Page 29 - bon-dia-aruba-20220811

A29
world news Diahuebs 11 augustus 2022

At 75, India’s Kashmir challenge shifts China appears to wind down

foreign policy focus threatening wargames near Taiwan

(AP) — China on says such visits are routine
Wednesday repeated and that China used her
military threats against trip merely as a pretext to
Taiwan while appear- up its threats.
ing to wind down
wargames near the In an additional response
self-governing island it to Pelosi’s visit, China said
claims as its own ter- it was cutting off dialogue
ritory that have raised on issues from maritime
tensions between the security to climate change
two sides to their high- with the U.S., Taiwan’s
est level in years. chief military and political
backer.
The message in a lengthy
policy statement issued by Taiwan’s foreign minister
(AP) — For decades, In- nuclear confrontation. “helped create a new Indian the Cabinet’s Taiwan Af- warned Tuesday that the
dia has tried to thwart consensus about the need fairs Office and its news Chinese military drills re-
Pakistan in a protracted Starting in the 1960s, India to reset the entire relation- department followed al- flect ambitions to control
dispute over Kashmir, the was an active member of the ship with China, and not just most a week of missile fir- large swaths of the western
achingly beautiful Hima- Non-Aligned Movement, a solve the boundary issue.” ings and incursions into Pacific, while Taipei con-
layan territory claimed by grouping of over 100 coun- Taiwanese waters and air- ducted its own exercises to
both countries but divid- tries that theoretically did not Soldiers from the two sides space by Chinese warships underscore its readiness to
ed between them. align with any major power fought a medieval-style battle and air force planes. defend itself.
during the Cold War. Despite with stones, fists and clubs,
That relentless competition disputes with neighboring leaving at least 20 Indian and The actions disrupted Beijing’s strategy would
made Pakistan always the fo- Pakistan and China, India’s four Chinese soldiers dead. flights and shipping in a include controlling the
cus of New Delhi’s foreign nonaligned stance remained region crucial to global East and South China seas
policy. a bedrock of its foreign poli- The fighting came a year af- supply chains, prompt- via the Taiwan Strait and
cy, with its diplomats focused ter Indian Prime Minister ing strong condemnation imposing a blockade to
But in the last two years, mainly on upending Paki- Narendra Modi’s Hindu from the U.S., Japan and prevent the U.S. and its
since a deadly border clash stan’s claim to Kashmir. nationalist-led government others. allies from aiding Taiwan
between Indian and Chinese stripped Kashmir of its state- in the event of an attack,
soldiers in Kashmir’s Ladakh “Kashmir was in a way cen- hood, scrapped its semi-au- An English-language ver- Joseph Wu told a news
region, policy makers in New tral to our foreign policy tonomy, and clamped down sion of the Chinese state- conference in Taipei.
Delhi have been increasingly concerns,” said Kanwal Sibal, on local politicians, journal- ment said Beijing would
turning their focus to Beijing, a career diplomat who was ists and communications. “work with the greatest Beijing extended the on-
a significant shift in policy as India’s foreign secretary in sincerity and exert our going exercises without
the nation celebrates 75 years 2002-2003. The government also split utmost efforts to achieve announcing when they
of independence. the Muslim-majority region peaceful reunification.” would end, although they
But the current military into two federally adminis- appeared to have run their
India’s ever-growing econo- standoff between India and tered territories — Ladakh “But we will not renounce course for the time being.
my, which is now vastly larg- China over their disputed and Jammu-Kashmir — and the use of force, and we
er than Pakistan’s, combined border in Ladakh set off a ended inherited protections reserve the option of tak- China’s Defense Minis-
with Beijing’s increasingly grave escalation in tensions on land and jobs. ing all necessary measures. try and its Eastern The-
assertive push for influence between the two Asian gi- This is to guard against ater Command both is-
across Asia, mean that “New ants. Despite 17 rounds of The government insisted external interference and sued statements saying
Delhi has increasingly grown diplomatic and military talks, the moves involved only ad- all separatist activities,” it the exercises had achieved
Beijing-centric,” said Lt. the tense standoff continues. ministrative changes, part of said. their targets of sending a
Gen. D.S. Hooda, who from a long-held Hindu national- warning to those favoring
2014 to 2016 headed Indian For decades, India believed ist pledge to assimilate over- “We will always be ready Taiwan’s formal indepen-
military’s Northern Com- China did not represent a whelmingly Muslim Kash- to respond with the use dence and their foreign
mand, which controls Kash- military threat, said Hooda, mir into the country. of force or other necessary backers.
mir, including Ladakh. the former military com- means to interference by
mander. But that calculus Pakistan reacted with fury external forces or radical Taiwan President Tsai
Kashmir has suffered insur- changed in mid-2020 when to India’s changes, asserting action by separatist ele- Ing-wen and her Demo-
gencies, lockdowns and po- a clash high in Karakoram that Kashmir was an interna- ments. Our ultimate goal cratic Progressive Party
litical subterfuge since India mountains in Ladakh’s Gal- tional dispute and any unilat- is to ensure the prospects administration are “push-
and Pakistan gained indepen- wan Valley set off the military eral change in its status was a of China’s peaceful reuni- ing Taiwan into the abyss
dence from British colonial tensions. violation of international law fication and advance this of disaster and sooner or
rule in 1947, and has been at and U.N. resolutions on the process,” it said. later will be nailed to the
the heart of two of the four “Galwan represents a stra- region. pillar of historical shame!”
wars India has fought with tegic inflection point,” said China says its threatening Defense Ministry spokes-
Pakistan and China. The Constantino Xavier, a fellow But the main diplomatic moves were prompted by person Col. Tan Kefei was
three countries’ tense borders at the Centre for Social and challenge to New Delhi’s a visit to Taiwan last week quoted as saying in a state-
meet at the disputed territory, Economic Progress, a New moves in Kashmir came from by U.S. House Speaker ment on the ministry’s
in the world’s only three-way Delhi-based policy group. It an unexpected rival: China. Nancy Pelosi, but Taiwan website.