K.C. Singh | Need transparency, caution in Sino-India ties, LAC deal
The 16th Brics summit was held in the Russian city of Kazan on October 22-24. A 134-paragraph Kazan Declaration covers interminably the three specified pillars of the group -- political and security; economic and financial; and culture and people-to-people. Those attending consisted of the original five member nations -- host Russia, Brazil, India, South Africa and China -- whose initials provide the name. Also present for the first time were Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates, newly admitted. But of the overall 38 invited nations, 32 attended, including 22 heads of government or state. Russia was demonstrating that it was hardly isolated after two years of the Ukraine war and the Western sanctions.
India had two important aspects -- Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s address at the plenary session and his bilateral meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, besides some other bilateral meetings. As the membership of Brics expands and its agenda widens, India, Brazil and South Africa are trying to keep it from becoming a vehicle for Russian, Chinese and Iranian anti-US and anti-Western sentiments. Thus, Mr Modi’s address focused on development themes. These included the role of the New Development Bank, headquartered in Shanghai, the Brics Business Council, e-commerce and the Brics Start-up Forum, partnership with UNIDO for Industry 4.0, the 2022 Brics vaccine plan, etc. India also offered to share its experience in developing digital public infrastructure, especially in the health sector. Climate change, green energy and the International Solar Alliance were the other standard themes that India advocates at such groupings. Finally, the Prime Minister turned to financial integration. He mentioned India’s Unified Payment Interface (UPI), which even the UAE has adopted for simplified cross-border payments. He also mentioned local currency trade amongst Brics members. A more ambitious China-Russia proposal for a non-dollar trading currency is still not moving forward. Mr Modi also sought trade facilitation in agriculture, resilience of supply chains and the increased role of special economic zones.
Among the non-members attending the summit was Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Being a Nato member, his presence was a win for the Russian hosts. But notably, though invited, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman was concurrently receiving US secretary of state Antony Blinken to discuss “common efforts to end the conflicts in the region and establish greater peace and security”. The Kazan Declaration devotes much space to the conflict in West Asia, by comparison dismissing the Ukraine war as an issue on which members have national positions articulated in various forums. This shows the weakness of a group with multiple internal differences either amongst members bilaterally or as regards their relations with the United States. Moreover, the summit was being held when Iran awaits, as confirmed by a US intelligence leak, the likely aerial retaliation by Israel to Iran’s earlier ballistic missiles barrage. The same dilemma is reflected in Indian balancing in the emerging bipolar contestation or even friction between blocs led by the US on the one hand and China-Russia on the other.
The interest in India was naturally greatest in the one-on-one encounter between Prime Minister Modi and President Xi Jinping after a five-year gap. The 2020 summer military onslaught by China in eastern Ladakh, starting with the Galwan Valley skirmish, had kept relations unhinged. After 17 rounds of diplomatic meetings and 21 rounds of military-to-military talks, news had come, on the eve of the Brics meet, of a breakthrough in resolving the Chinese intrusions and obstruction of Indian patrolling in certain sectors along the Line of Actual Control (LAC). The question that naturally arises is why China has now
moderated its recalcitrance?
There could be multiple reasons. Firstly, the Chinese economy faces challenges which cannot be remedied without serious structural reform. It needs to modify its economic model depending on growth from housing investment, exports and big infrastructure. According to the Wall Street Journal, currently 90 million housing units stand unsold. Chinese households have invested 80 per cent of their savings in that sector. Meanwhile, industrial profits are down by 17.8 per cent. Youth unemployment is up consequently. China can hardly afford to see its Indian market constricted when higher tariffs by Western nations, and the fear of a second Donald Trump term, are looming. Thus, China may have chosen detente with India for now.
Secondly, Russia would have also argued that to negate US designs India needs to be with them, even if one Indian leg is in the American camp. In fact, India and China have concurring views on many issues like climate change amelioration and the reform of international institutions covering global finance and trade. However, when dealing with China, clarity is required to distinguish their tactical outreach from their strategic desire to dominate Asia and rival the United States globally. As the Chinese leader Zhou Enlai once famously remarked, that it was too soon to estimate the impact of the French Revolution, China never loses its long-term strategic perspective.
The devil indeed may lie in the details of the LAC deal, to work out which special representatives Ajit Doval and Wang Yi have been tasked. Since 2020, China has bolstered its infrastructure in many sectors of the LAC, especially in the Depsang Plains, Pangong Lake and Demchok. When the status quo ante is mentioned as the Indian objective, the Indian government needs to be transparent in revealing details of the deal when it is finalised.
Investment banker Jim O’Neill envisioned a key role for four emerging economies in 2001, which became the founder-members of Bric. South Africa was added in 2009. He wrote recently that now “the grouping serves no real purpose beyond generating symbolic gestures and lofty rhetoric”. He noted the unwillingness of Argentina and Saudi Arabia to join it. He advises that only groups like the G-20, which includes the G-7 and the original Bric members, can address issues of global governance.
Nothing underscores Jim O’Neil’s argument more than multiple paragraphs in the long Kazan Declaration on human rights and democracy. With the exception of India, Brazil and South Africa, the other six members are hardly votaries of those values and principles. The larger Brics-Plus gets, the more it will emulate past groupings like the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which lost relevance once the Cold War ended and their agenda became unfocused. India, alongside Brazil and South Africa, will meanwhile have to work overtime to keep Brics-Plus from that fate.