Asean

By David Kihara
The Cambodia Daily

It was a moment few people anticipated. In a cramped room full of Indian, Western and local journalists in April, Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee pledged his qualified support for a Khmer Rouge tribunal.

It was standing room only, and the elder Indian statesman sat alongside Prime Minister Hun Sen. India would send a judge to Cambodia to try former Khmer Rouge officials if the UN decided to end negotiations with Cambodia, Vajpayee vowed.

“If the United Nations doesn’t help, and Cambodia decides to go further in the matter, India will be ready to assist,” he said.

Vajpayee’s promise was definitive, considering that no other country had stepped forward to make such a public offer. Yet, in the past year, India has made equally decisive—if slightly less dramatic—pledges to various Asean countries and the Asean grouping.

During an April meeting with Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri, Vajpayee expressed “India’s keen interest” in working with railway and other infrastructure projects in Indonesia. The two leaders even discussed establishing “space technology” programs. India is also reported to have invested about $125 million in Vietnam, mostly in sugar production and electricity plants.

In October, India hosted the first India-Asean business summit in New Delhi, and in early August India announced it would give $2.5 million to the newly formed India-Asean cooperation fund to stimulate the science and technology sectors and trade relations between India and Asean, reported the Indian Express newspaper.

What emerges from these snapshots is a broader image of India’s relationship with Asean countries. And with this year representing the first-ever inclusion of India in high-level Asean meetings, India appears to be gaining as much influence as Plus Three members China, Japan and South Korea.

“India is an old friend of Asean,” said one Asean diplomat. “Many of the Asean countries have a long history with India—historically there have been many social, cultural and trade links between India and Asean countries.”
India has a growing middle class with “greater purchasing power,” which, combined with the age-old cultural ties to countries like Indonesia, Cambodia and Malaysia, make India a great country to court, the diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity in mid-October in Phnom Penh.

“India offers many opportunities for trade, great scientific minds, a [booming] Internet technology sector, so it would be very good to include India in the Asean groupings,” the diplomat said, adding that many Asean countries have a “general comfort level” with India.

It is this comfort level, along with the huge trade benefits, that has India’s prominence in Asean countries growing. In 2000, India-Asean trade rose by almost 30 percent from $7.6 billion in 1999 to nearly $10 billion, reported the Straits Times of Singapore. While trade with Singapore accounted for $7 billion, Indian officials estimated that the trade would continue to increase and even out among the Asean countries. By 2008, India-Asean trade is expected to surpass the $20 billion mark, according to the Straits Times.

There is, however, a political element to bringing India into Asean as well, according to some diplomats and officials.

“From an Asean perspective, [Asean countries] are bringing in India to balance the influence of some of the larger countries, be it the US, China or Japan,” said one Western diplomat in Phnom Penh.

Kao Kim Hourn, a leading Asean expert, also speculated that Asean countries are wooing India in order to offset the influence of some of the big international players, specifically China.

Because China is such a superpower and is so influential in Asean countries, India’s inclusion as an Asean dialogue partner could even out some of that power, he said in September.

Besides, China being an indisputable economic competitor, the country remains deeply influential in Asean affairs. For example, Asean still refuses to recognize Taiwan as a separate country from mainland China. This lack of recognition can play itself in the day-to-day politics of a country. As recently as September, China told Singapore it could face “trouble” if it started a free-trade agreement with Taiwan, the Reuters news service reported.

In a less threatening event, Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo asked China to support the Philippines’ bid to join the UN Security Council in September.

Yet some diplomats dispute that India’s inclusion into the Asean dialogue partners has anything to do with China.

“If [Asean countries] wanted to offset China’s influence by bringing in India, they would have done it a long time ago,” the Asean diplomat said. “It’s a seductive story [to pit India against China], but it’s not true. China is too influential to have its power offset by India.”

•••

“Look East” is India’s slogan for its Asean and East Asian policy. And on clear days, you can see the islands of Indonesia and Thailand, joked PK Kapur, the Indian ambassador to Cambodia.

