New Delhi: Reluctant to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, India is facing mounting Western pressure ahead of the visit of Moscow’s top diplomat on Thursday, analysts say, with New Delhi going the way between world powers. making it complicated.
India has avoided UN resolutions condemning its longtime ally Russia, which launched a multilateral attack on Ukrainian territory in late February, only calling for an end to the violence, as it comes amid international sanctions. Russian refuses oil. and continues to buy other goods.
Western envoys, including US Deputy National Security Adviser Dalip Singh and UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, flew to New Delhi ahead of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s visit to India this week and are pressing for strong action.
Lavrov’s visit is probably intended to urge New Delhi to do the exact opposite.
“India is having to navigate a very difficult relationship from both the sides. Professor Harsh V. Pant, Head of Strategic Studies at the New Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation, told Arab News that India has historically had strong ties with Russia and certainly with the West in recent years.
New Delhi’s ties with Moscow go back more than seven decades, with half of India’s military hardware procured from Russia. On the other hand, its partnership with the West has been growing for the past 20 years, and is a member of the Quad, a four-state strategic security dialogue – which also includes the US, Japan and Australia – that was established. from increased sugar. The confrontation of economic and military power, which has become a threat to its territorial status. This threat has reached its peak level since the 2020 border conflict.
Tensions along the India-China border in the northern Himalayan region of Ladakh in April 2020 led to a deterioration in relations between the two Asian giants and the deployment of thousands of additional troops to the region.
“At a time when India is facing Chinese troops on the border, you really can’t resist a partner on whom you depend for 55 per cent of your defense imports,” Harsh said.
“Russia remains a very reliable supplier of defense technology in defense equipment, which is not something the West has been best at.”
He said the West’s approach towards Russia has been that of isolation and sanctions, but India cannot do that.
“India can’t really take a similar position because India doesn’t want the Russia-China axis to be too strong,” Harsh said. “I think the challenge for India is to keep a channel of communication open with Russia even in the most difficult of times.”
Manoj Joshi, a Distinguished Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation, said Russia’s historical support for India, particularly in its conflicts with arch rival and neighbor Pakistan, also played a major role in New Delhi’s reluctance to condemn Moscow. played. Is.
“Since the 1950s, Russians have generally supported India on policies in South Asia,” he said. “There is a lot of uniformity, political conformity that has been around for a long time. And in return, Indians were soft on the Russians for the invasion of Hungary in 1956 or the invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Therefore, there have been such relations. ,
But apart from Western pressure on India to take sides, there may be another dimension to the visits of its envoys.
Anil Trigunayat, former India’s ambassador to Jordan, Libya and Malta, described the recent developments as a possible attempt for New Delhi to play a role in ending the Ukraine crisis.
“They are now trying to stop this conflict somehow, but in my view, they are not directly becoming agents to stop it,” he said, adding that the West knows that India’s Russia and its President Vladimir Putin. strategic relationship with
“What they want to convey is that India should try to use its personal influence, which Russia and President Putin have, to stop it as quickly as possible,” Trigunayat told Arab News. “They know that if India condemns (Moscow), they will have no advantage over Russia.”