By S Nihal Singh
America’s Receding Ability to Bring Peace
“The major power in the region, the United States, is increasingly compromised by its total support of Israel, largely due to domestic factors, and its desire to reduce its footprint in the region. In hindsight as, many at that time suggested, the US was foolish to invade Iraq under false pretences. And on the Israel-Palestinian conflict, it is on the wrong side of history”, says the author.
That the Middle East (West Asia of our description) is in a state of flux is crystal clear. We have a three-yearold civil war in Syria, an Iraq wracked by tribal and Shia-Sunni strife, Libya still fighting the post-Gaddafi dispensation and Israelis launching a disproportionate war on Palestinians, not for the first time. The common thread in these crises is the role of outside powers, both in creating crises in the first instance and in muddying the waters and the inability of local actors to make peace.
In Syria, a minority Alwaite regime is seeking to retain its throne in a Sunni-majority country, with opponents of a bewildering variety of moderates and militants ranged on the other side. In Iraq, after all American troops left, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, belonging to the majority Shia, has been interpreting his role primarily in terms of advancing the interests of his community.
The Kurds are asserting their rights while the Sunni, dethroned from their ruling perch, have combined with Islamic militants to challenge the state. Both in Syria and Iraq the Islamists of the extreme variety, first under the rubric of the ISIS and later under the name of the Islamic State, have carved out an area in Syria and Iraq they rule, with President Bashar Assad’s regime in Syria and the Iraqi authorities unable to dislodge them. Superimposed on these dramatic events is the old Israel-Palestinian conflict, essentially caused by Israeli actions in occupying and colonising vast Palestinian lands and East Jerusalem on the strength of total American support extending to unprecedented military supplies and a generous annual financial subsidy.
These actions nullify attempts at finding a twostate solution and the prospect is of one state with a growing Palestinian population living as second-class citizens. Regional powers belonging to the Sunni and Shia faiths have taken up positions determined in the first category by supporting the anti-Assad forces in Syria, more of them supporting the cause of the newly disenfranchised Sunni of Iraq. On the other side is Iran, the minority Assad regime in Syria and the Hezbollah movement of Lebanon.
After the proclamation of the Islamic Caliphate in Syria and Iraq, the Sunni states led by Saudi Arabia have moderated their somewhat indiscriminate financial and military support for the Islamic militants fighting the Assad regime. Iran has been consistent in its support of President Assad and the Hezbollah. Turkey’s position has evolved over time, initially the leader of the regime change lobby for Syria, together with neighbours hosting large numbers of Syrian refugees.
It is taking time to reconsider its options while deeply disappointed with US inaction in Syria while supporting the cause of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinians. One big change in the regional picture is the anti-Morsi coup that has eventually brought the Army under the guise of a civilian President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi to power. The Brotherhood is classed as a terrorist organisation, its leaders and hundreds of its followers are in prison. The new regime has closed the Rafah border with the Gaza Strip, a lifeline for besieged Palestinians and shut down most of their tunnels.
Speculation is rife in this churning process, with extravagant scenarios of the break-up of Syria and Iraq and other countries essentially carved out by France and Britain out of the end of the Ottoman Empire. Two trends seem clear. The first is a sharpening Shia-Sunni conflict which is taking many forms. Second, the spreading cancer of 21st century Israeli colonization which lies at the heart of the historic Middle East conflict. There are no easy solutions to either of these problems. Any Shia-Sunni reconciliation assumes a measure of tolerance on the two sides. There are many actors inflaming passions, not least of all Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki.
On the other side, proponents of the Islamic Caliphate are keeping the fires of intolerance burning. The major power in the region, the United States, is increasingly compromised by its total support of Israel, largely due to domestic factors, and its desire to reduce its footprint in the region. In hindsight as, many at that time suggested, the US was foolish to invade Iraq under false pretences.
And on the Israel-Palestinian conflict, it is on the wrong side of history. What then can we expect from the devil’s brew, which is the Middle East in the coming days and months? There will no doubt be a ceasefire between Israelis and Palestinians even as Israel’s isolation in the world increases because of the scale of the carnage it has been inflicting on Palestinians, highlighted by the Human Rights Convention. But the problem will continue to fester because domestic factors compel US administrations to remain captive to the urges of Israeli colonialism.
The other regional crises will run their course, with little prospect of millions of Syrian refugees in neighbouring countries and the internally displaced able to return home soon. In many instances, there is no home to go to. In Iraq, the virtual partition of the state into Shia, Sunni and Kurdish regions will take firmer shape. The new Egyptian regime, in terms of the Palestinian cause, is a tacit ally of Israel and will pose problems for Gazans.
In this tangled mess, one crisis feeds on the other and the resulting picture is far from following a common pattern. The tragedy is that the sole mediator remains the United States and it is hamstrung by its own compulsions. In immediate terms, the future remains bleak. For the present, there is no countervailing force to take matters in hand.
The East-West conflict represented by the growing antagonisms between Russia and the United States over Ukraine make a complementary Moscow initiative impossible. The only bright spot is that since things cannot get worse, they will take a turn for the better.
Tag: Russia
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Devil’s Brew in Middle East
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Of Bullet Trains and Boundary Disputes
“While economic cooperation with China is mutually beneficial, India must review its approach to border issues with the Asian giant. It should insist that the dispute be resolved in accordance with 2005 Guiding Principles”, says the author.
Addressing an election rally in Arunachal Pradesh on February 22, Mr Narendra Modi called on China to shed its “mindset of expansionism”. Mr Modi averred: “Arunachal Pradesh is an integral part of India and will remain so. No power can snatch it from us. I swear in the name of this soil that I would never allow this State to disappear, breakdown, or bow down. China should shed its expansionist mindset and forge bilateral ties with India for peace, progress and prosperity of both nations”. This message was reinforced with the appointment of Mr Kiren Rijiju from Arunachal Pradesh as Minister of State for Home Affairs.
China made the predictable noises, with Prime Minister Li Keqiang congratulating Mr Modi on his appointment and President Xi Jinping sending his Foreign Minister Wang Yi to meet Mr Modi, with a personal message of greetings. Did these gestures signal any substantive change in China’s policies, either on its outrageous territorial claims on Arunachal Pradesh, or the continuing intrusion of its troops across the Line of Actual Control? The answer is clearly in the negative. Just on the eve of Vice President Hamid Ansari’s visit to the Middle Kingdom, China published yet another official map depicting the entire State of Arunachal Pradesh as its territory.
While the UPA Government had claimed that new “mechanisms” had been agreed upon to curb cross border intrusions, the intrusions continued. Given these developments the NDA Government should carefully consider reviewing and reorienting existing policies on China. Any talk of more robust military responses to Chinese adventurism is illadvised. The NDA Government has unfortunately inherited a situation where India’s armed forces are inadequately equipped and lacking in numbers. It would take a minimum of five years before the armed forces are adequately equipped and manned, to be able to present a more selfconfident response to Chinese adventurism.
New Delhi should, however, now reorient its diplomacy, by taking note of the fact that Chinese assertiveness and aggression is directed not only against India, but towards all its maritime neighbors, with unilateral declarations on delineation of its maritime boundaries. Just as China’s claims on Arunachal Pradesh have no legal or historical basis, its claims on its boundaries with all its maritime neighbors, are in violation of the UN Convention on the Laws of the Seas. China has used force to seize disputed Islands claimed by the Philippines and Vietnam and to explore for offshore oil and gas.
Tensions with Japan are escalating, because of China’s claims to the Senkaku Islands, controlled by Japan since 1894. China’s unilateral declaration of an Air Defence Identification Zone beyond its borders has been rejected by South Korea and Japan. Its territorial claims on its maritime borders face challenges from South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Vietnam, Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Indonesia. Yet another major source of concern has been the Chinese policy of strategic containment of India, primarily based on enhancing Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, missile, maritime, air power and army capabilities.
This is an issue which India inexplicably and rarely, if ever, highlights either bilaterally, or internationally. This policy of strategic containment through Pakistan has been reinforced by China’s readiness to provide weapons and liberal economic assistance to all of India’s neighbors in South Asia. Worse still, bending to Chinese pressures, India has periodically avoided proposed joint military exercises with Japan and the US. A measured response to Chinese containment would be for India to step up military cooperation with Vietnam, including supply of Brahmos cruise missiles which can enable Vietnam to counter Chinese maritime bullying.
This would be an appropriate answer to China’s unrestrained military relationship with Pakistan. Given the fact that Russia is a major arms supplier to Vietnam, President Vladimir Putin’s concurrence can surely be obtained for such missile supplies to Vietnam. Russia has, after all, given its concurrence to China’s supply of Russian designed advanced RD 93 fighter aircraft engines to Pakistan. Will growing trade relations with China soften its approach to border claims, or its strategic containment of India, as some in India appear to believe? Bilateral trade with China today amounts to around $66 billion, with India facing a growing trade deficit, currently of around $29 billion.
China’s annual bilateral trade with Japan amounts to $314 billion and that with South Korea $235 billion. China is also the largest trade and investment partner of Vietnam. Both Japan and South Korea also have substantial investment ties with China. Despite this, China has remained unyielding on its territorial claims on these countries, not hesitated to use force and threatened to cut its investment ties with Vietnam, after recent tensions. To believe that China will embark on a path of reason on border issues, because it sells us a few bullet trains and invests in infrastructure in India would be, to put it mildly, naïve.
On the contrary, India needs to ensure that unrestricted, duty-free access of Chinese products, in areas like energy and electronics, does not adversely affect indigenous development and production, or undermine energy, communications and cyber security. While dialogue, economic cooperation and interaction with China in forums like the BRICS and the G20 are mutually beneficial, there is need to review our approach to border issues with China. It is evident that China has no intention of exchanging maps specifying its definition of the Line of Actual Control, either in Ladakh, or Arunachal Pradesh. India should now insist that the border issue has to be resolved in accordance with the Guiding Principles agreed to in 2005.
