India’s Foreign Secretary Dr S. Jaishankar
Photolabs@ORF
India’s Foreign Secretary Dr S. Jaishankar will be heading to Beijing for the first Strategic Dialogue with his Chinese counterpart Executive Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Yesui on Wednesday, February 22. The decision to hold this Dialogue was taken by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi during the latter’s visit to India in August last year. Wang Yi was in India to prepare for Prime Minster Narendra Modi’s visit to Hangzhou, China, for the G 20 Summit in September, 2016 and for President Xi Jinping’s visit to Goa for the BRICS Summit a month later.
According to the Ministry of External Affairs, the two sides will ‘’take a holistic view of India-China relations and see to what extent they can accommodate each other’s concerns and interests.’’ They are expected to discuss key issues of mutual “concern and interest” including “friction points.”
The two sides started out well when the Modi government came to power in May, 2014. Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to India in September, 2014 started off well when he landed in Gujarat but its anticipated beneficial outcome was rapidly dissipated by the cross-border incursion by Chinese troops. It was however expected that the firm stand taken by PM Modi on this issue and the promise of US$ 20 billion investment by China in India will help to provide a significant impulse to bilateral ties.
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Relations between the two countries have however continued to move downhill. This is notwithstanding the useful visit by Modi to China in May, 2015, and a total of nine meetings between Modi and Xi since the NDA government took office in 2014.
The two major issues that have recently surfaced as principal irritants are of India’s membership of NSG and banning of Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Massod Azhar by UN Security Council (UNSC).
In the case of Masood Azhar, China had initially put a technical hold on discussions in the UNSC. This was subsequently converted into a veto. More recently, when USA, UK and France piloted the proposal to proscribe Massod Azhar, China again vetoed the move. China has demanded that India provide ‘’solid evidence’’ for it to withdraw its veto. All evidence about JeM’s and Azhar’s role in carrying out terrorist attacks against India has been furnished. It is on this basis that JeM was proscribed by UNSC in 2001. Azhar is suspected of having been involved in the Pathankot and Uri attacks on Indian defense assets in 2016. While 14 out of 15 members of UNSC are agreeable to banning Azhar, China has demanded ‘’solid evidence’’ for banning him. It is clear that China is taking a political stand to support its ‘’iron ally’’ Pakistan. It is unfortunate that China is adopting a pernicious stance on the sensitive issue of terrorism. It possibly feels that by supporting Azhar and the Afghan Taliban, it will be able to keep its own backyard in Xinjiang safe. This is a shortsighted approach and exposes its double standards. Its dishonesty became evident when it recently appealed for international protection against terrorist attacks on infrastructure being created by it under its One Belt One Road Initiative!
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