NEW DELHI // Barack Obama and his promise of change are music to the ears of most people, but not in India, where George W Bush is sorely missed.
Last autumn, Mr Bush helped India lift a three-decade ban on nuclear trade, prompting the prime minister, Manmohan Singh, to tell the US president, who left office with only a 22 per cent favourability rating, that India "loved" him.
New Delhi's intelligentsia cringed, but Mr Singh was not lying.
Unfortunately for India, there is now a new US president who is firmly committed to nuclear nonproliferation.
Lifting the nuclear trading ban without a requirement that India sign the Nonproliferation Treaty was controversial, both inside and outside India. Critics complained it rewarded India for developing nuclear weapons on the sly using fissile material provided for civilian purposes.
They also objected to India's continuing refusal to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
But the ruling Congress Party was jubilant, interpreting the move as a seal of approval for India's nuclear weapons programme. "Without compromising on our weapons programme, without compromising on our fast-breeder reactor programme, without signing the NPT, the CTBT or the Fissile Materials Cutoff Treaty, India has been able to access the entire spectrum of civil nuclear commerce on very much its own terms," Manish Tiwari of Congress said at the time.
It has also sparked a nuclear arms race just as Mr Obama attempts to calm the region, including Afghanistan, where it is fighting a Taliban insurgency. Pakistan has promised to beef up its nuclear arsenal, while Russia and China have reacted badly to India's determination to achieve a US-sponsored ballistic missile defence shield.
The Indian deal has also made it much harder for the United States to negotiate effectively with Iran to end its nuclear programme.
Some thought that the initiative for the deal came from New Delhi, with its rickety grid and constant power blackouts and brownouts; India has since announced plans for up to 30 nuclear reactors.
Some also suggested that the US civilian nuclear industry pushed Mr Bush into it. Others said Mr Bush is solely to blame.
"The commercial aspect from the United States' point of view is secondary to the strategic political dimension," said Achin Vanaik, head of the political science department at the University of Delhi.
"The initiative for this deal, actually, did come from the Bush administration, not from New Delhi, and it was motivated primarily by the desire to consolidate and deepen the strategic relationship."
The Bush administration actively encouraged New Delhi to view itself as a "strategic partner" of the United States, and a counterweight to an emerging China, said M K Bhadrakumar, a former Indian diplomat.
"Delhi's priority is to use the deal to provide the context for access to sensitive US military technology within the overall framework of the 'strategic partnership'," Mr Bhadrakumar told Asia Times.
The only problem, he said, is that the US-China relationship is established and relatively stable, despite - or perhaps even because of - the financial crisis.
"Obama threatens to shake up the daydreamers in Delhi," he said.
Mr Obama's commitment to nonproliferation is firm. He has promised to make ratification of the test ban treaty a priority, and has threatened automatic international sanctions on any nation - including India - that refuses to comply with the Nonproliferation Treaty.
Mr Obama supported lifting the ban partly because it provides a solution to India's crippling electricity shortage. But he quickly wrote to Mr Singh to clarify that he viewed the deal as a "central element" of US nuclear weapons policy.
That means adherence to the test ban treaty, including a total and verifiable production ban on fissile material, as well as much more stringent accounting of all its nuclear material. It is unlikely that New Delhi will go along with this, but given US weakness in the civilian nuclear industry, Washington may not have much to bargain with. "We don't need them," one observer said. "The deal is signed."
Mr Singh kept the letter under wraps for weeks, indicating both some unease about Mr Obama, and some concern about the durability of the strong US-India ties that developed under Mr Bush.
Mr Bhadrakumar speculates that the "strategic relationship" may have existed less in reality and more in the minds of Mr Bush and Mr Singh.
Mr Bush is now gone, and Mr Singh is now absent from office after undergoing heart bypass surgery at the weekend. He was moved out of intensive care at a New Delhi hospital yesterday, the Press Trust of India reported, and is making a "speedy recovery" at the state-run All India Institute of Medical Sciences, doctors were quoted as saying.
