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Subject: International Stories of Key Importance

  • India-Turkey relations

    As a new round of geopolitical jousting begins on India’s north-western frontiers, Delhi must deal with a number of new actors that have carved out a role for themselves in the region.

    Overambitious Turkey

    • Our focus today is on Turkey’s regional ambitions (particularly in Afghanistan) and their implications for India.
    • Ankara is in negotiations with the US on taking charge of the Kabul airport which is critical for an international presence in Afghanistan that is coming under the Taliban’s control.
    • Turkey has been running Kabul airport security for a while, but doing so after the US pullout will be quite demanding.
    • Taking a longer view, though, Turkey is not a new regional actor in India’s northwest.

    Turkey and Afghanistan

    • Ankara and Kabul have recently celebrated the centennial of the establishment of diplomatic relations.
    • Through this century, Turkey has engaged purposefully with Afghanistan over a wide domain.
    • While it joined the NATO military mission in Afghanistan after the ouster of the Taliban at the end of 2001, Turkey avoided any combat role and differentiated itself from the Western powers.
    • Ankara has contributed to the training of the Afghan military and police forces.
    • It has also undertaken much independent humanitarian and developmental work.

    Affinity with Pakistan

    • Turkey’s good relations with both Afghanistan and Pakistan have also given space for Ankara to present itself as a mediator between the warring South Asian neighbours.
    • Turkey’s “Heart of Asia” conference or the Istanbul Process has been a major diplomatic vehicle for attempted Afghan reconciliation in the last few years.
    • Widespread goodwill for Turkey in Afghanistan has now come in handy for the US in managing some elements of the post-withdrawal phase.
    • In Pakistan, PM Imran Khan has rallied behind Erdogan’s ambition to seize the leadership of the Islamic world from Saudi Arabia.
    • Pakistan’s Army Chief had to step in to limit the damage with Saudi Arabia, which has long been Pakistan’s major economic benefactor.

    Challenges for India

    • Turkey’s growing role in Afghanistan opens a more difficult phase in relations between Delhi and Ankara.
    • India’s opposition to alliances and Turkey’s alignments reflected divergent international orientations of Delhi and Ankara after the Second World War.
    • And Turkey’s deepening bilateral military-security cooperation with Pakistan made it even harder for Delhi to take a positive view of Ankara.
    • Turkey and Pakistan were part of the Central Treaty Organization (CENTO) that was set up in 1955 by the British.
    • Although CENTO eventually wound up in 1979, Turkey and Pakistan remained close partners in a number of regional organizations and international forums like the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

    Pre-Erdogan era Turkey

    • The shared secular values between Delhi and Ankara in the pre-Erdogan era were not enough to overcome the strategic differences between the two in the Cold War.
    • To make matters more complicated, the positive legacy of the Subcontinent’s solidarity with the Ottoman Empire and the Turkish Republic, emerged out of its ruins in the early 20th century, accrued mostly to Pakistan.
    • There were moments — during the tenures of PM Rajiv Gandhi and Mr Vajpayee, when India and Turkey seemed poised for a more productive relationship.
    • But those have been rather few and far between.

    Turkey’s departure from Secularism

    • Meanwhile, Turkey’s Islamist internationalism under Recep Tayyip Erdogan has inevitably led to its deeper alliance with Pakistan, greater meddling in South Asia, and a sharper contraction with India.
    • The Pakistani prism through which Delhi has long seen Ankara, however, has prevented it from fully appreciating the growing strategic salience of Turkey.
    • Erdogan’s active claim for leadership of the Islamic world has seen a more intensive Turkish political, religious, and cultural outreach to the Subcontinent’s 600 million Muslims.

    Self-goals on Kashmir

    • Turkey has become the most active international supporter of Pakistan on the Kashmir question.
    • Delhi is aware of Erdogan’s hypocrisy on minority rights.
    • While pitching for self-determination in Kashmir, Erdogan actively tramples on the rights of its Kurdish minority at home and confronts them across Turkey’s border in Syria and Iraq.

