International Relations
Content
Avoiding a false choice
CHOGM 2013 - Sri Lanka - 53 world leaders meet in paradise Visit the official website today!www.chogm2013.lk
R.K. PACHAURI K. SRINATH REDDY
Ads by Google
SHARE · PRINT · T+
EARTH WATCH:Environmental degradation is a symptom of wastage of resources and the pursuit of short-term profit. A jhum field in Karbi Anglong district, Assam.—PHOTO: RITU RAJ KONWAR
Much of the national discourse in India poses environmental sustainability as desirable but inimical to our objective of achieving a high rate of GDP growth, without which poverty eradication and economic and social development of our people would not be possible. There is a trade-off, it is argued, between pursuing development and safeguarding the environment. Still others point to the history of modern industrial development: first there was widespread pollution and degradation of the environment, and then a clean-up and setting of high international standards once prosperity was achieved. China appears to be following the same logic even though there appears to be some rethinking on the subject. We reject these arguments. At the very outset we wish to reiterate that safeguarding the environment is not at all inimical to rapid economic development. In fact, in our resource constrained world today, maintaining high environmental standards may have become a prerequisite for achieving steady, long-term growth of our economy. This is particularly so given our high population density and the dependence of large numbers on ecosystem services. Nor do we accept the argument that higher standards of living are incompatible with an insistence on environmental sustainability. In fact, maintaining and improving the quality of life for all our citizens may only be possible if the environmental degradation that we witness all around us is reversed and the fragile ecology of our country is preserved. These two propositions lie at the heart of the concept of Green Growth. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, “Green growth is about fostering economic growth and development while ensuring that the natural assets continue to provide the resources and environmental services on which our well-being relies.” The 13th Finance Commission clearly underscored this in stating, “Green growth involves rethinking growth strategies with regard to the impacts on environmental sustainability and the environmental resources available to poor and vulnerable groups.” Diminishing returns In rethinking growth, we need to focus on the current reality of a resource constrained world. During their period of rapid economic growth, the small cluster of western economies had access to the resources of the entire world. Technological progress further extended such access. Today, with the “rise of the rest,” in particular the rapid
development of continental size and highly populous countries like India and China, the demand for resources of every kind, has been rising exponentially. We are entering an era of finite resources where the production and consumption patterns typical of the advanced western economies are no longer sustainable. Resource intensive and, in particular energy intensive processes will need to make way for more efficient and resource frugal development strategies if we are to avoid an economic dead end or a world in which only a small elite is able to enjoy affluence in the midst of a sea of poverty. Environmental degradation is, in essence, a symptom of wastage of resources and the pursuit of short-term profit over long-term sustainable development. In India, we face a crisis in agriculture because it is land, energy and water intensive and all three resources are becoming increasingly scarce. The heavy use of chemical fertilizers and toxic pesticides has ravaged our soil and contaminated our food chain and water supply. The prolonged and unprotected handling of toxic chemicals is also exposing our farmers to multiple health problems, whose economic and social costs are rarely considered. The Green Revolution may have led to a period of food self-sufficiency but that input intensive strategy has now run its course and is yielding diminishing returns even while generating widespread environmental degradation. The good news is that a number of field studies carried out in various parts of the country have demonstrated that high yields in agriculture are compatible with practices that make minimal use of chemical inputs, conserve water and rely on organic nutrients and bio-pesticides. The natural fertility of the soil in these locations has been restored also leading to the revival of microorganisms in the subsoil which make the soil a living asset. Fossil fuels and a shift The air in our cities is heavily polluted and this too, is leading to increasing public health problems. The incidence of respiratory and ophthalmological problems in our urban population has been on the rise alarmingly. Even in our villages, the inefficient burning of bio-mass for meeting rural energy and cooking needs continues to cause both indoor and external air pollution again with serious health consequences, leave aside their climate change impact globally. The use of carbon-based fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas is at the heart of our economic processes and hence the challenge we face both in dealing with most forms of environmental degradation and climate change. Unless we make a strategic shift from our current reliance on fossil fuels to progressively greater use of renewable and clean sources of energy, green growth will remain a chimera. Making this shift requires rationalising our pricing of goods and services. The Indian economy suffers from pernicious subsidies, such as those on kerosene, even though it is common knowledge that 40 per cent of subsidised kerosene finds its way into adulteration of petroleum products. There is a cost-effective alternative to meeting the lighting needs of our rural population, without the health costs of ingesting kerosene fumes. TERI’s “Lighting a Billion Lives” campaign, based on modern designs of solar lanterns, has established the economic viability and social benefits of this option, but the spread of this technology is hampered by the barrier of kerosene subsidies. Steps forward Green growth in India can only be promoted by providing certain essential services to people as public goods. People have the right to mobility, not necessarily the right to private transportation for obtaining this service. If the density of car ownership in India was to reach even a fraction of that in western countries, the requirement for fuel imports and land for roads and parking would be multiples of the current global levels. We must invest in convenient and efficient public transportation and discourage private transport. Rail transport and the use of waterways would be less costly and less polluting, while bringing benefits to the vast majority of our people. India should position itself as an early leader in the green technology revolution, having missed out on the industrial revolution and becoming only a late entrant to the ICT revolution. Green growth is efficient growth. Green growth is inclusive growth. Green growth is sustainable growth, ensuring that we never take from Nature beyond her capacity for regeneration. India is living on an ecological overdraft. It is time for us to balance our books reflecting our true assets and real liabilities. Mahatma Gandhi rightly stated, “We may utilize the gifts of Nature just as we choose but in her books, the debits are always equal to the credits”. (Dr. R.K. Pachauri is director general, TERI, Dr. K. Srinath Reddy is president, Public Health Foundation of India, and Shyam Saran is chairman, National Security Advisory Board.)
Shyam Saran: Climate change - An unequivocal report
The latest IPCC report leaves no room for doubt. India should take the lead in renewing international negotiations Luxury Apartments, Thane
Spacious 3 BHK Starting at 1.1 Cr Rumah Bali Creme on Ghodbunder Road puranikbuilders.com/022-3026-6101
Ads by Google 6
Add to My Page Read more on:
Ipcc | Unfccc | Monsoon | Climate Change | Shyam Saran
More Columns by Shyam Saran
China's flawed rebalancing A cloudy Independence Day Time to resurrect G5 The case of Snowden and global voyeurism India's Japan moment
4 BHK Villas In Pune
Get Assured Rental Income of Rs.27k PM for 11 Months. Limited Offer!Gera.in/Sky-VillasKharadi
Compare Prices on Mobiles
All Types of Branded Mobiles, Smart Phones. Visit Junglee.com!www.Junglee.com/Mobiles
Ads by Google
On September 27, 2013, the Working Group 1 of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released in Stockholm its "Approved Summary for Policy Makers", providing the latest assessment of the science underlying the phenomenon of climate change. This is the most significant document on climate change since the fourth IPCC report. The fourth report, which was released in 2007, generated the momentum for the ongoing multilateral negotiations on climate change under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). While the full report of the fifth IPCC session is awaited, the present document is important because its agreed conclusions, scientifically determined, will influence the course of the negotiations on the Durban Platform - which, by the year 2015, "must develop a protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force under the convention applicable to all parties". The "Approved Summary" states categorically, without the usual qualifications scientists are so fond of, that the "warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s, many of the observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia. The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, sea level has risen, and the concentrations of greenhouse gases have increased". No ambiguity here. The report is also categorical in ascribing this warming trend to anthropogenic, or man-made, factors - in particular, the burning of fossil fuels since the industrial revolution began 200 years ago, land use changes due to an increase in population, extension of agricultural acreage and habitat, thereby shrinking the natural forest sinks that absorb carbon dioxide. The world's oceans are becoming steadily saturated by the carbon that they absorb, warming in the process, though more slowly. Sea levels could rise by a metre above current levels by the end of this century. Were Greenland ice cover to melt entirely, sea levels could rise by as much as seven metres. These changes are impacting weather patterns throughout the world. Of particular interest to India is the observation:"Whilemonsoon winds are likely to weaken, monsoon precipitation is likely to intensify due to the increase in atmospheric moisture. Monsoon onset dates are likely to become earlier or not to change much. Monsoon retreat dates are likely to be delayed, resulting in lengthening of the monsoon season in many regions." Is this what is happening in Delhi right now with unusually late monsoon rains? There is another observation of relevance to India: "It is virtually certain that there will be more frequent hot and fewer cold temperature extremes over most land areas on daily and seasonal timescales as global mean temperatures increase. It is very likely that heat waves will occur with a higher frequency and duration." This confirms what we have been experiencing anecdotally in most recent years. The most important part of the report concerns the density of carbon and non-carbon greenhouse gases accumulated in the earth's
atmosphere. In order to limit the global temperature increase to two degrees Celsius compared to pre-industrial levels, with a more than 66 per cent probability, cumulative greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere must stay within 800 gigatonnes of carbon equivalent (GtC). But by 2011, we had already used up approximately 530 GtC. Therefore, the balance available is only 270 GtC. On a business-as-usual basis, this balance will also be used up in the next 20 to 25 years. It may be noted that even if, by some miracle, greenhouse gas emissions became zero, the climatic effects would continue for a considerable period, since these emissions stay in the atmosphere for long periods of time. As the summary says, "Depending upon the scenario, about 15 to 40 per cent of emitted CO2 will remain in the atmosphere longer than 1,000 years." For the first time we have an authoritative document with a much-needed focus on the stock aspect of emissions rather than the current flow. What the summary is demonstrating scientifically is that climate change is integrally linked to the accumulated stock of greenhouse gas emissions in the earth's atmosphere, to which current emissions are only an incremental addition. The stock is mainly the responsibility of advanced industrial countries, although developing countries such as India and China may be responsible for most incremental additions. Historical responsibility and equity demand that the former shoulder most of the burden of making the strategic shift required through transforming existing energy systems and support developing countries in taking similar action. The summary has spelt out the climate emergency starkly and unambiguously for policy makers; but is there political will to collaborate in confronting what is indisputably an elemental threat to humanity? It has been clear for some time that unless there is a global and strategic shift from production and consumption processes based on fossil fuels, which are a hallmark of our industrial age, to those progressively based on renewable and clean sources of energy, there is little or no prospect of averting an ecological emergency of global proportions. Yet, in 2012, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development reported that the world's top 200 listed oil, gas and mining companies had spent $674 billion on finding and developing new sources of oil and gas. The same year even the modest investment in renewables had declined. In addition, the world spends nearly $1.9 trillion annually on energy subsidies, according to the International Monetary Fund. It is difficult to see how such entrenched energy systems and the powerful vested interests behind them can be transformed speedily to avoid a climate-induced disaster. India has declared that the earth's atmospheric space is a global commons to which all citizens of the world have equal entitlement. The carbon space, as long as it exists, must also be shared equitably. In fact, a global and collaborative response to the climate challenge can only be built - and sustained - on the basis of equity. India should use the latest analysis to reinforce its constant emphasis on the principle of equity, which is sought to be set aside by the developed countries in the current negotiations. This should be our brief for the forthcoming UNFCCC meeting in Poland later this year.
