The President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, will arrive this Monday (6) in India with the objective of strengthening military and energy relations with a traditional ally who is also courted by the United States.
India was a country close to the former Soviet Union during the Cold War and the relationship has lasted so long that New Delhi classifies it as “a special and privileged strategic alliance”.
“The friendship between India and Russia has stood the test of time,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi told Putin at a virtual meeting in September. “He was always a great friend of India”.
This is the Russian president’s second international trip since the beginning of the pandemic, after a meeting in June in the city of Geneva (Switzerland) with the American president, Joe Biden.
“This is very symbolic,” commented Nandan Unnikrishnan of the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi.
But Putin will have to deal with complex regional dynamics, a consequence of rising tensions between India and China, another traditional Moscow ally, after lethal clashes in the Himalayas.
“Russian influence in the region is very limited,” said Tatiana Belousova of the OP Jindal Global University in Haryana, “in particular because of ties to China and unwillingness to go against Chinese regional interests.”
Russia is a long-time arms supplier to India, which is looking to modernize its armed forces, and one of its biggest contracts includes the purchase of long-range S-400 surface-to-air missiles.
The deal, valued at more than $5 billion, was signed in 2018 and deliveries have already started, but it could jeopardize the growing relationship between New Delhi and Washington, which has threatened to apply sanctions over the purchase.
“It is quite remarkable that India decided to go ahead with the purchase of the S-400s, despite the disapproval of the United States”, commented Belousova.
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