India aims to strengthen ties with Russia

New Delhi: India aims to strengthen ties with strategic partner Russia amid hopes of a favourable global climate in the backdrop of US President Donald Trump’s indication in a recent phone call with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to reset US-Russia relations.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to further this agenda when he visits Russia from June 1-3, officials said. The PM is scheduled to visit St Petersburg to attend the 18th edition of the annual bilateral summit during the trip, besides being the guest of honour at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum. India has been invited as a guest country at the forthcoming edition of this annual forum.

Modi is also expected to travel to Russia’s resource rich and strategically located Astrakhan region, a person aware of the matter said. As Gujarat chief minister Modi had travelled a number of times to Astrakhan, which is now home to several Gujarati immigrants involved in diamond trade. Diamond is fast emerging as a key trading commodity between India and Russia, and the two sides are planning to set a separate diamond bourse in India. Astrakhan will be the entry point in Russia for the International North South Transport Corridor from Mumbai to St Petersburg via Iran. The region, which has a partnership with Gujarat, is keen to position itself as a major trans-shipment hub between India and Europe. This will be Modi’s third trip to Russia since becoming the PM while he has hosted Putin twice for the annual summit. India and Russia celebrate 70 years of their diplomatic ties this year and improvement in US-Russia relations is expected to work to India’s advantage, according to international affairs experts. There are reports that Modi might visit Israel in June or July, in the first such visit by an Indian PM, besides Kazakhstan on June 7-8 for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit where India will be admitted as full member along with Pakistan. Two simultaneous high-level meetings in Delhi and Moscow earlier this week led to the decision that counter-terror partnership will figure high on Modi’s agenda during his visit to Moscow in June, as will a deradicalisation initiative to counter cross-border terror in Af-Pak region. National Security Adviser Ajit Doval paid an official visit to Moscow on January 30 and 31 at the invitation of his counterpart Nikolai Patrushev, secretary of the Security Council of Russia. The special focus of this meeting was security and defence cooperation including arms purchases, joint production and projects under Make in India initiative. Officials said Doval and Patrushev discussed the situation in Afghanistan in the backdrop of Russia-China-Pakistan meet over future of the landlocked country and Russia’s outreach to Pakistan which raised some eyebrows in Delhi. “Indian concerns over ‘media reports’ that Russia was moving towards recognising the Taliban were taken up by Doval,” a person aware of the matter said on condition of anonymity. “Russia assured India of its support for the Ashraf Ghani government in Kabul.” The two officials also explored measures to counter the Islamic State and terrorist groups in Pakistan. In Delhi, during the meeting on counter-terror issues with Russian deputy foreign minister Oleg V Syromolotov, India raised the issue of China blocking attempts to blacklist Pakistan-based terrorist Maulana Masood Azhar in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). Both sides agreed that the UNSC 1267 sanctions list processes for blacklisting various terrorist individuals and entities must be stringently complied with. Prospects for deepening engagement on counter-terrorism under the UN, BRICS and Shanghai Cooperation Organisation were also emphasised.

Cybersecurity cooperation was among the issues discussed at the meeting in Delhi. Last month, the intergovernmental agreement between India and Russia on cooperation and coordination in the field of information technology security and information sharing to combat terrorism came into force. As part of this, the Central Bureau of Investigation will coordinate its efforts in counterterrorism with the Russian interior ministry’s cybercrime detection units.

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.