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<\/p>\nRussian President Vladimir Putin has been urged by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a close ally, to end Moscow’s war against Ukraine.<\/p>\n
“Every day spent in war pushes humanity back, and every step taken towards peace fills humanity with new hope and enthusiasm,” Modi said on Monday.<\/p>\n
Modi, whose country’s economy depends heavily on discounted oil from Moscow, has made several similar pleas to Putin since he launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.<\/p>\n
BBC correspondents in Delhi and Moscow look at what lies behind Modi’s renewed appeal for peace, and Putin’s response.<\/p>\n
Modi’s comments on ending the war in Ukraine are not surprising and don’t suggest any tactical change in India’s foreign policy.<\/p>\n
In fact, speaking on the sidelines of a regional summit in 2022 – less than a year into the conflict – Modi told Putin publicly that “now is not the time for war”.<\/p>\n
But it would be an oversimplification to suggest that Modi’s current or past statements on the war can be seen as a rebuff to Putin or Russia’s strategy.<\/p>\n
Western countries have pushed Modi hard to take a clear stand on the war – but Delhi has largely stayed neutral, urging dialogue to end the war instead.<\/p>\n
The stand hasn’t made many Western capitals happy but they have continued to court Modi and India – it’s just too big and too fast-growing an economy to be ignored.<\/p>\n
In this context, Modi’s current statement cannot be seen as an attempt to please a third country.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
India’s economy relies heavily on imported Russian oil [Getty Images]<\/p>\n
If anything, it is very much in line with India’s policy of strategic autonomy. Which then begs the question: why would Modi say something on the war so publicly?<\/p>\n
The answer lies in the long-standing Russia-India ties – the two countries have generally found a way to work together, even when they see geopolitics through different lenses.<\/p>\n
Moscow has continued to be one of India’s strongest allies despite Delhi forging closer relationships with Europe and the US in the past three decades.<\/p>\n
Delhi is one of the founding members of the Brics grouping of nations along with Russia and China, and it is also a member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation with the two countries.<\/p>\n
But at the same time, Delhi is also a member of the Quad group with Australia, Japan and the US – Moscow has not been happy about this association.<\/p>\n
Still, Moscow and Delhi tend to work through these differences. Moreover, Russia still supplies around 40% of India’s defence imports and it has also been a steady supplier of Delhi’s energy needs.<\/p>\n
So, Modi’s latest statement is not expected to cause any rift in Moscow-Delhi relations and analysts say it’s unlikely that it would have come as a surprise to Putin or his diplomats.<\/p>\n
As for the West and Modi’s critics in India, they will feel that the prime minister should have been even more direct in his criticism of the war.<\/p>\n
This isn’t the first time a foreign leader has publicly urged Putin to end the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n
Just five weeks ago the President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev suggested Putin freeze the conflict and return to the negotiating table.<\/p>\n
He didn’t. And he hasn’t.<\/p>\n
There’s no sign of these public calls for peace changing Putin’s calculations.<\/p>\n
To Modi’s call for a cessation of hostilities, the Kremlin leader replied:<\/p>\n
“Thank you very much, prime minister. We are moving forward along this path.”<\/p>\n
Polite, but vague. And non-committal.<\/p>\n
After all, a path can be short. But it can also be long. Very long.<\/p>\n
And “moving forward” at what pace?<\/p>\n
And, crucially, on which path?<\/p>\n
All the evidence suggests that Russia’s leadership remains convinced it is on a path to military victory in Ukraine. To frame that in terms of peace, “moving forward” to peace on Russia’s terms dictated by military success.<\/p>\n
Therefore, for now, the fighting goes on.<\/p>\n
Despite the fact that, after more than four-and-a-half years of war and huge military losses, the Kremlin has yet to secure victory.<\/p>\n
And despite Ukraine’s success in bringing the war back home to Russians: for example, through long-range drone strikes on Russian oil refineries that have sparked fuel shortages and petrol queues across the country.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
Four people were killed in overnight Russian strikes on Ukraine’s town of Boryspil, outside Kyiv [Reuters]<\/p>\n
In recent days Russia has stepped up its attacks on Ukraine.<\/p>\n
“After [Russia] intensified its strikes on Ukraine’s military-industrial facilities and critical infrastructure,” wrote the Kommersant newspaper this morning, “the Russian side is convinced that in the military confrontation time is working against Kyiv.”<\/p>\n
While Putin believes that, he’ll be reluctant to pause his so-called “special military operation”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Russian President Vladimir Putin has been urged by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a close ally, to end…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35796,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[6949,12277,3460,12430,38,6777,414,509,26,33],"class_list":["post-35795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-delhi","tag-indian","tag-modi","tag-modis","tag-moscow","tag-narendra-modi","tag-putin","tag-russian","tag-ukraine","tag-vladimir-putin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}