On January 28, 2022 the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) and the Indian Council on World Affairs (ICWA) held a major annual conference “Strategic Visions of Russia–India Relations and Changes in the World Order”, aimed at comprehensive assessment of Moscow – New Delhi cooperation in the global, regional and bilateral contexts.
Andrey Kortunov, RIAC Director General, and Vijay Thakur Singh, ICWA Director General, Indian Council of World Affairs, as well as Roman Babushkin, Minister-Counsellor of the Embassy of Russia in India and Gina Uika, Deputy Chief of Mission of the Embassy of India in Russia delivered opening remarks.
On January 28, 2022 the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) and the Indian Council on World Affairs (ICWA) held a major annual conference “Strategic Visions of Russia–India Relations and Changes in the World Order”, aimed at comprehensive assessment of Moscow – New Delhi cooperation in the global, regional and bilateral contexts.
Andrey Kortunov, RIAC Director General, and Vijay Thakur Singh, ICWA Director General, Indian Council of World Affairs, as well as Roman Babushkin, Minister-Counsellor of the Embassy of Russia in India and Gina Uika, Deputy Chief of Mission of the Embassy of India in Russia delivered opening remarks.
The conference consisted of three sessions, focusing on various levels of analysis.
The first session “Global agenda: Russia’s and India’s shared and diverging interests” was centered around the influence of global processes on the bilateral agenda, with Sergey Lunev, Professor at MGIMO University and Higher School of Economics, and Nandan Unnikrishnan, Distinguished Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation, presenting their views on the topic.
The second session “Regional dynamics: India’s Indo-Pacific strategy and Russia’s vision” was dedicated to the increasingly more vibrant concept of the Indo-Pacific, Russia’s and India’s perceptions of it. Tatiana Shaumyan, Head of the Center for Indian Studies and Academic Board Member at the RAS Institute of Oriental Studies; Sarabjeet S Parmar, Executive Director of the National Maritime Foundation; Alexey Zakharov, Research Fellow at the Department of International Relations, Higher School of Economics, and at the Center for Indian Studies, RAS Institute of Oriental Studies; and Vivek Mishra, Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation were among the participants.
During the third session "Bilateral priorities in the Post-COVID world", the speakers conducted a comprehensive analysis of new potential spheres of cooperation for Moscow and New Delhi. Nitin Pai, Co-founder & Director of the Takshashila Institution; Lydia Kulik, Head of India Studies at SKOLKOVO Institute for Emerging Markets and Research Fellow at the Center for Indian Studies, RAS Institute of Oriental Studies; Amit Bhandari, Fellow Environment & Energy Studies Program at Gateway House; Natalia Galistcheva, Head of the World Economy Department at MGIMO University; D. Suba Chandran, Dean and Prof. at the National Institute of Advanced Studies; and Anna Kireeva, Associate Professor at the Department of Asian and African Studies and Research Fellow at Center for Comprehensive Chinese Studies and Regional Projects, MGIMO University, all shared their perspectives on the matter.
Ksenia Kuzmina, RIAC Deputy Director of Programs, P.S. Raghavan, former Chairman of the National Security Advisory Board and former Ambassador of India to the Russian Federation; Gleb Ivashentsov, RIAC Vice President, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Russia; and Anuradha M Chenoy, former Dean of the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University , accordingly moderated the sessions.
