G20: How did India pull off the 'Delhi Declaration' – and why does it matter?
Plus, Trudeau on the tarmac.
Many years ago, former Indian Deputy Prime Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party leader LK Advani declared Narendra Modi a “brilliant and efficient event manager” – a comment that was at the time seen as a dig at a party rival. If you can, however, look past the passive-aggressive inference embedded in Advani’s remark – it would be hard not to admit that he was right.
Modi knows the value of a show. And he has worked to assemble teams that can pull them off.
This much is evident from the G20 Leaders’ Summit over the past weekend in New Delhi, a showcase for the New India (urf Bharat) that Modi has built over the past decade.
As Seema Sirohi put it,
“It was India's show to steal, and it stole it with aplomb. The G20 summit was a blockbuster - no two ways about it. India managed to forge consensus, produce a clean communique, announce a mega connectivity project linking different worlds and welcome the African Union (AU) as a new member…
The summit was a diplomatic fair with flair. And it was cleverly choreographed - Joe Biden kept bumping into Sheikh Hasina, and Justin Trudeau was bereft of cameras and camaraderie. Some guests got the famous Narendra Modi hug, some only the correct greeting. In sum, India proved it can be an East-West bridge, a North-South connector, but, above all, a problem-solver.”
The mood in Delhi afterwards was triumphant, brimming with confidence as the spotlight began to shift towards the domestic political calendar (the surprise special session of Parliament that we mentioned last week, and elections to five states due later this year).
The key achievements from the weekend:
India managed to get the G20 nations to agree, by consensus, to a joint communique (The ‘New Delhi Declaration’). No G20 summit in the past has failed to arrive at a joint declaration, including 2022’s gathering in Bali, but there were signs that consensus might be hard to achieve given the hardline positions taken by the G7 on one side and the Russia-China duo on the other over references to the war on Ukraine. Ultimately, using the interests of the Global South as a lever, and with the support of Western nations that seemed to put a bigger premium on ensuring the survival of the G20 forum, India managed to find language that was acceptable to all. More on this below.
Modi began the leaders’ summit by announcing that the India-backed proposal to include the African Union as a member of the G20 summit had sailed through. Naturally, this meant a Modi hug to Comoros President Azali Assoumani, who currently heads the AU, before he took a seat at the table. Despite the limited role that the African Union actually plays in economic and geopolitical matters – unlike, say, ASEAN – the move helped New Delhi underline its effort to be seen as the ‘voice’ of the Global South and a bridge between North and South, a role that China has sought to essay.
On the sidelines of the summit, India, Saudi Arabia, the European Union, the United Arab Emirates, France, Germany, Italy and US signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the aim of establishing the (awkwardly named) India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, featuring shipping routes and rail links that will, at least according to one calculation, would make trade between India, the Gulf and Europe 40% faster. The IMEEEC (or IMEEC or IMEC, depending on how you abbreviate) was immediately compared to China’s Belt and Road Initiative, even if many details about the announcement remained unclear. More about this in the next edition of India Inside Out.
Although it may not count for much, since it mostly came in the commitments without any actual plans, the G20 endorsed the aim of tripling renewable energy capacity by 2030 and asserted that $4 trillion would be needed every year to pay for the green energy transition.
Alongside the summit, India announced the launch of a Global Biofuels Alliance, with the US and Brazil among others as founding members, yet another effort to play a major role in the energy transition and participate in multilateral institution building, as it did with the International Solar Alliance.
Modi also carried out a number of important bilateral meetings, including one with US President Joe Biden, despite having been invited to a state visit in Washington, DC just months ago, and then held a state visit for Mohammed bin Salman, crown prince of Saudi Arabia, on what was evidently a hectic weekend.
One world, one communique
So, how did India pull off that joint declaration?
In Bali, last year, the G20 nations all signed up to a set of ‘agree-to-disagree’ lines in what was nevertheless a joint declaration, mentioning that a majority of countries ‘deplored’ in the strongest terms the aggression by the Russian Federation against Ukraine and demanded complete withdrawal from Ukrainian territory territory. By way of acknowledging the Russian point of view, it also mentioned “other views and different assessments of the situation and sanctions.”
Soon after that summit, however, Russia and China started to express their discomfort with those lines and made it clear in the various preparatory G20 meetings in the run-up to the Leaders’ Summit, that they would not sign up to the same language. India, over the course of the year’s numerous G20 meetings, was forced to issue official summaries following these meetings instead of the usual communiques.
Going into the weekend, particularly with both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping not in attendance, it seemed as if the Leaders’ Summit too might be forced to conclude without consensus for the very first time in G20 history, a development that would raise questions about the utility of the grouping and overshadow any other achievements of India’s presidency.
Reports from the summit suggest that, against this backdrop, India swung into action with the aim of leveraging its ‘Global South advocacy’ as a way to push both the G7 and the Russia-China blocs to be more flexible.
