Kabul knot for India; Nirmala sees no recession; Nancy Pelosi dares China in Taiwan
Opinion Watch
The drone killing of al-Qaeda face Ayman al-Zawahiri by the US on the order of President Joe Biden signals the western world bracing up to give up on the Doha Acord that allowed the Taliban to take power in Afghanistan.
The Taliban broke the Doha Accord that specifically mandated that the Afghan soil wouldn’t be used to shelter terrorists.
Within a few months of taking over the power in Kabul, the Taliban sheltered Ayman al-Zawahiri in the heart of the city.
All the newspapers in India have commented on the killing of the face of al-Qaeda, with common theme in which they have cautioned India from legitimizing the Taliban regime.
The Indian Express cited that a UN Committee had flagged the Taliban breaking the Doha Accord in June itself.
But the daily doesn’t inform that by the same time the joint secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs JP Singh along with a delegation of officials was sipping tea with the top leadership of the Taliban.
The newspapers have ran through the terror career of Ayman al-Zawahiri, while pointing out that the franchise model of al-Qaeda has now been taken over by its various offshoots in Iraq, Syria, Indian subcontinent, North Africa and elsewhere.
Nirmala sees no recession
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman replied to the discussions in both the Houses of Parliament after the Short-Hour discussion under Rule 193, and asserted that India neither needs to fear slipping in recession or stagflation.
Most of the newspapers have commented on Sitharaman’s claims, with some of them arguing that even while India may not go into a technical recession, the inflation remains high at 7.01 per cent, above the comfort level of the Reserve Bank of India.
The newspapers has also quoted the International Monetary Fund scaling down India’s growth projections.
Deccan Herald in its Edit has noted that while the IMF’s projection for the world economy is gloomy India slightly fares better.
The Economic Times has contrasted India’s growth rates with that of the US and China, while noting that there will be lesser demands for the Indian goods in some of the largest trading partners of the country.
The daily stays short to dig deeper, and ignores that India’s slowing down is much more disappointing and there’s no ground for comparison with China or the US, which have seen decades of high growth.
Nancy Pelosi dares China in Taiwan
Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan has been the top story for the world since Tuesday evening, and yet only The Hindu could come out with an Edit on the development, which threatens to bring war closer to India.
“Ms. Pelosi is the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit Taiwan in 25 years — the first by a House Speaker since Newt Gingrich’s trip in 1997. That visit took place in the aftermath of the third Taiwan Strait crisis, when China conducted missile tests in response to then Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui visiting the U.S.,” reminded TH.
The daily further added “that the visit appears to have been driven largely by Ms. Pelosi, who has been sharply critical of China’s policies in Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong, rather than by the Biden administration, has not appeared to have assuaged Beijing”.
However, the daily seems to have missed out on the larger context in which Pelosi visit to Taiwan fits in, and that’s the world order meltdown in the aftermath of Russian invasion of Ukraine and the Covid-19 pandemic.
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