China, Pakistan and the NSG
by Siddharth Varadarajan
Rather than objecting to what it can't prevent, India should back a nuclear deal for Pakistan structured around a package of non-proliferation commitments.
How would Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary have reacted to the news that a 13-year-old boy recently scaled the same peak which they were the first to conquer in 1953? Would they feel a tinge of irritation at how ‘easy' the summit has now become? Perhaps. But I am sure they would not feel their own accomplishment had in any way been diminished.
Having successfully broken the back of international sanctions on its civilian nuclear programme in September 2008, India needs to ask itself how it should look upon Pakistan's desire to follow in its footsteps and access civil nuclear technology for its energy needs. Should it stand in the way and try and block Islamabad from entering base camp as some panicky members of the Indian strategic community advocate? Or should it adopt a more mature attitude and work with its international partners to ensure the orderly incorporation of Pakistan into the global non-proliferation regime?
The question is relevant because China is likely to inform the Nuclear Suppliers Group of its decision to sell two pressurised water reactors (PWRs) for the Chashma-3 and 4 power stations in Pakistan. Virtually, every member of the 46-nation cartel believes this sale would be a violation of guidelines Beijing committed itself to follow when it joined the NSG in May 2004. China, of course, disagrees. India has so far wisely confined itself to asking the Chinese side for information about the proposed transfer. On June 22, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao fielded questions from reporters on the subject with a straight bat: “We are monitoring the debate and the developments in this regard as they relate to this subject of supply of nuclear reactors by China to Pakistan,” she said, carefully choosing her words. She did not criticise the proposed transfer or object to it, nor could she have. Three months ago, when asked about the possibility of nuclear cooperation between the U.S. and Pakistan, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had made it clear India has no locus standi. “Who am I to interfere with what goes on between the United States and Pakistan?” he said. “That's a matter for these two countries to consider.” The same logic should surely apply to what goes on in the civil nuclear field between Beijing and Islamabad.
NSG guidelines say members should sell nuclear equipment and material only to countries that are party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty or who accept full-scope safeguards — that is, who agree to place all their nuclear facilities under international inspection. There are only three countries which do not satisfy this criterion: India, Pakistan and Israel. Two years ago, the NSG voted unanimously to exempt India from this restriction. In exchange, India took on a number of commitments. These included separating its civilian and military nuclear facilities and placing the former under International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards. India also undertook to abide by its moratorium on nuclear testing, support international efforts to negotiate a verifiable Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty (FMCT), implement rigorous export control norms and not share enrichment and reprocessing technology with others. Prior to the NSG waiver, India finalised a safeguards agreement with the IAEA providing for indefinite IAEA supervision of its civilian nuclear sector.
Today, the NSG's restrictions no longer apply to India but they do still to Israel and Pakistan. When China became a member of the NSG six years ago, it made a “declaration of existing projects” in order to be able to fulfil supply obligations towards Pakistan that had been made prior to that. China and Pakistan signed agreements for civil nuclear cooperation in 1986 and 1991. The latter agreement has not been made public but two MoUs were signed in its wake for the construction of PWRs for the Chashma-1 and Chashma-2 power stations. China told the NSG that since these projects were ongoing, it would continue to supply fuel and equipment for them. Since it made no mention of Chashma-3 and 4 at the time, their inclusion is clearly an afterthought. If China persists with its export plan, this would arguably be the first time it openly flouts international rules it had voluntarily agreed to abide by. Chinese help for the Pakistani nuclear weapons programme is well known but virtually all of its proliferation activities occurred before it formally acceded to the NPT in 1992. Similarly, China has stuck to its NSG commitments since joining the cartel in 2004. Deviating from them now would raise questions about its willingness to play the role of a “responsible stakeholder” in the international system.
India is not a member of the NSG and will, therefore, not be in the room when the matter is discussed in Christ Church, New Zealand, this week. But it can respond to the new situation that is unfolding in one of three ways. First, it can go into overdrive to lobby NSG members to take on China and make sure there is no dilution of the group's rules prohibiting nuclear commerce with Islamabad. Second, it can remain quiet and do nothing. Third, it can make a virtue out of necessity and suggest the NSG start considering the need to bring Pakistan into the non-proliferation tent.
