Jaishankar Reminds West of Afghanistan as Europe Presses India to Justify Its Stance on Ukraine

Asking Europe to see the matter in the "right context," Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar on Tuesday launched a scathing attack on visiting European leaders who questioned India's stance - as the world's largest democracy - on the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict.

"When rule-based order was under threat in Asia, the advice we got from Europe was to 'do more trade'. At least we are not giving you that advice. And regarding Afghanistan, please show me which parts of the rule-based order justified what the world did there. Let's see things in the right context," Jaishankar responded to foreign ministers of Norway and Luxembourg when they questioned India's stance on the Russia-Ukraine conflict during the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi.

The minister reminded the West about last year's events in Afghanistan "when an entire civil society was thrown under the bus by the world."

Millions in Afghanistan reeled from an unprecedented crisis last August as US-led NATO forces haphazardly withdrew their troops after two decades of war without reaching a political settlement.

India's top diplomat said he understands that in Europe, the Ukrainian crisis is the dominant issue of the day.

"But there is also a world out there ... and there are equally pressing issues in other parts of the world," Jaishankar said at the Raisina Dialogue, India's annual geopolitics conference attended by dozens of European ministers.

The minister's remarks come a day after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen mentioned that the "unrestrained pact" between China and Russia would have consequences in Asia and the Indo-Pacific.

"We have been hearing a lot of arguments from Europe over the past two months about how Asia should worry about what's happening in the West because this could happen in Asia. Things have been happening in Asia for the past 10 years which Europe might not have looked at," Jaishankar said without actually mentioning the border conflict with China.

Nevertheless, the Indian minister said that he was in favour of an imminent cessation of fighting and a return to diplomacy and dialogue to bring peace to eastern Europe.

Narendra Modi's government has not joined the West's concerted condemnation of Moscow's special military operation in Ukraine, and abstained on two votes in the UN Security Council.

Russia's President Vladimir Putin had announced the beginning of the military operation on 24 February at the request of the people's republics of the Donbass region to de-Nazify the eastern European country.