Nepal’s Foreign Policy

Just a week has passed since Prime Minister Sushil Koirala visited India to attend the ceremony of Narendra Damodardas Modi taking oath of the office of the prime minister of India on May 26, 2014, Prime Minister Sushil Koirala took another foreign trip: this time to the north on June 5, 2014. Apparently, the Chinese have convinced PM Koirala of the need for visiting China to open the Nepalese pavilion at the Second China South Asia Trade Exhibition to be held at Kunming city of the Yunnan province on June 6-10, 2014.

PM Koirala was not sure to visit China. Initially, he had hesitated to visit China. However, he was for visiting China after the visit of Chinese Vice Minister for Finance Shi Yaobin in the last week of May. Ostensibly, Chinese Vice Minister for Finance Shi Yaobin was in Nepal with the proposal for making Nepal the founding member of the proposed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank with the capital of US$ 50 billions of which China will hold 50% shares, Asian countries will hold 25% and others hold the remaining 25%. After the meeting with Vice Minister for Finance Shi, the hesitance of PM Koirala about visiting China evaporated.

PM Koirala took a 33-member team with him to the second China South Asia Trade Festival at the Kunming city of the Yunnan province. They flew to the province on a special aircraft on June 5, 2014.

PM Koirala opened the Nepalese pavilion at the trade festival held at the Kunming city of the Yunnan province on June 6, 2014. Forty-six South Asian and South East Asian countries participated in the trade Exhibition. The Provincial government of Yunnan and Ministry of Commerce of the People’s Republic of China jointly held the Second China South Asia Exposition to promote the trade among these countries.

Nepalese Minister for Commerce and Supplies Sunil Bahadur Thapa led another trade delegation to China to take part in the trade festival. Minister Thapa left Kathmandu one day ahead of PM Koirala for China.

The business community also participated in the trade festival in Kunming of the Yunnan province of China. Officials of the Federation of Nepal Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI) led the delegation of Nepalese business leaders.

So, attending the trade festival in Yunnan has been the trade and business diplomacy of PM Koirala. How much Nepal could benefit from this diplomacy remains to be seen. It depends largely on how our prime minister, and his team could convince the officials of the South Asian and South East Asian countries, and the officials of FNCCI could convince the business communities of those countries of the need for extending the trade and business to Nepal.

The whole exercise of taking PM Koirala has been for China a showdown. China has demonstrated that it could take the Nepalese prime minister to China and to make him repeat the one-China policy of Nepal by rote.

PM Koirala attended the ceremony of Narendra Modi and his cabinet members swearing in as the prime minister and ministers respectively in New Delhi on May 26, 2014. By mere coincidence or by design just after a week of visiting India, PM Koirala dashed off to China.

Vice Prime Minister of China Wang Yang descended on Kunming from Beijing. PM Koirala and Vice Prime Minister Wang Yang have had the meeting. PM Koirala reiterated the one-China policy of Nepal, which means Nepal would not allow any activities of Tibetan exiles in Nepal.

To remind the readers, India has been host to the spiritual leader of Tibet: Dalai Lama since he left Tibet in 1958 after the botched uprising against the Chinese rule in Tibet. Tibetan exiles in Nepal, India, and abroad set up an elected Tibetan government at Dharmashala in India. Under the pressure of China, Nepal even spoiled the voting process of electing representatives of Tibetan exiles to the government in exile held in Nepal.

PM Koirala could have an audience with the prime minister of China if he were to fly to Beijing. Very rightly, he did not do so but the prime minister of Bangladesh did so. PM Koirala returned back to Nepal from Kunming. PM Koirala had demonstrated that he could be pulled to the north, too.

PM Koirala passed the hat for collections for holding the summit of the regional association called SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation). China was happy to throw some donations.

It is a shame on Nepal that is holding the summit of SAARC with the support of China. I don’t know how India and other member countries would take it. Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi had been deadly against the donor countries involving in the SAARC summit. King Birendra had once put the idea of asking donor countries for the support for the SAARC.

PM Koirala also extended invitations to China’s top leaders including President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang to visit Nepal at their convenience through Vice-Premier Wang. Whether the Chinese leaders would have time to visit Nepal or not remains to be seen. At the current regional and global situation, Chinese leaders would not find any concrete reasons for visiting Nepal except for a pleasure trip.

PM Koirala had played the business diplomacy with the Chinese. He urged the Chinese to invest in hydropower, infrastructures and in all possible areas for the economic development of Nepal. His urge for the Chinese investment in Nepal had been responded positively. It was a diplomatic norm not to reject such request but whether it will be met remains to be seen.

Chinese have been profit-oriented. They would invest only if they could make money from the investment. PM Koirala went to the extent of stating that his government would amend whatever the Act needed to be amended for making the environment conducive to money-making for the investors in Nepal. I don’t know whether the Chinese have been convinced of the statement of PM Koirala. Chinese knew that PM Koirala was not in a strong position in the current coalition government.