Mr Singh's government faces an election before May 15, in which the Hindu nationalist party - the Bharatiya Janata Party - is expected to make a strong showing. The BJP opposes the deal, but only because it thinks it places too many restrictions on India.
In the meantime, many energy experts say India is making a mistake investing in outmoded civilian nuclear projects rather than an renewable energy infrastructure that has limited political or environmental effect.
* The National
Singham Again
Director: Rohit Shetty
Stars: Ajay Devgn, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Ranveer Singh, Akshay Kumar, Tiger Shroff, Deepika Padukone
Rating: 3/5
LOVE%20AGAIN
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The biog
Name: Salvador Toriano Jr
Age: 59
From: Laguna, The Philippines
Favourite dish: Seabass or Fish and Chips
Hobbies: When he’s not in the restaurant, he still likes to cook, along with walking and meeting up with friends.
Building boom turning to bust as Turkey's economy slows
Deep in a provincial region of northwestern Turkey, it looks like a mirage - hundreds of luxury houses built in neat rows, their pointed towers somewhere between French chateau and Disney castle.
Meant to provide luxurious accommodations for foreign buyers, the houses are however standing empty in what is anything but a fairytale for their investors.
The ambitious development has been hit by regional turmoil as well as the slump in the Turkish construction industry - a key sector - as the country's economy heads towards what could be a hard landing in an intensifying downturn.
After a long period of solid growth, Turkey's economy contracted 1.1 per cent in the third quarter, and many economists expect it will enter into recession this year.
The country has been hit by high inflation and a currency crisis in August. The lira lost 28 per cent of its value against the dollar in 2018 and markets are still unconvinced by the readiness of the government under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to tackle underlying economic issues.
The villas close to the town centre of Mudurnu in the Bolu region are intended to resemble European architecture and are part of the Sarot Group's Burj Al Babas project.
But the development of 732 villas and a shopping centre - which began in 2014 - is now in limbo as Sarot Group has sought bankruptcy protection.
It is one of hundreds of Turkish companies that have done so as they seek cover from creditors and to restructure their debts.
LIVERPOOL SQUAD
Alisson Becker, Virgil van Dijk, Georginio Wijnaldum, James Milner, Naby Keita, Roberto Firmino, Sadio Mane, Mohamed Salah, Joe Gomez, Adrian, Jordan Henderson, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Adam Lallana, Andy Lonergan, Xherdan Shaqiri, Andy Robertson, Divock Origi, Curtis Jones, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Neco Williams
Blonde
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAndrew%20Dominik%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStars%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAna%20de%20Armas%2C%20Adrien%20Brody%2C%20Bobby%20Cannavale%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E3%2F5%3Cbr%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
COMPANY PROFILE
Founders: Alhaan Ahmed, Alyina Ahmed and Maximo Tettamanzi
Total funding: Self funded
2018 ICC World Twenty20 Asian Western Regional Qualifier
The top three teams progress to the Asia Qualifier
Final: UAE beat Qatar by nine wickets
Third-place play-off: Kuwait beat Saudi Arabia by five runs
Table
1 UAE 5 5 0 10
2 Qatar 5 4 1 8
3 Saudi 5 3 2 6
4 Kuwait 5 2 3 4
5 Bahrain 5 1 4 2
6 Maldives 5 0 5 0
The years Ramadan fell in May
The specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cyl, 48V hybrid
Transmission: eight-speed automatic
Power: 325bhp
Torque: 450Nm
Price: Dh359,000
On sale: now
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%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EResults%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3Cbr%3EHong%20Kong%2052-5%20UAE%3Cbr%3ESouth%20Korea%2055-5%20Malaysia%3Cbr%3EMalaysia%206-70%20Hong%20Kong%3Cbr%3EUAE%2036-32%20South%20Korea%3Cbr%3E%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFixtures%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3Cbr%3EFriday%2C%20June%2021%2C%207.30pm%20kick-off%3A%20UAE%20v%20Malaysia%3Cbr%3EAt%20The%20Sevens%2C%20Dubai%20(admission%20is%20free).%3Cbr%3ESaturday%3A%20Hong%20Kong%20v%20South%20Korea%3Cbr%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
The Old Slave and the Mastiff
Patrick Chamoiseau
Translated from the French and Creole by Linda Coverdale
What drives subscription retailing?
