Please do go away

Another ‘K’ factor

Prime Minister Vajpayee’s trip to Turkey on June 1-2 is being cancelled on Ankara’s request (Turkist PM Bulent Ecevit is in hospital with a heart problem), but the decision to keep the Kazakhstan leg from June 2-4 is meant to give at least a little boost to New Delhi’s so-called ‘‘look Central Asia’’ policy.

Protestations from the MEA that this revamped initiative is now the real thing must however be taken with a dollop of salt. For it is now a whole ten years since the disintegration of the Soviet Union, and the old yearning of the then newly independent republics of Central Asia for closer ties with New Delhi — which was then far too busy with other relationships — has been replaced by a more hard-nosed sense of what India can really bring to the table.

Still, New Delhi seems determined to show interest in regional groupings as well, which is what accounts for the PM’s decision to participate in the security CICA conference in Almaty. Russian president Vladimir Putin and Chinese president Jiang Zemin will likely be there too, and bilaterals are being finalised. So will Pervez Musharraf. But unless the General sticks his hand out to the Prime Minister, like he did in Kathmandu, Vajpayee seems to be hardly inclined to meet him there.

Some French amour

There are new opportunities afoot to build a renewed relationship with France. The killing of the French engineers in Karachi recently — they were working on building submarines for Pakistan — is believed to have persuaded the otherwise practical-minded French Foreign Office at the Quai D’orsay in Paris that Pakistan may not be a completely safe defence partner to work with. The French deaths took place on a day when the new government under Jacques Chirac had been barely sworn in. Still, here’s a surprise. The new French foreign minister, De Ville Pin, served as a middle-ranking diplomat (he was a minister-counsellor) in the French embassy in New Delhi from 1989-92. Last heard, Monsieur Pin’s appointment had sent a frisson of excitement through the French Embassy in Chanakyapuri, even as South Block was contemplating a huge bunch of flowers.

Pak isn’t invited

Every big country interested in Afghanistan is doing it, including Japan and Iran: having a big meeting on aid and reconstruction. So why should India be left behind? On May 23-24, the government will be hosting a massive bash in collaboration with the UN called the ‘‘South-South cooperation for reconstruction in Afghanistan.’’ The UNDP head is coming, as well as the UNHCR chief. But since India’s the host and has done the inviting, ‘‘South-South’’ nations do not include Pakistan. Certainly, India is quite furious that Islamabad seems to be playing spoil-sport on its major initiatives on Afghanistan.

The Merc that survived

This must either be the perfect advertisement for Mercedes-Benz or for India’s Ambassador to Afghanistan Vivek Katju. While so much else in Kabul was destroyed by the Taliban during seven years of their rule — including the Indian ambassador’s residence, which was used by a Taliban functionary — some things remained unchanged. Like the Ambassador’s official car, none other than a Mercedes-Benz. Seems the mothballed Merc was taken out just the other day for an airing. And when somebody turned the key in the car’s ignition, it began to purr right away!