SOURCE: NDTV

A Chinese soldier, who was caught by Indian forces in eastern Ladakh after he strayed across the Line of Actual Control (LAC), was handed back to China on Tuesday night. The soldier, identified as Corporal Wang Ya Long, was caught in the Chumar-Demchok area, the army said on Monday.
The soldier was questioned by China experts before he was handed back to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA), according to sources.

On Monday, the army had said that the soldier would be returned to the Chinese Army “as per established protocol after following due procedure”. He was provided medical assistance including oxygen, food and warm clothes “to protect him from the vagaries of extreme altitude and harsh climatic conditions”, the army said in a statement.

SOURCE: SPTUNIK

The smartphone generation of Asia’s most populous nations, India and China, have taken the ongoing border hostilities in contested Ladakh which have been going on since April, to Twitter. The two armies of the two nuclear powers are near each other on the border and fought a pitched battle in June, in which soldiers on both sides died.

The Global Times, China’s state-run news agency, has been regularly posting videos of Chinese troops testing weaponry and training troops, flaunting the country’s might.

SOURCE: Hindustan Times

Shanti Devi was 22 when she fled her home in Chatra village in what is now Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, two young children in tow. A tribal militia was pillaging its way through her village, killing people and torching huts. Devi, now 105, remembers that the attackers — aided by members of the Pakistani army — abducted young children, killed adult men and raped the women.

It was October 22, 1947, and the militia was part of a Pakistani design — ultimately unsuccessful — to forcibly capture Jammu and Kashmir. Her husband, Duni Chand, was a marginal farmer. Her family, along with hundreds of other Hindu and Sikh families, settled in Jammu’s Poonch district.

SOURCE: Hindustan Times

India should remain committed to the one-China principle and deal with Taiwan prudently, Beijing warned on Tuesday following a media report that New Delhi could open trade talks with Taiwan, which the mainland considers a breakaway region.

The Chinese foreign ministry also slammed a meeting of the newly appointed US officer for Tibetan affairs with the head of Tibet’s government-in-exile.

SOURCE: The Tribune

Moeed Yusuf, special assistant to the Pakistan PM ‘on national security division and strategic policy planning’, gave a long interview to a well-known Indian TV personality last week. Yusuf, an academic with a background, inter alia, in India-Pakistan studies, has been in his job since December last year. Earlier, he had a long stint with the US Institute of Peace, a US Congress funded think-tank in Washington DC.

Yusuf had sought an Indian media platform since some time to assert his establishment’s propagandist views to an Indian audience. His offer was ignored till he was interviewed recently. He used the interview to peddle the themes in a highly offensive manner that Pakistan has been pursuing against India, especially since the constitutional changes in J&K in 2019.

SOURCE:  The Tribune

The Indian Army’s near complete dependence on imported high-altitude clothing and associated mountaineering equipment for nearly four decades will be highlighted yet again when its troops deploy against the irredentist People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in eastern Ladakh during winter.

After mid-August, when the PLA’s pullback from the occupied Indian territory along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) appeared doubtful, the frantic and costly procurement of special clothing and mountaineering equipment (SCME) began. It was done to equip the over 40,000 troops positioned at heights between 12,000 and 18,000 feet to prevent further PLA ingress. Ministry of Defence (MoD) and Army officials fanned out across Europe, Australia, Canada and the US to procure assorted high-altitude gear under ‘emergency purchase’ procedures in times of massive financial indigence of kit that can easily be sourced locally.

SOURCE: TNN

Cybersecurity firm Kaspersky claims that a dangerous malware known as GravityRAT spyware is back in business. GravityRAT was first talked about back in 2015. As per Kaspersky, the tool had been used in targeted attacks against Indian military services. Earlier, it used to only attack Windows computers, now it is modified to attack Macs and Android phones too.

Kaspersky was alerted about a previously unknown piece of Android spyware recently. While studying this ‘unknown’ spyware, researchers found out that it is GravityRAT, a spying Remote Access Trojan (RAT) known for carrying out activities in India.

SOURCE: Times Now

Pakistan has ramped up terror activities in Jammu and Kashmir and around 250 terrorists are waiting at launch pads across the Line of Control to infiltrate into India.

