India has never been a treaty ally of another country and does not have that kind of strategic architecture in mind, said Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar. - Photo: Reuters
WASHINGTON: India does not share the vision for an “Asian Nato” called for by Japan’s new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said on Tuesday (Oct 1).
Jaishakar told an event at Washington’s Carnegie Endowment for International Peace that unlike Japan, India had never been a treaty ally of another country.
“We don’t have that kind of strategic architecture in mind,” he said, when asked about Ishiba’s call.
India and Japan, along with the United States and Australia, are part of the so-called Quad grouping of countries established as a counterbalance to China.
“We have... a different history and different way of approaching..,” said Jaishankar, who spoke at the UN General Assembly in New York last week and will meet US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell later on Tuesday.
Ishiba on Oct 1 said he would seek deeper ties with friendly nations to counter the gravest security threats his country has faced since World War II.
He has called for the creation of an Asian Nato, the stationing Japanese troops on US soil and even for shared control of Washington’s nuclear weapons as a deterrent against Japan’s nuclear-armed neighbours, China, Russia and North Korea.
He argues that the changes would deter China from using military force in Asia.
The US has brushed off the idea.
US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in 2023 that Washington was not looking to create a Nato in the Indo-Pacific and Daniel Kritenbrink, the US assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific, recently said it was too early for such talk.
Ishiba nevertheless doubled down on his idea on Sept 27, telling a press conference that “the relative decline of US might” made an Asian treaty organisation necessary.
On Sept 21, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi joined US President Joe Biden, Ishiba’s predecessor Fumio Kishida and Australia’s prime minister for a Quad summit at which they announced joint security steps in Asia’s trade-rich waters in the face of growing challenges from China.
However, even though the Quad is increasingly addressing security matters, India has stressed that it is not intended as a military alliance. - Reuters
