Petulant Beijing should grow up
China entered a zone of serious diplomatic error when last week it peevishly informed this country of the cancellation of scheduled boundary talks on account of the chance fact that the talks were to coincide with a Buddhist religious conference in New Delhi to be addressed by the Dalai Lama. News reports suggest that Beijing first asked New Delhi to get the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism to not address the conference, but then demanded that the conference itself be disallowed.
India quite correctly declined to entertain such foolish requests.
With unbecoming stubbornness for a rising power, Beijing refuses to understand that India is a democratic country which guarantees spiritual freedoms, and not a dictatorial or one-party state. Religious meets are not proscribed here. Besides, India treats the Dalai Lama as a venerable spiritual guru. As a condition of his stay in India as a refugee from Chinese-controlled Tibet, the Dalai Lama may not engage in political activities but enjoys absolute spiritual freedom.
Two years ago, China had outrageously asked India to stop the Dalai Lama from visiting a famous monastery at Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh, which Beijing claims is a part of Tibet. India firmly refused to do so, as that state is an integral part of this country over which China advances counterfeit claims. In the light of this episode, Beijing would have known that New Delhi would not accede to its unreasonable demand of not letting the Dalai Lama speak at a spiritual gathering in India’s capital. It does seem, therefore, that the petulant stance Beijing has chosen to adopt is really a petty riposte to India’s position that its exploration for oil in the South China Sea for a Vietnamese company is a commercial activity not connected with the territorial claims of the littoral states in those waters.
The boundary talks were begun a decade and a half ago as the two countries wanted to keep a tranquil border while resolving a dispute, and meanwhile keeping cooperation going in other areas. India did not disengage from the talks despite considerable Chinese provocations in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. It is time Beijing grew up.
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