World is changing, India is zigzagging

It was in that framework that we supported wars of 8220;liberation8221; of which the Palestinian cause was the prime example. Nasserism, Ba8217;thism, all fitted in nicely with our secular purposes.

By the time the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990, the8220;progressive8221;8217; movements in West Asia had been replaced by political Islam, its strongest manifestation being the emergence of the Ayatollahs in Iran. Some of these Islamic movements were first stoked by the west as a bulwark against communism but later they acquired a life of their own.

Emergence of Nizam-e-Mustafa in Pakistan, export of terrorism in Punjab and Kashmir, aggravated the communal divide in India as well, climaxing in the fall of the Babari Masjid on December 6, 1992.

In other words, our very self-conscious awareness of the world8217;s second largest Muslim population being in India almost coincided with the rise of political Islam world wide, increase in militancy in Kashmir and the collapse of the Soviet Union. The completely altered set of circumstances required enlightened, bold leadership.

If foreign policy is an expression of a nation8217;s internal dynamics, our leaders failed to establish coherent linkages between internal and external realities.

For years Rajiv Gandhi hesitated onrelations with Israel because his advisers convinced him that his Muslim support base would dwindle. Some of us argued that this approach betrayed a complete lack of understanding of the Indian Muslim mind. Egypt had established relations with Israel, and all Arab states had overt or covert relations with Israel. It was ridiculous for us to keep a legitimate foreign policy initiative hostage to a faulty reading of the Muslim mind.

However, a move set into motion by Rajiv Gandhi bore fruit when P.V. Narasimha Rao established full diplomatic relations with Israel. But inhibitions have not yet totally disappeared. Israel is already an important partner in agriculture and defence; President Ezer Weizman and Shimon Peres have visited India. But no high-level Indian visit to Israel has yet taken place. The Israeli government is running around in circles trying to seek a date for President K.R. Narayanan to visit Israel.

If relations with Israel is one example of a misplaced awareness of the Muslim in our midst,our responses to situations in other parts of the world lend themselves to the interpretation that we are insensitive to the plight of Muslims elsewhere.

Remember the Bosnian tragedy? Every country in the world by deed or gesture sympathised with the Bosnian Muslims. We kept up the myth of special ties with Yugoslavia. After Benazir Bhutto as Pakistan8217;s prime minister along with Tansi Ciller of Turkey made a flying visit to the besieged Sarajevo, whatever residual sympathy we may have had for the hapless Bosnians dried up.

By this logic, the Albanians may well have forfeited our sympathy because Nawaz Sharif is visiting that country as a gesture of solidarity.

Of course, NATO8217;s efforts to impose a world order outside the ambit of the United Nations must be resisted at all costs. Our criticism of NATO in the Balkans is perfectly in order. But does it logically follow that we are seen by our silence to be justifying ethnic cleansing, rape camps, mass graves and worse perpetrated by Slobodan Milosevic onthe innocent people of Kosovo? Our official statement is grotesquely insensitive. 8220;We would urge 8212; that the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, a fellow member of the non-aligned, be enabled to resolve its internal issues internally.8221; Are we really projecting Milosevic as a model for the non-aligned?

Have we put on blinkers on this issue because someone has told us that Kosovo may, in some of its ramifications, resemble Kashmir? If we can be blackmailed so easily, we must be terribly uncertain about our case.

Let us, for a moment, forget Kosovo. Since 1973 Iraq has consistently supported us on Kashmir. We know that Iraq8217;s 21 million people are being subjected to unspeakable suffering because of the UN sanctions. And we have not been able to put together one official delegation to visit Baghdad as a gesture of sympathy. Why?

The world8217;s attention is riveted on oil and gas in the Caspian Sea. Everybody is making a beeline for Azerbaijan. But we cannot open an embassy in Baku until an embassy is also openedin Armenia with which Azerbaijan has a conflict but with which we have no apparent interests. Can someone please explain these zigzags?