CPEC and related projects are at the core of Pakistan’s future development, but it would be prudent for the country to sometimes be able to flexibly decouple itself from this initiative in order to appeal to other partners such as Russia who are reluctant to participate in CPEC for political reasons. The Indian Challenge CPEC…
Pakistani prime minister-in waiting Imran Khan’s ability to chart his own course as well as his relationship with the country’s powerful military is likely to be tested the moment he walks into his new office. Pakistan’s most fundamental problems loom large and are likely to demand his immediate attention. He probably will have to turn…
China appears to be shifting gears in its multi-billion dollar Belt and Road initiative. Long projected as driven by economics and the benefit of infrastructure linkages, China appears to be increasingly adding a security component to the initiative against the backdrop of President Xi Jinping positioning of his country as a superpower rather than a…
In spite of its non-aligned history and its tradition of a decades long partnership with Moscow dating back to the 1940s, India’s contemporary foreign policy is a far cry for that of its comparatively recent past. Under Premier Narendra Modi’s BJP, India has begun allowing its historic friendship with Moscow to quietly die while engaging in…
Increased Pakistani dependence on China to help it avert resorting to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to avoid a financial and economic crisis spotlights fears that the terms of Chinese investment in massive Belt and Road-related projects would not pass international muster. Concerns that China’s US$ 50 billion plus investment in Pakistani infrastructure and energy,…
Iran’s Indian-back port of Chabahar, inaugurated months before the United States re-imposed sanctions on the Islamic republic, is where Asia and the Middle East’s multiple political conflicts and commercial rivalries collide. Chabahar was destined to become a player in geopolitical and economic manoeuvring between China, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and…
