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By Prof. Srikanth Kondapalli Since early 2022, clear political signals are visible to Xi’s relative decline. Let's read tea leaves for portents. As the 20th communist party congress of China is round the corner this November, the continuation or otherwise of its leader Xi Jinping has been debated extensively. There is also his tumultuous legacy since coming to power in 2012. Last one decade had seen meteoric rise of Xi—with the dramatic arrest of his political rivals Bo Xilai and Zhou Yongkang and to his political consolidation. His anti-corruption drive nearly decimated the base of his political rivals like Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao. Xi soon acquired the sobriquet of “Chairman of everything” by centralising all levers of power. At the last count, Xi was holding 13 crucial positions of the party, state and the armed forces. Xi Jinping's Military Might Against the World Although there is a decline in economy growth rates from over 10 percent before 2010 to 2.4 percent in 2020, Xi’s period coincided with massive military modernisation and breakthroughs in science and technology. This further wetted Xi’s “accomplishing something” philosophy and to his grandiose plans for “socialist modernisation” by 2050. Xi’s assertiveness also brought gains to China in South China Sea and other areas, although this led to an estrangement in relations with the neighbours. Xi’s identification of red lines with Taiwan has raised nationalist rhetoric. Xi decimated Hong Kong opposition through national security law. Instead of Deng Xiaoping’s restraint policies, Xi not only grabbed disputed reefs in South China Sea but also refurbished them with military assets. Xi also crafted a policy of occupying disputed lands with India, despite his rhetoric of “developmental partnership”. Xi also alienated Japan with aggressive transgressions in Senkaku islands administered by Japan. How Strong is Xi Jinping on Home Ground? At home, Xi rebooted the political spectrum by first filling crucial party-state posts with his “new Zhijiang Army” cadres and his home province Shaanxi leaders. Xi also ushered in a “new era” with ideological and political firmness. Everything seemed to be going Xi’s way. However, since early this year, clear political signalling is visible to Xi’s relative decline, although in the intensive cesspool of Chinese politics and its opaqueness, it is hard to predict the outcome of the 20th party congress. Let's read the tea leaves for portents. Even though the 6th plenary meeting of the central committee in November last year at its third “historical resolution” glorified Xi, putting him at par with Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping and thereby downgrading his predecessors Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, the 5 May party meeting this year skipped mentioning Xi as the “core of the leadership” – an ominous signal for Xi’s decline. Besides, Xi’s selective extension of his Presidential term at the March 2018 parliament session had alerted his detractors in the party. What Might Trouble Xi Jinping? Firstly, Xi’s pet Belt and Road Initiative project is under stress from several quarters: decline in investments and interest, with debts of several nations increasing and their assets seized such as Hambantota port in Sri Lanka and challenged by the United States-led Build Back Better World and others for lack of transparency, violation of sovereignty principles and environmental disasters. Secondly, Xi’s “dynamic zero Covid” policy is under attack given the massive impact on the welfare of the people, their livelihood, economic decline and the overall inconvenience to an estimate 400 million people in lockdown. China’s concerted narrative that its pandemic policies have been transparent and effective ignores the all-round debilitating effect these have had on the public. These were compounded by Xi’s “common prosperity” policies of curbing big businesses. Thirdly, political factional struggles have intensified given the relative economic decline and rise in unemployment. With at least five out of seven members of the core decision-making body, the politburo standing committee, expected to retire based on age limit, intense political jockeying for these posts have been unleashed. This is a do or die situation for rival factions in China as stakes are high. Will the 'Shanghai Gang' Beat Xi Jinping in His Own Game? The reform oriented “Shanghai gang” faction—still under Jiang Zemin, Zeng Qinghong and others' influence—is said to be concerned about the economic slowdown, restrictions on domestic businesses, decline in investments, gradual shift of manufacturing sector to other greener pastures in Vietnam and other countries, possible sanctions of western countries due to China’s position on the ongoing war in Ukraine. As the political stakes are high, the Shanghai gang is likely to step up multiple attacks on Xi. Already in January this year, an article traced to Jiang’s faction titled “An objective evaluation of Xi Jinping” emerged with full invectives on Xi. This trend is expected to increase. On the other hand, the conservative Communist Youth League—headed by Premier Li Keqiang and supported by a possible 6th generation of leader and vice premier Hu Chunhua—have been quietly working behind the scenes to checkmate Xi. In the coming weeks the relative publicity given in the official media to Xi’s close aides like Chen Min’er, Li Hongzhang, Chen Xi, Shen Haixiong and others on the one hand and Communist Youth League leaders like Hu Chunhua, Wang Yang and others will indicate the rising stock of these factions. It would be cataclysmic if Xi steps down at the next party congress. In such an unlikely scenario, the 6th generation of leaders would have to start afresh with its attendant political uncertainties. Despite all these set-backs, Xi may scrape through, possibly with his wings clipped with reduced majority support among the politburo members and ensuing compromises at all levels of governance. #China #XiJinping Originally published: The Quint, June 21, 2022. https://www.thequint.com/voices/opinion/chinas-chequered-games-are-president-xi-jinpings-days-of-glory-over-or-will-he-prevail#read-more Posted in SIS Blog with the authorization of the author. Prof. Srikanth Kondapalli is Professor in Chinese Studies and Dean of School of International Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University.

By Prof. Swaran Singh The coming BRICS Summit - to be hosted online by China on June 23 - is already drawing attention for becoming the first multilateral forum of this year where Russian President Vladimir Putin will be seen interacting directly with national leaders from China, India, Brazil, South Africa and several other invited nations. The summit likely would be read in the West as the BRICS countries' enhanced support and endorsement of Putin's policies. This is because they have been extremely uncomfortable with all BRICS members resisting the US-led campaign to denounce Russian actions and slap unbearable sanctions against Russia. The reality is that China stands out as the largest importer of Russian energy and India as the largest importer of Russian defense equipment. What adds to US discomfiture is that most of its own allies have also been and continued to be major importers of Russian energy. But while the Ukraine crisis has seen US allies reduce their Russian imports, China and India have increased theirs. This has been facilitated by the BRICS' shared policy stance on Ukraine: refusing to denounce Russia, urging both sides for immediate cessation of hostilities and for initiating direct talk to resolve this crisis. Second, the most novel proposition of this summit - BRICS expansion - also makes the presence of Putin and several new invitees open to various interpretations. The Ukraine crisis has seen fissures emerge in the G20 and adding new members to BRICS could make it an alternative minus US and its allies. This could also mean an expanded BRICS overtaking G7 earlier than imagined. BRICS has been shy of adding new members and South Africa was the last to be added in 2010. But a change in mood is in the making. Last year, BRICS added Bangladesh, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Uruguay to its New Development Bank. Last month, BRICS foreign ministers were joined by representatives from Argentina, Egypt, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Senegal and Thailand. National leaders of some of these countries are expected to join the summit and several others will join the BRICS usual leaders' outreach summit. Third, BRICS has always stood as a unique forum that holds dozens of pentagonal meetings that precede their annual summits. These include meetings of their think-tanks, academics, experts, corporates, journalists, followed by advisors, several officials and senior ministers including their foreign ministers. This building of an annual momentum and the resultant institutionalization with relatively lesser media glare have helped BRICS create favorable grassroots constituencies for building trust. Fourth, though they also deliberated on issues of geopolitics and security, BRICS nations are known for their technocratic focus. This has resulted in piecemeal building of credibility reflected in their debates on creating an independent Credit Rating Agency as also in their initiatives like the Currency Reserves Arrangement and now nine-member New Develop-ment Bank which has already disbursed more than $15 billion and completed and/or sanctioned support for hundreds of projects. The bank now has regional offices in South Africa and India and its style of functioning has pushed Bretton Woods institutions into structural reforms. Of course BRICS camaraderie has had its own share of challenges. Externally, BRICS has come to be compared with the US-led Quadrilateral Security Framework that includes Australia, Japan and India. Quad has had four summits in 14 months and precipitously expanded its agenda. At least US presents Quad as aimed at containing China though others vary in their engagement with Beijing. Internally, BRICS' members like Brazil or India are sometimes suspect for being closely aligned to the US. India is a member of both BRICS and the Quad. Comparisons get drawn on how India had walked out of China-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership but joined US President Joe Biden's Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity last month. India is not just the second-largest and the fastest growing economy in BRICS but has had issues with Beijing. Also members like India, Brazil, South Africa may not be just sensitive to some of the proposed names for new additions and changes but perhaps susceptible to Western criticism of BRICS' evolving dynamics. Moreover, most leaders attending the BRICS summit find themselves focused on their domestic challenges flowing from ongoing pandemic and Ukraine crisis and their economic and political fallouts like rising prices especially wheat and crude oil. The pandemic has seen China and India engaged in supplying healthcare to the Global South and more recently providing humanitarian assistance to countries from Ukraine to Sri Lanka. In view of these being unusual times, modest expectations like the BRICS Summit consolidating its extant initiatives and launching negotiations to build consensus on criteria for adding new members and other future initiatives should suffice. #BRICS #China #India #Quad Originally published: Global Times, June 19, 2022 https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202206/1268451.shtml Posted here with the authorization of the author. Prof. Swaran Singh is Professor of Diplomacy and Disarmament at the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi; President of Association of Asia Scholars (asiascholars.in); Adjunct Senior Fellow at The Charhar Institute, Beijing; Senior Fellow, Institute for National Security Studies Sri Lanka, Colombo; and Visiting Professor, Research Institute for Indian Ocean Economies, Kunming (China).

