Ukraine 'deeply dissatisfied' as India avoids condemning invasion by Russia

At an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on Monday night, India had called for 'restraint on all sides'

Kyiv's envoy to New Delhi expressed disappointment as India continued to tread cautiously on the issue of conflict over Ukraine and refrained from condemning Russia for launching a military operation against the East European nation early on Thursday.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar received calls from British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and European Union's High Representative for Foreign Affairs Josep Borrell Fontelles, who apparently nudged New Delhi to strongly condemn Russia's military offensive against Ukraine. New Delhi, however, continued with its cautious approach. Jaishankar called the situation in Ukraine as 'grave', but refrained from condemning Russia.

Just hours before Russia launched a full-scale invasion into Ukraine, India reiterated at an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council that it was in favour of urgent de-escalation of tension and sustained and focused diplomatic efforts to bridge divergent interests. “I would like to underline that the legitimate security interests of all parties should be fully taken into account,” T S Tirumurti, New Delhi's envoy to the UN, told the Security Council, adding: “Situation is in danger of spiralling into a major crisis.”

Also Read: Ukraine cuts diplomatic ties with Russia

But after Russia announced the launch of military operations in Ukraine, New Delhi did not condemn the move.

Igor Polikha, Kyiv's envoy to New Delhi, said that Ukraine was “deeply dissatisfied” by the stand India took ever since Russia started military build-up around the East European nation.

“India should be much more actively engaged, given the privileged relation India has with Russia. Not just for our safety, but for your own citizen's safety too, we need the intervention of India,” Polikha told journalists at the Embassy of Ukraine in New Delhi.

He called upon Prime Minister Narendra Modi to speak to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“You have a privileged, strategic relationship with Russia. If Modi ji speaks to Putin (Russian President), we are hopeful he will respond,” Ukraine's ambassador to India said.

New Delhi has been finding it increasingly difficult to maintain the delicate balance between its ties with Moscow and Washington D.C. after the US-Russia tension escalated over Ukraine.

Though the Modi government has been speaking out against China’s aggression along its disputed boundary with India, it refrained from siding with the US and abstained from voting against Russia on the issue of Ukraine at the UNSC on January 31.

Even as the US has been trying to draw a parallel between China's belligerence against India and other nations in the Indo-Pacific region and Russia's military build-up around Ukraine, New Delhi last week rejected the argument, saying the situations in the two regions have not been “analogous”.

New Delhi, however, closely monitored Putin's meeting with Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan in Moscow. Russia has since long been the largest supplier of military hardware to India and has been maintaining a low-key defence cooperation with Pakistan. But with the changes in the geopolitical landscape and New Delhi’s growing ties with Washington DC after the landmark India-US civil nuclear agreement of 2008, Moscow, too, responded to Islamabad’s overtures to improve bilateral relations.

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