Nepal: The Buffer State between India and China

Despite being a small landlocked state in the Himalayas, Nepal commands geostrategic significance and acts as a security bulwark for its neighbours India and China. In addition to their security interests, these formidable powers are courting Nepal to expand their spheres of influence and to ultimately establish themselves as the regional hegemon in South Asia. In this paper, the conflictual and cooperative Nepalese relations with India and China and the impact on Nepal’s foreign policy is explored. Furthermore, this paper presents a comparative study of Nepal’s foreign policy with Bhutan, Taiwan and Switzerland’s foreign policies.