The boundary has to be along “well defined and easily identifiable natural geographic features”. Secondly, any border settlement should “safeguard due interests of their settled populations in the border areas”. Proceeding according to these Guiding Principles enables India to reinforce its claims that the border lies along the Karakoram Range in Ladakh and the McMahon Line in Arunachal Pradesh. Given China’s agreement to safeguard the “interests of settled populations,” its claims to Arunachal Pradesh are untenable.
Moreover, with the Dalai Lama now clarifying he no longer seeks an independent Tibet, India should not hesitate to state that it hopes the Tibet issue is settled in accordance with the 17 point 1951 agreement between the Chinese authorities and the Dalai Lama. This agreement acknowledges Chinese “sovereignty” in Tibet, while respecting the freedom of religion and the “established status, functions and powers of the Dalai Lama”.
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Foreign funding and the Maharajas among NGOs
It is speculated that a big portion of foreign funding goes to politicians and bureaucracy as a large number of institutes are owned, controlled and managed by politicians and business houses.
India is a fascinating country. The number of stock exchanges we have, as per official records is 20, but the number of functioning exchanges is only two. The number of scrips listed on the Bombay Stock Exchanges [BSE] is nearly 9,000, only 3500 of these are traded at least once a year, and the top 50 securities constitute nearly two-third of the turnover. Actually only 250 to 300 are “active” traded scrips. Interestingly, the latest Handbook of Statistics on Indian Securities Market published by the Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has dropped the column for number of scrips listed on the BSE! It is one way to solve the issue of numbers.
In a similar fashion, we decided to probe the number of not-for-profit or nongovernmental organisations (NGO) in India. Being in the teaching line, we have the habit of probing issues that are otherwise not to be probed at all! Let sleeping dogs lie is the national dictum in such matters. NGOs are also known as Voluntary Organizations (VOs) or Voluntary Agencies (VAs) and more recently as Voluntary Development Organizations (VDOs), Non- Governmental Development Organizations (NGDOs) or Non-Profit Institutions (NPIs).
There are equivalent names for NGOs available in different Indian languages. In Hindi NGOs are called Swayamsevi Sansthayen or Swayamsevi Sangathan. Prior to the enactment of the Societies Registration Act of 1860, voluntary action was guided mainly by religious and cultural ethos. Subsequently, a series of legislations addressing the non-profit sector were promulgated. The starting point in this respect was Article 19 of the Indian Constitution which recognized a number of civic rights including the right “….to form associations or unions”. It constitutes the legal basis of relevant legal provisions applicable to the non-profit sector.
There are also non mandatory provisions that allow any group with the intention of starting a non-profit, voluntary or charitable work to organize itself into a legally registered entity. However, given the optional nature of these provisions, there is a large group of voluntary bodies that are not registered. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) India and the UN Volunteers(UNV) programme had organized a Forum in January 2006 at UNDP’s Delhi office to discuss the issues relating to implementation of the UN Handbook on Nonprofit Institutions (NPIs) in the System of National Accounts in India.
The meeting was attended by representatives of the Planning Commission, Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI), NGOs, UNV Headquarters, and the Centre for Civil Society Studies of Johns Hopkins University, which is leading the effort to implement the UN NPI Handbook throughout the World. At this Forum, the UN Resident Coordinator and UNDP India Resident Representative stressed the need to implement the UN Handbook in order to capture the contribution of NPIs to the national economy. It was mentioned that the voluntary sector played a significant role in the economic and social change of the country and contributed significantly to the development in both rural and urban areas.
The Forum therefore urged that India should take suitable steps to implement the UN Handbook on NPIs and compile accounts of NPIs functioning in the country. The National Policy on the Voluntary Sector, adopted in May 2007, presumably under the guidance of the National Advisory Council, pledges to encourage, enable and empower an independent, creative and effective voluntary sector, with diversity in form and function, so that it can contribute to the social, cultural and economic advancement of the people of India.
It constitutes the beginning of a process to evolve a new working relationship between the government and the voluntary sector, without affecting the autonomy and identity of voluntary organizations (GoI/Planning Commission, 2007). Accordingly, it is expected that the enabling environment will be further enhanced to encourage the development and active engagement of the non-profit sector, including volunteerism, in the community’s affairs and developmental efforts. So we can conclude that at the beginning of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA)’s second term, the so called voluntary or NGO sector was fully ensconced in decision making and fund collecting activities. NGOs can be registered under several regulations or none-the latter is more common.
The main statutory laws governing the various types of registered non-profit organizations are: The Societies Registration Act, 1860; The Indian Trusts Act, 1882; Public Trust Act, 1950; The Indian Companies Act (Section 25), 1956 Religious non-profit organizations can be registered under: the Religious Endowments Act, 1863; The Charitable and Religious Trust Act, 1920; Mussalman Wakf Act, 1923; Wakf Act, 1954 and the Public Wakfs (Extension of Limitation) Act, 1959 By 2009, a total of 33 lakh societies reported as “Societies registered under the Societies Registration Act/ Mumbai Public Trust Act”.
Of these, the State Directorates of Economics and Statistics [DESs] were able to collect information for about 22.58 lakh units and computerize the information relating to about 21 lakh units. But when the Central Statistics Office (CSO) sent people searching for these NGOs in the states, it could not trace lakhs of them. Of the roughly 22 lakh NGOs it tried to verify, only 6.95 lakh could be traced. These figures did not include non-profit organizations registered under the Charitable and Religious Trust Act, 1920, which, if counted, would add a few thousands to the number. Then there are non-profit companies under the Indian Companies Act, 1956, and other laws that also help set up trusts.
The numbers also did not include many groups and associations, which, in common parlance are referred to as mass-based groups, usually operating at block and village levels, at times federating into larger organizations for specific purposes or campaigns. A study by PRIA and Johns Hopkins University suggested, nearly 50% of the total voluntary organizations in India were not registered under any law. The antiquated societies registration law is blind when it comes to classifying these registered groups.
It treats all registered societies the same way. These numbers include societies that run hugely profitable schools, colleges, hospitals and sports bodies in the country. Remember, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is also an NGO, registered under the Tamil Nadu Societies Registration Act. The Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) too is an NGO, under the law.
The Major Findings from the CSO Survey are as follows:
The CSO’s study covered only the societies registered under the Societies Registration Act 1860/Bombay Public Trusts Act, 1950 and companies Registered under section 25 of Indian Companies Act, 1956. Data available from the first phase shows that there are about 31.7 lakh NPIs registered in India and that 58.7% of these are located in rural areas. A majority of NPIs are involved in community, social and personal services, cultural services, education, and health services. The number of NPIs formed after 1990 has increased manifold. This is the post economic reform period when global powers began to show interest in India.
There were only 1.44 lakh societies registered till the year 1970, followed by 1.79 lakh registrations in the period from 1971 to 1980, 5.52 lakh registrations in the period from 1981 to 1990, 11.22 lakh registrations in the period from 1991 to 2000, and as many as 11.35 lakh societies were registered after 2000. Since there is no clause in the Act for the de-registration of defunct societies, the first phase of the survey results give number of societies and their distribution on the basis of records available with the registering authorities. About 18 lakh societies have been visited during the second phase, i.e. 57.6% of the registered societies.
Out of these, results are available for 4.65 lakh. The top three sectors where these societies were engaged is as follows: engaged in Social Services (35%), followed by Education Research (21%), and Culture Recreation (15%). The top three activities account for 71% of the registered societies. The data on total work force includes volunteers and paid workers. Out of the 144 lakh work force, only 11 lakh are paid workers. The CSO used the sum of their operational expenditures to come to a value of their economic output at a whopping Rs41,292 crore! Non Profit Institutions are also registered under the Indian Companies Act (Section 25), 1956.
The financial data in respect of 2,595 companies listed with Ministry of Corporate Affairs has been obtained and analyzed. However, no information could be obtained in respect of the workforce of these companies and activities/purposes in which they are involved. CSO decided to limit the coverage to the Societies registered under Societies Registration Act 1860, Mumbai Trust Act and the Indian Companies Act (Section 25), 1956. This is because a majority of the NPIs are registered under Societies Registration Act 1860. This also means that NGOs under various religious non-profit organisations were excluded and they constitute a large number. The study found that in most States, the provision of submitting financial statements is not strictly enforced. Even if societies file financial statements with the registrar’s office, there is no mechanism to maintain this database.
Maharajas among NGO’s:
Maharajas among NGO’s: A category of NGOs are registered with Ministry of Home Affairs -under Foreign contributions regulations Act [ FCRA] -These can be called Euro or Dollar NGOs who get funds from private charities as well as Government organizations abroad. The salient features for 2011-2012 are as follows: I. A total of 43,527 Associations have been registered under the FCRA until 31 March 2012. During 2011-12, as many as 2001 associations were granted registration and 304 associations were given prior permission to receive foreign contributions. II. 22,702 Associations reported a total receipt of Rs11,546.29 crore as foreign contributions. [Under or non-reporting is common]
TRENDS OVER LAST 10 YEARS
Year No. of Registered Associations No.of Reporting Associations
Amount of Foreign Contributions
[Rs Crore]
2002-2003
26404
165905046.51
2003-2004
2835117145
5105.46
2004-2005
3032118540
6256.68
2005-2006
3214418570
7877.57
2006-2007
3393718996
11007.43
2007-2008
3480318796
9663.46
2008-2009
3641420088
10802.67
2009-2010
38,43621,508
10,337.59
2010-201140,575
22,735
10,334.122011-2012
43,527
22,70211,546.29
Total from 2002-2012
97383.531. Source: Ministry of Home AffairsForeigners Division, FCRA wing
III. Delhi reported the highest receipt of foreign donations at Rs2,285.75 crore, followed by Tamil Nadu (Rs1,704.76 crore) and Andhra Pradesh (Rs1,258.52 crore).
IV. Among districts, Chennai reported the highest foreign donations (Rs889.99 crore), followed by Mumbai (Rs825.40 crore) and Bangalore (Rs812.48 crore).
