Courtesy: India Today
The origin of current India-China hostilities in Bhutan harks back to a colonial era agreement framed in 1890 between the British and the Qing empire on issues related to Tibet and Sikkim. The present standoff is an occasion to revisit many aspects of a relationship that has shown perennial strain
Courtesy: Google Maps
Since mid-June, India and China have been locked in an intense stand-off in the Doklam plateau, at the tri-junction of Bhutan, India, and China. Gateway House chronicles previous border incursions and transgressions by China into India’s territory and mentions relevant treaties and agreements
Courtesy: New York Times
Three epoch-making events in 2016 are continuing to have global repercussions. They were: Brexit, China’s rubbishing of the July verdict of the Permanent Court of Arbitration after it rejected its claims on disputed islands in the South China Sea, and Trump’s election. This article, the prologue to a book-in-progress, The Hinge Year – Geopolitical Dislocations and Dispersals, outlines how these events intersect with transformed geoeconomic realities
Courtesy: GLOBSEC
An annual important networking occasion for security experts, the GLOBSEC 2017 Bratislava Forum, had surprisingly little representation from major European countries, such as Germany and France. Russia’s misuse of cyberspace was loudly censured, but Chinese activity in the South China Sea, and the recently concluded Belt and Road Forum received little attention
Courtesy: Selvaraja Rajasegar
Yameen Rasheed (1988-2017), Gateway House contributor, blogger and activist, was always full of sharp insights about his country’s politics
Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
Iran’s former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s disqualification from contesting the May 2017 presidential election has reduced the number of aspirants to six. The winner may well be a contender for the post of next Supreme Leader too
Courtesy: Wikimedia
As the United States considers its policy options towards North Korea it must understand that Pyongyang has been thinking about military conflict for decades. It too will have military plans and they could pose major challenges for the U.S. This is why China and South Korea–and U.S. regional experts too–prefer the diplomatic route
Courtesy: Independent.co.uk
Myanmar’s first democratically elected government in decades completes a year this month, but it has not won widespread appreciation on many counts. Critics have highlighted the areas of darkness, but ignored its many achievements
Courtesy: Wikipedia
Referendums are a way of mobilising society and bringing in exceptional change. Turkey’s third constitutional referendum in the last 10 years, being held on Sunday, April 16, is the greatest of them in many respects as it puts the country on uncharted waters, having it move from one unbalanced system to another
Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
A Pakistani committee has recommended to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif that Gilgit-Baltistan should be declared the country’s fifth province. For 70 years Pakistan has avoided integrating its occupied parts of Kashmir for fear of damaging its legal position. That calculation may now have changed