Indo-UK relations: UK PM David Cameron tries to cultivate a "special relationship"

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What's going on inside David Cameron's foreign policy?​

Posted By Will Inboden Monday, August 2, 2010 - 5:41 PM Share

A year ago I speculated on what a Tory foreign policy might look like. One thing that I didn't anticipate is that it might look so much like David Cameron himself. That is, not content to delegate the national security portfolio to capable ministers such as William Hague and Liam Fox, Cameron has emerged as a major foreign policy player in his own right. Whether a distinctive "Cameron Doctrine" in British foreign policy might emerge remains to be seen. What appears so far is an effort to reassert the U.K.'s posture on the global stage through building new alliances, repairing old ones, bolstering British commerce, and generating headlines through "straight talk."

Cameron's first weeks in office were heavy on domestic policy, marked by his proposed dramatic budget cuts and decentralizing National Health Service reforms. Although evoking outrage from the usual interest groups (especially public sector unions), such measures will be indispensable for returning the U.K. to fiscal solvency, restoring broad-based economic growth, and reigniting the U.K.'s moribund entrepreneurial sector. More recently, Cameron's global travels from the U.S. to Turkey to India have been marked by a series of brash statements. Whether confident assertions of national interest (defending BP in Washington), shameless pandering (criticizing Israel in Turkey), or impolitic yet true criticisms (denouncing Pakistan's ties to terror groups in India), Cameron is serving notice that he intends to be the main voice of British foreign policy.

Less noticed but equally interesting has been Foreign Secretary William Hague's tenure. Hague and Cameron seem well-aligned on policy though divergent on style. True to form, Hague has been systematically laying out a vision for the U.K.'s role in what he calls the "networked world" through a series of thoughtful speeches. Fortunately Hague seems to have eschewed his previous declinist rhetoric about the U.K.'s global posture; perhaps with the responsibilities of office comes a renewed commitment to U.K. leadership.

Herewith a few questions and question marks on the Cameron government's foreign policy:

Where are the LibDems? The story in the weeks before the May 4 election was the stratospheric ascent of the LibDems; the story since they joined the government is a plummet just as rapid. As Max Hastings put it, Nick Clegg's plunge from a 72 percent approval rating to just 8 percent "makes Icarus seem a success story." On the other hand, Clegg's leveraging of one golden campaign week in May into a perch as deputy prime minister looks now like perhaps the shrewdest capitalization on an inflated asset bubble since AOL merged with TimeWarner. Meanwhile, on the question of governing, the LibDems have barely been seen or heard on foreign policy issues. This may change if they take a stand against funding for full replacement of the Trident nuclear deterrent.
Whither Liam Fox? The potentially odd-man out in the Cameron-Osbourne-Hague leadership triumvirate is Defence Minister Liam Fox. Smart, conservative, and strong-willed, he is making his presence known but may have limited influence due to his distance from the Cameron inner circle.
Will the overtures to India bear fruit? The kerfuffle over Cameron's Pakistan comments threatened to overshadow the significance of his visit to India. Leading a delegation of five Cabinet Ministers and numerous business leaders, Cameron made India the first and only Asian country on his itinerary -- and made clear that the U.K. seeks a broad-based commercial, security, and diplomatic upgrade in its relationship with India. Ironically, amidst the Obama administration's ongoing neglect of India, it may be the Cameron government that carries forward the Bush administration's legacy of elevating the strategic partnership between India and the West.
What about Afghanistan? Cameron has tried to straddle fragile and diminishing public support for the U.K.'s Afghanistan deployment with the security imperatives of the NATO mission by announcing a withdrawal date of 2015. Even this, however, sends a signal of irresolution to British troops in theatre. In private conversations I had last week with several British Army officers, every one voiced frustration that a specified withdrawal date demoralizes their forces and encourages the Taliban enemy. (No surprise, they found the Obama administration's July 2011 drawdown date even more indefensible). The Afghan question has major implications for other U.K. concerns as well. For example, as Walter Ladwig has pointed out, Cameron's hopes for a partnership with India hinge in part on the U.K.'s sustained and successful commitment to a stable and peaceful Afghanistan.
What hath Brussels to do with London? (or, What about the EU?) During the decade-plus of the Tory sojourn in the political wilderness, pundits incessantly tut-tutted about how the EU issue would forever bedevil Conservative efforts to regain power, as the party was wracked by internal divisions between its Euroskeptic and Europhile wings. Now into the third month of the Tory government (in coalition with the Europhile LibDems), EU issues have been on the back-burner. Will EU concerns stay simmering along as second-tier concerns, or will they re-emerge in some way as a first-order threat to government unity?
And of course...what about the "Special Relationship"? Considering the various BP distractions, David Cameron's recent visit to Washington seemed to go well enough. The rapport between Cameron and Obama is much improved over the flaccid Gordon Brown-Obama relationship. Relations between Hague and Secretary Clinton are likewise cordial. Press conferences and photo ops aside, the real tests will be whether and how much the leaders come to confide in and depend on each other on a regular basis. And even more, how they act in the eventuality of an international security crisis -- such as a large-scale terrorist attack, or a military confrontation with Iran.

