May 15, 1999	atimes.com

China China-Russia-India axis more likely By Ranjit Dev Raj NEW DELHI - Contoversy over the North Atlantic Treaty Organization-led bombing of Yugoslavia may have revived chances for a China-Russia-India axis against the emerging unipolar world. The proposed ''triangle'' at the time it was mooted by then-Russian Prime Minister Yevgeni Primakov during a visit to India last December was thought impractical by Indian leaders. But the escalation of NATO's air offensive against Belgrade and China's stiff reaction to the accidental bombing of its embassy in the Yugoslav capital seem to have given the triangle idea a fresh chance. On May 11, China's ambassador to India, Zhou Gang, uncharacteristically told television interviewers here that it was time for the two Asian giants to get together on mutual security concerns and face up to the emerging unipolar world. Relations between the two countries, plagued by serious long- standing border disputes, hit a new low after India's Defense Minister George Fernandes said a year ago that China represented the biggest security threat to this country. But earlier this month China offered, at a Joint Working Group (JWG) meeting, to settle border wrangles and revive an overland trade that had came to a halt in the wake of a bloody 1962 border war. China may actually have fewer difficulties with India than with Russia, says historian Hari Vasudevan, a member of the Ford Foundation-sponsored Peace Studies Group. ''Russia fears Chinese expansionism into the 'yellow territories' of the former Soviet Union and Beijing seems to be encouraging a demographic push northwards,'' Vasudevan said. Still, the three countries have the common ground of seeking to preserve self- respect and recognition in a world that is increasingly dominated by the U.S.-NATO allies, he said. On Tuesday, the Voice of Russia broadcast a commentary suggesting that New Delhi, Beijing and Moscow cooperate and avoid the possibility that more non-NATO countries would meet the same fate as Belgrade. ''Such an arrangement would help avoid the use of force, strengthen world security and reduce global tensions,'' the commentary said. During his visit to Beijing this week, in preparation for a Sino-Russian summit, Sergei Prikhodko, a Russian leader, was reported to have kept the triangle high on the agenda. India has yet to make any formal move on the separate Russian and Chinese proposals bilaterally or otherwise but is believed to be taking the triangle idea seriously. Meanwhile, foreign ministry officials in New Delhi have reacted strongly to NATO's stonewalling attempts by China to condemn the alliance in the United Nations Security Council. The officials said, in India's strongest reaction yet to the Kosovo crisis, that ''NATO's tendency to usurp the power and function of the UN Security Council'' is ''a source of concern to all countries big and small." India, they said, was particularly concerned at the ''new strategical concept of NATO that permits operations beyond the Euro-Atlantic region and outside the territory of the alliance." Former prime minister Inder Kumar Gujral has already warned that the Albanian-Serb conflict is the type of internal ethnic matter which could happen anywhere. But the three members of the proposed triangle are especially vulnerable because of serious ethnic conflicts within their large territories. India has Kashmir and the northeastern states, for a start. ''NATO is now demonstrating the power to break up at will any country it may have on a hit agenda,'' says Madhavan Palat, professor at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) here, which is considered a think tank on international affairs. Palat sees as ominous the fact that various secessionist groups are openly supported by Western powers and allowed to maintain headquarters in places like Geneva, New York and London. But Palat advises India and its foreign policy-makers to steer clear of new strategic alliances with a Russia crippled by serious indebtedness to the West. The collapse of the Soviet Union, India's strategic ally, has completely changed the ground rules for the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), whose members must now look for new partnerships, he said. Vasudevan said the problem in the Balkans owed to the failure of Russia to exercise control over the Serbs. ''Russia is a sick man economically and politically and left with nothing but a veto in a sidelined Security Council,'' he said. Palat thought it nearly impossible to challenge the U.S because of its stranglehold on international opinion through the media and its patent disregard for well-established international law. New Delhi has bristled at U.S technology sanctions that were first imposed after India exploded a nuclear device in 1974 and that were toughened after a second round of tests last year. India thus may well see advantage in the U.S discomfiture at the inaccurate bombing of the Chinese embassy last week. There are even signs that India may see an opportunity to renege on commitments made by the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), as demanded by the U.S in return for lifting the sanctions. ''There is no proposal'' to sign the CTBT, Lal Kishan Advani, home minister in India's caretaker government, stated at a press conference on Tuesday, countering opposition charges of a secret sellout to U.S demands. Following the defeat of the BJP-led ruling coalition in a confidence motion last month, India is due to elect a successor government only in October. The government's position is that signing of the CTBT cannot happen before then in any case for lack of consensus. (Inter Press Service)

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