Section: Gateway House Indian Council on Global Relations (India)
Syria: energy battles to regional alliances
The following article is the transcript of an interview conducted by Gateway House of Huricihan Islamoglu, Professor of Economic History at Bogazici University, Istanbul, Turkey and a Senior Fellow, Institut d’Etudes Avancées de Nantes, Nantes, France. Gateway House (GH): Popular Western discourse views Sunni-Shia sectarian differences, and...
Can Tillerson reset US-Russia ties?
US President elect Donald Trump has picked Rex Tillerson, Chairman and CEO of ExxonMobil, to be his secretary of state. Tillerson will be the fourth businessperson–after Wilbur Ross, Steven Mnuchin and Andrew Puzder–to have joined the Trump administration and is easily the most high-profile as head of one of the largest global companies. His...
Indian foreign policy: a paradigm shift?
This article was first delivered as a speech earlier this month at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, inaugurating the Rajni Kothari Memorial Lecture Series Indian foreign policy is undergoing a paradigm shift. It has had several such shifts over the last seven decades, but over the course of time, these have amounted to continuity....
French polls: a foregone conclusion?
The French will elect their president in May 2017, but, in all likelihood, 10% of the 45 million-strong electorate may have already made a definitive decision about who the next president will be. Under the French electoral system, citizens elect the president directly through a two-round election. If none of the candidates gets an absolute...
Russia’s zero sum games in Asia
Although President Putin’s extraordinary and somewhat contentious foreign policy initiatives have been the hallmark of his third presidential term, it took the scheduling of the on-going maiden Russian military exercises with Pakistan to focus the Indian strategic community on Russian objectives and power-plays in Asia. This attention has...
Eastern Economic Forum: India misses out
The Second Eastern Economic Forum held in Vladivostok, Russia on 3-5 September 2016 saw some important opportunities for Asian cross-regional cooperation, but only lacklustre participation from India. According to Far East development minister Alexander Galushka, more than 3,000 people from 60 countries took part in the forum, resulting in over...
Brexit, NATO, EU: emerging dichotomies
Two events, whose timing may have been coincidental, highlight the complex challenges confronting the west. The first was Brexit – whereby, after 43 years, the UK decided to leave the EU on 23 June via a nationwide referendum. The second was the biennial NATO summit in Warsaw that concluded on 9 July and focused on the perceived security threat...
The dislocations of Brexit: can India gain?
On 23rd June 2016, citizens of the United Kingdom (UK) shocked the world especially their European partners by voting to leave -“Brexit” – the European Union (EU). Equally upset was the United States (U.S.), whose president had campaigned against Brexit. The U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry lamented that Brexit constituted the loss of his...
Discussions in a disorderly world
For a third time I had the opportunity to attend the Global Security forum at Bratislava from 15 to 17th April. This forum came into being ten years ago. Since then, it has developed into the most high-profile security conference in Central Europe. It is sponsored by the governments of the Czech Republic and Slovakia and is supported by NATO and...
Resolving referendum roadblocks
On April 6, Eurosceptics claimed an important victory when Dutch voters rejected the European Union’s Association Agreement with Ukraine in a referendum[1]. The agreement would have established a free trade area between the two sides and is seen as a first step towards EU membership for Ukraine. The vote was probably based on concerns among...
