Central Asia
Asia’s secret nuclear arms race
For all the hoopla about North Korea, a far more significant threat on the Asian continent is getting virtually no coverage: the nuclear arms race between China and India.
Tag: Great Game
South Asia
Nepalese Maoists betray Indian Maoists
Nepalese Maoist leader Prachanda sent a condolence letter to Sonia Gandhi over the attack by Maoist Naxalite guerillas in which 27 were killed, including a brutal paramilitary chief.
Central Asia
China-India border face-off amid Tibet unrest
India is protesting what it calls an incursion by some 30 Chinese troops from across the Line of Control in the Himalayas, while Tibetans charge stepped up repression.
Planet Watch
Arctic Great Game in Alaska missile deployment?
As the Pentagon adds 14 interceptors to its anti-missile system in Alaska, some observers see a design on Arctic resources also sought by competitors Russia and China.
Iran
Iran-China pipeline route via restive regions
A new pipeline that would link Iran to China via Pakistan, bypassing the strategic Strait of Hormuz, would pass through the insurgent regions of Baluchistan, Kashmir and Xinjiang.
Afghanistan
Afghanistan: 20,000 troops to remain?
Gen. John R. Allen, outgoing US commander in Afghanistan, submitted military options to the Pentagon that would keep 6,000 to 20,000 troops in the country after 2014.
Central Asia
China: Han-Tibetan solidarity emerging
Human rights lawyer Xu Zhiyong, who defends Chinese peasants struggling to keep their lands, proclaims his support for the Tibetans and calls for Han solidarity with their cause.
Afghanistan
China launches bid to undermine trans-Afghan pipeline project
A Chinese proposal for a pipeline route across northern Afghanistan for Caspian Basin gas could sabotage the US-backed Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) project.
Afghanistan
Putin: victory to NATO in Afghanistan!
Vladimir Putin called upon NATO to stay in Afghanistan until it has prevailed over the insurgency. He spoke at the inauguration of a new NATO transit hub at Ulyanovsk.
Central Asia
Central Asia opium wars escalate
Tajikistan sealed its border with Afghanistan after clashes with armed rebels left 48 dead—a re-escalation of conflict over control of the cross-border traffic in Afghan opium.
Iran
GIG
As in the Venezuela crisis, Donald Trump, the great enthusiast for dictators, is making a cynical pretense of concern for democracy in Iran. Fortunately, his latest bit of exploitation of the Iranian protesters has blown up in his face. Noting the anniversary of the 1979 revolution, he issued a tweet featuring a meme with an image of a student protester from the 2017 anti-austerity uprising and the words: "40 years of corruption. 40 years of repression. 40 years of terror. The regime in Iran has produced only #40YearsofFailure." Now, the courageous photographer who snapped the image at the University of Tehran in December 2017, Yalda Moayeri, comes forward to express her outrage at its co-optation by Trump. Alas, Masih Alinejad, the Iranian-American feminist who last week met with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, seems not to get how she is endangering opposition activists in Iran, allowing the regime to paint them as pawns of imperialism. (Image via @realDonaldTrump)
Greater Middle East
mosque147
Talk about strange bedfellows! This week witnessed the surreal spectacle of US National Security Adviser John Bolton, the most bellicose neoconservative in the Trump administration, visiting Turkey to try to forestall an Ankara attack radical-left, anarchist-leaning Kurdish fighters that the Pentagon has been backing to fight ISIS in Syria. "We don't think the Turks ought to undertake military action that's not fully coordinated with and agreed to by the United States," Bolton told reporters. Refering to the Kurdish YPG militia, a Turkish presidential spokesman responded: "That a terror organization cannot be allied with the US is self-evident." Bolton left Turkey without meeting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who then publicly dissed the National Security Adviser's stance as a "serious mistake." YPG spokesman Nuri Mahmud, in turn, shot back: "Turkey, which has been a jihadist safe-haven and passage route to Syria since the beginning of the conflict, has plans to invade the region end destroy the democracy created by blood of sons and daughters of this people." (Photo: ANF)