Jaishankar: ‘Russia never hurt India’s interests, Moscow-New Delhi relations were always stable’

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar (photo) was responding to a question if the Indo-Russian relationship was a burden on the India-Europe relationship, as in Germany, there is criticism that India buying Russia oil in bulk is detrimental to the effectiveness of the sanctions against Russia.

Asserting that Moscow and New Delhi have always shared a “stable and very friendly relationship,” External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar told a German daily earlier this week that “Russia has never hurt India’s interests”.

In an interview to Handelsblatt during his visit for the Munich Security Conference in Germany, Jaishankar stated that “Everyone conducts a relationship based on their past experiences. If I look at the history of India post-independence, Russia has never hurt our interests. The relations of powers like Europe, the US, China or Japan with Russia, they have all seen ups and downs. We have had a stable and always very friendly relationship with Russia. And our relationship with Russia today is based on this experience. For others, things were different, and conflicts may have shaped the relationship. We, on the other hand, had a politically and militarily much more difficult relationship with China, for example.”

He was responding to a question if the Indo-Russian relationship was a burden on the India-Europe relationship, as in Germany, there is criticism that India buying Russia oil in bulk is detrimental to the effectiveness of the sanctions against Russia.

On being told about India’s increased arms cooperation with Russia, Jaishankar said, “In terms of inventory, yes, because many Western countries have long preferred to supply Pakistan and not India.”

He, however, noted that the scenario has changed in the past ten or fifteen years with the USA, for example, and that India’s new purchases have diversified with the USA, Russia, France and Israel as the main suppliers.

When asked if these differences in relations with Russia have put a strain on India-Europe relations, Jaishankar said, “Both sides have communicated their positions clearly and have not emphasised their differences. But yes, there are differences… When the fighting started in Ukraine, Europe shifted a large part of its energy procurement to the Middle East – until then the main supplier for India and other countries… In many cases, our Middle East suppliers gave priority to Europe because Europe paid higher prices. Either we would have had no energy because everything would have gone to them. Or we would have ended up paying a lot more because you were paying more. And in a certain way, we stabilized the energy market that way.”

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