Manmohan Singh, India's first non-Hindu prime minister, was preparing to announce his Cabinet yesterday, after days of political wrangling within his new ruling coalition.
Singh, 71, faced his first test as India's new leader when suspected Islamic militants blew up a paramilitary bus yesterday in insurgency-wracked Jammu-Kashmir state, killing at least 28 people and wounding 15 others.
In the new government's first meeting yesterday led by Singh, a resolution was passed condemning the attack, Cabinet member Ramvilas Paswan told reporters.
PHOTO: AFP
The new prime minister has vowed to tackle the crisis in Kashmir, where militants have been fighting for 14 years for independence or a merger with Pakistan. He also has said he wants "most friendly" relations with Pakistan, with whom India has fought two wars over control of Kashmir.
The deadly attack came less than 24 hours after Singh was sworn in Saturday, putting his Congress party back in control of the predominantly Hindu nation after eight years on the sidelines. His swearing-in also ended a week of political turmoil in which Italian-born Congress leader Sonia Gandhi declined to become prime minister.
Although 28 Cabinet members and 40 ministers of state and junior ministers were also sworn in Saturday, Singh said there were "difficulties in finalizing the Cabinet" and their portfolios were to be announced yesterday.
Singh was expected to assume the post of finance minister, a position he held from 1991 to 1996, when he introduced the most wide-ranging economic reforms in the nation's history.
During yesterday's meeting, it was also decided that parliament's new session will be held June 2 to June 10, and President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam will address a joint session of the upper and lower houses of parliament on June 7.
Also yesterday, Pakistan's Foreign Ministry said Pakistan and India agreed to postpone nuclear talks originally set for this week so the new Indian government has time to settle into power.
Singh, India's first prime minister from the Sikh minority, replaced Atal Bihari Vajpayee, whose Hindu-nationalist government was ousted by the Congress party in tumultuous elections last month and this month.
Because Congress failed to gain an outright majority in the 545-seat Parliament, it will be forced to rely on two powerful Communist parties for support from outside its coalition. That prospect spooked investors, causing them to send the Bombay Stock Exchange plunging on fears the Communists would slow economic reforms.
Markets have since stabilized, however, with Singh assuring investors that India would remain pro-growth.
Singh began his first full day in office by visiting memorials in New Delhi for four former prime ministers -- Jawaharlal Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi -- and independence leader Mohandas K. Gandhi.
Sonia Gandhi will continue to be the head of the Congress party. She is the widow of Rajiv Gandhi, who was assassinated by a suicide bomber in 1991, and a daughter-in-law of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, assassinated in 1984.
Asian perspectives of the US have shifted from a country once perceived as a force of “moral legitimacy” to something akin to “a landlord seeking rent,” Singaporean Minister for Defence Ng Eng Hen (黃永宏) said on the sidelines of an international security meeting. Ng said in a round-table discussion at the Munich Security Conference in Germany that assumptions undertaken in the years after the end of World War II have fundamentally changed. One example is that from the time of former US president John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address more than 60 years ago, the image of the US was of a country
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
BLIND COST CUTTING: A DOGE push to lay off 2,000 energy department workers resulted in hundreds of staff at a nuclear security agency being fired — then ‘unfired’ US President Donald Trump’s administration has halted the firings of hundreds of federal employees who were tasked with working on the nation’s nuclear weapons programs, in an about-face that has left workers confused and experts cautioning that the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE’s) blind cost cutting would put communities at risk. Three US officials who spoke to The Associated Press said up to 350 employees at the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) were abruptly laid off late on Thursday, with some losing access to e-mail before they’d learned they were fired, only to try to enter their offices on Friday morning
STEADFAST DART: The six-week exercise, which involves about 10,000 troops from nine nations, focuses on rapid deployment scenarios and multidomain operations NATO is testing its ability to rapidly deploy across eastern Europe — without direct US assistance — as Washington shifts its approach toward European defense and the war in Ukraine. The six-week Steadfast Dart 2025 exercises across Bulgaria, Romania and Greece are taking place as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine approaches the three-year mark. They involve about 10,000 troops from nine nations and represent the largest NATO operation planned this year. The US absence from the exercises comes as European nations scramble to build greater military self-sufficiency over their concerns about the commitment of US President Donald Trump’s administration to common defense and
RSS