As many as 31 evacuation flights will be operated to neighbouring countries of crisis-hit Ukraine and will bring back more than 6,300 Indians stranded in the eastern European nation, according to official sources.
India on Friday said it accidentally fired a missile two days back that landed in Pakistan and that the "deeply regrettable" incident was caused by a technical malfunction in the course of its routine maintenance.
A US Congress-constituted quasi-judicial body on Monday recommended to the Biden Administration to designate India, China, Pakistan, Afghanistan and 11 other nations as "country of particular concern" in the context of status of religious freedom.
'The attack killed 166 innocents, including six Americans. We will never let terrorists win, or even come close to winning!' he said.
The free trade agreement (FTA) talks with India are no longer working towards a Diwali deadline though negotiations are progressing well, UK Trade Secretary Kemi Badenoch has said as New Delhi expressed confidence on Friday of an "early date" for a mutually beneficial deal. "There are ongoing negotiations as we know on the FTA. There is interest on both sides to see if we can work towards a deal, an FTA, that is beneficial to both the countries at an early date," external affairs ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi told reporters in New Delhi. It came as External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar spoke to his UK counterpart, James Cleverly, and referenced the Roadmap 2030 bilateral agreement signed between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and former UK PM Boris Johnson in May last year, with no specific reference to the FTA.
Diplomatic and Congressional sources tell Rediff.com that for all intents and purposes, the F-16 sale is dead.
It is going to be a long-term proposition for India -- which has a decades-old relationship with Moscow -- to reorient its foreign policy away from Russia, the US has said, insisting that re-aligning one's approach is not like flipping a light switch.
The government may soon give the green light to bilateral trade between Russia and India in their national currencies to avoid any trade disruptions, multiple people aware of the matter said. While the Department of Commerce has recommended the proposal, an announcement is likely to be made by the finance ministry after further deliberations between the Department of Economic Affairs and Department of Financial Services. "The finance ministry will take a call on how to peg the two currencies," a senior government official told Business Standard. In the past, the two nations have had rupee-rouble trade, and when such an arrangement is implemented again, it will bypass the sanctions imposed on Russia by the West.
The UN Security Council is scheduled to vote on Friday evening on a draft resolution on Russia's military operation in Ukraine as well as the escalating situation in the eastern European country.
Union minister Rajeev Chandrashekar on Tuesday rejected Dorsey's claim, calling it an "outright lie" and "an attempt to brush out that very dubious period" of firm's history.
The government has merged the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) with the finance ministry to give it a better control over state-owned firms and facilitate its ambitious privatisation programme. Finance ministry will now have six departments while DPE's hereto parent ministry, the ministry of heavy industries and public enterprises will now be called the ministry of heavy industries. Previously, the disinvestment ministry - created under the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government - was merged with the finance ministry and is now a department under it. Also, Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) was abolished and administration of foreign investments was given to the finance ministry (FinMin).
'From the very start, PM Modi was insistent that visiting foreign leaders should be exposed to an India beyond its capital.' 'Through these experiences, he felt that the full Indian narrative would be much better understood across the world,' explains External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. A riveting excerpt from Bluekraft Digital Foundation's Modi@20: Dreams Meet Delivery.
The average age of those who died was 80.3, and 90 per cent of the fatalities were aged 65 or over, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported.
'India will come increasingly in the US crosshairs if it insists on maintaining its strategic autonomy, warns Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The US move came after the Justice Department said that hackers working with the Chinese government targeted firms developing vaccines for the coronavirus and stole hundreds of millions of dollars worth of intellectual property and trade secrets from companies across the world.
China on Friday announced plans to permit the return of 'some' Indian students stranded in India for over two years following the visa and flight restrictions imposed by Beijing due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
How will the Modi Sarkar's likely return affect other nations?
The Pakistani team investigating the Pathankot terror attack will complete its probe this week, a top official said on Monday, days after three suspects in the high-profile case were remanded to police custody.
El-Sisi welcomed Modi, who is on a two-day state visit to Egypt, at the Presidential Palace where the two leaders were closeted for one-on-one meeting after which the two sides signed a memorandum of understandng.
India's total purchase of oil from Russia in a month is probably less than what Europe does in an afternoon, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said.
China's population in 2022 -- 1.4118 billion -- fell by 850,000 from 2021, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said.
India has already termed as untenable the 'artificial enlargement' of the territorial claims by Nepal after its Parliament unanimously approved the new political map of the country featuring Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhura areas which India maintains belongs to it.
The government is likely to file draft papers for the mega initial public offering of LIC with market regulator Sebi by next week, while a portion of the issue would be reserved for anchor investors, a top official said on Wednesday.
Despite the government's hectic efforts to avoid voting on the no-confidence motion against Khan, the joint Opposition succeeded in its month-long efforts to oust Khan from the prime minister's office as 174 members of the 342-member National Assembly voted against him in the wee hours of Sunday after a day of high drama.
'Sullivan and Jaishankar welcomed the cooperation in recent weeks that resulted in deliveries of over USD 500 million in COVID-19 relief supplies from the US federal and state governments, US companies and private citizens across America for the people of India'
Religious tolerance in India is "deteriorating" while religious freedom violations are "increasing", a rights expert has told American lawmakers.
The Taliban is showing its strong discontent as the high hopes given to it by the Pakistani military have been dashed, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Braverman, 42, resigned from the cabinet of former prime minister Liz Truss last week, having breached the ministerial code by sending secure information from her private email.
It is understood that India's border row with China figured in the talks between Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla and US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs David Hale though there was no mention of it in the press statements issued by the two sides.
The Assam government has set up an eight-member committee to prepare a framework for implementation of all clauses of the 36-year-old Assam Accord, especially the Clause-6 report prepared by a central panel pertaining to protecting the cultural, social and linguistic identity and heritage of the indigenous people, officials said on Saturday.
'While the US-Pakistan relationship has been stabilised, it's still mired in uncertainty.'
The US has also urged the two South Asian neighbours to avoid further military action.
The 18-year-old youth, named Jake Bilardi, had previously made preparations to launch a string of attacks across Melbourne, including at shopping centres, cafes and foreign consulates, according to a blog he is believed to have written.
External affairs minister S Jaishankar has told his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi that the two sides should work for an early resolution of the remaining issues along the LAC in eastern Ladakh to restore peace and tranquility in the border areas as this has been an essential basis for progress in Sino-India ties.
One Chinese source informed ANI that 10 million new infections are probably occurring daily in China.
Pakistani security forces on Thursday raided the house of the father of the woman suicide bomber from Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) who blew herself up in Karachi University that killed three Chinese teachers and injured another.
Regional States will be worried that the US's nascent engagement with the Taliban behind the fig leaf of humanitarian aid enables the return of US intelligence personnel to Afghanistan, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The paper also includes musing that SARS -- which hit China in 2003 -- could have been a man-made bioweapon deliberately unleashed by "terrorists".
Pompeo, during a Congressional hearing on Thursday, told the members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee that 'the actions are entirely consistent with what they have been signalling to the world for decades you might even argue since 1989, but certainly since General Secretary Xi came to power'.
Alleging that India was offering its services to the US to "pressurise" China, Pakistan Prime Minister's Adviser on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz said India has been trying to downplay the Kashmir issue for a very long time.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Investor Information - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances