India, which often speaks of the destructive rule of the British and Mughal empires, has refrained from condemning Russia. On 2 March, it even joined a small number of countries that abstained from a UN resolution calling on Russia to stop its war and withdraw from Ukraine…
India is not alone. South Africa, which also has a long and prominent anti-colonial history, remains just as indifferent towards Ukraine. If the invasion of Iraq in 2003 was the moment the West failed to live up to its own norms, such as the principles of territorial integrity and humanitarian international law, Ukraine is the moment the Global South failed to live up to its anti-colonial and anti-imperial ideals. For Ukrainians, theirs is a war of national liberation, but the evangelists of national liberation – China, South Africa and India – have been missing in action…
Many are puzzled by the way India and China have refused to condemn the Russian invasion. Notions of democracy and autocracy seem far from their thinking; for these countries, it’s about something else. China and India feel their strength is growing. Their own will to expand – their “passionarity” – is back. With centuries of national humiliation overcome, the future belongs to them. VS Naipaul called India a wounded civilisation, but the wounded civilisation is reasserting itself. For these giants, a new era of colonialism is nothing to fear and may even, for at least some in Delhi and Beijing, be welcome.
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