V. The list of donor countries is headed by the US (Rs3,838.23crore), followed by UK (Rs1,219.02 crore), and Germany (Rs1,096.01 crore).
VI. The list of foreign donors is topped by the Compassion International, US (Rs183.83 crore), followed by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints, US (Rs130.77 crore), and the Kinder Not Hilfe (KNH), Germany (Rs51.76 crore).
VII. World Vision of India, Chennai, Tamil Nadu (Rs233.38 crore) received the highest foreign donations among NGOs, followed by the Believers Church India Pathanamthitta, Kerala (Rs190.05 crore) and Rural Development Trust, Ananthapur, AP (Rs144.39 crore)
VIII. The highest foreign contribution was received and utilized for–Rural Development (Rs945.77 crore), Welfare of Children (Rs929.22 crore), Construction and Maintenance of school/colleges (Rs824.11 crore) and Research (Rs539.14 crore). Activities other than those mentioned above received Rs2,253.61 crore. Interestingly establishment expenses [Building/ cars/ Jeeps/ Computers/Cameras etc.] constituted the bulk of expenditure in most of the NGOs.Need of the Hour:
In the context of the Intelligence Bureau’s (IB) report on antidevelopment activities of many foreign funded NGOs, it may be time to constitute a commission of experts including those from the IB to comprehensively study this sector. Also, to use experiences of other countries like Russia, China and the US in dealing with NGOs and formulating regulation to govern them. Perhaps, it is also time to re-look the foreign funding of NGOs in the context of compulsory CSR contributions introduced in the Companies Act 2013-since we are no more the white man’s burden!(The author is Professor of Finance at IIM-Bangalore. He sits on the advisory boards of SEBI and the RBI.)
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US SAYS RUSSIA HAS ‘HOURS’ TO EASE UKRAINE CRISIS
PARIS (TIP): The United States warned Russia on june 26it had only “hours” to prove it was helping disarm Ukrainian insurgents whose separatist drive has reopened a Cold War-style chasm in East-West ties. US Secretary of State John Kerry’s warning came a day before Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko signs the final chapters of an historic EU accord that nudges his country toward eventual membership and pulls it firmly out of Russia’s reach.
Poroshenko also intends to get German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande to join him for a second round of telephone diplomacy with Russian President Vladimir Putin in two days. Putin came under intense pressure from both European leaders and US President Barack Obama on Wednesday to rein in separatist fighters over whom he denies exerting control.
Obama said sweeping economic sanctions were imminent unless the Kremlin stopped “the flow of weapons and militants across the border”. US Secretary of State John Kerry was even more explicit in Paris on Thursday following talks with French counterpart Laurent Fabius.
“We are in full agreement that it is critical for Russia to show in the next hours, literally, that they’re moving to help disarm the separatists, to encourage them to disarm, to call on them to lay down their weapons and to begin to become part of a legitimate process,” Kerry said. The State Department added that sanctions would be also discussed by EU leaders on Friday when they sign the full Association Agreement with Ukraine that was ditched by the ousted pro-Russian president in November and now lies at the heart of the raging crisis.
The punitive steps under deliberation would target Russia’s financial and defence sectors at a time when its export-dependent economy is on the verge of slipping into another recession. US media reports said one particularly painful step under consideration would prohibit the export of technology that could help Russia explore for oil and gas in the Arctic — a major ambition of powerful stateheld energy firms.
But 11 weeks of fighting that has already claimed more than 435 lives and brought factories in Ukraine’s economically vital eastern rustbelt to a virtual standstill continued today despite the ceasefire agreement. A spokesman for Ukraine’s “antiterrorist operation” said 10 paratroopers were wounded in rebel attacks on government roadblocks on Thursday. Ukrainian media reports said gunmen had also attacked a small airport overnight in the flashpoint village of Kramatorsk.
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India opposes Russian decision to sell arms to Pak
NEW DELHI (TIP): India conveyed to Russia, June 18, its concern over Moscow’s decision to lift embargo on the supply of Mi-35 attack helicopters and defense equipment to Pakistan. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj told visiting Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin that Moscow must keep in mind India’s sensitivities while dealing with its neighbors on defense-related matters.
Rogozin also held talks with Defense Minister Arun Jaitley. MEA spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin confirmed that the issue did figure during Swaraj’s four-hour meeting with Rogozin in the context of defense cooperation between India and Russia. Official sources said New Delhi had unambiguously told Moscow in recent days that it could not be business-asusual on the defense front between the two countries until Moscow reconsidered its decision. India imports nearly 60 per cent of its defense equipment from Russia.
The meeting between Swaraj and Rogozin was the first high-level contact between the two countries after the Narendra Modi government assumed office. The two ministers also discussed the possible dates for the annual summit between Prime Minister Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Delhi towards the end of the year.
The two leaders are also scheduled to meet next month in Brazil on the margins of the BRICS Summit. The spokesperson said the principal focus of the talks was on how to harness the “untapped potential” of their economic ties and raise it from the $10 billion at present, of which Russian exports amount to $6.5 billion.
Both sides have decided to set up a joint feasibility study on a free trade agreement between India and Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, which have formed the Eurasian Economic Union bloc. Swaraj informed the Russian minister that the first unit of the Kudankulam Nuclear Power plant attained full capacity on June 7. The second unit was to attain criticality at the end of the year. In April this year, India and Russia signed an agreement to build units 3 and 4 of the power plant.
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Will sign EU pact this month: Ukraine President
KIEV (TIP): Ukraine’s new pro-Western President Petro Poroshenko said on June 19 he would sign the crucial trade and economic relations portion of an historic EU pact in Brussels on June 27. The old Kremlin-backed leadership’s rejection of the EU Association Agreement in November sparked months of deadly protests that led to the February ouster of president Viktor Yanukovych.
The interim government headed by Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk signed the political relations portion of the deal in Brussels on March 21. But Kiev delayed signing the economic section because it demanded that Ukraine lift import barriers aimed at protecting its farmers and steel mills in the east from direct EU competition.
The Wall Street Journal had earlier reported that Poroshenko was considering pushing back the trade agreement’s signature until he stabilised the recession-hit economy and resolved the pro-Russian separatist insurgency gripping the industrial east.
The complete pact’s signing will effectively cut Ukraine off from a Moscow-led economic alliance of a few former Soviet nations championed by Russian President Vladimir Putin. Russia on Thursday once again threatened to impose trade restrictions against Ukraine should it sign the full EU deal.
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US supports Ukraine- Russia peace talks: Joe Biden
WASHINGTON (TIP): Vice President Joe Biden has said the United States strongly supports negotiations among Ukraine, Russia and international diplomats to resolve the crisis in Ukraine. The White House said that Biden spoke by phone on Wednesday with Ukraine’s new president, Petro Poroshenko. It was their second conversation in two days. The White House also said that Poroshenko told Biden that he’s still committed to his offer to grant amnesty to insurgents who lay down their arms or allow them to return to Russia.
Biden told Poroshenko that the US applauds the peace plan he presented on Saturday during his inauguration. Biden has said that Moscow must recognize Poroshenko as Ukraine’s legitimate leader, stop supporting pro-Russian separatists and prevent arms from flowing over the border. The White House added that the leaders also conferred on the security situation in eastern Ukraine.
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Russia wants UN action to stop violence in Ukraine
UNITED NATIONS (TIP): Russia introduced a UN Security Council resolution on June 12 that strongly urges an immediate end to all violence in Ukraine and the launching of a national dialogue involving all political forces and regions. The draft resolution, circulated to council members and obtained by The Associated Press, calls on all parties to immediately implement a “road map” to peace put forward by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe on May 12.
Russia’s UN ambassador Vitaly Churkin said the draft supersedes a text he circulated June 2 demanding an immediate halt to deadly clashes in eastern Ukraine, which has languished. Western diplomats have insisted that any UN resolution reaffirm Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, a critical issue following Russia’s invasion and annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula which the United States and the European Union refuse to recognize.
Like the June 2 draft, the newly proposed Russian resolution does not mention Ukraine’s sovereignty or territorial integrity, which makes its approval by the Security Council highly unlikely. Churkin said there was only a brief discussion of the text, with support from some council members and suggestions from others. He said council experts would meet Friday to go over the text “to try to accomplish this very quickly.” Lithuania’s UN Ambassador Raimonda Murmokaite called the resolution “another surprise … like a rabbit out of the box.”
Any resolution on Ukraine has to “insist on territorial integrity, sovereignty and inviolability of Ukraine’s borders and we have to clearly name insurgents and militant separatists and what they’re doing,” she said. Lithuania and some others will also express concern “that there’s military movement across Russia’s border including recent information on three tanks which have crossed into (Ukraine’s) territory,” Murmokaite said.
“For Russia not to be able to take care of its own borders and not to prevent the flow of arms, insurgents and military capabilities is a highly troubling situation.” The draft expresses deep concern at the intensification of hostilities and killing of civilians in eastern Ukraine, where government forces have battled pro-Russian rebels for two months. Churkin noted reports of the use of white phosphorous munitions, which are banned, by the Ukrainian side.
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It’s a new era in India’s foreign policy as countries compete to woo Modi
“The new majority government in power in New Delhi, freed from debilitating coalition politics and attaching priority to economic development, has aroused external interest”, says the author.
In foreign policy, Prime Minister Modi has hit the ground running, taking unexpected initiatives. He reached out to our neighbors, taking the unprecedented step of inviting their leaders to his swearing-in ceremony. While invitations to Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives and Afghanistan carried only positive connotations, those to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and President Rajapakse carried mixed political implications. It was felt that the plus points in extending invitations to Pakistan and Sri Lanka outweighed the negatives.
Engagement
In Pakistan’s case the dilemma is whether we should engage it at the highest level without any ground-clearing move by Nawaz Sharif on terrorism, the Mumbai trial and trade. The Pakistani premier has been, on the contrary, aggressive over Kashmir, invoking the UN resolutions and self-determination as a solution, seeking third party intervention, permitting tirades by Hafiz Saeed against India, maintaining the pitch on water issues and reneging on granting MFN status even under a modified nomenclature.
