US lawmakers meeting Modi after Dalai Lama signals New Delhi shift on China: analysts

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted American lawmakers, including former House speaker Nancy Pelosi, in New Delhi on Thursday, shortly after they had an audience with the Dalai Lama, a meeting that defied stern warnings from Beijing.

"Had a very good exchange of views with friends from the US Congress in a delegation," Modi posted on X, formerly Twitter, adding that he "deeply" valued the "strong bipartisan support in advancing the India-US comprehensive global strategic partnership".

Had a very good exchange of views with friends from the US Congress in a delegation led by @RepMcCaul, Chairman of @HouseForeignGOP. Deeply value the strong bipartisan support in advancing India- US Comprehensive Global Strategic Partnership.@RepMMM @RepBera @NMalliotakis... pic.twitter.com/qSElM0z2bt

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- Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) June 20, 2024

The delegation's visit coincided with a trip by US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell to New Delhi, where both sides agreed to increase cooperation in hi tech and vowed to further bolster military ties.

As images of Modi with the US delegation were shared on social media, experts argued that New Delhi was reshaping its China policy amid territorial tensions and strengthening relations with the US, while some cautioned about a "real risk" of escalating the China-India border conflict as a consequence.

"India has once again indicated that it is willing to gradually ramp up pressure on issues like Tibet and Taiwan," said Harsh Pant, an international relations professor at King's College London.

India's foreign policy towards China, he said, has been undergoing a "gradual calibrated change" since 2020, when a border clash killed at least 20 Indian and four Chinese soldiers in the Ladakh region.

Since then, multiple rounds of diplomatic and military-level talks have failed to normalise relations. Both nations maintain a significant number of troops and advanced weaponry along the border. In April, Beijing said that the border dispute was "not the entirety" of its relations with New Delhi, calling for steady ties.

But Pant said that New Delhi had made it clear that unless Beijing recognized "India's concerns and sensitivities and respects Indian interests", it was not moving from that posture.

India, which has long hosted the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, and his followers in their exile in Dharamshala, acknowledged Tibet as part of China in 2003. Following the 2020 border clash, though, New Delhi has ceased accommodating Chinese sensitivities regarding the issue.

Michael Kugelman, director of the Wilson Centre's South Asia Institute, said that it seemed as though India was "trying to signal that it can use its relationship with the US as leverage".

"It can show China that there are ways that it can push back," he added.

Modi's hosting of the delegation was a "very explicit signal", he said, that New Delhi was "fully" behind the delegation's audience with the Dalai Lama, and that it wasn't just "politely" facilitating it.

"India appears more risk tolerant now when it comes to how far it's willing to go with pushing the Tibet issue," Kugelman said.

While US-India security relations are deeper than ever before, Kugelman said, the US delegation's meeting with the Dalai Lama could have consequences along the "Line of Actual Control" (LAC), the disputed 3,000-km (1,864 miles) Himalayan border between China and India, in the form of "stepped-up Chinese provocations".

"That's a real risk and will be something to watch," he said, suggesting that the growing US-India cooperation could have been one of the triggers of the border clashes in the first place.

Recalling the extensive military exercises China conducted around Taiwan after Pelosi's visit to Taipei in 2022, Kugelman said that her latest trip could give Beijing a "pretext to try to push back in a big way against India or the US or their allies".

Jabin Thomas Jacob, a professor of international relations at Shiv Nadar University in India, said that Beijing should remember that New Delhi "does not and cannot restrict access" to the Dalai Lama.

US and other foreign legislators or leaders visiting the Dalai Lama was a "long-standing tradition", he said, and there was "no reason" for China to send bilateral relations with either India or the US into a "tailspin".

This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright © 2024 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

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