NEW DELHI: China has no problem supporting India’s claim for a permanent seat at the high table of the United Nations Security Council, but is not willing to stick its neck out and place that support on record just yet, because the UN is nowhere near a resolution on the kind of reforms its will undertake.

So why, ask the Chinese, should Beijing openly come out in India’s support and alienate other ‘friends’ who may or may not stand as good a chance? Instead, it has clearly and consistently stated that it “understands” India’s aspirations to play a larger global role, within the multi-polar UN system, and would not “oppose” any such enhanced role for India.

It is equally clear however, that any new permanent members of the UN Security Council would not have the right of veto. That is a preserve the P-5 countries (United States, Russia, Britain France and China) will fight strongly to retain for themselves. Having arrived at a juncture where it finds itself immensely powerful and directly able to influence a wide variety of global events, China finds itself somewhat friendless and its intentions much misunderstood. To counter what it calls the ‘negative’ perceptions about itself and its actions, China has launched a public diplomacy blitz aimed at reassuring its neighbours and the world at large that its intentions are benign.

Using celebrations to commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of diplomatic ties between China and India, New Delhi is one of the key capitals in focus and former senior Chinese diplomats have been co-opted by the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs as advisors to go forth and spread the word of cooperation, as it were, that China’s outlook is very “rooted in the 21st century” and not ‘colonial’ like the western powers of the 20th century.

As it articulates these foreign policy goals through its public diplomacy campaign, the Chinese Foreign Ministry finds itself in close sync with its Indian counterpart. Both India’s National Security Advisor Shivshankar Menon and Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao are former envoys to China and reiterate the strengths of the multi-faceted bilateral relationship, even stressing the same parameters that have led up to the present Strategic Cooperative Partnership the countries share.

“The equilibrium in the India-China relationship has not been disturbed in any fundamental way,” a senior Indian official said, speaking of milestones like the 1988 (former PM) Rajiv Gandhi visit to China, the 1993 and 1996 agreements to maintain peace and tranquility and confidence-building measures along the disputed boundary and the 2005 ‘guiding principals’ to resolve the decades-old boundary problem.

The world has reached a stage of interdependence globally which effectively rules out any scope for future military

conflict or war. Any shoring up of border outposts and infrastructure is purely for each country’s internal security.

Hence the “string of pearls” or development of strategic ports and bases (like Hambantota in Sri Lanka or Gwadar in Pakistan or Sittwe in Myanmar) along key locations in the Indian Ocean is not aimed at encircling India but intended to protect China’s own interests along what is a crucial waterway for its trade and energy security. The “concept of encirclement” of India is “all wrong.”

While Indian External Affairs Minister SM Krishna visits Beijing to launch the diamond jubilee celebrations of bilateral diplomatic relations and stress the ‘Hindi-Chini bhai bhai” elements, “areas of divergence” or contentious issues between the giant Asian neighbours, like the boundary problem, Chinese construction activities within Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and the issue of China providing visa documents stapled onto passports (and not stamped inside passports, as is the norm) to residents of J&K will be raised during delegation level talks.

While India claims it has noticed and protested against the practice of ‘stapled visas’ to J&K residents over the past two years, China claims there has been no change in its visa policies and it has always issued stapled visas to J&K residents.

According to Chinese experts, the China Pakistan Border Agreement of 1963 (Agreement, not Treaty) is a provisional one, pending final solution of the Jammu and Kashmir issue.

Indians tend to be wary of Chinese intentions primarily because of Beijing’s special “all-weather friendship” with Islamabad. China however, claims India should be more wary of the Pakistan-US relationship and says it has largely modified its position from “total support” of Pakistan’s views on Kashmir (plebiscite and UN resolutions) to one in which it believes the dispute is a bilateral one.