The event held on June 23 – Accelerating Citizen-Centric Energy Transition – was co-hosted with the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy…reports Asian Lite News
Ambassador of India to United Nations T S Tirumurti has expressed happiness over co-hosting a special event at the United Nations HLDE 2021 on India’s efforts to achieve the 2030 agenda.
The event held on June 23 – Accelerating Citizen-Centric Energy Transition – was co-hosted with the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) at UN’s High-level Dialogue on Energy 2021.
“Delighted to co-host with Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), “Accelerating Citizen-Centric Energy Transition” -Special event at United Nation HLDE 2021 on India’s efforts to achieve 2030 Agenda. India selected Global Champion for Energy Transition Track. Only G20 member on course for Paris Agreement target,” the Ambassador said in a tweet on Friday.
According to a UN statement on June 23, countries that hosted the programme along with India included Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Denmark, Germany, Nigeria, Poland, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
“The global effort to mobilize actions and commitments to achieve clean, affordable energy for all by 2030 and net zero emissions by 2050 is accelerating. At the Ministerial Thematic Forums taking place this week–a major milestone on the road to the High-level Dialogue on Energy–new commitments and plans have been announced by countries, businesses, youth, civil society groups and foundations that show greater resolve to ensure that everyone has access to clean, renewable energy and to reach net-zero emissions,” the statement said. (ANI)
India is currently placed third after China and Canada in terms of green buildings…reports Asian Lite News
As climate concerns take centre stage globally amid the pandemic, the National Real Estate Development Council (NAREDCO) has assured to take steps towards creating awareness and adoption of green buildings across the country, saying that India can be a global leader in this respect by next year.
India is currently placed third after China and Canada in terms of green buildings.
During a webinar on ‘India’s Leadership Role in Advancing Green Buildings’, which was jointly organised by NAREDCO, CII and Indian Green Building Council (IGBC), the apex bodies noted that the developers are firm believers of sustainable development.
Green building(wikipedia)
The sector stakeholders were of the view that although the cost of green buildings is marginally higher, it is in greater good to go green.
Addressing the webinar, Surendra Kumar Bagde, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, said that a campaign should be launched to spread awareness about the marginal cost difference between green and conventional buildings and the former’s benefits.
He also said that all the required laws and regulations are in place to help the developers construct green buildings. The official, however, noted that it needs to be seen whether cities in specific are adopting the norms to support the growth of green buildings.
Chief Guest, Dr. Surendra Kumar Bagde, Additional Secretary, @MoHUA_India addressed NAREDCO Webinar on "India’s Leadership Role in Advancing Green Buildings" & shared his views on the need to adopt Green Building Practices in India Realty Sector.#NAREDCO#Webinar#Housingpic.twitter.com/NgnddyDJuQ
Chairman of NAREDCO, Rajeev Talwar, stressed on having more greenery in the cities.
“Now city forests are parts of life and that’s where the government can step in. In many urban agglomerations it may not be possible, but the more vertical we go, the greater the chance that we can go green,” he said.
Gurmit Singh Arora, Vice Chairman, IGBC, noted that India has been a global leader in the green buildings movement over the last two decades, with over 7.83 billion square feet of green footprint.
“The contribution of all the stakeholders, including the government, developers and builders, in the green journey has been phenomenal,” he added.
Trade between the two countries in Jan-Dec 2020, recorded $16.9 billion, according to Indian Embassy data. In 2018, Korea’s investment to India crossed the $1 billion mark for the first time, touching $1.053 billion…reports Mahua Venkatesh.
South Koreas ambassador to India, Shin Bongkil, who prepares to leave New Delhi after completion of his three-year term, will have reasons to cherish. It was only last year that India introduced Korean as the second foreign language in schools as part of the National Education Policy last year.
Jang Jae-bok, who is currently posted as the Ambassador for Public Diplomacy in Korea will assume take charge in place of Shin by the middle of next month, Asian Community News (ACN) said. Shin’s tenure will also be marked by the two brutal Covid 19 waves that hit India.
The Korean Embassy under Shin along with other Korean associations arranged for oxygen concentrators. “It was not easy during the lockdown period but the embassy arranged for the logistics to transport the same to the Korean community staying in far-flung areas,” ACN quoted Euy Don Park, President, Federation of Korean Associations in India as saying.
While the bilateral Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CEPA), is in place since 2010, bilateral trade between the two countries touched $21.5 billion only in 2018 — crossing the $20 billion mark for the first time.
