US Defe­nce Secretary Lloyd J. Austin said on Wednesday that his talks with visiting Pakistan Army Chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa focused on the long-standing partnership between the two defence establishments and on areas of mutual interest. Underlining the importance of this partnership in a tweet he posted on his official site, Secretary Austin noted that this year marks the 75th anniversary of relations between the United States and Pakistan. In a separate statement, his office said that on Oct 4, Secretary Austin hosted Gen Bajwa at the Pentagon during the 75th anniversary of relations between the United States and Pakistan. “This long-standing partnership continues today with discussions focused on opportunities to address key mutual defence interests,” the Pentagon said. ISPR says Gen Bajwa, defence secretary discussed cooperation in various fields The military’s media department, ISPR, also highlighted this point in its statement, saying that the two leaders also discussed the “regional security situation and bilateral cooperation in various fields”. Additional points in the ISPR statement included the need for continued assistance from Pakistan’s global partner for the rehabilitation of flood victims in Pakistan and enhancing trade and economic ties between the two allies. “Both sides had convergence on major international issues, including Afghan­istan,” and also on the “need for cooperation to avoid humanitarian crisis and improving peace and stability in the region”. Diplomatic sources in Washington, however, say that the talks with US officials focused on renewing the strong defence partnership that once existed between the two allies. Diplomatic observers view this effort against the backdrop of a recent announcement by the US State Depar­tment that it has asked Cong­ress to release $450 million for the sustenance of Pakis­tan’s fleet of F-16 aircraft. After the announcement, the US rejected India’s criticism that those planes would be used against New...

As the United Arab Emirates' energy transition gathers pace before it hosts the United Nations climate conference next year, it is looking to climate partners such as China to help it sustain the momentum, its climate change special envoy says. Sultan Al Jaber, the UAE special envoy for climate change and minister of industry and advanced technology, said the UAE is seeing "record growth in renewables", representing more than 80 percent of all new power-generating capacity last year. However, he said, a transformative and pragmatic global energy transition is needed to deliver climate action, and while wind and solar accounted for the vast majority of all new power-generating capacity last year, this still only accounts for 4 percent of today's energy mix. "As the world's energy needs grow ever larger, maintaining global energy security will require oil and gas to remain a significant part of the mix for decades to come," Al Jaber said. A successful energy transition must make progress with economic and climate action in tandem, he said. As part of this, "we know we must do more now" to reduce the impact of oil and gas on the climate, and in the medium term the UAE plans to increase its renewables portfolio to 100 gigawatts by 2030. "I see many more opportunities for collaboration with China as we continue to build and adapt to clean energy solutions. We are constantly looking to the future and have allocated more than $1.5 billion in grants and low-interest loans for renewable energy innovation in more than 40 countries." Like China, Al Jaber said, the UAE is also investing in clean energy projects globally, with more than $50 billion across six continents, including in 27 climate-vulnerable island nations, which, he said, "is extremely important to us" and is one of the country's key approaches for COP 28 UAE next year. In 2017, the UAE launched Energy Strategy 2050, which is considered the first unified energy strategy in the country that is based on supply and...

WASHINGTON: The United States and Pakistan need to rebuild a modest but pragmatic relationship, based on mutual respect for each other’s interests, and not on exaggerated expectations, says a report released on Tuesday. The report, prepared by a dozen American scholars of South Asian affairs associated with the Pakistan Study Group (PSG), Washington, has been released a day before Pakistan’s Army Chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa is expected to meet US scholars and think-tank experts at the Pakistan Embassy. The paper warns American policy makers that they cannot afford to walk away from a country that involves three key regions — South Asia, Central Asia, and the Middle East — and has borders with China and Iran and is close to Russia. The authors include a former US secretary of state for South Asia, two former US ambassadors to Pakistan, a former Pakistani ambassador to the US and other senior diplomats who have worked in Pakistan, and American scholars specialising in South Asia. According to this paper, a modest, pragmatic relationship between the US and Pakistan would involve understanding that Pakistan and the US will “continue to see Afghanistan through different lens but can cooperate in maintaining peace in that country and alleviating its people’s suffering”. It also reminds American policymakers that “attitudes toward India at both the elite and popular levels in Pakistan will, at best, change slowly”. The report also notes that “public opinion in both the US and Pakistan acts as constraints on bilateral relations”. The United States, however, can still induce Pakistan to change its overall strategic calculus, which is based on Pakistan’s understanding of its security environment, it added. The paper acknowledges that the United States and Pakistan have divergent views on China and recommends “a more nuanced US policy on Pakistan”. The authors argue that the US engagement with Pakistan would benefit if it were based on a realistic appraisal of Pakistan’s...

As Vladimir Putin’s game of chicken with the US and its allies over Ukraine escalates into a new round of nuclear threats, the smaller weapons that his officials have called on him to use may provide vital hours or even days of warning. While Russia’s long-range missiles and bombers are kept on constant alert, ready to fire in just minutes to ensure they aren’t destroyed by a pre-emptive strike, lower-yielding tactical weapons are locked up in about a dozen warehouses across Russia and it would take time to transport them to launchers. “At a certain level of readiness, weapons are taken out of storage facilities and moved to some other place, for days if necessary. This would be detected by satellites or other means,” said Pavel Podvig, a nuclear security expert at the UN Institute for Disarmament Research in Geneva. That would be exactly the point. So far, US and European officials have said there’s no sign of any such preparations and the nuclear threats have remained purely rhetorical. But as Russian forces steadily lose ground to a Ukrainian counteroffensive – including territory the Russian president formally claimed as his own last week – the Kremlin has again sought to sow fear with hints that further escalation may involve arms that haven’t been used in war since 1945. The threats are part of a broad attempt by the Kremlin to intimidate the US and Europe into cutting support for Ukraine and forcing Kyiv into negotiations on Moscow’s terms. With Europeans braced for a difficult winter after Russia triggered an unprecedented energy crisis by cutting gas supplies, Putin’s seeking to widen divisions within Europe over the price of continued support for Ukraine to try to turn public opinion in key states as tensions grow. His decision to call up 300,000 reservists to shore up Russia’s struggling army and the hasty annexation of the occupied territories, followed by a fiery speech that accused the West of “Satanism”, were just the latest attempts to show the...