In these circumstances, the move to invite him risked suggesting that, like the previous government, the new government too was willing to open the doors of a dialogue in the hope of creating a dynamics that would yield some satisfaction on the terrorism issue. In other words, practically delinking dialogue from terrorism, despite having taken a position to the contrary while in opposition.
In Sri Lanka’s case, the whipped-up sentiments in Tamil Nadu against President Rajapakse for his triumphalist rather than reconciliatory policies on the Tamilian issue have upset the overall balance of India’s foreign policy towards Sri Lanka that requires that we adequately weigh the need to counter powerful adversarial external forces are at play there against our interests. Inviting President Rajapakse to New Delhi obviously risked provoking a strong reaction in Tamil Nadu, but the new government had to decide whether, like its predecessor, it would get cowed down by such regional opposition, or it would act in the greater interest of the country even when according importance to the sentiments of a section of our population.
This dramatic outreach to the neighbors has elicited praise internally and externally, primarily focused on the invitation to the Pakistan president and its implication for the resumption of the Indo-Pak dialogue. Internally, those pro-dialogue lobbies that have espoused the previous government’s placative policies towards Pakistan have naturally welcomed the surprise move by Modi. Externally, India has always been counseled to have a dialogue with Pakistan irrespective of its conduct and its terrorist links, the argument being that these two South Asian nuclear armed neighbors with unresolved territorial conflicts risked sliding into a nuclear conflict unless they found a way to settle their differences for which a dialogue was an inescapable necessity. Such praise from within and without from predictable quarters should neither be surprising nor worth much attention.
Outreach
The new majority government in power in New Delhi, freed from debilitating coalition politics and attaching priority to economic development, has aroused external interest. The sentiment outside the country- as well as inside it – has been that the previous government lost its way, leading India into the quagmire of high fiscal deficits and tumbling growth, belying international expectations about its economic rise paralleling that of China.
If India can be steered back into a high growth trajectory with stronger leadership and improved governance, more economic opportunities will open up for our foreign partners. This would also draw renewed attention to India’s geo-political importance which, though an accepted reality now, has receded from the foreground lately.
Reassurance
Modi is seen as the man of the moment. This would explain the telephone calls from world leaders to Modi and the invitations given and received. India is being courted, and Modi’s choice of the countries he first visits or foreign leaders he first receives, is drawing external attention as an indication of his diplomatic priorities.
On this broader front too, Modi is following an unanticipated script of his own. He is being generous to the US despite its reprehensible conduct in denying him a visa, by prioritizing national interest over his individual feelings. He has not waited for the stigma of visa refusal to be erased by a US executive order removing his name from the State Department black-list. He is planning to meet President Obama in Washington in September – the first external visit to be announced – quickly relieving the Americans of fears that the visa issue could become a hurdle in engaging him.
In another remarkable gesture that the State Department would have noted for its political import, he has agreed to a book launch by an American think-tank at Race Course Road. China wants to complicate moves by Japan to strengthen strategic ties with India. Its decision to send its Foreign Minister to India after the swearing-in seems to have been motivated by this rivalry, apart from seeking to build on the personal contacts established by China with Modi when he was Chief Minister. If the Chinese FM was allowed to be the first consequential foreign leader to meet Modi, it appears Japan may be the first foreign country – barring Bhutan – the latter may visit en route to the BRICS meeting in July in Brazil.
The Bhutan visit underscores the importance Modi intends attaching to neighbors. Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister is visiting Delhi on June 18. It would seem that Modi’s immediate priority is to reassure all his important interlocutors, friends or adversaries, that they should have no misgivings about him and the direction of his policies, and that he seeks to engage with all power centers in a balanced manner.
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G7 threatens Russia with more curbs
BRUSSELS (TIP): World leaders urged Vladimir Putin on June 4 to stop destabilizing Ukraine or face further sanctions as they met without a Russian president for the first time since the 1990s. Putin reached out a hand despite being banned from the Group of Seven summit following Russia’s annexation of Crimea in March, saying that he was ready to meet Ukraine’s president-elect. But G7 leaders said that while they still hoped for “constructive” talks with Putin on the sidelines of D-Day commemorations in France on Friday, Moscow could face further punitive measures.
In a joint communique they said Putin must recognize the results of Ukraine’s May 25 presidential election, won by Petro Poroshenko, stem destabilization in the east of the country, and pull Russian troops back from the border. “Actions to destabilize eastern Ukraine are unacceptable and must stop,” the group said. “We stand ready to intensify targeted sanctions and to implement significant additional restrictive measures to impose further costs on Russia should events so require.”
The leaders have warned Russia that manipulating energy supplies to intimidate one’s neighbours is unacceptable and that they need to diversify their energy systems to avoid getting blackmailed. “The use of energy supplies as a means of political coercion or as a threat to security is unacceptable,” a draft G7 summit statement seen by AFP said. Russia supplies about 30% of Europe’s gas, with about half of that transiting Ukraine. Obama has shown no signs of wanting a meeting with Putin despite the fact that both will be in Normandy to mark the 70th anniversary of the World War II D-Day landings in Europe.
Other G7 leaders whose economies are more exposed to Russia than Washington took a softer tone. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that European leaders would “take stock” of Russian actions at a summit end June and “reflect which further sanctions are necessary”. But Merkel, who is due to meet Putin in France, said that “the main thing is to be constructive” and that further sanctions would take effect only if there had been “no progress whatsoever”.
French President Francois Hollande – who is scheduled to have separate dinners with both Putin and Obama in Paris on Thursday – agreed that “dialogue and deescalation must be encouraged”. British PM David Cameron said he would be taking a similar message to Putin when he meets him also on Thursday. Putin hinted that he could meet both Poroshenko and even Obama, saying “I don’t plan to avoid anyone”.
But he taunted the United States and waved away allegations of Russian military meddling in eastern Ukraine. “Proof ? Let’s see it!” he said. “The entire world remembers the US secretary of state demonstrating the evidence of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, waving around some test tube with washing powder in the UN Security Council,” Putin said.
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China under-reported defence by 20%: Pentagon
WASHINGTON (TIP): China underestimated its growing defence budget by nearly 20% with its spending likely nearing $145 billion last year, the Pentagon has said. In an annual report required by Congress, the Pentagon said yesterday that China’s defence budget for 2013 was higher than the officially announced $119.5 billion. “We think that if you start factoring in other considerations, other funding streams that go into the military, other investments that are not included in the defence budget, that it could be up to $145 billion,” a Pentagon official said of the report.
The United States and its allies, especially Japan, have repeatedly voiced concern about the Chinese military’s lack of transparency amid growing tensions between Beijing and neighbouring countries over maritime disputes. In its previous annual report on China, the Pentagon said that Beijing’s military spending was anywhere between $135- 215 billion. The $145 billion estimate “reflects an improvement in our understanding of how China develops its defence budget,” the official said. “But I would say there’s a lot that we still don’t know about China’s defence spending and that’s an area where we encourage China to be more transparent,” he said.
In March, China announced a new hike of 12.2% in its defence budget to an official 808.23 billion yuan ($132 billion) for 2014. China dismissed foreign criticism, with the staterun China Daily saying, “World peace needs a militarily stronger China.” China’s military budget — either the official figure or Pentagon estimate — is significantly higher than the amount spent by its neighbours.
In 2013, Russia’s defence budget was $69.5 billion, Japan’s was $56.9 billion, with India at $39.2 billion and South Korea at $31 billion. But China’s budget is much lower than that of the United States, by far the world’s largest military power, which has a $495.5 billion defence budget in 2013 along with another $82 billion allocated for the Afghanistan war.
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Remembering a Technology visionary who reshaped India
The author pays a tribute to a former Prime Minister of India, Rajiv Gandhi, on his 23rd death anniversary. Rajiv Gandhi was killed by LTTE on May 21, 1991 at Sriperumbudur, near Chennai, in Tamil Nadu where he had gone for electioneering.
When we remember late Rajiv Gandhi, several scenarios could come to one’s mind. To some, he was a young and charismatic leader who had given great hope to a new generation with dynamic initiatives and for others, he had assured India’s continuing path onwards with its secular politics. However, I remember him more for his bold initiatives in the Telecom and Information Technology areas that have transformed India forever.
Little knowing the presence of a suicide bomber, Rajiv Gandhi mingled freely with people on the fateful day of May 21, 1991.
If we look back in history, couple of events or initiatives has made some dramatic change to the status quo. India is primarily an agricultural nation. In 1990, nearly 70% of India’s work force was engaged in farming, although agriculture accounts for only 33 % of India’s gross national product (GNP). However, two separate event/initiative catapulted India into being an Information Technology super power of this modern time. One significant such set of events that took place in 1965 when Hindi became the official language of India.
The architects of modern India felt that India needed an official language as a unifying force for such a diverse nation. However, they wanted to give several more years to this effort as they were very conscious of the sentiment of non-Hindi speaking folks particularly in South India. However, some of the ardent Hindi advocates in the north were pressing hard to make that a reality soon although many of their sons and daughters were sent to U.K. or USA for English Education and higher professional studies.
Protests and Riots erupted across South India and most of the violent confrontations occurred in Tamil Nadu. Finally, the Central Government relented and made English the sub-official language of the Nation. If it were not for that particular decision, India would not have fared any better than China or Russia in developing software technology or providing high quality services to multi-national companies in the west.
Since most of the advanced computing instructions and training materials were written in English and the project management was conducted using the same, Indians gained a natural advantage over others gaining that expertise and excelling in it. The United States, Japan, and most Western European nations in recent decades have become information societies, countries in which information workers are more numerous than such occupational categories as farmers, industrial workers, or service workers (Rogers, 1986).
