Biden caught between allies as Canada accuses India of assassination

President Biden has prioritized strengthening partnerships over fierce advocacy for democracy among U.S. allies.

A day after pledging to “defend democracy,” President Biden discussed India and Saudi Arabia in a series of meetings at the United Nations on Wednesday – not to express concerns about repression from one side or the other, but to salute them for contributing to the establishment of a new economic corridor. . “I think it's a big deal,” he said.

Perhaps no country reflects more than difficult and delicate compromises in Mr. Biden's foreign policy at the moment. India and Saudi Arabia. He has made it a priority to court both nations as part of his efforts to counter Russia and China, even though India has regressed in its democracy and Saudi Arabia never had one to begin with. .

The news this week illustrated how acute this tension is. The Indian government has been accused of orchestrating the assassination of a political opponent on Canadian soil, leaving Mr. Biden caught between one of the United States' oldest friends and the new friend he is cultivating. And word emerged that Mr. Biden's envoys were negotiating a new defense treaty with Saudi Arabia, putting aside its own history of extraterritorial assassinations.

Although Mr. Biden addressed neither on this topic, the White House responded to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's accusations against India on Wednesday with studied wisdom. John F. Kirby, a spokesman for Mr. Biden's National Security Council, said the administration was "deeply concerned" about the allegations and said "the facts should lead investigators where they may and that the perpetrators of this attack must be brought to justice.” justice. »

But he emphasized American ties with India. “I can just tell you that our relationship with India remains vitally important not only to the South Asian region but of course to the Indo-Pacific,” Mr. Kirby told reporters. Then, shortly after the briefing, the council emailed a statement from another spokeswoman, Adrienne Watson, saying: “Targeting dissidents in other countries is absolutely unacceptable and we will continue to take action measures to combat this practice."

The killing in Canada has raised doubts about Mr. Biden's efforts in India, at a time when he is increasingly giving more priority to strengthening partnerships rather than fierce advocacy in favor of democracy. He just visited India this month, and on his way back he stopped in Hanoi to cement a strategic relationship with Vietnam, a one-party state ruled by Communists, with barely a mention repression in this country. His administration has just signed a new economic and security agreement with Bahrain, a tightly controlled monarchy. And last week he approved $235 million in military aid to Egypt, frozen for two years over human rights concerns.

“They talk a lot about the importance of democracy. Sarah Margon, who was Mr. Biden's initial nominee for deputy secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labor, said Wednesday. “Important initiatives have been developed to support democracy. But when things are going well, what we find is that supporting and maintaining democracy does not rise to the same level as other geopolitical concerns. »

Mr. Biden, who called the “battle between democracy and autocracy” the defining struggle of this era, has recently moved away from that framework. While he used some version of that wording 11 times last year, he has only done so four times this year and not in the past two months, according to research on Factba.se, a service that checked in...