Author: Chi Song
According to media reports, India is not expected to send senior officials to the Ukraine peace summit in Switzerland on June 15-16. Senior officials, including India's prime minister and India's foreign minister, will not attend, despite growing calls in Europe for India's top leaders to attend the peace summit in Ukraine, which New Delhi is still considering for attendance, the source told the Hindustan Times. Russia Today noted that while more than 160 countries were invited to the peace summit in Ukraine, many refused or sent lower-level officials to attend.
Coincidentally, Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar was also absent from the BRICS Foreign Ministers' Meeting just held in Russia a few days ago.
Although these are the two most important international conferences in recent times, and they are also a platform for many countries to take advantage of the opportunity to increase their international influence, they have been deliberately ignored by India. Perhaps, India has been distracted by domestic elections, especially the failure of Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to win half of the seats, which has had some impact on the Indian authorities, but it has not prevented Modi from being re-elected. Then, the shift in India's foreign policy is most likely not due to internal factors, which is very worthy of attention.
Although the BRICS Foreign Ministers' Meeting can be regarded as some kind of support for Russia, it is mainly biased towards the economic level, and the color of geopolitical confrontation is very weak; The peace summit in Switzerland largely reflected some support for Ukraine and was an international conference that was in fact an attempt to isolate Russia, and China chose not to participate. India, on the other hand, plans to send low-level officials to participate, or in the case of Europe's great efforts, there is no doubt that India does not want to offend Russia, after all, India-Russia relations were once very close, and after the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, India has also made a lot of money as a transit point for Russian oil and the European market.
But now, India seems to have begun to become cold, no longer keen on international affairs, and has begun to speak cautiously on some local hot issues, including the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Russia may have some of its own views on this. It is reported that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov expressed dissatisfaction with the absence of the Indian foreign minister from the BRICS foreign ministers' meeting, saying that "there are countries that always seem to seek dual interests, wanting to maintain existing interests and aspiring for more." The author did not find a relatively authoritative source of information about the above remarks, but this is more logical, after all, Russia now needs the support of international "friends" very much, and the BRICS Foreign Ministers' Meeting is a good platform. In any case, Russia needs to express its disappointment and complaints.
Historically, some of India's actions are not unfounded, and there is a certain policy continuity, as India has always considered itself a non-aligned country, starting with the Nehru era. But India, when Russia was in trouble, suddenly did not even want to express political support, and after all, it seemed unkind. After all, when relations between the United States and India were poor because of the nuclear issue, Russia provided a good "friendship", while India obviously did not reciprocate. In other words, India can engage in non-alignment, but it cannot deliberately highlight "non-alignment" at such a delicate moment and use this as an excuse to distance itself from Russia.
Of course, India is not a guest of the West, and it is important to the West when there is a political or economic need, especially when it needs India's help to confront China, but under normal circumstances, it is at best a second-class citizen. As a former British colony, India made limited contributions in World War I and World War II, and was never elected as a permanent member of the United Nations. Undoubtedly, India's international political status is not so high. Although the United States has given it the title of "the world's largest democracy", this is just a high hat, and India still needs to work harder to truly win the respect of the international community. India's economy has improved slightly in recent years under Modi's leadership, but that's about it.
India has already won some benefits in this conflict between Russia and Ukraine, and now it is suddenly avoiding it for only one reason, and that is that it does not want to pay the "price", and India may not be willing to bet easily until the final winner is found. Of course, India may not be left and right, and will keep a low profile in future international affairs, so it cannot be ruled out that it has great ambitions and has begun to learn from China and keep its head open. Objectively speaking, considering the current fierce competition between China and the United States and between the United States and Russia, this provides an unprecedented opportunity for India's development, and India can indeed devote more energy to domestic development.
In any case, India may have to make its own choice, and it is only a matter of time, either to be a friend of Russia, or a partner of the West, and moreover, to be an independent India itself. As far as China is concerned, it is enough to just hope that India will not become a strategic pawn of the United States to contain China, after all, distant relatives are not as good as close neighbors, and perhaps one day in the future, India will be able to figure out this problem.