Comment & Briefs

Nawaz Sharif’s sentiments for better relationship with India are laudable in spite of being still premature. There are constituencies within Pakistan for whom Kashmir continues to remain the core issue but the bigger challenge is whether Sharif will be able to bring the army on board.

Changing the political relationship between two rising powers requires that both countries use the opportunity provided by their shared interest in global governance reform to develop close cooperation.

Kenneth Waltz hailed as the ‘King of thought’ was a towering thinker in the field of IR. His two most important works, Man, The State, and War (1959) and Theory of International Politics (1979), provided a framework within which emerged the principal debate in IR.

Timely as it was, the Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s five-day China visit may be considered a success on all fronts. Leading the ‘strongest Australian delegation ever’ to China, Gillard pledged to give the relationship a ‘concrete shape’, which in Chinese Premier Li Kequing’s words, is already ‘comprehensive, constructive and cooperative’. This issue brief analyses Julia Gillard’s China visit in the context of rising Australia-China bonhomie.

In the context of recent Chinese assertiveness in Ladakh, it is important to not only understand Sun Tsu but possibly also to follow him.

Nawaz Sharif having expressed his intentions of improving relations with India will try to give trade a big push. Yet, one should not expect policy changes related to terrorism targeted at India or its aversion to India’s presence in Afghanistan.

The new government to be led by Nawaz Sharif will have to tread a very difficult path to manage, if not solve, the monumental problems that confront the Pakistani state and society.

The External Affairs Minister has returned back from his visit to China. Despite this seemingly happy ending to the sordid border incident, inconvenient questions about China’s intentions and assertiveness persist.

What we are seeing in Pakistan is the ushering in of an anti-democratic Islamic order through the ballot box. What is more, the Pakistan Army has decided to also indirectly ensure that Islam is never “taken out of Pakistan”.

Rockets in the Maoist arsenal may seem, presently, to have nuisance value. However, the possibility of the Maoists acquiring greater capability to fire the rockets with accuracy cannot be ruled out. Many strategic and static locations would come under threat with disastrous consequences.