Back‘Can’t have a tense border and great ties’
Jaishankar said the Quad was not caused by the tensions of the border that were triggered by Chinese intrusions into India in the spring of 2020, but pre-dated that
PremiumNEW DELHI : Indian foreign minister S Jaishankar on Thursday said that by amassing large number of troops along its border with India, China violated agreements that were in “cold print" between the two countries.
Speaking at the 19th Hindustan Times Leadership Summit, Jaishankar also said that the Quad – the coming together of India, US, Australia and Japan – was not caused by the tensions of the border that were triggered by Chinese intrusions into India in the spring of 2020, but pre-dated that.
The minister also indicated that arrangements like the Quad with India, the US, Australia and Japan or a more recent grouping of the US, India, Israel and the UAE were here to stay.
On Afghanistan the minister said that there was a consensus that however difficult the political situation might be, in terms of the Pakistan-backed Taliban coming to power, the people of Afghanistan needed support. This was why India had offered to send 50,000 tonnes of wheat to Afghanistan to help the people of the country tide over the food scarcity situation caused by a combination of three factors -- a drought, civid-19 pandemic and conflict.
On China, Jaishankar was clear that any expectation on the part of Beijing that “we will contain it (tensions) in a narrow sense and carry on with life ….is not a realistic one."
“It is not an impression we thought we had an understanding, we had it in cold print, in two agreements. So there is no ambiguity on that score. They were very, very clear cut commitments, not to mass forces on the border. And those commitments stand violated from 2020 Spring," he said of the ties strained since last year.
“As we have made clear, the state of the relationship at the end of the day, will reflect the state of the border," the minister said adding “you can’t have a tense high friction border and have great relations in all other parts of life, it doesn’t work like that."
On the Quad, Jaishankar said, “In the current incarnation, the Quad actually started in 2017, whereas this round of our difficulties on the India-China border dates back to 2020."
“So to ascribe that as a causal factor I think you need to be a little more broadbased in the explanation," he said negating a direct link between India teaming up with the US, Japan and Australia and the troubled ties with China.
“I think it is important for us as a Quad participant to be very clear that the Quad is for something, it is not against somebody," the minister said.
Pointing out that the Cold War had ended and as had the situation that had a unipolar world, Jaishankar said the current context had “big challenges out there" with no single country able to respond to it by itself.
“So you are seeing a larger international development which is a bunch of countries, whose interests are similar, whose concerns are similar, who have the ability and the confidence to work with each other, come together," he said.
“I would suggest to you that this kind of combos, countries coming together saying ‘I am not interested in a formal relationship, I don’t want a detailed list of obligations and responsibilities, I want a practical arrangement where, if you and I get along with somebody else out there, we can sit and work together for our mutual advantage and it works it works one day of we feel it doesn’t work’… I do think this much more ad-hoc, open minded, open ended, comfortable way of working of groupings of countries -- this is the future that I see," the minister said.
On the coming together of India, US, UAE and Israel, the minister said that the Abraham Accords had opened the doors for these countries to work together in areas like connectivity, logistics, trade, agriculture and water.
“A collective (of countries) is like an additional layer…There are many things you can do as a collective when four countries come together," he added.
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