In an information society, information is the crucial ingredient, much like energy was in the industrial society of an earlier era. The computer is the most important tool in the information society, just as the steam engine was the basic technology in the industrial society. The second significant initiative that made India an IT super power has happened under Shri Rajiv Gandhi.
As we know, telephones have arrived in India in 1881. Some 100 years later, India reputedly had world’s worst telephone service. The Rajiv Gandhi government, realizing the importance of advanced, widely-accessible telecommunications, announced a new telecommunications policy in 1985. This policy: These reforms by the visionary Rajiv Gandhi encouraged Non-Resident Indians to participate in the upcoming Telecommunication revolution in India.
In 1984, Satyan “Sam” Pitroda, an overseasreturned Indian (formerly an executive of Rockwell, Inc. in Chicago), was invited by Rajiv Gandhi and subsequently he founded the Center for Development of Telematics (CDOT) in New Delhi. Pitroda’s R&D organization has developed state-of-the-art telephone switching equipment to serve India’s special telecommunications needs.
Indian telecommunications are characterized by high traffic and low density (as compared to low traffic and high density in most Western countries), and extreme temperature and humidity conditions. C-DOT accomplished most of its R&D goals, saving $3.5 million of its $29 million budget allocations in the three-year period between 1984 and 1987. C-DOT successfully developed the technology for electronic PABX systems, developed a 128-line rural telephone exchange, and then tested 4,000- line and 16,000-line telephone exchanges. Several government and private companies were then licensed to manufacture C-DOT’s electronic telephone exchanges.
A second three year C-DOT mission was announced in 1987 to develop technological prerequisites for a future Integrated Systems Digital Network (ISDN) in India. If it were not for these reforms by Rajiv Gandhi, there would not have been any IT revolution in India and we would never have become the world’s hub for Call Centers and high-end online software services.
It was the learning of English language together with restructuring of the Telecommunication policies by our dynamic and visionary leader Rajiv Gandhi that has catapulted India to the pinnacle of technology supremacy and brought us fame and fortune and probably more respectability around the globe.
1. Permitted foreign collaboration with the Indian private sector in manufacturing indigenous telecommunications equipment;
2. Created a Department of Telecommunications by bifurcating the Indian Posts and Telegraph Department; and
3. Created autonomous telephone corporations to serve Delhi and Bombay (Chowdary, 1986).
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Russia negotiates MI-35 helicopter supplies to Pakistan
Russia and Pakistan cooperate in resisting new challenges and threats as active participants in the international anti-terrorist coalition
MOSCOW (TIP): Russia is negotiating MI-35 helicopter supplies to Pakistan, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday, June 4. Russia and Pakistan cooperate in resisting new challenges and threats as active participants in the international anti-terrorist coalition, the Foreign Ministry said.
Contrary to some media reports, Russia had never introduced embargo on weapon supplies to Pakistan, it added. Helicopter supplies are part of the Russian assistance in strengthening Islamabad’s anti-terrorist and anti-drug potential. Similar equipment was supplied earlier, as military cooperation with Pakistan started back in the 1960s. Russia-Pakistan contacts in this field posed no threat to the existing strategic military balance in the region and were not aimed against the third countries, the Foreign Ministry said.
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Somasundaran appointed by US/ EPA to its Board of Scientific Conselors
NEW YORK (TIP): Professor P. Somasundaran has been appointed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. to serve as a member of its Board of Scientific Counselors and to chair the ‘combined BOSC Subcommittees for Chemical Safety for Sustainability and Human Health Risk Assessment research program” and as such to the Board’s Executive Committee effective April l 28, 2014.
Board members of this committee must have shown extraordinary accomplishments in the field to be invited to serve The committee’s mission is to provide advice and recommendations on science and engineering research programs, plans, labs, and research management practices; the use of peer review to promote sound science; the development and progress of plans of the EPA’s R&D office; the quality of technical products; and human resources planning. Somasundaran is an expert in surface and colloid science, enhanced oil and coal recovery, nanoparticles, biosurfaces, and biosensors.
He is the author of 15 books and more than 700 scientific publications and patents.. Somasundaran, La von Duddleson Krumb Professor at Columbia University, is the founding Director of Langmuir Center for Colloids & Interfaces, and director of the National Science Foundation Industry/University Cooperative Research Center for Particulate and Surfactant Systems.
His work strives toward designing greener surfactant systems for an environmentally conscious market. Author and editor of 22 books and 700 scientific publications, Somasundaran is a 1985 inductee of the National Academy of Engineering, highest honor for an engineer at that time, and subsequently of the corresponding academies of China, India, Russia, and the Balkan Academy of Sciences/MT and the sole 2012 foreign member of the Royal Society of Canada,.
Somasundaran has been honored with many awards, including the Ellis Island Medal of Honor (1990), Gaudin Award (1982), Mill Man of Distinction Award (1983), Publication Board Award (l980), Richards Award(l987), Taggart Award for best paper (1987), Henry Krumb Lecturer of the Year (1989), Distinguished Member of SME (1983), “Most Distinguished Achievement in Engineering” award from AINA (1980), Distinguished Alumnus (1989 sole award) and the first Brahm Prakash Chair from the Indian Institute of Science (1990), Engineering Foundation’s Aplan award (1992), AIME Mineral Industry Education Award (2006), Columbia Alumni Association and the ACAA Distinguished Achievement Award (2007), MEANA Engineer of the Year Award (2007), Fellowship of theAmerican Institute of Chemical Engineers (2009), the Leadership Citation from the New Jersey Senate in 1991, and the title of Pan American Advisor for Mines, Metallurgy and Materials.
He was awarded Padma Shri(among the highest civil award by the Government of India) by the President of India 2010. He is the author/editor of 15 books and close to 700 scientific publications and patents the Honorary Editor-inchief of the international journal “Colloids and Surfaces,” the Editor-in- Chief of “The Encyclopedia of Surface and Colloid Science” and has served on many international, national and professional committees and National Research Council Panels, NSF research and advisory panels, DOI Advisory Panel and university research advisory panels.
He served in the Congress’ 28th Environmental Advisory Committee. He was the Chairman of the Board of the Engineering Foundation (1993-95) and has served on the board of the SME/AIME (1982-85). In the community, he served as member of the Piermont Planning Board and Citizen Advisory Committee and currently as a member of the Zoning Board of Appeals and Board of the Volunteers in Service to Education in India.
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Ukraine military helicopter shot down, 14 dead
SLOVYANSK (UKRAINE) (TIP): Rebels in eastern Ukraine shot down a government military helicopter on May 29 amid heavy fighting around the eastern city of Slovyansk, killing 14 soldiers including a general, Ukraine’s leader said. Acting President Oleksandr Turchynov told the parliament in Kiev that rebels used a portable air defense missile on Thursday to down the helicopter and said Gen.
Volodymyr Kulchitsky was among the dead. Slovyansk has become the epicenter of fighting between pro-Russia insurgents and government forces in recent weeks. Located 100 miles (160 kilometers) from the Russian border, it has seen constant clashes and its residential areas have regularly come under mortar shelling from government forces, causing civilian casualties and prompting some residents to flee. An Associated Press reporter saw the helicopter’s go down and the trail of black smoke it left before crashing.
Gunshots were heard around Slovyansk near the crash site and a Ukrainian air force jet was seen circling above. It was too dangerous to visit the site itself. The city of 120,000 is in the Donetsk region, one of the two sprawling provinces in eastern Ukraine that have declared independence from the government in Kiev. The Kiev government condemns the insurgency roiling the east as the work of “terrorists” bent on destroying the country and blames Russia for fomenting it. Russia denies the accusations, saying it has no influence over rebels, who insist they are only protecting the interests of Russianspeakers in the east.
Still, fighters from Russia, including from the battled-hardened region of Chechnya, have been appearing recently in the ranks of the separatists. Also on May 29, an insurgent leader confirmed that his fighters were holding four missing observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and promised that they would be released shortly. Vyacheslav Ponomarev, the selfproclaimed “people’s mayor” of Slovyansk, told the AP that the monitors — who are from Turkey, Switzerland, Estonia and Denmark — were safe.
“I addressed the OSCE mission to warn them that their people should not over the coming week travel in areas under our control. And they decided to show up anyway,” Ponomarev said. “We will deal with this and then release them,” he said, without setting a specific timeframe. The OSCE had lost contact with the team in Donetsk on Monday evening. Their teams have been deployed to Ukraine to monitor security situation following Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the rise of the pro-Russia separatist insurgency in eastern Ukraine.
They also observed Sunday’s presidential vote, won by billionaire candy magnate Petro Poroshenko. Poroshenko has promised to negotiate with people in the east but also vowed to uproot the armed rebels. In the most ferocious battle yet, rebels in Donetsk tried to take control of its airport Monday but were repelled by Ukrainian forces using combat jets and helicopter gunships. Dozens of men were killed — some insurgent leaders said up to 100 fighters may have been killed. The mood in Donetsk was calm Thursday, although many businesses have stopped opening due to fears of renewed fighting.
The separatists in Ukraine have pleaded to join Russia, but President Vladimir Putin has ignored their appeal in an apparent bid to de-escalate tensions with the West and avoid a new round of Western sanctions. Putin has supported an OSCE peace plan that calls for ending hostilities and launching a political dialogue and has said Russia would work with new leader Poroshenko. But Russia has repeatedly urged the Ukrainian government to end its military operation against the separatists. Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov on Thursday called for quick international mediation to persuade Kiev to halt what he described as a “punitive operation” in the east.
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Russia seeks explanation from Britain over Prince Charles’ Putin remark
LONDON (TIP): Russia will seek an explanation from British officials on May 22 after reports that Prince Charles, the heir to the British throne, likened Russian President Vladimir Putin to Nazi leader Adolf Hitler for annexing part of Ukraine. During a tour of Canada, the 65-year-old prince told a Jewish woman who fled from Poland during World War Two that “Putin is doing just about the same as Hitler”, according to a report in the Daily Mail newspaper.
