India and the politics of Covid pandemic

World Health Assembly, decision-making body of WHO, meets in Geneva every May. This year’s is a virtual meeting. File photo The World Health Assembly’s virtual meeting on May 18-19 has brought into focus the politics of the Covid-19 pandemic in the international arena. The WHA is the decision-making body of the 194-member World Health Organisation (WHO).  …

Trump and Putin revisit the “Spirit of the Elbe”

Soviet officers and American soldiers met up at the Elbe River near Torgau, Germany, 25th April, 1945   Unusual for a Saturday evening, the White House and the Kremlin upgraded their websites simultaneously to feature a joint statement by the two presidents on “Commemorating the 75th Anniversary of the Meeting on the Elbe” (here and …

Covid-19 has a grandma, grandpa and great grandpa. Where are they?

The 76-day Covid-19 shutdown in Wuhan, China, was lifted on April 7, 2020. The search for the genesis of Covid-19 is developing into an epic story. Thanks to the insinuations by the US President Donald Trump — ‘China virus’, ‘Wuhan virus’, etc. — that were explosive in their political and strategic content, Beijing is now …

Why the OPEC+ deal is a many-splendoured thing

Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered a speech proposing a summit in September of the “founder countries of the United Nations, the five states that hold special responsibility to save civilisation,” Jerusalem, Israel, January 23, 2020 A perfect deal is where all protagonists get something out of it. All oil-producing countries stand to gain if oil …

We desperate Indians also need ventilators, Mr. Trump

President Trump’s crowded White House press conferences to discuss the coronavirus have become daily events, Washington, DC, March 13, 2020  It often puzzles me what transpires during high-level visits by world leaders. The substantive content of such events laced with pomp and glory impacting inter-state relations is generally handled by sherpas, quietly and unobtrusively. (Of …