India reaches nuke agreement with Canada
On November 28, 2009, India reached a civil nuclear agreement with Canada. The agreement was firmed up during a meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his counterpart Stephen Harper on the sidelines of the Commonwealth Summit.
Canada has become the eighth country with which India has reached civil nuclear agreement since the NSG lifted a 34-year-old ban on India to join global nuclear trade in September last year. The other countries with which India has already signed the civil nuclear deal are the US, France, Russia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Argentina and Namibia.
China protests against Dalai Lama’s Tawang visit
The Chinese rhetoric against India for the Dalai Lama’s visit to Arunachal Pradesh in November 2009 picked up again with a State-run newspaper running a report that said the Tibetan spiritual leader undertook the Arunachal visit under pressure from New Delhi. India rubbished the assessment and took the opportunity to remind China that the Dalai Lama was free to travel anywhere in the country.
Though the Chinese government has refrained from directly attacking India since the meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, it is significant that China’s state-run media ran a report attacking India over the visit of the Dalai Lama.
“India may make use of the Dalai Lama to solve the decades-long territorial conflict by encouraging his visit to southern Tibet (Arunachal Pradesh),” Hu Shisheng, a researcher of southern Asian studies at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, was quoted as saying. China calls Arunachal Pradesh southern Tibet.
“The Dalai Lama went to southern Tibet at this critical moment probably because of pressure from India... By doing so, he can please the country that has hosted him for years,” Mr Hu said. He added: “India may have forgotten the lesson of 1962, when its repeated provocation resulted in military clashes. India is on this wrong track again...When the conflict gets sharper and sharper, the Chinese government will have to face it and solve it in a way India has designed,” Mr Hu said.
China had protested against the visit of the Dalai Lama to Tawang monastery in Arunachal Pradesh, but India had dismissed the protests by pointing out that the Dalai Lama continues to be a guest in India.
Responding to that attack, the Dalai Lama dismissed China’s claim that his visit was anti-China and had said that Arunachal was an integral part of India.
Genisis of the dispute: In 1913-14, China, Tibet and Britain tried to hammer out the Shimla Accord—a deal defining borders between Inner and Outer Tibet, and between Outer Tibet and British India. Henry McMahon, a British administrator, drew up 550 miles of the boundary demarcating British India and Outer Tibet. China walked out of the talks, rejecting the line between Inner and Outer Tibet, but the Accord nonetheless ceded Tawang and other Tibetan areas to the British Empire. Since then, China has declared the line invalid, citing the absence of its signature on the Shimla Accord. After the collapse of Chinese power in Tibet, the McMahon line was, de facto, accepted as official, and Britain established administrations in the area. However, Tibet and later the People’s Republic of China claimed Tawang district after India's independence. With China all set to take over Tibet, India declared the McMahon line the official boundary in 1950.
The North East Frontier Agency was created in 1954. The Tibetan uprising was suppressed by China and its self-ruling government abolished in 1959. The Dalai Lama fled to Dharamsala, and maps published by the Tibetan government-in-exile now show McMahon Line as the southern border of Tibet.
During the 1962 war, China acquired large parts of NEFA but voluntarily withdrew to the McMahon line. It was only in 1985 that China declared its ownership claims on the eastern tract roughly corresponding to Arunachal Pradesh. Until then, it was prepared to cede this land to India if it was given the cold western desert of Aksai Chin in Ladakh, of strategic importance to China. India rejects China’s claims over both, and post-1985 China has insisted that Arunachal Pradesh is theirs.
India, EU ink atomic energy pact
On November 6, 2009, India and the European Union (EU) signed a major accord for cooperation in the civil atomic energy field and pledged to conclude an ambitious free trade agreement (FTA) between them within a year. The atomic energy agreement is aimed at facilitating India’s participation in the international thermonuclear experimental reactor (ITER) project for fusion research.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh led the Indian side at the 10th India-EU summit while the EU was represented by Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, in his capacity as chairman of the EU Council and EU President Jose Manuel Barroso.
