Ukraine- India relations
This is a collection of articles archived for the excellence of their content. |
Contents |
Indians in Ukraine
As in 2021
The Times of India / 16 Feb. 22
The government [of India] had said at the Security Council … more than 20,000 Indian students and nationals live and study in different parts of Ukraine, including in its border areas.
Pakistan and Ukraine
2022 – 23: Pakistan sells ammunition to Ukraine
Sep 19, 2023: The Times of India
Washington : Pakistan has sold munitions worth $900 million over the past year to Ukraine in a secret deal under pressure from the US, which in turn helped Islamabad secure an IMF bailout.
The so-called “bombs for bailout” deal, first reported in investigative website The Intercept, forced Islamabad from its neutral position in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, even as Washington prioritised protecting Ukraine over furthering democracy in Pakistan.
The Intercept said records detailing the arms transactions were leaked to it earlier this year by a source within the Pakistani military. The documents describe muni tions sales agreed to between the US and Pakistan from the summer of 2022 to the spring of 2023, it added.
The Biden administration and IMF denied the story, but the Intercept said its reporting was based on documents outli ning the money trail, American and Pakistani contracts, licensing, and requisition documents related to US-brokered deals to buy Pakistani military weapons for Ukraine.
Imran ouster, weapons deal part of US ‘forgiveness package’ for Pak?
Some of the documents were authenticated by matching the signature of an American brigadier general with his signature on publicly available mortgage records in the US; by matching the Pakistani documents with corresponding American documents; and by reviewing publicly available but previously unreported Pakistani disclosures of arms sales to the US posted by the State Bank of Pakistan,” the investigative website The Intercept said.
Noting that Pakistan is known as a production hub for the types of basic munitions needed for grinding warfare, the Intercept reported that as Ukraine grappled with chronic shortages of munitions and hardware, the presence of Pakistani-produced shells and other ordnances by the Ukrainian military has surfaced in open-source news reports about the conflict, tho ugh neither the US nor the Pakistanis have acknowledged the arrangement. The weapons deals were brokered by Global Military Products, a subsidiary of Global Ordnance, a controversial arms dealer with “entanglements with less-than-reputable figures in Ukraine”, it said.
The transaction “is a window into the kind of behindthe-scenes manoeuvring between financial and political elites that rarely is exposed to the public, even as the public pays the price”, it added, with a lengthy backgrounder on Washington’s role in encouraging the Pakistani military to oust Imran Khan, who took an “aggressively neutral” stance on the war in Ukraine, from office, resulting in protests and unrest across the country.
The report said Washington warned of dire consequences if Khan remained in power and promised “all would be forgiven” if he were removed. Part of the forgiveness package apparently was the IMF bailout. “The economic capital and political goodwill from the arms sales played a key role in helping secure the bailout from the IMF, with the state department agreeing to take the IMF into confidence regarding the undisclosed weapons deal, according to sources with knowledge of the arrangement, and confirmed by a related document,” it added.
YEAR-WISE DEVELOPMENTS
2024: first visit by an Indian PM
August 24, 2024: The Times of India
New Delhi : PM Narendra Modi’s visit to Ukraine, the first ever by an Indian PM to the country, saw the two sides expressing commitment to working towards elevating bilateral relations to a strategic partnership, with Modi saying growth in ties in the middle of the conflict was a sign of maturity in the relationship. Among other things, Modi and President Volodymyr Zelensky also agreed to boost defence cooperation, including manufacturing in India.
Zelensky said history had been made with the visit, adding in a post on X after the bilateral meeting that India backed Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. “And this is critical because everyone in the world must equally respect the UN Charter,” said Zelensky.
India and Ukraine signed four agreements including one for cooperation in agriculture and food industry and another for Indian humanitarian assistance for implementation of high impact community development projects in Ukraine. Two other agreements were signed for cooperation in medicines and drugs control and also culture.
Apart from focusing on political and economic cooperation, Modi and Zelensky also agreed to work towards stronger defence cooperation, including through joint collaborations and partnerships for manufacturing in India and cooperation in emerging areas. “The sides agreed to hold the second meeting of Indian-Ukrainian Joint Working Group on military-technical cooperation, established under the 2012 Defence Cooperation Agreement, in the near future in India,” said the joint statement.
In what was their fourth meeting in past few years, Modi and Zelensky, while seeking just, comprehensive and lasting peace, also reaffirmed their commitment to further developing bilateral ties for the benefit of the peoples of both countries based on mutual trust, respect, & openness.
