The report poked a sensitive spot in Sino-Indian ties but severely lacked factual evidence. The article was coarse, but was soon responded to by Indian media which were extremely excited to see such a topic. Thus it created a hotspot event almost instantaneously.
The current turbulence in the international and regional environment is largely due to US President Donald Trump’s vigorous unilateralism and a major departure from the traditional American economic and foreign policies. In response, China, Russia, Japan and Europe are at once trying to find ways to propitiate Trump as well as hedge against the current volatility in US policies.
China has begun large-scale mining operations on its side of the disputed border with India in the Himalayas, where a huge trove of gold, silver and other precious minerals – valued at nearly US$60 billion by Chinese state geologists – has been found.
In the western Indian Ocean, a battle for the soul of the Indo-Pacific is set to play out between China and the liberal order hitherto led by the US, and increasingly represented by India. While New Delhi and Beijing have initiated a tentative rapprochement, their interests do not align.
Every Indian government has taken a step forward to reach out to its Pakistan counterpart, only to be pushed back by a terror strike. The Pakistan civilian government desires peace but lacks control over its own army, hence chances of success remain bleak.
Tensions with China have pushed Asian nations including India and Japan to boost military spending, according to a global arms spending report. India’s defence spending rose by 5.5 per cent to US$63.9 billion in 2017, overtaking that of France as it became one of the world’s top five military spenders, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said in a report released on Wednesday. The United States, China, Saudi Arabia and Russia were the leading four last year in military spending.
Chinese President Xi Jinping’s “informal” summit meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, significantly, began on the same day as the inter-Korean summit on April 27. That Xi chose the same date for the two-day summit might not have been a mere coincidence, given that the historic meeting between the leaders of North and South Korea left China on the sidelines, with little influence over those proceedings.
Trust is an economic variable sounded like an echo swirling around Wuhan’s East Lake in China as President Xi Jinping was hosting last Friday and Saturday Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi for an “informal,” “heart-to-heart” summit.
Chinese President Xi Jinping met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Central China, saying he expected their two-day informal meeting will open a new chapter in bilateral ties. Welcoming Modi’s visit to Wuhan, capital of Central China’s Hubei Province, Xi said in the past three years, he and Modi have established a good working relationship through mutual visits and meetings at multilateral events.
China and India’s new Great Game has reached the playing field of the original imperial power rivalry in the 19th century: Iran and Central Asia. Each of the rising giants wants to be the one to shape a new regional order. Their competition for influence continues to unfold in Indian Ocean countries like the Maldives and Sri Lanka. But they are also pressing farther west, up into the Arabian Sea, Iran and the Central Asian states.
Read Here – Nikkei Asian Review
Also Read: Rising Power Of India’s influence On China in Regional Politics
