Srinath Raghavan’s broad and detailed swathe of the US-South Asia relationship beautifully brings out the inherent contradiction in the heart of US policy.
For oil-importing India, the combination of a weaker currency and surging oil prices is a threat not only for the current-account deficit, but also inflation.
Apart from complaining to the WTO that India's export subsidies were hurting US companies, the latter has also put India on its currency manipulators watch-list.
The Italian term sprezzatura—a studied nonchalance that conceals intention—best captures the spirit of Trump’s foreign policy so far. The pattern is unpredictability, transactionalism, and disruption as diplomacy.
With 20.2 percent of its total loans in default by the end of last year, Bangladesh had the weakest banking system in Asia. Despite reforms, it will take time to recover.
This world is being restructured and redrawn by one man, and what’s his power? It’s not his formidable military. It’s trade. With China, it turned on him.
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