The ITER project on fusion energy is said to be the costliest experiment of its kind that will cost some 10 billion euros. The first fusion reactor is expected to be operational in Cadarche in southern France by 2016.
India and the EU have been negotiating an FTA since 2007 but have not been able to firm up the accord due to differences over EU’s attempts to link trade with climate and other extraneous issues. Both sides are of the view that a political push was need for the agreement to be wrapped up by 2010.
In a joint statement the two sides shared the understanding that the development of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes should take place in conformity with the highest standards of safety, security and non-proliferation. The joint statement further said India and the EU welcomed the renewed momentum in global disarmament talks while reaffirming their shared interest in working together for disarmament and for countering the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems. In this context, they stressed the importance of strengthening national export control laws.
On terrorism, the EU condemned the terrorist attacks in Mumbai in November 2008 and reiterated the need for intensifying global cooperation in combating international terrorism. Without any reference to Pakistan, the two sides emphasised the utmost importance of bringing the perpetrators of the crime to justice.
On international financial crisis and global economy, the two sides reiterated their commitment to continue to sustain a strong policy response until the recovery was secured, to prepare internationally coordinated and cooperative exit strategies to be implemented once the recovery has taken hold, to strengthen and reform financial regulatory and supervisory systems to ensure global financial stability and prevent further crises, and to ensure that the international financial institutions reflect contemporary economic realities.
French Parliament ratifies N-deal with India
Even as India and the United States iron out their differences over the reprocessing of the spent nuclear fuel under the 123 agreement, the French Parliament has ratified the India-France nuclear accord, paving the way for French nuclear giants to build nuclear plants in India.
The French National Assembly adopted a law authorising the ratification of the agreement signed between the two countries on September 30, 2008, during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Paris. This is subsequent to the adoption of the same law by the Senate on October 15, 2009.
It will enable the early entry into force of the agreement. It now paves the way for strengthening relations between French and Indian partners and for more concrete developments in the industrial field.
France was the first country to sign a civil nuclear cooperation agreement with New Delhi days after India secured a waiver from the nuclear suppliers’ group (NSG) to undertake nuclear commerce in 2008. Since then, India has signed nuclear deals with the US, Russia, Namibia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Argentina.
French nuclear supplier Areva has been allocated the nuclear project site at Jaitapur in Maharashtra to initially build two power plants.
The Indo-French nuclear agreement allows reprocessing of the spent nuclear fuel from French nuclear reactors under safeguards, and gives an assurance of lifetime supply of nuclear fuel for these reactors. It does not bar the transfer of enrichment and reprocessing technologies. With the ratification of the agreement by the French Parliament, France becomes the second country after Russia to give unconditional rights to reprocess spent nuclear fuel to India.
The agreement makes it mandatory that reprocessing be done under the safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
SCANDALS
CBI pegs Satyam fraud at Rs 14,000 cr
Seven months after its first charge sheet in the Satyam scam, CBI on November 24, 2009, filed a supplementary charge sheet against disgraced Satyam founder B. Ramalinga Raju and nine others, pegging the Satyam fraud at Rs 14,000 crore instead of the Rs 7800 crore that Raju had owned up to in January 2009.
The additional charge-sheet, however, fails to nail Raju and aides on siphoning of funds from Satyam Computer, instead saying that the investigating agency was planning to file a separate chargesheet on the allegations of funds diversion and income-tax frauds within the next few days.
The 200-page charge-sheet filed in the CBI court charged the accused of forging board resolutions and unauthorisedly obtaining loans worth Rs 1220 crore from banks as well as inflating Satyam revenues to the tune of Rs 430 crore by creating fake customers and generating fake invoices.
The charge-sheet also identifies 1065 properties with a documented value of Rs 350 crore that were acquired by the Rajus with the spoils of the fraud. These include 6,000 acres of land, 40,000 sq yd of housing plots and 90,000 sq ft of built-up property.
