Oil And Human rights of India: The Russian-Ukrainian conflict is still continuing and India’ stance and abstentions on the matter have not been liked by the ‘Western countries’, especially the United States. The US has been very subtle and diplomatic in it’s remarks with regards to India but it can be easily seen that it’s not happy with India’s position on the subject.
Recently two things that have come to light in this matter are the matters of Oil (energy) and human rights.
There was a joint media briefing after the India-US ‘two plus two’ ministerial meeting in Washington.
The US through multiple well crafted statements expressed it’s disproval of India buying Russian oil. The Us President had said that conveyed to Prime Minister Modi that increasing the amount of oil bought from Russia will not be in India’s interest. This statement and stance was further strengthened by the remarks of the Secretary of State Anthony Blinken.
India has repeatedly argued that the purchase of Russian crude should not be “politicised”, especially when Europe is still buying energy from Moscow. India has responded to this in various ways bringing to light that only 1-2 percent of total oil is bought from Russia and the discounted rates at which it is being bought. The Indian Foreign affairs minister S. Jaishankar mentioned that India’s total monthly purchases were less than what Europe was buying in one afternoon. Given these statements the White House press secretary Jen Psaki explained that India’s import of Russian oil is no violation of sanctions’ given ‘it is only 1-2 per cent at this time.
The press secretary also further mentioned that imports from the United States were significantly higher, around 10 percent and also mentioned that the US was ready and willing to help the Indian government diversify it’s means of importing oil. She also urged the Indian government to work with the US administration to further reduce dependency on Russian oil .
The Secretary of State in the same speech made a reference to India’s human rights records. He mentioned, “We also share a commitment to our democratic values, such as protecting human rights. We regularly engage with our Indian partners on these shared values, and to that end, we’re monitoring some recent concerning developments in India, including a rise in human rights abuses by some government, police, and prison officials,”.
Blinken did not elaborate on his remark. Singh and Jaishankar, who spoke after Blinken at the briefing, also did not comment on the human rights issue.
The US secretary of state’s remarks came days after US representative Ilhan Omar questioned the alleged reluctance of the US government to criticize Modi’s government on human rights.
In the joint statement issued after the meeting, India and the US have asked Pakistan to take “immediate, sustained, and irreversible action” to ensure that no territory under its control is used for terrorist attacks and called for the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai attack and Pathankot attack to be brought to justice.
India and the US have also signed a bilateral space situational awareness arrangement on the sidelines of the India-US 2+2 ministerial meeting.
Austin noted that the two countries recently concluded an agreement to work together on air-launched unmanned aerial vehicles through our Defence Technology and Trade Initiative. “And today, we agreed to launch new supply chain cooperation measures that will let us more swiftly support each other’s priority defense requirements,” he said.
There was also discussion and remarks made with regards to the Quad Alliance in the Indo – Pacific region and were a focus point of the discussion.
While on one hand the US is apprehensive about India’s position in the current situation it is also aware of its importance in the geopolitical scenario of the world today , especially in the Indo – Pacific region.
Therefore we can see that the US is trying to strengthen it’s ties with India and bring it farther and farther from it’s longtime ally, Russia. But we have no way of knowing what the real intentions are, and what the future holds, for only time shall tell.
Published By: Simran Mulani
Edit By: Khushi Thakur
