NEW DELHI (NYTIMES) - His Covid-19 task force didn t meet for months. His health minister assured the public in March that India had reached the pandemic s endgame .
A few weeks before that, Prime Minister Narendra Modi boasted to global leaders that his nation had triumphed over the coronavirus.
India saved humanity from a big disaster by containing corona effectively , Mr Modi told a virtual gathering at the World Economic Forum in late January, three tricolour Indian flags displayed in the background.
Now, a second wave has made India the worst-hit country in the world.
New infections have reached about 400,000 a day. Vaccines are running short. Hospitals are swamped. Lifesaving oxygen is running out. Each day, cremation grounds burn thousands of bodies, sending up never-ending plumes of ash that are turning the skies gray over some of India s biggest cities.
Indiaâs COVID-19 crisis shakes Modiâs image of strength
By Jeffrey Gettleman, Hari Kumar, Karan Deep Singh and Sameer Yasir New York Times,Updated May 2, 2021, 12:53 a.m.
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An image of Narendra Modi, Indiaâs prime minister, in Kolkata ahead of state elections.SAUMYA KHANDELWAL/NYT
NEW DELHI â His COVID-19 task force didnât meet for months. His health minister assured the public in March that India had reached the pandemicâs âendgame.â A few weeks before that, Prime Minister Narendra Modi boasted to global leaders that his nation had triumphed over the coronavirus.
India âsaved humanity from a big disaster by containing corona effectively,â Modi told a virtual gathering at the World Economic Forum in late January, three tricolor Indian flags displayed in the background.
Is Washington prepared for a geopolitical ‘tech race’?
As Biden passes 100 days in office, how is the administration’s thinking shaping up on China?
When Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan sat down with Chinese officials in Anchorage, Alaska for the first high-level bilateral summit of the new administration, it was not a typical diplomatic meeting. Instead of a polite but restrained diplomatic exchange, the two sides traded pointed barbs for almost two hours. “There is growing consensus that the era of engagement with China has come to an unceremonious close,” wrote Sullivan and Kurt Campbell, the Administration’s Asia czar also in attendance, back in 2019. How apt that they were present for that moment’s arrival.
Fierce Foes, Iran and Saudi Arabia Secretly Explore Defusing Tensions
Talks between the two regional powers, if successful, could start to lower the temperature on several conflicts across the Middle East.
Fighters loyal to Yemen’s Saudi-backed government deployed in the northeast province of Marib, facing Houthi forces backed by Iran.Credit.Agence France-Presse Getty Images
May 1, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ET
BEIRUT, Lebanon In a prime-time television interview four years ago, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia dismissed the idea that his kingdom could somehow find an accommodation with its archrival, Iran.
“How do we communicate?” he asked. “The mutual points that we can agree on with this regime are almost nonexistent.”