CBI has also slapped charges of criminal breach of trust and falsifying accounts by inflating the acquisition price of Nipuna Services Ltd, the ITeS arm of Satyam. It also slapped a criminal breach of trust on them in the declaration and disbursal of dividends of Satyam Computers.
Meanwhile, the Rs 1,220 crore unauthorized loans detailed by CBI in the charge-sheet are not reflected in the company's books and are over and above the Rs 1,230 crore that Raju confessed to Satyam having received from various Raju family owned companies including Maytas Infra and Maytas Properties.
Madhu Koda arrested for mining and money laundering
The Jharkhand Vigilance Bureau has arrested former Chief Minister Madhu Koda in the multi-crore mining and money laundering case. A joint team of Jharkhand Police and State vigilance bureau arrested Mr Koda after he repeatedly refused to respond to summons from the Enforcement Directorate for questioning. Mr Koda described his arrest as part of Congress’ conspiracy to keep him away from election campaigning.
Mr Koda is alleged to have laundered thousands of crores during his stint as the Chief Minister between 2006 and 2008. ED’s probe into the money laundering operation, which is spread from Singapore to Thailand and from Dubai to Liberia, is set to balloon into one of the biggest bribery and corruption scandals in the country.
NAGALAND
Assembly hails rebel groups
The Nagaland State Legislative Assembly has extended ‘recognition’ to the Naga undergrounds for having “selflessly worked, fought and sacrificed” for the aspirations and rights of the Naga people. This ‘recognition’ as a resolution was adopted in the State Assembly on November 29, 2009, even as talks between the government of India and the NSCN(IM) have yet to reach a conclusive stage. The resolution was passed unanimously with members cutting across party lines to support it.
The State Assembly also reiterated its earlier stand on integration of all Naga-inhabited areas in the region, an issue that also figures prominently on the NSCN agenda.
The Nagaland Assembly has so far passed four resolutions in favour of integration of Naga areas—first on December 12, 1964, followed by August 28, 1970, September 16, 1994 and December 18, 2003. The 60-member House in the resolution also appealed the negotiating parties of the Naga political dialogue to expedite the political process and bring about an early resolution through a negotiated settlement which was honourable and acceptable to the Naga people.
The State Assembly, through its resolution, also appreciated the government of India, particularly Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram for their “renewed sincerity” towards finding a permanent solution to the decades-old “Indo-Naga” political problem.
The resolution also appreciated the civil society, churches, NGOs and the Forum for Naga Reconciliation (FNR) for their all out efforts towards reconciliation, understanding and oneness of all sections of Naga society. The resolution also hailed the sincerity of the underground groups, especially their commitment towards peace and understanding by signing the “Covenant of Reconciliation” earlier at Chiangmai in Thailand on September 23, 2009.
The resolution further decided to constitute a Joint Parliamentary Committee on the Naga political issue comprising members from all political parties. This committee would carry the voice of the House to all concerned sections including the Centre and the Naga rebel groups.
TERRORISM; LAW & ORDER
Centre ready with anti-Naxal plan
Home Minister P. Chidambaram announced on November 1, 2009 that the Union government is a ready to launch the much-awaited full-fledged anti-Naxal operations in three different areas, considered tri-junctions of Maoist violence.
The tri-junctions, which have been identified for the offensive against the ‘Red Rebels’, are: Andhra Pradesh-Maharashtra-Chhattisgarh; Orissa-Jharkhand-Chhattisgarh and West Bengal-Jharkhand-Orissa.
Around 40,000 paramilitary personnel would assist the respective State police forces during the operations. Almost 7,000 specially trained troops in jungle warfare are also part of the total strength of the Central forces to be deployed for the task.
The anti-Naxal plan also includes Rs 7,300 crore package for unleashing developmental works in areas cleared off the Left-wing extremists. Officials feel that the Naxal menace, which has now spread to 40,000 sq km area across the country, can be wiped out in a period of 12 to 30 months.
Around 25 lakh people live in areas where Maoists are now having a free run. The Naxalites have killed more than 2,600 people, including civilians, in 5,800 incidents in last three years.
