Jaishankar Asks Where Were World Community's ‘Principles’ When India Faced Aggression After Freedom

Union external affairs minister S Jaishankar while addressing an event in Tokyo said principles are being cherry-picked to suit a certain narrative when questioned about India’s stance on the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

He said that when there were attempts to change India’s borders right after its independence, the world community was largely absent and those ‘principles’ which have been touted so much were not being upheld.

“We in India know better than almost any other country because immediately after our independence, we experienced aggression, we experienced an effort to change our boundaries,” S Jaishankar said.

“Even today, parts of India are occupied by another country. But we did not see the world response saying, oh, there’s a great principle involved, and therefore, let us all go with India,” the external affairs minister said.

“My position would be that the world is a complicated place, and there are many important principles and beliefs in the world. What happens sometimes in world politics is countries pick one issue, one situation, one principle, and they highlight it because it suits them,” he further added.

“Today we are being told that there are principles involved. I wish I’d seen that principle in play for the last 80 years. I’ve seen those principles cherry-picked when it suits people and not when it doesn’t suit people,” the foreign minister said.

India has maintained that the resolution to the war in Ukraine can only be resolved through diplomatic means. It has urged both leaderships in Moscow and Kyiv to head to the table for discussions and end the war.

PM Modi also told Russian President Vladimir Putin in Samarkand, Uzbekistan in 2022 that this is ‘not an era of war’ and told Zelensky that India will continue to provide humanitarian assistance to the people of Ukraine.

He had also told Zelensky that the conflict in Ukraine has had a significant impact on the whole world. He, however, stressed that for him, this is not a political or economic issue but an issue of humanity, of human values when they met in Japan last year.