Three of the four Commonwealth members in Southern Africa have pulled out of the Commonwealth Games, prompting other nations to join the growing protest against Britain’s opposition to sanctions against South Africa. Zambia and Zimbabwe agreed to join fellow frontline state member Tanzania in a boycott of the Games. Botswana, the fourth Commonwealth member of the six-nation frontline, did not join the boycott.

Junejo’s successful visit to US

Both Pakistan and the US have achieved what they wanted from the visit of Prime Minister M K Junejo to Washington. The US has accepted as democratic the elections that brought Junejo to power — although they gave even less scope to opposition parties to participate than the Nicaraguan elections, which the US denounced as a fraud.

India-China border talks

India and China will have comprehensive discussions on the border dispute covering all three sectors at the seventh round of official-level talks beginning in Beijing. The ambit of the talks has been widened to cover the Eastern Sector, too. The Indian delegation, led by Foreign Secretary A P Venkateswaran, left carrying a brief from the government on the line to be adopted over the Chinese intrusion in Arunachal Pradesh last month.