On November 28, 2009, India reached a civil nuclear agreement with Canada. The agreement was firmed up during a meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his counterpart Stephen Harper on the sidelines of the Commonwealth Summit.
Canada has become the eighth country with which India has reached civil nuclear agreement since the NSG lifted a 34-year-old ban on India to join global nuclear trade in September last year. The other countries with which India has already signed the civil nuclear deal are the US, France, Russia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Argentina and Namibia.
China protests against Dalai Lama’s Tawang visit
The Chinese rhetoric against India for the Dalai Lama’s visit to Arunachal Pradesh in November 2009 picked up again with a State-run newspaper running a report that said the Tibetan spiritual leader undertook the Arunachal visit under pressure from New Delhi. India rubbished the assessment and took the opportunity to remind China that the Dalai Lama was free to travel anywhere in the country.
Though the Chinese government has refrained from directly attacking India since the meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, it is significant that China’s state-run media ran a report attacking India over the visit of the Dalai Lama.
“India may make use of the Dalai Lama to solve the decades-long territorial conflict by encouraging his visit to southern Tibet (Arunachal Pradesh),” Hu Shisheng, a researcher of southern Asian studies at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, was quoted as saying. China calls Arunachal Pradesh southern Tibet.
“The Dalai Lama went to southern Tibet at this critical moment probably because of pressure from India... By doing so, he can please the country that has hosted him for years,” Mr Hu said. He added: “India may have forgotten the lesson of 1962, when its repeated provocation resulted in military clashes. India is on this wrong track again...When the conflict gets sharper and sharper, the Chinese government will have to face it and solve it in a way India has designed,” Mr Hu said.
China had protested against the visit of the Dalai Lama to Tawang monastery in Arunachal Pradesh, but India had dismissed the protests by pointing out that the Dalai Lama continues to be a guest in India.
Responding to that attack, the Dalai Lama dismissed China’s claim that his visit was anti-China and had said that Arunachal was an integral part of India.
Genisis of the dispute: In 1913-14, China, Tibet and Britain tried to hammer out the Shimla Accord—a deal defining borders between Inner and Outer Tibet, and between Outer Tibet and British India. Henry McMahon, a British administrator, drew up 550 miles of the boundary demarcating British India and Outer Tibet. China walked out of the talks, rejecting the line between Inner and Outer Tibet, but the Accord nonetheless ceded Tawang and other Tibetan areas to the British Empire. Since then, China has declared the line invalid, citing the absence of its signature on the Shimla Accord. After the collapse of Chinese power in Tibet, the McMahon line was, de facto, accepted as official, and Britain established administrations in the area. However, Tibet and later the People’s Republic of China claimed Tawang district after India's independence. With China all set to take over Tibet, India declared the McMahon line the official boundary in 1950.
The North East Frontier Agency was created in 1954. The Tibetan uprising was suppressed by China and its self-ruling government abolished in 1959. The Dalai Lama fled to Dharamsala, and maps published by the Tibetan government-in-exile now show McMahon Line as the southern border of Tibet.
During the 1962 war, China acquired large parts of NEFA but voluntarily withdrew to the McMahon line. It was only in 1985 that China declared its ownership claims on the eastern tract roughly corresponding to Arunachal Pradesh. Until then, it was prepared to cede this land to India if it was given the cold western desert of Aksai Chin in Ladakh, of strategic importance to China. India rejects China’s claims over both, and post-1985 China has insisted that Arunachal Pradesh is theirs.
India, EU ink atomic energy pact
On November 6, 2009, India and the European Union (EU) signed a major accord for cooperation in the civil atomic energy field and pledged to conclude an ambitious free trade agreement (FTA) between them within a year. The atomic energy agreement is aimed at facilitating India’s participation in the international thermonuclear experimental reactor (ITER) project for fusion research.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh led the Indian side at the 10th India-EU summit while the EU was represented by Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, in his capacity as chairman of the EU Council and EU President Jose Manuel Barroso.