India’s date with the Arctic
CHOGM 2013 - Sri Lanka - 53 world leaders meet in paradise Visit the official website today!www.chogm2013.lk
SHYAM SARAN
Ads by Google
SHARE · COMMENT (7) · PRINT · T+
APTaking
into account the ‘global commons’ character of the Arctic, such an international regime must be able to put in place a n effective compliance mechanism. Photo: AP INFOGRAPHIC Arctic circle: A new energy front
LINKS Arctic Council - the official website TOPICS diplomacy international relations
summit
Instead of joining the race to commercially exploit this pristine region, New Delhi must use its position in the regional council to push for a global mechanism to prevent an unseemly gold rush
On May 15, 2013, India became an Observer at the Arctic Council, which coordinates policy on the Arctic. (The Arctic Council has eight states as members, the five coastal states, Canada, Russia, the U.S., Norway and Denmark (through Greenland), and Sweden, Iceland and Finland.) Other countries that joined India as Observers were China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Italy. The United Kingdom, France, Germany, Poland, Spain and the Netherlands are already Observers. Criteria In becoming an Observer, India had to agree to the following criteria set by the Council: (i) recognise the sovereign rights of Arctic states; (ii) recognise that the Law of the Sea and the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, constitute the legal basis and the legal framework within which the Arctic will be managed; (iii) respect indigenous peoples, local cultures and traditions; and (iv) be able to contribute to the work of the Arctic Council. Template transfer? In accepting to abide by these criteria, India has recognised the territorial jurisdiction and sovereign rights of the Arctic littoral states and hence their pre-eminent and even pre-emptive role over the Arctic zone. The acceptance of
the Law of the Sea as the governing instrument for the Arctic also implies that the extension of jurisdiction over the continental shelf as well as over maritime passage and the resources of the ocean space will lie with the littoral states. The Arctic has virtually become the inland water space of the five coastal states — Russia, Norway, Denmark, Canada and the United States. India has, therefore, no more room to argue that the region be treated in the same manner as the Antarctica. In the Antarctica Treaty of 1959, territorial claims have been kept in abeyance in favour of a global commons approach, respecting the pristine nature of the ice covered continent. The trends we see in the Arctic region may well come to pass in the Antarctic as well. The claimant states could reasonably argue that just as the Arctic space is being managed by the sovereign members of the Arctic Council, with well-defined norms and through cooperation among both the littoral and user states, why could this not serve as a template for Antarctica? Like the Arctic, the Antarctic, too, is a treasure house of resources. These are also being unlocked by the steady melting of the continent’s ice cover. It may only be a question of time before the northern Gold Rush is followed by its rampant Southern version. India has succumbed to the temptation of sharing in the emerging opportunities for resource extraction as the Arctic continues to melt because of global warming, Yes, as the government argues, becoming an Observer would enable India to take part in scientific research into the changing Arctic environment, including its serious climate change effects. These effects will be global, whether in sea level rise, the acidification of the worlds’ oceans and change in ocean currents and weather patterns. India’s association with the Arctic Council puts it in a better position to understand these changes and be a part of efforts to minimise the adverse consequences of the Arctic being opened up to intensified human activity. However, both the members of the Arctic Council and the Observers, including India, have avoided confronting the obvious: the opportunities that they seek to exploit and profit from are the very activities which will exacerbate the climate change impact of a warming Arctic. The “on the one hand” and “on the other hand” approach that all these stakeholders are guilty of merely disguises the fact that the lure of profit has already triumphed over the fear of ecological disaster. China has lost no time in positioning itself through a number of asset acquisitions in several Arctic states, in particular, Russia and Canada. Practical What could be done to restrain this headlong rush into a potential ecological catastrophe of global dimensions? Oceanographer and Arctic expert Rick Steiner has made a practical and reasonable suggestion. This is for the U.N. to set up its own Arctic body. It may be on the lines of the Indian Ocean Commission, which may provide the international community the capacity to monitor what is happening in the region, draw up strict norms for activities, taking into account the “global commons” character of the Arctic, and put in place a credible and effective compliance mechanism. India could certainly push for such a global regime without violating its role of Observer at the Arctic Council. It may also be worthwhile for India and other developing states to put the Arctic on the agenda of the ongoing multilateral negotiations on Climate Change under the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change. A separate resolution or decision of the Conference of Parties to the Convention could draw attention to the Arctic as a global commons, its impact on global climate and the need to ensure that the activities undertaken there do not harm the well-being of the vast majority of people around the world. I have said earlier and reiterate: it is hypocritical of the developed, industrialised countries, in particular, the rich Arctic states, to preach low carbon development strategies to poor, developing countries, while they themselves, rush headlong into ensuring the perpetuation of their own carbon and fossil fuel intensive patterns of production and consumption. This hypocrisy lies at the heart of the relentless spoilage and ravaging of one of the last pristine frontiers of our endangered planet. If we keep silent and look away because of the prospect of sharing in this unseemly Gold Rush, India’s credentials as a responsible member of the international community and as a champion of the principle of equitable burden-sharing and inter-generational equity, would become deeply suspect. (Shyam Saran, a former Foreign Secretary, is currently Chairman, National Security Advisory Board.)
Managing transition in Afghanistan
India needs a strategy to frustrate plans by Pakistan and its Taliban proxies to dominate Afghanistan after 2014 Submit Your Resume
Exp 3 - 15 Yrs. Salary 5 - 20 Lakhs To Apply Register on Shine.com Now www.shine.com/Urgent_Jobs
Ads by Google 5
Add to My Page Read more on:
Afghanistan | Pakistan | Taliban | Instability | Isaf | Cross-border Terrorism | Hamid Karzai |Internecine Violence
RELATED NEWS
Opium cultivation to surge in Afghanistan in 2013: UN Pak election tribunal rejects Musharraf's appeal India, China look to cooperate to counter terror in Afghan Musharraf admits to deal with US on drone strikes Musharraf files appeal against rejection of his nomination
HDFC ERGO™ Health Policy Luxury Apartments, Thane
Cashless Claims Across India at 4000+ Network Hospitals. Know More!HDFCERGO.com/Health_Insurance Spacious 3 BHK Starting at 1.1 Cr Rumah Bali Creme on Ghodbunder Roadpuranikbuilders.com/022-3026-6101
Ads by Google
Afghanistan will undergo multiple transitions in 2014, and their outcome will determine whether the country will emerge as a strong, viable and peaceful state or whether it will relapse intointernecine violence, instability and a base for cross-border terrorismagainst neighbouring states. The impending political transition has two aspects. One, there will be elections for a new president, marking the end of the Hamid Karzai era and, therefore, the political continuity - if not always predictability - that it represented. Two, there is the fate of the peace and reconciliation process, which seeks to integrate theTaliban and other militants into the political and constitutional mainstream. These two dimensions of the political transition are interlinked.
The political transition is accompanied by a security transition. There is already a steady drawdown of the US-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), and the Afghan National Army is taking on security responsibilities throughout the country. The Afghan army is already responsible for security in areas that account for nearly 90 per cent of the Afghan population - this will be complete by the end of 2014 when the combat role of the ISAF will come to an end. The ISAF may retain a residual presence for the purposes of extending training and advice to the Afghan army, but it will not engage in active operations. The peak strength for the Afghan security forces is 352,000 and is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future, provided the promised financial support from the ISAF countries - of $4 billion annually, initially for the three years 2014-16 - is realised. The third major transition will transform Afghanistan from an aid-driven economy to an investment- and trade-driven one, leveraging the country's location at the crossroads of South Asia, Central Asia and West Asia as well as its more recent emergence as a resourceand mineral-rich country. It should come as no surprise that the success of each of these transitions is linked to the other two. Political instability or renewed violence, for example, would render the achievement of the economic objective impossible. So, what is the current status of each transition, and what could India contribute to enhance the prospects of success? The reconciliation process is going nowhere. The representatives of the Mullah Omar-led Quetta Shura are in Doha, but no structured talks have been held so far either with the US or with the Karzai government. It had been reported that Pakistan had had a change of heart and was actively supporting the peace and reconciliation process. However, a recent interaction with Afghan government officials indicated that, rather than play a supportive role, Pakistan was looking at 2014 as an opportunity to get back into so-called "strategic relevance", become the dominant arbiter of Afghanistan's future and, in particular, marginalise India's considerable presence in that country. In recent talks with the Karzai government, Pakistan demanded that Indian presence in the country be limited only to its
embassy in Kabul; that training for Afghanistan's security forces should be sought from Pakistan and not from India; and that Indian involvement in infrastructure projects should cease - only then would Pakistan assist with the peace process by leaning on the Taliban and the other Pakistan-based militants such as the Hekmatyar group and the Haqqani group to take part. It is also noteworthy that a much-touted meeting of senior clerics from Pakistan and Afghanistan, which was sponsored by the Afghan High Peace Council last month, did not take place eventually. A leading Pakistani cleric even publicly declared that suicide bombings were justified in a so-called liberation struggle. Despite persistent hopes expressed in Western capitals, this process is a dead end and India should work on the assumption that Pakistan and its Taliban proxies look upon 2014 as an opportunity to regain a dominant and strategic foothold in the country. We need a strategy to forestall and frustrate this outcome. In this context, the second aspect of the political transition is of crucial importance. India should join hands with the international community to facilitate free and fair elections, both for the presidency in 2014 and Parliament in 2015. This will provide the incoming political leadership legitimacy and credibility with a stronger hand to pursue a more effective peace process. It is also important for India to use its strong political links with the Pashtun and non-Pashtun ethnic groups, so that a genuine inter-ethnic coalition not only survives but is consolidated in the course of the electoral process. Any fragmentation on ethnic or sectarian lines would make the country more vulnerable to inimical forces operating from across the border with Pakistan. The most difficult decisions may confront India on the security front. There are differing opinions about the capacity of the Afghan security forces to withstand an insurgency campaign by the Taliban and their Pakistani sponsors that will likely intensify after 2014. The Afghan army has demonstrated its fighting capabilities in recent operations, but is hampered by the lack of equipment - particularly long-range artillery and air capability. In case of a major ground assault, will the Afghan forces be able to call for air support from the residual ISAF? This is in doubt since no combat is envisaged after the drawdown of ISAF troops is complete. It may be necessary for India to work with like-minded regional partners to help overcome the disabilities the Afghan army faces in this respect, short of putting boots on the ground. India is on a much better wicket as far as the economic transition is concerned. It has contributed significantly to building muchneeded infrastructure in Afghanistan and has been engaged in capacity building in virtually all sectors. India hosted a well-attended international investment summit on Afghanistan in 2012. The government has been encouraging Indian business to look at investment opportunities in the country. If the political and security situation there remains relatively stable, Afghanistan could become a significant trade partner for India and a platform for India's expanded engagement with Central Asia. While Indian interests will certainly be impacted by the ISAF withdrawal from Afghanistan, India does possess levers to help shape developments in this strategically important neighbouring country. A carefully crafted strategy that must embrace some calculated risks is essential to prevent Afghanistan from relapsing into persistent turmoil and becoming once again a base for Pakistan-supported crossborder terrorism against India.
