Today, Americans are terrified of a pandemic virus whose infection rate has spiked up again. With just four percent of the world’s population, the US already has a quarter of the world’s Covid-19 deaths.
China loomed large over the in-person visit of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defence Secretary Mark T Esper to New Delhi on October 26-27.
The American project was founded on rank hypocrisies. On the one hand, President Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the stirring words in the Declaration of Independence that upheld “these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal”, did not free his own slaves (not even Sally Hemings, who bore him six children).
Think about this, almost half of Americans thinks he’s handling this pandemic swimmingly according to a recent CNN poll that puts him closer to 45 percent.
“Extraordinary times require extraordinary solutions”—that is how Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi summed up the worldwide response to the coronavirus pandemic during a video conference on March 30 with the heads of all of India’s embassies and high commissions across the globe.
As the epicentre of the Covid-19 pandemic shifts from China to the developed West, all too many rich countries are acting selfishly, invoking the “national interest”, by banning exports of vital medical supplies.
The fight in this week’s Democratic primaries may have been about who confronts Donald J Trump in November’s US presidential election, Bernie Sanders or Joe Biden.
Today, about 7.7 billion people call earth their home but our present home (world) is just not that happy of a place—at least, not according to the people living in it. Last year, US-based analytics firm Gallup conducted a global survey, asking 151,000 people in 143 countries
A public apology by a prominent Salafi scholar sheds light on Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman’s version of “moderate Islam”, his effort to shape the Middle East and North Africa in his mould, and the replacement of religion with hyper-nationalism as the source of his legitimacy.
When Bangladesh President Abdul Hamid and leaders of six other BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) countries attended Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s swearing-in ceremony in New Delhi,
POST-PARLIAMENTARY elections, a battle over sub-nationalism along ideological lines is on in West Bengal between Trinamool Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party.
The recent general election in Indonesia had a touch of déjà vu. In both 2014 and 2019, it was Joko Widodo taking on Prabowo Subianto; in both the elections, Widodo, also known as Jokowi, was declared the winner by the Indonesian General Elections Commission (KPU); in both the elections, hardliner former general Subianto rejected the election results and declared himself the winner; and in both the elections, he challenged the results at the Constitutional Court of Indonesia.
Afghanistan is a dangerous place for women. According to a new global index developed by Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security, and the Peace Research Institute of Oslo, Afghanistan is the second worst country for women in the world, after war-ravaged Syria,
The two most commonly used taglines for the Bharatiya Janata Party’s campaign in the just concluded parliamentary elections were “phir ek baar Modi sarkar” and “Modi hai to mumkin hai.” Both have come tellingly true as borne out the poll outcome that gave a much bigger mandate to Prime Minister Narendra Modi than when he came to power for the first time five years ago. It was the Modi factor which made it possible despite the BJP being hobbled by farm sector crisis, job crisis and the economic reforms like demonetisation and Goods and Services Tax which temporarily hit a cross section of people.
US President Donald Trump’s ultra-hawkish National Security Adviser John Bolton has been quoted as saying: “To stop Iran’s bomb, bomb Iran.” Chillingly frightening words indeed—and that too from one of the closest advisers of the most powerful office on earth
Trudging across the world’s largest inhabited island (Majuli) on the Brahmaputra river in Assam for three days carrying EVMs, VVPAT units and other election materials, scaling rugged mountains in eastern Himalayas to reach just one voter in Arunachal Pradesh, walking through the deep snow to the world’s highest battlefield Siachen Glacier, where oxygen is scarce, or risking Maoist ambush in a dense forest—these are just a few vignettes from the Indian parliamentary election, a mind-boggling exercise in the world’s largest democracy, that aim to ensure that no eligible voter is left out.
These days, Harvard Professor Graham Allison is hailed as something of a prophet. Officials he met in China recently referred to him as the man who “predicted” a clash between the United States and China, he says. “It was not a prophesy,” he adds. “I simply pointed out the recurring patterns of histor