Of these, the first option is the worst from the strategic and diplomatic perspective. Trying to block something which India is in no position to prevent will exacerbate tensions with Pakistan and China and expose the weak hand the country has on this question. The only circumstance that would justify a blocking strategy is if the proposed Chinese transfer were to alter the strategic balance in the subcontinent. In fact, the supply of two safeguarded civilian power reactors will not make any difference, unlike say a transfer of unsafeguarded nuclear equipment or material or of new delivery systems for nuclear missiles. The binding constraints on the size of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal are the enrichment capacity of Kahuta, the small size (40 MW) of its heavy water reactor at Khushab and the amount of natural uranium it has access to. None of these constraints will be affected by the two new PWRs.
Given the conservatism of Indian diplomacy, the second option of silence is the one most likely to be followed. But this option is also inferior. No country in the world, least of all Pakistan or China, will believe India has no views or concerns on the transfer. Its silence will, thus, likely be seen as an admission of impotence rather than as an expression of statesmanship and wisdom. This option is also inferior because it is not in India's interest that the international non-proliferation system be tinkered with on an ad-hoc basis. The Indian exemption at the NSG may have been pushed by the U.S. but it required the active concurrence of dozens of countries. What emerged from those bruising sessions in Vienna in August and September 2008 was a careful balance of rights and obligations which benefited both the international system and India. China today lacks Washington's hegemonic ability to change the global rules. If it breaks ranks with the NSG and acts unilaterally, the after-effects could be quite destabilising.
India should, therefore, consider the third option of encouraging the international community to discuss the contours of an agreement that would lead to the orderly induction of Pakistan into the global nuclear regime. Given its population and energy needs, Pakistan needs help in developing a diverse energy portfolio. In line with global trends, it is logical that its leaders should look favourably upon nuclear power. Thanks to its past record in proliferating weapons-related technologies, however, Pakistan will have to do much more to establish its credentials as a responsible partner in the field of nuclear commerce. Any exemption at the NSG would likely involve stricter parameters and wider commitments than were seen in the India case. And if the Indian exemption took three years and two months to fructify, it is reasonable to expect Pakistan's exemption to take twice as long. The benefits of immediate engagement are, nevertheless, overwhelming. Islamabad's opposition to the FMCT — partly triggered by irrational fears about the impact of the Indo-U.S. nuclear agreement on India's ability to produce fissile material — means the Conference on Disarmament has been unable to begin its work on the treaty. If Pakistan knows there is light at the end of the NSG tunnel, its attitude at the CD may change.
source; the hindu
Thursday, 24 June 2010
Wednesday, 9 June 2010
A “zhengyou” relationship with China
by Vidya Subrahmaniam
China's Premier Wen Jiabao shows the way to India's President Pratibha Patil during a meeting at Zhongnanhai in Beijing, China, on Thursday, May 27, 2010.
During Pratibha Patil's recent visit to China, both sides celebrated the Copenhagen spirit and affirmed to take the relationship beyond bilateral to global cooperation.
At the Asia Hotel in Beijing, Ma Jisheng, an official with the information department of the Foreign Ministry, was declaiming on millennia-old India-China relations. Suddenly he flung aside the prepared text and announced that he would speak straight from the heart: “Would the media on both sides please give India and China a chance to develop normal relations?”
The official's point was simple. Attitudes hardened when the media sensationalised issues, and the events of 2009, when bilateral relations reached a precipitous low following media frenzy and scare-mongering, proved as much. “This constant harping on border, visa and other things, is it not like eating the same food everyday?” Mr. Ma asked plaintively, adding, “I cannot help but think sometimes that China and India would solve their problems if only the media kept quiet a bit.”
The Indian media delegation accompanying President Pratibha Patil had looked upon the Asia Hotel lunch as little more than an interlude in an itinerary packed with ceremonial welcomes, meetings, inaugurations, receptions and so forth. Ornamental phraseology and practised rhetoric are the stuff of such visits, and we were naturally taken aback by Mr. Ma's plain speaking. Perhaps he was being free and frank because we were not officials but the media?
Yet as the tour — organised to coincide with the landmark 60th anniversary of the establishment of India-China diplomatic relations — progressed, it was evident that even at the highest level of the Chinese leadership there was a degree of candour and responsiveness that took the Indian side by surprise. As the presidential outing drew to a close, both sides seemed to concur that Ms Patil's visit had gone beyond the perimeter of goodwill ambassadorship to generate tangible positives for the future. A highly placed Indian official told The Hindu: “I read the visit as a clear Chinese signal to have better relations with us.”