India’s Nuclear Doctrine Prestige or deterrence?
What is worrying, however, is that this status-seeking argument has been finding an echo among some Indian analysts as well. One analyst recently claimed: “During its long and unfocused nuclear weapons quest, India came to develop a highly self-absorbed approach. This was because India’s dominant objective was political and technological prestige, while for every other nuclear weapon state it was deterrence.” Such sweeping statements show a lack of familiarity with the history of India’s nuclear weapons programme, set against the broader political and security backdrop. They also serve to diminish the very legitimacy of India’s nuclear weapons status though this may not be the intention. For if deterrence was not the reason for which India became a nuclear weapon state, but only for “political and technological prestige”, why should it have nuclear weapons in the first place?
If the argument is that India has and does face threats that require a nuclear deterrent, but these have been ignored by successive generations of India’s political and security elite, then obviously it must be a mere fortuitous coincidence that we have strayed into a strategic capability. This elite, it is implied, comprehends neither the security threats nor the manner in which this accidental acquisition of nuclear weapons and delivery capabilities must be operationalised. This does not square with facts. The thesis that India’s nuclear deterrent is mostly symbolic is, for some, driven by the per ception that India’s armed forces are not fully part of the strategic decision -making process and that they play second fiddle to the civilian bureaucracy and the scientific establishment. Even if this perception was true, and in fact it is not, one cannot accept that the credibility of India’s nuclear deterrence demands management by its military. The very nature of nuclear deterrence as practised by a civilian democracy dictates that decisions relating to the nature and scope of the arsenal, its deployment and use, be anchored in the larger architecture of democratic governance. It is the civilian political leadership that must make judgements about domestic, social and economic priorities as well as the imperatives imposed by a changing regional and global geopolitical environment. The military must be enabled to provide its own perspectives and inputs, just as other segments of the state must do. Undoubtedly the military’s inputs and advice would have to carry weight, especially in operational matters. But to equate exclusive military management of strategic forces, albeit under the political leadership’s overall command, as the sine qua non of deterrence credibility is neither necessary nor desirable. One should certainly encourage better civil-military relations and coordination. It may also be argued that the military’s inputs into strategic planning and execution should be enhanced to make India’s nuclear deterrent more effective. But one should not equate shortcomings in these respects with the absence of a credible nuclear deterrent. If we look at the current status of India’s nuclear deterrent and its command and control system, it is clear that at least two legs of the triad referred to in our nuclear doctrine are already in place. These include a modest arsenal, nuclear capable aircraft and missiles both in fixed underground silos as well as those which are mounted on mobile rail and road-based platforms. These land-based missiles include both Agni-II (1,500 km) as well as Agni-III (2,500 km) missiles. The range and accuracy of further versions, for example Agni V (5,000 km) that was tested successfully only recently, will improve with the acquisition of further technological capability and experience. The third leg of the triad, which is submarine-based, is admittedly a work in progress. We need at least three Arihant class nuclear submarines so that at least one will always be at sea. Submarine-based missiles systems have been developed and tested in the form of the Sagarika but these are still relatively short in range. It is expected that a modest sea-based deterrence will be in place by 2015 or 2016. There is also a major R&D programme which has been in place since 2005 for the development of a new, longer range and more accurate generation of submarine-based missiles which are likely to be ready for deployment around 2020.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------China's President Xi Jinping listed a "five point proposal" for guiding India-China relations. These are: maintain strategic communication and keep bilateral relations on the right track; harness each other's comparative strength and expand win-win cooperation in infrastructure, mutual investment and other areas; strengthen cultural ties and increase mutual understanding and friendship between our peoples; expand coordination and collaboration in multilateral affairs to jointly safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of developing countries and tackle global challenges; accommodate each other's core concerns and properly handle problems and differences existing between the two countries ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tackling new maritime challenges
Get Free Kitchen Catalog - Brand New Designs, Budget Friendly Options. Get Your Free Catalog Now!www.sleekworld.com
BRAHMA CHELLANEY
TOPICS
Ads by Google
SHARE · COMMENT (3) · PRINT · T+
diplomacy international relations
government national government
transport waterway and maritime transport
The international maritime order will continue to gradually but fundamentally change as new powers acquire greater economic and naval heft
Maritime challenges are being fundamentally transformed by new technological and geopolitical realities, shifting trade and energy patterns, and the rise of unconventional threats. The fact that about 50 per cent of the maritime boundaries in the world are still not demarcated, accentuates the challenges. Water covers more than seven-tenths of the planet’s surface, and almost half the global population lives within 200 km of a coastline. It may thus surprise few that 90 per cent of the world’s trade uses maritime routes. With countless freighters, fishing boats, passenger ferries, leisure yachts, and cruise ships plying the waters, a pressing concern is maritime security — a mission tasked to national navies, coast guards, and harbour police forces. Altering equations The maritime order has entered a phase of evolutionary change in response to global power shifts. Maritime power equations are beginning to alter. The shifts actually symbolise the birth-pangs of a new world order. Emerging changes in trade and energy patterns promise to further alter maritime power equations. For example, energyrelated equations are being transformed by a new development: the centre of gravity in the hydrocarbon world is beginning to quietly shift from the Persian Gulf to the Americas, thanks to the shale boom, hydrocarbon extraction in the South Atlantic and Canada’s Alberta Province, and other developments. The United States, for the foreseeable future, will remain the dominant sea power, while Europe will stay a significant maritime player. Yet, the international maritime order will continue to gradually but fundamentally change as new powers acquire greater economic and naval heft. According to a projection by the recently released Global Marine Trends 2030 report, as the global GDP doubles over the next 17 years China will come to own a quarter of the world’s merchant fleet. Several other maritime states in the Asia-Pacific, including Japan, South Korea, India, and Vietnam, are also set to significantly enlarge their maritime footprints. Admittedly, there are real threats to maritime peace and security from the changing maritime power equations and the sharpening competition over resources and geopolitical influence. The Asia-Pacific region — with its crowded and, in some cases, contested sea lanes — is becoming the centre of global maritime competition. Maritime tensions remain high in this region due to rival sovereignty claims, resource-related competition, naval build-ups, and rising nationalism. A lot of attention has focussed on the maritime implications of China’s rise. President Xi Jinping has championed efforts to build China into a global maritime power, saying his government will do everything possible to safeguard China’s “maritime rights and interests” and warning that “in no way will the country abandon its legitimate rights and interests.” China’s increasing emphasis on the oceans was also evident from the November 2012 report to the 18th national congress of the Chinese Communist Party that outlined the country’s maritime power strategy. It called for safeguarding China’s maritime rights and interests, including building improved capacity for exploiting marine resources, and for asserting the country’s larger rights. The risks of maritime conflict arising from mistake or miscalculation are higher between China and its neighbours than between China and the U.S. There has been a course correction in the Obama administration’s “pivot” toward Asia, lest it puts it on the path of taking on Beijing. Washington has bent over backward to tamp down the military aspects of that policy. Even the term “pivot” has been abandoned in favour of the softer new phrase of “rebalancing.” The U.S., moreover, has pointedly refused to take sides in sovereignty disputes between China and its neighbours. It has sought the middle ground between seeking to restrain China and reassure allies but, as former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg has put it, “without getting ourselves into a shooting war.” China has also shied
away from directly challenging U.S. interests. It has been careful not to step on America’s toes. Its assertiveness has been largely directed at its neighbours. After all, China is seeking to alter the territorial and maritime status quo in Asia little by little. This can be described as a “salami-slice” strategy or, what a Chinese general, Zhang Zhaozhong, this year called, a “cabbage” strategy — surrounding a contested area with multiple security layers to deny access to the rival nation. Bit-by-bit strategy This bit-by-bit strategy increases the risk of maritime conflict through overreach, and the inadvertent encouragement it provides to neighbouring countries to overcome their differences and strategically collaborate. The new international maritime challenges, however, go beyond China’s jurisdictional “creep.” The oceans and seas not only have become pivotal to any power’s security and engagement with the outside world but they also constitute the strategic hub of the global geopolitical competition. The growing importance of maritime resources and of sea-lane safety, as well as the concentration of economic boom zones along the coasts, has made maritime security more critical than ever. The maritime challenges extend to non-traditional threats such as climate security, transnational terrorism, illicit fishing, human trafficking, and environmental degradation. The overexploitation of marine resources has underscored the need for conservation and prudent management of the biological diversity of the seabed. Deep seabed mining has emerged as a major new strategic issue. From seeking to tap sulphide deposits — containing valuable metals such as silver, gold, copper, manganese, cobalt and zinc — to phosphorus nodule mining for phosphor-based fertilizers used in food production, the inter-state competition over seabed-mineral wealth underscores the imperative for creating a regulatory regime, developing safe and effective ocean-development technologies, finding ways to share benefits of the common heritage, and ensuring environmental protection. Inter-state competition over seabed minerals is sharpening in the Indian Ocean, for example. Even China, an extraregional power, has secured an international deep-seabed block in southwestern Indian Ocean from the International Seabed Authority to explore for polymetallic sulphides. More broadly, some of the outstanding boundary, sovereignty and jurisdiction issues — extending from the Arctic to the Indian Ocean — carry serious conflict potential. The recrudescence of territorial and maritime disputes, largely tied to competition over natural resources, will increasingly have a bearing on maritime peace and security. Bangladesh and Myanmar have set an example by peacefully resolving a dispute over the delimitation of their maritime boundaries in the Bay of Bengal. They took their dispute to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea for adjudication. The Tribunal’s verdict, delivered in 2012, ended a potentially dangerous dispute that was fuelled in 2008 when, following the discovery of gas deposits in the Bay of Bengal, Myanmar authorised exploration in a contested area, prompting Bangladesh to dispatch warships to the area. However, some important maritime powers, including the U.S., are still not party to the 1982 U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Iran recently seized an Indian oil tanker, holding it for about a month, but India could not file a complaint with the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea because Tehran has not ratified UNCLOS. The seizure of the tanker, carrying Iraqi oil, appeared to be an act of reprisal against India’s sharp reduction of Iranian oil purchases under U.S. pressure. The threats to navigation and maritime freedoms, including in critical straits and exclusive economic zones (EEZs), can be countered only through adherence to international rules by all parties as well as through monitoring, regulation and enforcement. Great-power rivalries, however, continue to complicate international maritime security. The rivalries are mirrored in foreign-aided port-building projects; attempts to assert control over energy supplies and transport routes as part of a 21st-century-version of the Great Game; and the establishment of listening posts and special naval-access arrangements along the great trade arteries. The evolving architecture of global governance will determine how the world handles the pressing maritime challenges it confronts. The assertive pursuit of national interest for relative gain in an increasingly interdependent world is hardly a recipe for harmonious maritime relations. Another concern is the narrow, compartmentalised approach in which each maritime issue is sought to be dealt with separately, instead of addressing the challenges in an integrated framework. (Brahma Chellaney, a geostrategist, is the author, most recently, of Water, Peace, and War — Rowman & Littlefield, 2013)
