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India not yet prepared to ditch
Iraq
By Sudha Ramachandran
BANGALORE - As the crisis over Iraq enters a new
phase with the return of the weapons inspectors to that
country, India has sent out a clear anti-war signal,
distancing itself from the United States' position.
In a statement of support to Baghdad, India’s
Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee said this week that
he hoped there would be no war in Iraq. "All issues
should be sorted out through discussions under the
auspices of the United Nations," he said.
Without naming the US, Vajpayee, in an obvious
reference to Washington's pursuit of regime change in
Baghdad, said that other countries should understand
that "the people of all nations have a right to rule
themselves and choose their own leader ... No one should
try to enforce their will on others. If Iraq has such
weapons that pose a threat to humanity, then it should
relinquish these weapons on its own."
India has
consistently expressed its opposition to the unilateral
use of force against Iraq and it has consistently called
for a diplomatic solution to the crisis within the UN
framework.
In an interview with the Arab media
late in August, Vajpayee was asked what he thought of
President George W Bush's axis of evil definition and
whether India would support US military action against
Iraq to effect a regime change. He responded, "India is
vitally interested in the peace and prosperity of the
Gulf region and has, therefore, supported all efforts to
defuse the crisis relating to Iraq. In that respect,
India supports the resumption of diplomatic efforts
under the auspices of the United Nations."
India
has kept a low profile on the Iraq crisis in recent
weeks, refraining from commenting on the various
proposals that were being considered by the Security
Council. When asked about Delhi’s position on the
various proposals, officials of the Indian Ministry of
External Affairs refrained from commenting; the reason
for the silence being that India had no part to play in
hammering out the resolution since the matter concerned
the Security Council alone.
From a position of
merely supporting the UN role in defusing the crisis,
India has now shifted to opposing US goals and proposed
strategy in Iraq.
India's disagreement with the
Bush administration’s approach on Iraq does not come as
a surprise. Delhi has consistently expressed its
opposition to international interference in the internal
affairs of a country. It has also supported the pursuit
of a diplomatic approach to ensure Iraq's full
compliance with UN resolutions with respect to
inspection of its suspected chemical and biological
weapons facilities. It has opposed the use of force
against Iraq to ensure compliance. In 1998, for
instance, when the US and Britain launched air strikes
on Iraq, India called for an immediate halt to the
military operations.
What comes somewhat as a
surprise is the expression of the disagreement with the
US at a time when Delhi's relations with Washington,
after decades of frostiness, are warming up. India’s
military and economic ties with the US have blossomed.
And in the past couple of years, noticeably from
2001, the Indian government has been more than
enthusiastic in endorsing US positions on global
strategic issues, on the controversial national missile
defense, for instance.
It has been argued that
India’s gains from a rapidly expanding relationship with
the US far outweigh what it gets from its long-standing
ties with Iraq. In 1990-91, India’s policy towards Iraq
and the Gulf War was determined to a major extent by its
concern for the safety of the huge Indian population
working in Iraq and Kuwait. Analysts point out that now
India is less constrained by that concern as the number
of Indians in Iraq has dwindled to a couple of hundreds,
small enough for a quick evacuation.
India's
foreign policy establishment is said to be divided on
the issue of Iraq. Some believe that with Bush set on
ousting President Saddam Hussein through military
strikes and in determining the nature of a post-Saddam
dispensation, it would be in India’s interest to just go
along with the US now and gain a share in the spoils
(reconstruction projects) as it has in Afghanistan.
However, others believe that India does not
stand to gain from an Iraqi invasion. The political
upheaval and economic uncertainty it will engender
across the Middle East will severely affect India. It
could mean the return to India of millions of Indians
working in the Middle East who are currently remitting
around US$6 billion annually. Furthermore, the impact on
the Indian economy will be severe given the fact that
Arab oil accounts for almost two-thirds of India's crude
imports.
Indian officials are worried that
Washington's current preoccupation with Iraq has
distracted its attention away from the military
operations against al-Qaeda. An American invasion of
Iraq would lead to a more serious dilution of the
operations, Delhi fears. India has an enormous interest
in seeing al-Qaeda rooted out.
M H Ansari, a
former Indian ambassador to Saudi Arabia, told the
weekly news magazine Outlook that "India should be happy
with the status quo where there's no strategic hostility
to New Delhi in the Arab world and there's $10 billion
trade with the Gulf countries."
While India’s
support will not influence US decisions on Iraq, New
Delhi's position on the evolving situation is of some
significance. India not joining an anti-Iraq coalition
in the event of an attack on that country will
underscore the fact that democracies do not go to war
easily. For long, the US, while willing to overlook
India's trade ties with Iraq, has been peeved with its
reluctance to vote with Washington in the UN on key
global issues.
As for Iraq, outside of the Arab
world and Islamic countries, it has few supporters.
India’s support is therefore important. For the Iraqis,
India's call for lifting of sanctions on Baghdad "in
tandem" with its compliance with UN resolutions is
refreshingly different from the standard Western
position.
Last week, Iraq’s ambassador to New
Delhi, Salah Al-Mukhtar, said that India should join the
UN inspection teams operating in his country.
Mohammed Sayeed Al-Sahaf, a special envoy of the
Iraqi president, is currently in the Indian capital and
is expected to meet the Vajpayee to hand over a message
from Saddam.
At a time when Iraqi
representatives do not count for much in world capitals,
it is significant that Saddam's special envoy will be
meeting with the Indian premier and foreign minister.
The kind of attention that he receives in Delhi will be
closely watched by Washington.
(©2002 Asia Times
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