China blocks mention of LeT, JeM in Russia meet statement

NEW DELHI: China is learnt to have prevented a specific mention of Pakistan-based terror groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Muhammed (JeM) in the Russia-India-China (RIC) joint communique that reiterated the need for an inclusive regime in Afghanistan last week, but India is hoping to make up for it with an unequivocal condemnation of these UNSC-proscribed outfits in the summit and the first ever 2+2 dialogue with Russia on Monday.
Ahead of President Vladimir Putin’s arrival, India is working with Russia to ensure a categorical assertion of the need to eliminate India-focused terror groups for enduring peace in Afghanistan, official sources said while adding that Moscow remained sensitive to India’s concerns on terrorism.
Putin will have his annual summit meeting with PM Narendra Modi on Monday after the 2+2 that will see foreign minister S Jaishankar and defence minister Rajnath Singh holding wide-ranging talks with their counterparts Sergey Lavrov and Sergey Shoigu, respectively. While Putin is not expected to spend more than six hours in India, the visit is still seen as significant as this will be only the second time that the Russian leader will leave his country since the outbreak of Covid-19. According to Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov, 10 bilateral agreements are likely to be signed during the visit.
The Afghanistan situation will figure in the summit with discussions likely also on China. Official sources said while RIC was a trilateral engagement, they expected the need to call out Pakistan-based terror groups will figure unambiguously in joint documents with Russia.
The joint communique issued after the 18th RIC virtual meeting had left out LeT and JeM even as it stressed the necessity of urgent elimination of UNSC proscribed terrorist groups such as the al-Qaida, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and others for lasting peace in Afghanistan and the region. It is learnt that India, in turn, ensured there was no mention of East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), the Uyghur extremist group accused of fanning separatism in China’s Xinjiang province.
In a tweet, foreign minister S Jaishankar asserted Afghan territory must not be used for terror activities by terrorist groups like LeT and JeM and that global expectations of Afghanistan were articulated by UNSC Resolution 2593 passed under India’s presidency in August this year.
Ahead of the Putin visit, government sources said any Russia-Ukraine conflagration was unlikely to affect India’s ties with Moscow. While admitting that Moscow continues to nurse reservations about the Indo-Pacific and Quad initiatives, sources said India was already working with Russia in the region as evident from the ongoing work on the Chennai-Vladivostok corridor and that both countries believed in Asean centrality.