Maximizing on the visit of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to India

Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is expected to be in New Delhi on 29th April for a working visit. Energy issues are on the agenda of talks between India and Iran during the short six-hour visit. The visit has a wider geo-political significance and hopefully the Government of India will avoid diplomatic sluggishness and maximize on the opportunity.

The timing of the visit is crucial. The Bush administration has focused attention on isolating the regime of President Ahmadinejad. In March 2008, the third round of Security Council sanctions was imposed on Iran. Despite the findings published in the National Intelligence Estimate of December 2007, the U.S. continues to view Iran as a major threat and seeks to increase international pressure on Iran to suspend Uranium enrichment. Given the cordiality of Indo-U.S. relations, the visit of President Ahmadinejad can emerge as an unnecessary irritant in bilateral relations. On the other hand, the U.S. has recently lost much international support for branding Iran as a rogue state. President Ahmadinejad has visited the Arab states and even addressed the Gulf Cooperation Council. India will thus need to diplomatically balance the growing regional popularity of President Ahmadinejad and the U.S. abhorrence for the Iranian regime.

The visit of President Ahmadinejad was not a planned one. The Indian Government had received request for re-fuelling the Iranian President’s plane in India on a flight from Sri Lanka to Tehran. The technical stop-over was tactically turned into an official visit by India. This was an intelligent gesture for correcting the seemingly negative perceptions of the Indian government towards Iran. India has further demonstrated diplomatic deftness by refusing to be unduly pressurized by the U.S. The U.S. has advised India to use the upcoming visit of President Ahmadinejad as an opportunity to insist Iran for complying with the Security Council resolutions and give-up Uranium enrichment. The Government of India in response has refused to be guided by any third party in defining its bilateral relations with Iran. Moreover, India has asserted the legality of the IAEA, rather than the U.S., in judging Iran’s non-compliance to the non-proliferation commitments.

The U.S. has attempted in the past to dictate India’s Iran policy. In January 2006 U.S. Ambassador to India David Mulford, stated that the Indo-U.S. nuclear deal could be stalled in the U.S. Congress if India did not vote against Iran at the IAEA. After the visit of Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister to Delhi in September 2007, Richard Boucher, Assistant Secretary for State, expressed concerns over India’s military relationship with Iran. On both the occasions India had countered the U.S. pressures through verbal statements. The visit of President Ahmadinejad provides an opportunity to go beyond rhetoric and make substantial improvements in the relations with Iran.

India appears to be involved in a damage control exercise following its vote against Iran in the IAEA in September 2005. The Indian government realizes that Iran is in a position to fulfill India’s energy requirements in the next decade. The proposed Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline is expected to provide crucial energy supplies for India. Apart from being traditional friends Iran has supported India on the Kashmir issues in the OIC. The huge Shia Muslim population in India shares a natural bondage with the Iranian Shiites. Iran and India have agreed to join hands in the reconstruction of Afghanistan and to support the development of alternate access routes to that country via Iran’s Chahbahar. Hence India’s relations with Iran do not represent mere traditional symbolism, but have immense diplomatic advantage for the future. The Iran policy needs to go beyond publicizing India’s non-alignment to concretizing the national foreign policy objectives.

The tests of India’s diplomatic capabilities lie in consolidating relations with Iran, without unduly antagonizing the U.S. India has traditionally encountered the problem of balancing relations with other countries. India tends to displease and appease other countries at regular intervals. The clue for India lies in being unapologetic about pursuing her national interests by building bilateral, regional and global partnerships. For realizing these goals it is essential that India remains committed, in letter and spirit, to the agreements concluded with the U.S. and Iran. The 2004 New Delhi Declaration on strategic partnership with Iran needs to be treated as important as the Indo-U.S. Nuclear Civilian Agreement of 2005. For ensuring the stability of Afghanistan, India needs to cooperate with the U.S. and Iran.

According to Morgenthau’s Realism, nation states are not judged by the universal moral principles; the success of a nation-state is dependent on its ability to define national interest in terms of power. Hopefully Indian diplomacy realizes that interactions with the Iranian President should be guided by the goals of serving India’s national interest rather than for appeasing either Iran or the U.S.

