US-Russia reset will help India, save Putin from Xi’s hand – Firstpost

The sanctions the US, under its former President Joe Biden, and its Western allies slapped on Russia in the wake of the Ukraine crisis have pushed Moscow closer to Beijing

It is assuring to learn that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is in touch with his Indian counterpart S Jaishankar to end the Ukraine war. After Lavrov had a talk with his US counterpart Marco Rubio in Riyadh the other day, he and Jaishankar met on the sidelines of the
G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in Johannesburg. The subjects of their talks included the developments pertaining to the Riyadh meeting on ending the Ukrainian crisis.

Observers say New Delhi must do whatever it can to help end the Ukraine crisis. The Trump administration today is making its best efforts to defuse the crisis and achieve a “just and lasting” peace settlement between the two warring nations. The recent talks US and Russian officials had in Riyadh have been structured to culminate in a summit between President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, which should have Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on board.

It is good that the meeting President Zelenskyy had with President Trump and Vice President JD Vance in the Oval Office on February 28 has not ended in any permanent showdown between Washington and Kyiv. Zelenskyy has, of late, indicated he is willing “to work under President Trump’s strong leadership” to get a lasting peace deal with Russia. The Trump presidency seems to be now better focused on a final peace deal to end the Ukrainian crisis.

New Delhi would do well to help Washington, Moscow, and Kyiv clinch a final peace deal. It could advise Zelenskyy to find ways to reach Trump and sign the agreement he was supposed to discuss and sign to move forward to a peace plan. President Zelensky would do well to listen to what British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has recently stressed. Starmer has rightly said Europe must “do heavy lifting”, and this plan would succeed, if it had a “US backing”.

The observers say New Delhi is in an advantageous position to foster peace between Russia and Ukraine. India has always been for its friendship with Russia and for the defence of Ukraine’s sovereignty. India has had a pacifist approach to defuse the friction between Russia and Ukraine. From the very day the Ukrainian crisis erupted, India has emphasised engaging “with all stakeholders and understanding different perspectives, approaches, and options to find a way forward for a sustainable resolution of the conflict”.

In the wake of the Ukraine war, New Delhi has sent humanitarian aid to Kyiv. At the same time, New Delhi has seen to it that it does not act in a way that might hurt Moscow. New Delhi has abstained from voting on the US-led UN resolutions critical of Russia.

India has always called for “dialogue and diplomacy” to resolve the conflict. In July last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Russia. In August, just one month later, he visited Kyiv. In both Moscow and Kyiv, he stressed that only dialogue and diplomacy could end their fighting. PM Modi had already, in 2022, told Russian President Putin that “this is not the era of war” and “solutions can’t be found on the battlefield”.

Modi also told Putin on the eve of the BRICS summit (Kazan, Russia, October 22, 2024) that New Delhi was ready to help achieve a truce to end Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II. The other day, when India’s Foreign Minister S Jaishankar and his Ukrainian counterpart Andrii Sybiha met in Munich, they also discussed efforts to resolve the conflict.

The experts add that helping to end the crisis would be in tune with New Delhi’s much-established tradition of working for peace and development in the world. The ongoing Russia-Ukraine war has been catastrophic for the whole world. It has claimed hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian and Russian lives.

The economic sanctions the US and its Western allies slapped on Russia in the wake of the Ukrainian crisis have proved costly to almost all nations, including the US itself. Today, Americans are paying more for gas.

More importantly, defusing the Russia-Ukraine crisis is in the strategic interest of India. The sanctions the US, under its former President Joe Biden, and its Western allies slapped on Russia in the wake of the Ukraine crisis have pushed Moscow closer to Beijing. The growing coalescence between Russia and China, both nuclear powers, adds to Beijing’s military prowess. This might embolden China to activate its territorial designs against India.

The author is a senior journalist based in Delhi. He is also a Senior Distinguished Fellow, Gatestone Institute, New York. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.