By Harinder Bali In less than three weeks from now, Jo Biden will begin his tenure as the 42nd President of the United States of America. He will take over from Mr Donald Trump, who leaves behind a complicated and divisive legacy. Jo Biden will have his task cut out both at the domestic and the International arena. Most of the issues he will have to address within the first hundred days of Presidency will be either the problems either created or left unresolved by the outgoing President. Let us look at some of the problems which will demand immediate redressal. a) First and foremost will be controlling the rampaging pandemic, which has caused havoc to both human lives and the economy. Although the pandemic has affected the entire world, the US has been the worst affected. Almost 20 million people have been infected and close to 300,000 have lost their lives. In the last few months, the control mechanisms seem to have fallen apart as President Trump's focus shifted from controlling the pandemic towards saving his Presidency. Mr Jo Biden would have to put on rails a comprehensive program to combat the pandemic. He has already put a Covid Advisory team in place to brace up to face the challenge. His Presidency will begin on the right notes has the advantage as two very effective vaccines have already been approved for safe use. Getting vaccine rapidly to everyone across the country is a monumental job, and the new team will have to put a comprehensive supply chain in place to achieve it. He would need to convince the American people, many of whom are apprehensive about vaccine efficacy and safety to get vaccinated at the earliest. Unlike his predecessor, he would have to carry all the state governments along in this nationwide vaccination program. Along with vaccination, he would have to emphasize the common man on the street to observe social preventive measures like wearing masks and maintaining social distance. If he succeeds in controlling the pandemic, it will have a positive impact on the American economy as well b) President Biden and his team will have to make all efforts heel the wounds of electioneering which have viciously divided the American people along party lines. Mr Donald Trump leaves behind a fractured legacy. As Mr Trump's tenure neared its completion, he became more and more President of the Red States than the United States of America. Mr Jo Biden has always claimed that if elected, he would be the President of the entire USA and not only of the states that vote for it. He needs to make good that promise and progressively bring the warring sections together. It is going to be a challenging and prolonged process. He is expectedly going to face severe opposition from the Republican supporters as well as from Republican lawmakers. His job is not likely to be made any easy by the outgoing President who would continue to claim that the Presidency was stolen from him and Jo Biden is not the legitimate President. Mr Jo Biden would need all the diplomatic acumen at his command to make American one country again. C) The economy has taken a battering due to the pandemic. Unemployment numbers are at an all-time high, and millions have applied for unemployment security. He would need to reassure the American public that by controlling the pandemic, the economy would come back on the rails, and more jobs would be created. D) The USA has seen major diplomatic confrontation in the last few months with China, the second most powerful country globally. Mr Trump had blamed China for the origin of the Coronavirus and delayed information about it to the world. He derisively repeatedly called the Covid virus the Chinese virus. Many countries have held China responsible for the pandemic and for following unethical policies detrimental to other countries' interest. China is an expansionist bully that has spread its tentacle across the globe to undermine other countries' national interests. However, due to its huge economy and global reach, it is impossible to isolate China or have prolonged conflict. Mr Jo Biden and his administration would need to engage with China so that constructive cooperation can be done while also combatting its expansionist behaviour. The fine balance between aggression and diplomatic engagement would test the incoming administration. E) The US under Mr Trump had withdrawn from several multilateral and bilateral commitments and engagements. This includes the WHO, the WTO, and NATO. Until recently, the US was the largest donor to WHO. Mr Trump stopped aid to the WHO blaming it for biased and partisan behaviour in the months leading to the pandemic. Despite serious lapses during the pandemic, the WHO is the only multinational body that looks after health worldwide. Mr Jo Biden would certainly like to reclaim US's preeminent position in the WHO. It is expected to join back WHO and introduce checks and balances in the organization to prevent recurrence of lapses in the future. F) Mr Donald Trump had a serious problem with the climate body, and it walked out from the Paris Agreement. The new administration will certainly join back the world body for climate change. G) The NATO alliance countries have been facing difficult times due to Mr Trump's policies in the last few years. It is expected that Mr Biden would re-engage with the NATO alliance countries and allay their fears for long term strategic cooperation. H) Afganistan would also demand the immediate attention of the new President. Mr Donald Trump had committed to pull out of Afghanistan during his 2014 election campaign. In the last few months, Mr Trump was in undue haste to fulfil his promise to the American electorate. At present, there is only a limited presence of US soldiers in the strife-torn country. Afganistan is likely to fall back into prolonged civil war unless a comprehensive peace plan acceptable to all stakeholders is in place. Despite Doha talks between warring factions, there is no peace accord on the horizon. Mr Biden would have to play a preeminent role and continue to have a military presence in Afghanistan to stabilize the country. I) Iran has been at the receiving end of outgoing President's wrath. Much against its NATO alliance and the world opinion, Mr Trump pulled out of the Nuclear Treaty with Iran and imposed stifling economic sanctions on the Islamic country. These sanctions have pushed Iran into the waiting arms of China and Turkey. Most experts on this subject believe that Mr Jo Biden will restart engaging with Iran to check its nuclear ambitions while at the same time easing economic sanctions. These negotiations may cause more than a little heartburn for its natural allies Israel, Saudia Arabia and the UAE. But for peace and stability in the region, it is absolutely essential to get Iran back on the negotiating table. J) North Korea and its maverick dictator, Mr Kim Un Jong, continue to be a potential threat to the park strait region. Although Mr Trump had two very well-publicized interactions with Kim, no concrete outcome has come out of those engagements. Mr Jo Biden would have to take those negotiations further for a beneficial solution to the Korean problem. At home, Mr Biden would face severe position from within its own democratic party, particularly left-leaning Bernie Sander's followers. Opposition from a powerful segment of the Democratic Party became obvious even as the President-Elect was finalizing senior members of his administration. He is likely to face severe opposition from the House of Representatives as the majority there is with the Republicans. The world would be watching with extreme concern and anticipation about how the USA demonstrates its exemplary democratic power at home and how it reclaims the world's leadership, which has remained unchallenged since world war II. China is emerging as a strong superpower and is expected to overtake the US as the world's number one economy by 2028. The coming four years of Biden administration will determine to a considerable extent how the world economic order, as well as geopolitics, unravel in the coming decades. ( The writer is associated with Paras Hospital, Panchkula. Views are personal.)