Morning Brief: India Pulls Out Of SAARC Summit; Competitiveness Ranking Boost; New Trump Warning

India Refuses To Attend SAARC Summit
Stepping up its diplomatic offensive to isolate Pakistan globally, the Indian government on Tuesday said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will not travel to Islamabad for the SAARC summit due to Pakistan’s increasing interference in Kashmir and support for cross-border terrorism. This is the first time that India has cancelled participation in the SAARC summit meeting.

Three other countries - Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Bhutan - have also signalled that they will not attend the meeting. “We also understand that some other SAARC states have also conveyed their reservation about attending the summit in November 2016,” the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement

Pakistan High Commissioner Summoned

Foreign secretary S Jaishankar summoned the Pakistani envoy on Tuesday and handed over the details of guides who helped the attackers to infiltrate into the Indian territory to carry out the Uri attack. Abdul Basit, Pakistan’s High Commissioner to India, was informed that two persons who guided the attackers to the army camp were from Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
The Indian side also agreed to provide consular access to the three individuals arrested in connection with the terrorist attack. This is the second time that India has summoned the Pakistan envoy over the Uri terror attack.

Global Competitiveness Ranking

India has moved up 16 spots to 39th rank in the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Global Competitiveness Index. This is the biggest improvement by any country this year on the index of the WEF.
India’s competitiveness has improved in goods market efficiency (60), business sophistication (35) and innovation (29). India’s financial markets developed significantly, propelling the country about 15 places to the 38th spot on that index, with a score of 4.4.

US Presidential Debate

Republican nominee Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he will hit rival Democrat Hillary Clinton harder in the next presidential debate. Talking to Fox News on Tuesday, Trump praised himself for not attacking Clinton about the marital infidelity of her husband, former president Bill Clinton, during the debate.

Trump added that he resisted when Clinton criticised him for his treatment of women. “I was going to hit her with her husband’s women. And I decided I shouldn’t do it because her daughter was in the room.”

MUST READ OP-EDS

Narendra Modi Keeps Retaliatory Options Close To His Chest: If Modi indeed ends up falling for strategic restraint, he will need to be mindful of the possibility of yet another terror attack a few months down the line. The advocates of strategic restraint, plenty today, would have winnowed out by then.

For him, politics was welfare: Upadhyaya’s caution about the Indian communist parties who held ‘extra-territorial loyalties’ which become “all the more dangerous to the nation” is telling, such parties, he said, could not be “loved and supported” they had to be instead, “exposed and liquidated.”

An APMC Tale: The APMCs were undoubtedly established with good intentions, but the harsh reality is that effective public policy should depend on more than good intentions.The APMC legislation has in effect created fragmented markets—small trading zones that can quite easily be captured by trader cartels.

SWARAJYA SPECIAL

Is The US Fed Batting For Hillary? Trump Thinks So, And Fed Policies Suck: Trump would gain from a crash, for a crash would be seen as a failure of Obamanomics – something Trump has been railing against. Clinton can’t afford a declining economy to tilt the balance against her in a close race.

We hope you enjoyed reading our morning brief. Have a great day ahead!

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