 

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UK - PM urges India to invest in the UK​

Government ministers and business leaders from India and the UK have taken part in a summit to discuss opportunities for trade and investment between the two countries.

Prime Minister David Cameron, Business Secretary Vince Cable and Chancellor George Osborne and a number of Indian government ministers attended the summit in Delhi, India, this morning.Mr Cameron told delegates that Britain's universities, strong science sector, and expertise in defence and civil nuclear power were among the reasons that other countries should consider investing in the UK.

The PM added:

"I think we bring a lot of those things in terms of expertise that we can share with you, but the one-minute advert for investing back in Britain is we have the English language, we have a time zone between America and Asia, we have access to European markets, we have a highly trained workforce and, as I've said, we're one of the most open and welcoming economies."

Earlier, the PM had taken part in a ceremonial welcome at the Presidential Palace in Delhi and held a meeting with President Pratibha Patil.

Mr Cameron also laid a wreath at the Samadhi of Mahatma Gandhi and had a series of meetings including with Vice President Ansari and Ratan Tata, chairman of India's largest corporation Tata Group.

Following the summit, the PM visited the Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games Hockey Stadium and had talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, where UK and Indian representatives signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Cultural Cooperation.

In a joint press conference following the meeting, Mr Cameron said:

"I believe we have made tremendous progress with this relationship already. I believe there is much, much more to come and, after this visit, I feel even more enthusiastic than I did when I put into our manifesto then into the Queen's Speech how we wanted to build this very special relationship with India. And I, for one, cannot wait to come back again and make further progress in this, an important and winning relationship for both our countries."
The PM travelled to Delhi on the second leg of a visit to India. Yesterday, he was in Bangalore where he gave a speech calling for a stronger relationship between Britain and India.

 

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Cameron's realism​

By Harsh V Pant

UK is trying to cultivate emerging powers in the Asia-Pacific so that it can leverage the region's economic growth to its own ends.

By any measure, David Cameron's visit to India has turned out to be a transformative one. In one stroke, he has re-defined the parameters of the Indo-British partnership for the 21st century. The Conservative Party has been clear about India being a priority for the UK since the visit of Cameron to India in 2006.

Cameron had written fondly of India before his visit: "India is the world's largest democracy, a rapidly growing economy, a huge potential trading partner, a diverse society with a strong culture of pluralism and a key regional player — a force for stability in a troubled part of the world." He had suggested that though Britain's relationship with India 'goes deep,' it 'should go deeper.'

India and Britain had forged a 'strategic partnership' during the former British prime minister Tony Blair's visit to India in 2005 but Cameron's visit has imparted a new dynamism to the relationship.

The visit primarily had a commercial focus. As the centre of gravity of global economics and politics shifts to Asia-Pacific, Britain is looking to cultivate emerging powers in the region so that it can leverage the region's economic growth to its own ends. This is especially important as Britain's traditional economic partners, the EU and the US, are facing long term economic problems putting in jeopardy Britain's role as the world's financial capital.

