International Affairs
By N.P. Upadhyaya
Kathmandu: The South Asian region is in turmoil. The probable fight will be a triangular one that includes the US, regional hooligan India and Nepal’s Northern neighbor – China. If politics worsens, emerging regional power Pakistan and Putin’s Russia may enter into the conflict. The venue first is India controlled and subdued Kathmandu and then it will be Kabul – the capital of war-torn Afghanistan and then Kashmir which is already a playground for the regional trouble maker – India.
Bluntly speaking, after Kashmir, it is Kathmandu and Kabul that is sure to feel the heat of the “power rivalry”. So on three fronts, there will be a fight in the region: Kathmandu, Kabul and India’s illegally occupied Kashmir. While the Kashmir issue deals mainly with India and Pakistan then Kathmandu and Kabul have all the regional players plus the US and China as it affects these countries plus Iran and Central Asian countries. Kashmir is currently under India’s brutal occupation which, in many more ways than one has become the largest “open-air jail” in the world.
However, India is being shielded even by the US and UN (by not executing its own earlier decisions made on Kashmir and the US not intervening in the issue as mediator) and some more international powers which have a say in world politics.
Look at the turn of events in this part of the world that have taken place in a short span of a week which have sown the seeds of a fierce skirmish in between China, the US and India – the former stooge of the now-dissolved Soviet Union for all along the Cold War period.
The reason for the expected ferocious fight is India and India alone – the South Asian menace.
Kathmandu’s political circuit takes India not only as a camp-changer but also as pleased to name this hooligan country a nation being now ruled by PM Narendra Modi for example.
Xi’s visit to Tibet:
A fortnight ago, President Xi Jinping mysteriously landed in the autonomous region of China, Tibet and headed towards that part of Tibet which borders Arunachal Pradesh of India to which China claims that it is the extended territory of Tibet.
Xi last visited the region ten years ago as vice president. The last sitting Chinese leader to officially visit was Jiang Zemin in 1990. This visit was taken as a security threat to India and the Godi media are crying, since then, foul against China as is their habit. On the contrary Chinese media asserts that the visit “underscores China’s concerns over security on the border with its southern neighbor” India where military clashes between the two rivals took place only last year.
President Xi intends to link Lhasa with Kongpo (Nyngchi in Chinese) which, Indian experts believe, would create a security threat to the Delhi regime. India’s pain is Nepal’s pleasure for so many obvious reasons. India is a permanent curse for the Himalayan nation, Nepal.
President Xi during his Tibet visit is learnt to have instructed the Tibetan high placed officials to take up the issue of the Rail links to Kathmandu as soon as possible. This news came no less than an explosion for India’s rulers as the latter concludes that Nepal is a small nation under its pocket and so Nepal has no right or whatsoever to tilt towards China. Xi’s Tibet visit has worried the US also. One influential Republican lawmaker said Joe Biden was not doing much to stop the Chinese “march”.
Talking to Fox news Republican Devin Nunes said: “The Chinese dictator was on the border with India …also a threat to India…threatening India that he is going to build a big water project, possibly cut off water to India”.
The second event:
The day US Secretary of State Antony Blinken landed in Delhi, July 27, he made his first call to Nepali Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba and hopefully told the latter to get the US project Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) parliamentary approval.
The fact is that the MCC doesn’t need parliamentary approval in Nepal but yet some “leaders” have made it a point to get it through the Parliament so that it assumes the status of law which later can’t be challenged in any Nepali Court.
The UML leader Dr Bhim Rawal and NCP leader C.P Mainali both claim that some of the articles and clauses contained in the MCC agreement with the Nepal government dismisses the authority of the Nepali state in an insulting manner and thus Dr Rawal and Mainali suggest that the US’s MCC project could be accepted only when the other side amicably deletes those provisions which demean the authority of the Nepal nation.
However, PM Deuba and his supporters in the fractured UML led by Indo bend Madhav Nepal and other peripheral political parties that elevated him to power this time prefer the Parliamentary approval of the MCC at the earliest possible.
Talks on MCC was first initiated and brought in by the Maoists led government when K.B. Mahara was the Foreign Minister.
It is rumored in the political circuit that those who strongly favor the early approval of the MCC project may have enjoyed “financial gains” and that is why they need the sure-shot approval of the MCC.
While the debate is on, Kathmandu Street is being now captured by those who aggressively oppose the approval of the MCC claiming that the US project not only undermines the Nepali territorial integrity and sovereignty but also pushes Nepal to exist as a new protectorate of the former British colony – that is India which unfortunately borders Nepal.
Lapdog of India? Never.
A section of learned men suggests the US administration look Nepal through its own lens but not from India’s with whom Nepal have never enjoyed cordial relations.
And the third one: The US dignitary while residing on Indian soil, July 27-28, made some comments that have for sure angered China.
For China, the Dalai Lama is a dangerous separatist. For India, the Dalai is a China Card.
The US top diplomat’s meet with the Dalai man in Delhi speaks that the US wants to send signals to China that the US sides with the Dalai and that China in no way can appoint a new Dalai on its own but it should be left to the Tibetans to decide.
Blinken met briefly with Ngodup Dongchung, who presented him with a scarf from the Dalai Lama, a senior State Department official said.
Dongchung serves as a representative of the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA), is also known as the Tibetan government in exile, reports Reuters dated 28, 2021.
The US Congress, to recall, has already passed the Tibet Policy and Support Act which in essence champions the rights of Tibetans to choose the successor to the Dalai Lama, and the establishment of a US consulate in the Tibetan capital Lhasa.
