Round
The World
New Delhi, 19 April 2011
21st C India’s
Diplomatic Plate
DIVERSIFYING ENGAGEMENTS
By Monish Tourangbam
Research Scholar, School
of International Studies (JNU)
Close on the heels of
Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao’s visit to Japan, where an India-Japan-US
dialogue was initiated, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh travelled to Sonya in China
to attend the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) Summit. Post
the Summit, he also made a bilateral visit to Kazakhstan, a relationship important for India’s energy
quest. Now, this speaks volumes about the trajectory of Indian foreign policy-making
and also the changing nature of global politics that necessitates such a course.
The international system
is undergoing a phase of complex inter-dependence and despite major and
emerging powers complaining and criticizing each other’s policies they have no
choice but to talk to each other and work on the areas where they have
complementariness of interests.
In an era that is
witnessing a mushrooming of organizations and associations within and across
regions, India’s growing
stature in world politics would be measured to a great extent by the kind of
presence it has in these groups and the importance that is given to New Delhi’s views in
major organizations.
Moreover, India’s changing power status is to be seen from
the changing dynamics of its relations with major world powers, who can no
longer ignore a good relationship with New
Delhi. As such, India’s relationship with the US, or
its ties with China and Russia does not come at the expense of another, but
every relationship is being seen at its own merit notwithstanding various
issues of divergences, normal in any relationship covering various issue areas.
Indeed, the BRICS Summit was another
reflection of the growing importance of emerging economies in world politics
and a mirror to the shifting power bases in the international system. The meet
that brought leaders from five major emerging world economies, expressed their
vision of sustainable growth of BRICS countries, emphasizing on increased
cooperation in economic, finance and trade matters, thus contributing to
sustainable growth of the world economy. They also dwelt on the need for reform
in international organizations to better reflect changing realities.
The Sanya declaration said, “We express our strong commitment to multilateral
diplomacy with the UN playing the central role in dealing with global
challenges and threats. In this respect, we reaffirm the need for a
comprehensive reform of the UN, including its Security Council, with a view to
making it more effective, efficient and representative, so that it can deal
with today’s global challenges more successfully.”
Under the theme “Broad Vision, Shared Prosperity”, deliberations were
held and a broad consensus was reached on strengthening BRICS cooperation as
well as on promoting coordination on international and regional issues of
common interest. The BRICS
leaders also propagated their support for the increasing relevance of the G20 Group
and its premier role in global economic governance.
As the engines of growth
in a world that is undergoing a fragile recovery from the global recession,
emerging economies like India and China have dramatically increased their power
shares in international politics and every effort should be made to transfer
this economic convergence to other issues of political importance where New
Delhi and Beijing do not see eye to eye.
Regardless of the
economic commonalities and some areas of cooperation between the two Asian
giants, there are too many issues to be managed whereby the two are typecast as
arch-rivals in regional and international politics. This should be corrected if
Asia is to sustain its dominance not only in
size and population but also in other sources of power.
For instance, Beijing
would provide a major confidence building measure to New
Delhi if it came out with a more categorical support for India’s bid for a permanent seat at the Security
Council, rather than its repeated rehearsed line: “We understand and support India’s
aspirations to play a bigger role at the UN.”
But a welcome step was
taken during the Indian Prime Minister’s visit. The two countries agreed to
resume defence exchanges following a meeting between Manmohan Singh and Chinese
President Hu Jintao, along the sidelines of the BRICS Summit. Especially as defence
exchanges had been suspended last year when the
Chinese Government refused to provide a visa to Northern Army Commander Lt Gen
B S Jaswal on the grounds that his jurisdiction included Jammu and Kashmir State.
For
some time, China has been issuing
stapled visa to Indian citizens in J & K,
a move that officials felt is tantamount to questioning Indian sovereignty over
the State. According to bureaucrats Beijing
has agreed to receive an officers' delegation from the Northern Command later
this year, and will issue them regular visas.
However, the Foreign
Ministry spokesperson did not reply to a question on whether China had
indeed withdrawn the stapled visa policy or it was merely making an exception
to allow exchanges to resume. As such, uncertainties still linger on core
issues of national interest, which need to be worked out transparently if the
convergences at some levels are to be replicated in others.
This apart, Prime Minister used the Summit sidelines to inter-act with Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev vis-à-vis the need for a review of nuclear safety issues in the
context of Japan’s Fukushima
nuclear power plant calamity along-with taking stock of developments in the
larger India-Russia ties. Manmohan Singh also met South Africa President
Jacob Zuma and decided to hold joint Naval exercises and fixed a new trade
target of $15 billion to be achieved by next year.
The major highlights
of the Prime Minister’s Kazakhstan
visit were the agreements signed for procuring energy from this Central Asian
country. According to sources, three agreements were signed between the
national companies of both countries.
The Satpayev exploration
block located in the Kazakhstan
sector of the Caspian Sea contains two
prospective structures — Satpayev and Satpayev Vostochni (East) -with estimated
hydro-carbon reserves of 256 million tonnes. The agreements will reportedly enable
ONGC Videsh (OVL) to acquire 25 per cent equity from Kazmunaigas (KMG), define
how OVL will pay KMG, repayment in case of commercial discovery and development
of the discovered fields.
Importantly, in today’s
world politics, no bilateral relationship is projected as coming at the expense
of another, because a country has a plethora of interests that cannot be
satisfied from its relationship with a few countries. For an emerging economy
and an emerging power holder at the international stage, diversifying its
sources of engagements with many countries across a wide spectrum of issues is
needed, clearly, that’s where Indian foreign policy-making is directed.
Hence, against this
backdrop Prime Minister Singh’s recent visits assume importance. As India looks towards a future where it is certain
to play a more pivotal role than it has ever played before, New Delhi needs to increase the size and
diversity of its diplomatic platter. The “Indian diplomatic platter” in the 21st
century should have something to entice everyone. ----- INFA
(Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)
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