Istanbul

Istanbul:  Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Monday boycotted the speech by Indian Minister V.K Singh over Kashmir at the Heart of Asia Conference here. As soon as Singh started speaking at the Heart of Asia Conference, which aims to promote durable peace and stability in Afghanistan, the Pakistan Foreign Minister left his seat and walked out of the conference. He boycotted the Indian minister's speech in a mark of protest over India's move to revoke special status for Kashmir, according to tweets posted by Pakistani officials from the venue. In September, Qureshi had similarly boycotted Indian External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar's speech at a SAARC ministerial meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York. As soon as Jaishankar had got up to speak, the Pakistani minister left the room. Once Jaishankar finished his address and left, Qureshi had made his re-entry. Earlier on Monday, the two-day Eighth Heart of Asia - Istanbul Process was … [Read more...] about Pakistan Foreign Minister Boycotts Indian Minister’s Speech At Istanbul Meet

Whenever I hear One Belt, One Road, like many others, I think of the famous ancient Silk Road which developed over many centuries, with one form of it dating back to the Han Dynasty (206 BC to 220 AD) and further developed in the Tang Dynasty (618- 907 AD).This reflected the period in which today’s Xi’an was the capital of China and on my regular visits to Xi’an in the last 10 years, I wondered what it would have been like to head west from there all those centuries ago. However, the term Silk Road (reflecting trade in silk, horses and other items) was only commonly used to describe that route from the 19th Century. A famous city at the Western end of the Asian continent and a city partly in Asia and partly in Europe was, and is, Istanbul in Turkey (thinking back to the Ottoman Empire), which I have also visited - but by plane. In the ancient days, ships had to be used to cross into Europe once in Istanbul, but since 1973 when the first of three bridges were … [Read more...] about Reflections on the Belt and Road Initiative

Ankara: The United Nation`s (UN) special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings, Agnes Callamard, leading the investigations into deceased scribe Jamal Khashoggi`s death, on Thursday confirmed that evidence showed the latter to be victim of "a brutal and premeditated killing, planned and perpetrated by officials of the state of Saudi Arabia". Al Jazeera reported that Callamard had heard recordings of Khashoggi`s last moments.  The tapes, which are in Turkey`s possession, have been previously shared with USA`s Central Intelligence Agency`s (CIA) Director Gina Haspel and countries like the UK, France, Germany amongst others. "Woefully inadequate time and access were granted to Turkish investigators to conduct a professional and effective crime-scene examination and search required by international standards for investigation," Callamard said. A statement issued by the UN on the gruesome killing of the former Washington Post columnist revealed that Saudi Arabia "seriously undermined" … [Read more...] about Jamal Khashoggi killing ‘planned and perpetrated by Saudi Arabia’: UN