Affluent travellers from India, China and South Africa are making a beeline to Malaysia and are set to become the top source markets of big spenders for the scenic country's tourism industry over the next two years.
A cameraman tells us how India can learn lessons in handling crisis.
Aiming to give fillip to India's Look East policy, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is expected to announce new initiatives to take forward ties with the ASEAN by setting up a mission and appointing an ambassador for the 10-member grouping.
An article in the Chinese newpaper People Daily, says that Japan is eeking out India to secure its supply of rare earth materials. Japan is said to be anxious to decrease its undue reliance on Chinese rare earth materials.
India demonstrated leadership on behalf of countries in South-East Asian Region to integrate agricultural diversification and alternative crops to tobacco in the comprehensive tobacco control as FCTC proposes.
The CEPAs with South Korea and Japan are likely to be concluded in September and October, respectively. While the pact with South Korea is likely to have only a moderate impact on the economic relationship between the two countries, the one with Japan will immensely help the Indian industry in gaining market access in the world's second largest economy. Currently, bilateral trade between India and Japan, which is currently close to $4 billion.
Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) on Friday organised a 500-kilometre-long human chain with over four million participants in Kerala to protest a treaty signed with the 10-country Southeast Asian bloc. The agreement will be effective from Jan. 1, 2010, and tariffs on the products covered would be reduced to zero between 2013 and 2016. The Communists oppose the agreement saying its would sound the death knell for the southern state's agro-based economy.
To strengthen closer and enduring partnership with countries of Association of South East Asian Nations region as part of India's Look-East policy, President Pratibha Devisingh Patil left on Thursday for a state visit to Laos from September 9 to 13 and Cambodia from September 13 to 18.
But even as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh plans to visit Tokyo for his annual summit from October 25-27 -- as part of a journey to Hanoi and Kuala Lumpur -- and hopes to sign a landmark civil nuclear pact with his counterpart, Naoto Kan, Japanese resentment against India's nuclear ambitions continues to simmer.
The 10-member ASEAN described the Indo-US nuclear deal as an extremely positive step, hoping that the two countries would be able to conclude the pact soon.
The pact on trade in goods under the Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement was signed by Indian commerce and industry minister Anand Sharma and ASEAN economic ministers after more than six years of intense negotiations.
India is the only country which has a negative list incorporated in a trade pact with Asean.
Notwithstanding their differences on the boundary question, India and China on Wednesday vowed to deepen their multi-faceted ties for a "lasting friendship" as Union External Affairs Minister S M Krishna met his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi in Phuket.
The India-Asean free trade agreement (FTA) in merchandise goods has failed to realise its full potential, even as the deal was implemented in January 2010 to facilitate greater trade in the region. As a result, reduction of duties on several products might get delayed.
Government officials said the Asean FTA, as well as a similar pact with South Korea involving free trade of goods, services and investment, could be signed on the sidelines of the summit of Asean nations, scheduled in October this year. The India-South Korea Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement is also ready for signing, sources added.
JSL Ltd (formerly Jindal Stainless) had last year entered into a joint venture with the mining firm PT Antam to build a 20,000-tonne ferro-nickel plant and 3-lakh-tonne stainless steel slab unit in Indonesia. However, with prices of nickel, a vital input for producing the alloy, dipping sharply, the Indian firm has decided to drop the project.
The 10-nation regional block of Association of South East Asian Nation (ASEAN), and not China and India, is the leading destination of America's foreign direct investment, a top US trade official said Monday.
The agreement that provides for both India and ASEAN reducing tariff on agreed goods has come into force with all but Cambodia and Philippines.
India is not particularly enamoured by the AMF idea and would much rather see the Fund revitalised and reinvented as a multilateral institution. Indeed, there could be a meeting of minds between India and the US on the IMF's future.
India-ASEAN Summit, scheduled for December 17 in Thailand, has been postponed as crisis-ridden South-East Asian country is unable to host the meet.
Abdullah Badawi's remarks come after a ruling by this Muslim-majority country's National Fatwa Council that yoga was haram (forbidden) as it involved chanting of mantras which was against Islamic teachings and that people could deviate from Islam if they performed yoga which has its roots in Hinduism
Changing political situation in America and European countries have forced rich Islamic investors from the Gulf countries to look for investment opportunities in South East Asian countries, including India.
ASEAN's dialogue partners are -- Australia, China, the EU, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, Russia and the US.
Not less than 10,000 people, mostly children, are trafficked into the Northeast with a good number smuggled in from Bangladesh, Nepal and other South East Asian countries, surveys by NGOs have revealed.
The FTA will provide Indian trade and industry with access to a large and vibrant market in a region that is increasingly prosperous. This market is bound to expand further as the Asean trading bloc is already in talks with countries like China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand for free or preferential trade pacts.
The Chinese research vessel returned to China a few days ago after being under constant watch of Indian Navy vessels, the sources said.
The World Health Organisation has given $ 2 million to a Pune based vaccine making firm to develop and manufacture swine flu vaccine.
Formula One's governing body would carry out a full safety assessment before agreeing to any night-time race.
Panacea Biotec is planning to launch its organ transplantation drugs to Latin American and South East Asian markets.
A gold-encrusted dagger belonging to Mughal emperor Shah Jahan is expected to fetch 500,000 pounds when auctioned at Bonhams on Thursday.The dagger is part of the collection of Islamic and Indian art and artefacts of the late textile businessman Jacques Desenfans.The inscriptions in nasta'liq script on the blade include Shah Jahan's official titles, date and place of birth, and the honourific parasol.
Despite no real change in the economics governing their industry, coinciding with the lean season, low fares on domestic sectors -- as promised by the airlines -- are suddenly back. The drop in fares, in many instances, is quite significant.
Differences among the Association of South-East Asian Nations came to the fore on Tuesday night when 10 heads of governments aborted a briefing by United Nations Special Envoy Ibrahim Gambari on the Myanmar situation after Prime Minister Gen Thein Sein strongly opposed the move.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard will visit India sometime early next year. \n\n
The two countries have already formed a Steering Committee to carry forward the proposals, one of which relate to setting up a 2,500-acre multi-product SEZ in the south.
India is pursuing sales to South East Asian countries that are wary of Chinese aggression, including Vietnam and the Philippines.
Thai carrier Nok Airlines on Tuesday said it was looking to expand its reach in India to cash in on the growing interest of consumers from the country to go shopping in the south-east Asian nation.
This will hit the Indian plantation sector as it is not competitive, cost wise, and will be wiped out from the domestic market as well as from the export market, according to D P Maheshwari, president, United Planters' Association of Southern India.
