Monthly Archives: August 2018

U-TURN Beijing mutes opposition a day after saying India’s application not on Seoul agenda; US reinforces support

BEIJING: Hours after Washington reiterated its support for New Delhi’s bid to join the Nuclear Suppliers Group, China toned down on Tuesday its opposition to India’s admission to the elite club, saying members were open to discussing the inclusion of countries that are still to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), a nuclear arms control pact.

The position adopted by China marked a shift from its assertion on Monday that India’s application to join the 48-nation NSG was not on the agenda of the organisation’s plenary in Seoul on June 23-24.

“The door is still open within the NSG for non-NPT members to join,” foreign ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said. “There is always room for discussion.”

“We did not target any country, India or Pakistan. We only care about the non-proliferation treaty,” she said, suggesting that the topic of including non-NPT countries in the NSG could “probably” come up during the plenary.

China, which is perceived to be acting at the behest of its “all weather ally” Pakistan, has blocked India’s bid by linking it to the NPT. Neither India nor Pakistan has signed the NPT. Days after India applied, Pakistan responded with a bid of its own to join the NSG. Indian sources said they were making every effort to get into the club, making realistic assessments of hurdles and devising means to overcome them.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi too will take up the issue with Chinese President Xi Jingping on the sidelines of the SCO summit in Tashkent on June 23.

As the Americans and the Japanese continued to work the phone lines to drum up support for India, reports suggested foreign secretary S Jaishankar is likely to travel to Seoul to marshal Indian efforts to get membership of the NSG. But the sources admitted that while China remained the biggest challenge, there were some other countries, including Austria and Ireland, which have reservations about a non-NPT member being admitted to the exclusive club.

“We are working the phone lines, convincing members about our impeccable non-proliferation credentials and remain hopeful of becoming a member of the NSG. Of course, such negotiations go down to the wire,” a source said. The NSG functions by consensus and opposition from even one member will mean that India will not be able to gain entry. The NPT is the “cornerstone” of the NSG and the nonproliferation regime, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Hua said. “The NSG members should focus on whether the criteria (of admitting new members) should be changed,” she said, underlining fears that such a move could have implications for the Iran nuclear deal and the situation in North Korea.

The US, she said, was the country which made the rule that non-NPT countries should not be allowed to join the NSG.

But on Monday, the US again called on NSG members to back India’s application in Seoul. “We believe, and this has been US policy for some time, that India is ready for membership and the US calls on participating governments to support India’s application,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.

India enjoys most of the benefits of membership under a 2008 exemption to NSG rules granted to support its nuclear cooperation deal with Washington.

Other than China, no other nation is openly backing Pakistan because of its track record. The father of its nuclear weapons programme ran an illicit network for years that sold nuclear secrets to countries, including North Korea and Iran.

An op-ed in the Chinese state-run Global Times tried to downplay Islamabad’s role in the proliferation of nuclear secrets. “Actually, the proliferation carried out by Pakistan was done by Abdul Qadeer Khan, Pakistan’s chief nuclear scientist, and was not an official policy of the Pakistani government,” it said.

Hands-on: The pro-American swing has confirmed that India needs the US.

