Rediff.com takes a look at the major aviation disasters of the year.
Defence Secretary Lt Gen (retired) Alam Khattak told the Senate Standing Committee on Defence on Wednesday that RAW had set up a 'special cell' to sabotage the ambitious CPEC.
Beijing's growing assertiveness as kingmaker in Kabul has suffered a setback with Washington quietly moving in, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'The war against ISIS is what earned the Kurds global recognition of being some of the best fighters that overshadowed regular armies,' points out Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd).
'We have been bold and innovative on recognition in the past and we do not need to rush,' advises Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
'Trump's desecration of all that Obama represented can be seen at different levels: Personal, political, systemic and structural,' explains Ambassador B S Prakash.
'India would not like to see Pakistani domination and tutelage of Afghanistan against Indian security and economic interests.'
'There were assurances that Jaish-e-Mohammad was being reined in as was the Lashkar-e-Tayiba, but Pakistan's security forces could not risk opening too many dangerous new fronts,' notes former foreign secretary Ambassador Shyam Saran, who has just returned from a visit to Lahore.
The Indian intelligence brass may have snared a key Pakistani spy and Jadhav's arrest is Pakistan's way of getting even with India, says Rajeev Sharma.
The summit probably fulfilled the expectations on both sides, but the bar of expectations was intentionally kept low, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Snooping is one of the oldest peccadilloes of man, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
With Shanghai Cooperation Organisation set to admit India and Pakistan amid growing rancour over their Nuclear Supplies Group membership bid, a Chinese state-run daily expressed concern on Friday that the hostility between them may have a "negative effect" on the security grouping.
The Global Hawk can carry out surveillance of a stretch of land or ocean for over 30 hours continuously, physically scanning up to 100,000 sq km each day.
'Bolstering India's conventional military capability against China is in America's strategic interest,' says military historian Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
The announcement came as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson decided to re-designate about 10 countries as 'Countries of Particular Concern'.
The road ahead will be long and winding and much resistance can be expected from the high-flying 'hawks' in our skies. But that should not deter the policymakers from planning a road map with the 'big picture' in mind, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Jaishankar is the first foreign secretary to head the Ministry of External Affairs as minister.
The effort made to define the larger picture by focussing on history and the wish not turn differences into disputes and conflicts is welcome. In the obtaining circumstances today, nothing more could have been possible, observes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
How long can Pakistan remain neutral in the Saudi Arabia-led Yemen conflict?
China is in no hurry to disengage at the border and the region and international community is moving on. The spectre of a long haul in Ladakh haunts India, points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Aseem Chhabra lists the films that won his heart at the recent Toronto International Film Festival.
During the meeting, Obama expressed appreciation for Saudi Arabia's contributions to the campaign against ISIL, the White House said in a readout of the meeting.
How much are others responsible for the Trump presidency moving in the directions it has, asks T N Ninan.
Kim Yong Chol delivered a letter from the North Korean leader to Trump.
A day after the National Investigation Agency filed a chargesheet against Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar in the Pathankot attack, India took on Pakistan at the United Nations and called on the hostile neighbour to leave behind its ways of terrorism, with the warning saying that, "what you sow will bear fruit".
News of all that's transpired on and off the football field.
Noting that the US energy dominance will be declared a strategic economic and foreign policy goal, Trump said America has 1.5 times as much oil as the combined proven resources of all OPEC countries
Indian High Commissioner in Islamabad Gautam Bambawale met Pakistan Foreign Secretary Tehmina Janjua in connection with the case of Jadhav, who has been given death sentence by a Pakistani military court for alleged spying.
'The Modi government's greatest blunder is to exploit sensitive external relations in its domestic politics,' says Shekhar Gupta.
'Insignias or not, Dhoni's will remain the deadliest pair of gloves behind the stumps,' notes Shekhar Gupta.
A very delayed and subdued reaction, at a time when the non-aligned world had expected a big country like India to come out in support of rights and justice. It was yet another example of the mealy mouthed approach that has come to define Indian foreign policy, says Seema Mustafa.
'Does the country risk being enclosed in a geographical cocoon if it spurns a multi-continent project for which everyone else has signed up,' asks T N Ninan.
Providing military assistance in the hope that it will change Pakistan's worldview is wrong, says erstwhile ambassador to the United States Husain Haqqani
Beyond the barbed wire and watchtowers, though, lies a story that casts more than a little doubt on whether this dream will ever be realised. Praveen Swami reports.
President Obama had no intention of risking a global conflagration on account of the use of chemical weapons in Syria, especially at a time when he was struggling to wind up the wars his predecessor had started, says T P Sreenivasan
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'This has never happened. And not to mention the bisexual angle as well. You hope that it'll speak to people because after a while you forget about the disability and you look at the person and that's the point of the film.'
Referring to Kim Jong-Un, Trump said 'Rocket Man', is on a suicide mission for himself and for his regime.
The stakes are high and it is not certain that slow-moving foreign office bureaucracies can measure up to the challenges being thrown up, says Hardeep S Puri.
India looks less equal to China than 5 years ago, the strategic alliance with the US is hobbled by trade, and Pakistan is looking anything but chastened by Balakot. What has gone wrong? asks Shekhar Gupta.
The court asked challengers of the ban respond to the appeal, and for the Justice Department to file a counter-response by Monday.