The ITER project on fusion energy is said to be the costliest experiment of its kind that will cost some 10 billion euros. The first fusion reactor is expected to be operational in Cadarche in southern France by 2016.
India and the EU have been negotiating an FTA since 2007 but have not been able to firm up the accord due to differences over EU’s attempts to link trade with climate and other extraneous issues. Both sides are of the view that a political push was need for the agreement to be wrapped up by 2010.
In a joint statement the two sides shared the understanding that the development of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes should take place in conformity with the highest standards of safety, security and non-proliferation. The joint statement further said India and the EU welcomed the renewed momentum in global disarmament talks while reaffirming their shared interest in working together for disarmament and for countering the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems. In this context, they stressed the importance of strengthening national export control laws.
On terrorism, the EU condemned the terrorist attacks in Mumbai in November 2008 and reiterated the need for intensifying global cooperation in combating international terrorism. Without any reference to Pakistan, the two sides emphasised the utmost importance of bringing the perpetrators of the crime to justice.
On international financial crisis and global economy, the two sides reiterated their commitment to continue to sustain a strong policy response until the recovery was secured, to prepare internationally coordinated and cooperative exit strategies to be implemented once the recovery has taken hold, to strengthen and reform financial regulatory and supervisory systems to ensure global financial stability and prevent further crises, and to ensure that the international financial institutions reflect contemporary economic realities.
French Parliament ratifies N-deal with India
Even as India and the United States iron out their differences over the reprocessing of the spent nuclear fuel under the 123 agreement, the French Parliament has ratified the India-France nuclear accord, paving the way for French nuclear giants to build nuclear plants in India.
The French National Assembly adopted a law authorising the ratification of the agreement signed between the two countries on September 30, 2008, during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Paris. This is subsequent to the adoption of the same law by the Senate on October 15, 2009.
It will enable the early entry into force of the agreement. It now paves the way for strengthening relations between French and Indian partners and for more concrete developments in the industrial field.
France was the first country to sign a civil nuclear cooperation agreement with New Delhi days after India secured a waiver from the nuclear suppliers’ group (NSG) to undertake nuclear commerce in 2008. Since then, India has signed nuclear deals with the US, Russia, Namibia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Argentina.
French nuclear supplier Areva has been allocated the nuclear project site at Jaitapur in Maharashtra to initially build two power plants.
The Indo-French nuclear agreement allows reprocessing of the spent nuclear fuel from French nuclear reactors under safeguards, and gives an assurance of lifetime supply of nuclear fuel for these reactors. It does not bar the transfer of enrichment and reprocessing technologies. With the ratification of the agreement by the French Parliament, France becomes the second country after Russia to give unconditional rights to reprocess spent nuclear fuel to India.
The agreement makes it mandatory that reprocessing be done under the safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
SCANDALS
CBI pegs Satyam fraud at Rs 14,000 cr
Seven months after its first charge sheet in the Satyam scam, CBI on November 24, 2009, filed a supplementary charge sheet against disgraced Satyam founder B. Ramalinga Raju and nine others, pegging the Satyam fraud at Rs 14,000 crore instead of the Rs 7800 crore that Raju had owned up to in January 2009.
The additional charge-sheet, however, fails to nail Raju and aides on siphoning of funds from Satyam Computer, instead saying that the investigating agency was planning to file a separate chargesheet on the allegations of funds diversion and income-tax frauds within the next few days.
The 200-page charge-sheet filed in the CBI court charged the accused of forging board resolutions and unauthorisedly obtaining loans worth Rs 1220 crore from banks as well as inflating Satyam revenues to the tune of Rs 430 crore by creating fake customers and generating fake invoices.
The charge-sheet also identifies 1065 properties with a documented value of Rs 350 crore that were acquired by the Rajus with the spoils of the fraud. These include 6,000 acres of land, 40,000 sq yd of housing plots and 90,000 sq ft of built-up property.
