Two events occurring within hours of each other earlier this week illustrate India’s potential for great power status as well as the vast distance the country still has to travel to fulfill its global ambitions.
Two events occurring within hours of each other earlier this week illustrate India’s potential for great power status as well as the vast distance the country still has to travel to fulfill its global ambitions.
Afghanistan has two education systems; the religious and the government. The religious system is taught by Mulas (religious leaders) at masques that includes teaching Quran and provide religious advices. The government system is implemented at schools which is free of charge and is consist of different subjects including religious. Afghanistan does not only have different […]
In another mutual advantage move, Bangladesh and Nepal have signed a deal that will very likely increase bilateral trade between the two countries. A transit deal, including a transport route worked out in Dhaka–and finalized in early 2011– will increase transport and tourism between the two countries. The deal initially made in 1976 will finally […]
Although the news is yet to hit the Iraqi Ministry of Transportation’s state-of-the-art website, Ayad Katheer Raheem, director-general of the Iraq’s aviation department, said Tuesday that Saudi Arabian Airlines tapped privately-owned Al-Wafeer Airlines to run daily flights between the two Arab nations. Saleh A. Bogary, Alwafeer Air’s marketing director , confirmed the news, […]
Welcome to this Foreign Policy Association blog dedicated to Southern Africa. This blog is an inside perspective on latest news, discussion, analysis, and commentary in Namibia and Zimbabwe. Although Namibia and Zimbabwe are the main focus of my attention, I also expect to be posting on other countries in Southern Africa. I suspect that politics […]
Petrobras announced today the discovery of gas reserves in the Camarupin fields in the Santos Basin as well as the signing of a landmark $160 million-dollar deal with GE Oil & Gas to develop power turbines for offshore platforms. These announcements come on the heels of Tuesday’s press release by Brazil’s National Petroleum Agency (Agência Nacional […]
The Indian Rupee now has its unique symbol – a confluence of the Roman ‘R’ and Indian (Devanagari script) ‘Ra’. The symbol was finalized yesterday by an Union Cabinet Committee. Uday Kumar, the designer of the symbol explains the symbol, “My design is based on the Tricolour with two lines at the top and white […]
More than 70 hours of plane travel later and a five-plus hour drive to get me home I’m finally back from my great World Cup adventure. I hope you’ll appreciate some scarce posting while I readjust to life back in the States and make sense of it all. But two quick points/anecdotes: First, are there […]
George Packer’s latest piece in the New Yorker is a must read for anyone interested in Afghanistan and the war, there, boiling over. Packer is sifting through President Obama’s Afghanistan war strategy. He’s interested in parsing through the infighting, the dramatic change in leadership personnel, the wild hedging on Obama’s fruitless partnership with the heroically incompetent Karzai […]
The government has stumbled upon the opportunity to move against all its enemies on the religious right. International partners are asking the Awami League government to take its next steps carefully. The BNP is backing down from its high pitched rhetoric on the ruling party’s moves against the right. With that confluence of events, the […]
The Parliament’s acceptance of the EEAS, the EU’s diplomatic corps, on July 8 was hailed as a ‘historic’ moment by the EU’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. Of course, such words are necessary on special occasions. Nevertheless, Ashton certainly has plenty of reason to be pleased. The overwhelming support among MEPs (549 votes for, […]
It seems that the day’s reportage always fails to deliver good news. Lives lost and opportunities squandered, squarely pegged in the middle of each New York Times piece, is the mounting price we pay. NATO troops and Afghan sons and daughters, fathers and mothers dead and dying. Today’s bomb attack has added four more casualties […]
The street protests in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) are de javu for many locals. It is claimed that a new generation of youth in the state are turning to confrontational tactics as the state continues to define security in strictly militaristic terms. For the Indian side peace in J&K implies ensuring that separatists and militants […]
The government of Bangladesh has placed severe penalties against burning the national flag. The cabinet approved the move and the parliament will debate the prospect of 2 year prison terms and a 10,000 Taka fine levied against all such acts. This smacks of nationalism run amok. It is nearly incontestable that any instance in […]
Israel is a highly democratic country, where the minority non-Jewish population has significant rights and representation in the Knesset. But, the precise role and responsibility of these non-Jewish Arab members of the Knesset is hotly contested, with the issue taking center stage today. MK Hanin Zoabi was largely unheard of in the rest of the […]