From the Indian Express report:
“New Delhi made the “voice of Global South” the fulcrum of the argument, and first roped in Brazil, the next host in 2024. The Brazilians were the most active and supportive partners. Later, the South Africans joined in, since they are the hosts in 2025. These three, along with the last host Indonesia, became a team, and worked on each of these negotiating teams.
At the political level as well, there was outreach to leaders from both sides —Modi spoke to Putin and Jaishankar met Lavrov; South African President Cyril Ramaphosa spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping and Brazilian Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira spoke to his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov.
There was consensus on two aspects. One, the G20 is the last working and functioning global forum, and it should not go the UNSC way where veto power has blocked any movement and the body has effectively collapsed. And, two, the Global South was most adversely hit by the consequences of the war.
This framed the backdrop for the “creative ambiguity” that was needed to come up with a language acceptable to both sides.”
A number of the lines that ended up in the Delhi Declaration, as a result, acted like Rorshach tests, allowing each bloc to read whatever they wanted into them. For example, one much fought-over line called for the “cessation of military destruction” and the “adverse impact that conflicts have on the security of civilians thereby exacerbating existing socio-economic fragilities.”
Again, from the Indian Express:
“While the West saw this as a criticism of Russian action in Ukraine, Moscow saw this as something they are also suffering from in the war… Both warring sides felt that this reflected their grievance….
New Delhi also added paragraphs on territorial integrity: Beijing found it applicable for US approach to Taiwan; Delhi saw it as a message to China over the border standoff; G7 saw it as a message to Russia and Moscow saw it as a message to NATO.”
Ultimately, however, the big climbdown came from the G7 set of nations, which, despite the precedent of language condemning Russia a year ago, decided to accept a final text that didn’t name-check Moscow and watered down even the implicit criticism.
The broader aims of maintaining the G20 as a global forum, as well as supporting India’s efforts, seem to have been the motivations here. From the Hindustan Times:
“India told the West that flexibility over terminology on Russia’s aggression in Ukraine would help G20 arrive at a declaration. It also indicated that if the Indian presidency failed in the quest, not only did the summit risk being a failure, there was a bigger risk of China’s efforts to carve out an alternative international power structure gaining traction.
The contrasting images of a failed G20 and an energised Brics was on offer. But if it was flexible, the West was told, not only would this danger be averted, on substantive issues that went beyond the terminology used to describe the war in Ukraine, the West and the Global South could nuance their positions about the implications of the war. The US, which has been invested in seeing the success of the Indian presidency, saw merit in the argument and displayed unexpected flexibility to support Delhi.”
Or, as another European official told the Hindu: “Let’s say you had no G-20 statement — newspaper headlines would say the G-20 is finished, and they would be right. G-20 could be replaced by blocs like BRICS and G-7. So in a way by having a statement [we] keep the platform and the organisation alive — and that is the broader picture we must see.”
Of course, some of this led to Western commentators insisting that the G7 had ‘saved’ the G20. While the Western part in arriving at a consensus is evident, this reading of developments ignores the legwork India, as well as Brazil, South Africa and Indonesia, put into placing the Global South at the centre of the conversation – which allowed the language to be reframed in such a way that the two blocs came on board. Moreover, the Delhi Declaration has a sign-off from all members of the G20, rather than the awkward ‘majority’ framing from Bali.
German ambassador to India Philip Ackerman gave some of the details of the negotiations a few days after the summit:
“The G-20 is a very important forum. It is one of the last fora that has everyone around the table and a summit without a declaration would have meant death to the G-20,” Mr. Ackerman told a select group of journalists. “And it would have made it very difficult for Brazil to pick it up next year [at the G-20 summit in Rio De Janeiro].”
“The ultimatum was delivered by the Indian G-20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant on September 8 overnight, asking other delegations to “take it or leave it”, and if they had a problem with the wording the four emerging economies had come up with, to “have their leader to speak to Prime Minister Narendra Modi”, an account that matches with statements made by Mr. Kant during a number of interviews. On Monday, Mr. Kant thanked the “Sherpas who helped us clinch the geopolitical paras and arrive at consensus”, naming the Sherpas of Brazil, Indonesia and South Africa specifically.
Much was also made of Xi Jinping’s decision to skip the summit, with observers wondering whether it was a snub to India, a reflection of economic worries back in China, or a desire to not be blamed if no consensus was achieved.
Whatever the reason, Xi’s absence allowed India to more forcefully push its candidature as the actual bridge between North and South, which it has sought to do all through the years, starting with the convening of a ‘Voice of the Global South’ meeting to the case it made for bringing the African Union on board.
New Delhi also used the summit to make progress on a number of other fronts, taking advantage of the ‘India sweet spot’ and again, positioning itself as an alternative to Beijing.