Charles’s remarks, described by a royal source as “well-intentioned” and not meant to be public, stunned political leaders and diplomats in Britain because the royal family does not traditionally voice political views in public. Queen Elizabeth, Charles’s mother, has never aired any such emotive sentiments in public. A spokeswoman for Charles’s office said they did not comment on his private conversations. The Soviet Union lost more than 20 million people in World War Two and the victory over Nazi Germany is celebrated across Russia as a national triumph.
A senior Russian diplomat from its London embassy is expected to meet a senior officer from Britain’s foreign office on Thursday, according to a source with knowledge of the situation. The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, gave no further details about the meeting or whether Russia had yet complained about the reported remarks. Prime Minister David Cameron, who has scolded the Kremlin for annexing Crimea and supporting pro- Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine, declined to comment on Charles’s reported remarks. The Russian embassy in London could not be reached for immediate comment.
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11 Ukrainian troops dead, 33 wounded by rebels
BLAHODATNE, UKRAINE (TIP): Three days before Ukraine holds a presidential vote, pro-Russia insurgents attacked a military checkpoint on Thursday in eastern Ukraine, killing at least 11 troops and wounding at least 33 others in the deadliest raid yet in weeks of fighting. A rebel group who claimed responsibility for the attack said one of their own was also killed.
AP journalists saw 11 dead Ukrainian soldiers scattered around a checkpoint near the village of Blahodatne, 30 kilometers (20 miles) south of the major city of Donetsk. Witnesses including a medical worker said 33 Ukrainian troops were wounded in the attack and that some of them were in grave condition. All the wounded were being treated at nearby medical facilities. The Ukrainian defense ministry confirmed the attack but wouldn’t comment on casualties. Ukraine’s acting Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk in televised comments blamed Russia for backing the rebels in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, which have declared independence from the government in Kiev.
Thursday’s carnage cast a shadow over Ukraine’s upcoming presidential vote on Sunday, which separatists in the east have pledged to derail. Authorities in Kiev see the vote as a chance to defuse tensions and stabilize the country. Even so, they have admitted it will be impossible to stage the vote in some eastern areas where election officials and voters have faced intimidation and sometimes death threats from the rebels.
Three charred Ukrainian armored infantry vehicles, their turrets blown away, and several burned trucks were seen at the site in the Donetsk region. A military helicopter landed, carrying officials who inspected the area. Residents said attackers used an armored bank truck, which the unsuspecting Ukrainian soldiers waved through, and then mowed them down at point-blank range. Their account couldn’t be independently confirmed.
In the town of Horlivka, a masked rebel commander claimed responsibility for the raid and showed an array of seized Ukrainian weapons. “We destroyed a checkpoint of the fascist Ukrainian army deployed on the land the Donetsk Republic,” said the commander, who wore a balaclava and identified himself by his nom de guerre, “Bes,” Russian for “demon.” He said one of his men also was killed.
“The weapons you see here have been taken from the dead, they are trophies,” the rebel commander said, showing automatic and sniper rifles, rocket grenade launchers and bulletproof vests in the courtyard of the occupied Horlivka police headquarters. “People living in western Ukraine: Think about where you are sending your brothers, fathers and sons, and why you need any of this,” he added. Many in the east resent the government in Kiev, which came to power after a pro-Russian president fled in February following months of protests, seeing it as nationalists bent on repressing Russian-speakers.
But many locals also have grown increasingly exasperated with the rebels, whom they blame for putting civilians in the crossfire. In the village of Semenovka on the outskirts of Slovyansk, artillery shelling badly damaged several houses on Thursday. Zinaida Patskan, 80, had her roof torn away by an explosion that also shattered a wall. She said she was hiding under a kitchen table with her cat, Timofey, when the shelling came.
“Why they are hitting us?” she said, bursting into tears. “We are peaceful people!” About 100 Semenovka residents later vented their anger against the central government, demanding that Ukrainian forces cease their offensive against the separatists and withdraw from the region. Speakers at the rally also urged residents to boycott the presidential vote. While fighting raged in Ukraine, Russia’s Defense Ministry said Thursday its forces were leaving the regions near Ukraine as part of a massive military pullout ordered by President Vladimir Putin.
It said four trainloads of weapons and 15 Il-76 heavy-lift transport planes had already left the Belgorod, Bryansk and Rostov regions. Nato had estimated Russia has 40,000 troops along the border with Ukraine. Gen. Philip Breedlove, Nato’s supreme commander in Europe, told reporters in Brussels that some Russian military movements had been detected but it was too early to assess their size or importance. He said a very large and capable Russian force still remained close to Ukraine.
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A MODI GOVERNMENT MUST PROJECT A MORE ROBUST FOREIGN POLICY
“Rather than debating a new conceptual framework for our foreign policy – more “nationalistic” or resting on an “India first” foundation – we could look at how some concrete issues should be addressed by a Modi-led government”, says the author.
Now that it appears that the next government in New Delhi could well be Modi-led, questions about the possible changes in India’s foreign policy are being raised inside and outside the country. India’s external challenges are well known and policy responses have been examined over time by governments in power. Whether or not existing policies represent the best balance in coping with our external environment with the capacities we have can always be debated.
Some say that our foreign policy is weak and accommodating, too risk-averse and lacking in self-confidence. Others argue that we are unsure of what we want and consequently we are reactive, allowing others to define the agenda on which then we position ourselves. ‘Modi is not above the law’: NaMo insists he has nothing to hide from snoopgate probe and denies corruption slur against Vadra Hurriyat supports Army Chief’s statement that Kashmir is the ‘jugular vein’ of Pakistan Pakistan Army chief calls Kashmir the country’s ‘jugular vein’ Such a foreign policy is not seen as compatible with India’s stature and role in international affairs.
Refashion
Some others advocate that the Modigovernment should make a break with the Nehruvian foreign policy that India has been practicing, even under the previous NDA government. The implications of this are unclear. It could mean that we should defend our interests more vigorously, worry less about international opinion and attenuate the moral overtones of our foreign policy. Inflammatory: Pakistan’s army Chief General Raheel Sharif recently termed Kashmir Pakistan’s ‘jugular vein’ More importantly, we should develop the necessary military sinews to pursue a more robust foreign policy, including accelerating our strategic programs and climbing down from the nuclear disarmament bandwagon.It could mean therefore a more muscular China and Pakistan policy. It could also mean discarding our allergy to alliances, getting rid of the malady of non-alignment that still afflicts us, shedding leftist, third world rhetoric and not allowing concepts of “strategic autonomy” to constrict more decisive foreign policy choices. Rather than debating a new conceptual framework for our foreign policy – more “nationalistic” or resting on an “India first” foundation – we could look at how some concrete issues should be addressed by a Modi-led government. Pakistan is a perennial problem, embodying the worst challenges India faces, whether of terrorism, religious extremism and nuclear threats, all linked to its territorial claims on us.
The latest statements by Pakistan’s Interior Minister and its army chief reflect Pakistan’s abiding hostility towards us. Nawaz Sharif has been harping aggressively on the Kashmir issue, calling it Pakistan’s “jugular vein”, a phrase repeated by the current army chief. By speaking highly politically about Kashmir, the army chief has drawn a red line for Pakistan, besides signaling support to the separatists in Kashmir. An unreconstructed Nawaz Sharif is lobbying with the US and UK to intervene in the Kashmir issue.
If by “jugular vein” Pakistan means that we can inflict death on Pakistan by thirst, it is dishonestly ignoring India’s strict adherence to the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty despite the 1965, 1971, 1999 armed aggressions by Pakistan, its terrorist onslaught against India since the mid-1980s, with the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks capping its emergence as the epicenter of international terrorism, and its policy of derailing our power projects on the western rivers allowed by the Treaty by dragging us into international arbitration.
Mismanagement
Meanwhile, by acquiring contiguity with China through its illegal occupation of parts of J&K and preventing our contiguity with Afghanistan, Pakistan’s “jugular vein” receives plentiful sustenance to counter us strategically. These Pakistani statements helpfully give room and reason to a Modi-led government to reject any hurried dialogue with Pakistan and exclude Kashmir and Siachen from any future structured agenda.Pakistan’s intransigence also argues against any back-channel contacts, because unless Pakistan can publicly speak of its willingness to compromise over its differences with India, the back-channel is simply a means to “soften” India and exploit its attachment to a come-what-may, dialogueoriented and “readiness to walk the extramile” approach to extract concessions. China presents a more complex case as it has outshone us in its diplomatic, economic and military performance and has decisively gained ground on us regionally and internationally. By mismanaging our democratic politics internally, neglecting our defense preparedness and failing to sustain high rates of economic growth, we have gravely weakened ourselves vis a vis China.
Diminished
China is thus setting the agenda for our bilateral engagement, advancing its interests, keeping us on the defensive with calculated provocations and evading any serious response to our concerns. We should continue our engagement of China but make it more balanced by calibrated countervailing steps by us like winding up the Special Representatives mechanism which is no longer serving the specific purpose for which it was set up, apart from allowing the Dalai Lama to call on India’s new leader after May 16, refusing visas to Tibetans in any Chinese delegation visiting India, avoiding any official meeting between the two sides on Tibetan territory and the new prime minister visiting Tawang and Japan before the expected visit of the Chinese president to India.The US seems to be giving diminished political attention to India while stepping up economic pressure on us. Its threats of isolating Russia and sanctioning powerful Russian political and business personalities for actions in Crimea in disregard of Russia’s nuclear armory, its huge resource base, European energy dependence on Russia, and the risk of losing Russian logistic support for Afghanistan and for dealing with Iran and Syria, contrasts with the US reluctance to punish Pakistan for its misdemeanors in the region that has cost American lives too. US’s domination of the global financial system and its readiness to use it as an instrument of coercion stresses the need for India to assess more carefully the future of the India-US strategic partnership. Much more than this will be on the new government’s plate, of course. But if the big morsels are chewed well, the smaller ones can be swallowed with ease.
