Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif met with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to express Pakistan's support for the Kingdom amidst escalating tensions in West Asia, reaffirming their mutual defence pact and commitment to regional stability.
'Saudi-Pak defence pact is to anchor the defence and security of Saudi Arabia and not Pakistan, per se, with Islamabad being the junior partner.'
Prime Minister Narendra Modi cut short his two-day visit to Saudi Arabia and returned to New Delhi on Tuesday night following a deadly terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir. Modi, who held bilateral talks with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Jeddah, skipped an official dinner hosted on Tuesday to address the crisis. He was originally scheduled to return to India on Wednesday night. The attack, claimed by The Resistance Front (TRF), a proxy of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist group, prompted an urgent internal meeting at the Ritz Carlton hotel in Jeddah, attended by Modi, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, and other senior officials.
'We need to raise the costs and consequences for Pakistan. It is long overdue. Our initial surgical strike was effective for about six months. Then, the Balakot strike provided a deterrent for perhaps two to three years. But we cannot operate under the assumption that such limited responses will suffice for decades to come.'
'There is no question that Putin's preference will be to avoid unpleasantness with Trump, leave alone a collision course,' observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'He may respect others, but he is unlikely to admire them'
Chinese President Xi Jinping has arrived in Saudi Arabia on a three-day visit. Xi will not only meet with Saudi King Salman and his son Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, but also other leaders in the region.
Saudi Arabia Prince Mohammed bin Salman met with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and noted that the targeting of civilians in Gaza was a "heinous crime and a brutal attack", Arab News reported citing the Saudi Press Agency.
The evacuation came days after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar spoke to his Saudi Arabia counterpart and Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a high-level meeting to review the security situation in Sudan.
The Oil prices have surged and surpassed $85 per barrel after several oil producer countries announced surprise cuts in production, TASS Agency reported. According to the Russian News Agency, this is the first time since March 7 that the price of futures contracts of Brent crude oil surged. The price of futures contracts of Brent crude oil for June 2023 delivery on London's ICE surpassed $85 per barrel.
With developments like the Russia-China alliance and the rise of China in the Middle East, India's role has diminished though the India-Israel-US-UAE grouping may assume some importance in the future, observes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
The development has now removed Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef as next in line to the throne and replaced him with Mohammed bin Salman, who earlier held the position of the deputy crown prince.
More than two million people perform the annual pilgrimage in the holy city of Mecca every year, including many travelling from abroad.
The assault on Saudi Aramco's processing plant in Abqaiq and at the Khurais oil field caused huge fire but no casualty was reported, Gulf News reported.
All people who have arrived in Saudi Arabia from European countries, as well as other states where the new coronavirus strain has emerged, will have to self-isolate at home for two weeks. Those who have visited these countries in the past three months will need to get tested for Covid-19, according to SPA.
Saudi ruler King Abdullah extended the 'Nitaqat' deadline by four more months and has given undocumented expats time till November 4, 2013, to have their status corrected. The decision is set to provide relief to thousands of migrants based in the Islamic country, including hundreds of people from Kerala.
The world's largest clock will soon start ticking atop a soaring skyscraper in Islam's holiest city of Mecca, according to a report on Tuesday.
A suicide bomber blew himself up near the prince while he met members of the public in connection with the festival of Ramzan, the Islamic month of fasting, according to the report. Reports suggested that the suicide bomber was a wanted militant who said he wanted to meet the prince, to announce his surrender.
The arrests, made over the last three months, included 115 Saudis and 21 foreigners.
"Some of their most prominent goals were to carry out suicide attacks against public figures; oil installations and refineries and military bases inside and abroad," the ministry said.
Saudi Arabia has decided to curb its reliance on foreign labourers and implement a slew of measures to tackle the problem of unemployment in the Kingdom.
The stampede occurred during the ‘stoning the devil’ ritual in the last stages of the annual Hajj.
Two Indians were among three persons killed when a missile fired from strife-torn Yemen struck Saudi Arabia's southwestern border city of Najran
Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud on Wednesday dismissed the heir to the throne, Crown Prince Moqren bin Abdul Aziz bin Saud, and replaced him with the Interior Minister Mohammed bin Nayef.
The SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors jihadist media, identified the shooter as Mohammed al-Shamrani, and said that prior to opening fire he condemned America as a "nation of evil" in an online manifesto on twitter, according to media reports.
This is the second major disaster at Mecca this month.
Saudi Arabia has not yet officially notified the United Nations about its decision to reject a seat on the Security Council, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said.
India's curve, yet to flatten vis-a-vis countries with similar or more conservative plans to ease restrictions, still points to 'exponential growth', despite India having tested much fewer people.
The crush and stampede that struck the Hajj last month in Saudi Arabia killed at least 2,121 pilgrims, a new tally showed on Monday, after officials in the kingdom met to discuss the tragedy.
Saudi Arabia on Sunday came under attack globally a day after it carried out mass execution of 47 people, including Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr who was a vocal critic of the government and the Saudi monarchy.
'The stage is set for increasing tensions in a highly volatile region as crucial as ever from a geopolitical standpoint,' predicts Claude Smadja.
Saudi Arabia has severed diplomatic ties with Iran following attacks on the kingdom's embassy and consulate in the Islamic Republic over the execution of a Shiite cleric.
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