Relevance: GS-2: Effects of Policies and Politics of Developed and Developing Countries on India’s interests, Indian Diaspora.

Key Phrases: Russia-Ukraine war, special military operation, International Court of Justice, Genocide Convention, Western Countries, Euromaidan Movement, Separatist Movement, NATO Membership, NATO, Poverty, Energy trade, Investment and finance.

Background:

• The ongoing conflict between Ukraine and Russia has entered its fifth month. It has led to one of the most severe humanitarian crises in Europe since World War II.
• Russia has sought to justify its “special military operation” as a response to the alleged act of genocide of the Russian speaking people in the territories of Donetsk and Luhansk.
• Ukraine approached the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the principal judicial organ of the United Nations (UN), requesting the ICJ among other things, to hold that no acts of genocide defined under the Genocide Convention 1948 and as claimed by Russia have been committed by Ukraine in Donetsk and Luhansk.
• Additionally, Ukraine also requested the court to indicate certain provisional measures, such as directing the Russian Federation to “immediately suspend military operations” in Ukraine, and to ensure that Russia will not aggravate or extend the dispute.

Reasons behind this conflict:

• Buffer Zone for Western Countries:
  • For the US and the European Union, Ukraine is a crucial buffer between Russia and the West.
• Balance of Power:
  • Ever since Ukraine split from the Soviet Union, both Russia and the West have vied for greater influence in the country in order to keep the balance of power in the region in their favour.
• Euromaidan Movement:
  • Euromaidan (European Square) was a wave of demonstrations and civil unrest in Ukraine, which began in 2013 due to government getting closer to Russia than EU.
• Separatist Movement:
  • The Donbass region (the Donetsk and Luhansk regions) of eastern Ukraine has been facing a pro-Russian separatist movement since 2014. Ukraine blames Russia for this.
  • Russia seized Crimea from Ukraine in what was the first time a European country annexed territory from another country since World War 2.
• Ukraine’s NATO Membership:
  • Ukraine has urged the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to speed up his country’s membership in the alliance. Russia has declared such a move a “red line”.
  • Russia is seeking assurances from the US that Ukraine will not be inducted into NATO. However, the US is not prepared to give any such assurance. This has left the countries in a stand-off, with tens of thousands of Russian troops ready to invade Ukraine.

Western Countries on Russia-Ukraine war:

• Solidarity with Ukraine and resistance against the incursion of Russian forces into Ukrainian territory are the main refrain of the Western media.
• The NATO, EU and G-7 have sprung into action, offering support of various kinds — from the supply of arms, intelligence, cash and logistics and training of Ukrainian troops, to imposing severe sanctions intended to “cripple” the Russian economy.
• Western troops have not been directly involved in combat so far but mercenaries of Western provenance are actively engaged, and some have actually been caught in action.
• Weakening Russia is the hidden agenda of the Ukraine war.
• President Joe Biden of the United States — who has vowed to stand with Ukraine “as long as it takes” - and Prime Minister Boris Johnson(resigned recently) of the UK have been the leading spirits behind the mobilisation of the West on “both sides of the Atlantic”, to confront the “common enemy”.

Effect of the war on world economy:

• Poverty and hunger:
  • The World Bank’s baseline projection assumes Ukraine’s poverty, based on the $5.50 per day threshold rate, will increase from 1.8% in 2021 to 19.8% in 2022.
  • World Bank said the latest surge in food prices could push an additional 40 million people under the $1.90-per-day poverty line.
  • Steeper price increases for food and fuel may spur a greater risk of unrest in some regions, from Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America to the Caucasus and Central Asia, while food insecurity is likely to further increase in parts of Africa and the Middle East.
  • With Ukraine and Russia accounting for up to 30% of the global exports for wheat, food prices, too, have jumped.
• Energy trade:
  • Russia and Ukraine are major commodity producers, and disruptions there have resulted in soaring global prices, especially that of oil and natural gas.
• Commodity trade:
  • The IMF says that wider supply-chain disruptions, in addition to rising fuel prices, may also be consequential.
  • Disruptions, sanctions and higher commodity prices also bear the potential of troubling global value chains.
  • Conflict and subsequent sanctions have frayed trade connectivity by disrupting transit routes, particularly for maritime container shipping and air freight traffic.
  • Higher fuel prices and insurance premiums have pushed up shipping costs.
• Services and travel:
  • World Bank also pointed to the global impact on services trade as outbound travel was disrupted with airspace closures, travel restrictions, sanctions and increased fuel prices.
  • Russia and Ukraine are among the top 10 countries for total global departures and a key source of revenue for tourism-reliant countries in Europe, East Asia and the Pacific, the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia.
• Investment and finance:
  • The OECD observed that inflation is hitting living standards and reducing consumer spending across the globe, and businesses are becoming less optimistic about future production. Crucially, that hit to confidence is deterring investment, which in turn threatens to hurt supply for years to come.

India stand on Russia-Ukraine war:

• India-Russia Friendship:
  • Russia remains India’s biggest and time-tested supplier of military hardware.
  • Russia has boosted India’s defence capability against China with the S-400 air defence system.
  • Moscow is also a reliable ally in the UN Security Council. India-Russia ties have ensured that Delhi has not been entirely left out of the conversation on Afghanistan, and Central Asia, while also providing some leverage with the US.
  • Russia is an important partner for India in the area of peaceful use of nuclear energy.
• India’s relationship with the West:
  • The US, the European Union, and the UK are all vital partners, and India’s relations with each of them, and the Western world in general, go far beyond the sum of their parts.
  • In the UNSC, India has counted on France’s unstinted backing on many issues.
  • India has relied on western support as it deals with an aggressive China on the Line of Actual Control.
  • Recently the West has also been supportive of India’s aim to contain Pakistan’s support for cross-border terrorism.
• Moving away from neutrality but maintaining balance:
  • Prime Minister Modi’s appeal to President Putin for a “cessation of violence” and for all sides to return to the dialogue table was certainly a notch up from India’s earlier explicitly neutral stance, and carried a hint of the compulsions to get off the fence, though still largely maintaining a balance.

Way forward:

• The time for resuming negotiations is now. There might be a window of opportunity for India, which has consistently held dialogue and diplomacy as the only solution, to take the initiative towards mediation.
• Under Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in 1953, post-independence India, a fledgling in world politics, had stepped in as a mediator in the Korean conflict.
• With the dexterity that current Indian diplomacy has shown – successfully repatriating vast numbers of Indians from Ukraine at the outbreak of the war, keeping a line open to Russia and the United States, and retaining its strategic room to manoeuvre - Modi’s India has the potential to get the warring parties to the negotiation table. Some Ukrainian and Russian lives might still be saved.

Source: Indian Express

Mains Question:

Q. “The war in Ukraine has rung the death knell of globalisation.”. Discuss the statement.