Current Affairs

Date: 18 January 2020

Quiet, for now

Phase one trade deal
NOTE: It is a temporary truce that leaves the key issues of the trade dispute unresolved.
It still leaves intact nearly 3/4th of punitive tariffs slapped on China.
China is to buy $200-billion in goods and services in the coming 2 years.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He

Agricultural exports form the smallest proportion of the latest offers relative to manufactured goods and services.

China has given assurances to remove barriers for American banking, insurance and other financial services.
IP protection and alleged forced technology transfers.
Washington has invoked provisions on threats to its national security to punish adversaries.
Mr. Trump has said that negotiations on a phase two agreement would begin immediately and even hinted that he could travel to Beijing.
Questions over government control of China’s state-owned firms and industrial subsidies — at the core the bilateral dispute — are not expected to be resolved until after the 2020 U.S. Presidential elections.

Raisina dialogue organised by the Ministry of External Affairs and Observer Research Foundation at New Delhi.

There has been a significant increase in radicalisation among young people in Kashmir — “girls and boys as young as 10-12”, included.
He suggested that youth should be “isolated from radicalisation in a gradual way” and to be “taken out separately and possibly taken into some deradicalisation camps”.
He also revealed that such camps existed in the country.
There is no doubt that radicalisation must be countered at all levels, whether in Kashmir or elsewhere.
Decade ago: terrorism and violence had reduced drastically when compared to the 1990s.
Today, the ground has become fertile for the revival of radicalism

Deradicalisation is best achieved through effective teaching and incorporation of civic studies in the school curriculum for children who are getting radicalised due to the prevailing circumstances in the Valley.
Besides this, there has to be an administrative outreach to the citizenry not to give in to radical demands and the rhetoric of extremists.

Cancelled or put on hold a number of high-profile State contracts and projects.
It will be extremely hard for the State to attract foreign investors in future.
Without investments, it will be harder for the State to raise the revenues it needs for social programmes and economic development.
For Amaravati, Mr. Naidu was trying to transform a rural area into a massive, advanced greenfield city.
Today, over four years after Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid Amaravati’s foundation stone, little is there save a number of temporary government office buildings.
Neighbouring business-friendly Hyderabad has attracted many ambitious Andhra Pradesh residents and foreign investors.
Cancelling multiple high-profile public projects may imperil CM’s ability to deliver on his most important goal: to create new jobs and opportunities in the State.

Legal challenges
Stakeholders have a real voice in the outcome?
Investors look to the overall commercial environment before deciding whether to commit funds.
Create governing rules and bureaucracies that are more durable than any one leader or administration.

Any new Indian State government must take into account the Modi government’s encouragement of competitive federalism.
Newly-elected governments certainly have the right to review potentially unjust or unwarranted deals.
However, a State must be careful to provide explicit and clear evidence when making its case to trigger such reviews

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