PRIME Minister Narendra Modi’s last visit to the United States during the presidency of Mr Barack Obama was notable on many counts. But its most significant aspect was that never before, except for an anguished plea in the 1962 conflict with China, has New Delhi proclaimed its wish for a defence relationship with Washington in such clear terms.The age of non-alignment was dead and gone long before Mr Modi assumed office, but for the first time India has made it clear that she was militarily aligned with the US to safeguard her national interests. Membership of the Nuclear Suppliers Group remains on the wish list but the most symbolic act of the Prime Minister was the laying of a wreath at Arlington cemetery for the American war dead in the many wars they fought.Besides, Mr Modi scored a personal triumph in addressing the joint session of the US Congress, an organisation that had denied him a visa for nearly a decade following the pogrom in Gujarat during his chief ministership. There was a parallel Congressional hearing on India’s human rights record during the Prime Minister’s visit, but it was clear that the US establishment was willing to look the other way — as it had done with so many of its partners earlier — in view of its stakes in enlisting India for larger geopolitical purposes.The motive for India’s swing towards the US is determined by similar reasons. In view of China’s assertive regional policy, particularly by using Pakistan as a cat’s paw, New Delhi has felt it had no option but to rely on the US, still the most powerful nation in the world, to balance Beijing’s growing power.For a change, Mr Modi was forced to praise the Congress government for the landmark nuclear deal Dr Manmohan Singh had signed. The first fruit of this deal was in the agreement by Westinghouse to install nuclear plants in India, although all the loose ends will be tied only in a year from now. On the environment, India has resisted setting out a precise framework in line with the Paris consensus,  although Mr Modi has an ambitious plan for renewable energy.India obviously hopes, also by signing the agreement on the mutual use of military bases, that given the range of understandings, she will receive dual-use military equipment and advanced weaponry which could also help in Mr Modi’s ‘Make in India’ credo. What the Washington establishment has welcomed most of all is the Prime Minister’s acknowledgement of the new nature of the relationship with Washington without the inhibitions of the Congress leadership in publishing it. Mr Modi’s preference is to call a spade a spade.One of the Prime Minister’s aims during his visit was to woo the business community to invest in India although he seems to have drawn red lines as far as labour and land reforms are concerned. His sales pitch was India was the fastest growing major economy at a time China’s growth has stalled after piling his usual insults on the preceding Congress governments. He has promised to continue to improve ease of doing business and introduce other reforms.The themes of Mr Modi’s address to the US Congress were balanced between extolling the familiar credo of shared democratic values mixed with using India’s growth engine for the good of America and the world and a thrust for tackling the evil of terrorism in the tough neighbourhood (an oblique criticism of Pakistan). In short, there were no real surprises, although he was wise to talk in his trademark Indian English with a sing-song intonation, rather than resort to Hindi, in seeking to bond with American legislators.In sum, Mr Modi can regard his American visit a success, although the future of Indo-US relations will be determined in part by a future President in a particularly contentious domestic environment with an acute public dissatisfaction among the middle class and poor whites on stagnant wages and on unemployment levels, which has given rise to the phenomenon of Donald Trump. Mercifully, Democrat and Republican legislators desire good relations with India.Given the decisive pro-US swing in India’s worldview, the Prime Minister will have to flesh out the consequences of this pronounced change. Sino-Indian relations will not be much affected because unlike Indians’ propensity to sentimentality, Beijing follows a cynical foreign policy determined by its national interests. Apart from the string of border disputes, which lie frozen, China is an important economic partner and Mr Modi’s effort has been to encourage major Chinese investment in India.India’s dilemmas are many. Despite Mr Modi’s initial efforts to befriend neighbours, Pakistan remains hostile, Nepal has its domestic compulsions in its attitude to New Delhi. True, relations with Bangladesh are better than they have been in a long time and exchanges with Sri Lanka have improved with the change in the island’s presidency. Essentially, New Delhi will have to live among difficult neighbours even as it strikes out to engage countries farther in geographical terms.Mr Modi has also to contend with domestic problems despite his joy in travelling around the world with a copious wardrobe of Nehru jackets in striking colours with colourful multicolour handkerchiefs peeping out of the breast pocket. His monogrammed suit with his name woven into the stripes was auctioned.With the government’s mentor, the RSS, laying down the ideological line for the ruling BJP, Mr Modi’s autonomy in decision-making is restricted. And the Sangh Parivar’s anti-Muslim obsession, with the Bajrang Dal recently enforcing an unofficial ban on cow transport in Uttar Pradesh, the Union Government’s problems will grow.American legislators have already pointed to the insecurity Muslims and Christians feel with the advent of the Modi dispensation. But the danger is in the spillover effect of the anti-minority bias of the Sangh Parivar on relations with important Muslim countries Mr Modi has visited in recent times.However, Mr Modi can gain some satisfaction from his American excursion in setting a new paradigm in Indo-US relations. 