Disenchanted with their special relationship with the US and disillusioned with the overly bureaucratic EU, Britain is now looking to Asia to develop new partnerships. The aim of Cameron's visit was to use India's economic dynamism to help sustain Britain's status as a major global economy.

Emphasising the commercial nature of Indo-British partnership, Cameron led a delegation that included six ministers and more than 30 senior executives from top UK firms. Britain is seeking ties with India across a whole range of sectors: IT, infrastructure, defence, education, telecommunications and counter-terrorism. The UK is the largest investor in India and the bilateral trade is worth over £13 billion. Indian students are the second largest group in Britain.

Britain supports India's candidature for the permanent seat of the UN Security Council. Britain had supported the US in its efforts to spearhead a proposal in the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) for modifying its guidelines to allow trade in nuclear fuel and technology with India, a non-signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Not surprising therefore that India and Britain signed the civilian nuclear energy cooperation pact during Cameron's visit. BAE Systems and Rolls Royce also signed a pact to supply India with 57 Hawk trainer jets in a deal worth around $1.09 billion.

Politically sensitive issues

But it was on the politically sensitive issues of Pakistan's use of terrorism as state policy and Kashmir that Cameron managed to break from the past and make a new beginning. Without obfuscating the issue, he warned Islamabad against promoting any 'export of terror,' whether to India or elsewhere, and said it must not be allowed to 'look both ways.'

Cameron proposed a close security partnership with India and underlined that Britain like India was determined that groups like the Taliban, the Haqqani network or Lakshar-e-Toiba should not be allowed to launch attacks on Indian and British citizens in India or in Britain. Despite causing a diplomatic row with Pakistan and his political opponents back home calling him 'loudmouth,' Cameron stuck to his comments.

More significantly, the British prime minister has rejected any role for his country in the India-Pakistan dispute. In stark contrast to the previous Labour government that continues to view South Asia through the prism of Kashmir, Cameron has put aside Labour's condescending posturing towards India and imparted a new 'realism' to British policies towards the sub-continent.

As late as last year, the former foreign secretary and now a contender for the Labour Party leadership, David Miliband, was hectoring the Indian government that the resolution of the Kashmir dispute is essential to solving the problem of extremism in South Asia. Such an approach has left an indelible mark on the Indian psyche of Britain being on the side of Pakistan on this most crucial of issues.

The Labour government failed to recognise that New Delhi's ties with Washington could only evolve after George W Bush administration more or less accepted the merits of the Indian arguments on Kashmir.

Cameron wants to forge a new special relationship with one of the world's major economic powers but he has realised that a genuine political partnership cannot be realised without repudiating Labour government's legacy. No wonder at the end of Cameron's visit, the Indian prime minister described India and the UK as "natural partners to shape a better world."

This is indeed a far cry from 1997 when during Queen Elizabeth's visit to India the then British foreign secretary Robin Cook offered to mediate between India and Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir only to be reminded by the then Indian prime minister, I K Gujral, that "Britain is a third-rate power nursing illusions of grandeur of its colonial past."
Cameron's is a bold move to qualitatively transform Indo-British relationship. It remains to be seen if this gambit would actually work.

(The writer teaches at King's College, London)

 

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India wants its crown jewel​

By Raja Murthy

MUMBAI - British Prime Minister David Cameron's refusal to return the Kohinoor diamond to India adds to the centuries-old saga of one of the most famous, yet contentious, gemstones in history.

Leading news channel NDTV, in an interview with Cameron on July 28 during his two-day visit to India, told him the favorite question among viewers was about the Kohinoor: will Britain return the 105-carat (21.6 gram) diamond?

"No," Cameron told NDTV boss Prannoy Roy, adding that returning the Kohinoor would lead to similar requests and "suddenly we would soon have the British Museum empty" - a remark tantamount to admitting the museum in London was a storehouse for plundered goods.

Roy delivered India's general sentiment, assuring Cameron that "we will keep trying to get back the Kohinoor".

