, Columnist
Why Nepal’s New Power Brokers Should Worry India and China
Gen Z has changed the conversation. The region will need to catch up.
India and China are vying for influence in Nepal.
Photographer: Prabin Ranabhat/AFP/Getty Images
A new political generation is reshaping Nepal’s future. For decades, the Himalayan nation has been caught between India and China, both vying for influence through patronage and investment. But those familiar formulas may no longer work.
Nepal’s location has long made it a geopolitical prize for New Delhi and Beijing. Landlocked between the two, it has been the object of endless courtship, but also manipulation. Successive governments have often tilted toward one giant neighbor or the other, but the country’s deepest political crisis in years is disrupting that playbook.