India Takes an Integrated view of its Interests: Working with US, France
STORIES, ANALYSES, EXPERT VIEWS
Although the focus of India’s engagement with the US and France was on defence and advanced technologies, C Raja Mohan (Senior Fellow with the Asia Society Policy Institute, Delhi and a contributing editor on international affairs for The Indian Express) opines “India’s neighbourhood figured prominently in both Washington and Paris. In Paris, for example, PM Modi and President Emmanuel Macron issued a declaration on the Indo-Pacific Roadmap for wide-ranging cooperation. The statement builds on the ambitious regional agenda in the Indian Ocean that Modi and Macron outlined when the French president visited India in 2018. That was the first time that India agreed to work together with a former European colonial power in the Indian Ocean…..”
The Indo-Pacific: Working together with France and US
Modi and Macron have expanded the “Indian Ocean regional framework to include the Pacific. The Indo-Pacific Roadmap issued by the two leaders declared that Delhi and Paris will ‘continue to work together to extend development cooperation to countries in the region, including in Africa, the Indian Ocean Region, South Asia, Southeast Asia and the Pacific’. The two leaders also promised to boost cooperation with regional partners in bilateral, plurilateral and multilateral arrangements like the Indian Ocean Rim Association, the Indian Ocean Naval Symposium, the Indian Ocean Commission, the Djibouti Code of Conduct, and the ASEAN-led institutions.”
Similarly, Mohan points out “India’s strategic partnership with Washington today is well-anchored in a specific regional context — the Indo-Pacific. The joint statement issued by Modi and US President Joe Biden last month included a section on strategic collaboration in the Indo-Pacific through the Quad.”
Working closely with regional platforms such as the Indian Ocean Rim Association, Indo-Pacific Oceans Initiative, and ASEAN
Modi and Biden also committed to working closely ‘with regional platforms such as the Indian Ocean Rim Association, Indo-Pacific Oceans Initiative, and ASEAN to achieve shared aspirations and address shared challenges in the Indo-Pacific Region’. The two leaders ‘welcomed the depth and pace of enhanced consultations between the two governments on regional issues including South Asia, the Indo-Pacific and East Asia and looked forward to our governments holding an inaugural Indian Ocean Dialogue in 2023’.”
Not business as usual in Indian diplomacy
This certainly is not business as usual in Indian diplomacy, argues Mohan. “India’s relations with its Asian neighbourhood since independence were treated as separate from Delhi’s engagement with the great powers. At the root of it was the proposition that India must keep the major powers out of the region to create an ‘area of peace’ in Asia.”
Mohan concludes stating “Delhi now takes an integrated view of its interests and pursues them through new and cross-cutting forums. As Jaishankar told the Southeast Asian leaders in Jakarta last week, the Quad is complementary to the efforts of the ASEAN and the institutions led by it. As India becomes a major economic entity with significant geopolitical heft, its ability to shape the intersection between its extended neighbourhood and the world will rapidly grow.”
