‘Rules of existing world order not applied equally’: EAM on Kashmir at Raisina Dialogue
Jaishankar brought up the Kashmir issue while speaking to the unequal application of rules of the world order that has existed since the end of World War II.
Pakistan’s occupation of a part of Jammu and Kashmir since 1948 is an example of the shortcomings of the existing world order that need to be addressed, external affairs minister S Jaishankar said on Monday.
In his address at the Raisina Dialogue, India’s flagship conference on geopolitics, Jaishankar said that the rules of the existing world order had not been applied equally. He also pointed to Pakistan when he cautioned that, in the absence of a world order, countries with extreme positions can try use disorder to their advantage.
The EAM made the remarks while participating in a session with the theme ‘Thrones and Thorns: Defending the integrity of nations’ along with Liechtenstein foreign minister Dominique Hasler, Slovak foreign minister Juraj Blanár and Sweden’s former premier Carl Bildt. The session focused on the relevance of the UN Charter and principles such as non-interference in the context of territorial borders being violated and digital interference in political processes.
Jaishankar brought up the Kashmir issue while speaking to the unequal application of rules of the world order that has existed since the end of World War II and the principle of sovereignty and territorial integrity.
“After the second World War, the longest standing illegal...presence, occupation of a territory by another country pertains to India. What we saw in Kashmir,” he said.
“We went to the UN. What was an invasion was made into a dispute. So, the attacker and the victim were put on par. Who were the culpable parties? The UK, Canada, Belgium, Australia, the US. So, pardon me, I have some question marks on that old order.”
Jaishankar’s remarks were in line with recent calls by other leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government for Pakistan to end its occupation of a portion of Jammu and Kashmir. They come at a time when bilateral ties have been at an all-time low since India’s decision to scrap the special status of Kashmir in 2019.
Jaishankar argued that the absence of a world order wouldn’t benefit only big countries. “I would argue that any country which will take risks, which will have extreme positions, which would test the system will actually use disorder to its advantage,” he said.
In this context, he again pointed to Pakistan and said: “We’ve seen in our own neighborhood, you don’t have to be a big country to be a risky country. I’ve some smaller neighbours who have done a pretty good job of that.”
Jaishankar also questioned the application of rules to the Taliban in Afghanistan, especially the different standards adopted by Western countries in the negotiations with the group in different periods, and said the virtues of the old order “were exaggerated”.
In the context of political interference, Jaishankar contended that the pursuance of democratic freedoms by the West in other countries was okay, whereas other countries taking up the same issues in the West is perceived as a “very malign intention”.
He said, “To have an order, there must be fairness. We need a strong UN, but a strong UN requires a fair UN. A global order must have some basic consistency of standards.”
The new order must be based on the understanding that balances and shareholdings in the world have changed, he added.
Jaishankar said India’s stand on the world order is shaped by its role in the Global South, its democratic polity, market economy and respect for faiths, and its past record in navigating and adapting to “a world which has not always been kind to us”.
Bildt said Russia’s invasion of Ukrainian has questioned the fundamentals of international law since sovereignty and territorial integrity of states is the “absolute foundation stone of international security”. In the context of West Asia, he said Israel had the right to respond to the terror attack by Hamas, but “at the same time it had a duty to respond within respect for international humanitarian law”.
“Did it do that? In my opinion not. And the European Union said so as well,” Bildt said.
He also cautioned that a new era of map-making would be a new era of war. “If you start to mess with borders, the only thing that is certain is that blood is going to flow again... If it’s a new era of map-making, then some are strong and some are weak. And the strong will draw the borders in the way they want. 1962 might be remembered in this part of the world as another exercise in map-making that was dangerous,” he said, referring to the India-China border war.
The foreign ministers of Lichtenstein and Slovakia highlighted Europe’s concerns about the Russian invasion of Ukraine and its fallout on regional security arrangements. They also spoke of the need to step up coordination and spending on European security and the need to frame a new strategy to cope with challenges.
