- Of reforms and funerals in Communist China
December 23, 2013
The recent Third Plenum of the Chinese Communist Party admitted that ‘reforms’ would decide the destiny of modern China. A statement of the Central Committee spoke of “the need to deepen reforms in order to build a moderately prosperous society, and a strong and democratic country, as well as realize the Chinese dream of national rejuvenation.”
- Nehru was no friend of the Tibetan cause
December 10, 2013
During the recent Assembly Elections, ‘Common Men’ have created history in India; for the first time, the dominance of established political parties has been challenged. In the future, parties will have to seriously think of the vox populi.
- China’s claim on Arunachal Pradesh fake
December 3, 2013
Look at this map: in the left corner between Bhutan and the rest of Arunachal, there is dark green patch, corresponding more or less to the Tawang district. Why is Tawang depicted in a different colour?
- A new Chinese aggression
November 27, 2013
China has done it again. One would have thought that after the 4 day- Plenum of the 18th CPC Central Committee (held from November 9 to 12) that the new leadership would have began focusing their energies on reforms; but no, they have taken a most controversial and dangerous course, destabilizing the region and upsetting the neighbours.
- A small step for India
November 21, 2013
Indian politicians are not idiots; it is just that they are aware of what can bring them ‘returns’; the Moon or Mars cannot. While Bharat Ratna awardee, C.N.R. Rao stated: “Why the hell these idiots have given so little for us”, he missed this point, though he was right to add:
- Sardar Patel had vision to address needs of border States
November 11, 2013
It was raining and cold outside. I was sitting with my local hosts around a smokeless chula installed in the center of the main room of their house. I was in Menchuka, the remotest large village before the McMahon Line dividing India and China, in West Siang district of Arunachal Pradesh.
- Manmohan’s China visit defies strategic logic
October 20, 2013
Why is Prime Minister Manmohan Singh heading towards China? I am unable to answer this question; in fact, there is no economic, diplomatic or strategic logic. Of course, it is said that he would like ‘to prioritize investment and business by easing norms for business and tourist visas’ as well as reduce border tensions. But is the timing right?
- Chinese incursions: Bhutan suffers alongside India
October 15, 2013
The Indian press recently reported that China was building ‘a massive infrastructure in Bhutan’. A report of Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), India’s external intelligence agency, apparently warned that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) had constructed a new road from Gotsa to Lepola via Pamlung.
- China losing battle against pollution, Tibet is next
October 8, 2013
Do you know why the Chinese love Tibet so much?
It is simple, they breathe better on the Roof of the World.
Scientific research conducted by the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau Research Institute of China Academy of Sciences shows that the air quality of the Namtso Lake situated in southern Tibet, east of Lhasa is as good as that of Antarctica.
- Stalinist policies won’t help China in the long run
September 24, 2013
On August 19, an important meeting was held in Beijing; President Xi Jinping is said to have ordered “in-depth propaganda and education in socialism with Chinese characteristics so as to hold people of all ethnic groups in the nation in unity and cohesion under the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics.”
- China calling shots in Nepal
September 16, 2013
While South Block meditates on the Chinese intrusions in Ladakh, even forgetting others in the Middle Sector and the Eastern Sector, the Chinese quietly advance their pawns in other border areas too; one of them is Nepal.
- Nepal: Emerging new Chinese colony to crush free Tibet move
September 9, 2013
Nepal is fast becoming a full-fledged colony of China with Nepali leaders repeating what Beijing tells them to say, even using Chinese Communist jargon.
- China’s Marxist assault on the internet
September 5, 2013
The new leadership in Beijing has shown the way it intends to go: Bo Xilai, Chongqing’s discredited Party secretary (and former member of the CPC’s Political Bureau) has been sentenced to life imprisonment.
- China must go beyond one-party system
August 29, 2013
In the early 1970s, the CIA published for its agents, a manual entitled: “The Art of China Watching”. At that time, the CIA wrote, “by most standards, China is a peculiar country”. Forty years later, China has not changed much; it remains difficult to grasp the moves and motives of a self-proclaimed ‘more transparent’ leadership.
- A no-win situation for Tibet
August 20, 2013
A few years ago on a visit to France, I came across a large number of newspaper articles written just after Mao Zedong’s People’s Liberation Army invaded Tibet in October 1950.
- China wants to turn Tibet into an amusement park
August 11, 2013
China is a strange country. While its new leaders dream of a modern nation with a scientific outlook, some of China’s present practices take us back to the darkest days of Mao’s era. Where has the glasnost gone?
- China’s Army needs reform, Xi has work to do
September 16, 2013
August 1 is important date in China.
On that day in 1927, the Nanchang Uprising took place: following the dissolution of the first Kuomintang-Communist Party of China ‘United Front’ (alliance), several senior Communists leaders led by Zhu De, He Long and Zhou Enlai rebelled against the Kuomintang.
- Chinese intrusions will not stop
July 24, 2013
They have done it again. According to media reports, Chinese troops walked into what India considers its side of the LAC; in one of the five reported incursions, they would have come as close as 2 km to the Indian posts. The novelty is that on July 16-17, the Chinese troops used horses and ponies to cross the LAC.
- Chinese soldiers lose sanity controlling peaceful Tibetan protesters
July 16, 2013
Last week, during their annual Strategic and Economic Dialogue, Chinese State Councilor Yang Jiechi and Deputy Secretary of State William Burns had some wide-ranging discussions. During the two-day talks, Burns asked his Chinese counterpart about the fate of the Tibetans and Uighurs in the People’s Republic.
