There is the official Indian response to WikiLeaks at last. Foreign secretary Nirupama Rao has defended the confidentiality principle of diplomatic communication between ambassadors and the home government, while launching the new website of the publicity and public diplomacy wing for the ministry of external affairs on Saturday. Nothing less was expected from Rao, who heads the foreign office establishment. Interestingly, she said that this was indeed the civilised way of handling things, keeping the communication secret for the time being before putting it out in the public domain. She has tried to sanctify a routine bureaucratic procedure which, no doubt,has its virtues but there is nothing sacrosanct about it.
Like a true bureaucrat/diplomat, she has stood up honourably for the status quo. But not all will agree. It will be much better if diplomatic assessments are made public because then the harm that comes out of decisions based on these assessments could be avoided. Much of the misunderstanding seem to have been result of wrong judgment calls of diplomats based in foreign capitals.
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