11-22-2003, 10:27 AM
Any idea what is India game plan ???
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Delhi sends an invite to key Iraq Kurds
Saturday November 22 2003 02:01 IST
NEW DELHI: India has taken an unusual step in the fast-changing Iraq theatre by inviting key Kurdish leaders Jalal Talebani and Masoud Barzani, besides Adnan Pachachi, the Sunni leader who once served as the country's foreign minister.
The invitations to the three key members of the Iraqi Governing Council_Talebani is right now its rotating head_were issued on the weekend, around the same time US announced it would hand over power to the Iraqis by the summer of 2004.
New Delhi will also decide ``over the next few days'' when to send the advance Army medical team to Najaf in central Iraq to put together a hospital specializing in maternity and paediatric care, along with the Jordanians.
The invitations to the Iraqi leaders comes in the wake of a long debate within the government over how to deal with Iraq. While PM Vajpayee has ruled out sending troops to help ease the pain of the US-led coalition forces, because they are also ``occupying forces'', he has also stressed the need for India ``to get out of its Cold War mindset'' and deal with a new world.
Even critics admit the Indian invitation perfectly straddles that divide. Firstly, the US had invited New Delhi to send its troops to the Kurdistan sector in northern Iraq, knowing full well that New Delhi would not like to confront Sunnis and Shias in middle and southern Iraq.
When Indian officials went on a trip to northern Iraq in the late summer and met both Talebani and Barzani, the Kurdish leaders told the officials that they ``would have no problem'' if Indian troops kept the peace in their part of Iraq.
Significantly, both Talebani and Barzani told the Indian officials that they fondly remembered the support given to the 1925 Kurdistan campaign by none other than Jawaharlal Nehru.
They knew too that Nehru had sympathetically referred to the Kurds vis-Ã -vis the Turks (``(Kemal Pasha) then crushed the Kurds without pity...The Kurdish leaders, Sheikh Said and Doctor Fuad and many others, were executed. They died with the plea for the independence of Kurdistan on their lips.''), and cited chapter and verse from Nehru's `Glimpses of World History.
Certainly, New Delhi seems not only keen about reforging the old Kurdish connection, it is also interested in restoring ties with the rest of Sunni-Shia Iraq. Short of sending troops and putting its people in danger, the message in the government is, India would be willing to help participate in civilian projects in that country.
One Indian team has already restored power in a central Iraqi city. The decision to send the advance medical team, for example, is only on hold because of the unstable security situation. The invitation to Adnan Pachaci, the very patrician Sunni leader, is also part of this effort.
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Delhi sends an invite to key Iraq Kurds
Saturday November 22 2003 02:01 IST
NEW DELHI: India has taken an unusual step in the fast-changing Iraq theatre by inviting key Kurdish leaders Jalal Talebani and Masoud Barzani, besides Adnan Pachachi, the Sunni leader who once served as the country's foreign minister.
The invitations to the three key members of the Iraqi Governing Council_Talebani is right now its rotating head_were issued on the weekend, around the same time US announced it would hand over power to the Iraqis by the summer of 2004.
New Delhi will also decide ``over the next few days'' when to send the advance Army medical team to Najaf in central Iraq to put together a hospital specializing in maternity and paediatric care, along with the Jordanians.
The invitations to the Iraqi leaders comes in the wake of a long debate within the government over how to deal with Iraq. While PM Vajpayee has ruled out sending troops to help ease the pain of the US-led coalition forces, because they are also ``occupying forces'', he has also stressed the need for India ``to get out of its Cold War mindset'' and deal with a new world.
Even critics admit the Indian invitation perfectly straddles that divide. Firstly, the US had invited New Delhi to send its troops to the Kurdistan sector in northern Iraq, knowing full well that New Delhi would not like to confront Sunnis and Shias in middle and southern Iraq.
When Indian officials went on a trip to northern Iraq in the late summer and met both Talebani and Barzani, the Kurdish leaders told the officials that they ``would have no problem'' if Indian troops kept the peace in their part of Iraq.
Significantly, both Talebani and Barzani told the Indian officials that they fondly remembered the support given to the 1925 Kurdistan campaign by none other than Jawaharlal Nehru.
They knew too that Nehru had sympathetically referred to the Kurds vis-Ã -vis the Turks (``(Kemal Pasha) then crushed the Kurds without pity...The Kurdish leaders, Sheikh Said and Doctor Fuad and many others, were executed. They died with the plea for the independence of Kurdistan on their lips.''), and cited chapter and verse from Nehru's `Glimpses of World History.
Certainly, New Delhi seems not only keen about reforging the old Kurdish connection, it is also interested in restoring ties with the rest of Sunni-Shia Iraq. Short of sending troops and putting its people in danger, the message in the government is, India would be willing to help participate in civilian projects in that country.
One Indian team has already restored power in a central Iraqi city. The decision to send the advance medical team, for example, is only on hold because of the unstable security situation. The invitation to Adnan Pachaci, the very patrician Sunni leader, is also part of this effort.