Speaking at the Indian Embassy one bright day in September, Kapur explained how the rich cultural ties between India and Burma, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia has helped shape this policy.
Such connections are found in the Sanskrit of today’s Singapore and the religion that can be found in many Asean countries and the temples of Angkor, Kapur said.

It is exactly these ties that lend India a certain “comfort level” with the Asean countries, and which help make what India can offer all the more appealing to Asean. Yet, according to Kapur, it is virtually impossible to list everything that India can do—and has done—in Southeast Asia.

“What are the areas where India could help Asean countries bilaterally? Infrastructure, such as roads, railways, power stations.... India could improve and help develop the IT sector; already India offers Cambodia [as well as other countries] scholarships in every sector; there are many business and economic relationships already formed,” Kapur explained.

He would not discuss what diplomatic function India would serve in Asean and whether it would indeed equalize the influence of China, saying only, “We have excellent relations with China.”

Kapur could not, however, avoid discussing India’s offer to send a judge to Cambodia to help try Khmer Rouge leaders if the UN walked away from the negotiations.

“Cambodia requested the judge—we didn’t offer—it is absolutely in keeping with our past relationship with Cambodia,” the ambassador said. “After the Khmer Rouge, India was [in Cambodia] to get Cambodia on its feet from the beginning.”

India was one of the few countries that had a presence in Cambodia immediately after the Khmer Rouge years. According to Kapur, India came into Cambodia in 1979 and by 1981 had a fully functional embassy—a move that did not come without consequences. For years, India was criticized for siding with the Hanoi-installed government—a viewpoint the Indian ambassador does not share.

“This country asked the foreign community for help, and no one came forward,” he said, adding that India played a part in the Paris Peace Accords and had the second-largest contingent of troops stationed in Cambodia during Untac.

This relationship with Cambodia is also partly what positioned India so prominently in Asean this year, according to the Western diplomat.

“It’s generally acknowledged in Asean countries that Cambodia is India’s best friend. Cambodia has a special relationship with India and really has no problem with India,” the diplomat said. As the chair of Asean this year, Cambodia has been pushing hard for the inclusion of India into the Plus Three partnership, the diplomat said.

“Not that other Asean countries don’t want India—they do. But Cambodia has been putting an extra effort into it,” the Western diplomat said.
While only speculating, the Western diplomat also hinted that Cambodia’s closeness with India could have consequences for the country considering its alliances with China.

“The relationship between China and India is very complex, and Cambodia could potentially be a country where those complexities play themselves out,” the Western diplomat said.

Not surprisingly, one issue where these complexities may be playing themselves out is the Khmer Rouge trials. Rumors have abounded for years that China—which supported the Khmer Rouge—has worked to halt any progress in the Khmer Rouge trials. Officials with the Chinese Embassy in Cambodia declined to be interviewed and refused to comment on this issue.
But Youk Chhang, the executive director of the Documentation Center in Cambodia, said recently that he has reason to believe that China has played some part in stalling the trials.

“China always happily answered that the trial is a Cambodian affair—that was its public statement,” Youk Chhang said. “But when you think about how much financial support the Chinese government contributes to Cambodia with no transparency—financial support which could be two to three times that of other countries that openly support the Khmer Rouge trials—then it implies that China has no interest in trying Khmer Rouge officials.”

But would the internal political issues of one Asean country affect all Asean countries, or would the geo-political dealings of powerful nations affect the trade and economic opportunities in Southeast Asia?

No, says Kapur.

“We are not here for competition for political control—this is for trade and economic, business and trade relations,” he said, adding that India’s closer relations with Asean countries are about “positive dialogue.”

Perhaps the most telling comments, however, come from the Asean diplomat.
“We can get along with China, the US, Japan—we can engage them all. Asean countries are development oriented.... We are most interested in creating wealth,” the Asean diplomat said. When asked about the sticky political situations that arise from engaging many countries with opposing political views, the diplomat said, “Those countries can have their fights—we are looking for development.”

Almost as an afterthought, the diplomat added, “In China, they have more than a billion people—think of selling a billion cans of Coke!”