It certainly helped that Ms Patil arrived in Beijing at a time when India-China relations were seen to be on the mend after a difficult year characterised by intense mistrust on both sides. The irritants seemed daunting enough on their own: China's angst over the Dalai Lama's visit to Arunachal Pradesh, and the Indian unhappiness at stapled visas, not to mention apprehensions over Chinese-assisted construction in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). But aided by irresponsible speculation on an upcoming war, they began to look insurmountable. In July 2009, the editor of an Indian defence magazine prophesied that China would attack India by 2012. A month later, a so-called Chinese strategist posted a web article that argued that China with some effort could indeed balkanise India.
Neither of the articles was officially authorised. Yet, together, they assumed a life of their own with commentators in India hyperventilating about China's hidden agenda, and the Chinese media and think tanks contributing their bit to the rising hysteria.
While it may be difficult to locate the precise point when tensions began to ease up, analysts on both sides agree that India and China were well served by the “Copenhagen spirit.” This is a euphemism for the exemplary cooperation witnessed in the Danish capital during the December 2009 Climate Change summit. India and China so finely coordinated their negotiating positions at the talks that the online edition of the German magazine, Der Spiegel, was provoked to put out an article, “How India and China sabotaged the UN Climate Summit.”
The summit revealed the humongous potential of India-China cooperation on international platforms. Given the size of either country's population and economy, India and China are intimidating enough individually. Together their might could be staggering. Not surprisingly, Copenhagen became a metaphor for forward movement at the 2010 India-China Beijing talks. Ms Patil and President Hu Jintao agreed that the Asian neighbours were now ready to move beyond bilateral engagement to consider cooperation at international groupings and venues, among them G-20, Doha and BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China).
The enlarged scope of cooperation was brought up again on the last day of talks by Vice-President Xi Jinping, who made several significant points. First, he declared that India and China were ripe for a “new start.” Second, he reiterated the prospects for global cooperation between the Asian neighbours. Third, he pointed out that between them China and India boasted a combined population of 2.6 billion. The imagery would overawe anyone: Two fastest growing economies with close to 40 per cent of the global population acting in tandem. That Mr. Xi followed this up by attending the 60th anniversary celebrations of India-China relations held at a local hotel was not missed by the Indian side. Mr. Xi is not just any Vice-President. Though currently fifth in the Chinese leadership hierarchy, he is widely tipped to succeed Mr. Hu, which invests his words with weight and value. Mr. Xi's presence at the reception was noteworthy because the usual practice is to send Ministers to such functions.
Indian Foreign Ministry officials counted other factors which lent that special touch to the presidential visit. Ms Patil had an audience with each member of the leadership hierarchy — besides Mr. Hu and Mr. Xi, she met Chairman of the National People's Congress Wu Bangguo, Premier Wen Jiabao and Chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Jia Qinglin. This is considered a rare honour for a visiting head of state.
Through the visit, the two sides seemed to have firmed up a formula, slowly evolving over meetings between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the Chinese leadership, and now held up as the way forward: Manage the areas of conflict so that the relationship, rather than being held hostage to “one or two persisting issues,” could move forward to explore areas of global and bilateral cooperation.
Inevitably India's growing trade with China — China is India's largest trading partner with volumes targeted to reach $ 60 billion this year — figured prominently in the talks as did the fact that it was adversely balanced against India. President Patil missed no opportunity to speak for wider Indian access to Chinese markets. India's exports are currently restricted to primary and resource-based products such as iron ore and copper, with little opening available to core competence sectors like IT, pharma and engineering. In her speeches, Ms Patil stressed these as thrust areas for market development, and according to Indian officials, the Chinese team agreed that the trade imbalance was not sustainable. Said an Indian official: “The Chinese are minimal with their promises because they see them as commitment. The fact that at almost every forum they agreed to import more from us shows that they are very serious about trade.”
Yet with all the positives, the tour also showed how delicately poised the relationship is and how easily views can be shaped for or against China. So far, the Indian public opinion has alternated between exultation over Chindia and paranoia over imagined war threats. Chindia is an inappropriate coupling notwithstanding the growing prospects for India-China global joint action. China is far ahead of us on all indicators. On infrastructure and organising capacity, we must abandon all hopes of catching up — a truth that hit home when we saw the woefully inadequate Indian pavilion at the Shanghai expo.
As the presidential entourage flew into Beijing, the media mood was set by a report in the Guardian indicating huge Chinese diversion projects on the Brahmaputra. But thanks to excellent background briefing by the Indian side, which pointed to lack of evidence for the report, the accompanying media were prevented from blowing it up into “yet another Chinese threat.”