[The article was published at http://www.ipcs.org/whatsNewArticle1.jsp?action=showView&kValue=2569&status=article&mod=b]

South Asia: Moving from Programmes of Cooperation to a Cooperative Programme

Regionalism in South Asia is celebrated through the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). But, in practice regionalism rarely functions through the activities of SAARC. Regionalism in South Asia is viewed as a tool to manage the structural dynamics of the region and not as a mechanism to address regional concerns. The purpose of a regional dialogue is to discuss common problems and evolve remedial measures to which all parties can contribute and reap comparable benefits. But, in practice regional dialogue in South Asia is an exercise in one-upmanship where the regional blame-game is exhibited at its worst.
The Charter of SAARC does not categorize the forum as an explicit political or economic or strategic grouping. Its imprecise character was considered an asset; a flexibility which could adapt to emerging demands. The initial phase justified this approach, given the recent origin of the nation-state system in South Asia. But South Asian countries have not worked towards evolving a specific mandate for the regional forum. Even 22 years after its formation the SAARC programme remains as amorphous and vague as it was in 1985.
Regionalism refers to intensifying political, economic or strategic processes of cooperation among states. Such intensification and coordination of activities is not visible in the SAARC. There has been multiplication of institutional structures and proliferation of regional meetings, but few successes in terms of specific action-based programmes. Regional dialogue is dominated by the negative agenda of thrusting the responsibility for the regional challenges on specific national policies, rather than evolving a mutual approach to address the concerns.
The political goal of cooperation, namely, a political union, may be an ambitious objective for many regional groupings, but convergence of certain political practices which have regional and extra-regional implications could surely be on the agenda. Likewise, an economic union may qualify as the ultimate step in economic cooperation, but a free trade area is a more realizable target. A common defense system for a region is yet a far dream, but a coordinated defense strategy for strategic concerns has been evolved by regional groupings around the world.
If South Asian cooperation is measured against these political, economic or strategic yard sticks, the record would be extremely unimpressive. The saddest part is not that SAARC has not achieved the desired results in these spheres, but surprisingly SAARC has not even taken the initial steps in that direction. The strongest defense in favor of SAARC is its ability to survive despite widespread regional animosity. But, this defense is now being extended as a rationale for the existence of SAARC. To insulate SAARC from undue challenges, comparisons with the accomplishments of EU and ASEAN are discouraged. But by depriving SAARC activities a minimum denominator for genuine evaluation, its aspirations are being condensed.
SAARC claims to keep political disagreements out of the regional agenda to allow a congenial climate for dialogue. But, in fact the process of cooperation is challenged by the political uncertainties in the region. By ignoring regional realities SAARC cannot claim to create regional harmony. Moreover, if political disagreements are not discussed across the table, these would lead to greater regional tensions. SAARC defeats the very purpose of a regional forum. SAARC could personalize the process of political dialogue in the region so as to address the specific political contentions without appearing too intrusive with regard to bilateral relations.
Each state in South Asia has specific economic interests to safeguard. The process of economic cooperation needs to take cognizance of these concerns while forging regional economic agreements. Such concerns voiced by some member states are usually projected as mischievous attempts to disrupt the process of economic cooperation. The purpose of economic cooperation is safeguarding the interests of all parties rather than merely achieving a few institutional targets.
According to Barry Buzan, security interdependency means that two states make a hostile or friendly pairing and their behavior is regularly interactive. Buzan has emphasized on one security interdependency in the region, namely India and Pakistan. And this security interdependency has come to dominate the regional strategic discourse for over two decades. For evolving a viable regional security dialogue it is imperative that security concerns of the region are discussed beyond the India-Pakistan framework. Issues of political assassinations, sectarian violence, democratic instability, armed insurgency are challenges faced by all states in South Asia. A regional analysis of such threats and remedial measures needs to figure in the regional security dialogue.
Instead of the lengthy deliberations made at recent SAARC Standing Committee and Council of Ministers meetings in December 2007, the 15th SAARC Summit will merely need to comprehend the above stated facts. SAARC claims to have entered the implementation phase; the focus should now be on framing, refining and implementing general conventions of cooperation in the region, rather than implementing isolated programmes of cooperation. Hopefully in future, the member states will more actively invest to build a culture of cooperation in South Asia.

