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With much fanfare, Indian Prime Minister Modi's trip to the United States came to a close September 30. However, beyond catchy slogans, are current Indo-US space cooperative initiatives living up to their full potential? Will space help India and the U.S. move forward together for a better world?

Nearly 20 million people in Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen are facing what has been described as the largest food crisis in the world in 70 years. Conflict is the main reason behind these famines, abetted by drought, climate change, poverty, and the existing vulnerability of the people in these countries. Security issues have led to a dramatic decline in agricultural production and have adversely affected the supply and distribution of

In all the hype and hyperbole about what to do with coal blocks, the plain fact is that the real danger lies in our coal reserves turning valueless for the country, of no benefit to the owner - the people of the land. They will be value less if we don't extract them before they turn un-burnable by climate action a few decades from now.

I have no problem with military officers running a nation as long as they are out of uniform and have won the mandate to do so. But when a military officer ousts a legitimate civilian government, refuses to shed his uniform and abuses the basic democratic right of franchise, there is a reason for the civilized world to be alarmed and ashamed. Such men are a blot on the democratic, civilized world.

The EU’s push for multilateralism on developing a vaccine against COVID-19 comes amidst fraying international relations

Joint efforts within the ISA, progress in nuclear energy, and advancements in green hydrogen highlight India and France's mutual commitment to promoti

After sending out confusing signal for months, France may have chosen the worst possible moment for intervention. Because its procrastinations allowed a whole range of potential opponents to mingle and be jointly prepared just in case the French did intervene.

France has continued to remain one of India’s trusted strategic partners, with cooperation extending across many issues.

Franco-German cooperation can mitigate the rise of the European Right, lead the EU’s post-COVID19 economic recovery, and strengthen the EU’s defen

The FRDI Bill creates a process, with early-warning systems in place to alert regulators and the government about the risk on financial institutions,

In this digital age, how free speech is dealt with in a multipolar world, and the emergence of the new and complex forms of censorship were discussed in a talk on "Rethinking Media Freedom in the Digital Age" at the Observer Research Foundation.

India pulled out of the planned Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) in 2018 after entering negotiations in 2013. India has a trade deficit with 11 out of the 15 RCEP countries and some analysts have theorised that India decided to opt out of the agreement because of such adverse trade balance.  Indeed, India has a trade deficit with most of its trade partners in past free trade agreements (FTAs). It is in this context that this br

The quotas in textiles, enforced under the Multi Fibre Agreement (MFA) which was signed in 1994, are going to be lifted on December 31, 2004 and the trade in textiles would come under the WTO directly. It means that all forms of protectionism applied to textile industries the world over, would have to go.

The COP21 was at the heart of the conversation on July 28 at the French Embassy in India, where the fifth in a monthly series of talks leading up to the Paris conference was held in partnership with Observer Research Foundation.

Should the story of the French in Syrian custody become public in France, the voters will ask: did the government sanction illegal entry of our soldiers into foreign countries? Is the Syrian rebellion an imported rebellion?

India’s relations with China involve the four C’s — conflict, competition, cooperation and containment. The areas of conflict are well known — the border, and China’s relationship with Pakistan.

Although Modi could not make Japan his first foreign destination as PM, he has kept the essence of his promise that he would attach special significance to ties with Tokyo. His trip to Japan is his first bilateral diplomatic engagement outside the subcontinent.

The amazingly imbalanced judgement on Binayak Sen handed down by the Chattisgarh court has some lessons for all. Basically, intellectuals are being put on notice. Don't cross the Red Line otherwise this will be your fate.

If the ISIS is not brought under control, the chances are that it could spread to Pakistan, especially Waziristan, a tribal region which plays host to most terror outfits. This could in turn affect India by means of border infiltrations.

The Taliban, ably helped by Pakistan, the US’s frontline ally in its global war on terror, has badly dented the notion of US invincibility. Despite President Joe Biden’s efforts in recent months to reassure allies that “America is back”, there is a wariness about both US commitment and its competence.

China remains a superpower in the making but its journey has now become profoundly more difficult

This year’s theme for the Earth Day, ‘Invest in our planet’, is a pivotal point in history as the need to adapt and mitigate the triple planetar

This paper evaluates deficiencies in India’s naval shipbuilding programme, and identifies factors that adversely impact naval warship construction in the country. It argues that despite considerable effort, India’s shipbuilding endeavours continue to suffer from systemic deficits that cannot be addressed through ad hoc policy interventions and short-term solutions. Through an assessment of strengths and weaknesses of India’s defence shipyar

The 77-paragraph outcomes statement from the Ufa BRICS summit was inevitably going to be a list of ideas that would cater to different expectations and aspirations of each of its members.

