prince Turki bin Sultan once said that Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have “one of the closest relationships in the world between any two countries”. Read Here – The Indian […]
If I were to write about a new power rising in the East, one whose population of 633 million is the third largest in the world after China and India, and 100 million more than either the European Union or the whole of North America, you might expect to have heard quite a lot about […]
looking beyond borders 