Bhutan

The coming election campaigns in Bhutan may not focus much on the country’s relations with India and China. They are more likely to be based on internal governance issues. For instance, the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party(PDP) led by Prime Minister Topgay, is now filtering candidates on the basis of their performance at the constituency level. It is reported that at...

Colombo, February 8 (newsin.asia): Wednesday’s stunning performance by a symphony orchestra comprising Sri Lankan and Indian musicians under the baton of Indo-American Viswa Subbaraman, led the audience to believe that it was time South Asia, torn by conflicts for the last 70 years, eschewed animosities and conflicts and got together to revive those strands of South Asian history which had...

New Delhi, August 11: The Bhutanese government has once again reportedly referred to its foreign ministry statement issued about six weeks ago that Doklam is Bhutanese territory, thereby rejecting a recent Chinese claim that Bhutan had agreed the area belongs to China, Asian Age reports.. “Official sources in the Bhutanese government” were quoted as telling an Indian news agency over...

The unfolding realities underlying the Sino-Indian standoff over the border in Doklam are clearly bringing out serious flaws in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “Neighborhood First” policy, writes P.K.Balachandran in www.southasianmonitor.com The “Neighborhood First’ policy enunciated in 2014 as India’s new foreign policy “mantra” has not achieved what it was meant to achieve. Instead of generating friendly feelings towards India, with...

New Delhi, July 22 (South Asian Monitor):A month into the border standoff between India and China at the tri-junction with Bhutan, Pakistan’s High Commissioner in India, Abdul Basit, has waded into the Doklam row. The High Commissioner is learnt to have met the Chinese and Bhutanese envoys in New Delhi this week. While it is not unusual for the envoys...

By Frances Bulathsinghala Colombo, April 23 (www.southasianmonitor.com):  Concealed from privileged city dwellers, tucked away from posh tourist resorts and invisible to policy makers are the rubbish dumps in the cities of South Asia. But the thick wall of apathy cracked on April 14 when a 300 ft high mountain of garbage, allowed to build up for years in the low-lying Colombo suburb of Meetotamulla in Kolonnawa, came crashing, killing at least 33...

By P.K.Balachandran/South Asian Monitor Colombo, April 15: The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) launched in 1997, is an ambitious effort to integrate the countries around the Bay of Bengal. The Bay of Bengal region has striking commonalities in culture and religion. It has  had very close trade and cultural relations from ancient times until...