Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s initiative fits in with the UN Secretary General’s call for “unprecedented personal, national and international action”

Prime Minister Modi’s initiative to organise a video-conference of Saarc leaders to develop together a roadmap to fight the challenge of Covid-19 shows once again his capacity to surprise. Just when India was seen as downgrading the Saarc platform for stronger regional cooperation and promoting Bimstec, he has jolted Saarc back into life a bit. Sensing the need of the situation, he has again asserted India’s leadership role in the region by inviting other Saarc leaders to join him in addressing collectively the mounting threat of coronavirus.Modi’s initiative had a delicate diplomatic aspect.

An initiative with the framework of Saarc could not exclude Pakistan without inviting criticism at home and abroad for allowing narrow bilateral political differences to over-ride collective humanitarian concerns in the face of a pandemic. Inviting Pakistan, however, risked speculation that India might have been looking for an opening to re-engage Pakistan, which the Covid-19 threat provided, prompting the pro-dialogue lobbies in India to push for resuming political contact with Pakistan.

One could well argue that the Covid-19 initiative was in the health context what the Kartarpur Corridor was in the religious context, which even saw two Indian ministers visit Pakistan without affecting India’s basic position that terrorism and dialogue cannot coexist. Modi’s initiative no doubt put Imran Khan in a spot. If he accepted it he would open himself to domestic criticism that after reviling Modi so brutally and taking an inflexible position on India’s recent decisions on Kashmir he was compromising, but if he rejected it, he would put himself in the false position internationally for rejecting an opportunity to engage with India, and that on a humanitarian issue that has implications for Pakistan’s own population. As one expected, he has fielded a health official to participate in the conference.

Its political dimension aside, Modi’s move is pragmatic. India has an open border with Nepal, visa-free arrangements with Bhutan, considerable movement across the India-Bangladesh border, easy movement between India and its southern Saarc neighbours like Sri Lanka and Maldives, as well as some traffic with Afghanistan. With Pakistan there is virtually no contact at present. Although the cases of coronavirus are very few in Saarc countries, for India to take the lead in devising cooperative strategies at this stage itself to contain the spread of the virus was essential. The Saarc countries can take steps of the kind India has taken externally and internally to contain the entry of the virus in Saarc territory, with exchange of information, avoidance of unilateral steps, and close cooperation at the level of health authorities.

Modi’s initiative fits in with UN Secretary General’s belated call for “unprecedented personal, national and international action” to control the pandemic. He was quiet when China inflicted this virus on the world and has reacted when the virus has got transmitted to Europe and the US.

The WHO could be accused of playing down the coronavirus threat under presumed Chinese pressure, not categorising it as a pandemic until the focus shifted away from China to Europe as its epicentre. China’s role in unleashing two pandemics in a generation needs highlighting. Pressure must be put on China for making its political system more transparent and ending some unhealthy habits of its society, given the country’s massive role today in the international system. We now have the WHO’s Ethiopian Director General lauding, ironically, the experience of China — the source of the pandemic — as an example of countries which have successfully prevented infections and saved lives through aggressive testing, contact tracing, social distancing and community mobilisation.

Courtesy: The Economic Times
Prime Minister Modi’s initiative to organise a video-conference of Saarc leaders to develop together a roadmap to fight the challenge of Covid-19 shows once again his capacity to surprise. Just when India was seen as downgrading the Saarc platform for stronger regional cooperation and promoting Bimstec, he has jolted Saarc back into life a bit. Sensing the need of the situation, he has again asserted India’s leadership role in the region by inviting other Saarc leaders to join him in addressing collectively the mounting threat of coronavirus.Modi’s initiative had a delicate diplomatic aspect.

An initiative with the framework of Saarc could not exclude Pakistan without inviting criticism at home and abroad for allowing narrow bilateral political differences to over-ride collective humanitarian concerns in the face of a pandemic. Inviting Pakistan, however, risked speculation that India might have been looking for an opening to re-engage Pakistan, which the Covid-19 threat provided, prompting the pro-dialogue lobbies in India to push for resuming political contact with Pakistan.

One could well argue that the Covid-19 initiative was in the health context what the Kartarpur Corridor was in the religious context, which even saw two Indian ministers visit Pakistan without affecting India’s basic position that terrorism and dialogue cannot coexist. Modi’s initiative no doubt put Imran Khan in a spot. If he accepted it he would open himself to domestic criticism that after reviling Modi so brutally and taking an inflexible position on India’s recent decisions on Kashmir he was compromising, but if he rejected it, he would put himself in the false position internationally for rejecting an opportunity to engage with India, and that on a humanitarian issue that has implications for Pakistan’s own population. As one expected, he has fielded a health official to participate in the conference.

Its political dimension aside, Modi’s move is pragmatic. India has an open border with Nepal, visa-free arrangements with Bhutan, considerable movement across the India-Bangladesh border, easy movement between India and its southern Saarc neighbours like Sri Lanka and Maldives, as well as some traffic with Afghanistan. With Pakistan there is virtually no contact at present. Although the cases of coronavirus are very few in Saarc countries, for India to take the lead in devising cooperative strategies at this stage itself to contain the spread of the virus was essential. The Saarc countries can take steps of the kind India has taken externally and internally to contain the entry of the virus in Saarc territory, with exchange of information, avoidance of unilateral steps, and close cooperation at the level of health authorities.

Modi’s initiative fits in with UN Secretary General’s belated call for “unprecedented personal, national and international action” to control the pandemic. He was quiet when China inflicted this virus on the world and has reacted when the virus has got transmitted to Europe and the US.

The WHO could be accused of playing down the coronavirus threat under presumed Chinese pressure, not categorising it as a pandemic until the focus shifted away from China to Europe as its epicentre. China’s role in unleashing two pandemics in a generation needs highlighting. Pressure must be put on China for making its political system more transparent and ending some unhealthy habits of its society, given the country’s massive role today in the international system. We now have the WHO’s Ethiopian Director General lauding, ironically, the experience of China — the source of the pandemic — as an example of countries which have successfully prevented infections and saved lives through aggressive testing, contact tracing, social distancing and community mobilisation.

Courtesy: The Economic Times