By Prithvi Naresh Rathod Realism devalues the role of norms as a big constraint in the great-power behaviour, but in reality, norms have actually played a significant role in explaining the effective response to Russia’s invasion. Right after the escalation of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, an old video of Prof. Mearsheimer has been doing rounds on social media which clearly justify Russian actions in Ukraine. The video got so popular that in fact, the Russian Foreign Ministry also reshared the video in order to justify their actions. This can be taken as a good example of how precisely ‘academia’ explains the ‘real world’. This has opened up a new discussion among the IR Theorists who are presenting their analysis of events based on some theory or the other. In my opinion, realism can explain the overall conflict very well, but still other aspects of the war can also be explained by Liberalism. The Russian invasion of Ukraine The Russian invasion of Ukraine can be explained well by Realism since it portrays a world without any central authority which can protect states from each other. This makes the states worry about a dangerous aggressor that might threaten them in the future. This forces the states, especially great powers, to be concerned about their security and leads to great power competition. This is the concept of classical realism called the ‘security dilemma’. To understand this concept, we need to go back to the US move for expansion of NATO in the 1990s by offering countries like Georgia and Ukraine a theoretical chance to join NATO. This triggered a security dilemma for Russia that led to the Russian invasions of Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014 and 2022. The security dilemma arises because the steps taken by one state to make itself more secure often makes other states less secure. In the end, both countries end up being poorer and less safer than they were before. This explains why Eastern European states wanted to get into NATO and why Russian leaders became insecure due to it. The Western response the Invasion The Western response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine can again be explained by Realism. The quick response by the west can be understood by the concept of ‘alliance politics’. Russia’s actions threatened the West which thus commanded a swift response by displaying a balancing behaviour. This alliance politics worked since shared values bring alliances closer and abiding; but serious commitments to collective defence security is possible only if there is perception of a common threat. The level of threat, in turn, depends on the power, proximity, and the enemy’s capabilities and intentions. I believe that Liberal institutionalism helps us understand the unified Western response more aptly. If an institution like NATO did not exist, the response couldn’t have been so effective. Even though International institutions cannot resolve conflicts of interest or stop great powers from acting as per their wishes, they still facilitate effective collective responses. The shortcomings of Liberal Institutionalism In the recent past, there have been instances when the international institutions and international law have proved to be weak when it comes to keeping the great powers in control. Even in 2022, economic interdependence did not stop Russia from launching its invasion of Ukraine, despite the costs that it will have to face as a result. Even the public opinion could not stop Russia. The General Assembly’s one-sided 141-5 vote (with 35 abstentions) condemning the Russian invasion didn't have much impact either. This war has thus demolished the liberal belief that war was no longer “thinkable” in Europe. The shortcomings of Realism Realism devalues the role of norms as a big constraint in the great-power behaviour, but in reality, norms have actually played a significant role in explaining the effective response to Russia’s invasion. Russia had trampled over most of the norms pertaining to the use of force and that partly explains why countries and corporations around the world have judged Russia so harshly and their rapid response. This shows that even if nothing can stop a country from violating global norms, obvious transgressions will customarily affect how its intentions are judged. This whole tragic war could have been avoided if the US and its NATO allies had not given way to liberal idealism. If they would have stuck to the core insights of realism, this crisis would not have occurred and Russia would have never invaded Crimea and Ukraine would have been safe. According to Realism, wars occur because the international system is anarchic and states compete for power and may use force to make themselves more secure or gain advantages. Also, since there is no way that the states can know exactly what other states may do in the future, this makes them more reluctant to trust each other and thus encourages them to sidestep against the possibility that another more powerful state may try to harm them at some point in the future. This is exactly what makes us understand the behaviour of Russia in response to the NATO expansion by the US and its allies. #Russia #Ukraine #War #NATO #Realism #Liberalism Prithvi Naresh Rathod is pursuing MA in Politics (with specialization in International Studies) at the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

By Prof. Swaran Singh Three-day visit to Hanoi by Defense Minister Rajnath Singh underscored the evolving nature of their bilateral ties. Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh on Friday concluded a three-day visit to Hanoi. This not only reinforced but showcased how, other than the Quadrilateral Security Framework of Australia, Japan, India and the United States, Vietnam has come to be the most powerful pillar of India’s Indo-Pacific strategy. This rapidly strengthening bilateral partnership portends far-reaching implications for the larger Indo-Pacific region. Singh’s visit also marked one more instance of India’s assertive foreign policy in the making. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s last eight years have seen New Delhi becoming increasingly firm in pushing its own line and withstanding pressures from friends and foes alike. And observers in Vietnam see this change being most aptly appreciated in Hanoi, undergirding an enduring future for their strategic cooperation. For these last eight years, for instance, bilateral India-Vietnam trade has more than doubled, rising from US$7 billon for the 2015-16 fiscal year to $14.14 billion for 2021-22, with India’s exports to Vietnam last year marking impressive 34% growth over the preceding year. But what has brought India and Vietnam closer is also their increasing concerns about China’s expanding footprint in the South China Sea, where both have serious commercial and strategic interests. And here, the recent past has especially witnessed China being further emboldened by its expanding engagements with the larger littoral across the Indo-Pacific region. Apart from building known naval facilities from Djibouti in Africa to Solomon Islands in the Pacific, and leasing the ports of Gwadar and Hambantota or exploring naval access to ports in Bangladesh and Myanmar in South Asia, China has been secretly building naval facilities in Vietnam’s neighbor Cambodia, though officials both in Beijing and Phnom Penh have denied it. This is where New Delhi and Hanoi find their larger visions – like the ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific and India’s Act East policy or Indo-Pacific Ocean’s Initiative – synergizing their rapidly transforming defense-centric partnership that promises to make this novel axis an influential factor in emerging Indo-Pacific dynamics. Defense-centric axis In short, India’s relationship with Vietnam has transformed from their millennia-old civilizational and cultural linkages and 20th-century camaraderie of anti-colonial struggles to the 21st-century geopolitics prodding a whole range of robust defense-centric partnerships. Today these partnerships involve a whole spectrum of regular high-level visits, military training and exchanges, joint naval exercises, defense supplies and co-production, intelligence sharing and cooperation in UN peace operations. The fact that their partnerships have lately begun to drift toward greater maritime and multilateral bonhomie makes their axis an interesting ingredient for prognosis on the evolving realignments in the Indo-Pacific region. Recent years have witnessed India’s arms exports leading this transformation. No other nation has received the kind of defense supplies that have been destined from India to Hanoi. In this three-day visit itself, India’s defense minister formally handed over 12 high-speed boats for Vietnam’s border guards. Underlining the move from defense exports to joint defense production, the first five boats were built in the Larsen & Toubro shipyard in India and the other seven at Vietnam’s Hong Ha shipyard. Rajnath Singh also announced a monetary grant for setting up language and IT labs for the Vietnamese armed forces. Plus India is expected to gift Vietnam a Khukri-class corvette, the INS Kirpan (“Dagger”), which is currently in service with the Indian Navy. All this is bound to be read in Beijing as aimed at constraining China in the South China Sea and beyond. Singh and Vietnam’s minister of national defense, General Phan Van Giang, also revived talks on India supplying its state-of-the-art BrahMos supersonic cruise missiles as well as Akash short-range ground-to-air missiles. This proposal was originally initiated way back during the 2016 visit of India’s then-defense minister Manohar Parrikar, who had also launched a $100 million line of credit facilitating India’s ongoing defense supplies. However, after India’s recent $375 million contract to supply of an anti-ship variant of the BrahMos cruise missile to the Philippines, which is also expected to sign another deal for India’s light combat aircraft and advanced light helicopter, Vietnam and Indonesia may also soon receive versions of India’s BrahMos missiles. Alluding to these trends in the making, India’s line of credit to Vietnam is now being expanded to $500 million, and the two defense ministers agreed for its “early finalization” as the two sides signed a slew of agreements signaling this changing nature of their future cooperation. Future roadmap outlined Without doubt, their shared China challenge remains the main driver guiding and accelerating future trajectories of this evolving India–Vietnam axis of the two fastest-growing economies of this region. This could not be more vividly underlined than this visit clinching a first-of-its-kind Memorandum of Understanding on Mutual Logistics Support. This will not only allow but both facilitate and simplify their administrative procedures to enable their militaries use of each other’s bases for repair and replenishment of supplies. These new arrangements should greatly enhance their operational outreach empowering their naval explorations across the South China Sea and also enable them to operate far away home: India around the Pacific and Vietnam in the Indian Ocean rim. This context was most aptly underlined by Rajnath Singh explaining how their “broader convergence