Pakistan’s New Trade Policy: A Step in the Right Direction? At a time when Pakistan’s phenomenal economic growth of the past few years under the Musharraf regime has hit a severe road block, the country’s Trade Minister Ahmed Mukhtar, who also holds the defence portfolio, announced a new trade policy on July 18, 2008. The announcement of the new trade policy has been governed by the state of Pakistan’s economy, which has been on a downward spiral since February. Alok Bansal | August 05, 2008 | IDSA Comments
Bangladesh Remains Sensitive on the Issue of Connectivity Though the recent Indo-Bangladesh Foreign Secretary level talks held in New Delhi made significant progress on several issues, there was no forward movement on the issue of connectivity. Bangladesh remains reluctant to extend this facility to India, though bilateral relations have generally been trouble-free in the last two years. Anand Kumar | August 04, 2008 | IDSA Comments
Games parties play: Nash equilibrium of the Nuclear Agreement Game theory is the analysis of strategic interaction among agents. These agents may be two or more people, firms or countries, with both taking into account how the other agent will “play”. Game theory has been employed to increase revenue at auctions, better equip challengers against incumbents in the market, and explain why bad dictators last so long. Prakarsh Singh | July 31, 2008 | IDSA Comments
Surging Energy and Food Prices will Accelerate Economic Downtrend in Bangladesh Rising food and oil prices worldwide have increased the misery of people in Bangladesh who have already been suffering the effects of near double digit inflation. The military backed caretaker government has been forced to increase the prices of oil products by 33 to 67 per cent with effect from July 1, 2008. Diesel and kerosene prices have been hiked by 37.5 per cent to 55 taka a litre (0.26 gallons) and petrol prices by 34 per cent to 87 taka a litre. Anand Kumar | July 30, 2008 | IDSA Comments
The threat of Bio-terrorism On the August 18, 2008, a meeting of experts on bio-weapons was held in Geneva. The meeting considered (i) national regional and international measures to improve bio-safety and bio-security, including… Continue reading The threat of Bio-terrorism Arundhati Ghose | July-September 2008 | CBW Magazine
The Unending Iranian Nuclear Crisis If anybody thought that a change of talk in the Bush administration’s Iran policy would be enough to induce the “isolated” Tehran to give up its intransigence and toe the western line, the July 19 meeting proved him or her wrong. Before the Geneva meeting between Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili and European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana, the US sent feelers to Tehran. Stanly Johny | July 25, 2008 | IDSA Comments
The Saudi Inter-faith Initiative The three day International Islamic Conference on Inter-faith Dialogue (also known as World Dialogue Conference) organised by the Saudi Arabia based World Muslim League (WML) was held in Madrid from July 16 to 18, 2008. Touted to be the brainchild of Saudi king Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, the conference was attended by around 300 religious leaders and scholars from across the world representing Islam, Hinduism, Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, Shintoism, Confucianism and other religions. Prasanta Kumar Pradhan | July 25, 2008 | IDSA Comments
Will Bangladesh Address India’s Security Concerns? The spate of talks and meetings between India and Bangladesh is unmatched in recent times. This pace alone sets bilateral relations apart from the five long years when the BNP-led coalition government was in power (2000-05) in Bangladesh. The recent (July 17, 2008) Foreign Secretary level talks have once again brought home the fact of how the interim government in Bangladesh without having to pander to any particular constituency has been able to constructively engage with its largest neighbour. Sreeradha Datta | July 24, 2008 | IDSA Comments
Violations of Ceasefire on the Line of Control: Unravelling Pakistan’s Motive While addressing the customary press conference after the Foreign Secretary level talks with Pakistan on July 21, 2008, the Indian Foreign Secretary stated that the India-Pakistan dialogue is “under stress” and Pakistan must address New Delhi’s concerns about cross-border terrorism. The talks were held in the shadow of the recent attack on the Indian embassy in Kabul, which, India alleges, had the involvement of “elements in Pakistan”. The Indian Foreign Secretary also admitted that the ongoing ceasefire on the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir has come under strain. Satinder K. Saini | July 23, 2008 | IDSA Comments
A Way Out of Naga Factional Violence Nagaland has been up in flames for quite sometime now. For the past eight months or so, heavy inter-factional killings between the National Socialist Council of Nagalim-Isak-Muivah [NSCN (IM)], the National Socialist Council of Nagaland-Khaplang [NSCN (K)], and the newly formed National Socialist Council of Nagaland-Unification [NSCN (U)], have been vitiating the atmosphere there. On July 9, clashes between the NSCN (IM) and the NSCN (U) in Diphupar village led to the death of a few insurgents. Namrata Goswami | July 23, 2008 | IDSA Comments