Why India’s new border pact with China won’t work
The new Border Defence Cooperation Agreement with China is loaded against India’s interests
Brahma Chellaney
109
inShare
109
0 inShare
0
Comments
Subscribe to: Breaking News
Enter email
Daily Newsletter
Latest News
05:44 PM IST
PM accuses Narendra Modi of resorting to falsehoods, twisting facts
05:07 PM IST
Former US treasury secretary Geithner to join private equity firm
04:52 PM IST
India in talks with US on Bangladesh political situation
04:50 PM IST
Malta to host next Commonwealth summit: Sharma
04:33 PM IST
Outlook for fertilizer companies hinges on winter crops
Editor's picks
Sachin Tendulkar to be awarded Bharat Ratna
Premature births rising in India, states lack neonatal care centres, says report
RBI deputy governor Chakrabarty says PSU banks lax in credit appraisals
Viswanathan Anand loses game six against Magnus Carlsen
ISRO performs last orbit raising manoeuvre on its Mars mission
Also Read
Scrap border defence pact with China: BJP tells Centre India, China set to sign landmark pact on border cooperation India, Russia to sign pacts on Kudankulam III, IV reactors India, China hold talks on new border security mechanism New border defence pact between India, China on anvil
New Delhi’s willingness to let China dictate the so-called Border Defence Cooperation Agreement mirrors its broader strategic timidity in permitting Beijing to lay down the terms of the bilateral relationship. Photo: AFP
Seeking to compensate for his low political stock at home,Manmohan Singhhas undertaken more overseas trips as prime minister than any predecessor, visiting China multiple times. Yet, India punches far below its weight internationally, while its regional security has come under siege, with his tenure witnessing a sharp deterioration in ties with China. The highlight of the latest China visit of India’s most-travelled prime minister will not be progress on any of the core issues dividing the two countries but a Chinese-ordained border accord designed to supplant existing frontier-peace and confidence-building agreements that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has undermined through repeated cross-frontier raids and other incursions. No Indian official has explained the rationale for entering into a new agreement demanded by the party that has breached existing border-peace accords with impunity. New Delhi’s willingness to let China dictate the so-called Border Defence Cooperation Agreement (BDCA) mirrors its broader strategic timidity in permitting Beijing to lay down the terms of the bilateral relationship. China has fashioned an asymmetrical commercial relationship, reaping trade surpluses, even as it stymies any progress on issues of core concern to India. China’s most-insidious warfare against India is in the economic realm, yet India has done little to stop Beijing from turning it into a raw-material supplier to the Chinese economy and from subverting Indian manufacturing through dumping of goods. Perpetuating such a lopsided economic relationship gives Beijing little incentive to bridge the political divide. It also aids China’s strategy to prevent India’s rise as a peer competitor. Even as Beijing disturbs the territorial and water-flow status quo, New Delhi won’t leverage China’s growing Indiamarket access to influence Chinese conduct. China, however, does not shy away from mixing politics and business. It has quietly used trade to punish countries it quarrels with. For example, Japanese exports to China, which sank 13.2% in the first seven months this year, have been falling since September 2012, when China began wielding the trade sword over the Senkaku islands dispute.
Singh’s visit will likely yield the usual platitudes about friendship and cooperation while leaving India’s concerns unaddressed. With an unresolved border issue, Beijing has been reluctant to even clarify what the two sides farcically call the line of actual control (LAC). And even as it turns Tibet into the new hub of its dam-building spree, China has brazenly sought to turn the tables on India, accusing it through a state mouthpiece last week of “attempting to reinforce its actual control and occupation of” Arunachal Pradesh through water projects there. Singh, acquiescing to China’s sidelining of the core issues, told reporters before leaving that, “The two governments are addressing them with sincerity and maturity without letting them affect the overall atmosphere of friendship and cooperation”. Even by his pusillanimous standards, making a Chinese-dictated accord the highlight of his official visit marks a new low in Indian diplomacy. Consider the humiliating circumstances that spawned this agreement: PLA intruded deep into Ladakh’s Depsang Plateau by stealth before Beijing embarked on coercive diplomacy, forcing India’s hand on BDCA, whose draft it had sent earlier. In return for China withdrawing its encamped troops from Indian land, India demolished a line of defensive fortifications in Chumar and ended forward patrols in the area, besides agreeing to wrap up negotiations on BDCA, which until then it had baulked at. The Depsang encroachment inflicted permanent damage to the existing border-peace accords, including the 2005 mutual commitment to “strictly respect and observe” the LAC. Yet, paradoxically, China demanded a new agreement to take precedence over the more equitable 1993, 1996 and 2005 border-peace accords. Indeed, such was the bloodless victory China scored by deploying a single platoon of no more than 50 soldiers in Depsang that India, in the manner of a vanquished nation, merely offered its comments and suggestions on the Chinese-imposed draft and sent its national security adviser and defence minister in rapid succession to Beijing to commit itself to BDCA’s “early conclusion”. Now, by personally paying obeisance in Beijing, Singh culminates this mortifying process, lending his imprimatur to an agreement that can only embolden China to up the ante. In fact, since India’s virtual capitulation to Chinese demands more than five months ago, China’s military provocations have included multiple daring raids and other forays across the Himalayan frontier, the world’s longest disputed border. Via the planeload of journalists he takes, Singh trumpets almost every overseas visit as a diplomatic success. His spinmeisters are also marketing BDCA as positive for India, highlighting features that in reality are dubious. Why would a new military hotline with China make a difference when a similar hotline with Pakistan hasn’t worked? Given that India timorously deploys border police to fend off incursions by the aggressive PLA, the clause on “no tailing” of each other’s patrols is really applicable to China. But any accord for China is just a political tool to advance its interests, including by lulling the other party into complacency and creating exploitable opportunities. Singh’s China policy represents a case study in how meekness attracts bullying. BDCA is a symbol of that. Comments are welcome at [email protected]
Averting water wars in the future
Water poses a more intractable problem for the world than peak oil, economic slowdown and other challenges
Brahma Chellaney
First Published: Mon, Oct 07 2013. 07 18 PM IST
Water wars in a political and economic sense are already being waged between competing states in several regions, including by building dams on international rivers. Photo: Sam Panthaky/AFP
ALSO READ
Why India’s new border pact with China won’t work I don’t want to compromise on due diligence process: Veerappa Moily China-to-India price jump threatens growth as world outlook dims Of India, China and water disagreements China grabs limelight as US hobbled at Asia-Pacific summit
In an increasingly water-stressed world, shared water resources are becoming an instrument of power, fostering competition within and between nations. The struggle for water is escalating political tensions and exacerbating impacts on ecosystems. This week’s Budapest World Water Summit is the latest initiative in the search for ways to mitigate the pressing challenges. Consider some sobering facts: Bottled water at the grocery store is already more expensive than crude oil on the international spot market. More people in the world today own or use a mobile phone than have access to water sanitation services. Unclean water is the greatest killer on the globe, yet a fifth of humankind still lacks easy access to potable water. More than half of the global population currently lives under water stress—a figure projected to increase to two-thirds during the next decade. Adequate access to natural resources, historically, has been a key factor in peace and war. Water, however, is very different from other natural resources. There are substitutes for a number of resources, including oil, but none for water. Countries can import, even from distant lands, fossil fuels, mineral ores, and resources originating in the biosphere. But they cannot import the most vital of all resources, water—certainly not in a major or sustainable manner. Water is essentially local and thus very expensive to ship across seas.
Rapid economic and demographic expansion, however, has already turned potable water into a major issue across large parts of the world. Lifestyle changes, for example, have spurred increasing per capita water consumption in the form of industrial and agricultural products. Consumption growth has become the single biggest driver of water stress. Rising incomes, for example, have promoted changing diets, especially a greater intake of meat, whose production is notoriously water-intensive. It is about 10 times more water-intensive to produce meat than plant-based calories and proteins. It is against this background that water wars in a political and economic sense are already being waged between competing states in several regions, including by building dams on international rivers or, if the country is located downstream, by resorting to coercive diplomacy to prevent such construction. US intelligence has warned that such water conflicts could turn into real wars. According to a report reflecting the joint judgement of US intelligence agencies, the use of water as a weapon of war or a tool of terrorism will be more likely in the next decade in some regions. Commercial or state decisions in many countries on where to set up new manufacturing or energy plants are increasingly being constrained by inadequate local water availability. The World Bank has estimated the economic cost of China’s water problems at 2.3% of its gross domestic product. China, however, is not as yet under water stress—a term internationally defined as the availability of less than 1,700 cubic metres of water per head per year. The already water-stressed economies, stretching from South Korea and India to Egypt and Morocco, are paying a higher price for their water problems. In fact, water is becoming the world’s next major security and economic challenge. Although no modern war has been fought just over water, this resource has been an underlying factor in several armed conflicts. With the era of cheap, bountiful water having been replaced by increasing supply and quality constraints, the risks of overt water wars are now increasing. Averting water wars needs rules-based cooperation, water sharing and dispute settlement mechanisms. However, there is still no international water law in force, and most of the regional water agreements are toothless, lack monitoring and enforcement rules and provisions to formally divide water among users. Worse still, unilateralist appropriation of shared resources is endemic where autocrats rule. For example, China rejects the very concept of water sharing and is working to have its hand on Asia’s water tap by building an extensive upstream hydro-infrastructure. India, by contrast, has a water-sharing treaty with each of the two countries located downstream to it—Pakistan and Bangladesh. Indeed, the only Asian treaties that incorporate a specific sharing formula on cross-border river flows are those covering the Indus and the Ganges. Both these treaties set new principles in international water law: the 1996 Ganges pact guarantees Bangladesh an equal share of the downstream flows in the most difficult dry season, while the earlier 1960 Indus treaty remains the world’s most generous water-sharing arrangement, under which India agreed to set aside 80.52% of the waters of the six-river Indus system for Pakistan indefinitely in the naïve belief that it could trade water for peace. A central issue facing Asia is not the readiness to accommodate China’s rise but the need to persuade China’s leaders to institutionalize cooperation with its neighbours on shared resources. China already boasts more dams than any other country in the world. And its rush to build yet more dams, especially giant ones, promises to roil relations across Asia. If China continues on its current course, prospects for a rules-based Asian order could perish forever. Water poses a more intractable problem for the world than peak oil, economic slowdown and other oft-cited challenges. Addressing this core problem indeed holds the key to dealing with other challenges because of water’s nexus with global warming, energy shortages, stresses on food supply, population pressures, pollution, environmental degradation, global epidemics and natural disasters.
Comments are welcome at [email protected] Brahma Chellaney is professor of strategic studies at the Centre for Policy Research and the author of the forthcoming book Water, Peace, and War: Confronting the Global Water Crisis (Oxford University Press).
