Articles By Claude Arpi
The US primarily looks after its own interests: Can Washington be a good ally?
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 22 May , 2023
A question has been going around in the strategic circles in the recent weeks: should India enter into a military alliance with the US and will the US be a good ally? Quoting several experts, The...
Digging the Tank Dens
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 03 May , 2023
In the recent times, the Chinese social media has been agog with ‘tank dens’ being built by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in Tibet; one article speaks of “fully underground design, to...
The Political Importance of the Reincarnations
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 13 Apr , 2023
‘Reincarnation’ is the fascinating topic for the media for several reasons, the main one being that it has a mystic aura, at a time when we live in a world where everything is...
The Importance of Pangchen
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Courtesy: http://claudearpi.blogspot.in/ | Date: 10 Apr , 2023
China has recently renamed 11 places in Arunachal Pradesh. The first-named is Pangchen; it is an important location, mainly because the border in this sector partly depends on the traditional...
Should China's Arunachal Name Changes Worry India?
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 07 Apr , 2023
China has done it again. China’s Ministry of Civil Affairs has standardized the names of 11 places in Zangnan, a new name for Southern Tibet – ‘Zangnan’ is an abbreviation of (Xi)Zang = Tibet,...
China is preparing the Dalai Lama’s succession
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 14 Mar , 2023
China is at it again: “Recognition of new Dalai Lama must be conducted in China”, asserted an article in The Global Times on February 22. The mouthpiece of the Communist Party explained that...
LAC vs IB: Why India's assessment of the length of Border along China is...
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 22 Feb , 2023
What is the length of India’s border with China? You may think that it is easy to answer this question, but unfortunately, it is not. The Ministry of Home Affairs states: “India has 15,106.7...
Why clear demarcation of LAC is a prerequisite to ensure India and China...
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 23 Dec , 2022
It is important to understand how the northern border of India has been delineated. From the end of the 19th century, the main factor for fixing a boundary in the Himalaya, in particular with...
Indianness of Arunachal is not to be proven to anyone: Pema Khandu
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Courtesy: http://claudearpi.blogspot.in/ | Date: 15 Dec , 2022
This is the second part of my interview with Pema Khandu, the Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh, Indianness of Arunachal is not to be proven to anyone. ‘Our love for our great nation — Bharat is...
Changing Ladakh
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 22 Nov , 2022
I still remember my first visit in 2002. There were hardly any roads outside Leh and the approach from Manali in Himachal Pradesh or Zoji-la in Jammu and Kashmir was not an easy one; only a few...
The Heroes Who Saved Ladakh For India
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Net Edition | Date: 18 Nov , 2022
Several years ago, I had the opportunity to interview one of the most renowned Indian mountaineers, who had chosen to live like local folks in the Himalaya. She recounted an anecdote which took...
The Unsung Heroes of the 1962 War
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 15 Nov , 2022
For the Indian nation, the 1962 conflict with China is one of the most traumatic post-Independence Indian events; for those who fought, for their families and for the Indian Army in general, the...
Had India employed its Air Force in 1962, there would have been fewer casualties
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 19 Oct , 2022
In July 2017, a few weeks after the start of the confrontation in Doklam near the India-China-Bhutan trijunction, Lt Gen Zhang Xuejie, the then Political Commissar of the Tibet Military Region...
Nehru and the ‘pending’ case of Tibet in United Nations
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 16 Oct , 2022
On September 30, Russia held four referenda with the objective of annexing Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, Zaporizhzhia regions of Ukraine recently occupied by Moscow; it immediately draw strong...
Chinese Panchen Lama visits an 'Indian' Village
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 26 Jul , 2022
On July 22, China Tibet Network posted an article announcing that the Chinese-selected Panchen Lama (Gyaltsen Norbu) visited a village on the Indian border: “Panchen: Guarding the border is a...
Season of Coincidences and Change
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 18 Jul , 2022
Do you believe in coincidences? Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama reached Ladakh on July 15. Two days later, the 16th round of Corps Commander-level meeting between India and China is to be held...
Double Standards with Chinese Characteristics
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 25 Jun , 2022
June 15 is a special day in the Middle Kingdom; it is the birthday of the Secretary General of the Communist Party of China. In 2020, probably wanting to please China’s new emperor, an officer...
Xi Jinping will lead China for record third time, but is much weaker than we...
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Net Edition | Date: 11 May , 2022
The 20th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) will be held in Beijing in November this year. About 2,300 delegates, representing an estimated 90 million members, will meet in the...
Where is China Going?
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Net Edition | Date: 03 Mar , 2022
Soon the Games are over. The Emperor of China, Xi Jinping, with his colleagues of the Politburo, had planned a grand show to prove to the world that the Middle Kingdom was one of the two most...
China shifts into propaganda overdrive in pandemic era but world is...
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 06 Jan , 2022
Can we today take Chinese propaganda seriously? I don’t think so. Take the issue of democracy. On 9-10 December 2021, US President Joe Biden organised a ‘Summit for Democracy’, bringing together...