According to intelligence input, terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba is trying to make its base stronger in Kashmir Valley, Times Now’s Sohil reported. Several Al-Badr and Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorists are being given specialised training in PoK’s Muzaffarabad to carry out the possible attacks in Hindu-dominated areas, according to intelligence inputs.

SOURCE: NEWS18

 In a thinly-veiled reference to Pakistan, India said the principle of self-determination continues to be “deliberately misinterpreted and misused” by a particular nation and it was not established by the UN to be used as a justification for undermining the territorial integrity of any member state.

“Since the principle of self-determination, as considered on the agreed agenda of this committee, continues to be deliberately misinterpreted and misused by a particular delegation, it is pertinent to highlight once again that the United Nations has established the principle as a vehicle for the worthy cause of decolonisation of the 17 Non Self-Governing Territories (NSGTs) on the agenda of this committee, and not as a justification for undermining the territorial integrity of any member state,” India said in a statement on ‘NSGTs and decolonisation.’ India said it strongly believes that pursuing a pragmatic approach towards decolonization would surely lead to fulfilment of legitimate wishes of the people of NSGTs.

SOURCE: Times Now

With China and Pakistan both on our nerves, putting up a two-pronged resistance requires a system to ensure India also has a self-reliant mechanism in place to meet the country’s defence demands.

In line with this same thought, Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Tuesday released the ‘Procurement Manual 2020’ for the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), India’s premier agency for military research and development (R&D).

SOURCE: PTI

A bipartisan group of influential American Senators on Tuesday welcomed India’s decision to invite Australia for the annual Malabar naval exercise involving Japan and the United States. In a significant move that comes amid a Sino-India border row, India on Monday announced Australia’s participation in the upcoming Malabar exercise along with the US and Japan, effectively making it the first military-level engagement between the four-member nation grouping — the Quad.

“From an operational perspective, the addition of such a uniquely capable and stalwart partner, like Australia, to this naval exercise is invaluable, providing increased interoperability, strengthening threat assessment abilities and enhancing the maritime roles and missions of the four naval powers,” the senators in a letter to India’s Ambassador to the US, Taranjit Singh Sandhu.

SOURCE: Hindustan Times

India and the United States will hold their third 2+2 ministerial meeting in New Delhi next week, the US said Tuesday. The state secretary Mike Pompeo and the defence chief of US Mike Esper will travel to New Delhi for day-long in-person meetings, rare given the Covid-19 pandemic and the global shift to virtual interactions, with their Indian counterparts S Jaishankar and Rajnath Singh on October 27.

“Secretary Pompeo and I will be there next week,” Secretary Esper said at Atlantic Council, a think tank, responding to a question about the upcoming 2+2. “It’s our second two plus two with the Indians, the third ever for the United States and India and it’s very important.”

SOURCE: Times Now

The Ministry of External Affairs on Tuesday issued a statement condemning the comments by UN High Commission for Human Rights on the issue related to Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA).

“India is a democratic polity based on the rule of law and an independent judiciary. The framing of laws is obviously a sovereign prerogative. Violations of law, however, cannot be condoned under the pretext of human rights. A mere informed view of the matter was expected of a UN body,” the statement read.

SOURCE: PTI

Four terrorists were killed in two separate encounters with security forces in Shopian and Pulwama districts of Jammu and Kashmir on Tuesday, taking the death count of the terrorists in the two operation to five, the Army said. Security forces launched a cordon and search operation at Melhura in Zainapora area of Shopian on Monday evening, following information about presence of terrorists in the area, a police official said.

He said the search operation turned into an encounter after terrorists opened fire at the security forces position.

SOURCE: PTI

A naxal was killed in an encounter with security forces in Chhattisgarh’s Bijapur district on Tuesday afternoon, the police said.
Two jawans of the police’s District Reserve Guard (DRG) were injured in the blast of an improvised explosive device (IED) triggered by the ultras during the skirmish, they said.

The exchange of fire started around 3 pm in a hilly forested area near Golakonda when a joint team of security forces was out on a counter-insurgency operation, Inspector General of Police (Bastar range) Sundarraj P told PTI.