CHOGM 2013 - Sri Lanka - 53 world leaders meet in paradise Visit the official website today!www.chogm2013.lk
R.K. PACHAURI K. SRINATH REDDY
Ads by Google
SHARE · PRINT · T+
EARTH WATCH:Environmental degradation is a symptom of wastage of resources and the pursuit of short-term profit. A jhum field in Karbi Anglong district, Assam.—PHOTO: RITU RAJ KONWAR
Much of the national discourse in India poses environmental sustainability as desirable but inimical to our objective of achieving a high rate of GDP growth, without which poverty eradication and economic and social development of our people would not be possible. There is a trade-off, it is argued, between pursuing development and safeguarding the environment. Still others point to the history of modern industrial development: first there was widespread pollution and degradation of the environment, and then a clean-up and setting of high international standards once prosperity was achieved. China appears to be following the same logic even though there appears to be some rethinking on the subject. We reject these arguments. At the very outset we wish to reiterate that safeguarding the environment is not at all inimical to rapid economic development. In fact, in our resource constrained world today, maintaining high environmental standards may have become a prerequisite for achieving steady, long-term growth of our economy. This is particularly so given our high population density and the dependence of large numbers on ecosystem services. Nor do we accept the argument that higher standards of living are incompatible with an insistence on environmental sustainability. In fact, maintaining and improving the quality of life for all our citizens may only be possible if the environmental degradation that we witness all around us is reversed and the fragile ecology of our country is preserved. These two propositions lie at the heart of the concept of Green Growth. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, “Green growth is about fostering economic growth and development while ensuring that the natural assets continue to provide the resources and environmental services on which our well-being relies.” The 13th Finance Commission clearly underscored this in stating, “Green growth involves rethinking growth strategies with regard to the impacts on environmental sustainability and the environmental resources available to poor and vulnerable groups.” Diminishing returns In rethinking growth, we need to focus on the current reality of a resource constrained world. During their period of rapid economic growth, the small cluster of western economies had access to the resources of the entire world. Technological progress further extended such access. Today, with the “rise of the rest,” in particular the rapid
development of continental size and highly populous countries like India and China, the demand for resources of every kind, has been rising exponentially. We are entering an era of finite resources where the production and consumption patterns typical of the advanced western economies are no longer sustainable. Resource intensive and, in particular energy intensive processes will need to make way for more efficient and resource frugal development strategies if we are to avoid an economic dead end or a world in which only a small elite is able to enjoy affluence in the midst of a sea of poverty. Environmental degradation is, in essence, a symptom of wastage of resources and the pursuit of short-term profit over long-term sustainable development. In India, we face a crisis in agriculture because it is land, energy and water intensive and all three resources are becoming increasingly scarce. The heavy use of chemical fertilizers and toxic pesticides has ravaged our soil and contaminated our food chain and water supply. The prolonged and unprotected handling of toxic chemicals is also exposing our farmers to multiple health problems, whose economic and social costs are rarely considered. The Green Revolution may have led to a period of food self-sufficiency but that input intensive strategy has now run its course and is yielding diminishing returns even while generating widespread environmental degradation. The good news is that a number of field studies carried out in various parts of the country have demonstrated that high yields in agriculture are compatible with practices that make minimal use of chemical inputs, conserve water and rely on organic nutrients and bio-pesticides. The natural fertility of the soil in these locations has been restored also leading to the revival of microorganisms in the subsoil which make the soil a living asset. Fossil fuels and a shift The air in our cities is heavily polluted and this too, is leading to increasing public health problems. The incidence of respiratory and ophthalmological problems in our urban population has been on the rise alarmingly. Even in our villages, the inefficient burning of bio-mass for meeting rural energy and cooking needs continues to cause both indoor and external air pollution again with serious health consequences, leave aside their climate change impact globally. The use of carbon-based fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas is at the heart of our economic processes and hence the challenge we face both in dealing with most forms of environmental degradation and climate change. Unless we make a strategic shift from our current reliance on fossil fuels to progressively greater use of renewable and clean sources of energy, green growth will remain a chimera. Making this shift requires rationalising our pricing of goods and services. The Indian economy suffers from pernicious subsidies, such as those on kerosene, even though it is common knowledge that 40 per cent of subsidised kerosene finds its way into adulteration of petroleum products. There is a cost-effective alternative to meeting the lighting needs of our rural population, without the health costs of ingesting kerosene fumes. TERI’s “Lighting a Billion Lives” campaign, based on modern designs of solar lanterns, has established the economic viability and social benefits of this option, but the spread of this technology is hampered by the barrier of kerosene subsidies. Steps forward Green growth in India can only be promoted by providing certain essential services to people as public goods. People have the right to mobility, not necessarily the right to private transportation for obtaining this service. If the density of car ownership in India was to reach even a fraction of that in western countries, the requirement for fuel imports and land for roads and parking would be multiples of the current global levels. We must invest in convenient and efficient public transportation and discourage private transport. Rail transport and the use of waterways would be less costly and less polluting, while bringing benefits to the vast majority of our people. India should position itself as an early leader in the green technology revolution, having missed out on the industrial revolution and becoming only a late entrant to the ICT revolution. Green growth is efficient growth. Green growth is inclusive growth. Green growth is sustainable growth, ensuring that we never take from Nature beyond her capacity for regeneration. India is living on an ecological overdraft. It is time for us to balance our books reflecting our true assets and real liabilities. Mahatma Gandhi rightly stated, “We may utilize the gifts of Nature just as we choose but in her books, the debits are always equal to the credits”. (Dr. R.K. Pachauri is director general, TERI, Dr. K. Srinath Reddy is president, Public Health Foundation of India, and Shyam Saran is chairman, National Security Advisory Board.)
Shyam Saran: Climate change - An unequivocal report
The latest IPCC report leaves no room for doubt. India should take the lead in renewing international negotiations Luxury Apartments, Thane
Spacious 3 BHK Starting at 1.1 Cr Rumah Bali Creme on Ghodbunder Road puranikbuilders.com/022-3026-6101
Ads by Google 6
Add to My Page Read more on:
Ipcc | Unfccc | Monsoon | Climate Change | Shyam Saran
More Columns by Shyam Saran
China's flawed rebalancing A cloudy Independence Day Time to resurrect G5 The case of Snowden and global voyeurism India's Japan moment
4 BHK Villas In Pune
Get Assured Rental Income of Rs.27k PM for 11 Months. Limited Offer!Gera.in/Sky-VillasKharadi
Compare Prices on Mobiles
All Types of Branded Mobiles, Smart Phones. Visit Junglee.com!www.Junglee.com/Mobiles
Ads by Google
On September 27, 2013, the Working Group 1 of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released in Stockholm its "Approved Summary for Policy Makers", providing the latest assessment of the science underlying the phenomenon of climate change. This is the most significant document on climate change since the fourth IPCC report. The fourth report, which was released in 2007, generated the momentum for the ongoing multilateral negotiations on climate change under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). While the full report of the fifth IPCC session is awaited, the present document is important because its agreed conclusions, scientifically determined, will influence the course of the negotiations on the Durban Platform - which, by the year 2015, "must develop a protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force under the convention applicable to all parties". The "Approved Summary" states categorically, without the usual qualifications scientists are so fond of, that the "warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s, many of the observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia. The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, sea level has risen, and the concentrations of greenhouse gases have increased". No ambiguity here. The report is also categorical in ascribing this warming trend to anthropogenic, or man-made, factors - in particular, the burning of fossil fuels since the industrial revolution began 200 years ago, land use changes due to an increase in population, extension of agricultural acreage and habitat, thereby shrinking the natural forest sinks that absorb carbon dioxide. The world's oceans are becoming steadily saturated by the carbon that they absorb, warming in the process, though more slowly. Sea levels could rise by a metre above current levels by the end of this century. Were Greenland ice cover to melt entirely, sea levels could rise by as much as seven metres. These changes are impacting weather patterns throughout the world. Of particular interest to India is the observation:"Whilemonsoon winds are likely to weaken, monsoon precipitation is likely to intensify due to the increase in atmospheric moisture. Monsoon onset dates are likely to become earlier or not to change much. Monsoon retreat dates are likely to be delayed, resulting in lengthening of the monsoon season in many regions." Is this what is happening in Delhi right now with unusually late monsoon rains? There is another observation of relevance to India: "It is virtually certain that there will be more frequent hot and fewer cold temperature extremes over most land areas on daily and seasonal timescales as global mean temperatures increase. It is very likely that heat waves will occur with a higher frequency and duration." This confirms what we have been experiencing anecdotally in most recent years. The most important part of the report concerns the density of carbon and non-carbon greenhouse gases accumulated in the earth's
atmosphere. In order to limit the global temperature increase to two degrees Celsius compared to pre-industrial levels, with a more than 66 per cent probability, cumulative greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere must stay within 800 gigatonnes of carbon equivalent (GtC). But by 2011, we had already used up approximately 530 GtC. Therefore, the balance available is only 270 GtC. On a business-as-usual basis, this balance will also be used up in the next 20 to 25 years. It may be noted that even if, by some miracle, greenhouse gas emissions became zero, the climatic effects would continue for a considerable period, since these emissions stay in the atmosphere for long periods of time. As the summary says, "Depending upon the scenario, about 15 to 40 per cent of emitted CO2 will remain in the atmosphere longer than 1,000 years." For the first time we have an authoritative document with a much-needed focus on the stock aspect of emissions rather than the current flow. What the summary is demonstrating scientifically is that climate change is integrally linked to the accumulated stock of greenhouse gas emissions in the earth's atmosphere, to which current emissions are only an incremental addition. The stock is mainly the responsibility of advanced industrial countries, although developing countries such as India and China may be responsible for most incremental additions. Historical responsibility and equity demand that the former shoulder most of the burden of making the strategic shift required through transforming existing energy systems and support developing countries in taking similar action. The summary has spelt out the climate emergency starkly and unambiguously for policy makers; but is there political will to collaborate in confronting what is indisputably an elemental threat to humanity? It has been clear for some time that unless there is a global and strategic shift from production and consumption processes based on fossil fuels, which are a hallmark of our industrial age, to those progressively based on renewable and clean sources of energy, there is little or no prospect of averting an ecological emergency of global proportions. Yet, in 2012, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development reported that the world's top 200 listed oil, gas and mining companies had spent $674 billion on finding and developing new sources of oil and gas. The same year even the modest investment in renewables had declined. In addition, the world spends nearly $1.9 trillion annually on energy subsidies, according to the International Monetary Fund. It is difficult to see how such entrenched energy systems and the powerful vested interests behind them can be transformed speedily to avoid a climate-induced disaster. India has declared that the earth's atmospheric space is a global commons to which all citizens of the world have equal entitlement. The carbon space, as long as it exists, must also be shared equitably. In fact, a global and collaborative response to the climate challenge can only be built - and sustained - on the basis of equity. India should use the latest analysis to reinforce its constant emphasis on the principle of equity, which is sought to be set aside by the developed countries in the current negotiations. This should be our brief for the forthcoming UNFCCC meeting in Poland later this year.
