Support from the committee gives Xi an indefinite extension on the reins of power, which will surely result in hawkish and insular policies. It does not bode well for relations with the USA, or with anyone else who does not bow the knee to Beijing, for that matter.
'If the situation escalates, then mini-scale firing might happen.'
'We should not allow ourselves to be surprised in any manner in future on the border.'
"First, is Azhar a terrorist? Second, was the Pathankot attack perpetrated by the Jaish-e-Mohammed group? To the first question, the answer should be yes," he said.
It will be interesting to see whether India-China border tensions figure during the deliberations of PLA deputies to the NPC and CPPCC, notes Jayadeva Ranade, the distinguished China expert and retired RA&W officer.
Take a look at these impressive towers with huge atriums...
Taiwan considers itself a sovereign state -- but China views the self-ruled island as a breakaway province. Beijing has not ruled out the possible use of force to achieve unification.
'The Ladakh clashes are mere warning signals of the storm to come on May 22 when the Chinese parliament meets,' observes Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
China's deteriorating economy is a serious concern. Xi Jinping and China's new premier will have a difficult task ahead of them after the 20th party congress, notes Jayadeva Ranade, the retired senior RA&W officer and China expert.
The Year of the Rabbit, according to the Chinese calendar, began on Sunday, January 22.
'I have seen, even in my village, people hanging pictures of Communist leaders -- Jyoti Basu, Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong -- in their drawing rooms. Could we not hang pictures of Swami Vivekananda? '
President Xi Jinping has called for better international communication, urging the bellicose official Chinese media and 'wolf warrior' diplomats to adopt a tone that displays openness and conveys modesty, in what observers see as a rare admission of Beijing's growing isolation exacerbated by COVID-19.
Why omit the Tiananmen massacre from the history of China's Communist party, asks Claude Arpi.
'What needs to be watched is that the border incidents at Dokalam in 2017 and Galwan in 2020 are triggering nascent Chinese nationalism against India,' asserts Srikanth Kondapalli, the leading China expert.
Xi, the most powerful leader in recent decades heading the ruling Communist Party and the military, will now be the first Chinese leader after the founder chairman Mao Zedong to remain in power lifelong.
'China need not worry about a truly 'resurgent India'.' 'It's not going to happen.'
The summit is being seen as an effort by India and China to rebuild trust and improve ties that were hit by the 73-day-long Doklam standoff last year.
China hiked its annual defence budget by 7.1 per cent.
Though General Naravane's visit will not deal with 'impermanent' issues like the changing stands of politicians, it will certainly reinforce the deeper 'permanent' links between the people of Nepal and India. Time will hopefully tackle the present impermanence of the Sino-Nepalese romance, notes Claude Arpi.
'If the situation deteriorates and there is further escalation, the USA is in preparedness.'
Overt displays of physical machismo is the stamp of the strongman and it's a symptom that manifests itself in direct proportion to their sense of insecurity, says Kanika Datta.
China will flood direct flights to India with wholesale takeaways of the authentic stuff; Indian businessmen will fight for the commission and the consumers for the cuisine, predicts Sunanda K Datta-Ray.
China's GDP took the worst hit since the disastrous Cultural Revolution in 1976, plummeting by 6.8 per cent in the first quarter of 2020 as the country took unprecedented measures to fight the coronavirus pandemic that brought the world's second largest economy to a standstill. China's gross domestic product stood at 20.65 trillion yuan (USD 2.91 trillion, approx) in the first quarter of 2020 amid the Covid-19 impact, down 6.8 per cent year on year, China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said on Friday.
'The leadership is confronted with an economy growing at its slowest pace in 20 years,' points out Claude Smadja.
The government's programmes should be expected to generate some momentum, but the macro-economic numbers are not encouraging, observes T N Ninan.
The removal of the term limit will give Xi a limitless tenure.
Arpi deserves to be complimented for the commitment and hard work that have gone into this production. The frustrations of seeking reliable documentation from the catacombs of the Indian bureaucracy did not deter him from going after the best information available, and the result is one that he can take much satisfaction in. Ambassador Prabhat P Shukla, Member Advisory Council, Vivekananda International Foundation, reviews Claude Arpi's The End of an Era: India Exits Tibet.
'It is not the country's interests alone that lead to all this secrecy.' 'More usually, the reason is the threat from political rivals: What will they do if they find out?', notes T C A Srinivasa Raghavan.
Now, as before, India's vote at the UN was dictated by paramount national interests. Though the Indian vote was 'neutral', its explanation was explicit in its criticism of the Russian actions. India took back with the left hand what it had given with the right, explains Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
There is growing alarm at the inexorable rise of China, both of its military prowess and its aggressive bullying of other countries plus its subjugation of whole portions of its own population.
The activist, who advises various farmer organisations, was arrested when Assam was witnessing widespread protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act.
Naga splinter groups impatient with stalled talks as well as rebel Manipuri groups who have a stake in disrupting upcoming elections to the state assembly, are believed to be regrouping in the borderlands of China's Yunnan province and Myanmar, taking advantage of the turmoil in the latter by using it as a transit corridor.
The just-concluded plenary session of the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC), headed by Xi, adopted his proposals for the formulation of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025) for National Economic and Social Development and the Long-Range Objectives Through the Year 2035.
India was fooled into believing that Communist China wanted a 'negotiated' settlement with the Tibetans; it was never the case, says Claude Arpi.
Former prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru had sought American assistance and wrote to the then US president John F Kennedy to provide India jet fighters to stem the Chinese tide of aggression during the 1962 Sino-India war, according to a new book.
India and China achieved a major milestone this year when their bilateral trade crossed the landmark figure of $100 billion but it did not generate any fanfare in both capitals as the two Asian giants are going through a "particularly bad patch" in their relations due to a set of actions by Beijing in violation of agreements that led to the military standoff in eastern Ladakh. Starting with a modest $1.83 billion in 2001, the bilateral trade crossed $100 billion-mark in the first 11 months this year, a significant milestone for which the two countries carried out campaigns to boost trade and build it as a major stakeholder to improve the relations between two nations, whose ties otherwise remained frosty over the festering boundary dispute and strategic rivalry. According to last month's data from China's General Administration of Customs (GAC), the India-China bilateral trade totalled $114.263 billion, up 46.4 per cent year-on-year from January to November 2021.
The armies are working to schedule their seventh round of talks to take steps towards "early and complete" disengagement of troops along the LAC in eastern Ladakh.
The chapters were dropped by the Assam Higher Secondary Education Council (AHSEC) for the 2020-21 session, as part of the 30 per cent reduction of the syllabus, keeping in mind the loss of academic schedule that the students had to face because of the pandemic.
'There is little doubt that China today stands in the dock, charged with misdemeanour with regard to the health and well-being of its own citizens and of the people of the world,' notes Amulya Ganguli.
