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| Photo courtesy: onlinekhabar.com |
The supreme source of succor here is that Foreign Minister Pradeep Kumar Gyawali put to rest swirling speculation that a government confronting extreme competing external pressures was about to release a new foreign policy document.
Having to choose between the Millennium Challenge Corporation and the Belt and Road Imitative has been exacting enough. The extrapolation of that into a litmus test of our very existence would have been unbearable. New times do warrant new thinking. Yet old ways, too, have enduring value.
Drawing from Lord Buddha’s teachings and Prithvi Narayan Shah’s Divine Counsels to Nepal’s own policy assertions and experiences over different systems and governments, ‘Nepal’s Foreign Policy, 2077 BS’ is replete with principles that have stood the test of time.
Presenting the document, Gyawali affirmed that Nepal would continue its long-standing non-aligned policy. Phew! The country wished to promote and promote the overall national interest by strengthening external relations based on universal equality, mutual benefit and respect through a network of independent and balanced foreign policy.
Nepal would expand and strengthen bilateral relations with all countries, including neighbors, based on universal equality, mutual benefit and respect. Our foreign policy also included promoting the national interest by enhancing Nepal’s identity and representation in international and regional fora.
Now, it would be easy to dismiss the document as a regurgitation of platitudes. Why assert the obvious with such fanfare, especially when voices on the streets are screaming for sweeping change?
The paramount point here, though, is that we now have a single affirmation of what Nepal values, thinks about, requires and expects in its engagement with the rest of the world. Foreign relations are a two-way street. We now have signposts.
In articulating those views, the government has illuminated vital continuities in our foreign policy. More importantly, it has done so rising above the practice of negation prevailing in the nation, much of it officially sanctioned. Denigrating the successes of the past simply because of their authors has been allowed to paralyze the country for far too long. The state’s severity has only toughened the streets.
Adjusting to a world in constant flux is a challenge in itself. Having to navigate periods of unusual turbulence is tougher. The document’s emphasis on international border security, climate change, economic diplomacy, and the protection of the interests of the Nepali community abroad clearly responds to emerging needs. The commitment to deploying soft power, too, holds promise, especially in view of the richness of Nepal’s heritage, natural splendor and fierce quest for survival amid the regional giants.
This is why the affirmation of underlying constants in Nepal’s pursuit for independence and prosperity becomes even more commendable amid our diminishing political discourse. Expressing them with clarity and candor can only help in pursuing them equal vigor and verve.
Elusive as it may seem at the moment, such broad consensus backed by commensurate conviction is the answer to our dismal internal affairs. But, then, our collective capacity to act remains an imponderable. Should it be so?
