Global Indian News
Seven billion people, seven days and 17 goals. Call it Mission 7717, if you like, or simply Mission 17. Blending glamour, glitz, star shower and snappy story-telling, the staid United Nations, known for pompous well-meaning speeches, has launched an audacious path-breaking campaign to tell the world about its “Global Goals” of weeding out poverty, combating inequality and climate change by 2030.
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There is a new upswing in India’s relations with the United Arab Emirates, home to 2.6 million-strong Indian community and New Delhi’s third largest trading partner after China and the US. Barely weeks after the successful trip of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the Gulf state in August, UAE’s Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdulla Bin Zayed Al Nahyan visited India on September 2 and 3, imparting a fresh momentum to multilayered bilateral ties.
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In a spectacular show of strength, tanks, missiles and troops filed past the iconic Tiananmen Square in Beijing in perfect military precision at the victory parade on September 3. The parade was held to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Japan’s World War II defeat. The military pageant, which involved 12,000 troops, 500 pieces of cutting-edge military hardware and 200 aircraft, made a compelling power statement and underlined China’s President Xi Jinping’s determination to make China the sole Asian power. Addressing a huge gathering at Tiananmen Square that included some major world leaders, President Xi said, “The aim of our commemoration is to bear history in mind, honour all those who laid down their lives, cherish peace and open up the future”.
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The Indo-Pacific bonding between New Delhi and Canberra is set to get stronger amid China’s assertive posturing in the region during Defence Minister Kevin Andrews’ ongoing visit to India which will focus on bolstering security ties between the two countries.
Mr Andrews’ visit to India comes ahead of AUSINDEX, the first-ever joint maritime exercise to be held between India and Australia in mid-September. The joint naval exercise between both countries will be held at the Visakhapatnam port in the Bay of Bengal.
In a column for the Hindu, Mr Andrews spoke about how India is an important player and a key partner in the Indo-Pacific region. Speaking about the relation between the two countries, he said as emerging powers both countries would seek to advance their own interests, while they would cooperate in some areas they would also compete in the other areas.
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The United States is contemplating sanctions against Chinese companies and individuals who benefited from cyber thefts of valuable US trade secrets. The decision comes ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s …
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India is keenly watching the unfolding dramatic events in East Asia as these not only have a bearing on its recent “Act East” policy, but also on regional stability issues. At stake are not merely half of Indian trade, major investments, markets, technology flows that transit through this region but also the subtle messages of power transition between China and Japan in the short and medium term.
China is celebrating the “V-J [Victory over Japan] Day” on September 3 with a massive Beijing military parade. It is also the first time that Beijing would be inviting armed forces from abroad to participate in a national event and also the first time President Xi Jinping will be organising such an event. The previous military parade was several years ago on the 60th national day in October 2009.
today the increasing contest between powers in the region – as reflected in the rising nationalism and right-wing sentiments, higher defence allocations, military modernization and outreach – have contributed to spirals of tension.
Ahead of the 70th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), India’s top leadership is set to engage the President-elect of the UNGA Mogens Lykketoft and impress upon him the imperative of fast-tracking reforms of the UN Security Council.
Mr Lykketoft, a former speaker of Denmark’s parliament, will succeed Uganda’s Sam Kuetsa and will begin his UNGA presidency in September at the commencement of the 70th General Assembly session. He will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.
The reforms of the UNSC have languished for years due to procedural quibbles and indifference of the permanent members of the UNSC, who are not keen to let emerging powers inside this exclusive club. India is hoping for for the launch of the text-based negotiations at the 70th anniversary of the founding of the UN, and this will be the key point of discussions between Mr Modi and Mr Lykketoft.
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In an interview to N. Ram for ‘The Hindu’ a day after being sworn in as Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister – for a second time in eight months and fourth time, overall – Ranil Wickremesinghe referred to India-facilitated Thirteenth Amendment, circa 1987, “build on it…maximise it” for finding a negotiated settlement to the vexatious ethnic issue in the island-nation. On China, another issue of concern for India, he had this to say: “We get back to having the close relations we had with the West and with India while maintaining our relationship with China, which has also been a longstanding one. And looking at our own role in the region and what stand we will take on some of the main international issues.”
Surprisingly for a South Asian, Third World nation’s Prime Minister in his place, Wickremesinghe was less critical of arch-political rival and former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Was it a kind bonhomie that had marked the personal disposition of the two leaders towards each other through the past decade and more, or was it also indicative of a kind of broad national consensus’ on key issues about which enough signs and signals where available for long now?
If nothing else, until the ‘people were ready to vote out Rajapaksa’ or even afterward, Ranil and his UNP were less than critical of the former’s regime. It owed to their combined ability to retain and recover much of the ‘traditional’ UNP vote-share/vote-bank on the one hand. On the other, they might have also not wanted to risk targeting the ‘war-victor’, whose image the civil society and the social media had sullied enough.
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Pakistan’s military has always touted India as the primary threat to the country. This projection of the India threat keeps the powerful military establishment in business. It’s therefore not surprising to find Pakistan’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff committee reiterating what has been the guiding credo of Rawalpindi HQ. “India is the only external threat for Pakistan,” General Rashad Mahmood, who is the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff committee, told Senate Defence Committee members on August 27 about the perceived threat.
Pakistan’s military informed the committee that India had purchased USD 100 billion worth of weapons of which 80 percent were Pakistan-specific and it is expected that India would be buying weapons worth another USD 100 billion.
The statement coming soon after the cancellation of the talks between National Security Advisers of both countries is set to sour the atmpsherics between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.
While there has been no official reaction so far from the Indian side, such remarks don’t create a conducive atmosphere for any sustained engagement between the two countries.
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On August 24, India’s stock markets witnessed a Black Monday with the Sensex falling over 1,600 points. Panic did strike the markets and the depreciation of the rupee only added to the worries. India’s Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Governor of Reserve Bank of India Raghuram Rajan came out to reassure the investors that it is only a temporary pain that India had to endure. Overall, the fundamentals were very strong and the market mayhem was more due to the ongoing economic crisis in China, they said.
In today’s global integrated markets any crisis in any part of the world is likely to impact markets world over. The impact of such a crisis on different markets varies from country to country, based on their exposure to the crisis-hit markets. China has been seeing its stock markets and real economy slump over the past few weeks. And when the world’s second largest economy took a hit and witnessed a steep fall in recent times, it was bound to create panic across the global markets.
China’s surprise move to devaluate its currency sent ripples across markets. The Shanghai Composite Index dropped 8.5 percent that led to sell off in stocks and commodities around the markets in the world. During the 2008 global financial crisis China was seen as a shock absorber and even India did well to weather the crisis at that point of time. Both the countries were cited as examples of resilience to global shocks worldwide.
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