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ndia aircraft carrier: New Delhi launches first home-built carrier
Since the Battle of Midway in World War II, the weapon that has most defined naval power is the aircraft carrier.
By enabling countries to deploy air power far from their own shores, carriers have become the unit by which modern navies are measured. Only a handful of countries have them and can build them, with the majority of such vessels in the hands of the US Navy.
So it’s no small thing that India today launched its first domestically built carrier. With the first-phase launch of what will eventually be named the INS Vikrant, India joins an elite club of countries that have built their own carriers: Only the United States, Russia, France, and Britain have done the same.
The Vikrant weighs in at 37,500 tons, and will carry up to 36 aircraft, reports The Times of India. Though Read more…
Governments falling short in drought fight: UN
Animal footprints are visible in dry and cracked mud on the bank of the half-full Bewl water reservoir in Kent on April 5, 2012. Governments worldwide are failing to do enough to tackle drought, which lacks the headline-making punch of a hurricane but can have an equally devastating human and economic impact, the UN weather agency warn.
Governments worldwide are failing to do enough to tackle drought, which lacks the headline-making punch of a hurricane but can have an equally devastating human and economic impact, the UN weather agency warned Thursday.
“A flood or hurricane is over within hours or days. A drought can last weeks, months, a season, a year. But droughts can cause as many deaths over time as any other natural disaster,” said Robert Stefanski, head of World Meteorological Organisation?s (WMO) agriculture division.
Droughts in recent years have struck regions ranging from the Horn of Africa and the Sahel, China, India, Mexico and Brazil to the United States, Russia and southeastern Europe.
Droughts are estimated to affect tens of millions of people and cause tens of billions of dollars in economic losses every year.
They are expected to increase in frequency, area and intensity due to climate change, yet Read more…
1 billion face starvation worldwide if India, Pakistan unleash nukes: study
More than a billion people around the world would face starvation if India and Pakistan unleash nuclear weapons — even if that war is regionally limited, a study released Tuesday warned.
That’s because the deadly and polluting weapons would cause major worldwide climate disruption that would dramatically drive down food production in China, the United States and other countries.
“The grim prospect of nuclear famine requires a fundamental change in our thinking about nuclear weapons,” said study author Dr. Ira Helfand of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War.
“The new evidence that even the relatively small nuclear arsenals of countries such as India and Pakistan could cause long lasting, global damage to the Earth’s ecosystems and threaten hundreds of millions of already malnourished people demands that action be taken,” Helfand said in a statement.
“The needless and preventable Read more…
India to test nuclear missile that can hit Beijing
This Agni-IV nuclear-capable missile is a forerunner of the Agni-V, which India plans to test as early as this week. (Saurabh Das/AP Photo)NEW DELHI (AP) — India is planning to test launch a new nuclear-capable missile that for the first time would give it the capability of hitting the major Chinese cities of Beijing and Shanghai.
The government has hailed the Agni-V missile, with a range of 5,000 kilometers (3,100 miles), as a major boost to its efforts to counter China’s regional dominance and become an Asian power in its own right. The test launch was slated to come as early as Wednesday evening, but Indian media said a delay was likely because of poor weather conditions.
“It will be a quantum leap in India’s strategic capability,” said Ravi Gupta, spokesman for India’s Defense Research and Development Organization, which built the missile.
China is far Read more…
India surpasses China as Iran’s top oil client
FILE - In this Monday, July 19, 2010 file photo, a part of the South Pars gas field facility is seen on the northern coast of Persian Gulf, in Assalouyeh, Iran. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi, File)
GENEVA: India has vaulted to the top of the list of Iran’s oil customers, overtaking China, in a first-quarter buying surge ahead of tighter sanctions against Tehran this summer, data published by a leading industry consultant showed.
Direct imports to India from Iran were 433,000 barrels per day in the first quarter, compared with 256,000 barrels per day to China, according to data compiled by Geneva’s Petrologistics and seen by Reuters via an industry source.
