Israel-Iran conflict, India’s relations with Balkan countries & the importance of G7 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcQHa0lxi84 ThePrintJun 18, 2025
In this edition of Geopolitics with Swasti, ThePrint Consulting Editor Swasti Rao talks about the latest development in the Israel-Iran conflict and the role of the US. She also explains the importance of the Balkans for India and whether G7 is still relevant
Yotube transcript: hello and welcome to a fresh new episode of Geopolitics with Swasti where our consulting editor for strategic and
international affairs Swasti Rao takes your questions dear subscribers on geopolitical developments around the
world swasti to begin with this week has been all about the Israel Iran conflict
and uh before we begin this episode I would like to tell you that our next episode is going to be a special on the
Israel Iran conflict so do send in your questions and we will focus singularly on the topic for the next episode but
for this episode Swasti I would also like to begin with it since a lot of our subscribers have this question and uh
basically the burning question on everyone's mind is what are the latest developments in operation rising lion at
this point uh so well I mean I know why we had to actually work this modus
operanti out because there were just so many questions on it and we thought of doing a special episode but but just to
give you like a brief sense of what the updates have been uh well the updates have been pretty staggering in many ways
because uh the operation was launched on on the 13th of June and it's been almost 5 days of continuous air strikes uh
Israel very early on achieved a complete air superiority over Iranian skies and the Iranian air defenses uh were almost
not working at all and uh to you know to cut a long story short because we are going to be dedicating an entire episode
to that to cut a long story short right now it is at a very important tipping point uh first but very quickly what are
Israel's objectives Israel seems to be having almost two three objectives you know clear objectives one is that they
want to stop Iranian regime from developing the nuclear bomb which according to the IAEA report which came
towards the end of May it said that they're only weeks away from it okay right uh then uh the other thing is that
it's not just the uh stopping uh you know Iran from developing uh the nukes
but also about decapacitating and decimating the ballistic missile program because Iran has the largest inventory
of ballistic missiles in the Middle Eastern region okay so I think that's also a way of sort of decapacitating
that military capability because remember Iran doesn't have an air force but Iran has a formidable um you know
arsenal of ballistic missiles etc uh which are many of those are indigenously developed and all that and they also
have hypersonic missiles and the third is very clearly regime change uh which has been reiterated again and again by
different quarters and the latest is that yesterday when Donald Trump who was in G he was who was in Canada for the G7
uh had to leave midway and come back to uh DC and then eventually put out on uh
truth social uh that uh he wants an unconditional surrender from the Iranian
regime also now shows certain uh signs that US could be really planning to get
militarily involved i still find it a little far-fetched because uh US military involvement could mean a whole
host of things and America under Donald Trump has been extremely wary and reluctant to get militarily involved but
we will see because the situation is evolving very fast and one of the things that actually uh has put so much focus
on US involvement in the region is also this uh bomb called the bunker busting bomb which is a GBU57 which only the
United States has in the world and why this has now become such a rallying point uh when it comes to geopolitical
analysis on the Israel Iran situation is because you know the nuclear enrichment facilities within Iran are spread across
the country so in the first set of strikes uh Israel has targeted uh facilities in Natans and facilities you
know is Havan etc but the there is another very important facility which is in foro and the thing with foro is that
it is really shrouded under you know about 200 200 ft under uh the the ground
below the ground level and for reaching those kind of facilities you cannot do it only by missile strikes or air
strikes you have to have a particular specialized weapon and that is where the bunker busting bomb comes which is a
30,000 lb uh you know heavy uh bomb and which is dropped from a USB bomber so
only the US has the ability and the launch machine to actually launch something like that and it kind of goes
in inside the um you know ground for about 200 ft and then it sort of
explodes so uh for operating anything like that you would need to have US
airmen you know doing it and that remains a question mark whether or not US is going to get involved to that
extent or not but then uh there are also other signs of uh enhanced US involvement because there are about 30
American air refueling tankers that are already there in the region now that
could be done for the purpose of refueling Israeli jets or for example enabling joint strikes but all this is
just mere speculation it's just that because of Donald Trump's very unequivocal a support to Israel and b
this call for unconditional surrender has actually then sparked all these speculations about to what degree is the
US going to get involved and there is some technical reason because unless if if Israel is serious about taking out
photo uh enrichment facilities it has to have something like uh the US weapon especially the uh bunker busting bomb uh
