NEW DELHI - Campaigners for a nuclear-free South Asia are aghast at the potential nightmare that lies ahead following the nuclear technology and fuel deal announced here this week by visiting United States President George W. Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan...
Maoist Overture to Enter Nepal’s Mainstream Politics?
NEW DELHI - While India denies that its security agencies helped arrange meetings between a top Nepali Maoist leader and its political establishment, analysts welcome dialogue with the rebels as a key to ending a seemingly intractable crisis in the neighboring...
Analysts: India’s Resumption of Arms to Nepal Not Due to China
NEW DELHI - India's plan to resume military assistance to Nepal, suspended after the Feb. 1 "royal coup" has nothing to do with China's offer of support to the regime of King Gyanendra, beleaguered by a nine-year Maoist insurgency, say security experts....
US Arms Industry Fishing in Troubled South Asian Waters
NEW DELHI - By offering nuclear-capable F-16 Falcon fighters to Pakistan and the even more advanced F-18 Hornets to India, Washington has shown a cynical readiness to profit from the long-standing rivalry between the nuclear-armed South Asian neighbors, say analysts....
Gujarat Pogrom Costs Chief Minister Modi US Visa
NEW DELHI - It's a rarity for the United States to lend its ear to Indian human rights campaigners, let alone take any action on their petitions. But Washington's cancellation Friday of a U.S. visa given to right-wing politician Narendra Modi, blamed by human rights...
India-Russia Alliance Turns Commercial
NEW DELHI - The fact that Russian President Vladimir Putin equally divided his three-day visit to India, that ended Sunday, between political and business leaders speaks much for the changing nature of what was once regarded as a definitively strategic alliance of the...
Road to Peace Is Still Long in Kashmir
NEW DELHI – When it comes to Kashmir there can be no pleasing of anyone, as Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh must surely have discovered during a two-day visit, this week, to the state troubled by 15 years of separatist insurgency and half-a-century-old...
India Firm on Status Quo in Kashmir
NEW DELHI - Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ruled out Wednesday any change in the status of Kashmir and indicated that he would not agree to a redrawing of India's borders with Pakistan as a solution to the long-disputed territory. Pakistani President Gen. Pervez...
Top Hindu Hawks May Face Trial for Demolition of Mosque
NEW DELHI – The top leadership of the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) could stand trial for the December 1992 demolition of the medieval Babri Masjid mosque, which propelled the right-wing, pro-Hindu party to national power but deeply polarized the...
Iran’s Gas Pipeline May Turn South Asia’s Peace Pipe
BANGKOK - Of the many initiatives undertaken to forge lasting peace between South Asia's squabbling neighbors, none can challenge the promise of Iran's proposed natural gas pipeline to India traversing through Pakistan. New Delhi and Tehran first signed a memorandum...