By juggling multitude of international relations, US is doing what India has been practising: EAM Jaishankar

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. File pic

By juggling a multitude of relations with countries, the US is now doing what India has been practicing through its policy of strategic autonomy, according to External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar.

"Pretty much what people used to say about us, Washington is today practising with a great deal of gusto", he said on Monday at an event in New York.

"You're dealing with China, you're dealing with Russia, with Ukraine, with other parts of Asia or with Europe", he told Daniel Russel, a former US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, who was in conversation with him at the event.

So actually, Washington was doing what India had practised, he said.

While posing the question about India's strategic autonomy, Russel jokingly used a common US metaphor, "chewing gum and walking at the same time," for doing different things at once.

EAM Jaishankar picked up the metaphor and joked, "I think that piece of gum is in pretty big supply in Washington", alluding to the different relations, and sometimes opposing interests, the US under President Donald Trump is trying to juggle.

"Once Washington takes the lead on that, it becomes, in a way, a kind of a global question. That's the reality", he said.

"There was a time when, I would say, the narrative was, 'You know we don't like you having too many options because we want ... you to focus your relationship on us'", he said.

And that was "even though the US, on its side, perhaps, kept more of its options on that because it's a global power", he said.

"Today the pretence has dropped for everybody", he said. "Everybody is openly dealing with everybody else".

"And that is how we are heading towards a multipolar world", he said.

Applying the metaphor, EAM Jaishankar added, "Everybody is going to be chewing it".

"And everybody is actually going to get the best deal that they can out of a given situation from a much more a sharper definition of their interest", he said.

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