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Sinha: all bilateral ties independent
Rajeev Sharma
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, July 20
External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha has made it clear that India does not look at its relationship with any country, including the USA, through the prism of other bilateral relationships.

“Each country must conduct its relationship with another independent of its relationship with other countries. We are doing the same. We have the best of the relationship with the Arab world. We also have a cordial relationship with Israel”, Mr Sinha said in an interview to The Tribune.

Responding to a question about Indo-US relations considering that Washington continued to treat Islamabad as a valuable ally against terror, the minister said: “It is like a child saying that you are my friend, so you will not be his friend. That is not the sign of a mature relationships. In other bilateral relationship nothing should be done which can affect adversely our relationship. If that happens, we will take it up with that country”.

He reckoned that the premise that if a country was friendly with us, it should not be friendly with Pakistan was notionally not correct. “This is not a valid premise”, Mr Sinha said.

Mr Sinha observed that India’s diplomatic overdrive in recent times should not be entirely attributed to the changed geo-strategic calculus in the post-9/11 and post-Iraq scenario.

“While the world situation has undergone a change because of 9/11, these things have been in the offing for quite some time as far as Indian diplomacy is concerned. For instance, we have had a very close relationship with Mauritius. We are further strengthening this relationship, but it is not because of 9/11”, he said.

The India-Brazil-South Africa dialogue was a new initiative, but a part of South-South cooperation”, Mr Sinha pointed out.

As far as ASEAN was concerned, the minister said it was a continuation of India’s decade-old policy of Look East.

He said India was strengthening its relationship across the globe. “We have the necessary economic clout now — both in terms of investment and technology — to do so. With the rest of the world, the EU, the USA, Russia and Japan, the same process is on”, he added.

On SAPTA talks, the External Affairs Minister said it was a forward movement.

Mr Sinha refused to be drawn into any viewpoint on whether a shift was being noticed in Pakistan’s foreign policy stand of “Kashmir first, trade later”.

“I will not like to go into the controversy because it is not a bilateral issue. I have always been of the view that bilateral issues should not be brought before a multilateral forum such as SAARC,” he said.

The minister was guarded in his opinion on the relevance of most favoured nation status after the operationalisation of a regional trade agreement.