World Tibet Network News Monday, May 11 1998

NEW DELHI, May 11 (AFP) - Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes urged Beijing to be a "good neighbour" but denied allegations he was "anti-China", in an interview published Monday.

Fernandes, trying to distance himself from his own anti-Beijing comments -- he branded China "potential threat number one" for India, told India Today weekly that he was "neither anti-China nor anti-Pakistan.

"I am only pro my country," he said, adding: "I would like it (China) to be a good neighbour."

India has fought three wars with Pakistan and, in 1962, a brief but bitter border with China which led to a virtual freeze in ties for 14 years. Relations have been on the mend and several high-level visits exchanged. People's Liberation Army chief General Fu Quanyou came to India in April.

Fernandes told India Today the term "potential threat" had been "put in my mouth" by a television journalist.

When asked if there was a "threat" from China, a charge denied by Beijing, Fernandes said: "Let me put it this way. China is a powerful country, a nuclear power, one of the five major nuclear powers of the world. I have a perception to which I gave vent."

"There are no soft perceptions in matters of security. If we have to stand up we have to take hard options."

The minister hinted that the "hard options" included making a nuclear bomb.

"I will not spell them out at this point... We have said that if our threat perception makes us believe we need to go in for a nuclear bomb, we will go for it. The hard option is that when you talk of a bomb you need a lot of money."

India, which carried out one nuclear test in 1974, last year refused to sign a global test ban treaty, arguing it was discriminatory and did not include a timebound framework for global disarmament.

Fernandes in his earlier comments also accused China of training the army in Myanmar (Burma) and said Beijing had set up listening posts in islands off Indian shores.

He has also accused China of supplying missile technology to Pakistan, stockpiling nuclear arms and extending military airfields in Tibet over the past six months.

A vocal critic of China and ardent supporter of Tibetan independence, Fernandes later tried to tone down his comments, saying he favoured mending Sino-Indian relations.

India says China still holds 40,000 square kilometres (16,000 square miles) of its territory in Kashmir. China lays claim to a swathe of Indian territory in the far eastern state of Arunachal Pradesh.