Approaching US excluded
India insists on importing Russian oil

12/04/2022 4:44 am

US President Biden is trying to convince his Indian counterpart Modi at the meeting to take a tougher political and economic stance towards the Kremlin. However, he defended Russia’s energy supply to India, referring to Europe.

The United States and India failed to reach an agreement on relations with Russia over the Ukraine war at a top-level meeting. “It is important that all countries, especially those with influence” over Russian President Vladimir Putin, “press him to end the war,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said after US President Joe Biden’s virtual summit with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Unlike Biden, Modi has not completely condemned Russia’s invasion of a neighboring country; India’s prime minister described the situation in Ukraine as “deeply worrying”. He expressed his support for the Russian-Ukrainian negotiations, which Washington, in turn, viewed with skepticism.

According to the White House, while the US President warned during an “open” debate that it was not “in India’s interest” to expand Russian energy imports, Indian Foreign Minister S. Jankhaiharan dismissed the demands. “Our purchases in a month may be less than Europe in the afternoon,” he said.

India has had close relations with Moscow since Soviet times and is dependent on Russia for arms. At the same time, Washington hopes to win over India as an ally in the conflict with arch-rival China. As such, US criticism of India’s position on the Ukraine war has been muted in comparison to criticism of Beijing’s position. Blinken simply emphasized that “democracies” around the world must speak with “one voice” “to defend the values ​​we share”. At the same time, India must “make its own decisions in the face of this challenge”.