The article was also published at http://www.ipcs.org/South_Asia_articles2.jsp?action=showView&kValue=2481&country=1016&status=article&mod=a

Public diplomacy: lessons for the conduct of Indian foreign policy

The Realist dictum that power struggle would dominate relations among states still holds ground. Conflictual relations and clash of national interests continues to involve states in different forms of diplomacy. As the contours of the power struggle are changing so are the tools of diplomacy. Public diplomacy is fast emerging as the essential tool for serving national interest in international politics. Public diplomacy refers to the art of serving national interest by informing, influencing and understanding foreign audiences. Educational, cultural, social and diverse media activities constitute the core of public diplomacy.
In May 2006 India’s Ministry of External Affairs established the Public Diplomacy Office aimed to educate the global and domestic opinion on key policy issues and project a better image of the country. It is modeled on the Public Diplomacy Division of the US State Department. The target audience is domestic and international think-tanks, faculties in institutes of higher learning, press clubs and editors of local and foreign newspapers. The public diplomacy efforts by India have turned out to be merely an organizational refinement of the Ministry of External Affairs, rather than a serious attempt at utilizing the benefits possibly accrued through public diplomacy. It is important for the Ministry of External Affairs to realize certain essential requisites of conducting public diplomacy before tangible results can be expected.
Public diplomacy is not merely a generic activity aimed at disseminating data about India. It is not expected to be limited to detailing the economic growth and industrial potential of the country and its democratic credentials. Public diplomacy is a target oriented activity; both in terms of objectives and audience. Positive attributes of the country needs to be projected through the right strategy at the right time in the right place to serve national interest.
It is essentially pro-active rather than reactive. The purpose of public diplomacy is to prepare the ground for launching a policy campaign rather than being limited to explaining the details of the campaign.
It does not merely seek to influence the public and governments of others countries but is also an exercise in informing the host government about the perceptions of others. Hence such diplomacy is not limited to gathering laurels for policy choices but also examining the failures resulting from complicated strategic options.
Public diplomacy efforts by the Government of India have been highly cosmetic and barely enlightening. The public diplomacy division has conducted conferences across the country on various themes with the declared objective of receiving feedback from experts and providing information to the public. The agenda chalked out for these conferences and the speakers invited simply reassert the official thinking rarely attracting popular attention. The Public Diplomacy Division held a conference on the “Connectivity in SAARC” in Kolkata last year with the apparent objective to understand the views of the eastern states on the issue, but invited all speakers from New Delhi.
The “Incredible India” banner on a hop-on hop-off New York Bus simply depicts a roaring loin; the International Media Press Opinion section in the Ministry of External Affairs website show no results for the year 2007 and 2008; the efforts of the India Brand Equity Foundation- a private-public partnership between the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and the Confederation of Indian Industries- are commendable as a information provider on economic opportunities in India rather than a strategic public diplomacy tool; can the activities of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations, without centers in the US and China be compared to the British Council or Swiss Pro Helvetia; these efforts clearly show that the public diplomacy efforts by the Government of India are neither issue oriented nor target specific.
The government of India has not used the tool of public diplomacy in managing concerns like the Indo-US nuclear deal, Chinese actions in Tibet, Pakistan’s assistance to the Taliban in Afghanistan, refugee influx from Bangladesh. Dissemination of authentic data on these issues in a manner serving the national interests of India could help to garner more support for the policy choices. Public diplomacy offers the opportunity to create a favorable environment whereby tough decisions can be executed with minimum resistance. The concept of ‘information warrior’ and ‘perception manager’ gaining prominence in the US needs to inspire the conduct of public diplomacy in India.
In an era where the most successful advertising agencies are running the public diplomacy efforts of countries like the US, the UK and China, efforts by India are rudimentary at best. Innovativeness, foresight, marketing blitz, strategic planning and psychological management are imperative for any successful public diplomacy effort. India needs to realize that public diplomacy is not simply meant to be an office space in the South Block, but a connecting link and strategic leverage in our foreign policy.

