NEW DELHI: External affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee met up with his Australian counterpart Alexander Downer in Manila on Tuesday. They are attending the East Asia Summit. The two have been in touch ever since Mohammed Haneef was arrested for suspected links with the London and Glasgow terror suspects.
On Tuesday, Mukherjee and Downer discussed the Haneef case. The doctor is back in Bangalore, but the Australian government has not given him the right to live and work in Australia. “The Australian Foreign Minister told me that investigation is still on. Once the investigation is over, then his case relating to visa will be finally disposed off,’’ Mukherjee said.
Despite minor hiccups over Haneef, India and Australia have not let it come in the way of growing warmth in their ties. Australia, which had taken a tough anti-India stand after New Delhi’s 1998 twin nuclear tests, have since completely changed its views. Today, it is willing to sell uranium, to India to be used in civilian nuclear reactors, once the Nuclear Supplier Group makes the exception for India to be part of the international nuclear commerce.
In fact, now that the 123 agreement between India and the US has been finalised, Australia will go ahead with the sale. Downer informed Mukherjee that Prime Minister John Howard’s government will soon bring up the issue and a decision will be taken in the cabinet soon. The signal to the NSG members is that Australia is willing to do business with India.
India’s ties with Australia have looked up ever since Canberra, a close ally of the US, saw the changing equation between New Delhi and Washington. This together with India’s 9 per cent GDP growth, has led to much closer business and political ties. In fact, there is now talk of a India-US-Japan-Australia line up to bring stability to the Asia-Pacific region.
Ashely Tellis, strategic analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for Democracy, was in India in March and spoke of a future security architecture for Asia. “Its an idea who’s time has come.’’ Tellis had said. In his presentation, Tellis pointed out why such an arrangement for Asia’s security would be welcomed by the US.