so this is the so the the updates so far and of course we are going to be coming back to it uh in terms of casualties of
course uh Iran has had hundreds of casualties uh but Israel also has had casualties in fact you you know we've
been seeing there's been a lot of question mark on how exactly well is the Iron Dome functioning of course it's
functioning well but uh uh you know this is a kind of an escalation that we have not seen in many many decades so this is
pretty much a turning point for where the Middle Eastern situation is going and we will talk a lot more about it in
the next few minutes so do remember to send in your questions uh so that we can discuss it in details but Swasti
following up from that uh our subscriber Ravi Rules has a very interesting question uh which is which he calls a
DII urge to do a Sharma beta comparison but you know a lot of people have been comparing the India Israel situation and
u the you know the Indian and Israeli strategic posture and tactics and Ravi
rule's question on that is that considering the new normal that India has set do you think the next time India
will truly give full operational freedom and engage Pakistani military directly
before the terrorists and then do you think that we can then truly take out uh
half a sed molana type high value targets instead of killing random foot
soldiers oh no well it's an interesting question and I don't know where this is coming from because uh part of the
reason why the Indian population uh also I mean this this entire counterterrorism narrative sort of resonates so well uh
Israeli um experience also resonates so well within the Indian populace is also because we undergo a similar experience
when it comes to being victim of terrorism uh that's one part so in terms of the experience I do see there's an
experiential uh kind of a similarity but that's where it probably ends somewhere because when it comes to capabilities I
think it it is very useful for us to remember and remind ourselves that we are not MOSADs and we are not Israel we
are not a hard security state like Israel so we obviously cannot really take the kind of options that Israel has
taken u you compare it on any count you know um do we have the kind of ironclad
support from the United States no we don't do we have uh uh do we have a population where every single uh is I
mean Indian citizen has to go or has to undergo compulsory conscription no i
mean you know so it's like the the the sheer experience of how the na the two nation states have developed and in what
context have the two nation states developed i mean that is so radically different that no matter how much we
sort of appreciate what Israel uh does when it comes to taking these decisions I think it is a far cry from what we are
able to do and in the manner in which the two operations also unfolded is very very clear to tell you what the
differences are so um I mean to just cut a long story short because it can just go on uh for a very long time if I go on
into the details of how each operation unfolded but I think the one worthwhile thing for us to remember is that
whatever we consider the new normal please remember that even till date uh neither the prime minister nor the
external affairs minister nor the defense minister has actually uh spoken to the Indian people yet you know about
what has happened what were the objectives what was the uh conditions of termination if it is ongoing uh what
does it mean what does a new normal mean uh will India have the bandwidth to actually launch a kind of a war because
if every act of terror is going to be an act of war uh will it really mean to say
that you know if there is one contact happening at the LOC will it also trigger a war and when you say a war do
you mean a kind of a mobilization that you would see in war i think these are questions which are uh not yet answered
uh I think what really comes from the new normal and all this um is basically posturing that India has called out
Pakistan's nuclear bluff and I think whatever comes later we'll have to be very carefully uh sort of you know you
know we will have to look at it step by step so Sharma beta analogy is that uh
we can appreciate but geopolitical realities are very different the constraints are different and uh we and
for for understanding what we can do and how far we can go it is also very useful to understand what we are not and what
our limitations is and have a sincere discussion around it you know this is not just about uh
this is not about it it is about identifying the contextual similarities and dissimilarities so any principle of
doing a comparative study is to understand the similarities as well as the dissimilarities and in this case
there are many dissimilarities as well at operational level uh Swasti since we are already
discussing operation sindur um Ravi rul has yet another question on a different domain this time and it's the maritime
domain and he asks that what is India exactly doing in the maritime
capabilities with you know threats all around and the fact that India does
maintain a predominantly continental focus on its defense strategy so what is its maritime capabilities what its
strategy and what is it looking ahead to now it's an interesting question i think a lot of people have this conception that India seems to be preoccupied with
the continental domain for very obvious reasons because we have to disturb borders on either side of the continental expanse so it only makes
sense i think a lot of people get and then of course since we are also getting all the threats from that side uh despite that let me also tell you that
uh in the last one decade at least okay uh there has been a humongous stride in
India's maritime vision and once you have a vision then you will start building capabilities you know because you have to have a vision for which you
