SOURCE: PTI

The India Army troops rose to the occasion to the challenges along the northern border as likely contingencies and possible options were war-gamed beforehand, Army Chief Gen MM Naravane said on Wednesday, referring to the eastern Ladakh standoff with China.

He also said that while focusing on the situation in eastern Ladakh, the Army did not ignore the rest of India”s borders as sufficient forces were deployed in high readiness along the western and eastern sectors to respond to any “misadventure”.

SOURCE: FIRSTPOST

Over a 100 years ago on 23 September, 1918, gallant Indian Cavalrymen fought and defeated the Ottomans in the legendary Battle of Haifa which is believed to be one of the last cavalry charges in modern military history. Two months later, World War I ended on 11 November 1918 — the Great War — changed the world in ways that nobody could have imagined.

A trip 200 years down the memory lane will help to recount the battle and why Indian are honoured by the Israelis even today.

SOURCE: ZEE NEWS

Pakistan’s Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry on Wednesday alleged that a threatening email to the New Zealand cricket squad that prompted the Kiwis to call off a tour of the country was sent from India. The Kiwis called off their first tour of Pakistan in 18 years last Friday due to a security threat to the team, followed by a decision by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) on Monday to cancel a bilateral series scheduled for next month in Pakistan.

However, India has dismissed these claims as “baseless propaganda” and asked Islamabad to take “credible and verifiable” action against terrorism emanating from its soil instead. Earlier in July, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said, “It is not new for Pakistan to engage in baseless propaganda against India. Pakistan would do well to expend the same effort in setting its own house in order and taking credible and verifiable action against terrorism emanating from its soil and terrorists who have found safe sanctuaries there.”

SOURCE: CNN-NEWS18

The Quadrilateral or the Quad grouping of countries was the brainchild of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. But back in 2007 when he proposed this coming together of Australia, the US, Japan and India, there were very few takers for the grouping. And the simple reason for it was this: back in 2007, China was not the threat it is today.

China was not the bully in Asia that it is now, neither did it have global hegemonic ambitions. Shinzo Abe was very clear about why he wanted this group of countries to come together. It was explicitly to counter a growing and assertive China. There was no other rationale for the grouping. Countering China was its raison d’etre.

SOURCE: INDIA TODAY

Space weather is one of the most dynamic events beyond Earth that has effects not only on payload operating in the orbit but also on the ground telecommunication networks. A new study now sheds light on how conditions and events in the solar atmosphere like coronal mass ejections influence the accuracy of space weather prediction.

The study will aid the upcoming Aditya L1 mission to the Sun by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) set to be launched next year. A team of astronomers led by Dr Wageesh Mishra of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bengaluru showed that plasma properties and Earth arrival times of CMEs from the Sun can vary substantially. The research published in Monthly Notices of Royal Astronomical Society is based on the study of observations of Interplanetary Coronal Mass Ejection (ICME) structures during the year 2011.

SOURCE: News18 

Turkey’s strongman Recep Tayyip Erdo?an once again raised Kashmir this week, for the nth time. Obviously nobody paid any attention and it got buried in the back pages. Normally, a world leader talking about Kashmir would raise some hackles but this time the MEA didn’t bother to even respond (at least not in the usual way), because it turns out nobody takes incoherent, friendless Erdo?an seriously anymore—except his equally incoherent and ignored Pakistani counterpart.

This is a far cry from 2003 when Erdo?an took charge as the prime minister and promised a zero conflict foreign policy under his then foreign policy adviser and later foreign minister Ahmet Davuto?lu. At that time things actually seemed good with Turkey mending its fences with not just all its Mediterranean neighbours but also countries like India with whom it had mildly antagonistic relations. Yet, it took just seven years for the façade to come off and the real face of radical Islamism and international terrorism to be revealed. The question is how did it go wrong so badly? How did someone seemingly so moderate turn out to be so fanatical? How did the man spearheading Turkey’s attempt to join the European Union end up becoming the biggest supporter of transnational terrorism in the 21st century?

SOURCE: TASS

 Chief of the Russian General Staff Army General Valery Gerasimov held bilateral meetings with his counterparts from India and China, the press office of Russia’s Defense Ministry reported on Thursday. The talks were held as part of the main stage of the Peace Mission 2021 anti-terror drills of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) running at the Donguz practice range in the Orenburg Region in the Urals, the press office specified.

“In the course of his meeting with Chief of the Joint Staff of China’s Central Military Commission Colonel-General Li Zuocheng, Gerasimov expressed his gratitude for China’s traditional high-level representation in the measures organized by Russia’s Defense Ministry in 2021,” the statement says.

