The North Korean Conundrum

The United States (US) Secretary of State Mr Rex Tillerson has just concluded his first East Asia trip with visits to Japan, South Korea and China. Today, the major security challenge which the new Trump administration faces, apart from the Islamic terrorism, is brazen approach of North Korea. Particularly, during his campaign phase Donald Trump had indicated that he would like to take a more business like attitude in regards to this region and is not keen to guarantee military cover to this region free of cost.

AJEY LELE

Two Decades of OPCW

April 29, 2017

On April 29,1997,the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), the first ever multilateral disarmament agreement entered into force along with the birth of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), an international chemical weapons disarmament regime, after years of negotiations under the auspices of United Nation’s Conference on Disarmament. and Preparatory Commission. The OPCW’s objective is to accomplish the Convention’s mandate ‘to end the development, production, stockpiling, transfer and use of chemical weapons’. It also has to ensure the ‘elimination of existing stocks of such weapons’. Two decade later, on the twentieth anniversary of OPCW it is imperative to recollect the journey so far and also to ascertain whether the regime succeeded in making the world safer from the threat of chemical weapons or warfare.This issue brief takes a broad overview of the journey of CWC and OPCW during the last two decades.

Reuters: "Bangladesh's missing militant link: the threat from abroad"

August 03, 2016

When Bangladeshi authorities last month released the names of 261 men who have gone missing from their families, in an attempt to find militants hidden in this country of 160 million people, at the very end of the list was "Jilani alias Abu Zidal".

He was not in Bangladesh. The young man, an engineering school dropout, travelled to Syria last year to fight for Islamic State. In April, IS announced he was blown to bits during battle by a 23-millimeter gun, the sort used to shoot down aircraft. 

Strengthening India’s External Intelligence Infrastructure: An Assessment

In absence of a national security strategy (NSS), the task of intelligence agencies in India has failed to be systemic. India’s intelligence infrastructure lacks a holistic view and very less effort has been put to reorganize intelligence infrastructure on the basis of contemporary threat perceptions. Without a strong security infrastructure country cannot eye towards becoming a regional power. Due to a rigid security system, India has a disparate intelligence mechanism in service. While little effort has gone towards synergizing all sources of intelligence and request dissemination in real time/ near real time basis. This paper attempts to outline a number of points, which would help to develop a more superior external intelligence infrastructure.

SHANTANU K. BANSAL
August 2016
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