India,US should seek Chinese co-operation on global issues: ex-NSA

US should also persistently express its strong support for India's peaceful rise,says Stephen Headley.

Asserting that India should welcome US’ continued presence in the Asia-Pacific as a source of stability and peace,a former Bush Administration official has said both New Delhi and Washington need to seek Beijing’s support and co-operation in regional and global issues.

“It is important for our two countries to cooperate as we develop our independent relationships with China,both to encourage China to have congenial relations with us and the international community,and to be prepared to respond to China to the extent it tries,as it has from time to time,to advance its own interests at the expense of others,” Stephen Headley,the former National Security Advisor,said.

“Working for this kind of international framework in which to embed an emerging China is one of the key recommendations of our report,” he said at an event organised by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR),a Washington-based think tank.

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Observing that the big story in Asia today is India and China’s emergence,he,however,said there’s a lot of “uncertainty” about the latter’s emergence.

“To the extent that China wants to be economically successful,respected in the international community and increase the well-being of its people,it’s in our interests to support that objective.

“That kind of interest does not threaten China or the United States or India. Opposition to hegemony is by no means opposition to the expansion of Chinese influence concomitant with its growing power,” Headley said.

It’s not about India and the United States working to confront China or contain China,but both countries have major interests that are served by having good relations with China,he said.

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A report jointly brought out by the CFR and Aspen Institute recommends that the two countries forge a global framework of intergovernmental institutions designed to engage China and attain its integration into Asia and the international system,he said.

“It talks about India and the United States needing to work more closely together to brief each other on their respective assessments of issues involving China,and intensify the dialogue between the United States and India on Asian security.”

The United States should persistently express its strong support for India’s peaceful rise as a crucial component of Asian security and stability,Headley said.

It’s in the United States’ interests that there be a strong India in Asia,Headley said adding the report talks about how India should greatly expand its diplomatic and military engagement with all states in the Indian Ocean Littoral,as well as East Asia.

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“We want India not just to look east but,as the report says,to be east,” he added.

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