Comment & Briefs

Resource-rich Balochistan province has high rates of poverty, unemployment, illiteracy and infant and maternal mortality.

Indian insurgent groups are re-establishing camps in Bhutan and are also forging links with Bhutanese rebel groups.

The strategic partnership is moving towards a higher trajectory with growing co-operation in the areas of defence, economy, energy, education, environment, science, technology and innovation.

If Karzai were to become President again in the election seen as marked by fraud, his lack of legitimacy will only feed into the insurgent propaganda.

The aggressive posture that the Chinese have adopted along the otherwise relatively tranquil Line of Actual Control (LOAC) has come under a lot of analytical examination by Indian Sinologists. They have advanced a number of explanations for the Chinese actions, all of which have a ring of truth about them.

Pratibha Patil’s three-day visit to Tajikistan (September 6 to 8, 2009) was the first ever visit by an Indian President to the Central Asian region. She attended the National Day celebrations of Tajikistan as the Guest of Honour. President Patil held talks with Tajik President Emomali Rakhmon on a wide range of issues, including efforts to tackle terrorism, bilateral relations, and developments in and around the region aimed at consolidating ties between the two countries in the political, economic and other spheres.

Pakistan’s ability to press home a multidimensional campaign against the radical forces, and contain domestic instability and economic downturn, is suspect.

Indications are that the stalled six-party talks on the North Korean nuclear issue will resume in the coming months. While North Korea has let it be known that it is willing to return to the negotiating table, the United States showed its willingness to hold one-to-one talks with North Korea. This time, the North Korean capability/status of uranium enrichment programme would, among other things, dominate the negotiations.

Once an exporter of Chinese style Communism and isolated internationally, today’s China is the mainstay of the capitalist world exporting a large quantity of what the world imports.

Pakistan has yet again shown its proclivity to raise tensions with India. This time, the Pakistan Army or its proxies have fired three rockets across the International Border (IB) near Wagha in Punjab. Although no injuries were reported, such attacks pose a major danger to the people living in areas adjacent to the border, and some 150 farmers of the area indeed protested. This is the second time that rockets have been fired from Pakistan in the recent past.