As against this, the media mood swing was overly positive on India's aspirations for a United Nations Security Council seat. Ms Patil did seek China's backing for it during her summit meeting with President Hu, and China did broadly indicate its support but the phraseology was far more nuanced than understood by the Indian media which drummed it up as “China backs India on UNSC seat.” Indeed, the omission of the “promised” UNSC seat from the Chinese Foreign Ministry statement issued the same day underscored the pitfalls of overinterpreting what Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao described as “a gradually developing relationship.” What official sources did convey later was that on the UNSC seat, “the Chinese were far more positive than they have been so far.”
Tibet provided some more media excitement on the last day of talks. Ms Rao and Ambassador S. Jaishankar were bombarded with questions: Did China raise Tibet? Just when we thought things were going fine, they brought up this irritant. Is this not unfair to us? MP Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, who was on the tour, added to the panic: “Heard they are singing the Tibet tune.” Tempers cooled down only after the Indian side explained that Tibet was on a checklist of queries China always raised in talks with India. The Indian side had a checklist too, and it was routine for both countries to go through the motions and allay each other's fears.
A top member of the Indian official delegation summed up India-China relations in terms of “pengyou” and “zhengyou.” “Pengyou” is a superficial friend. “Zhengyou” is a serious, real friend who will frankly admit to problems and work at overcoming them: “We have a zhengyou relationship with China.”
source:the Hindu-India
by Vidya Subrahmaniam
China's Premier Wen Jiabao shows the way to India's President Pratibha Patil during a meeting at Zhongnanhai in Beijing, China, on Thursday, May 27, 2010.
During Pratibha Patil's recent visit to China, both sides celebrated the Copenhagen spirit and affirmed to take the relationship beyond bilateral to global cooperation.
At the Asia Hotel in Beijing, Ma Jisheng, an official with the information department of the Foreign Ministry, was declaiming on millennia-old India-China relations. Suddenly he flung aside the prepared text and announced that he would speak straight from the heart: “Would the media on both sides please give India and China a chance to develop normal relations?”
The official's point was simple. Attitudes hardened when the media sensationalised issues, and the events of 2009, when bilateral relations reached a precipitous low following media frenzy and scare-mongering, proved as much. “This constant harping on border, visa and other things, is it not like eating the same food everyday?” Mr. Ma asked plaintively, adding, “I cannot help but think sometimes that China and India would solve their problems if only the media kept quiet a bit.”
The Indian media delegation accompanying President Pratibha Patil had looked upon the Asia Hotel lunch as little more than an interlude in an itinerary packed with ceremonial welcomes, meetings, inaugurations, receptions and so forth. Ornamental phraseology and practised rhetoric are the stuff of such visits, and we were naturally taken aback by Mr. Ma's plain speaking. Perhaps he was being free and frank because we were not officials but the media?
Yet as the tour — organised to coincide with the landmark 60th anniversary of the establishment of India-China diplomatic relations — progressed, it was evident that even at the highest level of the Chinese leadership there was a degree of candour and responsiveness that took the Indian side by surprise. As the presidential outing drew to a close, both sides seemed to concur that Ms Patil's visit had gone beyond the perimeter of goodwill ambassadorship to generate tangible positives for the future. A highly placed Indian official told The Hindu: “I read the visit as a clear Chinese signal to have better relations with us.”
It certainly helped that Ms Patil arrived in Beijing at a time when India-China relations were seen to be on the mend after a difficult year characterised by intense mistrust on both sides. The irritants seemed daunting enough on their own: China's angst over the Dalai Lama's visit to Arunachal Pradesh, and the Indian unhappiness at stapled visas, not to mention apprehensions over Chinese-assisted construction in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). But aided by irresponsible speculation on an upcoming war, they began to look insurmountable. In July 2009, the editor of an Indian defence magazine prophesied that China would attack India by 2012. A month later, a so-called Chinese strategist posted a web article that argued that China with some effort could indeed balkanise India.
Neither of the articles was officially authorised. Yet, together, they assumed a life of their own with commentators in India hyperventilating about China's hidden agenda, and the Chinese media and think tanks contributing their bit to the rising hysteria.
While it may be difficult to locate the precise point when tensions began to ease up, analysts on both sides agree that India and China were well served by the “Copenhagen spirit.” This is a euphemism for the exemplary cooperation witnessed in the Danish capital during the December 2009 Climate Change summit. India and China so finely coordinated their negotiating positions at the talks that the online edition of the German magazine, Der Spiegel, was provoked to put out an article, “How India and China sabotaged the UN Climate Summit.”