will have to then build capabilities uh now when it comes to Indian navy and I will tell you I will break it down for
you so that you get an understanding of how exactly it went so it will first of all it'll sort of bust the myth that
India is way too preoccupied uh with the continental domain it has been the case
earlier but now it's been changing because all the futuristic plurilaterals
or engagements or joint exercises everything everything is happening with the rise of the construct of Indo
Pacific and now we are looking at another maritime construct which is the Inditerranean and we are looking at actually connecting into Pacific with
intermediterranean so you can totally see that when it comes to bolstering India's capability and rise as a global
power and all the convergence that uh the different partners uh across the world especially the western partners have with us you will that it's the
maritime domain which is much more relevant to um how we will take things forward now with that let me just tell
you a little bit about the Indian Navy here because out of the three forces the Indian army the Indian Air Force and the
Indian Navy uh generally it is the Indian Navy that gets the smallest share of the budget but in my reading it is
also the Indian Navy that is most professional with using it uh most optimally so uh like army air force and
navy all have shortfalls you know we keep talking about air force and why the air chief is so upset with the hal etc
but at the same time let me just tell you that in the last um in the current year 202526
uh the total budget allocation to the Indian Navy has been highest ever and which is you know to the tune of 97,000
cr but that 97,000 cr rupees is basically the entire budget out of that
if you look at only the capital procurement which means you know that is you know to the tune of
65 or 67,000 cr so you do see that there is the and the rest of the money the
rest of the money goes in uh salaries and you know all of that and pensions and all that so that is something that
you need to understand that this particular rise that you see uh this year in the Indian Navy's budget has
been quite phenomenal if you compare it to to last years in the last few years you can see there's been steady increase
in fact from the last year uh you know there's been a 19.76% increase uh you
know and this has happened this itself shows how the Indian Navy uh is more serious about building more capabilities
etc and also sort of navigating the capital procurement uh thing that's one part secondly for the last two years let
me also tell you since we are discussing budgets since last two years there's another thing ddata which has happened
which actually should be mentioned and discussed more as you know we keep talking about how the difference
procurement uh processes are so slow in India in the last two years that what
the ministry of finance and the MOD you know have done is that instead of uh dividing these procurement between the
three um forces between army and air force and navy what they've done is that
when it comes to capital procurement they are doing it under a central uh body and the the the purpose of keeping
it or bringing it under the central body is to basically try and cut down the time that usually is spent
For example there are helicopters or there are you know aircraft or or or you know certain things that the navy also
wants the air force also wants the army also wants you know especially let's talk about the attack helicopters or something like that so in that regard
what happens is that when you are purchasing it under a central uh you know body uh the price negotiation the
cost negotiation committees function better um so basically the the purpose is to to make it more efficient and this
is pretty much in tune with how we want to also become more self-reliant you know how we want to really um improve
our very long-standing longdrawn uh defense uh acquisition uh processes the
procurement I mean we've been getting um criticism left right and center on just how slow our files move so this is also
one attempt that we are doing and we will see that overall we will see there may be some problems also because the inter forces you know the the tri
services have to also then um you know talk and discuss more and there are also criticisms that uh the army doesn't feel
that the air force and the navy we are you know on board etc so all these things notwithstanding I think this is a positive step so this is just to tell
you what we are doing in terms of defense um allocations like the budget allocations and how the budgets are
supposed to be used and this has been a change that only came in last 2 years so I thought I'll just share that with you
now like I said that the second part of it is that how has India been building its maritime capabilities so you know
you just need to know that now whatever you see happening now also has a foundation so if you can uh you can
roughly divide the uh development in India's maritime vision in in three phases so the first phase would be in my
opinion from 2004 to 2007 where uh India was focusing more on how to use the seas
okay uh and then basically how to have more coastal presence how to use the seas etc so this was this was something
that happened in 2004 and 2007 and I think the first ever strategy uh you
know which was very rudimentary but it came around that time then between 2007 and 2015 we see an emergence of a
stronger stance and where it was about also how do you ensure that your seas
are secure because remember that between 2007 and 2015 Xiinping had already come
in 2012 and because of his very wolf warrior diplomacy in South China Sea it actually necessitated for India to also
