External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Tuesday stressed the importance of having an international order just like a domestic order. He slammed the United Nations for making the Kashmir invasion a dispute and turning the attacker and victim at par and called for having a “strong and fair” UN.
In his remarks at the Session on ‘Thrones and Thorns: Defending the Integrity of Nations’ at Raisina Dialogue on Tuesday, Jaishankar called the occupation of some parts of Kashmir by Pakistan “the longest standing illegal occupation” of territory by another country after the Second World War.
When asked about his earlier remarks, where he said, “If you don’t have an order, then you are looking at a very anarchic world’, Jaishankar responded, “Look, I think we do need an international order just like we need a domestic order. Just like you need a society in a country, you need an international version of that and its not just big countries who will benefit if there is no order. I would argue that any country which would take risk, which would have an extreme positions, which would test the system will actually use the disorder to its advantage. I mean we have seen in our own neighbourhood. You don’t have to a big country to be a risky country. I have smaller neighbours who have done a pretty good job. So, first of all, we should all understand the importance of an order.”
“Now, the old order, it was an order, it was a product of its times. But, why I felt its virtuals were exaggerated was I think the rule maker and rule taker had somewhat different perspective because I also said in the same interview that if you are at the receiving end of those rules or the application of those rules, we had issues and let me give you two or three practical examples. You know, if you capriciously, you know, if it suits your interests, somebody is good, not good, well, I’ll make up my mind how they’re going to do and you apply that order to the same country on the same issues differently,” he added.
He said that the Taliban was welcomed in the Doha process and Oslo. He stressed that when it suits to deal with the Taliban, it is okay and when it is not, it is called extremist.
“Take Afghanistan, so, the same Afghanistan, the same Taliban which was an outlier was welcomed in the Doha process, was welcomed in Oslo, apparently, at that time people were okay with it. Today again we going back saying, Taliban is doing all these not so good things. Now, if they were doing all of that. what was discussed in Oslo and Doha. You know you had a British general who described them at that time as they are country boys with their own honour code. Now, so when it suits you to deal with the Taliban, they are okay. When it is not, they are not okay. You are an extremist today, you wear a suit and tie, you are okay. You know, I think I have a problem with that all,” Jaishankar said.
The EAM termed sovereignty and territorial integrity the “bedrock of global rules.” He also spoke on political interference, where he mentioned that when the West goes into other nations, it is “apparently in the perseverance of democratic freedoms.” However, he noted that when other nations come into the West, it appears to have a “very malign intention.”
Jaishankar said, “Let’s give you a second example. We all speak of sovereignty and territorial integrity. All of us agree. It’s a vital principle. It’s a bedrock of global rules. After the Second World War, the longest standing illegal, I would say presence, occupation of a territory by another country pertains to India, what we saw in Kashmir. Now we went to the UN, what was an invasion was made into a dispute. So the attacker and the victim were put on par. Who were the culpable parties? UK, Canada, Belgium, Australia, USA. So, pardon me, I have some question marks on that one. Now, I can give you many more. We speak today of political interference. When the West goes out into other countries, it’s apparently in perseverance of democratic freedoms. When other countries come into the West, it seems to have a very malign intention.”
Calling for a strong and fair UN, EAM Jaishankar said, “So I think we need to have an order, there must be fairness. agree with you, Dominique, we need a strong UN, but a strong UN requires a fair UN. A strong global order must have some basic consistency of standards. We have military crews to our east in Myanmar. They are no-no. We have them even more regularly to the west. You know where? They seem to be okay. I think it’s important to audit the working of the world for the last eight decades and be honest about it and to understand today that the balances, the share holdings in the world have changed. We need a different conversation. We need frankly in that sense a different order.”
Slovakia’s Minister of Foreign and European Affairs Juraj Blanar, former Sweden Prime Minister Carl Bildt, Liechtenstein’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Education and Sport, Dominique Hasler, Fiker Institute Founder Dubai Abulhoul participated alongside Jaishankar in this session.
The Raisina Dialogue, which is being held in Delhi from March 17-19, is hosted by the Observer Research Foundation in partnership with the Ministry of External Affairs. It is India’s premier conference on geopolitics and geoeconomics committed to addressing the most challenging issues facing the global community.
