- New Delhi’s top diplomat and Chinese envoy in New York voice sharply contrasting views on permanent seat candidacy and urgent terrorism concerns
- Separately and on sidelines of UN meetings, India and Pakistan accuse each other of fomenting terrorism
- Just days after their troops attacked one another with sticks and bricks at a disputed Himalayan border, China and India emerged far apart on Thursday after two days of discussions on reformed multilateralism and counterterrorism at the United Nations Security Council in New York.
When Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar during a special meeting on multilateralism on Wednesday called for an “honest conversation” to manifest “the global order that best reflects contemporary realities”, Britain, France and the United Arab Emirates pledged to support New Delhi’s bid for a permanent seat on the council.
But Zhang Jun, China’s permanent representative to the UN, instead urged for “special arrangements to accommodate Africa’s concerns and enhance its representation” and avoided any mention of India’s candidacy.
China is the only country among the council’s five permanent members to have never supported India’s attempts to secure a coveted seat on the panel.
India now serves as UN Security Council president for the month of December.
Jaishankar on Thursday said multilateral platforms were being “misused to justify and protect perpetrators”.The Indian foreign minister believed China was blocking his country’s efforts to list as terrorists certain Pakistani nationals whom New Delhi identified as involved in the 2008 attacks in Mumbai.The attacks on November 26 of that year killed 166 people, including 26 foreign nationals. Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba was accused of perpetrating them.During a special UN Security Council meeting on counterterrorism on Thursday, Jaishankar criticised “some members” of the council for putting on hold “evidence-based proposals without assigning adequate reasons”.
“How do we deal with double standards, both inside and outside this council? For too long, some have persisted with the approach that terrorism is just another instrument or stratagem,” the Indian foreign minister said.
Separate from the two envoys trading accusations, India and Pakistan – countries with historical bad blood dating to India’s independence and subsequent partition in 1947 – engaged in their own war of words on the sidelines of the two-day event.
- Pakistani Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Thursday said India at the council did not allow an “open and inclusive debate” on terrorism. He accused “a neighbour” of “financing and fostering terrorism” because of Pakistan’s economic engagement with China.
- India has long opposed the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, a Beijing-backed Belt and Road Initiative
- In response to Jaishankar’s assertion that Pakistan was the “epicentre of terrorism”, Bhutto said: “You cannot shut us up just because Osama bin Laden was found in Pakistan.”