“New Delhi assessed that hosting the G20 provided a chance to set and pursue agendas that require collaboration but need not involve all the members of the forum. Several of these projects were unveiled on the sidelines of the leaders’ meeting. The most eye-catching is a deal agreed with the European Union, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and the United States to finance and build a so-called India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) linking India into the Gulf and beyond. Another is the Global Biofuel Alliance, launched by Modi alongside the leaders of Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Italy, Mauritius, Singapore and the United States, that aims to develop and promote sustainable biofuels. The last is a significant agreement between the so-called IBSA group – comprising India, Brazil and South Africa – to work with the United States on the reform of multilateral development banks.
Tellingly, none of these initiatives involve China. This is not a coincidence…
India’s marginalisation of China at the G20 follows on from these efforts to curtail Beijing’s influence. For the moment, they might be working. Some interpret Xi’s refusal to attend the G20 summit as a tacit acknowledgement that the forum no longer serves China’s interests. If that is so, it will be partly due to New Delhi’s hard work, as well as China’s mishandling of a crucial bilateral relationship.”
Clearly, India managed the event well, giving New Delhi nearly everything it wanted out of a summit that the government’s supporters have sought to liken to the Beijing Olympics in 2008, now seen as a moment that affirmed as China’s arrival as a major power on the global stage.
But while the summit acts as a confirmation of India’s negotiation skills, what can it tell us about how that will play out on the ground?
“To begin with, a fuller assessment of the results of this summit needs to go beyond words on paper to what was achieved on the ground. If pious multilateral declarations could solve the world’s problems, we would have already had nuclear disarmament, global peace, common prosperity, equitable trade, democracy and universal human rights, and a lot more. If we have none of any of this, it’s because international politics is more complicated than negotiating down to reach the lowest acceptable language in joint statements.
There is an unfortunate tendency to see India’s success in convincing the US to compromise on the final statement as an indication of Delhi’s power…
[But] it would not be wise to exaggerate India’s real, material power from the success in getting to the Delhi Declaration. The only criterion by which India should measure its power is in relation to China. Here, the story is a longer-term one and still troubling.”
On this front, the fate of the IMEEEC will play a big role in telling us how much India has genuinely been able to leverage this moment into broader success. We’ll come back to this subject in the next edition.
But before going to the links, one counter-view on the success of the summit, from Alan Beattie in the Financial Times:
“It sounds reasonable enough to admit the AU, if only for reasons of legitimacy given the EU’s presence. But the EU is one of the world’s great trading, regulatory and currency powers. By contrast, while the AU did help to broker the creation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in 2018, the pact is a far weaker agreement than the EU single market and it doesn’t collectively strike deals with other countries and trade blocs…
Even the most fervent G20 cheerleader has to accept that the grouping’s promise has faded since its elevation to primary global governance gabfest status in 2008. China’s indifference, if it persists, will weaken it further…
So if the G20 didn’t advance matters much, what is the host India itself up to?
…
India’s prime minister Narendra Modi vaguely likes the idea of being a pro-business free-trader. He also specifically likes the idea of establishing trade and geopolitical links to challenge the gravitational pull of China. (His rather nebulous announcement over the weekend of an India-Middle East “transport corridor” backed by the EU, US and Saudi Arabia, details tbc, is a classic of the genre.) But he’s also got the standard Indian problems with exposing vulnerable small farmers to import competition. Moreover, he wants to try his hand at industrial policy, including raising some goods tariffs, to strengthen Indian manufacturing.
Ergo, India has offered round a fairly thin deal to trading partners that excludes access to its market for a lot of sensitive products including wheat, rice and sugar. Whether countries have taken this basically depends on how keen they are themselves to signal independence from China or an active trade policy more generally.”
Also see:
The Atlantic Council has a useful list of experts reacting to various elements of the G20 Summit outcomes.
Congress leader Shashi Tharoor makes a political point. Why doesn’t Modi’s BJP “bring the same attitude of conciliation & co-operation to bear in its domestic dealings”?
As if Modi doesn’t want the G20 honeymoon to end, he announced that, since India still technically holds the presidency for another two months, there would be another virtual summit in November to take stock of all that has been done.
Can’t Make This Up
First Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had to deal with terse comments from Modi about his handling of the Khalistani movement in Canada, where the secessionist groups continue to play an active role in the diaspora.
“They are promoting secessionism and inciting violence against Indian diplomats, damaging diplomtic premises, and threatening the Indian community in Canada and their places of worship. The nexus of such forces with organized crime, drug syndicates and human trafficking should be a concern for Canada as well,” said the statement issued by India.
Then… his plane got stuck in Delhi, because of technical issues. And the prime minister was forced to spend an extra 36 hours in India – even reportedly turning down an offer to use an Indian plane – before he was able to leave.
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