    Other ambitions in Asia

    • Erdogan was quick to condemn the Bangladesh government’s hanging of a senior extremist leader in 2016.
    • But in a reflection of his strategic suppleness, Erdogan also offered strong political support for Dhaka on the Rohingya refugee crisis.
    • As Bangladesh emerges as an attractive economy, Ankara is now stepping up its commercial cooperation with Dhaka.
    • Turkey, which hosted the Caliphate in the Ottoman era, had natural spiritual resonance among the South Asian Muslims.

    Riving the Caliphate

    • With the abolition of the Caliphate in 1924, Turkey’s Westernization under Ataturk reduced its religious significance.
    • Erdogan’s Islamist politics are about regaining that salience.
    • Erdogan’s strategy marks the declining relevance of the old antinomies — between alliances and autonomy, East and West, North and South, Islam and the West, Arabs and the Jews — that so resonate with the traditional Indian foreign policy discourse.

    Stance on Israel

    • Turkey was the first Muslim-majority nation that established full diplomatic relations with Israel.
    • Erdogan now actively mobilizes the Arab and Islamic world against Israel without breaking relations with Tel Aviv.
    • Erdogan’s outrage on Israel is about presenting himself as a better champion of Palestine than his Arab rivals.

    India’s option against Turkey

    • India, which has been at the receiving end of Erdogan’s internationalism, has multiple options in pushing back.
    • The recent naval exercise between India and Greece in the Mediterranean offers a small hint of India’s possibilities in Turkey’s neighbourhood.
    • Many Arab leaders reject Erdogan’s policies that remind them of Ottoman imperialism.
    • They resent Erdogan’s support of groups like the Muslim Brotherhood that seek to overthrow moderate governments in the Middle East.
    • There is much that India can do to up its game in the Arab world.

    Lessons for India

    • The new fluidity in geopolitics in India’s extended neighbourhood to the west.
    • Agency for regional powers is growing as the influence of great power weakens.
    • Religious ideology, like the more secular ones, is a cover for the pursuit of power.
    • Finally, Erdogan has carefully modulated his confrontation with major powers by avoiding a breakdown in relations.

    Conclusion

    • For Erdogan, the choices are not between black and white. That should be a good guide for India’s own relations with Turkey.
    • Delhi needs to vigorously challenge Turkey’s positions where it must, seize the opportunities opened by regional resentments against Erdogan’s adventurism, and at the same time prepare for a more intensive bilateral engagement with Ankara.

  • What lies ahead for Afghanistan after US exit?

    The US troops are departing away after coordinating the 20-year-long war in Afghanistan, effectively ending their military operations in the country.

    Why did the US invade Afghanistan?

    • Weeks after the 9-11 terrorist attacks, the US declared war on Afghanistan.
    • It was then ruled by the Taliban.

    Terror then gets safe heaven

    • Al-Qaeda’s leaders and key operatives fled to safe havens in Pakistan.
    • The US rejected an offer from the Taliban to surrender and vowed to defeat the insurgents in every corner of Afghanistan.
    • In 2003, US announced that major military operations in the country were over.
    • The US focus shifted to the Iraq invasion, while in Afghanistan, western powers helped build a centralized democratic system and institutions.
    • But that neither ended the war nor stabilised the country.

    Why is the US pulling back?

    • The US had reached the conclusion long ago that the war was unwinnable.
    • It wanted a face-saving exit.

    What are the terms of US exit?

    • Before the Doha talks started, the Taliban had maintained that they would hold direct talks only with the US, and not with the Kabul government, which they did not recognize.
    • The US effectively accepted this demand when they cut the Afghan government off the process and entered direct talks with the insurgents.
    • The deal dealt with four aspects of the conflict — violence, foreign troops, intra-Afghan peace talks and the use of Afghan soil by terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda and the IS.
    • According to the agreement, the Taliban promised to reduce violence, join intra-Afghan peace talks and cut all ties with foreign terrorist groups, while the US pledged to withdraw all its troops.