In the past, China had built a hydropower project, and constructed road infrastructures gratis for keeping Nepal on the side of China. Chairman of People’s Republic of China Mao Zedong even stood by the side of King Mahendra when Mahendra killed democracy in Nepal in 1960. So, Indian Prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru could say nothing more than that Nepal had lost democracy. Mahendra used the support of China for negotiating with India, and forcing the Indian government to stop any activities of the democratic minded cadres and leaders of the Nepalese political parties along the border with Nepal.

India did not want any Chinese walking along the border between Nepal and India. When Mahendra agreed the Chinese proposal for constructing some portions of the East-West highway in the Southern Nepal, Indian PM Nehru sent a special envoy to Mahendra to cancel the agreement with the Chinese on building a portion of the East-West highway. Mahendra did revoke the agreement with the Chinese but with the condition India would build it. Then, India constructed 400 km of the eastern segment of the East-West Highway in Nepal free.

Chairman Mao also launched a military campaign against India in 1962. China captured certain areas in the remote state called Ladak. China claimed it was the part of China the British government in India had included in the map of the British India.

India learned a great lesson from this war. It was the failure of the foreign policy of Indian PM Nehru. He had been a champion of the non-alignment movement. He organized the summit of the leaders of the non-aligned countries and so on. He earned a great prestige in the then world but he neglected the defense of the country. Consequently, PM Nehru suffered from the humiliating Sino-Indian war.

The world was divided into two super powers: one was led by the USA another was by the Soviet Union at that time. PM Nehru created a third force that did not go with anyone of the two super powers. Both the super powers liked it. The super powers found it nice to have a third power rather than the countries joining either the western or the Soviet block. The western power liked it as the non-aligned countries did not join the communist block headed by the Soviet Union. The communist block liked it, too as they did not join the western super power. However, both the super powers always tried to bring the non-aligned countries to their respective sphere. Often they fought proxy wars in those countries. For example, the western countries and the Soviet Union directly or indirectly supported the people fighting the Vietnam War, and the Afghan war. These wars were practically between the western power and the Soviet power.

Nepal applied for the membership of the UN in 1950s. Initially, the then Prime Minister of Soviet Union Nikita Khrushchev was skeptical about permitting Nepal to be the new member of the UN. Khrushchev gave a green signal to admit Nepal to the UN after he knew that Nepal was an independent nation not involved in any sorts of the activities of the super power. Thereafter, he set up a diplomatic mission in Nepal.

Nepal also became the member of the non-aligned movement. Nepal had benefited from it. Both the super powers extended the hands to Nepal to help in its efforts on making progress in the socio-economic development.

The diplomatic relations between India and China has never improved since China launched a war against India in 1962. Leaders of both the countries attempted to regularize the diplomatic relations but the contentious issues such as the border issues, and the Dalai Lama remained unresolved. China wanted Dalai Lama back to Tibet surrendering to the Chinese rule but Dalai Lama continued to have the safe haven in India for fighting diplomatic battles at least for the autonomy of Tibet from the Chinese rule.

Thus, Nepal has been between the two warring regional super powers. Their relations have been as bitter as possible. As already mentioned, Mahendra had cashed in the enmity between China and India. However, Nepal could benefit more from the better relations between these two countries. Unfortunately, the relations have remained acidic.

However, some communist leaders such as Prachanda, Dr Baburam Bhattarai and Jhalanath Khanal have been advocating for Nepal being a bridge between the two giant states. It is a nice argument but how the two countries having two different system of governance, and having the history of China invading India come closer through Nepal is a tough question. It is almost impossible to answer.

Nepalese leaders could talk to the leaders of both China and India. However, Nepalese leaders have not developed the ability to talk to Indian leaders about the Peace and Friendship Treaty of 1950 even when the Indian leaders were ready to talk about it for straightening all issues Nepalese wanted. The politically dwarf Nepalese leaders could not even speak to the giant leaders of the neighboring country for Nepal. How they would be able to say something about the relations between the two countries.

While in India in May 2014, PM Koirala did talk nothing more than inviting the freshly sworn-in Prime Minister Modi to visit Nepal. PM Modi accepted it stating he would have an opportunity to visit the Pashupatinath: one of the holiest shrines for Hindus across the world. Thus, PM Modi took the invitation of PM Koirala as the opportunity of making a pilgrimage to Pashupatinath rather than strengthening the relations between the two countries.

One thing I noticed on the live Indian TV broadcast of Modi swearing-in as the Indian prime minister in New Delhi on May 26, 2014 was that PM Koirala went to sit next to the chairman of Indian Congress Sonia Gandhi. I guessed PM Koirala sat next to Sonia Gandhi not by the seat allotted to him but by his desire. Sitting next to Sonia Gandhi, PM Koirala indicated that he was closer to the Indian Congress leader. Nepalese congress leaders have the identical ideology of the Indian congress party.

I did not know whether the leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party noticed it or not. Probably not because they were at high spirit of taking over the power rather than taking look at who was sitting where. However, for me, it was clear violence of not being impartial to any political party in India.

PM Koirala also claimed that he had asked the newly sworn-in Prime Minister Narendra Modi to help develop Nepal. PM Koirala quoted Indian PM Modi saying, “Let me have your projects. We will see.” PM Koirala has to submit projects to Indian PM Modi for the Indian assistance.