of interests and common interest” and the resultant “close defense and security cooperation is an important factor of stability in the Indo-Pacific region.” What is most interesting is that Vietnam has been traditionally reluctant to allow such free access to its military facilities to foreign militaries. This in turn makes India the first to achieve this feat. India, on the other hand, has had similar arrangements with a whole range of countries including the United States, Australia, Japan, France, South Korea, Singapore and so on. The second groundbreaking clincher of this visit by India’s defense minister is their issuing of a Joint Vision Statement on India-Vietnam Defense Partnership toward 2030 that aims to “significantly enhance the scope and scale” to their defense partnership. This roadmap for coming eight years allows long-term planning and initiatives. Strategic partners on the go Vietnam remembers that when it comes to its national defense, India was the only non-communist nation to support Hanoi both during its prolonged war with France and then against the United States and later in its conflict with Cambodia. Of course structural factors like expansion of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and launch of India’s Look East policy in 1990s have also laid strong foundations. The two remain connected in regular bilateral and regional forums. India has since also come to be Vietnam’s major partner in the fields of oil exploration, agriculture and manufacturing, though focus has clearly since moved toward military supplies and co-production, intelligence sharing and joint military exercises and other maritime and multilateral cooperation. Over the years, their bilateral ties were consequently upgraded to a strategic partnership during then-prime minister Nguyen Tan Dung’s India visit of 2007 and then to a comprehensive strategic partnership during Modi’s Vietnam visit of 2016. Without playing down the autonomy of shared values and interest and mutual stakes and institutionalization of their cooperation, it is primarily China’s continued unprecedented rise during last few decades and especially its muscle-flexing in the South China Sea that has sustained the momentum of India-Vietnam cooperation. Given their shared territorial disputes and geopolitical contestations with rising China, this reflects their shared determination to ensure China’s compliance with international laws and norms, especially around the Indo-Pacific region. But what is important to underline is that unlike some Western powers, both India and Vietnam have kept engaging with a rising and assertive China. Guided by their civilizational values, both believe in socializing and restraining China’s behavior by engaging with it and not by confronting or alienating it altogether. This is what promises to see the India-Vietnam axis emerging as a novel alternative locomotive of change in evolving realignments in the Indo-Pacific region. #India #Vietnam #China #IndoPacific Originally published: Asia Times, June 10, 2022 https://asiatimes.com/2022/06/novel-india-vietnam-axis-emerging-in-indo-pacific/ Posted here with the authorization of the author. Prof. Swaran Singh is Professor of Diplomacy and Disarmament at the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi; President of Association of Asia Scholars (asiascholars.in); Adjunct Senior Fellow at The Charhar Institute, Beijing; Senior Fellow, Institute for National Security Studies Sri Lanka, Colombo; and Visiting Professor, Research Institute for Indian Ocean Economies, Kunming (China).

By Prof. Bharat H. Desai The Stockholm 2022 at best remained a timid acknowledgement of things going terribly wrong and lacked the courage for a decisive course correction. The time seemed to stand still with the “world problematique” prophesized in the Limits to Growth (1972). The first week of June 2022 became a rare ‘environment week’ as it witnessed two back-to-back global environmental events prior to the World Environment Day (05 June): (i) 50th anniversary celebration of the 1972 Stockholm Conference (2-3 June) and (ii) 30th anniversary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (4 June). What does it portend for our common environmental future? In his opening remarks on 2 June in Stockholm, the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres lamented about the grim environmental scenario that the global “wellbeing is at risk” and “Earth’s natural systems cannot keep up with our demands”. “We haven’t kept our promises on the environment”, Guterres candidly admitted. As the UNSG pleaded to “lead us out of this mess”, his clarion call to address the “triple planetary crisis” caused by the climate emergency seemed alike a cry in the wilderness before the Stockholm audience. Similarly, the executive director of UN Environment Program, Inger Andersen asked as to what went wrong in the five decades (1972-2022). “If Indira Gandhi or Olof Palme were here today, what excuses would we offer up for our inadequate action? None that they would accept. They would tell us that further inaction is inexcusable”, Andersen unashamedly said. World Problematique The Stockholm+50 Conference remained a low-key affair. Ironically, the moral halo that ushered the world into global environmental consciousness at the Stockholm 1972 seemed to be missing at the Stockholm 2022 Conference. It ended with a listless statement jointly issued by Sweden and Kenya, the two host countries. Instead of the much-expected uplifting Stockholm+50 declaration, it took the shape of a strange ten point “Presidents’ Final Remarks to Plenary”. It didn’t cause any ripple as didn’t issue a clarion call to shake the conscience of peoples and nations for everting the existential planetary crisis. The Stockholm 2022 at best remained a timid acknowledgement of things going terribly wrong and lacked the courage for a decisive course correction. The time seemed to stand still with the “world problematique” prophesized in the Limits to Growth (1972). The Predicament The UN has put into practice the global conferencing technique. The Stockholm 1972 was followed by confabulations in Rio de Janeiro (1992), Johannesburg (2002), Rio de Janeiro (2012) and now Stockholm (2022). Notwithstanding all the global conferences, mega regulatory processes, creation of institutional maze and spending of a staggering amount of funds, the global environmental conditions have only worsened. Was it really worth it? The world seems to be in dire straits with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030 set to go haywire, alarming situation of chronic hunger (2021 Global Hunger Index), 2.37 billion people without access to adequate food (2021 FAO), uncertainty of meeting the 1.5 C GHG targets (2022 IPCC) and climate change exacerbating SGBV against women. The graphic description of “two worlds, two planets, two humanities” for the North-South divide by the economist Mahbub ul Haq before the Stockholm 1972 still haunts the world. Gandhian (1908) warnings about choice between our needs and greed as well as lament of Tagore (1908) on “progress towards what and progress for whom” seems to have been left far behind. What went wrong? The Earth in the Balance The quagmire of global environmental crisis stares us in the face. This author’s 1992 audacious prediction [Social Science & Medicine (Oxford: Pergamon) 35. 4. 1992 at 593] came true when Covid-19 pandemic came: “if the current pace persists, people will be forced to move with gas masks in some of the mega-cities in the not-too-distant future”. With 7.9 billion (2022) world population expected to reach frightening levels of 10 billion (2050), one can only imagine the kind of life the future generations will inherit. Ironically, “human being has reached the moon but does not know how to live on the earth” (former Indian PM Vajpayee). As the world assembled again in the Swedish capital in 2022, the echo of prediction (6 June 1972) of the Swedish Prime Minister (PM) Olof Palme was recalled: “The decisive question is in which direction we will develop, by what means we will grow, which qualities we want to achieve,and what values we wish to guide our future…there is no individual future, neither for people nor for nations”. India was present at the ‘origin’ (Stockholm 1972) with the Indian Delegation led by the PM Indira Gandhi. She drew attention to the wisdom from the Atharva Veda, thus: “What of thee I dig out; Let that quickly grow over; Let me not hit thy vitals or thy heart.” “Indira Gandhi looked at the environment not from an elitist view point. She did it due to her genuine conviction”, Dr. Karan Singh, former JNU Chancellor, shared his recollections with this author on 27 April 2022. Envisioning Our Future After 50 years, it is pertinent to assess the trajectory hitherto followed, assess what went wrong and how we need to move forward. An ideational book curated by this author, Envisioning Our Environmental Future (IOS Press: Amsterdam, 2022) (Road to Stockholm+50 and Beyond | Environmental Policy and Law), has painstakingly brought together futuristic ideas of 22 outstanding scholars from the five continents to look beyond the Stockholm+50 (2022). It presents prognosis and prospects for extricating the world out of the global environmental morass for a better future in the 21st century and beyond. It is a sequel to another ideational work curated by the author with cutting-edge ideas of 21 outstanding scholars from around the world: Our Earth Matters (IOS Press: Amsterdam, 2021) (Our Earth Matters | IOS Press). The address of the Indian PM Narendra Modi, at the 75th anniversary of the UNGA (2020) that “we cannot fight today’s challenges with outdated structures” holds relevance for comprehensive UN reforms. An explicit reference to “trusteeship of the planet” in the Indian PM’s address at G-20 Riyadh virtual summit (2020) provides one such indication for a possible change (The Tribune, 02 December 2020). The 2021 report of the UNSG has alluded to such ‘repurposed’ Trusteeship Council, mooted in this author’s lecture (15 January 1999) at Legal Department of the World Bank DC. Will the UN member states embrace this idea to make the Trusteeship Council the principal instrumentality for the trusteeship of the planet? India can seize this opportunity to galvanize the world as a global solution provider. The ‘Stockholm moment’ of 2022 provided a unique opportunity to all the heads of government to go down in history. Ironically, no world leader stepped forward at Stockholm 2022 to don the mantle to lead the planet earth out of the crisis of survival. As 2020-2022 grueling spell of Covid-19 pandemic showed, Nature has her own ways of drawing the ‘limits’ to our existence. Maybe it has been a wakeup call. One only hopes, peoples and nations come to senses before it is too late. #Stockholm+50 #Environment #UN #India #IPCC #SDG Prof. Bharat H. Desai is Jawaharlal Nehru Chair and Professor of International Law at the Centre for International Legal Studies of SIS, JNU. He coordinated the initiatives on Making SIS Visible during 2008-2013 (Making SIS Visible | Welcome to Jawaharlal Nehru University (jnu.ac.in) as well as Inter-University Consortium (Partner Universities: JNU, Jammu, Kashmir and Sikkim) during 2012-2020 (www.iucccc.in/Contact us.htm).

