{"id":51978,"date":"2019-09-07T19:00:48","date_gmt":"2019-09-07T13:30:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogadmin.forumias.com\/?p=51978"},"modified":"2019-09-07T15:46:02","modified_gmt":"2019-09-07T10:16:02","slug":"7-pm-bear-hug-on-india-strengthening-relations-with-russia-7th-september-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/7-pm-bear-hug-on-india-strengthening-relations-with-russia-7th-september-2019\/","title":{"rendered":"7 PM | Bear hug: On India strengthening relations with Russia | 7th September, 2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Context:\n<\/strong>India\n\u2013 Russia Relations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>More\nin news:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>PM Modi launches \u2018Act Far East\u2019 policy\nto boost India\u2019s engagement with Russia\u2019s Far East.<\/li><li>Addressing the plenary\nsession of the 5th Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, PM Modi\nextends $1 billion line of credit for development of Russia\u2019s Far East.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Act Far East\nPolicy: <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>\u2018<\/strong>Act\nFar East&#8217; is said to be an extension to India\u2019s Act East policy. <\/li><li>The focus of the Act East policy, which\nbegan as a \u201cLook East policy\u201d \u2014&nbsp;that&nbsp;was launched by the former prime\nminister PV Narasimha Rao in 1991 \u2014 was to shift the country&#8217;s trading focus\nfrom the west and neighbour to the booming South East Asian countries.<\/li><li>Its major objectives are to increase the\ninteraction of the&nbsp;northeastern Indian states with other neighbouring\ncountries and to curb the increasing impact of China in the ASEAN (Association\nof Southeast Asian Nations) region.<\/li><li>Some of the major projects in this\ncollaboration with South-East Asian countries include&nbsp;the Kaladan\nMulti-Modal Transit Transport Project, the India-Myanmar-Thailand Trilateral\nHighway Project, Border Haats and Rhi-Tiddim Road Project, etc.<\/li><li>So far, it has not only helped build\nbetter bilateral ties with the eastern countries but also shifted the focus\nfrom the west, to further enhance global understanding and multi-lateral\ncooperation.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Eastern\nEconomic Forum: <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>PM Modi became first Indian prime\nminister to visit the Russian Far East Region. He visited the place to\nparticipate in the 20th India-Russia annual summit with President Putin and the\nfifth meeting of the Eastern Economic Forum (EEF).<\/li><li>The Eastern Economic forum focuses on\nthe development of business and investment opportunities in the Russian Far\nEast Region and presents enormous potential for developing close and mutually\nbeneficial cooperation between India and Russia in the region.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>India-Russia\nRelations:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Relations\nbetween India and Russia are rooted in history, mutual trust and mutually\nbeneficial cooperation.&nbsp; This is a strategic partnership that has\nwithstood the test of time, and which enjoys the support of the people of both\ncountries.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Traditional ties:<\/strong><ul><li>Diplomatic relations between India and Russia began even before India achieved independence, on 13 April 1947.\u00a0 <\/li><li>In the period immediately following independence the goal for India was attaining economic self-sufficiency through investment in heavy industry.\u00a0 <\/li><li>The Soviet Union invested in several new enterprises in the areas of heavy machine-building, mining, energy production and steel plants.\u00a0 <\/li><li>During India\u2019s second Five Year Plan, of the sixteen heavy industry projects set up, eight were initiated with the help of the Soviet Union.\u00a0 This included the establishment of the world famous IIT Bombay.\u00a0<\/li><li>The signing of the <strong>Treaty of Peace and Friendship in August 1971<\/strong> was a watershed moment in relations between India and the Soviet Union.\u00a0 The Treaty was the manifestation of shared goals of the two nations as well as a blueprint for the strengthening of regional and global peace and security.\u00a0\u00a0<\/li><li>After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, India and Russia entered into a new <strong>Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation in January 1993<\/strong> and a bilateral Military-Technical Cooperation agreement in 1994.\u00a0<\/li><li>The <strong>strategic partnership (2000)<\/strong> institutionalized annual meetings between the Prime Minister of India and the President of Russia and meetings have been held regularly since then.<\/li><li>The relationship was elevated to the status of a <strong>Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership in 2010.<\/strong><\/li><li>There are two institutionalized dialogue mechanism: <ul><li>the Inter-Governmental Commission on Trade, Economic, Scientific, Technological and Cultural Cooperation <strong>(IRIGC-TEC),<\/strong> co-chaired by the External Affairs Minister of India and the Deputy Prime Minister of Russia<\/li><li>the Inter-Governmental Commission on Military and Military Technical Cooperation <strong>(IRIGC-MTC<\/strong>) co-chaired by the Defense Ministers of both countries.\u00a0<\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Defence Relations:<\/strong><ul><li>The defence facet of the relationship is one of the strongest pillars of the India-Russia relationship and has withstood the test of time.\u00a0 India, with Russia\u2019s cooperation, has achieved capacity building in strategic areas through acquisitions and development of weapons.<\/li><li>The relationship is evolving from the traditional buyer-seller one to that of joint production and development, with emphasis on technology sharing.\u00a0 Russia is committed to becoming a partner in the \u2018Make in India\u2019 programme.\u00a0<\/li><li>The first-ever TriServices Exercise, Indra 2017, that India has ever held with any country was held with Russia in 2017 in Vladivostok.<\/li><li>In 2018, India has contracted defence deals worth about $14.5 billion from Russia.<\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Economic Relations:<\/strong><ul><li>Trade between the two countries is an area which has been identified for special focus by both countries. Bilateral trade in 2015 amounted to US$ 7.83 billion.<\/li><li>Both the countries have set a target of total trade in goods and services of US$ 30 billion each way by 2025.<\/li><li>India and Russia have set up a US$ 1 billion Fund to promote mutual investment in infrastructure and technology projects.