This is not the first occasion in recent times that Maldives figures prominently regarding Pakistan’s attacks on India.
By defending the larger Indian neighbour at the virtual meet of the Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC), Maldives has added yet another element to the strengthening of bilateral ties, on religion-centric allegations against New Delhi. It comes at a time when an official US panel and also some UN entities have been targeting New Delhi on allegations of Islamaphobia. In doing so, true to the democratic credentials of the ruling MDP of President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, Maldives also highlighted India’s democratic credentials and multicultural society.
“Targeting a specific country will be like side-stepping the real issue. In this light, let me state that singling out India, the largest democracy in the world and a multicultural society and home to over 200 million Muslims, alleging Islamophobia would be factually incorrect,” Maldives Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Thilmeeza Hussain said. “Maldives cannot support any action within the OIC that singles out or targets New Delhi,” she said further at the virtual meet of the 57-member grouping. Incidentally, Amb Hussain is also the Maldivian envoy to the US.
“Islam has existed in India for centuries and it is the second largest religion in India, accounting for 14.2 percent of the country’s population,” the Maldivian envoy said. “Isolated statements by motivated people and disinformation campaign” on the social media should not be construed as representative of the feelings of 1.3-billion people,” she added. It would be “detrimental to religious harmony in South Asian region” if India alone were to be targeted on charges of Islamaphobia, she added.
The Maldivian defence of India is notable for two reasons. First, the Male rebuttal in such strong terms came in response to the envoy of Pakistan, an influential OIC member, accusing India of Islamaphobia. In context, Maldives delivered a knuckle-knock at Pakistan’s knees when Amb Hussain recalled how in recent years, India has built up stronger ties with many Islamic nations such as Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Afghanistan, Palestine and Mauritius. “These countries have conferred the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi with their highest civilian awards,” she pointed out.
In particular, Amb Hussain suggested that South Asian countries should find ways of working together. Stripped of diplomatic niceties, it could well mean that Male was telling Islamabad not to take up intra-regional matters to international fora (like OIC now, and may be the UNHRC, the UN, etc., as Islamabad has been doing over the past decades). The unsaid part was possibly to tell Pakistan not to expect Maldives on its side if it wanted to target India on the religion issue at OIC, or elsewhere.
Second, near-simultaneously, Maldives joined other non-aligned member-nations in condemning Israeli violations of the human rights of Palestinians and the activities impeding the efforts to establish two independent nations as the world battles against COVID-19. This has meant that Male has drawn the distinction between India and Israel on a religion-centric human rights issue (as is being sought to be propagated by Pakistan, in the case of the former).
This is not the first time the Maldives has condemned Israeli actions. President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih had also shed light on the matter and delivered harsh words against the illegal occupation and human rights violations of Israel while delivering an address at the United Nations General Assembly last year.
The OIC is seized of the Palestine issue for decades, owing to the Islamic identity of most Palestinian people. In this background, the Maldivian delineation of the internal demographic dynamics in India and the international ramifications of the continual Israeli attacks on Palestine, adds a new dimension to the conceptualisation of Islamaphobia in perceptible Maldivian view. This construct becomes relevant in the context of the much-misused and abused terminology, especially in the post-9/11 global discourse.
For India, the current Maldivian posturing in its favour at an OIC meet has proved that Male is as much a friend in deed for New Delhi as the reverse has always been. In the context of selective yet continuing, or continual, criticism of India on issues such as the abrogation of Article 370, CAA-related concerns especially of the nation’s Muslims as a community, and the more recent residency-related notification pertaining to the re-carved Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, the Maldivian defence should go a long way in putting bilateral ties on a much stronger pedestal.
From a domestic view, the Maldivian posturing comes at a time the nation has acknowledged the presence of ISIS and Al Qaeda elements in the country. The Solih government also launched massive anti-terrorism, anti-radicalisation measures, through police investigations and awareness-campaigns, before the COVID-19 pandemic crisis overlook the nation, as with the rest of much of the world. Considering that radical elements in the country are waiting for an occasion to make a political issue of what has remained an internal irritant for the Indian Ocean archipelago-nation, its OIC posturing is also a strong message to fundamentalists inside the country. Yet, it can cut both ways.
The approach of the Solih-MDP government to India’s concerns on the religion front is in positive contrast to those of predecessor dispensation of jailed former President Abdulla Yameen, who lost the 2018 elections. In response to New Delhi’s repeated concerns about the ever-nosediving status of democracy in Yameen’s Maldives, senior minister Mohammed Shinee compared it to India’s ‘Kashmir issue’. He said that the situation in Maldives, “like Kashmir issue,” is an “internal matter” and that New Delhi should let the local government resolve it. The provocation was as deliberate as the current Maldivian support for India is well considered and thought-out.
Incidentally, this is not the first occasion in recent times that Maldives figures prominently regarding Pakistan’s attacks on India. At the Fourth South Asian Speakers Summit on ‘Achieving the Sustainable Goals’ in Maldivian Parliament in September 2019, Speaker Nasheed and the Maldivian administration told the Pakistani delegation to “stick to the agenda and not raise any political issues” against India.
Despite advance caution by the host, the Pakistani delegation targeted India. “We cannot ignore the oppression of Kashmiris,” the Pakistan delegation said, to an instant retort from India. Deputy Chairman of Rajya Sabha Harivansh Narayan Singh said India “strongly objects to raising of the internal matter of India,” and that instead “there is a need for Pakistan to end crossborder terrorism.”
Media reports at the time spoke about Speaker Nasheed, as the host, and the powerful chief of the ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) of President Ibrahim Solih, assuring India that all references to Kashmir would be expunged from the records of the summit. As is otherwise known, India has since begun using the platform of regional and international organisations, after joining hands with fellow SAARC nations to have the 2016 Islamabad SAARC Summit stalled indefinitely, until Pakistan came clean on terrorism front — a line most global nations, big and small, have begun to acknowledge.
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N. Sathiya Moorthy is a policy analyst and commentator based in Chennai.
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