    Present situation in Afghanistan

    • After the agreement was signed, the US put pressure on the Afghan government to release thousands of Taliban prisoners — a key Taliban precondition for starting intra-Afghan talks.
    • Talks between Taliban representatives and the Afghan government began in Doha in September 2020 but did not reach any breakthrough.
    • At present, the peace process is frozen. And the US is hurrying for the exit.
    • The Taliban reduced hostilities against foreign troops but continued to attack Afghan forces even after the agreement was signed.
    • Kabul maintains that the Pakistan support for the Taliban is allowing the insurgents to overcome military pressure and carry forward with their agenda.

    Pakistani role in reviving Taliban

    • Pakistan was one of the three countries that had recognized the Taliban regime in the 1990s.
    • The Taliban captured much of the country with help from Pakistan’s ISI.
    • After the 9/11 attacks, Pakistan’s military dictator Musharraf, under pressure from the Bush administration, cut formal ties with the Taliban and joined America’s war on terror.
    • But Pakistan played a double game. It provided shelter to the Talabani leaders and regrouped their organization which helped them make a staged comeback in Afghanistan.
    • Pakistan successfully expected these groups to launch terror activities against India.

    Again in the spotlight

    • A violent military takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban may not serve Pakistan’s core interests.
    • It wants to check India’s influence in Afghanistan and bring the Taliban to Kabul.
    • But a violent takeover, like in the 1990s, would lack international acceptability, leaving Afghanistan unstable for a foreseeable future.
    • In such a scenario, Pakistan could face another influx of refugees from Afghanistan and strengthening of anti-Pakistan terror groups, such as the Tehrik-i-Taliban.
    • From a strategic point of view, Pakistan would prefer the Taliban being accommodated in power through negotiations and a peaceful settlement.
    • But it’s not clear whether Pakistan has the capacity to shape the post-American outcome in Afghanistan.

    Why is India reaching out to the Taliban?

    • India had made contacts with the Taliban in Doha. New Delhi has not denied reports of its outreach to the Taliban.
    • India has three critical areas in dealing with the Taliban:
    1. One, protecting its investments, which run into billions of rupees, in Afghanistan;
    2. Two, preventing a future Taliban regime from being a pawn of the ISI;
    3. Three, making sure that the Pakistan-backed anti-India terrorist groups do not get support from the Taliban.

    Is the Afghanistan government doomed?

    • The American intelligence community has concluded that Kabul could fall within six months.
    • None of the global leaders are certain about the survival of the Afghan government.

    Taliban is pacing its action

    • One thing is certain — the American withdrawal has turned the balance of power in the battleground in favour of the Taliban.
    • They are already making rapid advances, and could launch a major offensive targeting the city centers and provincial capitals once the last American leaves.

    Future of Afghanistan

    There seems three possibilities:

    1. One, there could be a political settlement in which the Taliban and the government agree to some power-sharing mechanism and jointly shape the future of Afghanistan. As of now, this looks like a remote possibility.
    2. Two, an all-out civil war may be possible, in which the government, economically backed and militarily trained by the West, holds on to its positions in key cities. This is already unfolding.
    3. A third scenario would be of the Taliban taking over the country.

    Any nation planning to deal with Afghanistan should be prepared for all three scenarios.

  • OPEC+ seeks consensus on oil output

    OPEC+ has failed to reach a deal on oil output policy because the United Arab Emirates blocked some aspects of the pact.

    About OPEC

    • OPEC is a permanent, intergovernmental organization, created at the Baghdad Conference in 1960, by Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela.
    • It aims to manage the supply of oil in an effort to set the price of oil in the world market, in order to avoid fluctuations that might affect the economies of both producing and purchasing countries.
    • It is headquartered in Vienna, Austria.
    • OPEC membership is open to any country that is a substantial exporter of oil and which shares the ideals of the organization.
    • Today OPEC is a cartel that includes 14 nations, predominantly from the middle east whose sole responsibility is to control prices and moderate supply.

