Nirendra Dev
New Delhi: External Affairs Minister Dr. S Jaishankar has made a scathing attack on China and blamed it for disturbing the 'foundation' of ties.
Addressing an event at the Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations in Moscow, the Minister said: “For the last one year there has been a lot of concern regarding the relationship (between two countries) and China did not respect the border agreements it signed up".
"For the first time in 45 years, there were incidents at the border with casualties,” he said adding, “Peace and tranquility at the border are the fundamentals of a relationship between two neighboring countries.
Naturally, the foundation has been disturbed, so has the relationship".
He was responding to a question on the occasion of how India views the rise of China.
Importantly about India's economic ties with China, he said: “For the last 40 years we maintained a stable relationship with China, there is a big economic element since China emerged as our second-largest economic partner."
But, he said China is part of an exception and. China is part of a trend as well, "because of its history, scale, and power."
"For India, it is a natural happening to some degree because we see ourselves in a similar situation.
The timing may show we are a few years behind and, the pace and intensity of it may be slightly different but broadly in the same time span India’s position period the world has also changed,” Dr. Jaishankar said.
Jaishankar further said China's rise also affects Russia and Eurasia and, forums like BRICS show how each of these nations profits collaboratively.
In his address, Dr. S Jaishankar said that history is "very much" in favor of robust India-Russia ties.
However, he also suggested that those who have reservations about India's role in Indo-Pacific should refer to the Indo-Pacific Oceans Initiative that Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced at the East Asia Summit in 2019.
"India and Russia are unquestionably on the same page. We have both been victims of fundamentalist thinking and know well the dangers of radicalization and extremism," he said.
About Indo-Pacific, he said, "Our major partners are located there, and indeed, cooperation with the Russian Far East is one notable example. There is a vast global commons whose safety, security, ecology, environment, and activities are increasingly a shared responsibility."
Russia has always had reservations about India's involvement in ."Indo-Pacific as it sees this as 'primarily a US-led initiative' perhaps designed to contain China and Russia.
Moscow has contended that attempts to plan a new rules-based Indo-Pacific order as a strategy to override
international law, circumventing the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) where Russia holds veto power.
The crucial Afghan situation will figure in India-Russia high-level talks on Friday.