More than any intrinsic value - like other diamonds, the Kohinoor, in reality, is only a blob of very condensed carbon - the issue is emotional and the stone is seen as symbolic of British subjugation of India.

Queen Victoria declared herself "Empress of India"in 1876, 26 years after the Kohinoor was presented to her. The stone was subsequently mounted in the crown of the mother of the present queen, in 1937.

The sun has long since set on the Empire, with British India having been partitioned into India and Pakistan in 1947, but not it appears on imperial booty. India is unlikely to consider accounts settled, until the Kohinoor is returned.

The Kohinoor ("Mountain of Light" from Persian), was once the largest known diamond in the world and came from the Guntur district in the state of Andhra Pradesh as long as 5,000 years ago, according to some claims.

The diamond belonged to various Hindu, Mughal, Persian, Afghan, Sikh and British rulers before being seized by the East India Company, after which it became a part of the British crown jewels. This passing of ownership was variously described as a gift, seized booty and war reparations.

Britain has consistently rejected demands from the Indian government, parliamentarians, the Archaeological Survey of India, as well as prominent citizens, to return the Kohinoor to the country of its origin.

In 1990, veteran journalist and former high commissioner to Britain, Kuldip Nayar, joined the Kohinoor struggle. "I found that the British would be embarrassed whenever I talked to them about the Kohinoor, " Nayar recalled in an article in 2005. "When I visited the Tower of London with my family to see Indian diamonds, including the Kohinoor, the British officials, who showed us around, were very apologetic. They said: 'We feel ashamed to show them [diamonds] because they are from your country'."

British governmental arguments against returning the Kohinoor are rejected outright in India. One argument says there are conflicting claims for ownership, including from Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan. But no one disputes the fact the Kohinoor's origins are in India - that it was mined in southern India and then taken to Britain.

A more abrasive argument says Britain is in "better position" to take care of the Kohinoor and other historical treasures, a claim befitting colonial justification for conquest and exploitation: the native heathens can't take care of themselves, so we, the superior race, have to do it.

Britain has not always been able to cling to property it does not own. The late Bhaskar Ghorpade, former counsel for the government of India in London and a Kohinoor activist, successfully had an invaluable 12th-century bronze statue of Natraj, the god of dance, returned to India from Britain after a legal battle.

Ghorpade, who died this year in January, had said that "British museums are so laden with Indian treasures that often they don't have room to even store them." The Indian section in Victoria and Albert Museum, he said, displays barely 2% of the collection from India.

India has company in its post-independence grouse with Britain. Countries like China, Mexico, Peru, Pakistan, Ethiopia, Cyprus, Libya, Greece, Syria, Egypt and Guatemala want back their cultural and historical treasures currently in foreign possession. These countries are part of stuttering international campaigns to reverse the loot taken during colonial and war times.

The United Nation Education Science and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) passed a 1970 convention calling for the return of antiquities and works of art to their countries of origin. But the UNESCO rule conveniently does not apply to artifacts looted before 1970, an untenable ruling since most of the plunder has already happened.

UN conventions or not, Britain will hear more of the issue. The Kohinoor has a track record of changing owners. Chances are the next change of address is due.

The Kohinoor has a more unstable biography than other famous diamonds like the Great Mogul, Tiffany, Black Orloff, Star of South Africa and the Hope. It flitted from Indian rulers, Mughal emperors, Persian raiders, back to Indian kings and then to a British queen - often leaving a bloodied trail of obsessive greed, intrigue, torture and murder.

The word "diamond" derived from the Greek word "adamas", means invincible, but the Kohinoor carried a curse in its wanderings through the centuries. Whoever wears the Kohinoor is doomed, said the curse, and its successive royal owners suffered untimely death or lost their kingdoms.

The British royalty seem to have escaped their scheduled fate by keeping the Kohinoor in the Tower of London. Or, from another perspective, the British Empire lasted barely another 100 years after the Kohinoor was fixed in the royal crown.

