Comment & Briefs

There is a need for India to participate in Project Loon to increase its ‘internet footprint’. The project perfectly fits into the scheme of ‘Digital India’. It could also lead to surge in India’s interest in near-space technologies.

The AKP needs to go over the fundamentals of its decade long success in the country before it charts its future course. Its success in the previous decade was built on the pillars of national consolidation, economic growth and religious tolerance.

The Vienna Conference was far from a gathering of powers with common goals. The key powers involved have yet to reach the conclusion that it is in their interest to end the multiple wars raging in Syria.

The wellbeing of veterans and their transition to a second career by ensuring implementable policy initiatives is a national obligation. This not only has a welfare agenda but also an economic sense to it?.

Touted as the most spectacular diplomatic exercise hosted by India since the 1983 Non Aligned Movement (NAM) summit, this meeting provides opportunity for India to rejuvenate relations with the continent.

Africa needs not only maritime administration frameworks and the local capacity to enforce regulations, but also a model for sustainable blue-economy development that does not result in the destruction of its natural maritime habitat. In this, it can use India’s assistance.

It is now abundantly clear that Russia has emerged as the most important player in Syria. With the US on the defensive, the coalition that Russia is forging with Iran and Iraq is likely to get stronger.

The MoD guidelines on handling of complaints do not seem to be free from potentially crippling afflictions. Conceptual ambiguity can easily defeat the purpose of the guidelines.

As India reorients its maritime posture to cater to the new realities of Asia, there is a realisation that regional maritime stability is increasingly susceptible to growing power imbalances.

For China, the Belt and Road initiative is a long-term strategy designed for it to assume a bigger role in global affairs through the business route. Various aerial and space-based platforms will play an important in making this strategy successful.