    What is OPEC+?

    • The non-OPEC countries which export crude oil along with the 14 OPECs are termed as OPEC plus countries.
    • OPEC plus countries include Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Brunei, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Mexico, Oman, Russia, South Sudan, and Sudan.
    • Saudi and Russia, both have been at the heart of a three-year alliance of oil producers known as OPEC Plus — which now includes 11 OPEC members and 10 non-OPEC nations — that aims to shore up oil prices with production cuts.

    Must read:

    [Burning Issue] Oil Prices and OPEC+

    Concerns for India

    • Rising oil prices are posing fiscal challenges for India, where heavily-taxed retail fuel prices have touched record highs, threatening the demand-driven recovery.
    • India imports about 84% of its oil and relies on West Asian supplies to meet over three-fifths of its demand.
    • As one of the largest crude-consuming countries, India is concerned that such actions by producing countries have the potential to undermine consumption-led recovery.
    • This would hurt consumers, especially in our price-sensitive market.

    Answer this PYQ in the comment box:

    Q.The term ‘West Texas Intermediate’, sometimes found in news, refers to a grade of (CSP 2020):

    (a) Crude oil

    (b) Bullion

    (c) Rare earth elements

    (d) Uranium

  • Places in news: Black Sea

    Russia accused Britain of spreading lies over a warship confrontation in the Black Sea.

    What is the issue?

    • Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, a move that was not recognized by most countries in the world.
    • Russia has frequently responded at NATO warships visits near Crimea, casting them as destabilizing.
    • NATO members Turkey, Greece, Romania and Bulgaria are in the Black Sea, but warships from the US, UK and other NATO allies also have made increasingly frequent visits in a show of support to Ukraine.

    About Black Sea

    • The Black Sea is a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and Asia; east of the Balkans (Southeast Europe), south of the East European Plain in Eastern Europe, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia in Western Asia.
    • It is supplied by major rivers, principally the Danube, Dnieper, and Don.
    • The watersheds of many countries drain into the sea beyond the six that share its coast.
    • The Black Sea is bordered by Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania, Russia, Turkey, and Ukraine.

    Must answer this PYQ in the comment box:

    Q.Consider the following pairs:

    Sea

    Bordering country
    1. Adriatic Sea Albania
    2. Black Sea Croatia
    3. Caspian Sea Kazakhstan
    4. Mediterranean Sea Morocco
    5. Red Sea Syria

    Which of the pair given above are correctly matched? (CSP 2020)

    (a) 1, 2 and 4 only

    (b) 1, 3 and 4 only

    (c) 2 and 5 only

    (d) 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5

  • NATO and China

    In a communiqué issued following the June 14 summit of its member-states in Brussels, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), for the first time, explicitly described China as a security risk.

    Try answering this question:

    Q.NATO has been an ideal vehicle for power-projection around the world by the US. Critically comment.

    China as a global threat

    • China has never figured in NATO summit declarations before, except for a minor reference in 2019 to the “opportunities and challenges” it presented.
    • But China’s stated ambitions and assertive behaviour present systemic challenges to the rules-based international order and to areas relevant to NATO security.
    • China has reacted sharply. It has urged NATO to view China’s development rationally, stop exaggerating various forms of China threat theory.
    • The other two threats identified by the NATO communiqué are on predictable lines: Russia and terrorism.

    Focus over two nations

    • There is a significant difference, however, between a strategic focus on countering Russia and casting China as a “systemic challenge”.
    • This goes back to NATO’s founding mandate and subsequent history.

    What is NATO, btw?