- China plays game of unpredictability, India falls for it
July 6, 2013
Have you heard of ‘atsaras’? They are important characters in the Tibetan monastic dance, the Cham. The traditional esoteric dance of Tibet is a sort of initiation for ordinary folks to the highest mysteries of Mahayana Buddhism. Lay spectators and monks assemble once in a year to witness the battle between good and evil.
- Nehru gave away Aksai Chin to China
June 18, 2013
The Special Representatives (SR) of India and China will hold the 16th round of talks on their disputed border.
Not much has been achieved so far; the best proof was of this that the Chinese could walk into India’s territory with impunity, pitch their tents for 3 weeks in Depsang Plains in the vicinity of the Karakoram pass in Ladakh and go back without any serious consequences on Sino-Indian relations.
- China uses economic retribution to control other countries
June 18, 2013
Everyone knows that China is an irritable country. And if you irritate China there is a price to pay. This was openly asserted on a blog published recently by The People’s Daily. Chinascope, the website which translated the posting into English, explains: “The People’s Republic of China often chooses economic retribution as a means to control other countries’ actions.”
- China, US play snooping game, India miles behind
June 12, 2013
Was it a Great Master coup by President Xi?
A few weeks ago, US President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping of China decided to meet for a week-end at a luxurious desert estate known as Sunnylands in southern California.
- India looking the wrong side
June 4, 2013
China has the unpleasant habit to peep into everybody’s computers. In India, it is not a major issue as the nation was too busy trying to guess (if not bet on) the next move of the BCCI president. But it bothers others; quoting a new US report prepared by the Defense Science Board, Reuters recently mentioned Washington’s worries:
- The border according to China
May 20, 2013
During the year 1960, long negotiations were held between India and China over their ‘disputed’ border. The background of these talks was the visit to Delhi of Zhou-Enlai, the Chinese Premier early that year and his offer to ‘solve’ the issue.
- China excels in making fakes, but religion is not its cup of tea
May 13, 2013
A couple of years ago, a Chinese site mentioned Château Lafitte, one of the most famous vintage Bordeaux wine. The site gave this surprising information: “Château Lafitte Rothschild, a wine estate in France, produces 15,000 to 25,000 cases of wine annually, or about 200,000 bottles.
- China’s great dream smells of resentment
May 6, 2013
Everyone knows that China is an irritable country. And if you irritate China there is a price to pay. This was openly asserted on a blog published recently by The People’s Daily. Chinascope, the website which translated the posting into English, explains: “The People’s Republic of China often chooses economic retribution as a means to control other countries’ actions.”
- China’s dream is India’s nightmare
April 29, 2013
Whatever happens in the future in Ladakh, India has already lost the battle. Even if the Chinese agree to withdraw, they will still claim that particular area near the Karakoram pass as theirs and this, forever.
- Nepal is the new Chinese colony
April 20, 2013
The Chinese are slowly invading Nepal. Last month, AFP reported that ‘China eyes India trade by boosting spending in Nepal’. The news agency stated that China’s ambassador to Kathmandu was recently seen in a traditional Nepali cap and silk scarf, digging with a spade to symbolise the laying of the foundations of a new land port on the Tibet border.
- Tragedy in Tibet reveals Chinese Government’s exploitation
April 13, 2013
On March 29, China’s State media reported that 83 miners had presumably died following a major landslide at the site of a gold mine in Gyama Valley, near the Tibetan capital, Lhasa. A few days later, 66 miners were confirmed dead and 17 were declared missing despite massive rescue efforts.
- China’s water war on India
April 5, 2013
As ‘emergent’ leaders returned from the BRICS meeting in South Africa, PTI reported that Manmohan Singh had ventured to ask the new Chinese President Xi Jinping to set up a joint mechanism for the dams being built on the Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibet (known downstream as Siang and Brahmaputra).
- Tibet has brought good luck to more one Chinese leader
March 22, 2013
Why do Chinese leaders love Tibet so much?
Perhaps because a posting on the Roof of the World seems to bring Communist officials ‘good luck’ in their career.
The latest senior cadre to experience this is the 47-year-old Qin Yizhi who served as a vice-chairman of Tibet’s regional government.
- No such thing as a ‘Chinese model’
March 16, 2013
After 115 cardinals elected a new pontiff on St Peter’s throne, White Smoke billowed from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel in Rome. The same morning, although a new Emperor had just been selected in the Middle Kingdom, nobody could see the White Smoke over the Great Hall of People from Tiananmen Square.
- Corruption equals communism in China
March 6, 2013
Xi Jinping will soon be President of the Peoples’ Republic of China. It is not an easy job. Xi, who was elected Party boss at the end of the 18th Chinese Communist Party Congress in November 2012, will have to tackle myriad problems, the first being the corruption within the Communist Party.
- China disarming India without fighting
February 24, 2013
More than 2,000 years back, Sun Tzu, the author of the Art of War wrote, “For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill; to subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill.”
- China speaks with forked tongue
February 17, 2013
‘Esteemed monks: Tibetan religious policy better than ever’, said a recent title on China Tibet Online, an official website of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
- Ghost of Zhao Ziyang still haunts China’s new leadership
February 1, 2013
Eight years after former Chinese Communist Party’s General Secretary (and earlier Premier), Zhao Ziyang passed away, the new leadership in Beijing is still afraid of Zhao’s ghost and tightly controls whatever is happening around his residence.
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