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Fear and loathing in Washington
The known unknowns about Modi are perfect catalysts for a reset of India-US relations
Over the past three years, Washington has also come to believe it did India too big a favor with the nuclear deal and received little payback. This premise conveniently ignores the many tangibles (Indian purchases of US defense platforms to the tune of $10 billion in less than a decade) and intangibles (India’s decision not to criticize wholesale spying by NSA). A strong government in New Delhi is unlikely to be as patient or as yielding
The American establishment is registering a measure of fear while the liberal academic-NGO community a sense of loathing at the prospect of Narendra Modi becoming India’s next PM. They are full of questions with no real answers. If elected, how would a state CM play the national and international game? How would he deal with a US administration whose policy lately has been to hit India on multiple fronts to extract concessions? More importantly, how would he look at a country that denied him a visa and had no contact with him for seven years?
The anti-Modi coalition of Christian evangelists, left-leaning Indian Americans and Muslim activists is gearing up to mount pressure through the US Congress. They will keep the heat on even though the old fervor is gone, especially among Republicans. The uncertainties, the ambiguities and the “known unknowns” about Modi are actually perfect catalysts for a “reset” of India-US relations currently running at a low. They can create the new chemistry necessary for a more balanced equation better suited to the times.
It cannot be the responsibility of one partner to create equilibrium, constantly ignore provocations and appease. A good relationship bears traffic in both directions. Actually the reset has already begun. Ironically, the button was pushed by the Khobragade affair. Needless provocation sparked a strong Indian response and washed the fuzziness off the relationship. Dialogue has gained in clarity since. The defensive tone has been replaced by a confident articulation of Indian expectations from the relationship. It is neither arrogant nor whiney. Terms of engagement will change further if Indian voters give a clear mandate.
Unfortunately, the last phase of the UPA government left the impression that India will reverse its policies in the face of pressure and noise from Washington. It did so on preferential market access and transfer pricing. This has emboldened US lobbies out to draw more blood. After all who wouldn’t use a tactic that works? Over the past three years, Washington has also come to believe it did India too big a favor with the nuclear deal and received little payback. This premise conveniently ignores the many tangibles (Indian purchases of US defense platforms to the tune of $10 billion in less than a decade) and intangibles (India’s decision not to criticize wholesale spying by NSA). A strong government in New Delhi is unlikely to be as patient or as yielding. Piling on public pressure is bad strategy for the general health of the relationship.
It reduces the Indo-US story to one of trade and investment disputes and blurs the original idea for coming together – a geostrategic convergence of interests. The new government will realize soon enough that an inward-looking Obama administration has had only fitful engagement with the world. That it has paid no special homage to strategic vision, and instead allowed a disaggregation of the India-US relationship. Then it has come after New Delhi issue by issue. It has attacked India at the behest of big pharma and other business interests whose maximalist agenda has been repeatedly exposed.
Their game is to scotch any serious attempt to keep medicine affordable while discrediting India’s generic drugs industry through means both fair and foul. In their calculation, if India bends, it would scare smaller, weaker countries from ever contemplating a compulsory license US pharma’s brutal overreach has even put the much-touted Trans-Pacific Partnership under a cloud as negotiating countries discover the traps set for them under the guise of protecting intellectual property and copyrights. If the US Trade Representative reviewing India’s intellectual property regime downgrades it and puts it on the list of ‘Special 301’ countries, this will add another twist to an already twisting relationship. Such naming and shaming could lead to sanctions.
Pushing the business agenda of demands drafted by the US Chamber of Commerce at a time when the US is losing international partners faster than it is acquiring them is unwise. Especially when Obama’s signature foreign policy effort – the pivot to Asia – keeps reincarnating in lesser and lesser avatars. Obama had also pledged to strengthen bonds with emerging economies but today all Brics are piled up against America for various reasons. India, Brazil, China and South Africa abstained on a UN resolution condemning the fifth partner Russia’s annexation of Crimea. India also abstained on a US-sponsored resolution against Sri Lanka’s human rights situation.
This reflects a post-Khobragade realism, a push-back, even a new equilibrium. India will give but also take. For every US demand to open the Indian economy, there would be an equal and opposite demand on completing a “tantalization agreement”. India may find it useful to cross-link and leverage defense contracts for something tangible. Surely $10 billion worth of arms can buy relief on H-1B visas or a more honest policy towards a certain neighbor that remains the hub of terrorism. The truth is if Washington can be transactional, so can others. But this new phase should not obscure the larger logic behind India and the US coming together because the many reasons for convergence remain. Those with a wider window than a four-year election cycle understand that. Equally importantly, those who make national security policy in India know what balance of power is more beneficial.
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IMF APPROVES $17 BILLION BAILOUT FOR UKRAINE AMID RISKS
WASHINGTON (TIP):
The International Monetary Fund’s board signed off on a $17 billion two-year aid program for Ukraine on Wednesday to help the former Soviet republic’s economy recover after months of turmoil. The IMF aid will allow the immediate disbursement of $3.2 billion to Kiev, and unlock further credits from other donors of about $15 billion, intended to help Ukraine stabilize its economy amid its worst civil turmoil since independence in 1991.IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde admitted the program faces geopolitical risks, along with uncertainty about the government’s ability to carry out the politically unpopular measures necessary to get its finances in order. “On the implementation front, we are taking all the precautions we can in order to mitigate those risks,” Lagarde told reporters after the board’s decision.
The IMF’s board decided to meet every two months for the next couple reviews of Ukraine’s program, rather than following the typical three-month schedule, in order to closely track the government’s continued commitment to economic reforms, such as floating the currency and cutting fiscal deficits. “On the geopolitical front, clearly the bilateral international support, and the cooperation of all parties, will be extremely helpful to reinforce the position of the economy of Ukraine,” Lagarde said.
Geopolitical risks
Pro-Moscow separatists seized government offices in more Ukrainian towns on Wednesday, a further sign authorities in Kiev are losing control of the country’s eastern industrial heartland bordering Russia. The unrest in the east follows months of upheaval from antigovernment protests and Russia’s subsequent annexation of the Crimea region, which had already edged Ukraine’s economy to the brink of bankruptcy.
Ukrainian authorities have said the economy will likely contract by 3 percent by the end of this year as a result of the chaos and mismanagement. Economic output fell 1.1 percent in the first three months of the year. Kiev is also in a dispute with Moscow over the price it will pay for natural gas exports in the future, and over money owed for prior gas purchases. Ukraine’s economy may further suffer if sanctions intensify on its neighbor Russia, a key market for Ukrainian exports.
Western nations have placed visa bans and asset freezes on Russian individuals and companies over what they see as Russian meddling in Ukraine. “Clearly on the front of sanctions, anything that undermines the economic situation of the country will jeopardize the implementation of the program, which is why we very strongly encourage the parties to negotiate, to come to terms,” Lagarde said.
The political unrest makes it even more difficult for Ukraine to get its economy back into shape, even though the country’s new government pledged to pursue politically unpopular reforms as a condition for receiving IMF aid. Ukraine’s previous two IMF programs were suspended after the government failed to follow through on promised reforms. The IMF expects Ukraine to implement major reforms in its energy and financial sectors, including raising the price of gas for domestic consumers.
The government, in power until elections on May 25, has already promised to raise gas prices by more than 50 percent from this Thursday. “(Ukraine) has demonstrated in the last few weeks that it can undertake comprehensive reforms and has actually addressed some of the issues that have been outstanding for a long time,” Lagarde said. “We believe that Ukraine has an opportunity to seize the moment, to break away from previous practices, both from the fiscal, from the monetary, and from the governance point of view.”
The decision from the IMF’s 24-member board, which includes representatives from Russia and the United States, clears the way for an immediate disbursement of $3.2 billion to Ukraine’s cash-strapped government, allowing it to meet looming obligations and avoid a potential debt default. Of that first tranche, $2 billion will be targeted at supporting the budget.
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INDIA PIPS JAPAN TO BE THIRD LARGEST ECONOMY IN PPP
NEW DELHI (TIP):
The global economic balance seems to be tilting towards the developing countries. India has overtaken Japan to emerge as the third largest economy in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms, after the US and China, latest data released by the World Bank showed. Separately, an analysis showed members of the OECD, a rich-country club, accounted for 50% of the global economy estimated at $90 trillion in 2011, compared to 60% of the $70 trillion economy in 2005. While developing countries made up the remaining half, large emerging market economies such as India, China, Brazil, Indonesia, Russia and South Africa now make up around 30% of the world GDP.The previous version of the World Bank’s International Comparison Program (ICP) report had said that India was ranked 10th in 2005 in terms of PPP. PPP is used to compare economies and incomes of people by adjusting for differences in prices in various countries. “The economies of Japan and the UK became smaller relative to the US, while Germany increased slightly and France and Italy remained the same,” the World Bank report said. It said that six of the world’s 12 largest economies were in the middle-income category.
The dozen largest economies accounted for twothird of the world economy and 59% of the population, the report added. The six largest middle-income economies – China, India, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia and Mexico – accounted for 32.3% of world GDP, while the six largest high-income economies – US, Japan, Germany, France, UK and Italy – accounted for 32.9%, showing the distance that the emerging economies had travelled through rapid growth in recent years. At 27%, China has the largest share of the world’s expenditure for investment, with the US at half the level with 13% share. India, Japan and Indonesia followed with 7%, 4%, and 3%, respectively.
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INDIA TURNS TO RUSSIA TO HELP SUPPLY ARMS TO AFGHAN FORCES
NEW DELHI (TIP):
India has signed an agreement under which it will pay Russia to supply arms and equipment to the Afghan military as foreign combat troops prepare to leave the country, in a move that risks infuriating Pakistan, says a Reuters report. Under the deal, smaller arms such as light artillery and mortars will be sourced from Russia and moved to Afghanistan. But it could eventually involve the transfer of heavy artillery, tanks and even combat helicopters that the Afghans have been asking India for since last year.India has already been training military officers from Afghanistan, hosted a 60-member Special Forces group last year in the deserts of Rajasthan and supplied equipment such as combat vehicles and field medical support facilities. But the decision to meet some of Afghanistan’s military hardware demands – albeit sourcing them from Russia – points to a deepening role in Afghanistan aimed at preventing it from slipping back into the hands of the Taliban and other Islamist groups that are hostile to India.