    • NATO, the planet’s largest — and largest-ever — military alliance, was formed in 1949 by 12 Allied powers to counter the massive Soviet armies stationed in Eastern and Central Europe after Second World War.
    • According to Paul-Henri Spaak, the second Secretary-General of NATO, it was, ironically enough, Joseph Stalin who is the true father of NATO.
    • It was Stalin’s overreach — especially with the Berlin blockade of 1948-49 and the orchestrated coup in Czechoslovakia in 1948 — that convinced a diverse set of war-ravaged European nations to come together under an American security blanket.
    • The collective defence principle enshrined in NATO’s Article V states that “an attack against one ally is considered as an attack against all allies”.
    • The formation of NATO, and its Soviet counterpart, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955, inaugurated the Cold War era.

    NATO and its relevance now

    • NATO was completely successful in its mission of protecting the “Euro-Atlantic area” from Soviet expansion and preventing war between the two superpowers.
    • When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, questions were raised about NATO’s relevance and future.
    • Since the Non-aligned Movement (NAM) became irrelevant when the Communist bloc disappeared, one cannot justify the continuation of a military alliance formed to protect Europe from Communist expansion.

    Post-Cold War era mandate of NATO

    • Its bureaucracy succeeded in refashioning NATO for the post-Cold war era.
    • The refashioning rested on a paradigm shift — from collective defence, which implied a known adversary, to collective security, which is open-ended, and might require action against any number of threats.
    • The threat included unknown ones and non-state actors.
    • In other words, the elimination of one threat to Europe — communist Russia — did not necessarily mean that security risks to Europe have vanished.

    Why dismantle a beneficial arrangement

    • Another factor in the persistence of NATO is that, like all successful alliances, it has been a mutually beneficial arrangement.
    • For Europe, it was an attractive bargain where, in exchange for a marginal loss in autonomy, it enjoyed absolute security at a cheap price.
    • Not having to spend massively on defence allowed Europe to focus on building powerful economies and invest its surplus in a strong welfare state.
    • NATO also offered the added bonus of keeping Germany down — historically a major factor for peace and stability in the region.

    An effective American weapon

    • For the US, NATO has been an ideal vehicle for power projection around the world — in places beyond the Euro-Atlantic area, such as Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya.
    • It views NATO as a tool to ensure the primacy of American interests across the globe.
    • Unsurprisingly, NATO’s post-Cold War role has evolved in tandem with U.S. foreign policy priorities.
    • The NATO doctrine of “enlargement”, which Russia calls “expansion”, is essentially about extending the American military footprint by bringing in new members.
    • That is how NATO’s membership today stands at 30, having added 14 members between 1999 and 2020.

    The final truth

    • The Biden administration wants to mobilize NATO member-states behind its larger objective of containing China.
    • NATO’s European member states may view China as an economic rival and adversary, but they are unconvinced by the American line that it is an outright security threat.
    • This line also, in a way, points to the underlying logic behind NATO’s persistence in the post-Soviet world.
    • Unlike the Soviet Union, China offers no alternative vision of society that could make Western capitalism insecure.
    • In fact, its own economy is already deeply integrated into Western markets. China, nonetheless, is perceived as posing a ‘threat’.
    • It remains to be seen how far an ageing Europe would be willing to commit itself to a strategic path that prefers confrontation to collaboration like the US.

    Also read:

    India & NATO

  • Rare Earth Metals at the heart of China-US rivalry

    Beijing’s dominance in rare earth minerals, the key to the future of manufacturing, is a cause for concern for the West.

    Answer this question from CSP 2011 in the comment box:

    Q.What is the difference between a CFL and an LED lamp? 

    1. To produce light, a CFL uses mercury vapor and phosphor while an LED lamp uses semi-conductor material.
      2. The average life span of a CFL is much longer than that of an LED lamp
      3. A CFL is less energy-efficient as compared to an LED lamp.

    Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

    (a) Only 1

    (b) 2 and 3 only

    (c) 1 and 3 only

    (d) 1, 2 and 3

    What are Rare Earth Metals?