By Prof. Srikanth Kondapalli In terms of leadership succession, Xi prefers his “new Zhijiang Army” to take over the sixth generation of leadership, while Li is grooming fellow-communist youth league colleague and Vice Premier Hu Chunhua to take over the mantle. The battles lines are drawn. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang is a worried man these days. He is now at the forefront of the “people’s war” to counter the pandemic but also to restore the economy battered by Communist Party chief and Chinese President Xi Jinping’s “zero-Covid” lockdowns and curbs on booming economic powerhouses. This is in sharp contrast to how Li was feeling when I, as part of a group of scholars and think-tankers, met him only a few years ago. In a 90-minute extempore presentation to us, Li was upbeat about the “medium-high growth” targets and the economic pivoting to domestic consumption and services. He was only concerned about the falling purchasing power in the rural areas and to the growing income disparities. Li’s confidence seems eroded now with the massive fall in the economy in the past two years, triggered by mass lockdowns, stringent border controls and quarantine procedures. These were aggravated by a sudden crackdown last year on big businesses such as Alibaba, Tencent and Meituan, while allowing the free fall of real-estate giants like Evergrande and others. Alibaba chief Jack Ma went into hiding after he made comments on the country’s banking system. Its shares tumbled. Xi defended these radical policies under the rubric of “common prosperity”, essentially the same old idea of “robbing the rich to help the poor.” In reality, all it did was to lead to economic disruption and slowing growth. Two distinct economic policies have emerged: Xi’s policy of Communist Party control over businesses versus Li’s “street vendor” economy. Xi bulldozed through a model that allowed big State-owned and private enterprises to flourish under his absolute control. His ‘anti-corruption drive’ targeted only the political and economic base of rival factional leaders Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao. Jiang’s “Shanghai gang” and Hu’s communist youth league (to which Li also belonged) suffered the most, while Xi consolidated his control. While Xi had grandiose plans for China’s “rejuvenation” and the “Chinese dream” till 2050, Li’s down-to-earth policies were trying to address the economic problems afflicting the country. While Xi declared victory over poverty alleviation and the ushering in of a “well-off society” last year, Li pointed out to the extensive work needed to alleviate poverty in urban areas, with the per capita income of over 600 million Chinese still under $140 a month. Li addressed 100,000 officers and cadre on May 25 on the restoration of the economy. This is unprecedented. The last time such a meeting was held – though on half the scale of Li’s meeting -- was in the aftermath of Mao’s disastrous Great Leap Forward in the late 1950s. Li admitted to a fall in the value added by Chinese industry and thus to a fall in revenues. Li’s biographers have noted the studious upbringing he had. In fact, then party supremo Deng Xiaoping had noticed Li’s talent on a visit to Henan province and notified his intent to promote Li to the top post in the State Council. In the run-up to the crucial 20th Communist Party congress this November, the Xi-Li tussle is expected to intensify as the stakes for each faction are high. There is, of course, play around the age limit criterion, as well. Li, born 1955, is approaching the age limit for a Politburo Standing Committee (PSC) member – 68 years. Xi, born 1953, has already crossed this limit, but at the parliament session in March 2019, he had his term as President, if not the General Secretary’s post, extended, for possibly an unlimited number of terms. By factional strength, though Xi has absolute majority in the PSC, his mishandling of the pandemic and the economy, the deleterious effects of the tussle with the US, the negative effects of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, etc., have dented his control. While the recent May 5 Politburo meeting drowned any criticism of the “dynamic zero-Covid” handling, interestingly it did not mention the “core” position of Xi in the party. In terms of leadership succession, Xi prefers his “new Zhijiang Army” to take over the sixth generation of leadership, while Li is grooming fellow-communist youth league colleague and Vice Premier Hu Chunhua to take over the mantle. The battles lines are drawn. In China’s political structure, the top political leader and the Premier are by design at loggerheads with each other. In reality, Premiers have generally played a balancing role, if not second fiddle to the top leader. Recall Premier Zhou Enlai vis-à-vis Mao, or General Secretaries Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang during Deng Xiaoping’s reign, or more recently, Zhu Rongji under Jiang Zemin or Wen Jiabao under Hu Jintao. Will the personality and ideas clash in the Xi-Li equation trump the political structure? Will Li, then, break the mould and live to tell the tale? #China #LiKeqiang #XiJinping #Covid #Economy Originally published: Deccan Herald, June 05, 2022. https://www.deccanherald.com/amp/opinion/trouble-in-middle-kingdom-xi-li-tussle-comes-to-the-fore-1115381.html Posted in SIS Blog with the authorization of the author. Prof. Srikanth Kondapalli is Professor in Chinese Studies and Dean of School of International Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University.

