POLITICS: Japan Gravitates India’s Way to Seek Security Council Support

By Suvendrini Kakuchi Reprint | | Print |

Suvendrini Kakuchi

TOKYO, Apr 11 2005 (IPS) - Using its traditional checkbook diplomacy Japan is trying to woo India to support its bid for a permanent seat in the U.N. Security Council, say analysts.

”India’s support is crucial for Japan that is working hard to be included in the Security Council,” said Masaaki Fukunaga, an expert on South Asia at Gifu University.

Fukunaga explained that winning support from the South Asian giant has gained particular importance in Japan that is presently grappling with a wave of hostility in China and South Korea, its former allies.

”Several steps taken by Japan recently illustrate how keen it is to foster closer relations with India. Tokyo realises the country is a strategic partner to maintain the balance of power in Asia with the rise of China,” said Yoshie Shimane, economist at the Institute of Developing Economies.

Japan has already made India the top recipient of the country’s Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) yen loans, pledging more than 12.5 billion U.S. dollars for fiscal 2004 in a second straight year.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Anan put forward two plans last month to expand the membership of the Security Council to 24 from its current 15 and he urged the General Assembly to decide on the proper model by the time of the September gathering. He said the Security Council’s makeup must be broadened to reflect the modern realities of global power.

Japan has demanded a permanent seat arguing it gives huge sums in aid to developing countries in the form of ODA. Also Tokyo is one of the major contributors financially to the U.N.’s peacekeeping operations, besides the United States.

But Japan’s bid has not gone down well in China and South Korea.

Millions of mainland and overseas Chinese are reported to have joined an online petition campaign opposing Japan’s U.N. bid, claiming that Tokyo was distorting facts of the country’s past colonisation of East Asia in new history textbooks.

The new history textbooks also state that Japan ”owns” the disputed Takeshima Island in the Sea of Japan, much to the chagrin of South Korea, which has overlapping claims and refers to the island chain as Dokdo.

Late last week China, a permanent member of the Security Council signaled that it would resist any proposal to enlarge the prestigious U.N. body.

China’s U.N. ambassador, Wang Guangya, told the General Assembly last Wednesday that while China shared Annan’s concern that the current makeup was outdated, it could not endorse either of the formulas for change and would in any case block quick action.

Late last month Japan told China emphatically that it would end new yen loans to Beijing by March 2008, the end of Japan’s fiscal year.

Low interest yen loans comprise the most important aspect of Japan’s effective ODA budget and have been viewed as supporting China’s impressive economic growth since it embraced open market policies in the eighties.

China soon became Japan’s top recipient of Japanese ODA, with yen loans peaking at 25 billion U.S. dollars in 2000. However, Japan recently quoted China’s double-digit growth rates and Beijing’s expanding military budget as the reasons for phasing out financial assistance.

Japan’s overtures to India will intensify this year, say analysts, pointing to a closer but more complex future between the two countries as the Indian economy heats up and Tokyo pushes ahead with its ambitious goal of becoming a global power with its own active national army.

Late last month, Japan’s former foreign minister Yoriko Kawaguchi, attending a high-profile business meeting in New Delhi, compared India-Japan relations to that of potential sweethearts who are interested in each other and now discovering it.

Yukio Okamoto, a former diplomatic advisor to Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, told the Indian audience at the same meeting, that ”the presence of a robust, democratic India in the middle of the Asian continent directly contributes to Japan’s national security.”

But India wants a more dynamic economic relationship with Japan.

India’s Commerce and Industry Minister, Kamal Nath said New Delhi was seeking a ”new economic partnership that shifts from ODA-based to FDI (foreign direct investment)-centered.”

He pointed out that Japanese FDI in India during 1991-2004 had been about 3.2 billion U.S. dollars, which is around 4.8 percent of total Indian approvals for all foreign direct investments. And he stressed that that figure could be better.

But economist Shimane said there is now a definite interest growing among Japanese companies to invest in India, attracted by the country’s strong democratic laws, technological expertise and relatively cheap labour.

”I have many inquiries from Japanese businessmen who say they are strongly interested in investigating the business potential in India. They believe that India is more reliable than China,” she said.

The upcoming goodwill visit to New Delhi by Prime Minister Koizumi, scheduled for early May, will certainly augur well for the business communities in both countries and Japan’s bid for a U.N. Security Council seat.