SOURCE: PTI

India has said that the Taliban’s commitment not to allow use of Afghan soil for terrorism in any manner should be implemented as it called for a broad-based inclusive government in Afghanistan that represents all sections of Afghan society.

Addressing a G-20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting on Afghanistan, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Wednesday said that India’s engagement would be driven by its historical friendship with the Afghan people. The Taliban swept across Afghanistan last month, seizing control of almost all key towns and cities in the backdrop of withdrawal of the US forces that began on May 1. On August 15, the capital city of Kabul fell to the insurgents.

SOURCE: TIMES NOW

Pakistan’s spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) is reportedly planning to carry out a big terror strike in the country during the festival season, a crucial Intelligence alert has revealed. An Intel alert accessed by Times Now was released on September 18 and this is a specific terror input that says that ISI has planned a terror strike in the country ahead of the festive season. The plan is to ‘fix the improvised explosive device (IED) in tiffin box’, reports Times Now’s Siddhant.

A multiple agency alert has been issued as the plot is at its advanced stage as far as logistics and material are concerned. The alert revealed ISI is planning to place these tiffin bombs in crowded places during festivals, he added.

SOURCE: TIMES NOW

The Indian Army, on Thursday, eliminated 3 terrorists in the Rampur sector near Uri on the Line of Control (LoC). The terrorists had recently crossed over from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir into the Indian side. The Indian Army has recovered 5 AK-47s, 8 pistols and 70 hand grenades from terrorists killed in operation.

“In the early hours today, a movement was observed in Hathlanga forest, Rampur sector. In a brief operation, the attempt was eliminated, with the neutralization of 3 terrorists. A similar attempt was made on (September) 18, which was foiled,” Lt General DP Pandey, Chinar Corps Commander said.

SOURCE: TIMES NOW

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is on a US trip, is scheduled to have as many as eight meetings today, including with Australian counterpart Scott Morrison. This would be for the first time that the two Prime Ministers would be meeting in person after the Coronavirus pandemic began in 2020.

Last time when Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison was scheduled to meet Prime Minister Modi in May 2020, he had a surprise gift for his Indian counterpart.

SOURCE: INDIA NEWS

The Punjab Police has foiled a big terror plot arresting three terrorists from Tarantaran district. The police have also recovered huge cache of arms, explosives from the three terror operatives. A massive combing and search operation has been launched in the region to look for any accomplice of the arrested terrorists. 

Last night, three car-borne terrorists were nabbed near village Bhagwanpura in the district. The police team recovered a 9mm pistol, 11 live bullets, a hang grenade and other explosives from them. All three terrorists – Kulwinder Singh, Kamalpreet Singh Mann, Kanwar pal Singh – are residents of Moga district of Punjab. Sources said, these terrorists were planning something big in the state.

SOURCE: NDTV

Thirteen months and 21 days after Rifleman Shakir Manzoor was killed, the fallen soldier was given a final salute and his burial with military honours gave his father – Manzoor Ahmad Wagay – closure after a year-long search to find the body of his missing son. Hundreds of villagers attended the funeral as the Army held a wreath-laying ceremony. There were emotional scenes as the body reached Shakir Manzoor’s native village.

For more than a year his father had left home every morning with shovels and spades to dig earth in attempt to find his son’s body. He always returned empty-handed. It was eventually identified by Wagay as his missing son, who had been kidnapped and killed by terrorists in Shopian district on August 2 last year

SOURCE: INDIA TODAY

An anti-India dossier released by the Pakistan government that alleged mass killings in Jammu and Kashmir by Indian security forces, relied on false images of a burnt body. The dossier was released by Pakistan’s National Security Advisor (NSA) Moeed Yusuf, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and Human Rights Minister Shireen Mazari in Islamabad last week.

It alleged that on July 4, 2017 Indian forces killed a person named Jehangir Khanday at Bahmanoo Area of Pulwama. The dossier also suggested that Indian forces “possibly used chemical weapons” in this operation. Graphic images of an unrecognizable charred body were included in the Pakistan government’s dossier to affirm the claim with the caption “charred body of Jehangir Khanday and Kifayat Ahmad”.

SOURCE: FREE PRESS JOURNAL

Pakistan on Wednesday alleged that a threatening email was sent to the New Zealand cricket squad from India, which prompted the Kiwis to call off a tour of the country. The Kiwis called off their first tour of Pakistan after 18 years last Friday due to a security threat to the team, followed by a decision by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) on Monday to cancel a bilateral series scheduled for next month in Pakistan.

Pakistan has been claiming that India was behind some of the terror attacks in the country recently. India has dismissed these claims as “baseless propaganda” and asked Islamabad to take “credible and verifiable” action against terrorism emanating from its soil instead.