have a fresh uh you know outlook towards how it's looking at uh you know maritime um uh space etc and then in 2009 we had
an upgrade to our uh maritime strategy and then you know how can we build more
presence in especially the IO region became more and more central but obviously there was a sea change uh in
2015 when the Saga doctrine came which was security and growth for all in the region and with that the focus which was
earlier on using the seas uh shifted to securing the seas and that semantic
shift itself will tell you how India matured its maritime uh you know outlook because it was about freedom of
navigation operations it was about upholding a rules-based order because all of this came um in the context of
China destabilizing the maritime especially the the choke points etc and how India started to play you know a
more important role and that was the time in 2015 when this first saga doctrine came then later in 2018 2019
when IPOi when the Indopacific vision came you know from India you saw how uh
for instance India started to work towards becoming a net security provider net security partner etc and Indian Navy
of course has a very very central role there now very quickly um just a couple of more things in terms of how we are
building our fleet etc there is no doubt about the fact that we want to reach uh the line uh the baseline of about 200
warships currently we are at about 130 warships only but at the same and even now we are dependent on foreign partners
for engines for example by the way I don't know if you remember I keep repeating it again and again that when it comes to the frontline uh warships
that we have about 130 all those engines are coming from Ukraine that those are Ukrainian gas turbine engines in fact
even our latest frigots that we uh got from Russia you know Tamal and Tushil etc where two of them were supposed to
be built in India two of them were supposed to come from Russia and Rajnaj went to Russia to get them i think it
was last year uh or early this year uh even those frigots have Ukrainian gas turbine engines so the dependence
continues but when it comes to indigenous construction you know the designing etc i think India has come a
long way and there are major players in the Indian ecosystem like LNT etc we're doing very very good work similarly
we've been really working very hard to build our submarine fleet and this must be highlighted because if you remember
uh you know some months ago it was I think around February or sometime earlier this year when there was a lot
of criticism of why the Indian Navy gave up on its plan of acquiring the third aircraft carrier and the idea was that
if you want to power project in the Indian Ocean region you have to have the classic uh you know aircraft carrier
because aircraft carrier is something that really makes you feel as if you've arrived okay and the biggest uh navies
the blue water navies okay whether it's uh the United States or France or you know China they have uh aircraft
carriers so aircraft carrier is like a power projection but the catch out there is that I just told you about how Navy
gets the smallest share of u you know defense uh budget and also when it when you when you further reduce it to
capital procurement it's even lesser so even our indigenous aircraft carrier we
already have two and now the point was to now you know go for a third one even our indigenously made aircraft carriers
are more expensive than the entire budget which is allocated for capital procurement for the navy and because of that there was a very sound decision
taken by the establishment saying that no let's put it on hold we will do it later we understand we need to power
project so we'll do it later for now we are going to be uh you know investing more on drones underwater drones for
example that have been a game changanger in Ukraine war uh also we have to keep in mind how China's underwater drone
capabilities are growing because China is all the time un uh veiling its um uh disruptive capabilities when it comes to
destroying the undersea um cables and critical infrastructure so I think those kind of things are more important so
having submarines is more important having you know drones are more important having having AI enabled drones so those kind of things are being
focused upon right now much much more not to say that the aircraft carrier has been shelved but this is not the right
time for us to go into these you know massive procurements at the cost of it when we have lesser money so in many
ways I think the Indian Navy if you go into the literature you will see that they are trying very hard to integrate
the fourth industrial revolution which is about all technology you know drones and automation and naval AI because
that's where the future is going and that's where the current wars are showing us and and this can just go on but I'll just give you a couple of more
ideas a couple of more points to just clarify it to you that you know Indian Navy is doing a lot to actually uh
really harness the potential of a maritime domain so for example our surveillance infrastructure has grown a lot you may have heard of this uh
wonderful initiative uh called the IFCOR which is information fusion center for the Indian Ocean region which is
headquartered in Guram okay and there you will see that India is partnering with more than 40 countries now critics
will say that just having an information fusion center will not help uh because it's still relegated only to white
shipping etc it's not really looking at uh exchange of intelligence and exchange of intelligence is also important if you
really want to understand where the um where the disturbances are but despite that come to think of this uh you know