1. The move will benefit an estimated 10 million government employees including nearly 60 lakh pensioners, starting from January 1, 2016. Among the defence services, 14 lakh serving officers and 18 lakh retired members will be covered.
2. Arrears will be paid within this year, said Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.
3. The last major hike in 2008 saw an average raise of nearly 50 percent. The auto and retail sectors gained in the stock market after today’s announcement.
4. The increments – considerably smaller than past increases-  will cost the government about one lakh crores or 15 billion dollars every year.
5. While this cost is a whopping 0.7 percent of India’s GDP, the hike is the lowest in the last seven decades.
6. The new allowances and hikes were cleared by the cabinet today and are based on the recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission – a government committee which reviews the pay of government employees nearly every decade.
7. Government workers also have been getting half-yearly and annual increments linked to prices. The new rules do away with 52 allowances and merge 36 others.
8. Under the new scheme, the maximum salary for a government servant will be about 2.5 lakhs a month, that’s more than double the top-rung pay of Rs. 90,000 a month.
9. The least a government officer can now be paid is  Rs. 18,000 a month, more than double the current compensation of Rs. 7,000 offered to the most  junior employees.
10. The government is counting on the higher salaries to result in more consumer spending which could trigger economic growth.However, some experts believe that the additional cash in the market could fuel inflation. To keep a check on price rise driven by greater liquidity in the market, the government plans to keep a close eye on the market

Dehradun, June 26

Brig KG Behl (retd), president of the Ex-servicemen League, in a statement has stated that in spite of promises made by the Uttarakhand government to reduce excise duty on liquor, nothing has been done so far. He said the state government should take a decision as ex-servicemen were feeling frustrated over this issue.Brig Behl said the government kept the rates of liquor same in civil by reducing VAT by 20 per cent on liquor but increased excise duty to get more revenue on the plea that it was being done to make liquor cheap in the state to check its smuggling from adjoining states. In the process, the rates of liquor in the CSD became 20 per cent costlier due to the introduction of 20 per cent excise duty.In revised excise duty in 2014, the government further reduced VAT by another 10 per cent in civil and increased excise duty instead, raising the rates of liquor in the CSD by another 10 per cent.—TNS

New Delhi: The Indian Ex-Servicemen Movement has moved the Supreme Court seeking implementation of one rank, one pension (OROP) as recommended by the Bhagat Singh Hoshyari committee without any dilution. The movement said the UPA-II government at the Centre headed by Manmohan Singh had assured Parliament on February 17, 2014, that OROP would be implemented. The BJP-led government had endorsed OROP on July 10, 2014, but diluted the recommendations of the Hoshyari committee in the final announcement made on December 14, 2015, the ex-servicemen based in Gurugram said. TNS

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj addresses a press briefing in New Delhi on June 19, 2016. PTI photo

New Delhi, June 19

India announced on Sunday it would not oppose any other country’s entry into the elite Nuclear Supplier’s Group, a clear indication to Pakistan’s bid to join the group.

”India won’t protest entry of any nation in NSG but would want application be considered on merit,” External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said at a news briefing held to mark the NDA government’s two years in power.

She also claimed that “China is not opposed to India’s entry, but insists on criteria”.

“China is not opposing membership of India in NSG, it is only talking of criteria and procedure. I am hopeful that we would be able to convince China as well to support our entry to the NSG,” she told a press conference here while highlighting her ministry’s achievements in the last two years.

“I think that there is a consensus which is being made and I am sure that India will become the member of the NSG this year,” she said, adding, “The NSG entry is crucial for India’s energy policy.”

“I am perosnally in touch with 23 nations. Although 1– 2 have voiced concerns, I think there is consensus.”

She also said India was trying to make sure that it could be part of the group by the end of the year.

Although most countries in the 48-member Nuclear Supplier’s Group — prominent among them the US — have agreed to India’s entry, some — among them China, New Zealand, Austria, Turkey and South Africa — have objected to allowing non-signatories of the Non-Proliferation Treaty from entering the group.

Pakistan has also opposed India’s entry arguing that the two nations must be treated equally.

Earlier this week, China’s official media said India’s NSG membership would “jeopardise” China’s national interests besides touching a “raw nerve” in Pakistan. The Chinese Foreign Ministry had said a week back that members of the NSG “remain divided” on the issue of non-NPT countries joining it and called for “full discussions”.
‘Peace in SCS’

She also said India wanted a peaceful settlement of the territorial dispute in the South China Sea.

Although China claims most of the key waterways that is passage to trade worth a total of $5 trillion annually, Philippines, Brunei, Taiwan, Malaysia and Vietnam have opposing claims, leading to frequent military and diplomatic standoffs.

‘Terror and talks can’t go together’

Swaraj said India and Pakistan relations were complicated due to “cross-border terrorism”, even while she claimed there was a “sehejta” (simplicity) in the chemistry involving Prime Ministers Narendra Modi of India and Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan.