Legend says the Kohinoor was first found over 5,000 years old. But it was first seen in writing in the Baburanama, memoirs of Babur, the founder of the Mughal Empire and a descendant of Genghis Khan from his mother's side.

The Kohinoor was part of Babur's booty after the Battle of Panipat, in 1526, in which he killed Ibrahim Lodi, sultan of Delhi. Among Lodi's slain allies was Vikramaditya, the king of Gwalior and last owner of the Kohinoor.

The Kohinoor passed onto Babur's son Humayun, who was dethroned by Sher Shah Suri, an able, Afghan adventurer. Wandering as a homeless exile, Humayan presented the Kohinoor to his host Shah Tahmasp, the ruler of Persia, in 1547.

Shah Tahmasp, like many others now seeing it while standing on a conveyor belt in the Tower of London, was not much impressed by the looks of Kohinoor. It fell into the hands of a wily diamond dealer, Mir Jumla, who brought it back to India. The Kohinoor passed from one royal owner to another, including Shah Jahan, the builder of the Taj Mahal. Only emperors and kings could afford the Kohinoor, whose value at one time was estimated to be "two and a half times the daily expense of the entire world".

In early 18th century, the Kohinoor was part of the fabulous Peacock Throne of Delhi - made of gold, diamonds, sapphires and pearls - before it again left India as part of the plunder of Persian invader Nadir Shah, who raided and ransacked Delhi in 1739.

From Persia, the Kohinoor returned once more to India, to Lahore (now in Pakistan), the capital of Maharaja Ranjit Singh's Sikh kingdom. The Kohinoor yet again left India, as part of the British booty from Ranjit Singh who was defeated in the Sikh wars. Lord Dalhousie took the Kohinoor with him on the HMS Medea, sailing from Bombay on April 6, 1850.

The Kohinoor-back-to-India movement is also getting backers in Britain. Keith Vaz, a British member of parliament of Indian origin, told Cameron his India visit was "a perfect opportunity" to render historical justice. "It would be fitting for the Kohinoor to return to the country in which it was mined 161 years after it was removed from India," Vaz said in a statement.

161 years later, sentiment for the Kohinoor making its return journey still runs high, as Cameron discovered. But his counterpart, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, and his government do not appear too interested in exerting pressure to retrieve the Kohinoor.

That is just as well for those believing in letting sleeping dogs and cursed diamonds lie. The Tower of London might be a safe resting place for the once restless Kohinoor, and India perhaps better off leaving the glittering bad luck with Britain.

 

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Cameron tells it as it is​

Premen Addy

British Prime Minister David Cameron was as good as his word. He promised to enhance the Indo-British relationship, to take it to the next level. Scarred by Mr Tony Blair's poodleism towards Uncle Sam, which has resulted in the draining experience of Iraq followed by exhaustion in Afghanistan-Pakistan, Mr Cameron is keen to explore the emerging realities available to him, to leaven relations with the US and the EU. This is no zero sum game. Key to the new vision is Mr Cameron's readiness to decouple the India-Pakistan Cold War construct for an exclusive partnership with India.

Nothing is as strong as an idea whose time has come. That idea, in Mr Cameron's view, is the "uncaged Indian tiger", which he is keen to embrace in Britain's national interest. The UK wants greater access to the Indian market and desires an increasing contra-flow of Indian investment into Britain. Beyond these are vistas of cultural and scientific co-operation and educational exchanges.

British Indian businessman Lord Karan Billimoria reminded a London television interviewer that Britain is blessed with four of the world's top 10 universities, that the British experience in this and other fields had much to offer India. He did also say that having been a member of previous British delegations to the country under the dispensations of Mr Blair and Mr Gordon Brown, he had no doubt whatsoever that the Cameron party dwarfed them all in size, outreach and ambition.

Beyond India's economy, Mr Cameron spoke warm words on why India was important to his country: It was India's secular pluralism encompassing a variety of religious faiths, its multitude of tongues and ethnicities within an over-arching Indian identity, which confected with democracy and the rule of law made India a light unto the nations. Western leaders are apt to indulge in such pieties as obligatory ritual. Mr Cameron's tribute, in contrast, carried conviction. He well understands the true significance of the Islamist terrorist goal to traduce the modern global narrative for a bonfire of the medievalist vanities.