    • The rare earth elements (REE) are a set of seventeen metallic elements. These include the fifteen lanthanides on the periodic table plus scandium and yttrium.
    • Rare earth elements are an essential part of many high-tech devices.
    • They have a wide range of applications, especially high-tech consumer products, such as cellular telephones, computer hard drives, electric and hybrid vehicles, and flat-screen monitors and televisions.
    • Significant defense applications include electronic displays, guidance systems, lasers, and radar and sonar systems.
    • Rare earth minerals, with names like neodymium, praseodymium, and dysprosium, are crucial to the manufacture of magnets used in industries of the future, such as wind turbines and electric cars.

    Curbing dependence on China

    • At a time of frequent geopolitical friction among those three powers, Washington and Brussels want to avoid this scenario.
    • They are investing in the market for 17 minerals with unique properties that today are largely extracted and refined in China.
    • The expected exponential growth in demand for minerals that are linked to clean energy is putting more pressure on US and Europe to take a closer look.
    • Amid the transition to green energy, in which rare earth minerals are sure to play a role, China’s market dominance is enough to sound an alarm in western capitals.

    Why such a move?

    • In 2019, the U.S. imported 80% of its rare earth minerals from China.
    • The EU gets 98% of its supply from China.

  • Pushback against China more likely as Quad gains momentum

    The article discusses the future pushback against China in South Asia and Indo-Pacific as Quad gains more momentum. 

    Context

    Recently, the Chinese Ambassador to Bangladesh, Li Jiming, warned Dhaka that there will be “substantial damage” in bilateral ties between China and Bangladesh if the latter joins the Quad.

    Bangladesh’s reaction

    • Bangladesh Foreign Minister A.K. Abdul Momen promptly and publicly challenged the Chinese envoy’s statement, underlining categorically that Dhaka pursues an independent foreign policy. 
    • That China’s remarks would reverberate far beyond South Asia was expected and perhaps intended.
    • The spokesperson of U.S. State Department remarked, “What we would say is that we respect Bangladesh’s sovereignty and we respect Bangladesh’s right to make foreign policy decisions for itself.”

    Implications for South Asia and Info-Pacific

    • With its message to Bangladesh, Beijing was laying down a marker that nations should desist from engaging with the Quad.
    • This episode captures the emerging fault lines in South Asia and the wider Indo-Pacific.
    • For all its attempts to play down the relevance of the Quad, Beijing realises that the grouping, with all its weaknesses, is emerging as a reality and there is little it can do to prevent that.
    • And so, it is agitated about Quad’s future role and its potential success in offering the regional states an alternative to its own strong-arm tactics.

    About Quad’s agenda

    • The Quad member states are figuring out a cohesive agenda amongst themselves and there are no plans for an expansion.
    • There is a desire to work with like-minded nations but that can only happen if the four members of the Quad can build a credible platform first.
    • Quad has not asked any country to join and no one has shown an interest.
    • But China wants to ensure that after failing in its initial attempt to prevent the Quad from gaining any traction.
    • Its message is well understood by other states who may harbour any desire of working closely with the Quad members.

    Way forward

    • Beijing has failed to prevent nations from the West to the East from coming out with their Indo-Pacific strategies.
    • It has failed to prevent the operationalisation of the Quad, and now it might be worried about other nations in the region thinking of engaging with the Quad more proactively.
    • Even Bangladesh is planning to come out with its own Indo-Pacific strategy and Beijing has now warned Dhaka that a close cooperation with the Quad should not be part of the policy mix.
    •  As the Quad gains more momentum and the churn in the waters of the Indo-Pacific leads to new countervailing coalitions against China, Beijing’s belligerence can only be expected to grow.

    Conclusion

    Beijing is more likely to demand clear-cut foreign policy choices from its regional interlocutors, as its warning to Bangladesh underscores. But as Dhaka’s robust response makes it clear, states are more likely to push back than become subservient to Chinese largesse.

  • Opportunity to expand ties with West

    The article takes an overview of the growing convergence of India’s interest with the West in the changing geopolitical scenario and opportunities it offers to India.