The summit revealed the humongous potential of India-China cooperation on international platforms. Given the size of either country's population and economy, India and China are intimidating enough individually. Together their might could be staggering. Not surprisingly, Copenhagen became a metaphor for forward movement at the 2010 India-China Beijing talks. Ms Patil and President Hu Jintao agreed that the Asian neighbours were now ready to move beyond bilateral engagement to consider cooperation at international groupings and venues, among them G-20, Doha and BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China).
The enlarged scope of cooperation was brought up again on the last day of talks by Vice-President Xi Jinping, who made several significant points. First, he declared that India and China were ripe for a “new start.” Second, he reiterated the prospects for global cooperation between the Asian neighbours. Third, he pointed out that between them China and India boasted a combined population of 2.6 billion. The imagery would overawe anyone: Two fastest growing economies with close to 40 per cent of the global population acting in tandem. That Mr. Xi followed this up by attending the 60th anniversary celebrations of India-China relations held at a local hotel was not missed by the Indian side. Mr. Xi is not just any Vice-President. Though currently fifth in the Chinese leadership hierarchy, he is widely tipped to succeed Mr. Hu, which invests his words with weight and value. Mr. Xi's presence at the reception was noteworthy because the usual practice is to send Ministers to such functions.
Indian Foreign Ministry officials counted other factors which lent that special touch to the presidential visit. Ms Patil had an audience with each member of the leadership hierarchy — besides Mr. Hu and Mr. Xi, she met Chairman of the National People's Congress Wu Bangguo, Premier Wen Jiabao and Chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Jia Qinglin. This is considered a rare honour for a visiting head of state.
Through the visit, the two sides seemed to have firmed up a formula, slowly evolving over meetings between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the Chinese leadership, and now held up as the way forward: Manage the areas of conflict so that the relationship, rather than being held hostage to “one or two persisting issues,” could move forward to explore areas of global and bilateral cooperation.
Inevitably India's growing trade with China — China is India's largest trading partner with volumes targeted to reach $ 60 billion this year — figured prominently in the talks as did the fact that it was adversely balanced against India. President Patil missed no opportunity to speak for wider Indian access to Chinese markets. India's exports are currently restricted to primary and resource-based products such as iron ore and copper, with little opening available to core competence sectors like IT, pharma and engineering. In her speeches, Ms Patil stressed these as thrust areas for market development, and according to Indian officials, the Chinese team agreed that the trade imbalance was not sustainable. Said an Indian official: “The Chinese are minimal with their promises because they see them as commitment. The fact that at almost every forum they agreed to import more from us shows that they are very serious about trade.”
Yet with all the positives, the tour also showed how delicately poised the relationship is and how easily views can be shaped for or against China. So far, the Indian public opinion has alternated between exultation over Chindia and paranoia over imagined war threats. Chindia is an inappropriate coupling notwithstanding the growing prospects for India-China global joint action. China is far ahead of us on all indicators. On infrastructure and organising capacity, we must abandon all hopes of catching up — a truth that hit home when we saw the woefully inadequate Indian pavilion at the Shanghai expo.
As the presidential entourage flew into Beijing, the media mood was set by a report in the Guardian indicating huge Chinese diversion projects on the Brahmaputra. But thanks to excellent background briefing by the Indian side, which pointed to lack of evidence for the report, the accompanying media were prevented from blowing it up into “yet another Chinese threat.”
As against this, the media mood swing was overly positive on India's aspirations for a United Nations Security Council seat. Ms Patil did seek China's backing for it during her summit meeting with President Hu, and China did broadly indicate its support but the phraseology was far more nuanced than understood by the Indian media which drummed it up as “China backs India on UNSC seat.” Indeed, the omission of the “promised” UNSC seat from the Chinese Foreign Ministry statement issued the same day underscored the pitfalls of overinterpreting what Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao described as “a gradually developing relationship.” What official sources did convey later was that on the UNSC seat, “the Chinese were far more positive than they have been so far.”
Tibet provided some more media excitement on the last day of talks. Ms Rao and Ambassador S. Jaishankar were bombarded with questions: Did China raise Tibet? Just when we thought things were going fine, they brought up this irritant. Is this not unfair to us? MP Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, who was on the tour, added to the panic: “Heard they are singing the Tibet tune.” Tempers cooled down only after the Indian side explained that Tibet was on a checklist of queries China always raised in talks with India. The Indian side had a checklist too, and it was routine for both countries to go through the motions and allay each other's fears.
A top member of the Indian official delegation summed up India-China relations in terms of “pengyou” and “zhengyou.” “Pengyou” is a superficial friend. “Zhengyou” is a serious, real friend who will frankly admit to problems and work at overcoming them: “We have a zhengyou relationship with China.”
source:the Hindu-India
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