How Pranab pulled off a balancing act in China
Presidential visits, more often than not, are more about symbolism than substance. But the lead up to President Pranab Mukherjee’s May 24-27, 2016 visit to China had curiously been dominated by two substantive - and rather difficult - issues.
The June meeting of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), the elite body that governs nuclear trade, had brought fresh attention to India’s long quest for accession to the group. Before the president’s arrival, China, which was far from enthusiastic about the NSG granting a waiver for India’s civil nuclear cooperation with the United States in 2008, had reiterated its view that the NSG members needed to have “thorough consultations” (diplomat-speak for prevailing, strong disagreements) on the question of countries that have not signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT) joining the group.
In other words, Beijing was saying that the group shouldn’t treat India as an exception - even if Beijing had supported it doing so in 2008, however reluctantly - and that its all-weather ally Pakistan and Israel should also have their aspirations heard.
The other thorny issue was Beijing last month placing a technical hold at the United Nations Security Council’s sanctions committee on India’s request to list Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar as a terrorist.
That the issue had been raised in recent weeks by external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj, defence minister Manohar Parrikar and national security adviser Ajit Doval with their respective Chinese counterparts in meetings in Moscow and Beijing did not stop much of the media from making it a top talking point before the president touched down in Guangzhou on May 24.
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| China blocked India’s request to UN to list JeM chief Masood Azhar as a terrorist. |
Though the focus remained firmly fixed on these two issues, diplomats from both sides were at pains to stress that the India-China relationship had, today, in its scope gone far beyond being defined by singular issues. Moreover, in truth, these issues were not to be the sole focus of the president’s meeting with his counterpart Xi Jinping, despite the perhaps outsized attention.
On Thursday (May 26), the president spent close to one-and-a-half hours in conversation with Xi at the Great Hall of the People, the massive parliament building that sits on the west side of Tiananmen Square, after a grand welcome ceremony. His conversation with the most powerful man in China, who is the general secretary of the Communist Party and also chairman of the Central Military Commission, continued over a banquet at the Great Hall.
The nature of diplomacy is such that meetings between presidents are very ceremonial, each accompanied by a delegation of officials in talks that are highly scripted and formal. In the days before visits, officials from the foreign ministries of both sides go over what the other is likely to bring up.
The Chinese, for their part, made it more than clear that they didn’t think a presidential-level meeting was the right forum to discuss “specifics” such as the NSG, which was for diplomats to handle, not for leaders to quibble over.
So the Indian president was left with the rather tricky task of using his visit to push China on issues that have recently challenged ties, but conveying India’s concerns against this backdrop. Rather than mentioning Masood Azhar, Mukherjee emphasised that “there were no good terrorists and bad terrorists” and that “transborder terrorism” - a phrase that leaves little doubt about its source - was a “menace”.
Similarly, the president didn’t tell Xi that India wanted China’s support at the NSG, but impressed upon him India’s climate change commitments and its need to rapidly expand its non-fossil fuel energy sources, of which nuclear energy will be a key component.
But for this to happen, he said, India and its international partners needed “a predictable international environment” to expand its civilian nuclear energy programme. He pointed out the close cooperation between India and China on climate change through the BASIC group (along with Brazil and South Africa).
The message was that “we are very confident that as we move in our quest for a more predictable environment for building civilian nuclear power, China can play a positive and facilitatory role in that regard". Mukherjee concluded by asking Xi to give his personal attention to this matter.
“The overall sense which we got from these meetings,” foreign secretary S Jaishankar told reporters later, “was a belief among the Chinese leadership that these are uncertain times globally, and in these uncertain times, there is a greater responsibility in India and China in terms of how they related to each other, communicated on regional and international issues, and worked together in international forums.
“A message of responsibility in heightened times,” he added, “was something that came through clearly.”
This was also a message that was stressed by Mukherjee in his speeches to a business forum in Guangzhou and in Beijing’s prestigious Peking University.
“There are challenges including the boundary question that still need to be addressed comprehensively,” he said at the university. “While it is natural for neighbours to have a difference of views on certain issues from time to time, I consider it a test of our political acumen when we are called upon to... resolve these differences to the mutual satisfaction of both sides. Both sides should work with the aim of ensuring that we do not burden our coming generations by leaving our unresolved problems and differences to them. I am confident that by ensuring that these matters are not aggravated and by remaining sensitive to mutual concerns, we can minimise our differences and maximise our convergences.”
As much as it might not please those who were demanding a ticking off from the president that would have presumably frightened Xi into sanctioning Masood Azhar or endorsing India’s nuclear credentials, the ultimate larger purpose of the visit was for both sides to acknowledge that while they have differences on a great many issues including the boundary, there was no reason for other areas of the relationship, such as the recent flood of Chinese investments into India, to be held hostage.
Differences are unavoidable, but minimising them and expanding areas of convergence could not only pave the way forward, but just might make it a little bit easier to deal with those issues where India and China don't usually see eye-to-eye.