India ‘somewhat shaky’ on Ukraine: US
NEW DELHI: Members of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue or Quad were extremely strong in responding to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine while India’s position on the issue was “somewhat shaky”, US President Joe Biden has said.
On February 24, Russian forces launched military operations in Ukraine, three days after Moscow recognised Ukraine’s breakaway regions – Donetsk and Luhansk – as independent entities.
“The one thing I’m confident, knowing Putin fairly well — as well as, I guess, another leader could know one another — is that he was counting on being able to split NATO. He never thought NATO would stay resolved - stay totally, thoroughly united. And I can assure you, NATO has never been stronger or more united in its entire history than it is today, in large part, because of Vladimir Putin,” Biden told a business roundtable of CEOs on Monday.
The US president, while summing up the response of NATO and Quad to the Ukraine crisis, said: “The Quad is — with the possible exception of India being somewhat shaky on some of this. But Japan has been extremely strong, so has Australia, in terms of dealing with Putin’s aggression.”
Biden added, “We presented a united front throughout NATO and the Pacific.”
Biden’s remarks were the first comments by a senior US leader regarding India’s position on the situation in Ukraine. India has so far refrained from criticising Russia’s actions and called for an immediate end to hostilities and a return to the path of dialogue.
Both Japan Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison raised the Ukraine crisis during their summits with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. A Japanese spokesperson said Kishida sought greater cooperation from Narendra Modi to ask Russian President Vladimir Putin to end the hostilities. Morrison said steps must be taken to ensure that the aggression in Europe is not repeated in the Indo-Pacific.
There was no immediate response from Indian officials to Biden’s comments.
Biden further said that when Vladimir Putin began amassing troops along the Ukrainian border, he called for an emergency meeting of NATO in Europe “to make the case that we had to be united”.
He said he was confident that Putin “was counting on being able to split NATO”, and the Russian leader “never thought NATO would stay resolved” and totally united.
“And I can assure you: NATO has never been stronger or more united in its entire history than it is today, in large part because of Vladimir Putin,” Biden said.
In response to Putin’s aggression, the US and its allies had presented a “united front throughout NATO and in the Pacific”, he said.
American businesses did a “hell of a lot to help us impose sanctions and incur costs” on the Russian economy. “And we’re seeing now that it mattered. It was really important what you all did,” he added.
The response of the US and its allies is working and the Ukrain
ians are fighting valiantly, Biden said. The Ukrainian side has the required equipment and “they’re wreaking havoc” on the Russian military, he said.
Biden said that Putin was not anticipating the extent or strength of the US-led unity of the international community.
“The more his back is against the wall, the greater severity of the tactics he may employ. We’ve seen it before. He’s run a lot of false flag operations. Whenever he starts talking about something he thinks NATO, Ukraine, or the United States is about to do, it means he’s getting ready to do it. Not a joke. “You may recall, I said this to a few of you this morning, that I was able to declassify a whole range of operations that they were about to engage in without sacrificing sources and methods,” he said.
Biden along with members of his senior staff met with 16 CEOs of major companies across several industries, including energy, food, and manufacturing to provide a briefing on the latest developments on Putin’s war against Ukraine.
“They conveyed the administration’s commitment to continue imposing heavy costs on Putin to degrade Russia’s war machine and support the people of Ukraine while taking concrete actions to mitigate the price increases on American consumers caused by Putin’s action,” the White House said.
“Participants also discussed the need to work together to address Putin’s disruptions to global markets and supply chains, especially for energy and agricultural commodities, and identify alternative sources of supply for key goods. The private sector and the administration committed to close communication and coordination going forward,” said the White House.
The Quad — comprising Japan, India, Australia and the United States — is not an alliance but a grouping of countries driven by shared interests and values and interested in strengthening a rules-based order in the strategically-important Indo-Pacific region.
Last month, Biden had said
that India and the US were trying to resolve their differences on the issue of Russian aggression against Ukraine.