Trade between the two countries in Jan-Dec 2020, recorded $16.9 billion, according to Indian Embassy data. In 2018, Korea’s investment to India crossed the $1 billion mark for the first time, touching $1.053 billion.
India – RoK Trade and Economic Relations. Foreign direct investment (FDI) from South Korea into India up to September 2020 stood at $6.94 billion.
“The Korean community in India appreciates his approach to make good relationship with India considering the fact that India is an important county for Koreans,” Park said. ACN further noted that it was during the tenure of Shin that the construction Korean Indian Friendship Park was completed in New Delhi, and Suriratna park (Queen Ho) park came up in Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh.
(This content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com)
Singh said the BJP welcomes the meeting, which is a golden opportunity for the leaders of Jammu and Kashmir to put forth their views before Prime Minister Narendra Modi…reports Asian Lite News.
Former J&K Deputy Chief Minister and BJP leader Nirmal Singh said on Wednesday that this is not the right time to raise the issue of statehood for Jammu and Kashmir.
Singh is among the 14 mainstream leaders who have been invited to an all-party meeting on J&K to be held in the national capital on Thursday. The meeting will be chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi
The meeting is seen as the first major outreach move by the Centre to end the political impasse in J&K after the abrogation of Article 370 and the splitting of the erstwhile state into two Union Territories on August 5, 2019.
Modi (PIB)
Speaking to IANS, Singh said the BJP welcomes the meeting, which is a golden opportunity for the leaders of Jammu and Kashmir to put forth their views before Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
“This is not the right time to raise the issue of statehood (for J&K),” Singh said, adding that the democratic process must begin in Jammu and Kashmir and the delimitation of constituencies must be completed.
“We want the long-pending issues to be addressed such as representation of PoJK refugees, Kashmiri migrants, West Pakistani refugees, STs and other deprived sections of the society,” Singh said.
“In the past, the National Conference had said that there has been no discussion on the autonomy resolution passed in the J&K Assembly. The Central government is clear that such issues can’t be discussed, the country won’t agree to it,” Singh said.
He also said that talks must held for the participation of the people in the democratic process and for giving due representation to the deprived sections of Jammu and Kashmir for their share in the electoral process.
India's NIA announces Rs 10L reward each for info on 2 suspects involved in blast outside Israel Embassy
A low-intensity bomb blast had occurred on January 29 near the Israel Embassy on Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Road, less than 2 km from the Vijay Chowk, where the Beating Retreat ceremony was on, sending the security establishments into a tizzy
The Special Cell of Delhi Police on Thursday arrested four students hailing from Jammu and Kashmir in connection with its probe into the blast near the Israel Embassy here on January 29.
India’s NIA announces Rs 10L reward each for info on 2 suspects involved in blast outside Israel Embassy
According to sources, they were brought on transit remand to Delhi from J&K’s Kargil area, and after several rounds of questioning, they have been put under arrest. The source, however, refused to share the details of the students who have been arrested.
A low-intensity bomb blast had occurred on January 29 near the Israel Embassy on Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Road, less than 2 km from the Vijay Chowk, where the Beating Retreat ceremony was on, sending the security establishments into a tizzy.
The Beating Retreat ceremony was attended by President Ram Nath Kovind, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other dignitaries.
The Special Cell had registered a case following the blast. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) had taken over the case on February 2 this year.
On June 15, the NIA had announced a reward of Rs 10 lakh each for any information on the two suspects involved in the bomb blast. It had also issued the photographs and videos of the alleged suspects seen in the CCTV video footage captured outside the embassy.
The blast had shattered the windscreens of three parked cars, and had coincided with the 29th anniversary of diplomatic relations between India and Israel.
There is need to examine closely a string of ‘coincidences’, each of which has had the effect of delaying and in some cases reducing India’s prospects for emerging as the preferred alternative of choice to the PRC for production platforms, writes Prof. Madhav Nalapat
Prof-Nalapat-1
Not only the skills of the forensic investigator but keeping track of global (as distinct from regional) geopolitics may be needed to identify and connect the dots linking incidents that get treated as occurring independently of each other. The Sunday Guardian connected the dots in the situation that caused an indefinite delay in the commissioning of the Koodankulam nuclear power plant add-ons.
After The Sunday Guardian exposed the external source of the disruptions that had been created in Koodankulam, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh acted swiftly and the blockages quickly disappeared. Such swift action in several of the cases of remote-controlled blockages in a host of matters important to the economy and security has been rare when not absent.
