India-China Bilateral Meetings Held in Moscow
At a time when two member nations – India and China – are in confrontation at the borders, Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Defence Ministers’ meet was held on 4 September. India and China are two important members of SCO. The defence ministers of all eight SCO member nations deliberated on regional security challenges like terrorism and extremism and ways to deal with them collectively in Moscow.
India’s defence minister Rajnath Singh was on a 3-day visit to Moscow at the invitation of Russian defence minister General Shergei Shoigu. During the visit, he also took part in the meeting of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Rajnath Singh said in a tweet said that India and Russia were privileged strategic partners.
It was Rajnath Singh’s second visit to Moscow since June. He had represented India at the Victory Day Parade in Moscow on the 24 June that commemorated the 75th anniversary of the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in the Second World War.
Russia has also invited external affairs minister S. Jaishankar to attend the SCO Foreign Ministers Meeting on 10 September.
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The SCO meeting brought Rajnath Singh face to face with his Chinese counterpart, Gen Wei Fenghe amid the border standoff.
Russia had ruled out the possibility of playing any sort of role in mediating between India and China. The Russian side was briefed by the Indian side on the border situation but there was no discussion on any sort of mediation.
Singh and Jaishankar travelled to Moscow largely because of the insistence of the Russian side, currently the chair of both BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) and SCO.
These meetings were preceded by a virtual meeting of the foreign ministers of the BRICS grouping on 4 September. Chaired by Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov, the foriegn ministers at the BRICS meeting exchanged views on “topical international matters.” BRICS foreign ministers discussed cooperation in three key areas – politics and security, economics and finance and humanitarian ties.
The BRICS and SCO summits are expected to be held in St Petersburg in October.
India, China Defence Ministers’ Meet
Rajnath Singh met his Chinese counterpart Gen Wei Fenghe in Moscow on 4 September. The meeting was requested by the Chinese side. The meeting took place amid heightened tensions between the two countries triggered by China’s fresh attempts to occupy Indian territory in the southern bank of Pangong Tso lake in eastern Ladakh. Two days later, the two countries accused each other of opening fire in Ladakh.
In the first highest level contact after border tension erupted in Ladakh in May, Rajnath said ahead of the talks that peace and security in the region demands a climate of trust, non-aggression, peaceful resolution of differences and respect for international rules.
Defence secretary Ajay Kumar and Indian ambassador to Russia DB Venkatesh Varma were part of the Indian delegation at the talks.
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The meeting between Rajnath and Wei did not bring any positive results. In fact, the Chinese defence ministry claimed that Rajnath Singh was told by his Chinese counterpart Wei Fenghe during their meeting in Moscow that “responsibility (recent events in Ladakh) lies entirely with India.”
The Chinese defence ministry further went on to suggest that relations between the two countries and the two militaries have been severely affected by the border issue. The cause and truth of current tension on the border between China and India are very clear, and the responsibility lay entirely with India.
Foreign Ministers Meet
Foreign minister S Jaishankar had a meeting with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, on 10 September, in an attempt to defuse tension after a spike in hostilities, on the sidelines of the SCO meet, amid hopes of a possible breakthrough in reducing tensions along the LAC in eastern Ladakh.
India and China decided to “expedite” work on a new set of confidence-building measures as soon as the ongoing standoff between forces in the Ladakh sector of the Line of Actual Control (LAC) eases, according to a joint statement issued after the meeting of External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
Both sides agreed to “take guidance” from their respective leaders, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, of “not allowing differences to become disputes” — an understanding that was reached during the last informal summit held between the two in Mamallapuram last year.
“The Ministers agreed that as the situation eases, the two sides should expedite work to conclude new Confidence Building Measures to maintain and enhance peace and tranquility in the border areas,” the joint statement said.
Enumerating a five-point agenda on the easing of tensions, the joint statement said, “The two Foreign Ministers agreed that the current situation in the border areas is not in the interest of either side. They agreed therefore that the border troops of both sides should continue their dialogue, quickly disengage, maintain proper distance and ease tensions.”
SCO, BRICS and RIC
Historically speaking, arrangements such as the SCO, BRICS or RIC have been convenient tools for Russia to pivot away from the Western bloc and rebrand itself.
In the post-Cold War world, Moscow tried building bridges with the West, but its brief flirtation with liberalism did not extend to the world’s largest democracy, India. Russia saw the United States, Europe and China as the loci of economic and political power.
Russia soon turned its back to the West and toward Asia, to restore Russia’s former position in the international system. In 1998, the concept of the RIC was floated to balance U.S. power while, in the backdrop, NATO continued to bomb Serbia without waiting for Moscow’s nod. RIC would become the political nucleus for BRICS.
In June 2001, SCO was created, building on the Shanghai Five arrangement of 1996, with Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan – as the sixth entrant — as founding members. India and Pakistan became full members of the grouping in 2017.
Together with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Putin’s programmatic vision for a “non-West” with Russian leadership revolved around BRICS, RIC as well as the SCO. But suspicions between Russia and China, fueled by history as well as power asymmetries, never quite faded away from the scene. India is a “balancing” force within these groupings.
In the Russia-China relationship cracks are beginning to show and India could serve as a valuable link to the United States, if Moscow might seek to pivot back to the West.
Exercise Kavkaz 20
India pulled out its contingent to the multinational military exercise Kavkaz-2020, a multilateral tri-services held in Astrakhan region of southern Russia on 15-27 September. The exercise was to bring together some 13,000 troops from 20 countries, including the eight members of SCO. India cited the COVID-19 pandemic for the pull-out. Both China and Pakistan were participating in the exercise.
China’s participation in the exercise was also a reason for India to pull out of the multilateral tri-services military exercise. While India was locked in a military conflict with the Chinese in eastern Ladakh and on high alert all along the 4,000 kilometre Line of Actual Control (LAC), it could not be business as usual for India troops to be participating in multilateral military exercises with them.
India, Pakistan and all SCO member-nations had participated in Exercise Tsentr last year.
