New Delhi: With an eye on China's growing influence, India on Tuesday signed a key pact to boost counter-terror cooperation with Myanmar and offered soft loans worth millions of dollars for a string of development and transport projects in the energy-rich southeast Asian country.
Tactfully balancing Western condemnation of the Myanmar junta over its human rights record and its security and energy interests, India gently nudged the junta in the direction of democratic reforms.
India emphasized the importance of comprehensively broad-basing the national reconciliation process and democratic changes being introduced in Myanmar, said a joint statement at the end of wide-ranging talks between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Myanmar's military ruler General Than Shwe. There was, however, no mention in the joint statement of the iconic leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who remains under custody, and has boycotted the elections likely later this year.
Security and counter-terrorism topped the agenda. Among the five pacts signed is a treaty on mutual legal assistance in criminal matters that will be crucial in enabling India get access to insurgents from India's northeast states who continue to shelter along the sprawling 1,650-kilometer India-Myanmar border.
The treaty aims at deepening bilateral cooperation in combating transnational organized crime, terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundering and smuggling of arms and explosives.
Both leaders reiterated that their territory would not be allowed for terror or insurgent activities against each other. "They agreed that security cooperation should be given immediate attention since terrorists, insurgents and criminals respect no boundaries and undermine the social and political fabric of a nation," said the joint statement.
The two sides also signed pacts in the areas of small development projects, science and technology and information cooperation. A memorandum of understanding on Indian assistance in restoring the Ananda temple in Bagan, a renowned Buddhist shrine and a major tourist site in central Myanmar, was also inked.
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