Carnegie Moscow Center
What do you expect from Vladimir Putin’s visit to India? Eurasia Outlook posed the question to some leading experts in the field in order to gather some predictions about the meeting’s significance to Russia-India relations moving forward.
Russia and India should initiate the creation of a roadmap for developing Russian-Indian relations. Without a binding roadmap, the “strategic partnership” will remain nothing but pretty window dressing that conceals the absence of strategy.
The falling oil price and rapid devaluation of Russian currency not only affect the economy, the budget, and the joking habits of the elite, but also have an effect on Moscow’s foreign policy.
By reactivating its policy on Pyongyang, Moscow is sending messages to Seoul, Tokyo, Washington, and Beijing, which should be properly understood.
Russia needs to use every opportunity to inform the Indian government and public about Moscow’s priorities in regional and global politics and about its views on all issues which are relevant to Indians.
Military cooperation between Russia and Pakistan will be very specific and driven by concrete, pragmatic, and limited goals. At the same time, India remains Russia’s priority partner.
Pakistani religious minorities live in fear. This fear can only abate through the Pakistani government’s consistent and tough policies directed at the softening of the blasphemy law and cracking down on any attempts of vigilante justice.
For Russia, the upcoming APEC Summit is seen primarily as an opportunity to attend important, bilateral meetings, not to talk about common issues in the Asia-Pacific.
China and India would definitely want to know if Russia is really so afraid of the missiles they are developing that is ready to abandon the INF Treaty.
Russia certainly seeks to further its strategic partnership with India and to continue to develop its relations with Pakistan. However, its moves will face growing mistrust in New Delhi and Islamabad if Moscow remains silent on South Asia’s hot-button issues.