India's concerns half-met

ON THE DAY the Northern Alliance, a friend of India and present ally of the U.S., scored a breakthrough victory in Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan - the first on the ground on behalf of the global alliance - Indian diplomacy secured a triumph of sorts in Washington. The formulation in the joint statement issued at the end of Mr. Vajpayee's talks with Mr. George Bush, describing both countries as ``targets of terrorism'' and clubbing the September 11 terror attacks in New York and Washington and the October 1 assault on the Assembly building in Srinagar, is acknowledgement by Washington, in however roundabout a manner, that it accepted in theory the need to root out this menace everywhere. New Delhi's ceaseless campaign to bring the focus on the Pakistan-sponsored terrorism it has been battling for more than a decade had begun paying dividends. In remarks at a joint press conference earlier, Mr. George Bush had half-met India's concerns over the sponsorship of terrorism from across the border. Calling it the ``evil'' of the politics of terrorism and murder, Mr. Bush had declared that there was but one universal law of anti-terror, implying that it will be applicable to all forms of such activity but giving no clue if and when it will be applied to specific other cases. It did not matter that this was vague enough to mean all things to all allies and friends. It also did not matter immediately that while Mr. Vajpayee may be talking of targets in his neighbourhood, his host may have his sights on old enemies further west in the Gulf region.

There were some other gains, too, on the bilateral front, more promises and few clear losses from the Prime Minister's mission to Washington as part of a three-nation voyage. It was clear that while India was eager not to compound Washington's worries by highlighting its specific concerns - Mr. Bush openly hailed the ``understanding'' shown by Mr. Vajpayee - the U.S was anxious to ensure that New Delhi was not alienated and understood American compulsions. As the two countries took one more step at the summit level to turn the estranged democracies into engaged democracies, the state of health of post-Sept. 11 bilateral relations was on public view on the precincts of the White House: there was the single-mindedness of purpose and steely determination of the U.S on one side of the podium and on the other the genuine worry and concern of India that it may have to fend for itself in tackling cross-border terrorism sponsored by its western neighbour after the Afghan crisis eases and world attention shifts away. Mr. Bush apparently brought no pressure to bear on Mr. Vajpayee to return to the dialogue process with Pakistan.

If Mr. Vajpayee's visit to the White House was itself the message at these extraordinarily sensitive times in the U.S, he did win friends by declaring that India will not overload the agenda of the global coalition, thereby unambiguously addressing a major U.S concern and promising to continue the policy of restraint that came under severe strain on Oct. 1 in the wake of the terrorist attack in Srinagar. The Prime Minister effectively projected India's basic argument that a frontline partner of the U.S-led coalition cannot be allowed to sponsor terrorism. In the end, there was but one message, and one objective. Washington let it be known to India, which was among the first to offer to join the fight against terrorism, that the global alliance's guns will for now be fully and solely trained on ``enemy number one'' Osama bin Laden, his network and the rag tag army of the Taliban. It brooked no diversions or distractions.

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