Reassuring and Unnerving India } 735
China reached out to New Delhi. The upheavals of 1989–1991 reinforced
Beijing’s desire for friendly ties with India. With its long border with Tibet,
large community of Tibetan refugees, and close ties with the Dalai Lama’s
Tibetan government in exile, India could cause considerable trouble for China
if it chose. Chinese leaders considered the developing countries of the Third
World to be China’s natural constituency, more concerned with stability and
development than with Western notions of human rights and often resentful
of Western interference in their internal affairs. India fit this to a T. New
Delhi had often been stung by Western criticism of its handling of internal
security matters in Kashmir, Punjab, or elsewhere in its sprawling territory.
India was also influential among non-aligned countries. Mobilizing India’s
voice to speak against Western interference in internal affairs of the Third
World and in favor of strong sovereignty norms would strengthen China’s
defenses against Western “intervention” in China’s internal affairs.
Beijing’s appeal to India in the aftermath of the Beijing Massacre was
this: both India and China were poor developing countries seeking to pull
themselves out of poverty in a world economic order set up by, dominated
by, and working primarily to the advantage of the rich Western counties.
The whole global economic order discriminated against the developing
countries. Developing countries, especially big and important ones like
India and China, should unite in struggle to create a new international eco-
nomic order more in accord with the interests of the developing countries.
India and China both had great traditions of civilization, but had been sub-
jected to over a century of national humiliation by aggressive and arro-
gant Western powers. Those Western powers, now led by the United States,
were so brazen as to tell non-Western developing countries how to govern
themselves. The Western countries constantly interfered in the internal af-
fairs of the non-Western developing countries. India and China should re-
turn to the spirit of “China and India are brothers” of the halcyon days
of India-Chinese friendship of 1954–1956, and struggle together against
the unfair international order set up by the West. As part of Beijing’s turn
to the Third World to counter Western criticism, Li Peng visited India in
December 1991. During his visit, Li dwelled on the need for Sino-Indian
cooperation in building a “new international political and economic order”
favoring the developing countries. Six full paragraphs in the joint commu-
niqué resulting from Li’s visit fleshed out that joint effort. Point three gives
the flavor of these principles:
Efforts should be made to address the growing gap between the North
and the South, and achieve the settlement of global economic, social,
demographic and environmental problems in a manner which would
benefit all members of the world community. ... The developed coun-
tries are urged to address the question of the mounting debt burdens