Richard N Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations and an erstwhile senior administration official, has predicted that domestic politics and factionalism will hold back India from becoming a major player in the global arena. Haass, who was in India recently and was witness to the political bickering over the India-United States civilian nuclear deal, also argued that the challenge to India would be "the tension between the central level and the periphery."
Buoyed by a ceasefire deal negotiated by Pakistan in 2007, the Al Qaeda has rebuilt some of its pre-September 11 capabilities, leading to major spike in attacks within the country and neighbouring Afghanistan, the United States State Department's latest annual terrorism report says. The ceasefire negotiated by Pakistan in 2007 gave Al Qaeda leaders "greater mobility and ability to conduct training and operational planning, particularly those targeting Western Europe," it said
The state department, in its annual report on terrorism, said terrorist activities along the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir are on the decline, but Pakistan-based militant outfits like the Lashkar-e-Tayiba and other terrorist groups continue to plan attacks in the Valley.
The nomination of Husain Haqqani as the new Pakistani ambassador to the United States, by Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, is being seen as a resounding slap on the face of President Pervez Musharraf. Haqqani -- a former journalist, diplomat and currently associate professor at Boston University is one of Musharraf's fiercest critics. In fact, Haqqani has not visited Pakistan for years, fearing possible imprisonment. Haqqani has been scathing in his attacks of Bush govt
Obama has refused to debate Hillary Clinton,with no moderator, before the Indiana and North Carolina primaries.
A district court in the United States has sentenced a former schoolteacher for the second time to 15 years in prison after an appeals court directed it to reconsider the original conviction, for providing material aid to terrorist outfit Lashkar-e-Toiba. The former school teacher was found guilty of acting as an assistant to LeT leader Mohammed Ajmal Khan, during his visits to the US in 2002 and 2003, and helping Khan transfer 50,000 paintball pellets to Pakistan.
The Bush administration apparently has no problem with the new Pakistani government's peace deal with militant groups in that country's North West Frontier Province, including Waziristan that have been sympathetic and allied with the Taliban and Al Qaeda. It has even given the tentative agreement its cautious blessings.
The Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, in what appears to be a fresh round of concern in party circles that the bitter campaign is going to find its way into the conventional hallways of Denver late August, is thinking of drafting a letter to the super delegates. The other co-signatories to this letter could include the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and the Chairman of the Democratic National Committee Howard Dean.
Boucher, who is the Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs, was asked by rediff.com not to dodge the question but to clearly articulate which one was binding on Indiathe Hyde Act or the 123 agreement. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had recently assured the Congress that for the nuclear deal to be consummated, it has to be consistent with the Hyde Act.
Delivering the keynote address at the conference on The Future of India's Foreign Policy organised by the Center for the Advanced Study of India of the University of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia, Sen said this was particularly imperative in the context of today's world that is "shaped by globalisation, inter-dependence, inter-connectedness and rapid changes."
For centuries, Jewish women along the Malabar Coast filled notebooks with Jewish-themed songs in Malayalam and Hebrew. Recently, a series of programs, including scholarly discussions, music and dance and a book exhibition in Washington, DC, attempted to revive that musical heritage.
"We have an organisation being placed on the list of designated foreign terrorists organizations. (It) has legal requirements that are placed on us. We have to honour those legal requirements and we'll certainly do so in the case of Nepal," State Department's Deputy Spokesman Tom Casey said.
Dr Sam Bathena of Wheaton, Maryland, a popular communist activist in the Washington, DC area, died in March while on a visit to India. Mumbai-born Dr Bathena, founding member of the Zoroastrian Association of Metropolitan Washington Inc and past president of both the Association of Indians in America, Washington, DC chapter, and the Association of Scientists of Indian Origin in America, experienced acute abdominal pain in Jodhpur, Rajasthan.
The special qualities of Professor G V Loganathan and Minal Hiralal Panchal and 30 other faculty and students of the Virginia Tech university community, who were killed a year ago on April 16, were read aloud in a remembrance ceremony attended by thousands on the Virginia Tech Drillfield in Blacksburg, Virginia.
Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi said the failure to consummate the Indo-US nuke deal would not jeopardise overall US-India relations. "It's very, very important to emphasise that India-US relations are multi-dimensional, multi-layered, multi-faceted. The Indo-US nuclear deal was neither the beginning and nor is it going to be the end of that," he said.
The agreement includes "financial compensation, health benefits and non-monetary assistance for surviving family members and victims of the April 16, 2007, massacre at Virginia Tech," according to a statement released by lawyers representing some of the families. The finer details have not been released because the agreement has not been finalised.
United States Congressman Jim McDermott has introduced major new legislation to, in his words, "unite the two great democracies of India and the United States together in development of new and renewable energy supplies". The legislation seeks to establish a Congressional Commission on Renewable Power Technology Commerce with India to study methods for improving and promoting bilateral renewable energy cooperation with India.
A Washington, DC think tank has called on India to 'tailor its Afghan policy to the new situation in Pakistan' in order to alleviate the decades-long competing strategic agendas between New Delhi and Islamabad vis--vis Afghanistan. The report said that if New Delhi could find even modest ways of working in harmony with the Pakistani government, it could reap substantial benefits in its relations with both countries.
Most south Asian nations will fall short on the Millennium Development Goals, a set of eight globally agreed development goals due to be achieved by 2015, a study by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund said.The report has warned that developing countries stand to suffer the most from climate change and the degradation of natural resources.
During the Spring Meetings, the issue of Bank's involvement in Botswana and the Tata's Mundhra's plant in Gujarat is likely to come up during the interactive session. It is claimed that the Tata's plant will account for nearly 28 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emission when fully operational. "In the Indian case there is the sense that if you look at India's energy needs, they are very, very significant and where we can we try to look for other sources.
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