CBI has also slapped charges of criminal breach of trust and falsifying accounts by inflating the acquisition price of Nipuna Services Ltd, the ITeS arm of Satyam. It also slapped a criminal breach of trust on them in the declaration and disbursal of dividends of Satyam Computers.
Meanwhile, the Rs 1,220 crore unauthorized loans detailed by CBI in the charge-sheet are not reflected in the company's books and are over and above the Rs 1,230 crore that Raju confessed to Satyam having received from various Raju family owned companies including Maytas Infra and Maytas Properties.
Madhu Koda arrested for mining and money laundering
The Jharkhand Vigilance Bureau has arrested former Chief Minister Madhu Koda in the multi-crore mining and money laundering case. A joint team of Jharkhand Police and State vigilance bureau arrested Mr Koda after he repeatedly refused to respond to summons from the Enforcement Directorate for questioning. Mr Koda described his arrest as part of Congress’ conspiracy to keep him away from election campaigning.
Mr Koda is alleged to have laundered thousands of crores during his stint as the Chief Minister between 2006 and 2008. ED’s probe into the money laundering operation, which is spread from Singapore to Thailand and from Dubai to Liberia, is set to balloon into one of the biggest bribery and corruption scandals in the country.
NAGALAND
Assembly hails rebel groups
The Nagaland State Legislative Assembly has extended ‘recognition’ to the Naga undergrounds for having “selflessly worked, fought and sacrificed” for the aspirations and rights of the Naga people. This ‘recognition’ as a resolution was adopted in the State Assembly on November 29, 2009, even as talks between the government of India and the NSCN(IM) have yet to reach a conclusive stage. The resolution was passed unanimously with members cutting across party lines to support it.
The State Assembly also reiterated its earlier stand on integration of all Naga-inhabited areas in the region, an issue that also figures prominently on the NSCN agenda.
The Nagaland Assembly has so far passed four resolutions in favour of integration of Naga areas—first on December 12, 1964, followed by August 28, 1970, September 16, 1994 and December 18, 2003. The 60-member House in the resolution also appealed the negotiating parties of the Naga political dialogue to expedite the political process and bring about an early resolution through a negotiated settlement which was honourable and acceptable to the Naga people.
The State Assembly, through its resolution, also appreciated the government of India, particularly Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram for their “renewed sincerity” towards finding a permanent solution to the decades-old “Indo-Naga” political problem.
The resolution also appreciated the civil society, churches, NGOs and the Forum for Naga Reconciliation (FNR) for their all out efforts towards reconciliation, understanding and oneness of all sections of Naga society. The resolution also hailed the sincerity of the underground groups, especially their commitment towards peace and understanding by signing the “Covenant of Reconciliation” earlier at Chiangmai in Thailand on September 23, 2009.
The resolution further decided to constitute a Joint Parliamentary Committee on the Naga political issue comprising members from all political parties. This committee would carry the voice of the House to all concerned sections including the Centre and the Naga rebel groups.
TERRORISM; LAW & ORDER
Centre ready with anti-Naxal plan
Home Minister P. Chidambaram announced on November 1, 2009 that the Union government is a ready to launch the much-awaited full-fledged anti-Naxal operations in three different areas, considered tri-junctions of Maoist violence.
The tri-junctions, which have been identified for the offensive against the ‘Red Rebels’, are: Andhra Pradesh-Maharashtra-Chhattisgarh; Orissa-Jharkhand-Chhattisgarh and West Bengal-Jharkhand-Orissa.
Around 40,000 paramilitary personnel would assist the respective State police forces during the operations. Almost 7,000 specially trained troops in jungle warfare are also part of the total strength of the Central forces to be deployed for the task.
The anti-Naxal plan also includes Rs 7,300 crore package for unleashing developmental works in areas cleared off the Left-wing extremists. Officials feel that the Naxal menace, which has now spread to 40,000 sq km area across the country, can be wiped out in a period of 12 to 30 months.
Around 25 lakh people live in areas where Maoists are now having a free run. The Naxalites have killed more than 2,600 people, including civilians, in 5,800 incidents in last three years.
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