'The leadership is confronted with an economy growing at its slowest pace in 20 years,' points out Claude Smadja.
'The Chinese are retaining geostrategic pressure on India by keeping troops there and building infrastructure continually.'
He warned that Pakistan-supported terrorist groups would continue to carry out attacks inside India.
The two-plus-two dialogue will be held on Tuesday. A host of crucial bilateral, regional and global issues including China's efforts to expand influence in the Indo-Pacific region as well as its aggressive behaviour in eastern Ladakh is likely to figure in the talks.
The US military has intensified its efforts to collect the remnants of the high-altitude surveillance balloon from China that floated over the United States over several days last week from Montana to South Carolina.
'It is an unpleasant fact of history that stronger nations dominate the power play and the only way it can be mitigated is through recourse to diplomacy,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has reiterated the UK's commitment to a free trade agreement (FTA) with India as part of the country's wider focus on enhancing ties with the strategic Indo-Pacific region and standing up to competitors with "robust pragmatism". Delivering his first major foreign policy speech since taking charge at 10 Downing Street last month at the Lord Mayor of London's Banquet on Monday evening, the British Indian leader reflected upon his heritage and committed to promoting British values of "freedom and openness" around the world. He also pledged to "do things differently" far removed from the so-called "golden era" with China, which he said poses a "systemic challenge" to British values and interests.
'If the Bangladesh-China relationship strengthens further, it can only be to India's detriment,' notes Vice Admiral Premvir Das.
'Chinese are going bang, bang, bang building 30-35 reactors.' 'We should announce a programme of 50 new reactors and show that we mean business on the ground and not just announcements.'
An aggressive Pyongyang is likely to force Seoul and Tokyo to build nuclear deterrents and thus thwart Beijing's ambitions.
London hopes to convince New Delhi's naval planners to power India's second indigenous aircraft carrier with the Queen Elizabeth's integrated all-electric propulsion system.
'He needs to see results while he is in office.'
'As in the Panchatantra tale of the cat and the monkeys, it is possible for the clever swing State to play off the two competing powers.'
There are signs of China's external behaviour becoming more aggressive in the coming years. If that happens, strategic implications for neighbours having territorial disputes with China can become deeper and imperatives can rise for the former to counteract, says D S Rajan
'The impasse on the India-China border in the Sikkim sector persists, but the Hamburg meeting between the two leaders will certainly have its salutary effects on the relationship between the two countries,' says China scholar Rup Narayan Das.
'While China has been hiking its defence spending, India has done precious little in implementing the Manmohan Singh government's decision of raising a 90,000-strong China-centric Mountain Strike Corps,' says Rajeev Sharma.
The president said China would never allow "any people, organisation or political party to split any part of Chinese territory out of the country at any time, in any form."
"In the flux and transition of our times, the most critical need in this region is to uphold and strengthen the rules and norms that must define our collective behaviour," he said.
China's official media reported air and ground movement of troops in Taiwan Straits -- the waters that separate China and Taiwan -- as US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi landed in Taipei on Tuesday disregarding Beijing's stern warnings.
The US is making investments in defence ties with India to uphold a favourable balance of power in the Indo-Pacific, a top Pentagon official told lawmakers Thursday indicating that strengthening ties with New Delhi is one of the key factors to address the pacing challenge from China.
The Southeast Asian nation has been focusing on modernising its military in the face of myriad security challenges as well as decades-long territorial disputes with China in the South China Sea.
Leaders of the United States, India, Australia and Japan did discuss the 'challenge' posed by China during the first meeting of the Quad, and they made clear that none of them have any 'illusions' about Beijing, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has said.
'Any fear or apprehension that this dialogue is aimed towards China, that is mistaken.'
The entire gamut of China's activities is aimed at keeping India on tenterhooks, cause fatigue to its troops and keeping its security system unstable, so that it cannot play a meaningful role in international geopolitics as an effective partner of the US and Japan, observes Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain (retd).
It's a man-made marvel! After several delays and budget overruns, the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau bridge was officially opened on Tuesday, marking the completion of the longest sea-crossing bridge ever built, nine years after construction began. Here's everything you needed to know about this bridge of steel.
The issue of radicalisation is not limited to Jammu and Kashmir but other states as well and the entire world too, she said in the Lok Sabha.
India's decision to skip the meeting came after a year of bilateral discord over China's stubborn opposition to India's entry into the Nuclear Suppliers' Group and a UN ban against Pakistan-based terrorist group Jaish-e-Mohammed leader Masood Azhar.
Concerned over the fallout of the Red Sea crisis and severe shortage of containers against the backdrop of a steep decline in merchandise exports in August, the Union government is pulling out all the stops to find a solution. To begin with, the government has devised a strategy aimed at boosting container supply and supporting exporters.
If you are serious about countering the Chinese threat, then the best weapon is investing in real freedom, plurality, elections and democracy. Unfortunately, it isn't an approach all Indians currently seem to agree on, asserts Shyam G Menon.
It took India and the Indian Army to show to the world that enough is enough and to challenge the neighbourhood bully, he said.
'The border standoff, if not properly addressed by both sides, could escalate to a conventional or sub-conventional conflict between India and China,' predicts Srikanth Kondapalli, one of India's leading China experts.
The joint statement issued after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Barack Obama's first-ever summit is high on intent and ambition. Notably missing from the statement is India's refusal to be America's partner in its war against ISIS.
We can no longer have massive trade deficits and job losses, the US President said.
From early indications, the Modi government's foreign policy seems to be pragmatic and reciprocal, says K G Suresh.
Terming Barack Obama as an "incompetent president", 70-year old Trump claimed that the US president did not know what he was doing.
Vietnam is a key player in India's act east policy under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. From India's perspective, a strategic partnership with Vietnam will only deepen political, economic, and security ties and be a bulwark against China, say Melissa S Hersh and Dr Ajey Lele
Quad leaders are also planning to roll out vaccine deliverables and announce a series of measures in the field of healthcare and infrastructure sector, officials in Washington, DC said.
The Bay of Bengal base will house nuclear submarines and aircraft carrier
'China seems more intent on creating a new world order rather than shaping the existing one.' 'India is of course, at this moment in time, aligned with the West-led order because of China's full-spectrum aggressive behaviour towards India.'
'The Chinese are only about 160-170 km behind.' 'It will not take much time for them to bring their troops back, considering that they have better infrastructure -- and the weather is now favourable.' 'They can move in much faster as the terrain favours them.'