    Significance of G-7 Summit for India

    • Summit of the G-7, the Group of Seven industrial countries, will be hosted by the United Kingdom this week.
    • Prime Minister Narendra Modi will participate digitally in this summit.
    • This participation also marks an important step towards a new global compact between India and the West.
    • The global financial crisis of 2008, the rapid rise of China, divisions within the West during the Trump years, and the chaotic response in North America and Europe to the Covid-19 pandemic, were the factors that indicated the decline of the West.
    • In his first tour abroad as the US president wants to demonstrate that the collective West is an enduring force to reckon with under renewed American leadership.
    • For India, the G-7 summit is an opportunity to expand the global dimension of India’s growing partnerships with the US and Europe.

    Convergence of interests between India and the West

    • The challenges from an increasingly aggressive China, the urgency of mitigating climate change, and the construction of a post-pandemic international order are generating convergence between the interests of India and the West.
    • India’s current engagement with the G-7 is about global issues.
    • The idea of a global democratic coalition that is based more broadly than the geographic West has gained ground in recent years.
    • And India is at the very heart of that Western calculus.
    • For India, too, the G-7summit comes amidst intensifying strategic cooperation with the West.
    • This includes strong bilateral strategic cooperation with the US, France, UK as well as the Quad and the trilateral partnerships with France and Australia as well as Japan and Australia.
    • India has also stepped up its engagement with the European Union.

    China factor

    • India’s increasing engagement with the US and the West has been triggered in part by the continuous deterioration of the relationship with China.
    • Besides the threat to territorial security, India finds that its hopes for strong global cooperation with China have taken a big beating in recent years.
    • China is the only great power that does not support India’s permanent membership of the UN Security Council and blocks India’s membership of the Nuclear Suppliers Group.
    • At the end of the Cold War, India believed that China was a natural partner in the construction of a multipolar world.
    • India now can’t escape the conclusion that China is the greatest obstacle to India’s global aspirations and the West is an emerging partner.
    •  India has relied on Western support to fend off China’s effort to internationalise the Kashmir question after the 2019 constitutional changes.
    • India walked away from RCEP due to the growing trade imbalance with China and the negative impact of Chinese imports on India’s domestic manufacturing.
    • After China’s aggression in Ladakh last April, India has also sought to actively limit its exposure to Chinese investments and technology.

    Way forward

    • The convergence of interests between India and the West does not mean the two sides will agree on everything.
    •  There are many areas of continuing divergence within the West — from the economic role of the state to the democratic regulation of social media and the technology giants.
    • It will surely not be easy translating the broad convergences between India and the West into tangible cooperation.
    • That would require sustained negotiations on converting shared interests.

    Consider the question “The idea of a global democratic coalition that is based more broadly than the geographic West has gained ground in recent years. This offers India an opportunity to expand the global dimension of India’s growing partnerships with the US and Europe. Comment.”

    Conclusion

    While India continues to strengthen its partnerships in Asia and the global south, a more productive partnership with the West helps secure a growing array of India’s national interests and adds a new depth to India’s international relations.

  • Colombo Port City Project and Chinese involvement

    Sri Lanka recently passed the controversial Colombo Port City Economic Commission Bill, which governs the China-backed Colombo Port City project worth $1.4 billion, amid wide opposition to the creation of a “Chinese enclave” in the island nation.

    Colombo Port City Project

    • The Colombo Port City has grabbed headlines in Sri Lanka in recent months even as the relentless third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic sweeps through the country.
    • Almost an artificial island, the territory coming up on 2.69 square kilometers of land reclaimed from Colombo’s seafront has stirred controversy since its inception.
    • Those backing it see in that patch of land their dream of an international financial hub — a “Singapore or Dubai” in the Indian Ocean.

    When was it launched?

    • The project was launched in September 2014 by Chinese President Xi Jinping during a visit to the island nation under the Mahinda Rajapaksa administration’s second term.
    • After President Mahinda Rajapaksa was ousted in January 2015, the successor “national unity” government of Maithripala Sirisena and Ranil Wickremesinghe went ahead with the project after briefly halting it.
    • On returning to power in November 2019, the Rajapaksas vowed to expedite the project. The Sri Lankan government says the project will bring in around 83,000 jobs and $15 billion initially.

