The involvement of Islamists in democratic movements is usually dismissed as a mere ruse to attain political power. However, evidence suggests that people in Muslim-majority democracies support Islamist groups which challenge a dishonest government, rather than those who seek to establish Islamic autocracy.
Apart from bilateral ties, also at play at the India-U.S. Strategic dialogue is the difficult triangulation in India’s relations with the U.S. and Iran. It does not serve India to get enmeshed in the U.S-Iran confrontation. Instead, the relationship must develop on the basis of realpolitik and mutual interest.
Conflict over oil and gas reserves, sectarian rivalries between Shiites and Sunnis and foreign involvement interconnect as sources of instability in the Persian Gulf–Arabian Peninsula.
With turmoil in the Middle East, a drawdown in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Iran-Israel-U.S. conflict, the international community has paid little attention to the democracy of a small group of people - the Bahrainis. More worrisome, however, is that politics now responds to the elite.
What are the implications for India if Iran is attacked? How effective has the response been by gulf nations to their own protests? Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad, India’s former Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, discusses the dynamics of West Asia with Gateway House’s Alisha Pinto and Azadeh Pourzand.
India and China can both satisfy their need for energy security by looking to the Middle East. Further, A trilateral initiative by the US, China, and India in the Gulf would benefit global growth and stability.
Iran was delighted by the Arab Spring, thinking it could have a big influence on the new governments' implementation. But fundamentalist Iranian ambitions remain only partially fulfilled.
The Wahhabis, who now merit NATO backing, continue on their global mission of converting the Muslim Ummah to its relatively harsh and antediluvian ways of thinking and living. For NATO, this is a geopolitical miscalculation that will have tragic security consequences for the alliance within a decade.
What are the implications of the political unrest in the Middle East and North Africa on the global oil market?
India should practice "economic diplomacy" to engage GCC countries as potential sovereign wealth fund investors given the growing importance of Middle Eastern economies in global finance
