Round The World
New Delhi,
13 April 2011
India-Japan-US Talks
SUSTAINING A STABLE ASIA
By Monish Tourangbam,
Research Scholar, School of International Studies (JNU)
Looking at the nature-inflicted crises in Japan and its
ramifications for the Japanese economy and nuclear industry and with concerns
of a rising China that increasingly sees Asia as its zone of hegemonic sphere,
the US as well as Japan would more than ever realize the importance of India as
a power balancer in Asia.
Lately, Japan
was overtaken by China as
the second largest economy in the world and then came the current natural
calamity that Prime Minister Naoto
Kan has called its worst crisis
since the end of World War II. In this hour of need, New
Delhi has steadfastly stood with Tokyo by providing aid and assistance
whole-heartedly. India
has a lot of stakes in the sustainability of the Japanese economy and the
continuation of its major power status in the region.
At the same time, India,
U.S. and Japan share common interests in preserving
strategic stability in Asia in the face of the
undoubted rise of Chinese power in the region. India’s Foreign Secretary
Nirupama Rao paid a recent visit to quake-hit Japan and held talks with leaders
of the Japanese Foreign Ministry on a range of bilateral, regional and global issues
and concerns related to the natural disaster.
India has offered assistance to Japan in “any
way required” something much appreciated by the Japanese side. According to
sources, an Indian relief and rehabilitation team has already fulfilled several
need-based tasks in the Miyagi prefecture, one of the worst affected areas.
Both sides agreed to have Ministerial-level Economic
Dialogue apart from initiating an India-Japan-U.S. trilateral dialogue. “The
two sides agreed that the new Ministerial-level Economic Dialogue, announced by
the Prime Ministers at their Annual Summit in Tokyo in October last, will be led by the
Foreign Ministers of the two countries. The first meeting of the Dialogue will
take place later this year,” sources said.
But the limelight was stolen by the announcement that
trilateral talks comprising India,
Japan and the US will be
initiated. An agreement was reached to establish an India-Japan-US trilateral
dialogue on regional and global issues of shared interest. These consultations,
agreed to earlier by the US
would be conducted by the Foreign Ministries of the three countries.
It is indeed an opportune time for the formulation of such a
framework, looking at the trajectory of the relationships between the countries
involved. India-US cooperation and the range of issues on which they work
together are more comprehensive than ever before.
Both the administrations in Washington
and New Delhi
are clearer than ever in their support for a more robust India-US relationship,
evident in the expanding defence cooperation between the two countries and the
range of military exercises that both have been conducting over the years. Significant,
being the Naval Malabar exercises, of which Japan is also an important partner
and which has often drawn the ire of the Chinese Government.
At the same time, India-Japan relations have seen an upward
trend in recent years and successive leaders of the Japanese Government have
given utmost importance to a close relationship and the gesture has been well
reciprocated from both sides. The two countries
had also signed a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) to give a
boost to trade in goods, services and investment.
While talks on a nuclear deal were steaming
up, the present calamity has put the Japanese nuclear industry in a predicament,
as the Government has to first tackle the fallout of the disaster that has sent
shockwaves raising new concerns about safety standards of nuclear installations.
Importantly, Indian nuclear
installations, being largely stationed on the coast, have drawn quite a lot of
attention concerning their safety standards. As such, talks of a nuclear deal
between India and Japan have
definitely faced a speed breaker.
But, at this time of need for Japan, India needs to be cautious of how
it deals with the Japanese side. New
Delhi has shown all seriousness with continuing the
talks of the tie-up in the nuclear energy sector. And the continuance of India’s confidence on Japan
would surely have major dividends when India needs support at any
international diplomatic table.
Further, Foreign Secretary Rao
during her discussions with the top brass of the Japanese Foreign Ministry conveyed that India had not yet taken a decision on banning
Japanese food imports and that it would consult Japan prior to taking a decision on
the advisory issued by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India.
Apprehensions abound regarding radiation contamination due the ongoing nuclear
calamity at the Fukushima
nuclear power plant, ravaged by the quake and tsunami.
Interestingly, the announcement of initiating the
India-Japan-US trilateral talks also came just before Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh is due to meet the top Chinese leadership in Sanya on the sidelines of
the Brazil-Russia-India-China summit (with South Africa to join in as a new
member). This indicates that India
is not out to annoy other powers and neither there is a game of choosing sides.
International politics is increasingly entering a multi-lateralist phase where
the centres of power are more diffused than ever.
Though the US
overwhelms other countries including its rising competitor China in the military sphere, the sources of
power are more multi-pronged and the US is hardly the power it used to
be in the economic sphere, still undergoing a fragile recovery from the
financial recession.
Hence, the thrust is on engaging all the major powers, keeping
clear the areas of convergences and the lines that cannot be crossed in view of
one’s national interest. That is why India
intends to work together with China,
Russia and also with Japan and the US, putting forward its relevance
as a power to reckon with and the deliverables that it can provide.
Significantly, the continuing trajectory of Indian foreign
policy emphasizes India’s
insistence on an independent foreign policy, factoring the need to increase areas
of cooperation across a broad spectrum of issues with diverse countries. So, if
India finds itself on the same plane with the US and Japan, to keep a check on
any future belligerency by a rising China, thus sharing a common interest in
preserving a stable Asia, at the same time New Delhi may find more areas of
cooperation with Beijing when it comes to the issue of climate change talks as
against the developed western countries.
Thus, this is a period of complex interdependence and hence,
the India-Japan-US trilateral talks should not be projected as targeting anyone
in the region. The emphasis should rather be on the traction that it could
provide India’s strategic
calculations in the region and enhance habits of cooperation with the concerned
countries, US and Japan,
with which India
already shares major areas of cooperation.
Clearly, the rise of a hegemonic and an aggressive China will
not serve the interests of any country in the Asian Continent, and this is
something clear to most policy makers and analyst across boundaries. Consequently,
this projected trilateral framework should serve as leverage for Indian
policymakers and be a sober reminder to the Chinese that their strategic moves
are being watched quite intensely. ---- INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
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