COMMENTARIES
  • Kashmir: India and Pakistan back to Incrementalism
    Sanjay Kumar    ·   12 Jan, 2005    ·    #1613    ·    Commentary    
    Conflicting claims over Kashmir has bedeviled Indo-Pakistan bilateral relations for the last 57 years. But the highly successful SAARC summit last year in Islamabad gave hope that both India and Pakistan would restart their composite dialogue to...
  • East Asia Diary - December 2004: The 'East Asia Community' - Promise Aplenty
    Jabin T Jacob    ·   12 Jan, 2005    ·    #1612    ·    Commentary    
    A raft of agreements were signed at the 10th ASEAN summit in Vientiane, Laos. The most important, between China and ASEAN, will lead to the creation of the world's largest Free Trade Area (FTA) by 2010 and cover about a third of the world...
  • China's Defence White Paper- Part 2
    Maj. Gen. Dipankar Banerjee    ·   10 Jan, 2005    ·    #1611    ·    Commentary    
    In Part 1 we noted the changes in China's security situation, its national defence policy and priorities and examined its military service system. What are the other major issues? The part in the Defence White Paper which is likely to d...
  • China's New Defence White Paper- Part 1
    Maj. Gen. Dipankar Banerjee    ·   10 Jan, 2005    ·    #1610    ·    Commentary    
    In December 2004 China released its latest and fourth Defence White Paper. It is important to examine it, as it reflects the developments and provides a glimpse inside the largest armed forces in the world. It is also an Army which is regularisi...
  • Towards a More Secure World (Part 2) - The UN High Level Panel's Report
       ·   06 Jan, 2005    ·    #1609    ·    Commentary    
    In the first part earlier we described the circumstances in which the UN High Level Panel was constituted, its terms of reference and considered the Panel's recommendations covering the first two parts of the report. Part 3 deals...
  • The Election Process in Iraq
    Anil Kamboj    ·   06 Jan, 2005    ·    #1608    ·    Commentary    
    The US sponsored Iraqi elections are round the corner. Election fever is slowly catching up with well organized former exiles and popular home grown leaders including the top Shiite figures, emerging as the real king-makers. In November 200...
  • Towards A More Secure World (Part 1) - The UN High Level Panel's Report
       ·   05 Jan, 2005    ·    #1607    ·    Commentary    
    A series of developments leading to 2003 saw the UN increasingly marginalised, unable to respond and made irrelevant to peace and security in the world, the raison de'etre for its creation in 1945. It began with Srebrenica and Rwanda in the ...
  • The Paris Agreement and Iranian Nuclear Case
    Satyabrat Sinha    ·   04 Jan, 2005    ·    #1606    ·    Commentary    
    In August 2002, an Iranian exile opposition group publicly disclosed the locations of two secret nuclear facilities in Iran that were confirmed by the United Nations. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in June 2003 concluded that the ...
  • Shaukat Aziz's Visit to China
       ·   03 Jan, 2005    ·    #1605    ·    Commentary    
    Ever since the first high-level contact between Pakistani and Chinese Prime Ministers Mohammad Ali Bogra and Zhou En-Lai at the Bandung Afro-Asian Conference in 1955, the two countries have formed ties that have been consistently friendly. Earli...
  • India-Pakistan Relations: In Need of External Direction?
    PR Chari    ·   30 Dec, 2004    ·    #1604    ·    Commentary    
    Somewhat disappointingly, the Foreign Secretary level talks between India and Pakistan ended in another stalemate with both sides agreeing to have another round of talks within their "composite dialogue" and meet again in mid-2005 to r...
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