External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar (L) met China’s State Councilor & Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Bali, Indonesia, July 7, 2022 The G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting at Bali, Indonesia, last week was threatened by the hot lava flowing from Eurasia. Western diplomats tried hard to “isolate” Russia but the indefatigable Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov refused …
India to boost Sakhalin-1 oil output
Sakhalin-1 oil and gas development project is located off the coast of Sakhalin Island in the Russian Far East (File photo) After Sakhalin-2, Moscow also plans to nationalise Sakhalin-1 oil and gas development project by ousting US and Japanese shareholders. But Moscow will make an exception for India so that OVL which holds 20% stake will …
Shinzo Abe: A controversial visionary
‘Sayonara’ – Japan’s controversial statesman Shinzo Abe departs When politicians die, especially an untimely death in tragic circumstances, obituaries tend to go overboard. A sense of perspectives is lost when obituaries become eulogies. But you can’t falsify history. And in the final analysis, it is the forces of history that write the course of politics …
Japan’s Kishida steps on Russian oil slick
Maiden cargo: LNG tanker arrives in Chiba Prefecture, Japan, in 2009 with first shipment from Sakhalin 2 project in Russia The simmering tensions between Moscow and Japan during the past 4-month period of the war in Ukraine surged when the Secretary of the Russian Security Council Nikolay Patrushev sounded the warning at a meeting on …
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EU economies are down on their knees
Russian President Vladimir Putin (L), at a meeting with Defence Minister Sergey Shoigu, revealed proposals of army commanders in Ukraine “for the development of offensive operations”, Moscow, July 4, 2022 On July 1 at the White House, US President Joe Biden made a startling disclosure that “the idea we’re going to be able to click a switch, bring …
Turkey, NATO joined at hips but think differently
US President Joe Biden (R) met Turkish President Recep Erdogan on the sidelines of the NATO Summit in Madrid, June 30, 2022 Turkey has had an uneasy history as a NATO member country. The push and pull of strategic autonomy constantly grated against a security guarantee the alliance offered and also a way of reinforcing its Western …
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India, BRICS in cold war conditions
The phone conversation on Friday between Prime Minister Modi and Russian President Putin conveyed a big signal, coming on the morrow of the release of the new Strategic Concept by NATO which called Russia the alliance’s “most significant and direct threat.” The readouts from Moscow and New Delhi both highlighted the two leaderships’ determination to …
Russia steals the thunder in ‘wheat war’
In a master stroke of military diplomacy, Russian Foreign Ministry announced today that it is “withdrawing” the garrison in Snake Island, the hotly contested Black Sea property from where Ukrainian forces were evicted in March in the early days of Moscow’s special military operation. This decision comes a day after Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and …
US, Iran let hopes shape their future — not hurts
Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani (R) with EU envoy Enrique Mora who will shuttle between the US and Iranian sides at the talks in Doha, Qatar, which began on June 28, 2022 There could be a feeling of déjà vu over the news that indirect talks began between the United States and Iran …
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G7: Cracks in Western unity on Russia
A show of unity, as G7 and European Union leaders met, Schloss Elmau, Bavaria, Germany, June 27, 2022 Ottoman Sultan Abdulmejid spared no expense to build the sumptuous Dolmabahce Palace in Istanbul during 1843 and 1856, which was constructed to impress the world. It had the largest Bohemian crystal chandelier ever installed and fourteen tonnes …