Pallavi Aiyar
Even as China has become a “model” that India’s political and business classes look to emulate whether it comes to special economic zones or urban planning, the Chinese until recently were usually too busy matching themselves against the Americans to pay their southern neighbor much attention. But as Chinese President Hu Jintao gets ready to make his first official visit to India next Monday, India-watchers in China argue that a major shift in Beijing’s assessment of its southern neighbor is ongoing.
Professor Ma Jiali, a veteran South Asia expert at the China Institute of Contemporary International Relations (CICIR), says India’s recent economic performance combined with its growing importance in international affairs has led to a rethink in Beijing of India as zhong he guoli, a Mandarin term that translates roughly as a “comprehensive national power”.
For Beijing, relations with India are now considered the highest priority, according to Professor Ma, given that India is what he calls a “four-in-one” country. “India falls into each of the four major categories of countries that China wants to focus its diplomatic energies on,” he explained. The four categories are: Developing countries, neighboring countries, rising powers, and influential actors on the international stage.
Rong Ying of the China Institute for International Relations, a government-think tank in Beijing, added: “China realizes that its ties with India will be key to ensuring stability in Asia and that given its checkered history, this relationship requires personal care at the highest level.” According to Rong, the proof for his observation lies in the fact that Hu Jintao is the second top leader to visit India in a year and a half, Premier Wen Jiabao having made the trip last year.
Hu’s visit to India will be the first by a Chinese president in a decade, but expectations regarding outcomes are somewhat muted in Beijing. Most analysts here say that the visit will help to keep the momentum of improving ties going, but that no major breakthrough should be expected.
“I don’t think that any huge announcement on our outstanding problems like the border will be made,” said Hu Shisheng, the director of the South Asia department at CICIR. “But in many ways this shows that our bilateral ties have now become more mature and normal. It’s only when a relationship is immature that breakthroughs are expected from every high-level visit.”
Professor Hu said the Chinese president’s visit will focus on improving relations on the economic front. New trade targets are likely to be set, as is an agreement to protect mutual investments. This latter agreement is particularly significant in the context of recent moves in India to restrict Chinese investments in certain sectors, such as telecoms and port development, on security grounds.
On the unresolved boundary issue, analysts in Beijing are uniformly cautious. “The general principle of ‘give and take’ is the guiding one when it comes to the boundary,” said Rong Ying, referring to the political parameters and guiding principles for the settlement of the boundary dispute that were agreed on during Wen’s India visit last year.
The idea of a territorial “swap” exchanging Aksai Chin in the west with Arunachal Pradesh in the east as the basis for a boundary settlement is the one thought to be the most viable. India, however, has ruled out any “populated areas” as part of a border deal, which makes concessions in Arunachal Pradesh unacceptable. The area of Tawang is a particular sticking point, since the Chinese claim it to be a part of Tibet, pointing to the fact that the sixth Dalai Lama was born there.
The entrenched positions of the two sides thus make the idea of a “swap” enormously complicated. However, few new ideas on resolving the dispute seem to have evolved.
“I think the point to keep in mind is that while the border is an important issue in bilateral ties, it is no longer the only issue,” said Rong. “The negative impact of this problem exerts much less influence on our relationship that it once did because both sides have agreed to live with it while seeking a political solution.”
Professor Ma believes that both sides will express a “more active stance to speed up negotiations” on the border during President Hu’s visit, but others say that given the seemingly intractable nature of the issue, the leadership is keen on putting border talks on the back burner, to be resolved by the next generation of leaders.
If this is indeed the case, full normalization of Sino-Indian ties remains impossible. Even progress on the economic front will eventually run up against the limits imposed by the unresolved boundary dispute. The controversy over restrictions on Chinese investments is one example.
Professor Hu agrees that until the border is clearly demarcated, a true “strategic partnership” between New Delhi and Beijing will remain wanting, but like the other analysts he is unable to suggest a way to break the deadlock.
Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Cui Tiankui recently said that active progress on the boundary settlement is taking place and that a framework agreement is now being explored. But given the closed-door nature of the negotiations, little information is available on the details of what if any progress has taken place.
Rong said hope should be drawn from the fact that the recent rounds of talks have been taking place in a friendly and relaxed atmosphere, in marked contrast to more strained discussions in the past.
“There are signs of slow progress on the border,” concurred Hu. However, he said that rather than dwelling on the boundary, the two countries should spend more energy focusing on economic relations and regional issues aimed at maintaining stability and promoting the development of their shared neighborhood.
But with New Delhi concerned about Beijing’s “all weather” relationship with Pakistan and China discomfited by India’s growing closeness to the United States and Japan, there are several regional issues that remain contentious as well.
President Hu will visit Pakistan directly after his India trip, and it is expected that while in Islamabad he will ink a wide-ranging energy deal that would assure Chinese assistance to Pakistan’s nuclear-power ambitions. New Delhi is understandably watchful.
Professor Hu claimed that India “places too much emphasis” on China’s relationship with Pakistan, a relationship he said is no longer that of a “military ally” but a “normal one in a post-Cold War scenario”.
Added Professor Ma, “Beijing has de-linked its relationship with India and Pakistan. We are friends of both but, whereas we are upgrading our ties with India, our ties with Pakistan remain the same as always. There is no upgradation of the relationship with Pakistan.”
According to Rong, China’s close ties to Pakistan are not directed toward India but toward ensuring the security of China’s western borders. There are, in fact, a range of explanations offered by Chinese analysts concerning Beijing’s military and nuclear relationship with Islamabad, but to New Delhi these are cold comforts.
What is increasingly clear is that in many respects India and China face similar foreign-policy challenges. It is the stated objective of both countries to maintain an independent foreign policy with regards to specific nations on the basis of their national interests - in other words, to build trust and create healthy bilateral ties with countries that might themselves hold reservations about each other. Thus China wants to develop a strategic relationship with India even as it continues its close friendship with Pakistan. India, in its turn, must balance its relationships with China, Japan and the US.
Just as it is difficult for New Delhi to accept China’s close ties with Islamabad, in Beijing too there are widespread fears that India’s civilian-nuclear-energy deal with the United States is a ruse for the US to ally itself with India in a bid to contain China. As a result, Beijing has been lukewarm in its reception of the deal and is reportedly working against its acceptance at the Nuclear Suppliers Group in Vienna.
A consequence of all these factors is that despite the ostensible “strategic partnership” India and China established last year, a serious trust deficit between the neighbors remains. “The strategic partnership we have is less a reality and more an orientation,” concluded Rong.
In this context, the task of greatly strengthening Sino-Indian ties will require painstaking work, changing ossified mindsets and balancing a complex set of factors. It will also take courage and political vision on both sides. President Hu’s visit is just one more step on a long road.