(The article is also avaliable at http://www.ipcs.org/)

SAARC – A Case of Perceptual Divergence

Four blind men decided to help each other in collectively exploring the world around them. They ventured to the zoo and came across an elephant. Each one decided to touch, feel, comprehend and then communicate what the elephant looked like. One man held the tusk and explained, “The elephant is like a heavy drain pipe!” The other touched the legs and declared, “The elephant resembles the trunk of a strong old tree!” The third felt the ears and claimed that the animal was fan shaped and the fourth examined the tail to conclude that the elephant was a hairy textured flute like creature.
Each of the men was right in their assessments given the specific examination they had made. The different and partially erroneous judgments were the result of two vital facts. The first was that all four of them were visually handicapped and hence needed to rely on each other’s assistance. Secondly, each of them examined the elephant from only a specific angle and did not assimilate the different viewpoints to create a holistic picture.
The eight members South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) presents a similar case. SAARC is a regional grouping of developing countries in South Asia facing similar political, economic and nation-building challenges. This similarity in the nature of problems makes cooperation among them necessary and desirable. Hence the South Asian countries decided to initiate regional cooperation as a system of collective help. But like in the case of four blind men, their endeavor did not prove to be a success. The expectations from and approach towards cooperation has varied among the member countries. Though the respective national positions may be tenable but the cultivation of a shared perspective essential to guide the regional programme is missing.
The common regional problems do not lead to a commonality of approach among the countries because each views and assesses the problem from a purely nationalistic perspective which creates divergence in final analysis. The usual approach in SAARC has been to make the member countries conscious of the common challenges that they have to encounter. The existence of these challenges is not something that emerged after SAARC was formed and will survive even if SAARC withers away. For example state building is a common challenge for South Asian countries, but each national unit faces the challenge at different levels. In India the issue may involve greater participation of the people in state functioning. Issues of judicial activism, right to information, coalitional power sharing dominate the democratization discourse in India. While in Nepal the efforts are focused on shaping the political institutions for ensuring democratic stability and in Pakistan the debate over the form and substance of democracy holds sway. Hence though the nature of the challenge is similar its specifities are different which lead to obvious differences in remedial suggestions.
In international economic negotiations though South Asia appears to support the collective demands of the South, there are several divergence in their specific demands. In global negotiations on agriculture one common demand is the provision of Special Products and Special Safeguard Mechanism, in Non-Agricultural Market Access (Nama). On this issue the South Asian Less Developed Countries (LDCs) are more concerned about compensation for the likely preference erosion resulting from multilateral tariff reduction. Although, the development-related problems of South Asian countries are common, the negotiating strategies are not similar. While in agriculture India and Pakistan have both offensive and defensive interests, the remaining countries have largely defensive interests. Another difference is that LDCs and Sri Lanka are net food importing countries and may face negative consequences of dismantling of farm subsidies. In Nama, the divergence is sharper. LDCs want some compensatory package in lieu of the likely preference erosion. Both Pakistan and Sri Lanka have expressed their reservations over such a package. In services, too, there are divergences. India is more aggressive on services compared with its neighbors, because of a robust growth in services sector in the 90s, which grew at an average annul rate of 9%, contributing to nearly 60% of overall growth rate.
All countries of South Asia face massive challenges from demands of ethnic, regional and religious conglomerations. The specific demands of each state in the region are different and require unique corrective measures. The Nepalese political process has recently facilitated the Maoists to join mainstream politics under certain conditions, while the Sri Lankan government is struggling to respond to the aggressive onslaughts of the LTTE. In dealing with issues of unemployment and poverty some sub-regions in South Asia are prioritizing micro-financing while others are keen on attracting greater amounts of foreign direct assistance.
The reassertions by regional states about their handicap has not changed the situation in the region. It’s like the four blind men promising to help each other to explore the world better in the hope that their collectivity would counter their handicap. But as long as they stick to their exclusive interpretations a holistic view of the animal will not emerge. Likewise the South Asian countries need to evolve strategies for complimentary analysis which will create a common vision rather than individual assessments which can rarely be fitted together.
The story of the four blind men went a little further. Having failed to assist each other in picturing the elephant, they called their acquaintances, who were visually fit to guide their endeavor. With the instructions from friendly sources the blind men were able to picture the elephant. However, the caveat is that since all four were blind they had no way of confirming their findings and excessive faith on the group of outsiders could mislead them. Moreover, the group of outsiders could only help the blind to piece their vision together and not re-vision their specific assessments. Similarly SAARC has opened doors to outsiders, but the same caution holds good.
Finally did the blind men succeed in correctly picturing the elephant?
Time only can provide an objective answer.