\u00a0<\/li><li>Both the countries have nine sister State and sister city agreements.<\/li><li>India, Russia and other neighbouring countries are engaged in efforts to operationalise the International North-South Transport Corridor which promises to propel connectivity and trade relations between the two countries.<\/li><li>The two countries have agreed to cooperate in projects in third countries. Both have been cooperating in the Roopur Nuclear Power Project in Bangladesh. Indian and Russian companies have been cooperating in oil and gas exploration in Vietnam.\u00a0<\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Relations in Nuclear Energy:<\/strong>\u00a0<ul><li>Russia is an indispensable partner in the sphere of nuclear energy and recognizes India as a responsible country with advanced nuclear technology with an impeccable non-proliferation record. <\/li><li>After the Paris Agreement on Climate Change India considers nuclear energy as an important source of energy to meet its energy and climate change obligations. This has brought both countries together into a mutually beneficial relationship.\u00a0<\/li><li>Rosatom is building six units of nuclear reactors at the Kudankulam site in Tamil Nadu. Two units are already operational and the next four are in different stages of implementation.\u00a0 This is in line with the \u201cStrategic Vision\u201d document signed in 2014 between President Putin and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. <\/li><li>India attaches very high importance to local manufacturing in India of equipment and components for upcoming and future Russian-designed nuclear power projects.\u00a0<\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Outcome\nof recent visit:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Both side agreed to\nmore actively engage the impressive resource and human resources potential of\nIndia and Russia, enhance industrial cooperation, create new technological and\ninvestment partnership, especially in advanced high-tech areas and find new\navenues and forms of cooperation.<\/li><li>In context of giving boost to \u2018Make in\nIndia\u2019, both agreed to speed up preparations for\nsigning of the India-Russia Intergovernmental Agreement on Promotion and Mutual\nProtection of Investments.<\/li><li>Development of the\nRussian Far East: Several Indian companies have been successfully set up in the\nFar East region, such as M\/s KGK in Vladivostok in the field of diamond cutting\nand M\/s Tata Power in Krutogorovo in Kamchatka in coal mining. The Russian side\nwelcomed the intent of the Indian side to expand its economic and investment\npresence in the Far Eastern region and Siberia.<\/li><li>India looks forward to\ncooperate with Russia in the Arctic. India has been following the developments\nin the Arctic region with interest and is also ready to play a significant role\nin the Arctic Council.<\/li><li>The two countries\nsigned the Roadmap for cooperation in Hydrocarbons for 2019-24.<\/li><li>To promote further\ndevelopment of trade and economic ties between India and Russia, the Sides\nintend to work on improving the transport infrastructure. This highlights the great\nimportance to the development of the International North-South Transport\nCorridor (INSTC). The major thrust in the INSTC is to secure freight volumes,\nupgrade and improve the transport and logistics services provided, simplify\ndocument workflow and switch to electronic document workflow, introduce digital\ntechnologies and satellite navigation into the transportation process.<\/li><li>The two countries are\nemphasizing on intensifying development of high-tech products in spheres like telecommunications,\nrobotics, artificial intelligence, nanotechnologies, pharmacy and others.<\/li><li>Both intend\nto strengthen cooperation within the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer\nSpace (UN COPUS), including guaranteeing long-term sustainability of outer\nspace activities and developing &#8220;Space 2030\u201d Agenda and implementation\nplan.<\/li><li>India and\nRussia unanimously recognize the effectiveness and great potential of the\nShanghai Cooperation Organization. India and Russia will increase their\ninteraction, including in the framework of Russia\u2019s SCO Presidency in\n2019-2020, to further strengthen the Organization as an important pillar of the\nemerging multi-polar world order based on equal and indivisible security.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Looking Ahead:<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>India and Russia\nhave identified several new areas of cooperation. These range from deep sea\nexploration to building knowledge based economies based on science and\ntechnology, innovation, robotics and artificial intelligence, focussing on\ninfrastructure, skill development, agriculture, shipbuilding, railways, aviation\nand greater connectivity, especially people-to-people&nbsp; contacts. Special\nfocus will be given to cooperation between the younger generation and cultural\nsphere.&nbsp;India and Russia will continue to\nremain a role model for harmonious and mutually beneficial partnership and\nstrong friendship between States. This will be to the benefit of our States and\ninternational community as a whole.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source:\n<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/opinion\/editorial\/bear-hug-on-india-strengthening-relations-with-russia\/article29355066.ece\">https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/opinion\/editorial\/bear-hug-on-india-strengthening-relations-with-russia\/article29355066.ece<\/a><strong><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Context: India \u2013 Russia Relations. More in news: PM Modi launches \u2018Act Far East\u2019 policy to boost India\u2019s engagement with Russia\u2019s Far East. Addressing the plenary session of the 5th Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, PM Modi extends $1 billion line of credit for development of Russia\u2019s Far East. Act Far East Policy: \u2018Act Far&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/7-pm-bear-hug-on-india-strengthening-relations-with-russia-7th-september-2019\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">7 PM | Bear hug: On India strengthening relations with Russia | 7th September, 2019<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":49370,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[130,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-7-pm","category-public","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/7-PM.png?fit=1000%2C500&ssl=1","views":{"total":0,"cached_at":"","cached_date":1704852880},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51978\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}