Disruptions to national life caused by external actors is a long list, which includes attempts to stifle (through the administrative, media, political and legal systems) lower-cost, more effective technological and scientific substitutes developed within India for essential items that foreign countries and entities have long retained a monopoly over. There has been much talk and the setting up of numerous committees over the decades in efforts at ensuring the reforms needed for success as a nation, reforms in the administrative sphere in particular. These seem to have largely been ignored or implemented in bits and pieces that take away most of their efficacy.
CONNECTING THE DOTS
Another example of dots left unconnected was The Sunday Guardian report on the deaths of multiple scientific and technological personnel in India’s atomic program. There was an unusual chain of fatal “coincidences” within what was a very small, very specific, subset of human beings. Those whose lives were being snuffed out were each connected with India’s nuclear program. After extensive and confidential enquiries with sources in multiple locations, it was discovered that two countries were behind several of the deaths, and most likely all of them. Once the story about the series of deaths appeared in print, they stopped taking place.
In the era of extremely close operational collaboration between GHQ Rawalpindi and the PLA, and given the indifference in observing ethical limits in both, as well as the immense financial and other capabilities of the latter, connecting the dots rather than taking events in isolation may be critical to uncovering such acts of sabotage. Any assessment of chains of significant events impacting the capability of India cannot remain separated from factoring in the asymmetric warfare that GHQ Rawalpindi has since 1947 been conducting against India.
Plus the not unreasonable assumption that the PLA has fully signed on to such a strategy (besides the kinetic operations of both military and security systems). GHQ Rawalpindi knows together with its ally in Beijing that the economy, farmers and the middle class are crucial to the progress of India in reaching the economic dimensions of a superpower. They would like to delay and if possible destroy such an outcome, preferably in a manner that outwardly suggests a self-destruct mode. As with GHQ Rawalpindi, the PLA is no friend of India. and does not even make a pretence of being so.
Even the BRICS summit in India may not be an occasion for the CCP General Secretary leadership to show the courtesy of coming to India for the summit. Presidents Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden met in Geneva on 16 June, ignoring those who regard absence of communication at the top as a healthy sign.
NON-KINETIC OPTIONS
The futures of two Asian countries that together hold 2.8 billion people are inextricably linked to the present. The ever-changing “Red Lines” of the other side have been created by the PRC mostly out of thin air (for example in the form of purpose-made maps detailing land and water). The Red Lines of India have continued to be crossed with seeming lack of consequences, but no longer. Beijing has been adventurous in its activities where New Delhi is concerned. As both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar have reiterated, such a situation cannot continue together with diplomacy and business as usual.
The patience of the people of India is wearing thin, especially now that GHQ Rawalpindi and the PLA are partners acting on a global scale. Such a shift in sentiment matches that of much of the rest of the world, especially after the onset of SARS2 and its consequences. The change in public mood is beginning to show itself even in words and actions of some of the most cautious of policymakers in capitals across both sides of the Atlantic and the Indo-Pacific.
Given that asymmetric and unconventional methods (such as resort to terror groups) have not been uncommon in the Pakistan military, it is not unreasonable to assume that the close all-weather (i.e., using every means) partnership between Rawalpindi and Beijing that has deepened since the beginning in 2012 would have led to joint work on non-kinetic options designed to weaken target countries. In the case of the PRC, these are mainly the US and India. In the case of Pakistan, it is India, Afghanistan and Iran, in that order. It is within such a context that a series of post-Doklam incidents that involve facilities crucial to the safety and economic progress of India need to be looked into. They need to be examined as other than a series of separate and disparate events.
NOTHING NATURAL ABOUT ALPHA OR DELTA VARIANT
Newspapers such as the New York Times and the Washington Post, not to mention outlets such as BBC and CNN, have for over a year spread disinformation created to protect the Wuhan Institute of Virology. (WIV). They continue to do so, permitting those responsible for funding and in other ways assisting the creation within the WIV of SARS2 to use their columns for conveying further disinformation, without even a cautionary note from the editors. These media outlets remain in high regard where this columnist is concerned, and it is therefore surprising that such a situation continues in media that have superbly competent minds within the editorial team. It is concerning that after finally backing away from the disinformation laboratory created hypothesis of the origin of SARS2 except in the lab, they are now giving space to the fiction that the Alpha and Delta variants of the novel coronavirus evolved in nature and were not created in a laboratory, of course not the facility that developed the initial SARS2 virus but located within the same country and also working for the PLA.
