While India’s relations with the United States have moved in a positive direction for the past two decades, the ideological common ground that appears to be shared between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Donald Trump has encouraged the Modi government to move in a less restrained manner in America’s direction.
Visiting the US during the Obama administration Mr Modi had announced he was abandoning the “hesitations of history” in moving into America’s parlour. That move seems to have become something of a glide.
US secretary of state Rex Tillerson, who held official talks on his first India visit on Wednesday, was received warmly in New Delhi. During his meeting with the secretary of state, the Prime Minister himself “noted the firm upward trajectory in the bilateral strategic partnership following the positive and far-reaching talks with President Trump in June this year”.
External affairs minister Sushma Swaraj and the visiting US dignitary agreed to convene the 2+2 dialogue mechanism of the foreign and defence ministers of the two sides early next year. Looking at the primacy given to the security aspect, this seems a move on from the Strategic and Commercial Dialogue of the foreign and commerce ministers of the two countries.
It should be noted that the optics of the South Asia and Afghanistan policies of the Trump administration, announced in August, raises India’s profile. But it is evident there is no basic change in the coordinates of US policy towards Pakistan or Afghanistan, although Mr Tillerson was blunt in his observations (in Islamabad and New Delhi) that Pakistan must be more effective in rooting out terrorism, which had begun to affect its own stability, as he put it.
According to Pakistan foreign minister Khwaja Asif, the name of Hafiz Saeed, or any Pakistani, for that matter, did not figure in the list of 75 terrorist names handed over by Mr Tillerson, although under the US designation the Jamat-ud-Dawa founder and 26/11 mastermind has been classified as an international terrorist.
It was evident from the joint press conference of Ms Swaraj and Mr Tillerson that Washington wants to work with Islamabad “in a positive way” to combat terrorism and promote regional stability. This is a continuation of the failed American policy of the past 15 years, for the US is yet to indicate any serious action if Pakistan does not take verifiable and effective steps to deal with terrorism and terrorist outfits, including those aimed against India and Afghanistan.
A clear positive feature of the Tillerson visit was the understanding the secretary of state showed publicly when he said that the US had nothing against countries engaging in legitimate business activities with Iran. This was in the context of the Chabahar port being promoted by India, Iran and Afghanistan.
