India in Central Asia: Time for a New Strategy
This paper introduces the dilemma of both India and Russia, whose state-owned energy companies are forced to operate in a region where Chinese government corporations have been dominant.
This paper introduces the dilemma of both India and Russia, whose state-owned energy companies are forced to operate in a region where Chinese government corporations have been dominant.
Growing instability in the region make the planned Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline seem more like a burden than a solution to India’s hunt for alternative energy sources. Is it wise for India to move ahead with the $7.6 billion project?
The completion of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline is significant to secure a constant supply of natural gas to India. Since this pipeline passes through Afghanistan and Pakistan, both restive regions, security concerns have triggered wide debate on its viability.
Corruption has become a galling global phenomenon: structured, vertically-integrated networks, whose objective is the extraction of resources, are forming in countries around the globe. And strikingly, these structures are masquerading as democratically-elected, seemingly-open governments.
Kyrgyzstan has remained politically unstable for the past few decades and many of its leaders have been ousted, President Kurmanbek Bakiyev being the most recent. What makes Kyrgyzstan this unusual place, with an ability to chase out its leaders when so many others in the world cannot succeed in doing so?
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh met with Kazakh President Nazarbayev to strengthen ties and announced a Joint Action plan for 2011-14. Should the countries enhance their “arms-length transactional” relationship, a deeper alliance can be forged to include untapped sectors with immense potential
The India-Kazakhstan relationship is in need of a massive overhaul. Manmohan Singh’s visit to Astana is full of possibilities that can transform the relationship from a short-sighted association into a broad-based, strategic, long-term one focusing on energy, security, trade and technology.