In some ways, the contemporary shift from non-alignment to strategic autonomy in India is simply a case of the rhetoric catching up to reality. A convergence of national interests and shared concerns about China have been bringing the United States and India steadily closer for twenty years, unmoored from the philosophical debates unfolding in New Delhi.
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Since his election for the country’s top post last June, Egyptian President Mohammad Mursi has been sending mixed messages as to whether he seeks to normalise relations with Iran after more than three decades of bitter animosity. In the wake of the Egyptian revolution, pro-Iran analysts expected that the new Islamist government in Cairo would rush to forge closer ties with Tehran.
The assessment of the Iranian government was not much different. It welcomed the inauguration of Mursi as Egypt’s first Islamist leader. Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad seized on the opportunity to congratulate Mursi and invited him to the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) conference in Tehran in late August.
What was most significant about the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit that was held in Tehran recently was that almost all of its 120 members gathered there in the face of U.S., allied western nations and Israeli attempts to pressure and isolate Iran to abandon parts of its nuclear programme. Great pressure was even brought on United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon by Washington and Tel Aviv not to attend, but the mild and generally pliant Ban could not bring himself to abandon the precedent set by his predecessors and skip the event.
In the complex chessboard where the New Great Game in Eurasia is being played, both Kings are easy to identify: Pipelineistan, and the possible, multiple intersections of a 21st century Silk Road. Few have noticed a crucial meeting that took place during the recent Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit in Tehran, between senior Foreign Ministry diplomats from Afghanistan, India and Iran. Their ultimate goal; a new Southern Silk Road connecting Iran to Central and South Asia through roads, railways and last but not least, major ports.
The crucial Silk Road port in this case is Chabahar, in Sistan-Balochistan province in southeast Iran. Tehran has already invested $340 million to complete 70 per cent of the port construction – a decade-long project. But with US and EU sanctions biting harder and harder, Tehran expects Delhi to come up with a closing $100 million. India has already invested $136 million to link Chabahar to Afghanistan’s ring road system.