Nothing underlines this more than his robust criticism of Pakistan's export of terrorism to India and countries beyond, and its dualism on Islamist violence, as the WikiLeak revelations demonstrate. The UK's Right-wing broadsheet, The Daily Telegraph, notes in an editorial that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency's links with myriad jihadi groups have long been "an open secret".

Yet Mr Cameron's strictures have provoked a firestorm of outrage in Pakistan, and among British Pakistanis — Labour's Lord Ahmed, a peer of the realm, Mr Khalid Mahmood, a Labour MP, and Yasmin Alibhai Brown, a columnist with the Left-liberal Independent and a loquacious verbalist on radio and television, lead the charge in defence of the land they have chosen to leave for another. They were all primordially unforgiving of Mr Cameron for having spoken as he did on Indian soil. If he had made the offending speech in, say, Antarctica before a crowd of penguins, walruses, seals and polar bears, it wouldn't have rankled nearly as much. Mr David Miliband, the former Labour Foreign Secretary, called Mr Cameron a "loudmouth". Protesters in Islamabad and Karachi and other Pakistani cities followed suit with banners denouncing "Cameroon loos mouth", an engaging variation of jihadi patois, no doubt.

Mr Cameron's forthright attack made media faint hearts bleat and whimper. Jeremy Page in The Times feared for peace in Afghanistan (and the UK) if the Pakistani authorities were unduly annoyed; the Financial Times was similarly cringing. Maybe this was covert regret at losing the Pakistan card to keep the Indians in check, with bombings and murders such as we witnessed in Mumbai. Old habits die hard.

However, increasing numbers of Britain's great and the good are advocating a bold and resolute line with Pakistan. Seasoned Foreign Office mandarins of yore like Sir Christopher Meyer, a former British envoy in Washington, and Sir Hilary Synott, once his country's High Commissioner in Islamabad, have advised firmness; Mr Cameron had nothing to apologise for, they said.

The veteran Times columnist William Rees-Mogg provided a welcome antidote to the Page poison. Whilst he did not discount the value of Pakistan as a Western ally in Afghanistan, "this does not mean that David Cameron was wrong to speak frankly about the reliability of Pakistan as a partner in the war against terror....It is no use Pakistan taking offence at the Prime Minister pointing out what he and the ISI know to be the truth. What Mr Cameron said was not an indiscretion or a 'gaffe'. It was part of a policy of telling the truth, as a calculated way of bringing awkward issues closer to the point of decision." Straight talk helps "when there is an open sore in existing relations."

Christina Lamb's headline in The Sunday Times — "Butchers of Mumbai join Afghan battle" — made by far the most significant political equation. She is arguably the best informed foreign correspondent in Pakistan, having acquired experience of the country in three decades as a reporter there.

Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari has arrived in Britain as part of his wider European tour. He has promised to put the British Prime Minister straight on terrorism, after which he will travel to Birmingham to address a public meeting of Pakistanis, where it is expected, his 21-year old son Bilawal, recently graduated from Oxford University, will be anointed leader of Pakistan's ruling PPP, the party founded by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, who was hanged by Gen Zia. He was succeeded by his assassinated daughter, Bilawal's mother, Benazir. Centuries ago, Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Today, Mr Zardari fiddles as much of Pakistan drowns, and its commercial hub Karachi burns.

There is a lesson for Pakistani leaders. Kemal Ataturk, addressing the National Assembly of the new Turkish Republic on December 1, 1921, warned: "Gentlemen, by looking as though we were doing great and fantastic things, without actually doing them, we have brought the hatred, rancour and malice of the whole world on this country and this people. We did not serve pan-Islamism. We said we had and would, but we didn't... There you have the problem... we increased the number of our enemies and the pressure upon us...". Two years later, Ataturk developed his theme. "My friends, those who conquer by the sword are doomed to be overcome by those who conquer by the plough... That is what happened to the Ottoman Empire."