The same pandemic that they succeeded in causing have seen the emergence of eminent specialists across the world emerge as the spearhead of disinformation about its origins. This pandemic now ravaging much of the globe has resulted in millions of deaths, hundreds of millions of cases and economic and societal tremors in several countries. As will become clear even to spreaders of the disinformation that the Alpha and Delta variants of SARS2 were of natural origin, scientists with integrity assert that both these were engineered using the same methods that caused SARS2 in 2019. Thanks to the delay in the WHO in naming the Alpha and Delta variants—in contrast to the promptness with which Geneva acted when the term “China virus” gained currency—the focus has shifted away from the PRC to the UK and later to India. While there had been criticism by news outlets in 2020 of the use of terms such as “Wuhan virus” to describe SARS2, a similar hesitation was not seen by them while talking of a “UK variant” or an “India variant”. This when both variants in the same way as SARS2 was created, except that they were developed in labs other than at WIV. Delay on the part of WHO was in part responsible for causing the destructive progress of the novel coronavirus across the world. The institution tarried also in naming the variant duo that first appeared in the UK and India. This was in contrast to the speedy renaming of what was getting referred to as the Wuhan or China virus.
TOTAL WAR BY PLA AND GHQ
Apart from in the case of the South China Sea and Taiwan, the entirety of which General Secretary Xi publicly seeks to control through the PLA, what he also clearly wants is control in the entirety of the Himalayan massif, and later Arunachal Pradesh, Bhutan, Sikkim, slices of Ladakh and the whole of PoK. The list of desired future conquests includes parts of Nepal. To achieve these outcomes, the Central Military Commission appears to be following the GHQ Rawalpindi-inspired playbook of “Total War”, which has been renamed “Comprehensive War”. 2008 was the year that made obvious to the world the decline of the US as a global power, and the shift from the Atlantic to the Indo-Pacific as the global centre of gravity.
No longer was there the trust in US institutions and expertise that had been the case until the greed of Wall Street and its fellow travellers in Frankfurt and London caused citizens in the GCC and much of the rest of the world to see their fortunes dissolve during 2008-9 under the supervision of fund managers across both sides of the North Atlantic. 2020 was the year when global trust in the PRC took a downward slope that will (unless unexpected changes in policy occur) continue well into the future. This is the year that has made Cold War 2.0 irreversible, despite denials of such a reality by policymakers in several democracies. It is clear to those with anchoring in the logic of facts (in the form of events and actions) that the PRC and its partners are waging a comprehensive war against the US and its allies. Not to forget India, the country that both GHQ Rawalpindi and the PLA know needs to avoid joining the Quadrilateral Alliance in anything other than what may be named a Gandhian Quad. In other words, a grouping that lacks a military component, and which consequently has about as much value as a tea club.
The CCP leadership believes that an effort to influence India away from a de facto military alliance with the rest of the Quad can be successful, and that the PRC and allies such as the Russian Federation must continue with moves aimed at de-linking India in military and security terms from the other three partners of the Quad. Air power was never used during the numerous PLA intrusions over the decades into Indian territory including in 1962 and 2020. Neither has the Indian Navy been deployed alongside the Japanese, Australian and US Navy manoeuvres in the South China Sea, much less the East China Sea.
The PLA has never reciprocated the many one-sided gestures of India except at best through symbolic actions and usually with merely comforting words from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, which lacks even the clout of the senior colonels in the PLA, a reality that has become obvious especially since 2013. Neither has the gesture of India to ensure that the Army vacated the Kailash Heights in February 2020 been reciprocated in the slightest by the PLA. What has instead taken place after this concession is that PLA infrastructure and troop deployment across the border has been strengthened in a manner that does not fit the view of some in the Lutyens Zone that another kinetic conflict affecting the Himalayan massif is unlikely.
CONNECT THE COINCIDENCES
In the meantime, another war is being fought by GHQ Rawalpindi and its Iron Partner, the PLA. This is to try and prevent India from becoming an attractive destination for companies looking to relocate from the PRC as a consequence of the anticipated effects of Cold War 2.0 on their production facilities within China. It would not cause sorrow in Beijing were India to take a while to recover its position as the top pharmaceutical and vaccine manufacturer of the world. Quite the contrary. Such a delay would give the PRC time to try and substitute India in such fields, thereby increasing an already dangerous degree of dependence on China by countries in the line of fire of the PLA’s comprehensive war against them. CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping is the most powerful Chinese leader since Chairman Mao. The extent of leeway he has given to the PLA in shaping policy and actions is even more than during 1949-76 when Mao founded and thereafter led the PRC.
