Afghanistan has emerged as a strategic focal point whereby global actors have shown increasing eagerness to engage in conflict resolution and mediate among the multiple stakeholders involved. In the Asian context, India and China have a great deal of involvement, as revealed in last year’s ‘Heart of Asia’ summit, followed by the multilateral consultations initiated by Russia in February. India and China have deployed up-front, albeit contradictory, means to pursue peace in Afghanistan– the latter championing negotiations with the Taliban, to which the former expresses strong opposition; in turn, India favors targeting both Taliban and the IS in an equally proactive manner. Against this background, the role of third parties acquires greater prominence. As third parties, including, Russia, Iran, United States, and Europe, to a limited extent, contest for exerting influence in the region, India and China are eager to form alliances, to enhance their status in the international ambit as well as to ensure a prominent role in regional cooperation. As India emphasizes on securing Afghanistan for security purposes, China’s larger motif is in enlarging its presence in the strategic domain.
China’s strategy in Afghanistan can be broadly classified as ambiguous accommodation, as can be conceived through its historical role in the state. At the other end, India has more or less balanced its approach between emphasizing on development and status enhancement via playing a major role in security, both in domestic and international arenas. In this context, accommodation can be rightly understood as a desire by a rising power, India and China, to elevate both its status and material interests in the regional sphere by securing for itself a crucial role in the conflict-ridden state of Afghanistan. Following this strategy, China has made bold attempts to acquire a prominent voice in the Afghan affairs. In February 2015, the first round of the China-Afghanistan-Pakistan Trilateral Strategic Dialogue was held in Kabul, having been preceded by talks between China, Russia and India in 2014. This highlighted an urgency in Beijing to gain significant advantage, diplomatically and economically, from involvement in Afghanistan. Recently, as a demonstration of China’s changing goals in the Afghan region, the multilateral consultations hosted by Russia witnessed increased interest from the Chinese. However, China’s stances in Afghanistan, are more or less, oriented towards tackling the influence of United States and India’s rise, therefore it can qualify as ambiguous. In the early phase of Afghan governance, China reacted to Soviet Union’s overwhelming indulgence, calling for an alliance with United States, later also providing support to ‘Operation Enduring Freedom’.
On the contrary, India has applied a comparatively stable formula for guarding its security interests alongside boosting developmental initiatives in the afghan conflict. Since 2001, having played a proactive role in conflict resolution, aided by United States attempts to create a safety valve, India has recently made fresh commitments of $1 bn for Afghanistan’s capacity building and infrastructural development. This has been adequately complemented with Indo-Afghan defence partnership, from the transfer of Mi-25 helicopters to Afghanistan, to the recently opened air corridor between the two surpassing Pakistan. India’s approach to Taliban has acquired significant magnitude, which has witnessed a clash with the ideologies of multiple stakeholders. While Russia, Iran and China have made attempts to negotiate with the Taliban, India remains largely hesitant. Lately, however, New Delhi has felt the need to rethink its Afghan strategy, with appropriate focus on garnering a positive status in the regional ambit.
As China and India reveal divergent modus operandi for pursuing their goals in Afghanistan, a point of convergence arrives in the security domain. Both the countries, as well as other stakeholders strive to ensure security, keeping their interests in the frame. China has increased its anti-terrorism alliance with Pakistan, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. The quartet have agreed to establish a ‘four-country mechanism’ to share intelligence and training. Beijing has been wary of its border province of Xinjiang, which has witnessed a recent surge in riots and terrorist attacks. It has made attempts to guard against the Uighur separatists receiving support from the Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan. India, on the other end, has made prolific attempts at securing United States support for safeguarding its security interests in Afghanistan. In alliance with the Afghan government, New Delhi has called for an ‘Afghan led and Afghan owned’ peace and conflict resolution process. While both India and China have made significant attempts to ensure security in the domestic as well as regional realm, convergence in their strategic goals can aide both the countries in Afghanistan. In doing so, the economic parameters can come in very handy, attempts to explore the options of an economic corridor that benefits both India and China can have profound repercussions on their bilateral relation as a whole. It seems appropriate for the policy makers on both sides to indulge, keeping mutual interests and perceptions in mind, to discover opportunities for a stable economic and security partnership that can prove worthwhile to conceive for the Asian giants.