The Rohingyas are among the world’s most persecuted communities, who, until a mass exodus in 2017, mainly resided in Myanmar’s Rakhine State. In 2017, about 712,179 Rohingyas made their way to Bangladesh, taking the total number of Rohingya refugees in that country to 855,000.[1]The overcrowding caused by this influx at the Cox’s Bazar refugee camps has led the Bangladesh government to consider temporarily relocating the Rohingya refugees t

The Vice-President of Maldives, in his address to the ORF faculty, recounts the long and bitter-sweet struggle against autocratic rule in his country. With an elected government now at the helm and democracy gradually taking roots in different spheres of society, he outlines the crucial challenges that lie ahead for the island nation.

If there is one thing on which all the ¿Dravidian parties¿ of Tamil Nadu stand united today, it is their criticism of the Union budget, presented by fellow Tamil leader Palaniappan Chidambaram. In doing so the DMK, the PMK and the MDMK, allies of the Congress at the Centre, have restricted their criticism to the proposed tax on the daily withdrawal of money from one¿s own bank account.

By delineating bilateral relations from the larger SAARC format, and at the same time taking them up after the Islamabad summit had addressed major agendas, India and Pakistan have done well for themselves and for the region ¿ without continuing to hold one the hostage of the other.

The BCIM Forum has come a long way, but there are still challenges. Clearing the geopolitical air may prove more beneficial on both domestic as well as international levels, than keeping them in the shadows.

Eighty-eight innocent civilians, about 60 of them Egyptians, and the remaining believed to be foreign tourists, were killed in three well-synchronised explosions by unidentified terrorist elements at the Red Sea resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt on July 23,2005.The city is a popular tourist resort on the Red Sea at the tip of the Sinai Peninsula.

Nomenclature notwithstanding, the evolution of an Indian National Security Industrial Complex (NSIC) must be watched with interest and caution.

The debate on the extent of private participation covers not only public goods within a country but also global goods that transcend boundaries: c

Despite sharing a close historical relationship based on the Soviet Union’s support during the 1971 Liberation War, Bangladesh had for long been out of the scope of Russia’s foreign policy priorities. This is best exemplified by the fact that no Soviet/Russian foreign minister had visited the country until September 2023. However, amid Western sanctions due to its war in Ukraine and tensions with the US, Russia is seeking to reinvigorate ties

Tantalising tit-bits of information relating to the links between jihadi terrorists in Pakistan and Egypt and in Egypt and the UK have been given in an editorial on the Sharm el-Sheikh blasts carried by the "Daily Times", the prestigious daily of Lahore, on July 25,2005. The editorial titled "Terrorist Link Between Egypt and Pakistan " makes the following salient points:

Japan's efforts to elevate its cybersecurity are transforming its defence capabilities across land, sea, air, and outer space, marking a shift in its

This paper analyses India’s participation in more than two decades of global climate politics. India has transitioned from a protest voice on the fringes of global climate policy to one that is actively shaping international efforts to combat climate change. Analysis of the drivers behind India’s negotiating positions on climate change thus far has focused on the competing motives of equity and co-benefits, which has however been insufficient

Underlying all practical steps between India and France is a shared strategic vision, particularly driven by the strategic uncertainties around China’s rise and its growing assertiveness.

Starting this week, ORF brings you the main events that have taken place in the week gone by in India's neighbourhood, from Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Maldives and Sri Lanka

In the 21st century, ideas and thoughts travel across the globe with considerable speed. And, areas inhabited by those whose ancestors belonged to ancient civilisations like our own are engaged in battles that are ideological and sectarian. Essentially, these are about dominance and reversion to a way of life pitted against those who want the systems changed.

The tech industry in India has a major gender imbalance. Can AI be leveraged to mitigate this issue?

India needs to foster the integration of spatial computing into education to capitalise on its transformative benefits

A year and a half since United States (US) President Joe Biden took the helm, both sides of the country’s political divide continue to debate whether the incumbent’s China policy is distinct from that of the Trump administration. The Republicans claim that Biden’s China policy has not veered away from Trump’s; the Democrats, meanwhile, argue that it is different. This brief weighs in on the debate, and finds that despite the Biden

Indian foreign policy will have to respond to the meta-trends by crafting an approach that is more than just the sum of its bilateral and multilateral