Certainly, the volume of slack that he is willing to give the PLA represents a quantum leap from the situation under Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin or Hu Jintao. Given this, and the meshing of activity of PRC entities with the Pakistan military (including in institutes of virology), there is need to examine closely a string of “coincidences”, each of which has had the effect of delaying and in some cases reducing India’s prospects for emerging as the preferred alternative of choice to the PRC for production platforms. Were such outcomes coincidental, or part of a plan to kneecap India’s capabilities? While the latter may not in some cases be true, their possibility in some of the events that have taken place merits a much closer examination than the routine procedure followed in the past.
THE WAR IS ALREADY A REALITY
Such a war involving these two “all weather” (or in other words, a pair who are willing to resort to use all means available to achieve the purpose) partners is already taking place in India. It is clear that Prime Minister Narendra Modi understands this. Measures already being taken, such as the CISF taking over the security of Bharat Biotech premises in Hyderabad are clearly to ensure the avoidance of terror or other threats that are in common use at least in the arsenal of GHQ Rawalpindi or acts of sabotage that are in the PLA toolkit do not lead to consequences. The reason why these could be severe is that the production of Covaxin involves the multiplication of “live” viruses and then attenuating them to ensure that they pose no threat to human beings.
At the same time, the attenuated virus creates antibodies that are in an overwhelming number of SARS2 cases sufficient to save lives. If not through preventing the onset of the disease altogether, then through ensuring that it does not progress to a serious health emergency. It ought not to be forgotten that a fire “accidently” broke out on 12 December 2010 at the Vindhya Organics plant in Hyderabad, just as it earlier had (on 11 January 2020) at Ank Pharma in Maharashtra. Both facilities produce hydroxychloroquine, which was looked askance at by the eminent Dr Fauci and the incomparable Dr Tedros but was later found to be effective despite President Trump having affirmed the same about a year
It seems obvious (except thus far to President Biden) that Trump went with the right choices in the hypotheses presented to him, while Dr Anthony Fauci and Dr Deborah Birx were wrong about this and many other matters relating to the SARS2 pandemic. The Fauci-WHO recommended measures sent the global economy into the ICU but were subsequently adopted by almost all governments across the world. The WHO and a clutch of collaborators of the WIV across the world did not have access to the data in the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and took the word of the “Bat Woman” to reach conclusions about the pandemic. This included their publicly ridiculing what they termed a “conspiracy theory” that a lab leak caused SARS2 and not bats in a cave. Across the world, vaccine manufacturers in India were subjected to a flood of disinformation designed to reduce to as low a level as such falsehoods could succeed of trust in them. A campaign that enjoyed some success even in India.
NON-KINETIC MEASURES AGAINST INDIA
Fast forward in reverse to May 2018, the year after Prime Minister Modi and the Indian Army surprised the PLA at Doklam. Could the Doklam surprise as well as the bravery of soldiers of the Indian Army at Galwan last year have been sought to be met by what is appears to be a multi-dimensional campaign of sabotage and misinformation designed to harm India? While the WHO and several other institutions and individuals believe in whatever is told to them by the world’s second superpower, the number of those who do the same in India has fallen sharply in 2020, a decline in trust that has continued into the new year, at least in the case of India, not to mention much of the rest of the world.
Fast forward from Doklam to 2018 and the closure of the Tuticorin copper plant through an unusual manifestation of extreme violence on the part of workers. On 12 December 2020, violence broke out between managers and workers in a Taiwanese company in Narasapura, Karnataka that had been shifted from the PRC to India to produce iPhones for Apple, a company whose top management took a while to realise that in a few years, shifts in geopolitical tectonic plates would mean that any iPhone produced in China would have to be sold only in China, Russia, Pakistan, Turkey and Iran, not to mention emerging markets such as North Korea. The large-scale shift of Taiwanese and several other hi-tech companies from the PRC to other locations will become inevitable in a few years, unless those companies decide to become Chinese entities, an unlikely prospect.
That many of these may shift to India rather than to smaller (and therefore perhaps more malleable) countries is not a welcome prospect for PRC strategic planners. India is seen as the only country that can replicate the success of China in the 1980s of emerging as the global factory of choice for international corporates, which is why the slowing down and final snuffing out of such a prospect must be a priority for the several “Best and the Brightest” of Chinese brainpower that Xi Jinping has assembled for the purpose of ensuring China’s rise to global primacy.