By Prof. Swaran Singh The two nations’ friendship has often been sorely tested, but common interests regarding the US and China may strengthen ties The prime ministers of Canada and India are expected to meet either next weekend on the sidelines of the Group of Seven summit at Schloss Elmau in Upper Bavaria, Germany, or toward the end of this month at the Commonwealth Heads of Government conference in Kigali, Rwanda. In the view of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is to visit India next year to attend the G20 summit, this earlier meeting could not only be groundbreaking for Canada-India bilateral relations, but could carry deeper implications for the evolving Indo-Pacific realignments. These reports are sourced to Wednesday’s phone conversation of two countries’ foreign ministers, Mélanie Joly and Subrahmanyam Jaishankar. Though their official briefs make no mention of a prime-minister-level summit and both underlined their (varying) perspectives about building consensus against “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine” and “misuse of freedoms and the dangers of extremism,” they both reiterated their unity on building a “free and open Indo-Pacific,” which has lately come to be a point of convergence in their flip-flop relations. As recorded in the Canadian readout, the two ministers “affirmed the importance of a free and open Indo-Pacific region.” In the wake of India’s growing recognition as the region’s net security provider and rising regional leader, while Canada seeks new partners in the face of its growing marginalization in this region, this could well become their new glue to stabilize their historically mercurial yet special relations. The roller coaster Independent India got off to a good start, with Jawaharlal Nehru’s October 1949 visit to Ottawa opening doors for Canada’s development assistance leading to supply of the CIRUS (Canada-India Reactor Utility Services) nuclear research reactor in 1954 laying the foundations of India’s nuclear program. But soon, Cold War dynamics were to push them into opposite camps and, in 1974, prime minister Pierre Trudeau, father of current prime minister, was to describe India’s peaceful nuclear explosion as “betrayal,” suspending all cooperation. The early 1980s saw Sikh militancy in India emerge as an added, though sporadic, irritant, the lingering effects of which were seen in Justin Trudeau’s last India visit in February 2018. A few uncanny events were to make this visit the second low point in Canada-India relations. It was on the last day of the Trudeau family’s week-long visit that Prime Minister Narendra Modi met with him briefly. When contrasted with Modi having personally accompanied foreign leaders to multiple Indian cities and holding joint public rallies and roadshows with them, this diplomatic distancing was not lost on anyone. The first friendly follow-up gesture came in October 2018 when Canada, defying strong Sikh lobbies at home, announced that it “would not recognize” Referendum 2020, a campaign that was being promoted by US-based “Sikhs for Justice” for holding a plebiscite on the secession of Punjab province from India. But again, Trudeau’s December 2020 remarks on the farmers protest in India were to unleash public outrage, including India’s Ministry of External Affairs calling it “unwarranted” and telling a Canadian envoy of such remarks having “potential to ‘seriously’ damage bilateral ties.” Soon, Trudeau’s use of emergency provisions in the wake of February’s truckers’ protests in Canada were again to trigger a spate of commentaries calling out his hypocrisy in dealing with protests. However, the two leaders have continued meeting at such forums as the G20 and G7 summits and held online conversations marking rituals of mutual engagement. Last September, Modi congratulated Trudeau on getting elected as prime minister for a third time and tweeted that he looked forward to “strengthening India-Canada relations, as well as our cooperation on global and multilateral issues.” As a sign of positive momentum, their negotiations from 2021 for a full-fledged Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) hoped to achieve “an interim trade deal” before the end of this year. Yet it remains unclear if CEPA can boost their bilateral trade, which slipped during the pandemic. The US disconnect This is where these two friends of the United States – feeling at variance with US Indo-Pacific strategy – may reconnect in building post-pandemic resilience that has become inordinately China-centric, even anti-China. This is because, unlike the US, both Canada and India wish to restrain China by building mutually beneficial engagements with it, and not by alienating it. China’s unprecedented economic rise and resultant political influence remain at the core of Indo-Pacific geopolitical imaginations. The past two decades have seen the Indo-Pacific region, led by China, emerge as the global growth engine and therefore the new global center of gravity. Chinese President Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road Initiative has accelerated debate on the United States’ relative decline, causing the US to band together its allies to redress their so-called “shared” China challenge. Canada, as a Pacific nation, has always aligned its policies with the US, becoming an ASEAN Dialogue Partner in 1977 and staying part of US-led Five Eyes Intelligence Sharing Network of World War II vintage. But when Five Eyes was revived by US president Donald Trump as part of his anti-China rhetoric, Canada refused to “share metadata with its Five Eyes allies,” respecting the privacy of its citizens. Last month, Canada also became the last to join Five Eyes’ US-led campaign against accessing China’s fifth-generation (5G) technologies. No doubt, Canada was neither included in the Quadrilateral Security Framework of Indo-Pacific democracies nor added to the AUKUS (Australia, United Kingdom, United States) security mechanism launched in September 2021; the UK was added in the latter though it is not even a Pacific nation. Canada has also so far failed to join the East Asia Summit except once as a special invitee. Now, US President Joe Biden has not included Canada in his Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF), though it also excludes Mexico, Chile and Peru, which defies logic as all four nations already have free-trade agreements (FTAs) with the US. Also, all four were part of US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership, which, after the US departure, has been revived as the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). Besides the US, seven of the 12 IPEF members also have an FTA with Canada as part of CPTPP. Moreover, unlike IPEF, the CPTPP has been in force since 2018 and offers concrete tariff reductions, market access and dispute settlement provisions. The proposed IPEF, just beginning negotiations, aims to create some open-ended modules for flexible alignments, and it remains open to other aspirants like Canada or even China, which has already applied for inclusion in the CPTPP. One explanation for Biden’s distancing from his close Pacific allies is that he wants to project IPEF as an exclusive US initiative for Asia and “didn’t want to share the stage and photo ops with non-Asian countries.” But others put the blame on Trudeau, saying “the current government is unfocused on the Indo-Pacific.” Exploring alternative alignments Both Canada and India continue to explore autonomous partnerships across the Indo-Pacific region. Both are averse to jumping on the bandwagon of the US Indo-Pacific Strategy, which they feel remains too China-centric. India continues to engage China, which is its largest trading partner. With the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, as its fourth-largest trading partner, India this year celebrates the 30th anniversary of their Dialogue Partnership. Likewise, facing exclusion from US-led Indo-Pacific initiatives, Canada has also been exploring alternative partners and paradigms. But does their growing clash over US Indo-Pacific strategies bring Canada and India closer? Canada has already initiated negotiations for partial FTAs with India and ASEAN that promise to be far more substantive than IPEF. As well, there are good reasons to believe that IPEF is unlikely to win congressional approval in the US. This should open up avenues for Canadian and Indian negotiators. Canada has already applied to join the Digital Economic Partnership Agreement (DEPA) of Chile, New Zealand and Singapore – three Indo-Pacific nations that are already with Canada in the CPTPP. In fact Canada would be better placed in DEPA, which unlike IPEF is a traditional trade agreement with provisions for tariff reductions, rules of origin for market access and dispute settlement mechanisms. This past Tuesday, Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong welcomed Canada’s application to join the DEPA, which aims to explore innovative realignments for post-pandemic resilience by building infrastructure, smart cities and cybersecurity and address other issues of digitization. Likewise, the coming Monday will see Gabriel Boric, the president of Chile – another member of DEPA – arrive in Ottawa to take their relationship forward. Google plans to lay its first sub-sea cable carrying 16 pairs of fiber-optic wires from Vancouver to Japan. Called Topaz, this project will provide faster access to Google services – including its search engine, Gmail, YouTube and Google Cloud – and will be ready by next year. Can all this open new possibilities for middle powers like Canada and India coming together to balance the US anti-China preoccupation? Will the much-awaited Canadian Indo-Pacific Strategy reveal such a rethink and reconnect Canada and India? Since early this year Joly has been reported saying that in spite of the all-consuming Ukraine crisis, she has been “activity working to deliver on a key marching order given her by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: to create a comprehensive new Indo-Pacific Strategy.” This January saw the India and Canadian navies join the six-nation anti-submarine-warfare drill called Sea Dragon 22 in the Indo-Pacific waters. Their gradual coming together may work to make the US Indo-Pacific strategy more balanced and to their comfort. Alternatively, they could begin to explore alignments in spite of the US. Either way their reconnect in the Indo-Pacific region promises to bring enduring stability to Canada-India relations. #India #Canada #Indo-Pacific #US #IPEF #CPTPP #China #Quad Originally published: Asia Times, June 3, 2022 https://asiatimes.com/2022/06/will-indo-pacific-policies-reconnect-canada-and-india/ Posted here with the authorization of the author. Prof. Swaran Singh is Professor of Diplomacy and Disarmament at the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi; President of Association of Asia Scholars (asiascholars.in); Adjunct Senior Fellow at The Charhar Institute, Beijing; Senior Fellow, Institute for National Security Studies Sri Lanka, Colombo; and Visiting Professor, Research Institute for Indian Ocean Economies, Kunming (China).