Thus, I see some flaws in the Nepalese foreign policy, as PM Koirala has been going around begging for assistance without having any concrete proposals for development projects. Begging for the support for holding the SAARC summit has been the lowest level of the diplomacy of poverty. Nepalese PM Koirala did not show any self-respect begging for the support for holding the SAARC summit in Nepal. He clearly demean Nepal for few hundred thousands dollars required for holding the SAARC summit. Consequently, Nepal could not appropriately conduct the foreign policy for the benefits of the Nepal and the neighboring countries. The Nepalese foreign policy has been torn up by the pull and push policies of the neighbors on both sides of our borders.

June 7, 2014

Annexes

1. Conference of NAM In Algiers
Kathmandu, May 29, 2014: addressing the 17th Non-aligned Movement Conference held in Algiers, Minister for Foreign Affairs Mahendra Bahadur Pandey called for enhanced solidarity and unity among the NAM member countries on all outstanding issues and problems and a cohesive approach to the problem-solving to make NAM more effective and dynamic.

The Minister said that core principles, values and ideals of the Non-aligned Movement (NAM) were as relevant today as they were at the time of its founding. The fundamental concerns for us therefore were ensuring a fair share of globalization to all, reducing democratic deficit in the political and economic governance of the world, promoting a stronger democratic world order and ensuring justice in the face of lurking challenges such as climate change, he added.

Stating the NAM's principles and ideals occupied a central stage on the global agenda for peace and security, development and the respect for human rights and freedom for all, he said that the movement represented an inner voice of the people of the developing world for shared peace, progress and prosperity in an equitable and just manner.

Speaking about the economic development issues, Minister Pandey underlined that the economically advanced countries needed to show additional flexibility in providing finance, technology and capacity building support to the developing countries in all traditional and newly emerging areas.

"The group of countries at the bottom rung of the development ladder, notably the LDCs (least developing countries) must receive more enhanced support in these areas both from the North and from the South, he emphasized. Eliminating poverty, combating constraints and vulnerabilities and ensuring enhanced partnership for a robust growth and sustainable development was very important to make a visible change in the status of the LDCs and facilitate their graduation," he added.

Ministers for Foreign Affairs of Algeria Ramtane Lamamra presided over the conference. Foreign Minister of Iran also the current chair of NAM Javad Zarif addressed the opening of the Conference. President of Bolivia also the current Chair of the G-77+ China Evo Morales, and the leaders of various regional groups spoke at the conference.

On the sidelines of the Conference, Foreign Minister Pandey held a bilateral meeting with Foreign Minister of Bangladesh Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali. The two leaders exchanged views on various aspects of bilateral relations and emphasized the need for exploring more cooperation in the fields of trade, tourism and people-to-people contacts.

Minister Pandey also held a bilateral meeting with Foreign Ministers of Spain José Manuel García Margallo Marfil. They talked over the ways and means to enhance various aspects of bilateral relations.

At the meeting with Foreign Minister of Turkey Ahmet Davutoğlu, Minister Pandey thanked the Turkish government for the continued cooperation with the LDCs. The Turkish Minister pledged the support for the cause of the LDCs.

The Nepalese delegation led by Minister Pandey comprised Shanker Das Bairagi: Officiating Foreign Secretary; Deepak Dhital: Joint Secretary (United Nations and International Organizations Division), Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Ghana Shyam Lamsal: Counselor, Permanent Mission of Nepal to the United Nations in New York; and Lok Bahadur Poudel Chhetri: Under Secretary, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a statement issued by the Foreign Ministry said.

The 17th NAM Ministerial Conference concluded on May 29, 2014 adopting Algiers Declaration and the final outcome document. (Source: Gorkhapatraonline.com, May 30, 2014)

2. Conference On Future Of Democratic Socialism In Kathmandu
Kathmandu, June 6, 2014: The ‘BP Thought Foundation’ is holding an international conference on ‘Future of Democratic Socialism’ in Kathmandu on June 14 and 15, 2014. Nobel Laureate also Democratic leader of Myanmar Aung San Suu Kyi will deliver a keynote address, according to General Secretary of the Foundation Devendra Prakash Poudel.

Other notable speakers at the conference will be democratic socialism thinker Prof. Thomas Mayeur of Germany, General Secretary of Socialist International Luis Ayala of Chile and Prof. Ananda Kumar of Jawaharlal Nehru University.

Likewise, Karan Singh of Indian Congress I, Indian leader DP Tripathi and Surendra Badauriya and socialist thinkers from Brazil, Denmark, Germany, Myanmar, Switzerland and the UK as well as from the SAARC countries are participating in the conference.

Leader Suu Kyi will arrive in Nepal on June 13. She will deliver a keynote speech on June 14. On the same day, she will address the parliament.

Then, she will be visiting Lumbini: Birthplace of Lord Buddha, and also the BP Museum at Sundarijal in Kathmandu on June 15. On the same day, the Civic Felicitation Main Celebration Committee will hold a civic felicitation for Suu Kyi, according to Haribol Bhattarai: coordinator of the Civic Felicitation Main Celebration Committee. (Source: RSS news on Gorkhapatraonline.com, June 7, 2014)

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