Back to Mr Cameron. His charm and steel make him a leader to the manner born, contradicting, alas, my previous judgement reached in haste. Mea culpa!

 

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Our leader knows his place in the world​

Harry Reid

3 Aug 2010
David Cameron's diplomatic gaffe – he told the truth about Pakistan but in language that was too direct and lacking in subtlety – should not detract from the underlying realism of his speeches in both Turkey and India.

A British leader was at long last accepting the new world order, and Britain's somewhat lowly place in it. After the posturing and warmongering of Tony Blair, and Gordon Brown's attempts to be the economic saviour of the world, we appear to have a leader who is neither vainglorious nor puffed up.

Cameron was saying, in so many words: OK, we are going to face up to the facts that we are now a second-rate power in a second-rate continent and that the future belongs to the Far East. We understand that and we want to work with you, not in any spirit of post-imperial arrogance, but rather as a wee brother in a world where you are now the big boys.

Obviously he did not put it quite like that, but that was the clear subtext. And how refreshing it was, after the pretensions of so many of our post-war prime ministers, to find a British leader facing up to new world realities.

The problem for Cameron is that the people of Britain are not yet used to being told that they are, in effect, a second- or even a third-rank power – a toothless old tiger, as an African statesman tellingly described us as far back as the 1960s.

Post-imperial delusions are still potent, not least among the politicians who defend our permanent place on the UN Security Council because it allows us to sit at the so-called "top table". The biggest delusion of all is that we still need an "independent" nuclear deterrent. There are signs that Cameron and Foreign Secretary William Hague are waking up to that nonsense too.

Cameron reminds me of the most charismatic Tory of the 1950s, the Scot Iain Macleod. He was the most unlikely of Tory ministers, a political risk-taker who was a former professional gambler. Backed by Harold Macmillan, he embarked on a bold policy of speedy, even breakneck, decolonisation in Africa.

Macleod, Britain's finest Colonial Secretary, believed passionately in the brotherhood of man. He quoted Burns at Tory conferences. It is not surprising that he was detested by the dinosaurs in his own party. One of them infamously called him "too clever by half", as if cleverness is something a politician should be ashamed of and should try to conceal.

Macleod was an outsider in his own party. Liberal or maverick or freethinking Tories always confuse and anger the backwoodsmen in their party, who often find it hard to grasp big ideas.

Macleod's rhetoric was brave and moving. He told Britain not to despair if new countries built their own traditions and made mistakes. Nor should the British get excited if the newly independent African countries were disrespectful. He admitted, honestly, that some of the liberated countries were not fully ready for the independence he was giving them, but Britain must not try to hold them back. The march towards freedom could be guided but not halted.

Now we find ourselves in a world where we have to understand that we are no longer the masters. Nor are the Americans, who are virtually bankrupt and in complete hock to China. On the other hand, India and, indeed, Turkey are about to be mighty economic powerhouses. Indeed, India is the next great superpower. China, already a superpower, has by far the biggest horde of foreign exchange reserves in the world today; most European countries have hardly any such reserves.

Yet when the world's leaders meet, to whom do we pay attention? Important statesmen such as Mr Hu of China, President Lula of Brazil or Manmohan Singh of India? Not a bit of it. We focus on jokers such as Nicolas Sarkozy and Solvio Berlusconi, insignificant and tawdry clowns. Cameron understands that our future depends on our relations with the great emerging powers, and that our role will be that of a junior partner or even a supplicant. Good luck to him.

 

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UK visas to Indians may get quicker and cheaper​

LONDON: British Prime MinisterDavid Cameron on Thursday promised to make the system of issuing visas to Indians quicker and cheaper.

Speaking to UK tourism industry representatives on the need to increase Britain's revenue from tourism, Cameron said, "Measures to help the industry would be speeding up the process of getting visitors' visas for the UK in India and China."

The reference to India is significant because it now provides the largest inflow of tourists from any Asian country, having overtaken Japan. Of the 30 million visitors coming to Britain annually, an estimated 400,000 are from India, making India the 10th largest source of visitors to the UK. And, the numbers are rising rapidly.

