COMMENTARIES
  • India-Nepal
    Contextualising KP Oli’s India and China Visits

    Pramod Jaiswal    ·   31 May, 2016    ·    #5047    ·    Commentary    
    Nepal has traditionally played India against China to maximise its benefits. Has Nepalese Prime Minister Khadga Prasad (KP) Sharma Oli been doing the same? How? Prime Minister Oli paid his first foreign visit to New Delhi before visiting Beij...
  • India vs Pakistan: Why can’t we just be friends?
    Book Review: "Much Ado About Nothing"

    Rana Banerji    ·   31 May, 2016    ·    #5046    ·    Commentary    
    Title: India vs Pakistan: Why can’t we just be friends? Author: Husain Haqqani Publisher: Juggernaut Books, New Delhi, India, 2016 Apart from the rather melodramatic disclosure of former Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate ...
  • The Strategist
    Barbarism and the Smell of Cordite

    Vijay Shankar    ·   30 May, 2016    ·    #5045    ·    Commentary    ·   Column
    Aggregation of power is never more apparent than when there is dramatic increase in state controlled power-activism. Equally impactful is the growing disregard for moral principles when power (political, corporate or military) is exercised. The ...
  • Chinese Military Modernisation: Takeaways from the Pentagon Report
    Bhartendu Kumar Singh    ·   30 May, 2016    ·    #5044    ·    Commentary    
    Every year, the American Department of Defence (Pentagon) publishes a report on the military and security developments of China under the National Defence Authorisation Act (2000). The report is supposed to address the current and probable futur...
  • India-Taiwan Relations: What is the Way Forward?
    Sumit Kumar Jha    ·   30 May, 2016    ·    #5043    ·    Commentary    
    The Modi government took many foreign policy initiatives to deepen India’s ties with the rest of the world soon after coming to power. One was to foster closer ties with the East Asian countries under its Act East policy. However in May 20...
  • J&K Focus
    Governance & Strategic Communication: Keys to Stabilising J&K

    Lt Gen (Retd) Syed Ata Hasnain    ·   30 May, 2016    ·    #5042    ·    Commentary    ·   Column
    With the durbar back in Srinagar, one of the first things the new government did was to convene a meeting of the Unified Command. That is most sensible because an early stock-taking of the situation and planning for contingencies for the summer ...
  • Nuke Street
    Why China is Using NPT to Block India's Entry into the NSG

    Sheel kant Sharma    ·   27 May, 2016    ·    #5041    ·    Commentary    ·   Column
    There is unusual and shocking stridence in China's very vocal stand, and its timing, demanding adherence to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as the criterion for India's membership of the Nuclear Suppliers Group. Such insistence on bei...
  • Obama in Vietnam: Only Permanent Interests
    Amruta Karambelkar    ·   27 May, 2016    ·    #5040    ·    Commentary    
    The US and Vietnam are the strangest bedfellows in the Asia Pacific. US President Barack Obama’s visit to Vietnam received wide attention, particularly because of the lifting of the embargo on the sale of lethal weapons to Vietnam. The ban...
  • IPCS Discussion
    India-Pakistan Under Prime Ministers Gujral-Sharif: A Retrospective

    Report    ·   26 May, 2016    ·    #5039    ·    Commentary    
    On 18 May 2016, the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies hosted a discussion on India-Pakistan bilateral relations during the governments of Prime Ministers Inder Kumar Gujral and Nawaz Sharif, at which Ambassador (Retd) Salman Haidar, Patron...
  • Brass Tacks of the Emerging Afghan Taliban
    Rajeshwari Krishnamurthy    ·   26 May, 2016    ·    #5038    ·    Commentary    
    On 21 May 2016, Afghan Taliban Chief Mullah Mansour was killed in a US drone strike in Balochistan, Pakistan. On 25 May 2016, the insurgent group’s Rahbari Shura – the central leadership council – declared Mansour’s first...