come to come to look at it as a benchmark of how far we've come and this is just the beginning so when it comes
to surveillance etc you do see that the Indian Navy is actually investing a lot we have lot of partner countries in fact
lot of partner countries give the IFC as an as a case study of how far India has
come in the Indopacific uh you know domain similarly if you look at the sheer number of our exercises and how we
are building on interoperability through these exercises right initially we were only doing with the regional uh you know
countries then we started doing with COD you know the Malabar exercises we started doing with France and now we
doing you know many of these exercises that we are doing are with multiple partners so all of that actually is
enhancing our naval capabilities our interoperability etc so we are together there similarly you know if you if you
see the number of deployments or port visits it's significantly grown you know so now but but just to sort of you know
um put it into perspective the fact that we are making progress is okay but when
you start assessing this progress that we have made in comparison to how far China has gone you will certainly see
that we need to do more and that is why we cannot do it alone in this theater which is as vast as the Indopacific
domain we will have to look out for partners and that is why nimble plurilaterals actually work so well in
the Indopacific region and here I mean cod in fact you know lately there's one uh very uh I would say ambitious project
that I have been working on which is that how do you develop a more coordinated response around hybrid
threats in the region because currently everybody is just obsessed with what happens if there's a war in the Taiwan straits and how will each country behave
then but whether or not there's a war in the Taiwan straits actually remains etched in the future but why the
Indopacific uh domain is vulnerable today is because of hybrid threats and we must have a more coordinated and
cogent response towards that so I'm developing you know lots of models on how we can do something more with
like-minded players of course nobody can do it alone but in terms of how far India is serious about its maritime
domain India is extremely serious about it and for the posity of time I couldn't really tell you everything but I'm sure
you g you uh had an idea and firstly moving on uh our subscriber Karthik Parasher wants to know what geopolitical
power does Oman hold that the US Iran deal which eventually didn't happen was
happening there yeah the Iranians and the Americans were supposed to meet in Oman and that never happened because
Israel went solo uh now it's an interesting question because uh it's not just that Oman was picked up uh randomly
oman is a very very stable nation it is a very uh I would say a nation that is
doing very well and if in fact if you see it on the map you will see what kind of a geopolitically contested space it
in uh it it it has so um you will then see that compared to many of its
neighbors of course Oman has been extremely stable and there's another reason why Oman is usually the preferred
mediator and the preferred destination for having these talks uh because uh you know in 1978 they had a DHFAR rebellion
and of course that's a war and I there's no reason for me to go into the details of the war but I'll just tell you the important outcomes so in terms of the
outcomes what happened was that uh Omar landed up having a very uh I would say
stable relationship with a a whole host of foreign powers so with the UK they were able to uh establish good relations
with Iran they were able to establish good relations also in the Gulf States they were able to have good relations
okay and they became very progressoriented so there was a particular time before 1978 Oman wasn't
like that but after 1978 they've been consistently working on trying to have stabilizing relationship with all the
partners in the region and also the bigger partners like for example back then it was the UK uh similarly what
also makes Oman interesting is because Oman is also uh you know the the
government out there is not really into this Shia Sunni split if you know that
uh there is a I don't know if you know Karthik but there is a huge problem with respect to the Muslim world unity in the
Middle East okay so Middle East does not really believe in one Muslim voice iran out there is all Shia and the the Saudi
Arabia and UAE and you know all these guys are complete and Sunni and there is a Shia Sunni divide and the Shia Sunni
uh you know rivalry and wars happening all the time oman on the contrary uh has an ibadi Muslim government which does
not really believe in the Shia Sunni split as much i don't know the details i'm not an expert on Oman but I these
are the reasons that make Oman a very attractive uh place for mediation because they are not really party to all
these conflicts uh similarly when it comes to uh hosting Iran for example you
know if you look at the map again you can see that it's also the strategic location of Oman where it is sharing uh
you know the straight of Hormuz's critical maritime routes with Iran and all of the sort of necess necessitates
the fact that uh Oman is a stable place for any of these discussions to you know to happen uh similarly it is not for the
first time that Oman was chosen even earlier over the successive years USA and Iran have chosen to speak at Oman
because Oman for the reasons that I just told you about and also uh it is not just about Oman but also if you look at
the tensions in Yemen Oman has also offered itself to be this one place where the Americans can speak about that
as well so um this is just to give you a brief understanding of why Oman was