A spokesman for the 'Visit Britain' campaign said, "India is terribly important. Prime Minister Cameron even indicated that visa fee may be lowered, thus making it more attractive for Indians to come to the UK."

There has recently been pressure from the British capital's West End and Knightsbridge stores on the UK government to ease visa formalities for visitors from India to enable well-off Indians take advantage of shopping opportunities.

The promise from China is yet to be tapped, as the country languishes in 22nd position among nations furnishing tourists to the UK, whereas the number of Chinese visitors to Germany is about to break into the latter's top 10.

The British PM said, "I want to see us in the top five destinations in the world. But that means being much more competitive internationally." According to UN figures, Britain is in sixth place, behind France, the US, Spain, China and Italy. He then joked, "If we can't always beat Germany at football, then we can beat them at tourism."

In a veiled censure of the previous Labour government, Cameron felt there had been too much emphasis on marketing Cool Britannia, rather than on the UK's heritage. A recent study undertaken on behalf of Visit Britain suggested that tourism's contribution to the British economy has the potential to grow by more than 60% from its present level to Pound 188bn by 2020 and create 264,000 extra jobs, thereby employing 2.89 million people. The UK's current turnover from tourism is Pound 115bn.

 

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UK visas to Indians may get quicker and cheaper​

LONDON: British Prime MinisterDavid Cameron on Thursday promised to make the system of issuing visas to Indians quicker and cheaper.

Speaking to UK tourism industry representatives on the need to increase Britain's revenue from tourism, Cameron said, "Measures to help the industry would be speeding up the process of getting visitors' visas for the UK in India and China."

The reference to India is significant because it now provides the largest inflow of tourists from any Asian country, having overtaken Japan. Of the 30 million visitors coming to Britain annually, an estimated 400,000 are from India, making India the 10th largest source of visitors to the UK. And, the numbers are rising rapidly.

A spokesman for the 'Visit Britain' campaign said, "India is terribly important. Prime Minister Cameron even indicated that visa fee may be lowered, thus making it more attractive for Indians to come to the UK."

There has recently been pressure from the British capital's West End and Knightsbridge stores on the UK government to ease visa formalities for visitors from India to enable well-off Indians take advantage of shopping opportunities.

The promise from China is yet to be tapped, as the country languishes in 22nd position among nations furnishing tourists to the UK, whereas the number of Chinese visitors to Germany is about to break into the latter's top 10.

The British PM said, "I want to see us in the top five destinations in the world. But that means being much more competitive internationally." According to UN figures, Britain is in sixth place, behind France, the US, Spain, China and Italy. He then joked, "If we can't always beat Germany at football, then we can beat them at tourism."

In a veiled censure of the previous Labour government, Cameron felt there had been too much emphasis on marketing Cool Britannia, rather than on the UK's heritage. A recent study undertaken on behalf of Visit Britain suggested that tourism's contribution to the British economy has the potential to grow by more than 60% from its present level to Pound 188bn by 2020 and create 264,000 extra jobs, thereby employing 2.89 million people. The UK's current turnover from tourism is Pound 115bn.

Won't that lead to more Indians settling in UK and stealing their jobs rather than tourism ?

 

[ajtr]

EU leak reveals UK to take major share of Indian IT workers under work permit agreement
http://www.visabureau.com/uk/news/0...n-it-workers-under-work-permit-agreement.aspx

EU to let in 50,000 workers from India

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rs-India.html?ito=feeds-newsxml#ixzz14oSRANWr

UK to push India on Typhoon
Tuesday, November 09, 2010
http://www.defencemanagement.com/news_story.asp?id=14692

Today's Britain and British people are different from those days of British Raj to many extent. India should think of investing a lot in Britain too as many Indians work here as highly skilled doctors and Engineers and administrators and investors. Indians are highly respected for their high skills and hardwork.

Indians rank second among international students in UK
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com...tional-students-in-UK/articleshow/6894493.cms