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The 2+2 Foreign and Defence ministers meeting between India and the US finally got concluded. This wasn’t business as usual. The meeting was held in the shadow of the Russia-Ukraine war and growing differences between New Delhi and Washington, D.C. over the ongoing crisis.
The US wants its ally, India to say and do certain things about Russia’s war against Ukraine. On the other hand, India insists on retaining autonomy over its foreign policy decisions and acting as per its own geopolitical interests. Therefore, the meeting was held under a rather uncomfortable backdrop with the two allies trying to make some progress despite a fundamental difference in their approach to the Ukraine crisis.
So, when India’s Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and External Affairs Minister Dr. S. Jaishankar met their US counterparts- Defence Secretary Llyod Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, there were some traditional remarks about increasing cooperation and engagement. However, there were also some unsubtle attempts at flexing muscles and intimidation. Blinken, for instance, suggested that the US was “monitoring some recent concerning developments” in India, including “a rise in human rights abuses by some government, police, and prison officials”.
One can understand why Blinken may have made this statement. The US wants India to refrain from buying Russian oil and Russian arms. This is a part of the Biden administration’s broader agenda to isolate Putin’s Russia. When it comes to strong-arming allies, this is the kind of language that the US likes to use. Even during Blinken’s India visit last year, a senior State Department official had said that he would raise human rights with his counterparts in India. However, Blinken is flirting with danger by trying to pursue the strategy of using human rights to strong-arm allies.
Blinken’s remark suggests that if India doesn’t kowtow the Biden administration’s line on crucial international issues, the US could start talking about ‘human rights abuses’ in India. But if the two allies actually start talking about human rights abuses, the US might find itself in a tight spot. Presently, all that Washington, D.C. can talk about is how Putin’s war is claiming innocent lives and destroying an entire country in Europe. Yet, if one dives into US history, it is full of wars and military campaigns that were no less brutal than Putin’s ongoing war.
Right from the Vietnam war of the 1960s and 1970s to the regime change wars in the Middle East that were fought for securing oil resources in the region, the US has had a questionable human rights track record. The US military was accused of having murdered hundreds of Vietnamese civilians during the Vietnam War and there is also a plethora of reports about how US military operations in Syria claimed the lives of innocent women and children. Only last year, the US conducted a botched drone strike in Afghanistan that claimed the lives of 10 innocent civilians. In fact, the US officially admitted the error but also made it clear that no military personnel involved in the strike would face any consequences. The killing of 10 civilians was dismissed as a tragic mistake.
It is however even more ironic that Blinken talked about “human rights abuses” by “police and prison officials”. Less than two years ago, the US was facing nationwide protests, violence and incidents of arson following the custodial death of George Floyd, an African-American man by a police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota. This however wasn’t the first incident of custodial torture or murder in the history of the United States.
When it comes to prisons, the US doesn’t have a great record either. The US has been running the Guantanamo Bay detention camp within the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base for the last 20 years. Hundreds of prisoners were confined at the military prison for several years, without being charged or tried formally. The prison has become a global symbol of institutionalised torture, human rights abuses and blatant disregard for democratic values. The prison was started as a part of America’s ‘war on terror’ following 9/11 and even today, 39 prisoners remain detained there.
The US criminal system too carries deep-rooted racial prejudice. African-Americans face rampant abuse and discrimination when it comes to facing incarceration. African-Americans are more likely to get arrested, convicted and sentenced to long terms in prison. African-American adults are estimated to face a six times greater risk of getting incarcerated than whites. In 2018, African-Americans constituted a third of the total sentenced prison population in the country. This was highly disproportionate to the 12% share of African-Americans in the US population and reflected racial profiling in the US criminal justice system.
Finally, there is the issue of the cruel and ruthless treatment of illegal immigrants. The US continues to talk about human rights abuses, but the sub-human conditions at American detention camps for illegal immigrants bring into question the US’s commitment towards human rights.
Therefore, Blinken should have avoided bringing up human rights during the high-level 2+2 meeting with Indian Ministers. When it comes to human rights, India doesn’t really need lectures from the US. India itself has a decent human rights track record. It hasn’t waged regime change wars in different parts of the world and has a long tradition of offering humanitarian assistance in times of global crisis starting from the Korean War in the 1950s to the two-decade-long Afghanistan war that ended last year. At a domestic level, India is showing a lot of promise. The ruling party has been winning Assembly elections which shows that it enjoys the confidence of the electorate, the welfare of the deprived classes has been institutionalised through a broad political consensus and the economy is also recovering in the post-COVID phase.
For the US, India is more of an indispensable partner now, which Biden administration officials including Blinken do understand. This is why the 2+2 Ministers meeting was organised with much fanfare by the US. However, the US must understand that muscle-flexing will not work with India. Blinken himself has had an awful experience of getting humiliated by the Chinese during the Alaska Summit in March 2021. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and senior diplomat Yang Jiechi had then mocked the US, while Blinken and White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan failed to hit back at the Chinese.
India doesn’t want to put US officials through such an embarrassment, given the unique relationship between the two sides. However, the US must not take magnanimity for granted. India isn’t one of the traditional US allies which would toe Washington, D.C.’s line, no matter what. The US must understand that India will exercise its strategic autonomy and any attempt by the Biden administration to flex its muscles or rake up human rights could prove highly counter-productive given Washington, D.C.’s dubious track record.
Akshay Narang is a columnist who writes about international affairs and developments in the defence sector. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent the stand of this publication.
