China and Pakistan Mull a Beijing-led Alternative to SAARC
The China-India tussle for influence in South Asia can be expected to intensify should Pakistan and China's plans for setting up a new regional organization materialize.
According to a report in the Pakistani English daily, Express Tribune, the proposed regional grouping 'could potentially replace the now-defunct South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC).' According to 'diplomatic sources familiar with the development,' the discussions between Pakistan and China are reportedly 'at an advanced stage.'
South Asia is among the least integrated regions in the world; intra-regional trade accounts for barely 5-7 percent of its total international trade. South Asian countries struggle with common problems like poverty, climate change and human trafficking that could be better tackled through cooperation.
In 1985, seven South Asian countries — Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka — came together to found SAARC; Afghanistan joined as the eighth member in 2007. Among its objectives were economic and regional integration to enhance the quality of life of its people.
However, SAARC's performance over the past four decades has been below par. Decisions are made by consensus, and the India-Pakistan rivalry paralyzed its functioning.
Pakistan would 'indirectly target' India at summits, and 'try to get the other members to gang up against Delhi,' a retired Sri Lankan foreign secretary told The Diplomat in 2019. As for India, 'it refused to move beyond its concerns over terrorism linked to Pakistan, which was a bilateral issue.'
Caught in the crossfire, SAARC stagnated.
Then in 2016, India drove the final nail in SAARC's coffin when it boycotted the summit that Islamabad was to host. India's boycott came in response to a terror attack on an Indian army camp in Kashmir in September 2016, which New Delhi blamed on Pakistan-based militants. Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, the Maldives, and Sri Lanka followed suit and withdrew from the summit. It was cancelled, and no SAARC summits have been held since.
SAARC's smaller members have tried to revive the organization by pressing for SAARC summits and meetings on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly. But they have met with little success. India has blocked such efforts as it is determined to isolate Pakistan.
'The need for regional cooperation has never been greater, and it is in this context that the Pakistan-China initiative must be seen,' a retired Pakistani diplomatic official told The Diplomat from London. The new organization will seek 'greater regional cooperation through greater trade and connectivity among its members,' he said. All SAARC members, including India, will be invited, but 'it is unlikely that India or Bhutan will join,' he said.
The China-Pakistan plan for an alternative organization doesn't come as a surprise. In recent months, the two countries have reached out to third countries to expand regional cooperation. In May, the foreign ministers of China, Pakistan, and Afghanistan met in Beijing, where they agreed to expand the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor to Afghanistan. The Chinese, Pakistani, and Bangladeshi foreign secretaries met at Kunming in China the following month where they committed to enhancing cooperation in areas including economic development and climate change. The Express Tribune report described the Kunming meeting as 'part of those diplomatic maneuvers' toward setting up the replacement for SAARC.
Analysts in New Delhi are not surprised by China and Pakistan's proposed initiative for South Asian regional cooperation.
'China has been undercutting SAARC since the proposal to induct China into the regional grouping was rejected in 2005,' Smruti S. Pattanaik, a research fellow at the New Delhi-based Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, said.
Pattanaik drew attention to several regional cooperation mechanisms that China has initiated over the past two decades in South Asia. 'In 2006, China set up the China-South Asia Cooperation Forum. In 2018, China formed the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) Trans-Himalayan Connectivity network that includes Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Nepal. In 2021, Beijing floated the China-South Asian Countries Poverty Alleviation and Cooperative Development Center,' she said.
Most importantly, all the South Asian countries, except for India and Bhutan, are members of the Belt and Road Initiative. Consequently, 'the latest proposal for South Asian regional cooperation is not new,' Pattanaik said.
Over the years, with SAARC stagnating and failing to deliver the benefits of regional cooperation, New Delhi lost interest in the group and set out on subregional cooperation with its neighbors through such forums such as the Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal (BBIN) Initiative, BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral and Economic Cooperation), and the Colombo Security Conclave, which includes India, Sri Lanka and the Maldives.
Unsurprisingly, Pakistan is not a part of any of these India-led groupings.
With India unlikely to sign on to the new China-led grouping, what are its prospects?
A look at a map of South Asia would provide pointers. Not only is the region India-centric but also with the exception of Pakistan and Afghanistan, South Asia's smaller countries do not share land borders with each other. It is only with India that they all share borders.
China has the funds and the expertise in building infrastructure. It already has strong relations with all South Asian countries — with the exception of Bhutan — which will come in handy as it sets out to build regional cooperation.
However, will it be able to overcome the obstacles imposed by geography? Will it be able to build overland connectivity without India on board?
