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As the Chinese Defence Minister, General Li Shangfu, visited New Delhi last week for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Defence Ministers’ Meeting, his host, India’s Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, had a clear message for him and Beijing: that the violation of existing agreements by China had “eroded the entire basis of bilateral relations.
Their 45 minute-long bilateral talks last week were significant on two levels: General Li’s was the first high-level military level from China since the start of the Line of Actual Control (LAC) crisis in April 2020, and Rajnath Singh’s comments marked a high-level intervention in conveying India’s stand on the relationship.
It isn’t only on the land borders where New Delhi is feeling the heat from Beijing. Last week, Navy Chief Admiral R. Hari Kumar expressed concerns on Chinese research vessels operating freely in international waters with the ability to track and collect electronic signals. The Yuan Wang series of the PLA Navy’s research vessels have, recently, made trips into the Indian Ocean purportedly on “scientific” grounds but not-so-coincidentally often timed with significant tests being carried out by India. “We are keeping a very close watch in the Indian Ocean Region... Our effort is to know who is present and what are they up to on a 24x7 basis,” the Navy chief said.
The Hindu, in an editorial today, observed that the new normal along the LAC, with large deployments in close proximity as well as an on-going race to build more forward infrastructure, appears here to stay, leaving the borders in what the Indian Army Chief has described as a “stable but unpredictable” state. Regardless of Beijing’s wishes to downplay the seriousness of the border situation and relegate it to an “appropriate” position, the editorial said, managing the LAC should certainly remain the priority for both sides to prevent the recurrence of the clashes of 2020. India and China cannot restore normalcy in relations under the shadow of lingering unpredictability on the borders.
Inside ‘Operation Kaveri’
First batch of stranded Indians onboard INS Sumedha as they leave Sudan under Operation Kaveri, in Port Sudan. | Photo Credit: ANI
Sudan’s Army and its rival paramilitary said on April 30 they will extend a humanitarian cease-fire by 72 hours. The decision followed international pressure to allow the safe passage of civilians. The conflict erupted on April 15 between the nation’s army and its paramilitary force.
India last week stepped up evacuating its citizens. The first group flew back on Wednesday evening when a civilian Saudia aircraft was used to fly 360 Indians to Delhi from Jeddah, where they were taken to from Port Sudan. An Indian Air Force aircraft, the following day, brought 246 Indians to Mumbai. On Friday, a further 754 citizens came home, with 362 passengers reaching Bengaluru and the rest arriving in New Delhi on board a C-17 heavy-lift aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF).
The Top Five
What we are reading this week - the best of The Hindu’s Opinion and Analysis
People pass by damaged cars and buildings at the central market during clashes between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and the army in Khartoum North, Sudan. | Photo Credit: Reuters
1. In this week’s World View, Suhasini Haidar examined the Sudan conflict, India’s evacuation, and the fallout for India and the world. You can watch or read World View here.
2. Also on Sudan, Stanly Johny on the rise of Mohamed Hamdan ‘Hemedti’ Dagolo. A warlord from a nomadic Arab community in Sudan’s restive Darfur, the paramilitary commander, who seized the vacuum left by the fall of Omar Bashir to engineer his own rise, is now challenging the armed forces and pushing the country into the brink of another civil war.
3. Stanly Johny reports from Tashkent on Uzbekistan’s third referendum since independence in 1991, which will ask voters if they support rewriting the Constitution. The new draft, which would rewrite over 60% of the current charter, promises more freedoms, better social protection, gender equality, and abolition of death penalty, among others. However, critics say the Constitution would extend President Mirziyoyev’s rule by at least 14 more years.
4. Narayan Lakshman on why Fox News fired Tucker Carlson, the high-profile U.S. television host, following the settlement of a case brought by Dominion Voting Systems, which alleged that the Rupert Murdoch-owned media house maligned its reputation by putting out unfounded claims about the 2020 U.S. presidential election.
5. As Western critics point to the wide variance between India’s desire to be a moral teacher and the cold pursuit of its interests in not condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Vivek Katju writes that what India can be justly proud of is the continuity of spiritual traditions and the absence of dogma in them. It will be sad, he argues, if dogmatic assertions are now made regarding these traditions.