India’s date with the Arctic
CHOGM 2013 - Sri Lanka - 53 world leaders meet in paradise Visit the official website today!www.chogm2013.lk
SHYAM SARAN
Ads by Google
SHARE · COMMENT (7) · PRINT · T+
APTaking
into account the ‘global commons’ character of the Arctic, such an international regime must be able to put in place a n effective compliance mechanism. Photo: AP INFOGRAPHIC Arctic circle: A new energy front
LINKS Arctic Council - the official website TOPICS diplomacy international relations
summit
Instead of joining the race to commercially exploit this pristine region, New Delhi must use its position in the regional council to push for a global mechanism to prevent an unseemly gold rush
On May 15, 2013, India became an Observer at the Arctic Council, which coordinates policy on the Arctic. (The Arctic Council has eight states as members, the five coastal states, Canada, Russia, the U.S., Norway and Denmark (through Greenland), and Sweden, Iceland and Finland.) Other countries that joined India as Observers were China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Italy. The United Kingdom, France, Germany, Poland, Spain and the Netherlands are already Observers. Criteria In becoming an Observer, India had to agree to the following criteria set by the Council: (i) recognise the sovereign rights of Arctic states; (ii) recognise that the Law of the Sea and the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, constitute the legal basis and the legal framework within which the Arctic will be managed; (iii) respect indigenous peoples, local cultures and traditions; and (iv) be able to contribute to the work of the Arctic Council. Template transfer? In accepting to abide by these criteria, India has recognised the territorial jurisdiction and sovereign rights of the Arctic littoral states and hence their pre-eminent and even pre-emptive role over the Arctic zone. The acceptance of
the Law of the Sea as the governing instrument for the Arctic also implies that the extension of jurisdiction over the continental shelf as well as over maritime passage and the resources of the ocean space will lie with the littoral states. The Arctic has virtually become the inland water space of the five coastal states — Russia, Norway, Denmark, Canada and the United States. India has, therefore, no more room to argue that the region be treated in the same manner as the Antarctica. In the Antarctica Treaty of 1959, territorial claims have been kept in abeyance in favour of a global commons approach, respecting the pristine nature of the ice covered continent. The trends we see in the Arctic region may well come to pass in the Antarctic as well. The claimant states could reasonably argue that just as the Arctic space is being managed by the sovereign members of the Arctic Council, with well-defined norms and through cooperation among both the littoral and user states, why could this not serve as a template for Antarctica? Like the Arctic, the Antarctic, too, is a treasure house of resources. These are also being unlocked by the steady melting of the continent’s ice cover. It may only be a question of time before the northern Gold Rush is followed by its rampant Southern version. India has succumbed to the temptation of sharing in the emerging opportunities for resource extraction as the Arctic continues to melt because of global warming, Yes, as the government argues, becoming an Observer would enable India to take part in scientific research into the changing Arctic environment, including its serious climate change effects. These effects will be global, whether in sea level rise, the acidification of the worlds’ oceans and change in ocean currents and weather patterns. India’s association with the Arctic Council puts it in a better position to understand these changes and be a part of efforts to minimise the adverse consequences of the Arctic being opened up to intensified human activity. However, both the members of the Arctic Council and the Observers, including India, have avoided confronting the obvious: the opportunities that they seek to exploit and profit from are the very activities which will exacerbate the climate change impact of a warming Arctic. The “on the one hand” and “on the other hand” approach that all these stakeholders are guilty of merely disguises the fact that the lure of profit has already triumphed over the fear of ecological disaster. China has lost no time in positioning itself through a number of asset acquisitions in several Arctic states, in particular, Russia and Canada. Practical What could be done to restrain this headlong rush into a potential ecological catastrophe of global dimensions? Oceanographer and Arctic expert Rick Steiner has made a practical and reasonable suggestion. This is for the U.N. to set up its own Arctic body. It may be on the lines of the Indian Ocean Commission, which may provide the international community the capacity to monitor what is happening in the region, draw up strict norms for activities, taking into account the “global commons” character of the Arctic, and put in place a credible and effective compliance mechanism. India could certainly push for such a global regime without violating its role of Observer at the Arctic Council. It may also be worthwhile for India and other developing states to put the Arctic on the agenda of the ongoing multilateral negotiations on Climate Change under the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change. A separate resolution or decision of the Conference of Parties to the Convention could draw attention to the Arctic as a global commons, its impact on global climate and the need to ensure that the activities undertaken there do not harm the well-being of the vast majority of people around the world. I have said earlier and reiterate: it is hypocritical of the developed, industrialised countries, in particular, the rich Arctic states, to preach low carbon development strategies to poor, developing countries, while they themselves, rush headlong into ensuring the perpetuation of their own carbon and fossil fuel intensive patterns of production and consumption. This hypocrisy lies at the heart of the relentless spoilage and ravaging of one of the last pristine frontiers of our endangered planet. If we keep silent and look away because of the prospect of sharing in this unseemly Gold Rush, India’s credentials as a responsible member of the international community and as a champion of the principle of equitable burden-sharing and inter-generational equity, would become deeply suspect. (Shyam Saran, a former Foreign Secretary, is currently Chairman, National Security Advisory Board.)
Managing transition in Afghanistan
India needs a strategy to frustrate plans by Pakistan and its Taliban proxies to dominate Afghanistan after 2014 Submit Your Resume
Exp 3 - 15 Yrs. Salary 5 - 20 Lakhs To Apply Register on Shine.com Now www.shine.com/Urgent_Jobs
Ads by Google 5
Add to My Page Read more on:
Afghanistan | Pakistan | Taliban | Instability | Isaf | Cross-border Terrorism | Hamid Karzai |Internecine Violence
RELATED NEWS
Opium cultivation to surge in Afghanistan in 2013: UN Pak election tribunal rejects Musharraf's appeal India, China look to cooperate to counter terror in Afghan Musharraf admits to deal with US on drone strikes Musharraf files appeal against rejection of his nomination
HDFC ERGO™ Health Policy Luxury Apartments, Thane
Cashless Claims Across India at 4000+ Network Hospitals. Know More!HDFCERGO.com/Health_Insurance Spacious 3 BHK Starting at 1.1 Cr Rumah Bali Creme on Ghodbunder Roadpuranikbuilders.com/022-3026-6101
Ads by Google
Afghanistan will undergo multiple transitions in 2014, and their outcome will determine whether the country will emerge as a strong, viable and peaceful state or whether it will relapse intointernecine violence, instability and a base for cross-border terrorismagainst neighbouring states. The impending political transition has two aspects. One, there will be elections for a new president, marking the end of the Hamid Karzai era and, therefore, the political continuity - if not always predictability - that it represented. Two, there is the fate of the peace and reconciliation process, which seeks to integrate theTaliban and other militants into the political and constitutional mainstream. These two dimensions of the political transition are interlinked.
The political transition is accompanied by a security transition. There is already a steady drawdown of the US-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), and the Afghan National Army is taking on security responsibilities throughout the country. The Afghan army is already responsible for security in areas that account for nearly 90 per cent of the Afghan population - this will be complete by the end of 2014 when the combat role of the ISAF will come to an end. The ISAF may retain a residual presence for the purposes of extending training and advice to the Afghan army, but it will not engage in active operations. The peak strength for the Afghan security forces is 352,000 and is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future, provided the promised financial support from the ISAF countries - of $4 billion annually, initially for the three years 2014-16 - is realised. The third major transition will transform Afghanistan from an aid-driven economy to an investment- and trade-driven one, leveraging the country's location at the crossroads of South Asia, Central Asia and West Asia as well as its more recent emergence as a resourceand mineral-rich country. It should come as no surprise that the success of each of these transitions is linked to the other two. Political instability or renewed violence, for example, would render the achievement of the economic objective impossible. So, what is the current status of each transition, and what could India contribute to enhance the prospects of success? The reconciliation process is going nowhere. The representatives of the Mullah Omar-led Quetta Shura are in Doha, but no structured talks have been held so far either with the US or with the Karzai government. It had been reported that Pakistan had had a change of heart and was actively supporting the peace and reconciliation process. However, a recent interaction with Afghan government officials indicated that, rather than play a supportive role, Pakistan was looking at 2014 as an opportunity to get back into so-called "strategic relevance", become the dominant arbiter of Afghanistan's future and, in particular, marginalise India's considerable presence in that country. In recent talks with the Karzai government, Pakistan demanded that Indian presence in the country be limited only to its
embassy in Kabul; that training for Afghanistan's security forces should be sought from Pakistan and not from India; and that Indian involvement in infrastructure projects should cease - only then would Pakistan assist with the peace process by leaning on the Taliban and the other Pakistan-based militants such as the Hekmatyar group and the Haqqani group to take part. It is also noteworthy that a much-touted meeting of senior clerics from Pakistan and Afghanistan, which was sponsored by the Afghan High Peace Council last month, did not take place eventually. A leading Pakistani cleric even publicly declared that suicide bombings were justified in a so-called liberation struggle. Despite persistent hopes expressed in Western capitals, this process is a dead end and India should work on the assumption that Pakistan and its Taliban proxies look upon 2014 as an opportunity to regain a dominant and strategic foothold in the country. We need a strategy to forestall and frustrate this outcome. In this context, the second aspect of the political transition is of crucial importance. India should join hands with the international community to facilitate free and fair elections, both for the presidency in 2014 and Parliament in 2015. This will provide the incoming political leadership legitimacy and credibility with a stronger hand to pursue a more effective peace process. It is also important for India to use its strong political links with the Pashtun and non-Pashtun ethnic groups, so that a genuine inter-ethnic coalition not only survives but is consolidated in the course of the electoral process. Any fragmentation on ethnic or sectarian lines would make the country more vulnerable to inimical forces operating from across the border with Pakistan. The most difficult decisions may confront India on the security front. There are differing opinions about the capacity of the Afghan security forces to withstand an insurgency campaign by the Taliban and their Pakistani sponsors that will likely intensify after 2014. The Afghan army has demonstrated its fighting capabilities in recent operations, but is hampered by the lack of equipment - particularly long-range artillery and air capability. In case of a major ground assault, will the Afghan forces be able to call for air support from the residual ISAF? This is in doubt since no combat is envisaged after the drawdown of ISAF troops is complete. It may be necessary for India to work with like-minded regional partners to help overcome the disabilities the Afghan army faces in this respect, short of putting boots on the ground. India is on a much better wicket as far as the economic transition is concerned. It has contributed significantly to building muchneeded infrastructure in Afghanistan and has been engaged in capacity building in virtually all sectors. India hosted a well-attended international investment summit on Afghanistan in 2012. The government has been encouraging Indian business to look at investment opportunities in the country. If the political and security situation there remains relatively stable, Afghanistan could become a significant trade partner for India and a platform for India's expanded engagement with Central Asia. While Indian interests will certainly be impacted by the ISAF withdrawal from Afghanistan, India does possess levers to help shape developments in this strategically important neighbouring country. A carefully crafted strategy that must embrace some calculated risks is essential to prevent Afghanistan from relapsing into persistent turmoil and becoming once again a base for Pakistan-supported crossborder terrorism against India.
