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Journalism of Courage
NEW DELHI, JULY 14: For the first time since the Indian troops were encircled in Sierra Leone and the crisis in Fiji began, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee briefed the opposition in an all-party meeting called to discuss the Fiji and Sierra Leone issues.
What is significant is that the Government said that it was considering all options and could think of some tough measures including economic sanctions in case the 1997 Constitution was not restored in Fiji and ethnic Indians not given equal rights.
Speaking to the media after the meeting, External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh, said that India would insist on Fiji having a Constitution which guaranteed racial equality. “India would not accept criminalisation of the polity in Fiji.
“Our first priority was the safe release of the hostages.” Now that deposed Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhary and his Cabinet colleagues had been set free, New Delhi would work towards ensuring that Fiji’s Constitution offered equal rights to all Fijians.“We are even contemplating economic sanctions,” he said.
New Delhi’s toughening of its stand seems to come close on the heels of Fijian coup leader George Speight’s recent statement saying that constitutional democracy would never return to Fiji. Besides calling for a new racially-biased Constitution guaranteeing indigenous political domination.
Singh said India wanted something similar to the 1997 Constitution, if not the same one.
During the meeting the opposition expressed concern at the encirclement of the Indian troops in Sierra Leone besides the situation in Fiji. Singh said, “We have briefed the opposition leaders about the situation in Sierra Leone and Fiji besides the future course of action that we’ll take and the opposition was satisfied with our response,” he said.
The more than one-hour-long meeting was attended by leader of the opposition Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh (Congress), Mayawati (BSP), Murasoli Maran (DMK), Amar Singh (SP) and Biplab Dasgupta (CPIM) among others.
Interestingly throughout his briefing Singh maintained that since Sierra Leone was not an Indian military operation but a UN peacekeeping operation the onus lay on the UN to secure the release of the peacekeepers as troops of 11 countries were encircled. He said that the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) had passed a resolution to this effect and Secretary General Kofi Annan had made personal efforts to secure the release of these peacekeepers and the Government was grateful to the Secretary General for his efforts in getting the 21 UN peacekeepers released.
Singh also said that the present mandate of the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) was of peacekeeping which was adequate and India did not see any need for it to be changed to peace enforcement, transforming it into a military operation.
He said that there was no question of India pulling out of Sierra Leone. “We are participating in the UN operation in five different locations, ” he added.
