Leaked US intelligence documents suggest that key emerging powers such as Pakistan, India or Brazil are attempting to sidestep the deepening differences between the United States, Russia and China, and in some cases using the rivalry to their own advantage.
The Washington Post quotes extensively from the documentswhich arguably made its way onto the internet via the Discord news platform, and at a time when America is no longer the world’s undisputed superpower, offer a rare glimpse into the efforts of rising nations to bridge the power gap.
According to one of the leaked documents, Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar said in March that her country “can no longer try to find a middle ground between China and the United States,” according to the Washington Post. The country received extensive financial and military support from the US, particularly after September 11, 2001; in recent years, however, China’s influence has increased through investments and loans to the country.
Another document describes Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s deliberations with staffers about an upcoming UN vote on the Ukraine conflict and the government’s expected Western pressure to support a resolution condemning the Russian invasion.
The internal memo said that backing the measure would signal a change in Pakistan’s position after Pakistan previously abstained on a similar resolution. In the UN General Assembly, Pakistan was one of 32 countries that abstained.
Great power India also appears to shy away from a clear positioning between Washington and Moscow, according to another leaked document reported by The Washington Post. It describes a meeting between Indian national security adviser Ajit Kumar Doval and his Russian counterpart Nikolai Patrushev, in which Doval is said to have given assurances that New Delhi was committed to stopping the war in Ukraine at a G20 group meeting not discussed under the Indian presidency despite “considerable pressure”.
At the G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in New Delhi a week later, disagreement over Ukraine meant that no consensus could be reached on broader global challenges.
Doval, the document reveals, also cited India’s resistance to pressure to back the Western-initiated UN resolution on Ukraine. His country will “not deviate from the principled position it has taken in the past”.
The leaked documents also provide a glimpse into Brazil’s role as a diplomatic bridge between the powers that President Lula da Silva envisions for the country. Lula said he wanted to discuss his proposal to set up a “world peace bloc” to mediate between US and Chinese interests and bring about an end to fighting in Ukraine with President Xi Jinping during a visit to China in April.
Lula had angered the NATO countries by accusing them of prolonging the Ukraine conflict by supplying arms to Kiev and suggesting that in the interest of peace Russia give up part of the territories it controls in Ukraine but keep the occupied Crimea peninsula could. Ukraine had indignantly rejected the proposal.
The documents, reported by The Washington Post, appear to indicate that Russian Foreign Ministry officials praised and supported Lula’s plan. Shortly after his return from China, Lula received Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Brasilia.
Secret documents from US agencies have been circulating on the Internet for weeks. Since then, the media have reported on sensitive material without publishing the documents themselves. The Pentagon and the White House, as well as spokesmen for Pakistan, India and Brazil, left inquiries from the Washington Post unanswered, according to the newspaper.