The Indian import figure was up by around 23 percent from the 351,0000 bpd imported over the same period of 2011 and significantly above its 2011 average of 326,000 bpd.
Iran, like many oil exporters, does not publish its own oil sales data on a timely basis. The Petrologistics figures, however, reinforce indications that India has stepped up imports, while business has slowed between Tehran and Beijing over payment terms.
“The first quarter was likely the exception to the rule … China took a strong stance on negotiations, but its imports will Read more…
BRICS Move To Replace Dollar With “Super-Sovereign” Global Currency
Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa launch attack to to replace the dollar with an single Chinese denominated “super-Sovereign” global currency.
As China is expected to rise to the status of a financial super power within the next 8 years and eclipse the US economy by 2020 Africa becomes center stage in the greatest currency war the world has seen since the 1930s which is now shifting into overdrive.
Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, collectively known as the BRICS nations, are moving forward with their plan to unseat the US dollar from its throne as the global trade currency and to replace it with a Chinese denominated “super-sovereign” international currency.
This Geo-political game to establish global monetary dominance is by no means limited to the attack on the US dollar.
Instead this is merely the first strike of a concerted campaign of worldwide economic Read more…
Sino-India military exchanges to help build more trust: China
Days after India and China agreed to have maritime cooperation, Beijing has favoured greater military ties with New Delhi, saying such exchanges would help build more “confidence and trust” between the two countries.
“Exchanges between our militaries will help us build more confidence and trust with each other,” Deputy Director General of Asian Department in the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs Sun Weidong said.
His remarks came ahead of President Hu Jintao’s visit to New Delhi from Wednesday to participate in the fourth BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit.
“Our military people are positive about military cooperation and exchange of visits with India. I think China and India are strategic partners military exchanges and cooperation are part of the partnership,” Sun said.
India had suspended Read more…
Military spending in South-East Asia
THE tiny island-state of Singapore, home to just over 5m people, has a well-deserved reputation as a quiet, clean-cut hub for banking, lawyering and golf. Yet beyond the fairways it bristles with weapons.
According to a report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Singapore is now the fifth-largest arms importer in the world, bested only by some obvious behemoths—China, India and Pakistan—plus South Korea. Singapore accounts for 4% of the world’s total spending on arms imports. Its defence spending per head beats every country bar America, Israel and Kuwait. This year $9.7 billion, or 24% of the national budget, will go on defence.
These are striking figures, but then Singapore has been one of the Read more…
China Ups Military Spending
China’s announcement of a more than 11 percent increase in declared military spending, following two full decades of double-digit increases, raises several uncomfortable questions for Asia and the West. It’s natural for a rising power like China to develop capabilities to defend its expanding array of interests. On the other hand, China’s ascent has been made possible by a benign security environment that well served China’s goal of “peaceful development.” China’s growing military capabilities now threaten to upset that order in ways that, ironically, could complicate China’s security environment at the same time as slowing economic growth intensifies its internal challenges.China’s defense spending – now officially $106 billion but estimated by the Pentagon and independent researchers to be more than $160 billion – is on track to exceed that of all its Asian neighbors combined within a few years. This is particularly striking in light of a wider Asian arms race: India is the world’s Read more…
BRIC countries consider their own multilateral development bank
India is proposing the creation of a multilateral bank to exclusively finance projects in BRIC countries, Bloomberg reported.
Bloomberg cited an Indian official who told the news service the plan is likely to be discussed at this weekend’s Group of 20 finance ministers meeting in Mexico City. The official said the plan was in an early, exploratory phase but had been circulated among the BRICs and shared with South African officials, Bloomberg noted.
The BRIC countries are Brazil, Russia, India and China. As it’s described now, the proposed bank would be funded exclusively by developing nations and finance projects in only those nations.
Reuters reported that Brazilian finance minister Guido Mantega is sympathetic to the idea.
Emerging market economies have in recent years become a larger driver of global growth than more established markets. They have been pushing for greater representation at the World Bank and IMF as their clout in the global economy has grown.
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