By Ramesh Ramachandran
AsiaTimes.com
In a departure from its familiar voting pattern on UN Human Rights
Council (UNHRC) resolutions critical of Sri Lanka, India on March 27
abstained from a vote on a resolution approving an independent
international investigation into war crimes and human-rights violations
allegedly committed by the government of Sri Lanka during the 2009 civil
war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE.)
The customary “explanation of vote” by the permanent representative
of India to the UN offices in Geneva said, among other things, that:
1. “In asking the OHCHR [the Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights ] to investigate, assess and monitor the
human rights situation in Sri Lanka, the resolution
ignores the progress already made by the country in this field and
places in jeopardy the cooperation currently taking place between the
Government of Sri Lanka and the OHCHR and the Council’s Special
Procedures. Besides, the resolution is inconsistent and impractical in
asking both the Government of Sri Lanka and the OHCHR to simultaneously
conduct investigations”;
2. “India believes that it is imperative for every country to have
the means of addressing human rights violations through robust national
mechanisms. The Council’s efforts should therefore be in a direction to
enable Sri Lanka to investigate all allegations of human rights
violations through comprehensive, independent and credible national
investigative mechanisms and bring to justice those found guilty. Sri
Lanka should be provided all assistance it desires in a cooperative and
collaborative manner”; and
3. “It has been India’s firm belief that adopting an intrusive
approach that undermines national sovereignty and institutions is
counterproductive.”
After having voted for UNHRC resolutions on Sri Lanka in 2012 and
2013, India’s abstention this year on the resolution presented by the US
early in March is indicative of a course correction in New Delhi’s
engagement with Colombo. This is aimed at retrieving the ground lost in
the intervening years, burnishing India’s credentials as a relevant
player in the island nation’s affairs and signaling a return to
bilateralism as the centerpiece of India-Sri Lanka ties (not necessarily
in that order).
If India’s support for the resolutions in the previous years exposed
an utter bankruptcy of ideas on how to engage with Sri Lanka (thereby
implicitly admitting to a failure on the part of New Delhi either to
influence the course of events or bring about the desired change in
Colombo’s disposition), the abstention should be seen as a belated
attempt to pull the relationship back from the brink. Of course, it
helped that the reaction from the regional parties was muted this year,
giving New Delhi extra room for maneuver, and enabling it in the process
to regain its voice vis-a-vis the states on foreign policy matters.
It needs to be said here that India cannot claim to adhere to a
consistent policy toward Sri Lanka. First, it nurtured the LTTE and
burned its fingers in the process. Then it extended tacit support to
Colombo – before, during and after the end of the Sri Lankan civil war
in May 2009 – only later, in its wisdom, to support the UNHRC resolution
piloted by the United States.
The 2013 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting summit in Sri Lanka
was in the news as much for the renewed focus on the rights record of
the host nation as for the decision by Indian Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh not to take part in it. In his stead, it was left to External
Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid to lead the Indian delegation for the
biennial event of the 53-nation Commonwealth. In a letter of regret that
was hand-delivered to President Mahinda Rajapaksa of Sri Lanka, Singh
informed Rajapaksa of his inability to attend personally, but he did not
assign any reasons for that.
Suffice it to say that a careful reading of the history of India-Sri
Lanka relations would make it evident to just about anyone that India’s
policy towards this island-nation in the Indian Ocean can be described
as consistently inconsistent, and characterized by myopia and
self-inflicted crises.
For the Ministry of External Affairs, what should be particularly
worrying is the erosion in India’s standing in what it calls its sphere
of influence. The recent debate over which way India should vote on a
UNHRC resolution on Sri Lanka is instructive to the extent that it
illustrated how far India has come from being an influential actor in
its neighborhood to being a marginal or fringe player.
Put simply (not simplistically), some of the key questions were: is
it advisable for New Delhi to vote for the resolutions and risk losing
whatever goodwill and leverage it might have had with Colombo? Should
not all other options have been exhausted before India (figuratively)
threw in the towel and (literally) threw in its lot with the West?
Thursday’s abstention has partially answered that question.
However, there remains another worry. The protestations from Tamil
Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa, and her rival, M Karunanidhi,
patriarch of the Dravida Munetra Kazhagam party, over India’s vote on
Sri Lanka in 2012, coming as they did a few months after West Bengal
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee “vetoed” an agreement on sharing the
Teesta River waters with Bangladesh, injected a certain degree of
dissonance in the conduct of foreign policy. What fueled diplomats’
anxiety was the precedent that would be set if the center – India’s
federal government – caved in or succumbed to India’s states on matters
that fell in its realm.
Already, India’s engagement with Pakistan on one hand and China and
Myanmar on the other are determined to an extent by the domestic
conditions prevalent in Jammu and Kashmir and the northeastern states
respectively. Prime Minister Singh betrayed his frustration when he said
in the Lok Sabha – India’s parliament – that difficult decisions were
becoming more difficult because of coalition compulsions. He called for
bipartisanship in the interest of the country.
At the same time, what cannot be denied is that there exists a view
among a section of serving and former practitioners of diplomacy that
devolution of foreign policy to more stakeholders would not be entirely
unwelcome.
As a former foreign secretary told this writer: “Foreign policy today
is made not only in New Delhi but elsewhere, too. There are multiple
stakeholders and one cannot deny states a say in foreign policy if it
relates to them.” In other words, it is argued that if the states assert
their rights and/or seek more consultations, then the center must
respect those sentiments.
Having said that, an impression seems to be gaining ground,
erroneously at that, that foreign policy is the worst sufferer of this
new phenomenon of the states having their say. A cursory look at recent
years would show that the states have consistently been vocal on a host
of other issues, too. The recent examples of certain states or regional
parties opposing the policy of raising the cap on foreign direct
investment in the retail sector is a case in point, as is the opposition
to the center’s proposal for setting up a national counter-terrorism
center. In some of these cases New Delhi chose to yield, albeit
temporarily, but in some others it had its way.
Therefore, it would not be accurate to suggest that regional
influences are wielding a “veto” over New Delhi. Also, it would not be
fair either to paint the states as villains of the piece or to apportion
all the blame for the center’s foreign policy woes to regional parties
that are, or could be, aligned against it in the political arena.
For instance, the center accuses the West Bengal government headed by
the Trinamool Congress party of scuttling a river-waters sharing
agreement with Bangladesh. However, the Congress party, which heads the
ruling coalition at the center and also in Kerala, is guilty of playing
to narrow political sentiments, too. This was evidenced by the state
government and party’s stand on two Italian marines who are facing
murder charges for the deaths of two Indian fishermen off the Kerala
coast.
On balance, it is time to reshape India’s neighborhood policy in a
manner that reflects the broadest possible national consensus on the way
forward in reshaping ties with countries such as Pakistan, Afghanistan,
Iran, Nepal, Bangladesh, Maldives, Bhutan and Sri Lanka.
A reset is imperative, irrespective of which coalition forms the next
government in New Delhi. India can ill afford a Pavlovian foreign
policy. Equally, framing India’s foreign policy options as a binary
choice can be self-defeating. There needs to be a dispassionate debate
and a greater appreciation of various shades of grey.
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
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