Once the domain of newspaper home deliveries, subscription model retailing has combined with e-commerce to permeate myriad products and services.
The concept has grown tremendously around the world and is forecast to thrive further, according to UnivDatos Market Insights’ report on recent and predicted trends in the sector.
The global subscription e-commerce market was valued at $13.2 billion (Dh48.5bn) in 2018. It is forecast to touch $478.2bn in 2025, and include the entertainment, fitness, food, cosmetics, baby care and fashion sectors.
The report says subscription-based services currently constitute “a small trend within e-commerce”. The US hosts almost 70 per cent of recurring plan firms, including leaders Dollar Shave Club, Hello Fresh and Netflix. Walmart and Sephora are among longer established retailers entering the space.
UnivDatos cites younger and affluent urbanites as prime subscription targets, with women currently the largest share of end-users.
That’s expected to remain unchanged until 2025, when women will represent a $246.6bn market share, owing to increasing numbers of start-ups targeting women.
Personal care and beauty occupy the largest chunk of the worldwide subscription e-commerce market, with changing lifestyles, work schedules, customisation and convenience among the chief future drivers.
Other workplace saving schemes
- The UAE government announced a retirement savings plan for private and free zone sector employees in 2023.
- Dubai’s savings retirement scheme for foreign employees working in the emirate’s government and public sector came into effect in 2022.
- National Bonds unveiled a Golden Pension Scheme in 2022 to help private-sector foreign employees with their financial planning.
- In April 2021, Hayah Insurance unveiled a workplace savings plan to help UAE employees save for their retirement.
- Lunate, an Abu Dhabi-based investment manager, has launched a fund that will allow UAE private companies to offer employees investment returns on end-of-service benefits.
AL%20BOOM
%3Cp%20style%3D%22text-align%3Ajustify%3B%22%3E%26nbsp%3B%26nbsp%3B%26nbsp%3BDirector%3AAssad%20Al%20Waslati%26nbsp%3B%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%20style%3D%22text-align%3Ajustify%3B%22%3E%0DStarring%3A%20Omar%20Al%20Mulla%2C%20Badr%20Hakami%20and%20Rehab%20Al%20Attar%0D%3Cbr%3E%0D%3Cbr%3EStreaming%20on%3A%20ADtv%0D%3Cbr%3E%0D%3Cbr%3ERating%3A%203.5%2F5%0D%3Cbr%3E%0D%3Cbr%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
Schedule:
Sept 15: Bangladesh v Sri Lanka (Dubai)
Sept 16: Pakistan v Qualifier (Dubai)
Sept 17: Sri Lanka v Afghanistan (Abu Dhabi)
Sept 18: India v Qualifier (Dubai)
Sept 19: India v Pakistan (Dubai)
Sept 20: Bangladesh v Afghanistan (Abu Dhabi) Super Four
Sept 21: Group A Winner v Group B Runner-up (Dubai)
Sept 21: Group B Winner v Group A Runner-up (Abu Dhabi)
Sept 23: Group A Winner v Group A Runner-up (Dubai)
Sept 23: Group B Winner v Group B Runner-up (Abu Dhabi)
Sept 25: Group A Winner v Group B Winner (Dubai)
Sept 26: Group A Runner-up v Group B Runner-up (Abu Dhabi)
Sept 28: Final (Dubai)
FORSPOKEN
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Marvel's%20Spider-Man%202
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Assassin's%20Creed%20Mirage
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Starfield
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The specs
Engine: 3.6 V6
Transmission: 8-speed auto
Power: 295bhp
Torque: 353Nm
Price: Dh155,000
On sale: now
What are the influencer academy modules?
- Mastery of audio-visual content creation.
- Cinematography, shots and movement.
- All aspects of post-production.
- Emerging technologies and VFX with AI and CGI.
- Understanding of marketing objectives and audience engagement.
- Tourism industry knowledge.
- Professional ethics.
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