By Prof. Srikanth Kondapalli The IPEF intends to strengthen digital trade, resilience in supply chain mechanism, green economy and rules- based order although a road map for tariff reductions has not been outlined, and hence cannot be termed as a free trade area. On the other hand, the IPEF intends to accommodate new changes ushered by China’s rise. In a major development last week, the United States President Joseph R Biden announced the formation of a 13-member Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF) a day before the Quad Leader’s in-person meeting at Tokyo on May 24. It has 13 members including, the US, India, Japan, Australia, Brunei, Indonesia, Republic of Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi welcomed the formation of IPEF and attended it's opening ceremony. In late 2021, the US began preparations for the IPEF by despatching commerce and trade secretaries to various countries in the Indo-Pacific for informal discussions, given the mounting economic challenges. These visits came in the wake of the US announcement at the East Asian Summit in October last year expressing its intent to usher in the IPEF. The US-China tariff wars posed the background for this alternative move, as with the unprecedented pandemic related supply-chain disruptions. Currently the IPEF constitutes 40 percent of global production and 60 percent of the population. Interestingly more than half of the IPEF members are from Southeast Asia and an overwhelming majority of them are also part of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) arrangement that came into being in November 2020. The RCEP is seen as China-dominated grouping and the IPEF therefore provides an alternative for many of its members outside China’s pressures. The IPEF intends to strengthen digital trade, resilience in supply chain mechanism, green economy and rules- based order although a road map for tariff reductions has not been outlined, and hence cannot be termed as a free trade area. On the other hand, the IPEF intends to accommodate new changes ushered by China’s rise. The IPEF adds to the Quad’s economic angle and expands the interactions with other countries as well in near future. The revived Quad since 2021 had four Summit meetings and focused on non-traditional security challenges like vaccine production and distribution, critical technologies and maritime order. By including several other “friendly” countries, the IPEF is signalling its expansion and outreach. IPEF appears to challenge China’s unilateral Belt and Road Initiative. Although China had joined the globalisation process, it has claimed leadership and began weaponing global and regional trade, investments, markets and tourism. China became the centre of trade value chain in the world and the problems surfaced as the Covid-19 pandemic worsened the global economy. Russian military action on Ukraine further led to the deterioration of global economy with high inflation and rise in food and energy prices. IPEF intends to wriggle out of this situation. The Quad and the IPEF are seen contributing positively to the Indian economic and technological growth as well as for its security. As a “major developing country” with the fastest growing economy (estimated above 8 percent in 2022), the IPEF provides an opportunity for India to expand its economic cooperation with the Indo-Pacific region. By joining the IPEF, India could explore and be transformed by the economic potential associated with digital economy. In early 2021, India singed an agreement with Japan and Australia for supply chain resilience. With the IPEF, this move will be further strengthened. India also has an ambitious target for “green economy” as reiterated at Paris in December 2015 and recently at COP-26 in Glasgow last year. Joining IPEF further strengthens this process. While IPEF is not a free trade area, New Delhi’s comprehensive economic partnerships with Japan, South Korea and Singapore or its free trade agreement with the Southeast Asian grouping, the recent trade agreement with Australia and similar negotiations with United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, Israel and the European Union members–all fit into the framework of linking up and integrating with hi-tech partners and to hence to the elevation of the Indian economy. Also, the emphasis in IPEF on preparing for the economic crisis, strengthens Indian crisis management skills and this is expected to cushion Indian economy. Covid pandemic had disrupted many sectors of the Indian economy and hence working with like-minded countries in a rules-based order strengthens Indian competitiveness. For long, India was denied access to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation grouping, which projected China. However, with China posing existential challenges to many a country, IPEF is seen as a robust and resilient alternative. #IndoPacific #India #US #IPEF #RCEP #APEC #China #Quad Originally aired: External Services Division, AIR, June 01, 2022. Posted in SIS Blog with the authorization of the author. Prof. Srikanth Kondapalli is Professor in Chinese Studies and Dean of School of International Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University.

By Prof. Srikanth Kondapalli While Bachelet criticised China’s human rights violations in Xinjiang, critics pointed to her 'controlled visit'. The Uighur internment camps with an estimated 1 million incarcerated minorities in Xinjiang in China continue to prick the global conscience. The issue is snowballing into allegations of genocide, leading to renewed tensions between western countries and China. In addition, Uighur links to turbulent Afghanistan also highlight regional security dimensions. Recently, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet visited Kashgar, Urumqi and Guangzhou from 23 to 28 May, and after discussions with the concerned stakeholders, she stated that she raised the issues of “lack of independent judicial oversight of the operation of the program, the reliance by law enforcement officials on 15 indicators to determine tendencies towards violent extremism, allegations of the use of force and ill-treatment in institutions, and reports of unduly severe restrictions on legitimate religious practices”. This is the first visit of the UN human rights body to China in 17 years. While Bachelet criticised China’s “arbitrary and indiscriminate” human rights violations in Xinjiang, critics pointed to her “controlled visit”, as also her soft position. The 'Xinjiang Police Files' The visit coincided with the release of Xinjiang Police Files, along with a number of classified documents on the situation in these camps. Adrian Zenz, a China expert banned along with European parliament members and others by China for work on exposing the internment camps, had published these files in peer-reviewed journals. The cache included 2,800 images of detainees, 3,00,000 personal records, 23,000 detainee records and more than ten camp police instructions. Considerable evidence thus suggests the precariousness of Uighur lives. They not only became minorities in their own land with the Han nationals’ influx but also lost public positions in legislature, bureaucracy, police, judiciary, economy and media establishments. Infrastructure projects under Western Development Campaign and the recent Belt and Road Initiative exacerbated this. This coincided with the revisions in China’s ethnic policies from an integrationist to an assimilationist agenda, reflected in the “Sinification” campaign in Xinjiang, Tibet and Inner Mongolia. Intensive residential surveillance – as Bachelet noted in her press briefing – religious curbs, demolition of mosques, disallowing of Friday prayers and wearing beards, all have stifled Uighur lives. Uighur discontent had resulted in a number of incidents, of which the 5 July 2009 violence at Urumqi remains widespread, with the killing of 187 people in just a few hours. There were also periodic bomb explosions, knife attacks at a railway station in Kunming in 2014, a car explosion at Tiananmen Square in 2013, etc. Noticeably, much of the Uighur political violence is against state systems like military, para-military forces and others in the region. China's 'Strike Hard' Policies China, on the other hand, argued that these camps were vocational education and training centres meant for temporary skill up-gradation units. In the light of the spread of extreme religious ideas leading to terror activities across the globe, and taking advantage of the post-9/11 global consensus on counter-terrorism, China intends to eradicate violent incidents involving Uighurs by introducing structural and systematic changes and through a controversial “people’s war on terror” campaign since 2014. They cite the Communist Party’s mission as ushering in ethnic harmony, stability and economic development. Began under the party secretary of Xinjiang Chen Quanguo, these “strike hard” policies have become controversial as they targeted entire communities rather than individual “terrorists”. Xinjiang’s political activities also need to be curbed as it had an independent history in 1933-34 and 1944-49 under the East Turkistan Republic. If such fissiparous sentiments remain, there is the danger of China meeting a Soviet disintegration-like fate. China had roped in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation to curb “three evils” – separatism, extremism and splittism – with diplomatic, political and law and order curbs imposed on member states. It also conducts annual “peace mission” paramilitary exercises to avoid any violent incidents in the region. For China, Xinjiang is a crucial part of its national security, with the region occupying nearly 1/8th of its territory. It has significant oil and strategic resources, such as uranium, as well as transportation hubs. It also occupies a strategic location as it borders eight countries, and hence, has foreign policy implications. The Threat From Taliban Takeover of Afghanistan Also, with the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan last year, the threat of militancy spreading into the Xinjiang borders with Badakhshan has increased significantly. By appointing a new military commander, Wang Haijiang, for the Western Theatre Command, China intends to create a buffer zone in the region to stop any Uighur insurgents from crossing over. Beijing has also raised a mobile military base in cooperation with Tajikistan to address this issue. That China’s handling of the Xinjiang issue has become an international concern is seen in the western sanctions on Chinese officials involved in repressive policies against Uighurs. The US, the European Union, Canada, Japan and others have been critical of such regional leaders and expressed disappointment over Bachelet’s visit. #China #UN #US #Xinjiang #Uighur #Afghanistan #Taliban Originally published: The Quint, June 1, 2022 https://www.thequint.com/voices/opinion/chinas-uighur-camps-why-is-a-un-visit-being-criticised-for-soft-position#read-more Posted in SIS Blog with the authorization of the author. Prof. Srikanth Kondapalli is Professor in Chinese Studies and Dean of School of International Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University.

