0

I am going to attend a Mock UN session soon, so any fast answers optionally with sources would be amazing.

South Asia has been a region of conflict since a long time, but things are heating up a lot. The problem is, China, India and Pakistan, all three nations have nukes, and a conflict between them would be, to put it simply, bad. Moreover, India has worsened relations with ALL of its neighbours. My question is, what exactly are Russia's views on this? Russia and India have been BFF's for a long time, but now that the USA also support them, are the Russians having double thoughts on letting Indians have nukes, and are moving over with Pakistan, who were formerly supported by the USA in the cold war? Moreover, China and Russia have a special relationship too. Now that the Chinese are moving against India, are the Russians also kinda anti-India, or are they pro-India?

TL;DR: Between the Chinese, Pakistanis and Indians, who do the Russians support more and would want them to have nukes?

2
  • 1
    It is a strange question, since fact, that ALL of the mentioned countries DO have nuclear weapons. Who do Russia support more? It is a waaaay broad question. But since Indian move towards the US, I don't think, that it would improve Russia-India relations Aug 25, 2020 at 7:14
  • Comments deleted. Please note that comments should not be used to answer the quesiton. If you would like to answer, please write a real answer.
    – Philipp
    Aug 28, 2020 at 14:08

1 Answer 1

5

Russia's position on the various territorial disputes between India and Pakistan is that these are a bilateral issue and Russia would only like a peaceful settlement. They have no strong opinion on where the border should be. In UN votes, Russia has tended to favour India. For example, Russia described the revoking of Article 370 (that gave Jammu and Kashmir a special status) as an "internal matter" (implying that Jammu and Kashmir are internal to India, note, this is an Indian source).

Historically India has been a central member of the Non-aligned movement. India had quite good relations with Russia while the Congress party held power, and some individual states had communist governments with good relations to the Soviet Union. Recently the BJP government has been moving towards the US, especially under Trump.

Similarly, Pakistan generally supported the USA during the cold war, but post 1990, as Islamist threats grew as a threat and the USA became more generally Islamophobic, so the relationship between the USA and Pakistan has chilled and that with Russia has very slowly warmed.

In terms of nuclear weapons. Russia would rather that only Russia had them. They can live with the other security council permanent members having nuclear weapons. But as signatories to the NPT they oppose both Indian and Pakistani nuclear weapons.

2
  • 1
    I would add that the chilling in relations between US and Pakistan has to also be viewed through the lens of Belt And Road, and more specifically the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, one of the biggest commitments so far. Although Pakistani interest for it has waned recently with a few cancelled projects, it seems obvious it played a role in the development you outlined as the US is certainly not keen on closer ties between the two.
    – J.C
    Aug 25, 2020 at 12:37
  • Thanks a ton to both of you for that answer! It helped me a ton! Aug 25, 2020 at 13:49

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .