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Khurshid defends vote against Lanka New Delhi, March 24 “We could have voted against it or abstained… I think it is important that India take on board the intensity of feeling in Tamil Nadu. You cannot overlook that entirely. That should not shape your foreign policy entirely but that cannot be something that you must not factor into your foreign policy,” he told Editor-in-Chief of The Tribune Raj Chengappa in an interview. Denying that India tried to dilute the text of the resolution, Khurshid asked, “Is the United States dictated to by India or a lackey of it?” He said India would continue to nudge Sri Lanka to implement the 13th Amendment to its Constitution on devolution of power and the report of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC). Asked if the settlement of the recent row with Italy over the return of two Italian marines to face trial in India could be called a success of the Indian diplomacy, the minister said, “I won’t call it a failure but I think yes it could have become very very difficult because there were the competing claims: one of domestic law and one of the Vienna convention and to be put through that very tough
test of which way you should tilt is something that was avoided by timely and far-sighted decision of the Italian government and I think there is no reason why we shouldn’t appreciate that and acknowledge it.” Asked why Prime Minister Manmohan Singh did not host a lunch for his Pakistani counterpart Raja Pervez Ashraf (who has since resigned in view of the elections in his country) during the latter’s recent visit to Ajmer, Khurshid said: “If the Prime Minister had given him a lunch, it would have been an extra special gesture - mine would have been a routine gesture. The PM giving him lunch could not have been in Jaipur. He would have had to come to Delhi. Coming to the Capital has its own feel and implications and arriving in Jaipur would have been another matter.” He said he did not discuss the problems between
the two countries during the luncheon meeting with Ashraf. On whether the dialogue process with Pakistan was dead, he said: “I would not say it is dead or in coma. I will say it has gone very sleepy.” On India’s relations with China under the new leadership in Beijing, Khurshid said: “The signals they have given us are very good. So far we have not had any eyeball-to- eyeball contact. But our Prime Minister had developed very good working relationship with the previous Chinese government. We have been given to understand that there are going to be continuity and enhancement of the relationship.” He emphasised that China’s assistance to Pakistan in its nuclear programme was a matter of concern to India. To a question, Khurshid said the government
would introduce in Parliament after its month-long recess a bill to ratify the land boundary agreement with Bangladesh.
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