The party-state established by the Communist Party of China (CPC) is an arcane structure that rests upon a propaganda and intelligence apparatus to help sustain the communist leviathan within the Chinese body politic, and advance its global interests and international influence. The pivotal agency entrusted with this responsibility is the United Front Work Department (UFWD). […]
For the first time in over two decades, Pakistan is not a foreign-policy priority for a new US administration… This new reality raises the important question of how the United States should think about its relationship with Pakistan. A country of more than 200 million people, Pakistan is geo-strategically located at the mouth of the […]
Pakistan is among the world’s most anti-Semitic countries, never mind that it has no Jewish community and few Pakistanis have ever met a Jew. That intolerance is a legacy of Saudi-funded religious seminaries, charities, and political assistance. Perhaps the student has now become the teacher: As Riyadh grows closer to Jerusalem, the Pakistani political leadership […]
Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s choice of Kamala Harris as his running mate has been rightly hailed as historic: If elected, she would be the first female vice president of the United States as well as the first Black woman to hold that office. But what’s getting less attention in global media is the […]
The tense border stand-off between China and India has forced their neighbours in South Asia to tread cautiously to avoid crossfire between the nuclear-armed powers, analysts say. Smaller countries in South Asia – such as Nepal, the Maldives and Sri Lanka – have sought to stay above the fray between New Delhi, which has historical […]
The United States has provided cover for India as it has sought to create facts on the ground in Kashmir. And so it is unsurprising that China is now trying to create its own facts on the ground. Indeed, by endorsing New Delhi’s unilateralism and attempting to prop it up as a regional hegemon, Washington […]
Has South Asia succeeded where Western countries have failed? Countries such as India and Bangladesh have imposed stricter lockdowns than the West—and earlier in their respective outbreaks. In that sense, South Asian economies should be commended for moving quickly in response to the shutdowns in other countries. With the exception of Pakistan, which for a […]
Bangladesh today is one of South Asia’s development success stories, with sustained growth of more than eight per cent and social indicators that are beginning to outstrip the rest of the region. It is also a country where more so than anywhere else in the region the independent press and opposition parties have withered away into […]
A successful Indian foreign policy, by definition, is one that creates the external circumstances conducive to realizing India’s fundamental aims, namely, protecting its physical security and its decisional autonomy, enlarging its economic prosperity and its technological capabilities, and realising its status claims on the global stage. Attaining these objectives requires New Delhi to engage at […]
Despite the temptation to blame violent extremism on foreign fighters returning from Iraq and Syria and the subsequent rise of the Islamic State’s virtual caliphate, the fact is that the seeds of extremism in South Asia were sown long ago by elites from Kabul to Colombo. Often dressed up in the garb of anti-imperialism and […]
looking beyond borders 