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Donald Trump's intervention in a brief Indo-Pakistan conflict and his diplomatic theatrics have rekindled fears of a return to Washington's old habit of hyphenating India with Pakistan. In the wake of a terrorist attack in late April targeting tourists in Pahalgam in Indian-administered Kashmir, a series of military skirmishes took place between India and Pakistan. These involved extensive artillery barrages along the Line of Control (the de facto international border in the disputed state of Jammu and Kashmir), the use of drones and missiles to attack a range of targets, and the use of air power. Following this four-day conflict, Pakistan alleged that it had shot down as many as six Indian combat aircraft. General Anil Chauhan, India's chief of defense staff, confirmed that the Indian Air Force had lost some aircraft but did not specify the number. After the hostilities concluded, U.S. President Donald Trump claimed that he had successfully persuaded both India and Pakistan to agree to a ceasefire. To that end, he asserted that he had threatened to impose significant trade sanctions on both countries, thereby inducing them to end the ongoing hostilities. Pakistan lauded his public remarks and even briefly nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize. (After Trump's decision to attack three nuclear facilities in Iran, Pakistan's political opposition asked its government to rescind the nomination.) India, for its part, has repeatedly and categorically denied that the ceasefire was a product of Trump's intervention. It is both difficult and unnecessary to adjudicate the veracity of either claim. What matters is that Trump's attempt to insert himself into this latest India-Pakistan crisis has set off alarm bells in New Delhi about the state of India-U.S. relations. Before Trump proclaimed his role in ending the brief, intense conflict, Vice President J.D. Vance had stated that the India-Pakistan crisis was 'none of our business.' Trump subsequently claimed the U.S. acted as mediator in defusing India-Pakistan tensions. The latter statement raised hackles in New Delhi owing to its long-standing aversion to external efforts to resolve its differences with Pakistan. Finally, to New Delhi's dismay, Trump decided to host General Asim Munir, the Pakistan Army's chief of staff, for lunch at the White House. Although little of substance emerged from the meeting, the optics were a source of considerable misgiving in New Delhi. Several Indian political analysts and commentators have argued that Trump's statements and actions suggest a return to the much-disliked U.S. policy of hyphenation: linking India and Pakistan in its dealings with the two antagonistic neighbors. Indeed, this had characterized U.S. policy toward the subcontinent during much of the Cold War. It was only under the late U.S. Ambassador Frank Wisner in the mid-1990s that Washington decided to de-hyphenate its relations with the two countries. Wisner, who served as the ambassador to New Delhi between 1994 and 1997, was able to pursue this strategy because of India's growing economic clout in the wake of its fitful embrace of economic liberalization in 1991. Subsequent administrations, for the most part, adhered to this policy. Even after the renewal of a Pakistan-U.S. security relationship following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, in the United States, Washington maintained a cordial and mostly robust relationship with India. The India-U.S. partnership even survived Secretary of State Colin Powell's maladroit designation of Pakistan as a 'major non-NATO ally' in 2004, despite causing its share of unease in New Delhi. What, in considerable part, redeemed the India-U.S. relationship was President George W. Bush's monumental decision in 2005 to pursue the India-U.S. civilian nuclear accord. This accord, for all practical purposes, exempted India from the strictures of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) of 1970 and allowed it to maintain its nuclear weapons program. All prior U.S. presidents had, to varying degrees, sought to cajole, persuade and even browbeat India to eschew its nuclear weapons program and accede to the NPT. Bush's decision to make an exception for India amounted to what scholars of international relations refer to as a 'costly signal' — namely, one that requires the expenditure of significant domestic and international political capital. In its wake, India-U.S. relations had been placed on a far more secure footing. Subsequent administrations, both Democratic and Republican, steadily built upon the solid foundations that Bush had constructed during his second term in office. The Barack Obama administration, for example, during its first year in office, neglected India. However, Obama visited India in 2010. During the visit, much to the surprise of his interlocutors in New Delhi, in a speech to the Indian Parliament he publicly stated that the United States, at some point, would look forward to including New Delhi as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. Since this was a long-standing Indian goal, his announcement came as a very pleasant surprise to the Indian political leadership. Also, at the initiative of then-Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, the administration designated India as a 'Major Defense Partner,' thereby easing defense acquisitions from the United States. Even the advent of the first Trump administration did not lead to substantial policy changes. India, it appeared, had for all practical purposes become a mostly bipartisan issue. The Joe Biden administration, despite expressing some misgivings about democratic backsliding and human rights in India, continued to deepen and broaden the strategic partnership, especially because of its concerns about an increasingly assertive, if not downright revanchist, China in Asia. Trump's return to office in 2025, however, has seen some disturbing signs, largely because of his propensity to use trade as a weapon or at least a source of leverage. Unlike in the past, perhaps cognizant of Trump's inclination to exploit the trade deficit with India as a political blunderbuss, the Modi government indicated a willingness to make certain trade concessions. These trade negotiations, though initially promising, have yet to result in an accord. Meanwhile, Trump's maladroit remarks and his hosting of General Munir have cast a pall on the India-U.S. relationship. It is, of course, possible that New Delhi is needlessly tying itself in knots about these ill-advised statements from the White House. They may simply reflect Trump's proclivity for self-aggrandizement and a degree of policy incoherence. That said, given Trump's mercurial disposition, New Delhi's concerns about the future of the relationship may well be understandable. Much of the progress that has been achieved in India-U.S. relations could suffer a setback owing to Trump's ill-advised remarks. Originally published under Creative Commons by 360info™.
