The Qatar crisis raises two issues in the field of international relations today. The first is to disprove the mainstream Cold War-era view that small states cannot play a significant role in global affairs. The second is that big powers always use hard means to take control of ambitious, small states in order to preserve the status quo.

Nepalese kings organized massive hunts to get on the good side of the British – hunts that may have been terrible for conservation, but worked diplomatic magic. [...] ‘Hunting diplomacy’ lent the Ranas much-needed social capital with the British elite, and an invite from the Ranas of Nepal became a much-coveted affair for the colonists themselves.

China Railway Eryuan Engineering Group Co Ltd (CREEC), which is involved in the engineering survey and design of world's one of the most difficult railway lines -- Sichuan-Tibet railway, has expressed its interest to take part in survey and design of a cross-border railway link construction project between Nepal and China.