The Tibet Policy Act of the US has already “sensitized” the Chinese regime and the fresh meeting of the US dignitary with the Tibetan official in Delhi at a gathering of so-called “Civil society leaders” must have heightened the anger of Beijing authorities. Ngodup’s presence in the civil society group is an Indian ploy to tease China which is clear.
Apart from this meet, Secretary Blinken also met separately another Tibetan representative Geshe Dorjee Damdul, who attended a roundtable Blinken held with around seven civil society members, reports the NDTV July 29. India used and overused Secretary Blinken to tease China from Delhi itself.
China’s reaction:
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said, “Tibetan affairs are purely China’s internal affairs that allow no foreign interference”.
“China firmly opposes all forms of contacts between foreign officials and the Dalai Lama, Lijian said. ”Any formal contact between the US and the Dalai clique is a violation of the US commitment to acknowledge Tibet as part of China”.
India will have to pay a very heavy price for this Indian (mis)adventure as it has received several setbacks in the past. Just recall the fresh Doklam incident and the great 1962 debacle.
If on the one hand, as the number one champion of the democratic world, the US should have avoided meeting the Tibetan officials in Delhi to lessen the difference with China, then on the other one high profile US official was visiting China at the same time when Blinken was touring the Indian capital-Delhi.
The U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman visited the Chinese city of Tianjin at the end of July last month for high-level talks with Chinese officials.
Wendy met foreign minister Wang Yi and assured the Chinese minister Yi and had “frank and open discussion about a range of issues, demonstrating the importance of maintaining open lines of communication between the US and China.
This is meaningful in that the US has carrots and stick both in its hands. This is the US diplomacy…superb.
Pakistan factor in Afghanistan:
While the Indian side wished Blinken to speak favoring India’s role in the Afghanistan peace process, the US top diplomat instead has lauded China’s significant role – the arch-rival of India thus frustrating its preferred “partner” in the Quad.
The Taliban(s) tentatively hate India as this country has been assisting Ashraf Ghani’s regime to pounce upon the “advancing” Taliban. The latter is about to capture Kabul, the seat of Ghani.
India in recent days has armed Ghani’s regime with Indian weapons to fight with the Taliban.
Blinken lauded Beijing’s role at a time when China was welcoming a Talibani “team” in Tianjin which speaks that the Taliban are already a force awaiting recognition from regional and international powers if and when the Taliban’s behave in a manner that is demanded of them.
Blinken said that China’s possible involvement in Afghanistan peace could be a positive thing. Yet he had some tight words for China.
Interestingly, Chinese minister Wang Yi certified the Taliban(s) as what he termed “an important military and political force in Afghanistan”.
This speaks of China’s intimacy with the Taliban authorities which will be “in use” after foreign forces’ withdrawal this September.
China is likely to enter Afghanistan upon US departures as stated in our previous articles.
This hobnob with the Chinese and the Russians augur well for Pakistan and these countries involvement (read China and Russia) in the Afghan peace process will be surely carried out through the use of the good offices of Khan’s Pak government and the strong Army led by COAS Bajwa.
As the luck would have it, Pakistan is key to peace in Afghanistan and the international powers can’t ignore Islamabad’s key character.
Pakistan, a close friend of China and to some extent of the US both prefer peace and want to see a government in Afghanistan that is the “choice” of the Afghani people. This is Pakistan’s standard position.
Talking to PBS News anchor Judy Woodruff, 30 July, PM Imran Khan says his country pushed the Taliban to negotiate with the US over the ending the conflict in Afghanistan and added that the best political outcome is an “inclusive” government”.
“I think the US has really messed it up in Afghanistan”, says Khan talking to Judy Woodruff, July 28.
The US, Russia, China troika plus Pakistan:
Moscow hosted a regular meeting of the extended “Troika” comprising representatives of Russia, China, the United States, and Pakistan, March 18, which had focused on making progress in the intra-Afghan process to reach a negotiated settlement and permanent and comprehensive ceasefire is all set to meet once again in Qatar on August 11 next week.
The Troika plus Pakistan has summarily “ignored” India-the regional spoiler which has of late brought more chaos in Afghanistan thus damaging the “peace process”.
Commenting on the Russian-US interaction with Afghanistan, Russian special envoy for Afghanistan Zamir Kabulov said in Moscow that it was developing successfully and that both countries had generally coinciding views on the Afghan peace settlement, reports the Pajhwok monitor (Afghan news), 31 July.
President Vladimir Putin’s Special Representative for Afghanistan Zamir Kabulov made some important announcements on the Afghan peace process at an online briefing in Moscow at the end of the last month.
When asked which country has the most influence in Afghanistan, Kavulov unhesitatingly said there was no single most influential state, but rather four, namely China, Russia, the US, and Pakistan.
“Pakistan has the greatest influence on the Taliban, but that does not mean it controls or guides them, Kabulov added.
Admitting Pakistan’s key role in the peace process, Kabulow stated that “Pakistan is a firm partner of Russia. We are on the same wavelength…the Pakistani leadership…is not interested in turning Afghanistan into an Islamic emirate”.
Kabulov is soon to meet his US, Chinese and Pakistani counterparts (the extended troika) in Doha.
Meanwhile, in Islamabad, Foreign Office spokesman Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri underlined the importance of Pakistan attached to the troika plus as an important forum for facilitating the Afghan peace process.
It is in this background that the Pak Army Chief has told the Afghani media men just the other day that “Stability in Pakistan and Afghanistan is inter-linked”.
Gen Bajwa pointedly told the media men “no sabotage from external forces shall be tolerated as the Pak-Afghan border security is meaningful”.
India visibly is being sidelined by international powers which count in institutionalizing peace in Afghanistan. The troika plus is an international recognition to Pakistan. That’s all.
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