“This warmth and simplicity in relations between two Prime Ministers were never there in the past,” she said.

While pursuing with the commitment for friendship, the government won’t compromise on issues of national security. India, she said, remained firm in its resolve that talks and terrorism cannot go together.

“We are awaiting solid action from Pakistan’s side on Pathankot attack. Pakistan has not rejected the proposal for NIA visit, has sought some more time,” Swaraj said.

“We have difficult issues to resolve with Pakistan. There is ease and warmth in the relations between the two countries at present,” Swaraj.

The minister denied that South Asia was not getting adequate priority in the Modi government’s foreign policy.

“In the last two years, India has emerged as a strong supporter and a friend in crisis to neighbouring countries,” she said, referring to New Delhi’s help to Nepal during the massive earthquake of 2015.

‘12 Indian sailors freed’

Twelve Indian sailors, who were in jail in Italy since June 2014 on allegations of possessing drugs, have been freed, Swaraj said.

“I appreciate Indian Embassy in Rome for the release of 12 Indian sailors on board MV ‘Aberdeen’ who were in jail in Italy since June 2014,” Swaraj said.

The Indian sailors had been arrested from aboard a ship seized by Italian police in June 2014, and were accused of possessing a huge quantity of drugs.

On the issue of threats to Hindus in Bangladesh, she said the Sheikh Hasina govermment had been taking adequate steps and had so far arrested as many as 3,000 suspects.

“More than that, I feel happy to say that even Islamic leaders in Bangladesh have condemned such threats to Hindus in that country,” she said.

India’s relationship with its western neighbour has remained strained despite repeated tries, with the latest round of peace talks between the two nations being halted after a militant attack on an air base of the Indian Air Force in Pathankot in January.

India frequently accuses Pakistan of not doing enough to contain terrorist organisations on its soil. —  Agencies

United Ex-Servicemen Front election incharge Capt CS Sidhu (C) with the kin of PoWs languishing in Pakistani jails, in Amritsar on Monday. photo: vishal kumar

GS Paul

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, June 13

The United Ex-servicemen Front is mulling to move the Supreme Court against the Centre’s lenient attitude in bringing back the 1965 and 1971 prisoners of war (PoWs) rotting in various Pakistani jails.The outfit claimed to have traced the antecedents of a few of the PoWs by establishing contact with their kin, who urged them to pursue the matter with the International Court of Justice (ICJ).They said that as many as 54 defence personnel are languishing in Pakistani jails since December 1971. Out of these 27 were from the Army, 24 from the Air Force, two from the Navy and one from the BSF. The organizations state incharge Capt CS Sidhu (retd) said that they would soon meet Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh to know why the government was hesitant to file a case with the ICJ.Sidhu said that the government cannot save its skin by submitting in the SC that the salary and retirement benefits had been given to the dependents of the POWs.“The Centre had obtained a stay on the SC order of approaching the ICJ stating constraints due to a bilateral agreement with Pakistan based on the 1972 Shimla Agreement.“The government’s prosecutor also submitted that all dues are being forwarded to the next of kin of imprisoned soldiers, but we question them that when it was known and admitted on the floor of the Parliament that 54 personnel were missing, why monetary benefits are being given to the kin of only 29 PoWs,” he said.Col Nishan Singh Randhawa (retd) questioned that when India can release 92,000 Pakistani soldiers in the light of Shimla Agreement then why can’t we force them to release our soldiers through the ICJ?He said the front would hold candle march in various districts and in Amritsar on June 17. “We also plan to hold a protest at the Wagah border in July. We will not let Delhi-Lahore bus or the Samjhauta Express run to lodge our protest against the government’s callous attitude,” he said.http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/punjab/ex-servicemen-to-move-sc-on-pows-in-pak/251456.html

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June10

The Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Sunil Lanba, visited Headquarters Western Command, Chandimandir, today. On his arrival, he was received by Maj Gen AK Sanyal. Later, he was briefed on the operational preparedness of the Western Army and issues of mutual interest were discussed.The Navy Chief also interacted informally with the officers posted at the Command Headquarters. Later, he proceeded to the Air Force Station, Chandigarh, from where he was seen off by the Army and Air Force officials.