By Prof. Bharat H. Desai The core question before the Arbitration Tribunal was: Should Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, in conformity with the rules of international law, be restored or not be restored by His Britannic Majesty’s Government to the Government of the French Republic? On 28 May 2022, the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid generous tributes on the 139th birth anniversary of the feisty Vinayak Damodar Savarkar (VDS). It gave an impetus to write this piece on the little-known facet about VDS who became a subject of an unprecedented international arbitration in 1910 between two global powers of the day – France and Great Britain. As a long-standing teacher of International Law, this author has taught for years the case concerning Arrest and Return of Savarkar (France v. Great Britain) as cause célèbre in the International Law on extradition (earlier known as restitution). Hence, this write-up is strictly based on the international arbitration triggered by the great escape of VDS as it comes within the author’s primary remit of International Law. In the world history, rarely a person – such as VDS – who joined the ranks of London-based group of Indian nationalists with fervor for the liberation of the native land has become the cause of an arbitration between two countries other than the country of nationality (though India was part of the British Empire). Recently, there has been a maelstrom arising from the books published on the persona of VDS. Yet, in the public domain there is rare mention, if any, about VDS’s daredevil slip from the British custody through the porthole of a ship anchored at the French port en route to its India voyage. The Great Escape On 25 October 1910, France and Great Britain reached a compromis signed as the London Agreement for an arbitration, facilitated by Permanent Court of Arbitration (The Hague). This special legal instrument provided the basis to adjudge facts and law arising from 8 July 1910 escape of VDS from the British merchant steamship S.S.Morea, his arrest from Marseilles shore and restoration by the French Police to the British Police. If we look back after more than eleven decades of the original event, it unfolds the saga of tenacity of 27 years old VDS – nothing short of a Hollywood thriller. Exactly 116 years ago, at the age of 23 years, VDS left for England on 26 May 1906 after securing a fellowship. The name of VDS had been recommended by Lokmanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak to Shyamji Krishna Varma, the London based doyen of the Indian freedom fighters. VDS had gone for the study of Bar-at-Law but soon joined the India House based group of nationalists. He was arrested in 1910. The British Police had suspicion about VDS support for his brother Ganesh Savarkar in organizing an armed revolt against the 1909 Morley-Minto reforms. The Indian Imperial Police implicated VDS in the investigation for allegedly plotting the crime. The resultant escape in question took place from the mail steamer Morea while VDS was being transported from England to India to face trial on the charge of abetment to murder. France demanded the ‘restitution’ of the fugitive on the ground that his delivery to the British officers was contrary to the rules of International Law. Since Great Britain refused to comply, the matter was referred to the five-member arbitration panel (M. Beernaert; L. Renault; Earl of Desart; G. Gram; A. F. de Savornin Lohman). The arbitration was facilitated by the Permanent Court of Arbitration (The Hague). While planning to transport VDS, the British Police had duly alerted the French Police by a letter of 29 June 1910. It did indicate possibility of risk of the prisoner’s escape. The French Ministry of the Interior informed the Prefect of the Bouches-du-Rhône by telegram on 4 July 1910 that some "révolutionnaires hindous" might take advantage of the steamer Morea anchoring at Marseilles to engineer “the escape of this foreigner”. In fact, the Prefect was requested to guard against any such attempt. When Morea reached Marseilles on 7 July 1910, the next day between 6 and 7 am, VDS managed in effecting his audacious escape from the ship’s porthole, swam ashore and began to run when his expected pick-up by the local supporters did not materialize. He was arrested “almost naked” by a brigadier of the French maritime gendarmerie and taken back to the vessel. Three persons, who had come ashore from the vessel, assisted the brigadier in taking the fugitive back. Finally, the Morea left Marseilles on 9 July 1910 – with VDS on board. The Arbitral Award After the informal handing over of VDS to the British Police, the French side realized the serious lapse and tried to reclaim the custody of VDS. However, by that time the Morea was out of the French waters onto her voyage to India. Still, the French swung into the legal action after persuasion by the feisty Parsi philanthropist, Madam Bhikaiji Cama, who was then resident of Paris. The core question before the Arbitration Tribunal was: Should Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, in conformity with the rules of international law, be restored or not be restored by His Britannic Majesty’s Government to the Government of the French Republic? The sessions of the Arbitral Tribunal took place during 14 to 17 February 1911, and the Award was swiftly pronounced on 24 February 1911. The Tribunal took on record the account of the French brigadier whose handover of VDS was swift, voluntary and without any kind of brawl. The Award of the Tribunal noted that “The brigadier had seized SAVARKAR by one arm for the purpose of taking him back to the ship, and the prisoner went peaceably with him”. The Tribunal deduced the fact that "Commissaire" of the French Police came on board Morea shortly after her arrival at Marseilles port, and, in accordance with the orders of the Prefect, placed himself at the disposal of the Commander in respect of the watch to be kept. Thus, it became clear from the sequence of events and conduct of the respective agents on the British and the French sides that the incident did not entail any kind of “recourse to fraud or force in order to obtain possession of a person who had taken refuge in foreign territory”. Moreover, it emerged from the testimonies that before the Morea left Marseilles (9 July 1910) “there was not, in the circumstances of the arrest and delivery of Savarkar to the British Authorities and of his removal to India, anything in the nature of a violation of the sovereignty of France, and that all those who took part in the matter certainly acted in good faith”. In view of the above, the Tribunal finally concluded that “an irregularity was committed by the arrest of SAVARKAR, and by his being handed over to the British Police, there is no rule of International Law imposing, in circumstances such as those which have been set out above, any obligation on the Power which has in its custody a prisoner, to restore him because of a mistake committed by the foreign agent who delivered him up to that Power”. In view of this the Tribunal ruled that: “The Arbitral Tribunal decides that the Government of His Britannic Majesty is not required to restore the said VINAYAK DAMODAR SAVARKAR to the Government of the French Republic”. Ironically, this Arbitral Award has remained understated. It has been often neglected among all the extradition cases studied and taught in the field of International Law. Time as the Final Arbiter The Indian freedom struggle comprised many figures, some known, little known and many unknown. These figures were only humans and hence, not infallible. They also had ‘shades of grey’ as seen among the principal players in the great epic Mahabharata. All civilized peoples in the mature democracies need to take a dispassionate view of roles of different personalities irrespective of their subsequent trajectory, beliefs and conduct. In the case of VDS, his arrest on the British soil, the great escape from the steamer Morea in the French waters, being the subject of an international arbitration and surviving the decade long sentence of transportation for life in the dreaded Cellular Jail of the Andaman Islands itself should have been enough to earn him a rightful place in the pantheon of the Indian freedom struggle. The Savarkar case teaches us vital lessons to keep all kinds of ‘gate-keepers’ at bay and give timely credit to whomsoever it is due. We need to strive for wider horizons, magnanimity of heart and humility-in-action – as Time is the final arbiter for all beings. #VinayakDamodarSavarkar #India #Britain #France #InternationalLaw Prof. Bharat H. Desai is Jawaharlal Nehru Chair and Professor of International Law at the Centre for International Legal Studies of SIS, JNU. He coordinated the initiatives on Making SIS Visible during 2008-2013 (Making SIS Visible | Welcome to Jawaharlal Nehru University (jnu.ac.in) as well as Inter-University Consortium (Partner Universities: JNU, Jammu, Kashmir and Sikkim) during 2012-2020 (www.iucccc.in/Contact us.htm).