It comes as China, another big player in the region which borders Afghanistan via a small, remote strip of land, is preparing for a more robust role in Afghanistan, also concerned that the withdrawal of NATO troops will leave a hotbed of militancy on its doorstep. Like China, India is unlikely to put boots on the ground to reinforce its strategy in Afghanistan.
“We can’t commit troops on the ground,we can’t give them the military equipment that they have been asking us for, for all sorts of reasons including the lack of surplus stocks,” said an Indian foreign ministry official, declining to be named because of the sensitivity of the issue.
“Involving a third party is the next best option,” the official said, referring to plans to source military supplies from Russia for Afghan forces. The lack of direct access to Afghanistan poses additional hurdles to arms transfers. An Indian team visited Moscow in February to firm up the deal, the official said. The two countries will also help Afghanistan restart an old armaments factory near Kabul and prepare an inventory of Russian military equipment in Afghanistan that could be refitted for use.
That dates back to the Soviet invasion of 1979-89, although much of the hardware is beyond repair. “We’ll work with India directly as well as trilaterally involving Russia,” said an Afghan official in New Delhi. “Most of India’s weapons are made in Russia or co-produced with Russia, so it makes sense.
Also the three-way arrangement is cost-effective.” Indian officials said they had held talks with China, Japan and Iran to find ways to fund Afghan security demands that outgoing President Hamid Karzai told his Indian hosts during a visit last year would touch $4 billion a year.
PAKISTAN WARY
India’s neighbor and rival Pakistan is likely to be angered by any move to help arm Afghan forces, even if indirectly. Pakistan shares a long border with Afghanistan and has traditionally exerted considerable influence on Kabul. But under Karzai, and since the ouster of the Islamist Taliban movement in 2001, relations have deteriorated amid accusations that Pakistan has failed to stop militants crossing into Afghanistan and launching frequent, deadly attacks.
Asked about India’s plans to supply Russian arms to Afghanistan, Pakistani foreign ministry spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam said: “I don’t have any confirmation, so it would be premature to comment on it.” A military spokesman did not return calls seeking comment. Ahmed Rashid, an author and expert on the region, said the deal could aggravate relations between India and Pakistan – nuclear-armed neighbors who have fought three wars – if the arms supplied were heavy enough to be deemed “offensive”.
“Diplomacy and political dialogue are what will bring peace to Afghanistan,” he said. “What is not going to bring peace is more weapons.” Russia’s Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation, the state agency responsible for arms and military cooperation deals, declined comment on the agreement. But Alexander Golts, an independent Moscowbased defense expert, said Russia had a similar arrangement with the United States under which it had delivered Mi-17 helicopters to Afghanistan.
The program is now threatened by U.S. sanctions on Russian government officials and firms linked to President Vladimir Putin as punishment for intervention in Ukraine, he said. Golts said India and Russia were likely to play a significant role in Afghanistan as coalition troops withdraw.
“At the end of the day, and despite all the contradictions, it’s very important for Washington to keep Russia engaged in Afghanistan.” Karzai’s “shopping list” submitted to New Delhi last year comprised 66 items ranging from tanks to spares for Afghanistan’s small fleet of helicopters. Karzai also wanted Indian instructors at the British-funded “Sandhurst in the Sand” military academy built outside Kabul to train Afghan military officers.
New Delhi remains opposed to deploying troops, including trainers, but has increased the number of Afghan officers training in India to nearly 1,100 this year from last year’s 574. “It is very clear that the Afghan government has been pushing for this, especially Karzai, to make sure that the ANSF (Afghan National Security Forces) is stocked and has options post-withdrawal,” said Rudra Chaudhuri, a South Asia specialist at King’s College London, referring to India’s decision to arrange for supplies from Russia.
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Russian jets cross into Ukraine airspace
WASHINGTON (TIP): US officials on Saturday said that Russian fighter jets flew into Ukrainian airspace a handful of times over the last 24 hours, in what one called a continued provocation of the heightened tensions in the region.
The officials said it’s not clear what the intent was, but the aircraft could have been testing Ukrainian radar or making a show of force. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk publicly about the issue. The flights come as Russia increases military exercises along the Ukraine border, including moving a broad array of fixed wing and rotary aircraft, infantry and armored troops.
The exercises inflame worries about a potential Russian military incursion into Ukraine. The west has threatened additional sanctions against Russia over its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean region in March and the ongoing escalation of military operations along the border. Army Gen Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, spoke with his Russian counterpart, Gen.
Valery Gerasimov, yesterday, but officials were not able to provide details of the conversation. Col. Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman, said US officials have let Russian defense ministry officials know that Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel would like to speak to his counterpart, Russia Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. There has been no response yet, Warren said.
This is the second set of military exercises conducted by the Russians along the border region. The latest exercises were quickly denounced by Hagel, who called them “dangerously destabilizing” and “very provocative.” If such activities escalate, they will make it more difficult to find a diplomatic solution to the situation in Ukraine, Hagel said, speaking in Mexico City.
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G7 to ‘move swiftly’ on more Russia sanctions
WASHINGTON (TIP): The United States and other nations in the Group of Seven said that they have agreed to “move swiftly” to impose additional economic sanctions on Russia in response to its actions in Ukraine.
In a joint statement released on Friday night by the White House, the G7 nations say they will act urgently to intensify “targeted sanctions”. The statement said that the G7 will also continue to prepare broader sanctions on key Russian economic sectors if Moscow takes more aggressive action.
The White House said that US sanctions could be levied as early as Monday. The G7 nations have also said that they are moving forward on the targeted sanctions now, because of the urgency of securing plans for Ukraine to hold presidential elections next month.
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US unwilling to give up Middle East peace process yet
WASHINGTON (TIP): The suspension of peace talks between Israel and Palestinians delivered the harshest blow yet to secretary of state John Kerry’s ambitious, if perhaps quixotic, hope of ending the decades-long impasse at the cost of focusing on other crises around the world.
But Kerry refused to accept defeat, saying “we will never give up our hope or our commitment for the possibilities” of Mideast peace. On Thursday, Kerry sought to portray the latest setback with as much optimism as the dismal development would allow. “There is always a way forward,” he told reporters at the state department, just a few hours after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Tel Aviv bluntly said the peace process had taken “a giant leap backward”.
Even diplomats and experts sympathetic to Kerry’s desire to soldier on with the talks declared the Mideast peace process on life support. Others, impatient with what they described as the Obama administration’s rudderless foreign policy, said the US needed to move on and refocus on other pressing priorities. Kerry acknowledged the bleakness of the situation, and said Israeli and Palestinian leaders needed to be willing to make compromises to keep the nine months of negotiations alive beyond an April 29 deadline.
“We may see a way forward, but if they’re not willing to make the compromises necessary, it becomes very elusive,” he said. Kerry has struggled to hold together the talks after a series of tit-for-tat diplomatic manoeuvres between the two sides over the last month that have eroded any trust or progress built since last summer. The worst blow came on Thursday when Israel’s security cabinet agreed to shelve the negotiations as the result of a new deal struck by the Palestinian Authority to create a reconciliation government with the militant group Hamas. Hamas has called for the destruction of the state of Israel, and is considered a terrorist organization by the US, European Union and other counties worldwide.
However, among Palestinians, the new agreement was hailed as a potentially historic step toward mending the rift that has split their people between two sets of rulers for seven years. Similar deals have been struck before between Hamas and the Fatah political party that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas represents. All have failed, and US experts said all sides should wait and see if the new agreement, reached on Wednesday, also fizzles out before declaring an end to the peace process with Israel. Former US diplomat and Mideast peace negotiator Dennis Ross said the Obama administration should wait to see whether Hamas and Fatah are able to form an interim government within five weeks, as they have pledged.
If the cannot, Ross said, the process might yet survive. Until then, “I don’t think you can say for sure that this is over with,” said Ross, who helped cobble together talks between Netanyahu and Abbas at the White House in 2010 and served as President Bill Clinton’s Mideast adviser. “It’s fair to say it’s on life support. I wouldn’t say this thing is done and can’t be resurrected.” Time is not on Kerry’s side, nor has it been throughout the negotiations. Originally, Kerry had envisioned a full agreement within nine months. When it became clear earlier this year that was not possible, given a glaring lack of meaningful progress, the state department adjusted its ambitions and set an April 29 deadline for producing a framework plan to keep the talks going for months longer.
It was not immediately clear how long the US is now prepared to let the latest impasse continue. US negotiators will remain in the region for the time being, said state department spokeswoman Jen Psaki. Throughout the year, Kerry has been forced to brush off snide accusations from critics that he is doggedly pursuing a peace deal in order to nab a Nobel Prize or make the Mideast his legacy issue after decades of statesmanship. During that time, the civil war in Syria has turned bloodier, with as many as 150,000 people killed and President Bashar Assad showing no signs of leaving.
Russia, meanwhile, has begun to flex its muscle in neighbouring former Soviet states, annexing the Crimea region in Ukraine and threatening to take over even more territory across that nation or others. No one accuses Kerry of ignoring other diplomatic crises, and he has spent at least as much time travelling to hotspots for negotiations on various problems during his first year at the State Department as he has spent in Washington. But Elliott Abrams, another longtime diplomat and top Mideast adviser to President George W Bush, described the peace process as a “forced march” fuelled by Kerry’s eagerness for a quick deal.
He predicted the peace process will live on in some form — largely because it fills a political need for the US, Israel and Palestinian leaders, and “because the two-state solution is still ultimately the right outcome”. “The pipe dream was Kerry’s belief that he could quickly reach a final status agreement; that was a vision based almost entirely on vanity,” Abrams said. “The administration should seriously be asking itself how it screwed things up so badly