India’s Nuclear Doctrine Prestige or deterrence?
What is worrying, however, is that this status-seeking argument has been finding an echo among some Indian analysts as well. One analyst recently claimed: “During its long and unfocused nuclear weapons quest, India came to develop a highly self-absorbed approach. This was because India’s dominant objective was political and technological prestige, while for every other nuclear weapon state it was deterrence.” Such sweeping statements show a lack of familiarity with the history of India’s nuclear weapons programme, set against the broader political and security backdrop. They also serve to diminish the very legitimacy of India’s nuclear weapons status though this may not be the intention. For if deterrence was not the reason for which India became a nuclear weapon state, but only for “political and technological prestige”, why should it have nuclear weapons in the first place?
If the argument is that India has and does face threats that require a nuclear deterrent, but these have been ignored by successive generations of India’s political and security elite, then obviously it must be a mere fortuitous coincidence that we have strayed into a strategic capability. This elite, it is implied, comprehends neither the security threats nor the manner in which this accidental acquisition of nuclear weapons and delivery capabilities must be operationalised. This does not square with facts. The thesis that India’s nuclear deterrent is mostly symbolic is, for some, driven by the per ception that India’s armed forces are not fully part of the strategic decision -making process and that they play second fiddle to the civilian bureaucracy and the scientific establishment. Even if this perception was true, and in fact it is not, one cannot accept that the credibility of India’s nuclear deterrence demands management by its military. The very nature of nuclear deterrence as practised by a civilian democracy dictates that decisions relating to the nature and scope of the arsenal, its deployment and use, be anchored in the larger architecture of democratic governance. It is the civilian political leadership that must make judgements about domestic, social and economic priorities as well as the imperatives imposed by a changing regional and global geopolitical environment. The military must be enabled to provide its own perspectives and inputs, just as other segments of the state must do. Undoubtedly the military’s inputs and advice would have to carry weight, especially in operational matters. But to equate exclusive military management of strategic forces, albeit under the political leadership’s overall command, as the sine qua non of deterrence credibility is neither necessary nor desirable. One should certainly encourage better civil-military relations and coordination. It may also be argued that the military’s inputs into strategic planning and execution should be enhanced to make India’s nuclear deterrent more effective. But one should not equate shortcomings in these respects with the absence of a credible nuclear deterrent. If we look at the current status of India’s nuclear deterrent and its command and control system, it is clear that at least two legs of the triad referred to in our nuclear doctrine are already in place. These include a modest arsenal, nuclear capable aircraft and missiles both in fixed underground silos as well as those which are mounted on mobile rail and road-based platforms. These land-based missiles include both Agni-II (1,500 km) as well as Agni-III (2,500 km) missiles. The range and accuracy of further versions, for example Agni V (5,000 km) that was tested successfully only recently, will improve with the acquisition of further technological capability and experience. The third leg of the triad, which is submarine-based, is admittedly a work in progress. We need at least three Arihant class nuclear submarines so that at least one will always be at sea. Submarine-based missiles systems have been developed and tested in the form of the Sagarika but these are still relatively short in range. It is expected that a modest sea-based deterrence will be in place by 2015 or 2016. There is also a major R&D programme which has been in place since 2005 for the development of a new, longer range and more accurate generation of submarine-based missiles which are likely to be ready for deployment around 2020.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------China's President Xi Jinping listed a "five point proposal" for guiding India-China relations. These are: maintain strategic communication and keep bilateral relations on the right track; harness each other's comparative strength and expand win-win cooperation in infrastructure, mutual investment and other areas; strengthen cultural ties and increase mutual understanding and friendship between our peoples; expand coordination and collaboration in multilateral affairs to jointly safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of developing countries and tackle global challenges; accommodate each other's core concerns and properly handle problems and differences existing between the two countries ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tackling new maritime challenges
Get Free Kitchen Catalog - Brand New Designs, Budget Friendly Options. Get Your Free Catalog Now!www.sleekworld.com
BRAHMA CHELLANEY
TOPICS
Ads by Google
SHARE · COMMENT (3) · PRINT · T+
diplomacy international relations
government national government
transport waterway and maritime transport
The international maritime order will continue to gradually but fundamentally change as new powers acquire greater economic and naval heft
Maritime challenges are being fundamentally transformed by new technological and geopolitical realities, shifting trade and energy patterns, and the rise of unconventional threats. The fact that about 50 per cent of the maritime boundaries in the world are still not demarcated, accentuates the challenges. Water covers more than seven-tenths of the planet’s surface, and almost half the global population lives within 200 km of a coastline. It may thus surprise few that 90 per cent of the world’s trade uses maritime routes. With countless freighters, fishing boats, passenger ferries, leisure yachts, and cruise ships plying the waters, a pressing concern is maritime security — a mission tasked to national navies, coast guards, and harbour police forces. Altering equations The maritime order has entered a phase of evolutionary change in response to global power shifts. Maritime power equations are beginning to alter. The shifts actually symbolise the birth-pangs of a new world order. Emerging changes in trade and energy patterns promise to further alter maritime power equations. For example, energyrelated equations are being transformed by a new development: the centre of gravity in the hydrocarbon world is beginning to quietly shift from the Persian Gulf to the Americas, thanks to the shale boom, hydrocarbon extraction in the South Atlantic and Canada’s Alberta Province, and other developments. The United States, for the foreseeable future, will remain the dominant sea power, while Europe will stay a significant maritime player. Yet, the international maritime order will continue to gradually but fundamentally change as new powers acquire greater economic and naval heft. According to a projection by the recently released Global Marine Trends 2030 report, as the global GDP doubles over the next 17 years China will come to own a quarter of the world’s merchant fleet. Several other maritime states in the Asia-Pacific, including Japan, South Korea, India, and Vietnam, are also set to significantly enlarge their maritime footprints. Admittedly, there are real threats to maritime peace and security from the changing maritime power equations and the sharpening competition over resources and geopolitical influence. The Asia-Pacific region — with its crowded and, in some cases, contested sea lanes — is becoming the centre of global maritime competition. Maritime tensions remain high in this region due to rival sovereignty claims, resource-related competition, naval build-ups, and rising nationalism. A lot of attention has focussed on the maritime implications of China’s rise. President Xi Jinping has championed efforts to build China into a global maritime power, saying his government will do everything possible to safeguard China’s “maritime rights and interests” and warning that “in no way will the country abandon its legitimate rights and interests.” China’s increasing emphasis on the oceans was also evident from the November 2012 report to the 18th national congress of the Chinese Communist Party that outlined the country’s maritime power strategy. It called for safeguarding China’s maritime rights and interests, including building improved capacity for exploiting marine resources, and for asserting the country’s larger rights. The risks of maritime conflict arising from mistake or miscalculation are higher between China and its neighbours than between China and the U.S. There has been a course correction in the Obama administration’s “pivot” toward Asia, lest it puts it on the path of taking on Beijing. Washington has bent over backward to tamp down the military aspects of that policy. Even the term “pivot” has been abandoned in favour of the softer new phrase of “rebalancing.” The U.S., moreover, has pointedly refused to take sides in sovereignty disputes between China and its neighbours. It has sought the middle ground between seeking to restrain China and reassure allies but, as former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg has put it, “without getting ourselves into a shooting war.” China has also shied
away from directly challenging U.S. interests. It has been careful not to step on America’s toes. Its assertiveness has been largely directed at its neighbours. After all, China is seeking to alter the territorial and maritime status quo in Asia little by little. This can be described as a “salami-slice” strategy or, what a Chinese general, Zhang Zhaozhong, this year called, a “cabbage” strategy — surrounding a contested area with multiple security layers to deny access to the rival nation. Bit-by-bit strategy This bit-by-bit strategy increases the risk of maritime conflict through overreach, and the inadvertent encouragement it provides to neighbouring countries to overcome their differences and strategically collaborate. The new international maritime challenges, however, go beyond China’s jurisdictional “creep.” The oceans and seas not only have become pivotal to any power’s security and engagement with the outside world but they also constitute the strategic hub of the global geopolitical competition. The growing importance of maritime resources and of sea-lane safety, as well as the concentration of economic boom zones along the coasts, has made maritime security more critical than ever. The maritime challenges extend to non-traditional threats such as climate security, transnational terrorism, illicit fishing, human trafficking, and environmental degradation. The overexploitation of marine resources has underscored the need for conservation and prudent management of the biological diversity of the seabed. Deep seabed mining has emerged as a major new strategic issue. From seeking to tap sulphide deposits — containing valuable metals such as silver, gold, copper, manganese, cobalt and zinc — to phosphorus nodule mining for phosphor-based fertilizers used in food production, the inter-state competition over seabed-mineral wealth underscores the imperative for creating a regulatory regime, developing safe and effective ocean-development technologies, finding ways to share benefits of the common heritage, and ensuring environmental protection. Inter-state competition over seabed minerals is sharpening in the Indian Ocean, for example. Even China, an extraregional power, has secured an international deep-seabed block in southwestern Indian Ocean from the International Seabed Authority to explore for polymetallic sulphides. More broadly, some of the outstanding boundary, sovereignty and jurisdiction issues — extending from the Arctic to the Indian Ocean — carry serious conflict potential. The recrudescence of territorial and maritime disputes, largely tied to competition over natural resources, will increasingly have a bearing on maritime peace and security. Bangladesh and Myanmar have set an example by peacefully resolving a dispute over the delimitation of their maritime boundaries in the Bay of Bengal. They took their dispute to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea for adjudication. The Tribunal’s verdict, delivered in 2012, ended a potentially dangerous dispute that was fuelled in 2008 when, following the discovery of gas deposits in the Bay of Bengal, Myanmar authorised exploration in a contested area, prompting Bangladesh to dispatch warships to the area. However, some important maritime powers, including the U.S., are still not party to the 1982 U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Iran recently seized an Indian oil tanker, holding it for about a month, but India could not file a complaint with the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea because Tehran has not ratified UNCLOS. The seizure of the tanker, carrying Iraqi oil, appeared to be an act of reprisal against India’s sharp reduction of Iranian oil purchases under U.S. pressure. The threats to navigation and maritime freedoms, including in critical straits and exclusive economic zones (EEZs), can be countered only through adherence to international rules by all parties as well as through monitoring, regulation and enforcement. Great-power rivalries, however, continue to complicate international maritime security. The rivalries are mirrored in foreign-aided port-building projects; attempts to assert control over energy supplies and transport routes as part of a 21st-century-version of the Great Game; and the establishment of listening posts and special naval-access arrangements along the great trade arteries. The evolving architecture of global governance will determine how the world handles the pressing maritime challenges it confronts. The assertive pursuit of national interest for relative gain in an increasingly interdependent world is hardly a recipe for harmonious maritime relations. Another concern is the narrow, compartmentalised approach in which each maritime issue is sought to be dealt with separately, instead of addressing the challenges in an integrated framework. (Brahma Chellaney, a geostrategist, is the author, most recently, of Water, Peace, and War — Rowman & Littlefield, 2013)
