The more embattled a leader is at home, the brighter the lure of foreign horizons. Manmohan Singh's growing collection of air miles makes the point. His trip early this week to Russia, his ninth as India's prime minister, was followed on October 22nd by one to China. Just before, on October 10th, he addressed a gathering of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (asean), in Brunei, and visited Indonesia to launch annual bilateral summitry. Hyperactivity is not new. Roughly a tenth of his near-decade as prime minister has been spent abroad; he has flown more than lm km (620,000 miles) in 72 official visits. But now, beleaguered at home by scandal, an economy growing by barely 4% and gloomy prospects for his ruling Congress party, the airport departure lounge is more tempting than ever.
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