    Issues with the project

    • But skeptics claim that it could well become a “Chinese colony”, with the Bill, which is now an Act.
    • The law provides China substantial “immunity” from Sri Lankan laws, besides huge tax exemptions and other incentives for investors.

    What is the extent of China’s involvement?

    Effectively, China has substantial control over two key infrastructure projects in Sri Lanka for a century.

    • The port city project is financed chiefly through Chinese investment amounting to $1.4 billion.
    • In return, the company will receive 116 hectares (of the total 269 hectares) on a 99-year lease.
    • The city separates from but located adjacent to the Colombo Port, the country’s main harbor — is the third major port-related infrastructure project where China has a significant stake.
    • China Merchants Port Holdings has an 85% stake in the Colombo International Container Terminal under a 35-year ‘Build Operate and Transfer’ agreement with the Sri Lanka Port Authority.
    • In 2017, the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe administration, unable to repay the Chinese loan with which it was saddled by the previous government, handed over the Hambantota Port to China on a 99-year lease.

    Concerns from within Sri Lanka

    • Since its launch, the Colombo Port City project has faced opposition from environmentalists and fisherfolk, who feared that the project would affect marine life and livelihoods.
    • However, in the absence of wider political and societal support, their resistance did not dent successive governments’ resolve to pursue the project.
    • The more recent opposition was specific to the Colombo Port City Economic Commission Bill.
    • The resistance came from Opposition parties and civil society groups, including many who do not oppose the project per se, but rather its governance by “an all-powerful commission answerable to no one”.
    • Significantly, a section of Buddhist monks, wielding much influence in Sri Lankan politics and the Sinhala society, also opposed the Bill and said that it eroded Sri Lanka’s sovereignty.

  • Close the vaccination gap, in global lockstep

    Why vaccination gap is cause of worry

    • By the end of May 2021, only 2.1% of Africans had received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
    • A widely vaccinated world population is the only way to end the pandemic; otherwise, the multiplication of variants is likely to undermine the effectiveness of existing vaccines.
    • Vaccination is also a prerequisite for lifting the restrictions that are holding back our economies and freedoms.
    • If the vaccination gap persists, it risks reversing the trend in recent decades of declining poverty and global inequalities.
    • Such a negative dynamic would hold back economic activity and increase geopolitical tensions.
    • The cost of inaction would for sure be much higher for advanced economies than what we collectively would have to spend to help vaccinate the whole world.
    • The International Monetary Fund has proposed $50 billion plan in order to be able to vaccinate 40% of the world population in 2021 and 60% by mid-2022.

    Need to resist the vaccine nationalism

    • To achieve the goal set by IMF, we need closely coordinated multilateral action.
    • We must resist the threat posed by linking the provision of vaccines to political goals and vaccine nationalism.
    • The EU has been vaccinating its own population, while exporting large volumes of vaccines and contributing substantially to the vaccines roll-out in low-income countries.
    • The EU has also exported 240 million doses to 90 countries, which is about as much as used within the EU.
    • One-third of all COVAX doses delivered so far have been financed by the EU.
    • India’s Vaccine Maitri is another example of global solidarity.
    • However, this effort is still far from sufficient to prevent the vaccination gap from widening.

    Way forward

    • To fill widening vaccination gap, countries with the required knowledge and means should increase their production capacities, so that they can both vaccinate their own populations and export more vaccines.
    • All countries must avoid restrictive measures that affect vaccine supply chains.
    • We also need to facilitate the transfer of knowledge and technology, so that more countries can produce vaccines.
    • Voluntary licensing is the privileged way to ensure such transfer of technology and know-how.

    Conclusion

    The COVID-19 pandemic has reminded us that health is a global public good. Our common global COVID-19 vaccine action to close the vaccination gap must be the first step toward genuine global health cooperation, as foreseen by the Rome Declaration recently adopted at the Global Health Summit.