Invasion of Ukraine: Delhi moves from 'non-alignment' to 'proactive neutrality'
International relations professor Swaran Singh believes India does not want to side with the United States and the West, but neither does it want to side with Russia. In the last week, however, it has had to recalibrate itself. The risk is that the Ukraine conflict will turn into yet another frozen conflict around the Russian borders.
New Delhi (AsiaNews) - In the last week India has been forced to reposition itself, changing its strategy towards the Russian Federation, moving from a historic policy of non-alignment to a "proactive neutrality," in the opinion of Swaran Singh, professor of international relations at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi and president of the Association of Asia Scholars.
The Russian aggression of 24 February was met with various stances taken by diverse nations: Bashar al-Assad's Syria and Myanmar's military junta immediately declared their support for Russian President Vladimir Putin, while NATO and the European Union regained a unity they were thought to have lost, forming a single bloc against Moscow.
"The context is that of a conventional war formed by two blocs with relative alliances," Professor Singh tells AsiaNews.
On 25 February, India along with China and the United Arab Emirates abstained from voting on a UN Security Council resolution calling on Moscow to "immediately and unconditionally withdraw its military forces from the territory of Ukraine". As Russia is one of the five permanent members of the Security Council, it vetoed the resolution.
At that point the ball was passed to the General Assembly. More than 140 countries voted for a non-binding resolution condemning 'in the strongest terms the Russian Federation's aggression against Ukraine' and calling once again for Russia to 'immediately, completely and unconditionally withdraw all its military forces'.
Only Belarus, North Korea, Eritrea and Syria voted with Moscow. But many African countries that have received Moscow's economic and military support in recent years abstained, along with parts of Asia. The most important abstentions were those of China and India.
"Historically, India has always maintained a policy of non-alignment, but now it has shifted to what I call a policy of proactive neutrality," says Singh. "We are in a context reminiscent of the Cold War. On the one hand we have NATO trying to expand towards Russia, on the other Moscow wants to create buffer States because it feels threatened. India has always avoided taking sides with military blocs and wants to continue to be neutral, which is why it abstained from voting in the Security Council and the General Assembly".
But Delhi has been forced to make adjustments to this balancing strategy.
Thousands of Indian students are still stranded in Ukraine, necessitating cooperation between Delhi, Kyiv and neighbouring Eastern European countries to allow their evacuation (in recent days the student killed by the bombing in Kharkiv was identified, his name was Naveen and he was 21 years old).
"Russia yesterday claimed that Indian students are being held hostage by Ukraine, which Delhi has denied. This will surely irritate Moscow," Singh commented. "Since yesterday, India has started sending humanitarian aid to the people of Ukraine, focusing on the victims of the conflict and calling for a peaceful resolution. In addition, international public opinion has become increasingly anti-Russian. Almost every nation in the world now deplores Putin's military aggression," the expert continues. "These elements have led India first to express concern, then regret and finally disappointment with Putin".
Above all, India has repeatedly stressed the need for all states and parties to respect the 'sovereignty and territorial integrity' of nations. This can be seen, for example, in the Foreign Ministry's statements, in which Delhi thanked the prime ministers of Slovakia and Romania for their help to the Indian displaced persons.
"Moscow will not like this, because it seems to mean that Russia has undermined the territorial integrity of Ukraine. It doesn't say it directly, but you it's implied," Singh explains. "So India is not openly siding with the US and the West, but it is not siding with Russia either."
The question of sovereignty and territorial integrity also regards a China, that is "increasingly friendly towards Russia", the lecturer points out.
"Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said the same thing, implying that he understood that Delhi's message was also addressed to Beijing." But there is a substantial difference in the two responses, because while China is on Russia's side and supports non-interference in other states' internal affairs, India wants to secure its borders from the Chinese threat.
Despite this proactive neutrality, however, it seems that other nations are trying to drag Delhi into their own bloc. Yesterday, there was an extraordinary summit of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, (Quad), which includes, besides India, the US, Japan and Australia, three countries that have strongly condemned Russia. "But unlike the others, India has not yet spoken of 'aggression' and is not thinking of imposing sanctions on Moscow," the professor continues.
The ties between India and Russia continue to be close in terms of energy and arms supplies: "India is the biggest buyer of arms from Russia and Russia is India's main supplier of arms", Singh points out, even though in recent years Delhi has tried to differentiate its war supplies, also entering into agreements with France, Israel and the United States and reducing its dependence on Moscow by 30%.
According to Singh, Moscow "will not, however, stop supplying defence technology to India to punish it, because these are weapons that do not harm Russia, on the contrary, they increase revenue. However, there could be delays in deliveries'.
The Pentagon believes the war could last 10 to 20 years. "Kyiv could become like Berlin in 1961. Russia wants to create a buffer and will try to control the territories east of the Dnepr river (which passes through the capital). The worst-case scenario is a division of Ukraine into two blocs, a pro-NATO bloc in the west and a pro-Russian bloc in the east," Professor Singh concludes. "The Russian armed forces have the capacity to stay in the territory for a long time'.
A cold war conflict then, one of many already surrounding Russia: 'Putin has already done the same thing in Transnistria, Abkhazia, Crimea and South Ossetia. But these were small territories. If this war were to end in a prolonged conflict Ukraine would be the largest territory Putin seeks to control."
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