By Debanjali Ghosh & Lyimee Saikia The Young Researchers’ Conference on Central and Eastern Europe: Three Decades since Transition was organised by the Jean Monnet Module Understanding European Integration Through the Regional Lens and the Centre for European Studies in the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University between May 18th and 19th, 2022. The Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries have undergone momentous developments since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. In this context, the objective of this webinar was to take stock of the domestic developments of the CEE countries in the three decades since transition and evaluate both their achievements as well as the obstacles faced by them. The conference was introduced by Prof Bhaswati Sarkar, Jean Monnet Chair and Chairperson of the Centre for European Studies through her Welcome Address. This was followed by Special Remarks delivered by Dr Erdő Mariann, Director of Liszt Institute, Hungarian Cultural Centre, New Delhi. Dr Mariann emphasised the similar cultural, religious and political backgrounds of the CEE countries and highlighted several aspects of their socio-cultural and economic transformations. Further, she also focused on Indo-Hungarian relations that have for long been underpinned by strong cultural ties, a theme which was continued by her Czech counterpart Mr Roman Masarik, Minister-Counsellor Charge d’affaires at the Embassy of the Czech Republic in India. With India and the Czech Republic set to celebrate 75 years of diplomatic relations in 2023, Mr Masarik underlined India’s strong cultural relations with the Czech Republic and called to attention the pivotal role played by the latter in India’s defence sector as well as the increasing trade and tourism between the two countries with promising expansion potential. The final Special Remarks were given by Prof Gulshan Sachdeva, Jean Monnet Chair and faculty member at the Centre for European Studies. Interestingly, Prof Sachdeva being a PhD student in Hungary in the early 1990s experienced first-hand some of these changes. Like the previous speakers, he too highlighted India’s strategic interest in the CEE countries and succinctly summarised the political and economic transformations experienced by this region from the 1990s up to the onset of the pandemic. Two of the major challenges noted by him during this transition are migration and the ageing population. Complementing the Special Remarks, the Keynote Address was delivered by Prof R.K. Jain, Jean Monnet Chair and former Professor and Chairman at the Centre for European Studies. Prof Jain, with his longstanding interest in the region, traced the history of India’s relations with Central Europe as far back as the 1950s and concluded that the relationship between India and this region had for years been defined by mutual neglect and an information deficit. Nevertheless, amidst the current political scenario marked by Brexit and China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), there is potential for greater engagement between India and Central Europe, not just in terms of trade but also in other areas like defence and technology sharing since Central European countries have the potential to contribute immensely towards India’s modernisation efforts. The inaugural session, which ended with a vote of thanks by Dr Sakti Prasad Srichandan, Assistant Professor at the Centre for European Studies, set the perfect tone for the webinar and was followed by the first working session on the theme Religion and Politics. The session was chaired by Dr Šarūnas Paunksnis, Associate Professor at the Kaunas University of Technology. The presenters addressed various issues related to religion, state and politics especially focusing on Poland. The final session of the first day pertained to Migration and the CEE and was chaired by Dr Srichandan. With a major focus area being Hungary, the presentations shared insights on identity politics, the securitization of migration and the refugee crisis. The second day commenced with the third working session on the theme India & Central and Eastern Europe: Strengthening Engagement, and was chaired by Dr Ankita Dutta, Research Fellow at the Indian Council of World Affairs, New Delhi. The presentations explored a plethora of topics ranging from new economic opportunities in light of the rising partnership between India and the Visegrád Group to understanding the dynamics of their relationship in the contemporary world and the contribution of Polish women in the cultural and public diplomacy of India-Poland relations. The next theme focused on Energy Security and the CEE which was chaired by Dr Amitabh Singh, Associate Professor at the Centre for Russian and Central Asian Studies, SIS JNU. It was marked by an exchange of thoughts and arguments on aspects related to energy and the prospects for the Visegrád Four. More specifically, the presentations shared research findings to understand the scope for diversification of energy and the challenges associated with it. Against the backdrop of the Ukrainian crisis, issues such as the impact of the war on energy security and related policies, the dependency on Russia for energy and the ‘Baltic Sea Pipeline’ project was also discussed. The theme for the fifth working session, Right Wing Populism and the CEE, was chaired by Prof. Bhaswati Sarkar. Within the current political circumstances of the Visegrád Four and the rise of populism and right-wing politics, the deliberations focused on the consequences of far-right ascendency in Hungary and Poland. Further, it also took into perspective the changing dynamics of the relationship between Hungary and Poland in the backdrop of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. A recurring theme throughout this session was the emphasis on analysing challenges faced by the existing democratic institutions in these countries and the possible repercussions associated with extremist politics. The final working session explored the theme CEE and the European Union and was chaired by Prof B. Krishnamurthy, former Professor at the Department of Politics and International Studies at Pondicherry University. This session assessed a diverse set of sub-themes which included understanding cyber security in wake of the Ukraine War, identity concerns within the broader European framework and the scope of integration of transition economies. The presentations at the Webinar were made by young researchers from diverse academic backgrounds who are at various stages of their careers. Every session was followed by lively discussions as well as Question-and-Answer rounds which were open to the attendees who hailed from different parts of India, with an overwhelming majority being Research Scholars and Post-graduate students from various institutions of higher education. The event was also attended on the first day by Dr Kristína Gondová of the Embassy of the Slovak Republic in New Delhi. The Webinar came to an end with Prof Bhaswati Sarkar’s concluding remarks where she expressed her sincere gratitude towards the participants and emphasised the need to carry forward the ideas and learnings from the six sessions to encourage further debates on the issues that presently dominate the European landscape. #Europe #EU #CEE #Hungary #Poland Debanjali Ghosh and Lyimee Saikia are Research Scholars at Centre for European Studies, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University.

By Aarshi Dua The theme of the Africa day celebration for 2022 is Nutrition, and the aim of AU is to strengthen the Agro-Food Systems, Health and Social Protection Systems to Accelerate Human, Social, and Economic Capital Development on the African Continent. Africa Day is commemorated every year on 25 May to honour the day Africa Union’s forerunner, the Organization of African Unity (OAU), which was founded on 25 May 1963. The OAU was transformed and remodelled into the African Union on 9 July 2002. The year 2022 signifies the 20th anniversary of the African Union. The theme of the Africa day celebration for 2022 is Nutrition, and the aim of AU is to strengthen the Agro-Food Systems, Health and Social Protection Systems to Accelerate Human, Social, and Economic Capital Development on the African Continent. Covid-19 has revealed African nations’ economic fragility and health and food system inadequacies. With COVID-19, many countries’ human capital gains over the last decade are in danger. In many African nations, keeping the virus at bay has meant sacrificing malnutrition reductions. Due to greater food insecurity concerns, waste will grow. Urgent action is required to protect the poor and vulnerable. Interventions targeting the most disadvantaged are required to invest in human capital. Continued efforts are needed, including advocacy in regions and communities where risks are greatest, strengthening social protection systems, and protecting access to good food and nutrition for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged groups like small children, pregnant and breastfeeding women, older people, and other at-risk groups. The 2022 Africa Day is aimed at generating awareness and consciousness for nutrition and health concerns in Africa. This is also emphasised in the long-term vision encapsulated by Agenda 2063. Where one emphasises the importance of nutrition for the “Africa We Want” with goals on “African people have a high standard of living, quality of life, sound health and wellbeing” and “citizens are healthy, well-nourished, and have a life expectancy of at least 75 years.” For this, preserving and developing high-quality agricultural techniques in Africa is necessary as agriculture is fundamental to Africa’s growth, which is vital to a future where Africa feeds itself and the world. In accord with the Africa Day of 2022, India and Africa have cooperated on food security in the recent decade. India has long-standing bilateral collaboration with various African countries via training programmes, institutional development, and soft loans in agricultural and related sectors to enhance farming practices irrigation, soil quality evaluation and improvement, and farm equipment. On the other hand, India’s trilateral collaborations to promote food security in Africa include India, Brazil, and South Africa (IBSA) Fund, USAID, and the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID)-funded Supporting India’s Trade Preference for Africa (SITA) program. Additionally, the Indian government has suggested the establishment of labs for the testing of foodstuffs in countries such as the Republic of the Congo, Zimbabwe, Gambia, Rwanda, and Nigeria, with International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) serving as the implementing agency. In Nigeria and Zimbabwe, the laboratories have already been established. India fosters private sector partnerships in Africa as well by adopting export-friendly policies. African initiatives to encourage FDI via financial and regulatory systems that simplify corporate procedures welcome this. Lastly, Indian NGOs like SEWA are devoted to sharing information and paradigms on female empowerment and self-reliance from rural India with their African counterparts. Across the last decade, the group has begun women-to-women collaborations in Africa. SEWA delivered their effective learning and experience-sharing technique with smallholder women farmers in Ghana. Currently, Ghanaian women have established a supply chain and export around 200 tonnes of shea butter to Japan. SEWA has been implementing exposure and conversation initiatives with Burkina Faso, Mali, Ghana, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and Kenyan women farmers. This is a source of foreign direct investment and capacity development for small-scale and local agricultural techniques. India is also supporting Africa’s agricultural agenda via bilateral and multilateral diplomatic efforts, including the India Africa Forum Summits (2008, 2011 and 2015) and high-level visits from India to Africa. The relationship between India and Africa extends beyond geopolitical and economic issues. This cooperation is set to achieve shared prosperity and food security for all. A robust agricultural sector is vital to attaining food security and reducing poverty in Africa and India. Thus, the 2022 Africa Day theme is to promote food security and strengthen the Agricultural system in Africa. The importance of health, nutrition and protection of at-risk communities is not only vital for Africa as a whole but also is a vital component of India- Africa Relations; therefore, it is a very relevant and must be implemented agenda in context of the contemporary health, agriculture and food crisis in Africa. #Africa #AfricanUnion #AfricaDay2022 Originally published: Financial Express, May 25, 2022 https://www.financialexpress.com/defence/africa-day-2022-the-20-year-celebration-of-the-african-union/2536905/ Posted in SIS Blog with the authorization of the author. Aarshi Dua is Doctoral Scholar, Centre for African Studies, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University.