Prime Minister Narendra Modi is ready to embark on his first State visit to the US next week. He will be visiting the USA from 21-24 June at the invitation of President Joe Biden and First Lady Dr Jill Biden. The much-awaited bilateral meeting between PM Modi and President Biden is expected to take place on 22 June in Washington. A host of key issues will be on the discussion table, with the Ukraine conflict likely to be one of them. Only a few weeks back, the US State Department said that the Ukraine conflict would be one of the key topics to be discussed during PM Narendra Modi’s visit to Washington. The Department Spokesman Matthew Miller had said that the issue of the Ukraine war would be discussed during PM Modi’s visit to Washington on 22 June. There are indications that during bilateral talks, Biden is expected to echo PM Modi’s position on the Ukraine crisis: “The Ukraine crisis must be resolved through dialogue and diplomacy as ours must not be an era of war”. PM Modi had last year said that, “This is not an era of war”. PM Modi had made this remark as a message to Russian President Vladimir Putin at the SCO summit in Samarkand Uzbekistan in September last year. These remarks from PM Modi were welcomed by all the world leaders who were seeking Indian leader’s intervention in ending the Ukraine war. Later, the Quad leaders during a meeting in Hiroshima last month had echoed the position taken by PM Modi in the Ukraine conflict.
During talks in Washington, President Biden is also expected to urge PM Modi to play a constructive role in ending the hostilities between Russia and Ukraine. However, the US President will not put any pressure on the Indian side to harden its approach on Russia. Moreover, Biden is also not expected to touch upon the issue of India importing oil from Russia, even though it has some reservations on that. India has not yet made any comment critical of Russia ever since the war broke out. India always sent out a message that it is on the side of peace amid the crisis. While Biden will, by all indications, speak about the issue of sovereignty and territorial integrity, the Indian Prime Minister can use the opportunity to turn the focus on China who is hardly respecting territorial integrity and sovereignty of any country. PM Modi’s State visit to the USA will definitely see the emergence of a new dimension in the India-US relations that will gain a dizzy height in strategic, defence, economic and trade sectors, with China being one of the factors in mind. A top Indian American Congressman Ami Bera’s observations assume significance ahead of PM Modi’s visit to Washington. Bera said that India is much better suited than China to play a leading role in resolving the war in Ukraine because of New Delhi’s old relationship with Moscow. He was also on record saying that he would love to see the Indian government use its full diplomatic capacities to help end the conflict in Ukraine. In fact, Bera’s remarks reinforce the belief that the entire international community including the US-led Western bloc has been looking to PM Modi in a hope that only he would be able to bring the hostilities between Russia and Ukraine to an end. All the countries saw that since the Ukraine conflict began in February last year, Modi spoke to Russian President Vladimir Putin as well as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a number of times during which he insisted that the conflict should be resolved through dialogue and diplomacy. Meanwhile, PM Modi’s visit also includes an address to the Joint Session of the Congress on June 22. The PM’s state visit to the US is a recognition of the strength of the India-US relationship. The US Congressman’s observation is again important in this context: “The fact that he’s invited by a Democratic President for a State Visit and by a Republican Speaker of the House for a joint session of Congress emphasises the bipartisan nature of the US-India relationship; how Congress and the administration see the importance of this relationship.”