Are events such as the Serum Institute of India fire of 21 January 2021 and the LG polymer plant at Vizag on 8 May the previous year innocent of external involvement? Or the cyberattack that denuded Mumbai of power on 13 October 2020, not to mention several other ports, including Chidambaranar? Those looking into such events in sufficient depth do not believe so. Neither, do they believe, are events such as the Evergreen (again Japanese and Taiwanese) ship marooned in the Suez Canal for such a long time.
Was the navigation software of the vessel hacked to make the captain follow a course that led to disaster? For that matter, why did a German-made ship belonging to the Indonesian navy take too deep a sudden dive to recover, despite its experienced crew? Were its systems tampered with, in the manner that several military platforms appear to have been in India in recent years? What was the actual cause responsible for some marine exports and some other food products to be labelled as unfit for human consumption? Earlier, drugs made in the PRC but given “Made in India” labels caused havoc when exported to parts of Africa, even as melamine mixed in baby food destined for Mexico killed several babies there. Whether it be in the military or civilian sphere, the PRC offers a range of substitutes for those who have been made to lose confidence in alternatives made in the democracies. Just when there is a worldwide shortage of semiconductors, two factories making this in Taiwan suffer from SARS2 clusters, slowing down production and assisting substitutes made in the PRC to replace town.
Earlier in March 2020, there was a sudden outbreak of SARS2 in a pharma plant in Nanjangud, Karnataka. It seems difficult to believe, especially given the propensity to resort to novel methods of warfare by the GHQ Rawalpindi-PLA alliance, that such occurrences are purely coincidental in either Taiwan or India despite such events being of direct benefit to the military alliance between Pakistan and China.
INDIA WILL MEET THE CHALLENGE
Understanding that there is an all-out war is the first step towards fashioning methods that can defeat the plans of the countries. The good news for Prime Minister Narendra Modi is that the country that he has been elected to lead in 2014 and again in 2019 is ready and capable of defeating the challenge caused by the comprehensive war against the Republic by the Sino-Pakistan Iron alliance, assisted by the reality of the Sino-Russian alliance in global geopolitics.
Speaking on theaterisation of forces, General Rawat said that the process is going on well and it is making satisfactory progress….reports Asian Lite News
Asking armed forces to be on guard along borders with both China and Pakistan, Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat has said that terrorists working with the Pakistan Army can go rogue and it could escalate the situation with India.
Speaking to ANI on Tuesday, the Chief of Defence Staff also stated that while there was a need to be alert on both the borders, the primary front for the defence forces at the moment was the Northern border where India and China have been locked in a military standoff since last year.
“I would say both the fronts are a priority for us. While we have to prepared at the northern fronts especially after the situation that evolved in 2020, We can’t lower our guard but on the western front.”
“I have always maintained that there are terrorists who operate with the Pakistani armed forces, some of these terrorists can actually become loose cannon and create a situation which could lead to an escalation. So we have to be fully prepared on our western fronts also. So I would say that we should be prepared for both the fronts but our primary front remains the northern front,” Gen Rawat said when asked who is the main adversary for the Indian defence forces between China and Pakistan.
Asked about the deployment of two-strike corps on the China front in last one year, he said this was about reorientation of the forces which have been getting dual tasks for several years now and they were not new raisings.
On Pakistan’s support for terror activities inside India, the CDS said while the ceasefire is holding along Line of Control (LoC) so far, the internal peace process is being disrupted by infiltration of weapons and drugs, using drones.
Gen Rawat said if the internal peace process is disrupted by the smuggling of drugs and weapons, then “we can’t really say that the ceasefire is holding”.
“Ceasefire so far along the LoC is holding, which is a positive sign. At the same time, we are also witnessing infiltration of weapons and ammunition, using drones. It doesn’t augur well for peace as these drugs and weapons are meant to disrupt the internal peace process,” he said.
“If the internal peace process is disrupted, then we can’t really say that the ceasefire is holding. The ceasefire doesn’t mean that you ceasefire along borders, but you at the same time create trouble in the hinterland. We would like a semblance of peace in the entire Jammu and Kashmir,” the CDS added.
Speaking on theaterisation of forces, General Rawat said that the process is going on well and it is making satisfactory progress.
“Amongst the three services, we have been able to resolve most of the issues. There is a better understanding that if the three services integrate, they can bring about jointness and carry out transformation. Then I think, we will ensure better efficiency and utilisation of our existing services. I think we’ll be better prepared for combat in the future,” he said.
