Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba
New Delhi: Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba has said that India-Russia relation is based on the Soviet legacy, which is “extinct and has no future”. He said India can play an “important” role in bringing peace to the war-torn region of Ukraine that can “enhance” the India-Ukraine ties.
“India can play a very important role in bringing together more nations from the Global South… if India sits at the table of the peace formula, the initiative put forward by Ukraine to find a diplomatic solution to the war, then many other nations will feel much safer and comfortable sitting next to India and they will come and join this effort,” he said in an interview to NDTV.
Kuleba is on two-day visit to India on the invitation of Minister of External Affairs S Jaishankar. He said it did not take any time for him to agree to the visit as India is a very important player in the world and we need India to restore just and lasting peace in Ukraine.”
On Jaishankar’s statements that India and Russia take special care of each other’s interests, but also that the country has given frank messages to Moscow, the Ukrainian foreign minister said the India-Russia is based on the Soviet legacy, which is “extinct and has no future”.
Calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘this is not an era of war’ statement “famous words”, he said that Russia has triggered the largest conflict in Europe since the Second World War, NDTV reported.
On India-Russia ties, he said it is based on the Soviet legacy, which is “extinct and has no future”. “We understand there are some economic, technological ties between India and Russia and India is a sovereign nation, it has the right to develop relations with any country it deems appropriate,” he told NDTV.
“But if India and Russia are so close, it means that India can influence the way Russia behaves and this is one of the reasons why the voice of India is so important but, second, I don’t think this relationship has a future for the reason that I mentioned. I think the Ukrainian-Indian relationship has more (of a) future in that sense,” the Ukrainian minister further said.
On India purchasing Russian oil, Kuleba said since the transaction is done in rupees, it does not end up benefiting the Russian “war machine”, NDTV report added.
Kuleba On Concert Hall Attack In Russia
On Russian President Vladimir Putin’s claim that the attackers of Moscow concert hall, that killed at least 140 people, were heading towards South Ukraine, Kuleba said the attempt at blaming his country was no surprise.
On the relevance of the United Nations, he said that criticising the UN would be an easy thing. “I will not resort to this easy exercise because the war taught us that only difficult exercises are worth spending your energy on,” the minister added.
However, he added that the UN is struggling because the balance of power inside the organisation is “broken” and things need to change.