Why India’s new border pact with China won’t work
The new Border Defence Cooperation Agreement with China is loaded against India’s interests
Brahma Chellaney
109
inShare
109
0 inShare
0
Comments
Subscribe to: Breaking News
Enter email
Daily Newsletter
Latest News
05:44 PM IST
PM accuses Narendra Modi of resorting to falsehoods, twisting facts
05:07 PM IST
Former US treasury secretary Geithner to join private equity firm
04:52 PM IST
India in talks with US on Bangladesh political situation
04:50 PM IST
Malta to host next Commonwealth summit: Sharma
04:33 PM IST
Outlook for fertilizer companies hinges on winter crops
Editor's picks
Sachin Tendulkar to be awarded Bharat Ratna
Premature births rising in India, states lack neonatal care centres, says report
RBI deputy governor Chakrabarty says PSU banks lax in credit appraisals
Viswanathan Anand loses game six against Magnus Carlsen
ISRO performs last orbit raising manoeuvre on its Mars mission
Also Read
Scrap border defence pact with China: BJP tells Centre India, China set to sign landmark pact on border cooperation India, Russia to sign pacts on Kudankulam III, IV reactors India, China hold talks on new border security mechanism New border defence pact between India, China on anvil
New Delhi’s willingness to let China dictate the so-called Border Defence Cooperation Agreement mirrors its broader strategic timidity in permitting Beijing to lay down the terms of the bilateral relationship. Photo: AFP
Seeking to compensate for his low political stock at home,Manmohan Singhhas undertaken more overseas trips as prime minister than any predecessor, visiting China multiple times. Yet, India punches far below its weight internationally, while its regional security has come under siege, with his tenure witnessing a sharp deterioration in ties with China. The highlight of the latest China visit of India’s most-travelled prime minister will not be progress on any of the core issues dividing the two countries but a Chinese-ordained border accord designed to supplant existing frontier-peace and confidence-building agreements that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has undermined through repeated cross-frontier raids and other incursions. No Indian official has explained the rationale for entering into a new agreement demanded by the party that has breached existing border-peace accords with impunity. New Delhi’s willingness to let China dictate the so-called Border Defence Cooperation Agreement (BDCA) mirrors its broader strategic timidity in permitting Beijing to lay down the terms of the bilateral relationship. China has fashioned an asymmetrical commercial relationship, reaping trade surpluses, even as it stymies any progress on issues of core concern to India. China’s most-insidious warfare against India is in the economic realm, yet India has done little to stop Beijing from turning it into a raw-material supplier to the Chinese economy and from subverting Indian manufacturing through dumping of goods. Perpetuating such a lopsided economic relationship gives Beijing little incentive to bridge the political divide. It also aids China’s strategy to prevent India’s rise as a peer competitor. Even as Beijing disturbs the territorial and water-flow status quo, New Delhi won’t leverage China’s growing Indiamarket access to influence Chinese conduct. China, however, does not shy away from mixing politics and business. It has quietly used trade to punish countries it quarrels with. For example, Japanese exports to China, which sank 13.2% in the first seven months this year, have been falling since September 2012, when China began wielding the trade sword over the Senkaku islands dispute.
Singh’s visit will likely yield the usual platitudes about friendship and cooperation while leaving India’s concerns unaddressed. With an unresolved border issue, Beijing has been reluctant to even clarify what the two sides farcically call the line of actual control (LAC). And even as it turns Tibet into the new hub of its dam-building spree, China has brazenly sought to turn the tables on India, accusing it through a state mouthpiece last week of “attempting to reinforce its actual control and occupation of” Arunachal Pradesh through water projects there. Singh, acquiescing to China’s sidelining of the core issues, told reporters before leaving that, “The two governments are addressing them with sincerity and maturity without letting them affect the overall atmosphere of friendship and cooperation”. Even by his pusillanimous standards, making a Chinese-dictated accord the highlight of his official visit marks a new low in Indian diplomacy. Consider the humiliating circumstances that spawned this agreement: PLA intruded deep into Ladakh’s Depsang Plateau by stealth before Beijing embarked on coercive diplomacy, forcing India’s hand on BDCA, whose draft it had sent earlier. In return for China withdrawing its encamped troops from Indian land, India demolished a line of defensive fortifications in Chumar and ended forward patrols in the area, besides agreeing to wrap up negotiations on BDCA, which until then it had baulked at. The Depsang encroachment inflicted permanent damage to the existing border-peace accords, including the 2005 mutual commitment to “strictly respect and observe” the LAC. Yet, paradoxically, China demanded a new agreement to take precedence over the more equitable 1993, 1996 and 2005 border-peace accords. Indeed, such was the bloodless victory China scored by deploying a single platoon of no more than 50 soldiers in Depsang that India, in the manner of a vanquished nation, merely offered its comments and suggestions on the Chinese-imposed draft and sent its national security adviser and defence minister in rapid succession to Beijing to commit itself to BDCA’s “early conclusion”. Now, by personally paying obeisance in Beijing, Singh culminates this mortifying process, lending his imprimatur to an agreement that can only embolden China to up the ante. In fact, since India’s virtual capitulation to Chinese demands more than five months ago, China’s military provocations have included multiple daring raids and other forays across the Himalayan frontier, the world’s longest disputed border. Via the planeload of journalists he takes, Singh trumpets almost every overseas visit as a diplomatic success. His spinmeisters are also marketing BDCA as positive for India, highlighting features that in reality are dubious. Why would a new military hotline with China make a difference when a similar hotline with Pakistan hasn’t worked? Given that India timorously deploys border police to fend off incursions by the aggressive PLA, the clause on “no tailing” of each other’s patrols is really applicable to China. But any accord for China is just a political tool to advance its interests, including by lulling the other party into complacency and creating exploitable opportunities. Singh’s China policy represents a case study in how meekness attracts bullying. BDCA is a symbol of that. Comments are welcome at [email protected]
Averting water wars in the future
Water poses a more intractable problem for the world than peak oil, economic slowdown and other challenges
Brahma Chellaney
First Published: Mon, Oct 07 2013. 07 18 PM IST
Water wars in a political and economic sense are already being waged between competing states in several regions, including by building dams on international rivers. Photo: Sam Panthaky/AFP
ALSO READ
Why India’s new border pact with China won’t work I don’t want to compromise on due diligence process: Veerappa Moily China-to-India price jump threatens growth as world outlook dims Of India, China and water disagreements China grabs limelight as US hobbled at Asia-Pacific summit
In an increasingly water-stressed world, shared water resources are becoming an instrument of power, fostering competition within and between nations. The struggle for water is escalating political tensions and exacerbating impacts on ecosystems. This week’s Budapest World Water Summit is the latest initiative in the search for ways to mitigate the pressing challenges. Consider some sobering facts: Bottled water at the grocery store is already more expensive than crude oil on the international spot market. More people in the world today own or use a mobile phone than have access to water sanitation services. Unclean water is the greatest killer on the globe, yet a fifth of humankind still lacks easy access to potable water. More than half of the global population currently lives under water stress—a figure projected to increase to two-thirds during the next decade. Adequate access to natural resources, historically, has been a key factor in peace and war. Water, however, is very different from other natural resources. There are substitutes for a number of resources, including oil, but none for water. Countries can import, even from distant lands, fossil fuels, mineral ores, and resources originating in the biosphere. But they cannot import the most vital of all resources, water—certainly not in a major or sustainable manner. Water is essentially local and thus very expensive to ship across seas.
Rapid economic and demographic expansion, however, has already turned potable water into a major issue across large parts of the world. Lifestyle changes, for example, have spurred increasing per capita water consumption in the form of industrial and agricultural products. Consumption growth has become the single biggest driver of water stress. Rising incomes, for example, have promoted changing diets, especially a greater intake of meat, whose production is notoriously water-intensive. It is about 10 times more water-intensive to produce meat than plant-based calories and proteins. It is against this background that water wars in a political and economic sense are already being waged between competing states in several regions, including by building dams on international rivers or, if the country is located downstream, by resorting to coercive diplomacy to prevent such construction. US intelligence has warned that such water conflicts could turn into real wars. According to a report reflecting the joint judgement of US intelligence agencies, the use of water as a weapon of war or a tool of terrorism will be more likely in the next decade in some regions. Commercial or state decisions in many countries on where to set up new manufacturing or energy plants are increasingly being constrained by inadequate local water availability. The World Bank has estimated the economic cost of China’s water problems at 2.3% of its gross domestic product. China, however, is not as yet under water stress—a term internationally defined as the availability of less than 1,700 cubic metres of water per head per year. The already water-stressed economies, stretching from South Korea and India to Egypt and Morocco, are paying a higher price for their water problems. In fact, water is becoming the world’s next major security and economic challenge. Although no modern war has been fought just over water, this resource has been an underlying factor in several armed conflicts. With the era of cheap, bountiful water having been replaced by increasing supply and quality constraints, the risks of overt water wars are now increasing. Averting water wars needs rules-based cooperation, water sharing and dispute settlement mechanisms. However, there is still no international water law in force, and most of the regional water agreements are toothless, lack monitoring and enforcement rules and provisions to formally divide water among users. Worse still, unilateralist appropriation of shared resources is endemic where autocrats rule. For example, China rejects the very concept of water sharing and is working to have its hand on Asia’s water tap by building an extensive upstream hydro-infrastructure. India, by contrast, has a water-sharing treaty with each of the two countries located downstream to it—Pakistan and Bangladesh. Indeed, the only Asian treaties that incorporate a specific sharing formula on cross-border river flows are those covering the Indus and the Ganges. Both these treaties set new principles in international water law: the 1996 Ganges pact guarantees Bangladesh an equal share of the downstream flows in the most difficult dry season, while the earlier 1960 Indus treaty remains the world’s most generous water-sharing arrangement, under which India agreed to set aside 80.52% of the waters of the six-river Indus system for Pakistan indefinitely in the naïve belief that it could trade water for peace. A central issue facing Asia is not the readiness to accommodate China’s rise but the need to persuade China’s leaders to institutionalize cooperation with its neighbours on shared resources. China already boasts more dams than any other country in the world. And its rush to build yet more dams, especially giant ones, promises to roil relations across Asia. If China continues on its current course, prospects for a rules-based Asian order could perish forever. Water poses a more intractable problem for the world than peak oil, economic slowdown and other oft-cited challenges. Addressing this core problem indeed holds the key to dealing with other challenges because of water’s nexus with global warming, energy shortages, stresses on food supply, population pressures, pollution, environmental degradation, global epidemics and natural disasters.
Comments are welcome at [email protected] Brahma Chellaney is professor of strategic studies at the Centre for Policy Research and the author of the forthcoming book Water, Peace, and War: Confronting the Global Water Crisis (Oxford University Press).