Shedding light on the internal situation in Jammu and Kashmir, the CDS said he is “very confident” that the people of the Union Territory want peace.
“They have seen a lot of terrorism and insurgency over the years. People are now looking at peace returning, especially after the abrogation of Article 370. If this continues, the time will come when people themselves will shun violence and will not allow insurgency in the Valley because insurgency and terrorism can’t survive without the support of locals,” General Rawat said.
He further said that Army needs to identify the youth in the Valley who have been misled and guide them away from terrorism.
“Some of the youth who have been misled, I think we need to identify them and see how best we can converse with them and explain to them that terrorism is not the way forward, but peace and tranquillity is the way forward,” CDS Rawat added. (ANI)
The Indian Mission in Islamabad has asked all individuals listed to make necessary arrangements to reach at the Wagah-Attari border in time for their repatriation…reports Asian Lite News
Over 400 Indian nationals stranded in different parts of Pakistan due to the closure of borders for the containment of Covid-19 in March last year will return on June 28.
Additionally, 48 No Obligation to Return to India (NORI) visa holders and 8 spouses and relatives of NORI visa holders will also return from Pakistan to India the same day.
“High Commission of India in Pakistan is facilitating the return of 405 Indian nationals, 48 NORI visa holders and 8 spouses/relatives of NORI visa holders from Pakistan to India on June 28, 2021 as per the attached list,” said a statement of the Indian High Commission in Pakistan on Wednesday.
The repatriation will be carried out as per the list of Indian nationals and NORI visa holders, it noted.
The Indian Mission in Islamabad has asked all individuals listed to make necessary arrangements to reach at the Wagah-Attari border in time for their repatriation.
This is by far the highest number of Indian nationals to be repatriated from Pakistan in a single day since the Indian High Commission begun facilitating return of Indians from Pakistan in June last year.
India and Pakistan had then operated a shuttle service for people stuck on both sides of the border due to the pandemic. The High Commission had facilitated the return of 748 Indians from Pakistan on 25-27 June 2020.
More than 2,000 Indians and Pakistanis have already been allowed to return to their respective countries though the border since June.
This year alone, 114 compatriots had returned to India on 11 January. Besides, Indian nationals, NORI visa holders and their spouses or relatives have also been bought back to the country from Pakistan.
The Indian government issues NORI visas to Pakistani and Bangladeshi nationals who leave their home country and live in India or are married in India but have not yet obtained Indian citizenship. (INN)
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar noted that the India-China issue is independent of Quad and with China there are two issues that still continue to exist between both countries….reports Asian Lite News
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has said that the onus is on China to live up to the written commitments that have been made and reiterated time and again in order to resolve the border tension between both sides.
Speaking at the Qatar Economic Forum, Jaishankar noted that the India-China issue is independent of Quad and with China there are two issues that still continue to exist between both countries.
“Now, the India-China border issue, it has pre-existed upon, in many ways, it’s a challenge, a problem, which is quite independent of the Quad. And there are two big issues there right now. One of course is that the close up deployments still continue, especially in Ladakh. The issue there is whether China will live up to the written commitments which are made about both countries not deploying a large armed force at the border. And the larger issue really, whether we can build this relationship on the basis of mutual sensitivity, mutual respect and mutual interest,” he said.
The Quad, on the other hand, brings together four countries with a common agenda that includes maritime security, connectivity and vaccines. “They have their own agenda, what I would say is a set of convergence, a world view. They meet and they talk about a whole lot of things,” the Minister said.
XI CHINA
Asked about the G7’s approach towards China – which includes cooperation on issues such as climate change, competition in trade and disagreement on matters such as human rights – Jaishankar said India shares the G7’s views on the importance of resilient and reliable supply chains.
“And when you look at the specific issues you mentioned, for example, climate change, obviously there is a G7 and China conversation if we would, but we are actually in a very different position, because we are at a much earlier stage of our development. So, leave alone a net zero. Here, we are not even there in terms of identifying a year of peaking. So our positions are much closer to many of the other G77 countries, the developing world countries,” he said.
“When it comes to an issue, like supply chains, I think there obviously we share with G7 the importance of having more resilient and reliable supply chains. But we also feel that we can contribute to it by expanding our own manufacturing capabilities. And in fact, one of the big initiatives for the Modi government is something called the PLI scheme, which is designed to attract more manufacturing into India,” the EAM added. On issues such as open societies and democratic freedoms, there is “much stronger convergence” between India and the G7. “It is a far more issue-based relationship that we are seeing in world politics,” he remarked.
