New Delhi, July 24: After a week-long standoff over the controversial Indo-Pak joint statement issued at Sharm El-Sheikh on July 16, Sonia Gandhi is believed to have sent word to prime minister Manmohan Singh to make suitable amends and correct the impression that the document was a “sellout” to Pakistan.
We understands that Sonia’s message was conveyed to the PM after she met with her main troubleshooters, Pranab Mukherjee, AK Antony and Ahmed Patel, on Wednesday morning to discuss the fallout of the political and diplomatic storm into which the government has been sucked.
It speaks of the concern and apprehension in the top rung of the Congress that Mukherjee and Antony have now been authorised to act as watchdogs to steer the government and the party through the present crisis. A highly-placed Congress source indicated that the PM has been apprised of the strong misgivings in the party over what happened at Sharm El-Sheikh. Some red lines have also been drawn and he has been urged to take the party into confidence in future before he launches any major initiative that overturns established policy. “What happened at Sharm El-Sheikh will not happen again,” the source emphasised. The result of all this backroom activity has been a frenzied damage-control exercise by the government.Turn to p14
It began with the two ministers of state for external affairs making explanatory statements to the media on Thursday and will culminate in the PM taking the floor in the Lok Sabha on July 29 to reply to the scheduled debate on the joint statement.
Sonia has deputed finance minister Pranab Mukherjee and defence minister AK Antony to discuss with the PM the modalities of the course correction necessitated by widespread misgivings over the inclusion of contentious phrases in the Indo-Pak document. The reference to Balochistan and the delinking of the composite bilateral dialogue from action against terror have attracted criticism from within the Congress, the opposition parties and foreign policy experts. They have attacked the PM for making unprecedented concessions to Pakistan.
Minister of state for external affairs Shashi Tharoor attempted a backtracking of sorts on Thursday. He told the media that the joint statement was merely a diplomatic paper, not a legal document. “It is a diplomatic paper that is released to the press, different from legal papers. Ultimately, what matters is not the perception of words on paper, it is the conduct of government,” he declared.
Former national security advisor Brajesh Mishra expressed surprise over Tharoor’s convoluted effort to extricate the government from the bungle at Sharm-el-Sheikh. “How can one talk like that? He has ended up rubbishing all the joint statements made so far all over the world. Of course, joint statements are not legal documents but they have diplomatic validity and indicate the intentions of governments, particularly when they are issued by heads of government or heads of state,” he said.
The controversy over the Sharm-el-Sheikh statement has plunged the government into a crisis of sorts. It clearly cannot totally disown the document because of the repercussions on ties with Pakistan and the effort to resume dialogue. At the same time, it has to find a way of wriggling out of the corner in which it finds itself.
—Agencies