On March 2, more than 20 government leaders descended on Delhi to deliberate on the state of the world under the aegis of multilateral platforms including the G20 and Quad. One of the most significant cues about the direction that this global multilateral engagement will take was evident in the last few lines of the... Continue Reading →
Speaking less than a day after the incident of Indian and Chinese troops clashing along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh came to light, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh spoke in Parliament assuring members that no Indian soldier had lost their lives or was injured severely. Accusing China of unilaterally trying... Continue Reading →
South Asia is in trouble. The economic crisis in Sri Lanka has led to an uprising ousting the government, with crowds taking over the president’s office and residence. The country has defaulted on foreign debt and asked the international community for help with basic necessities. In Nepal, concerns over depleting foreign exchange reserves and increasing inflation have prompted the government to reduce fuel consumption... Continue Reading →
Over the past decade, China has expanded its footprint in South Asia beyond infrastructure financing and development partnerships to include political and governance cooperation, security exchanges, and people-to-people relationships. However, the expansion comes at a cost that is beyond economic. In our project, China’s Impact on Strategic Regions, we aimed to understand the nature of... Continue Reading →
A day after the devastating earthquake in Nepal in April 2015, China dispatched a 68-member search-and-rescue team to aid its southern neighbor. Within months, it had pledged over $650 million to help Nepal. The event also acted as a springboard for several long-term Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief initiatives, such as an MoU on risk... Continue Reading →
Since 2020, China has allowed 97 per cent of Bangladeshi goods duty-free access to its domestic market. Simultaneously, it is helping the country to diversify its export base and move its industry up the value chain. This becomes all the more significant when you consider that China is not among Bangladesh's top ten export partners.... Continue Reading →
In June 2021, Sri Lankan president Gotabaya Rajapaksa inaugurated the biggest nephrology hospital in South Asia. The $59 million hospital was a gift from China to the people of Sri Lanka, and was built in response to a request from then president Maithripala Sirisena in 2015. The state of the art hospital symbolises how Sri... Continue Reading →
Bangladesh, Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka showcase the diversity of China’s engagement strategies in a very multidimensional region but also make clear that influencers across South Asia are learning from each other’s experiences with Chinese money and power. The complete paper is available on the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace website here.
After more than two months of high decibel sabre-rattling, the standoff between India and China in the Himalayas entered a process of phased deescalation in late July. This by no means suggests that the current crisis is coming to an end — merely that it is moving into the next stage of what is likely... Continue Reading →
In June, Chinese and Indian soldiers clashed in the Galwan Valley in Eastern Ladakh. The close-combat skirmish at high altitude, which resulted in twenty deaths on the Indian side and an unknown number of Chinese casualties, was the bloodiest fight along the disputed Sino-Indian boundary in over four decades. John S. Van Oudenaren interviewed NBR... Continue Reading →
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