Elections in Nepal

Nepal is holding elections for the Constituent Assembly which would guide Nepal's future political choices. The assertion that the end of Monarchy would remove a major obstacle on the road to a stable democratic Nepal is over-emphasized. Nepal is currently facing many challenges which defy simple solutions.
For the past 250 years the people of Nepal have been governed by a monarch. Though the political parties may refer to the prevelance of a strong anti-monarchy sentiment, it is still uncertain that the people would abolish monarchy rather than converting the Monarch into a titular head.
The options to Monarchy in Nepal are not highly encouraging. The Maoist agenda remains ambigious as the recourse to violence is not completely surrendered. The youth wing of the Maoists has been charged with beating members of rival political parties and threatening voters.
The Madhesia problem in early 2007 had demonstrated the divisions that exist in Nepali society and which would continue to challenge the political stability of Nepal irrespective of the form of government.
Girija Prasad Koirala hopes to win a clear majority in the elections and still discretely favors a constitutional monarchy. The political parties in Nepal have been widely discredited and the Seven Party Alliance faces a major credibility challenge.
Though the Nepali people are enthusiastic about the elections, which are taking place after nine years, the national challenges might continue much after the verdict of these elections is out. Nevertheless the elections are critical since it would determine whether or not Nepal has moved in the right direction for addressing its problems.
There is something unique about these elections in Nepal; the monarchy, the people, the political parties, the Maoists, all have opted for the elections as 'the best of the worst choice'. But the hopes of the global community continue to be pinned on this election of compromises.

Its a maze for sure!

The political scene in South Asian is undoubtly a maze....there are no simple answers and explanations for the political developments in the region.
The complexicity of the maze is evident from the confusion over who actually shut down Ary One World TV and Geo TV early this week. Mohsin Raza, Director New ARY has categorically stated that the channel was not shut down by the government. Though he did not clarify the reason for the blackout. On 8th April 2008, The Dawn published the 'actual story', which refers to the attempt by Information Minister Sherry Rehman to mobilize resources for investigating the real cause of the incident and ensuring the re-activation of the broadcasts by the two channels.
Still waiting for comments on the blackout from GEO-TV...however the previous post was more about challenges facing the new government; in this blame game the fact still remains that Arbab Ghulam Rahim was assaulted...hopefully Pakistan will be able to prioritize the challenges and not get embroiled in petty political controversies.
It seems that freedom of press and responsible journalism are equally challenged in Pakistan.
With such contradictory statement of facts from from different perspectives, the maze in Pakistan only thickens. Hopefully the media and political parties in Pakistan realize that such incidents are putting the credibility of the Pakistani state and government under strain.

Pakistan - government changes, governance remains the same

The attack by Pakistan Peoples Party members on Former Chief Minister Arbab Ghulam Rahim in the Sindh Assembly has marred the inauguration of 'democracy' in Pakistan. Not only is the PPP-MQM coalition under strain, the very democratic freedoms which the new government pledged to guarantee to the Pakistani people have been compromised. The incident has put the entire democratic process in Pakistan in jeopardy.
Firsly, for a 350 seating capacity gallery at the Sindh Assembly, over 1000 invitation cards were distributed. According to Ghulam Rahim, he was assured that the security in the Assembly would not be breached and minimum entry passes would be issued.
Secondly, as Arbab Ghulam Rahim left the Assembly, he was subjected to shoe lashing by the PPP activists. This was preceded by several attempts to attack Ghulam Rahim in the Assembly. The apparent reason for attacks was the inability of Ghulam Rahim to provide adequate security for Former PM Benazir Bhutto, who was assasinated in December 2007.
Thirdly, ARY One World TV and Geo TV confirmed that both the TV channels have been taken off air after airing footage of the chaotic scenes in the Sindh Assembly. There are several explanations emerging for the two hour blackout of the channels. According to the Cabel Operators the blackout was due to technical problems. The Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Sherry Rehman has denied any role of the Government and referred to 'some political party' as responsible for the suspension. The Pakistani Electronic Media Regulatory Authority has been directed to probe the issue.
No matter what the investigations reveal, one fact clearly stands out; creating political order in Pakistani is a challenging task. The form of government might be democratic or autocratic but its challenges remain the same. Unfortunately, for Pakistan the strategies for countering these challenges have also remained the same. In Pakistan the form of government has apparently changed from autocratic to democratic but form of governance remains much the same.