President Joe Biden during the QUAD leaders virutal summit
Replying to a question on India’s possible participation in the G7’s Build Back Better World or B3W initiative that is aimed at countering China’s Belt and Road Initiative, Jaishankar said the country has a history of its own connectivity and infrastructure projects in 62 countries.
“But what we share with the G7 is that today, it’s important to have broad principles that such projects should be viable, they should be transparent, they shouldn’t contribute to debt, they should be environmentally friendly. Most of all, they must be a priority of the community, where they are located,” he said.
“So it’s an area where we do feel there’s a lot of convergence with the G7. We look forward to working with them. But as I said, we have a substantial portfolio of projects, which we have already done in the last years and which I expect to see us continue to do more in the coming years,” he added.
Answering a separate question on vaccines, EAM Jaishankar said that if India has to ramp up its own production, the United States and Europe needs to step forward.
“The challenge in vaccine production is that if you are looking at the kind of scale, which the world needs, which is not just to vaccinate now, but plan to do it regularly, look at booster shots when they come, you’re not going to get that kind of scale without India scaling up. So the particular point of discussion for me was how do you keep the supply chain going so that we actually can ramp up production to the kind of level that the world needs. Now, why was it important for me to do that in Washington because a lot of the supply chain originates in the US. A lot of it comes from Europe as well. So I think the US and Europe need to step forward if India has to ramp up its own production,” he said. (INN)
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh delivers a speech in Gaza City, on Jan. 23, 2018. The Islamic Hamas movement called on Tuesday for Palestinian national conference to discuss a new Palestinian strategy. Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh stressed in a televised speech the need for a new strategy that addresses the U.S. and Israeli declaration aimed at striking the Palestinian issue. (Xinhua/Wissam Nassar/IANS)
Geopolitical expert Fabien Baussart says the ideological fount from which Hamas has sprung is organically linked to Pakistan and its jihadist orientation, reports Asian Lite News
A recent revelation by an ex-Pakistani minister of how Islamabad has been helping Palestinian militants by providing training to them, has made geopolitical observers take notice of how Pakistan is confusing the already obfuscate matters in Middle East.
In an op-ed for the Times of Israel, geopolitical expert Fabien Baussart has argued that the role of countries like Iran, Qatar and Turkey in sustaining Hamas has been well documented, however, the role of Pakistan has remained off the radar.
This comes amid the recent outbreak of clashes between Hamas and Israel and the subsequent ceasefire, which no one really expects to endure.
Baussart, who is the President of the Center of Political and Foreign Affairs (CPFA), said the ideological fount from which Hamas has sprung is organically linked to Pakistan and its jihadist orientation.
“The Muslim Brotherhood from which Hamas has remerged and the Jamaat Islami which is the mother organisation of jihadism in Pakistan, are two sides of the same coin. This ideological link and affinity is one of the basis of the burgeoning relationship between the Pakistani state and the Hamas para-state.”
Aside from the ideological connection, Baussart said Hamas makes a great fit for Pakistan’s ambitions to exercise influence beyond its borders. “Since these constraints prevent Pakistan from doing things that normal states do to expand their influence, Islamabad (or more appropriately Rawalpindi, the city where all strategic policy is framed and implemented) prefers to use asymmetric methods to expand its footprint without leaving behind its fingerprints,” he added.
Accusing Pakistan of muddying the waters in the Middle East, Baussart said Hamas is of course not the only terrorist organisation in the Middle East that Pakistan has flirted with. The expert even pointed to the reports of Pakistani terrorists moving into Syria to fight on the side of Daesh.
He further said of late Pakistan has been doubling down in its advocacy of the Palestinian cause. Although the Pakistanis are very vocal about Israeli actions in Gaza but avoid openly endorsing Hamas.
“The ideological, sectarian and religious dimension of this nexus is only one part of the story. The other even more important aspect of this nexus is that it neatly dovetails with Pakistan’s larger strategic play in the region where it is trying to forge new alliances with countries like Turkey, Qatar and Iran, all of which are not only backing Hamas but are also arraigned against the Saudi-led bloc or Arab countries,” Baussart said.
According to the writer, Pakistan’s efforts to amplify the Palestinian issue at the UNHRC suggests a diplomatic power play against countries like Saudi Arabia and UAE. The development is taking place as these Arab nations are moving towards normalizing relations with Israel.