chosen as a potential place for these mediation and for the talks to happen by the way many countries in the in the in
in the Gulf actually posit themselves as the hosts okay and of course Dubai is one of them and Saudi Arabia as you know
the most of the Russia Ukraine negotiations are happening uh either in Dubai the presence of war exchanges or
the the American and the Russians have been speaking at Jedha so all of that has been happening when it comes to
negotiations with Iran Oman has a special reason and I just told you four or five reasons why it makes sense so
even though the current talks have failed because Israel has chosen to go to go solo but whenever there is a need
to have discussions again perhaps Oman would be chosen again and fasy since we are talking about us our subscriber
Aditya 18893 has this question that amid all of this conflict and what is
happening how do you think that organizations like G7 will survive also
amid a new Trump administration um now it can have a very long answer
you know how can organizations like G7 survive because of Trump um yes
currently the times that we are in the kind of divide that we see within the western block is something which has
been rather unprecedented because Donald Trump has chosen to go after its allies and partners first right uh so that is
the reason Donald Trump is the chief disruptor here uh but having said that I think from India's perspective it opens
opportunities for us to then engage uh even you know uh with with a with a renewed vigor and we do see that
happening especially if you look at the case of Europe because uh both India and Europe find in each other a more stable
partner than this constantly shifting goalposts uh that Trump sort of champions so that's uh one part but in
terms of survival see G7 is a grouping of world's most advanced uh economies okay in that regard of course it is
going to survive because uh uh the world's most uh advanced economies are not just advanced in in their in their
respective or in their individual capacities they are advanced because technologically speaking they collaborate intelligence they share
right uh they are also sharing uh the trade but I do um uh share your assessment that in the current divide
that we see in the larger west uh you know this this concern that you have is is genuine uh how far the G7 is going to
go etc but from our perspective I think G7 remains very important because most if you look at the individual members
also I think the most of our whether it's bilateral trade or our ambitious FTAs or our diaspora remittances you
know most of these are coming from technological innovation defense industry cooperation all of that is actually coming from the individual G7
members and uh when it comes to you know since prime minister is going there this is also a tradition India has been this
is the sixth time that prime minister uh is going there for the outreach session this is not for the core G7 the outreach
session where many of these uh international organizations are also invited so uh I suggest you also watch
my explainer on the same where I have gone into the details of why prime minister first went to Cyprus and then
um he went to Canada and now he'll be going to Croatia etc but uh the short answer is that uh it is too early to
somewhere say that the G7 has lost its relevance so the G7 has its relevance the idea to understand is that right now
there is no such grouping in the world that can operate in isolation and that is where that is the larger point that
many of these analyses miss because the point is that of building complimentarity you know the point is
not to just keep hopping on the fact that you know one grouping is not enough and the other grouping is not enough we
no grouping by itself is enough because if they are the economies of skill we are the economies of scale swasti uh
since we already talked about Modi going to Croatia and uh following up on that
users Anup Sakena has this question that can you please explain how India is or
can build relationships with Balkan countries like Croatia Serbia Slovakia etc so it's uh actually one of my most
favorite topics frankly ddata because I've taught this uh you know balkcanization of the former Yugoslavia
uh for three years as a very important uh conflict case study of uh you know international conflict so it's a very
favorite topic of mine uh so I will try to not let the professor in me take over and I will try to keep it brief but uh
nonetheless I think the first thing you need to understand a lot of viewers also don't know is that Balkans Baltics
caucuses difference Balkans mountains Baltic Sea caucuses be mountain uh so
Balkans uh is is a region is a mountaneous region uh you know in Europe where you where there are Balkan
mountains and it has regions of uh you know former Yugoslavia and also um many
other countries like Bulgaria Romania Albania in fact some people also go to the extent of putting Greece uh in the
Balkan uh region so as you know I mean this is just to give you an understanding of where the Balkans are uh now very quickly um when you say
former Yugoslavia I mean I'm not getting into the history but I'm just saying that former Yugoslavia was the socialist
um country which was held together by Marshall Tito and when it started breaking down from the end of the 80s
and all the decade you know the entire decade of the '90s and it was a very very bloody war you you saw many
independent countries emerging so for example Croatia Slovenia Macedonia Serbia also Serbia has a
problem with Kosovo i'm sure you've heard Kosovo earlier bosnia Huzzgo all these countries emerged from former
Yugoslavia and uh not everybody's status right now is completely final so for
example Bosnia Hzgoa and Serbia they have disputes serbia and Kosovo have disputes but the rest Slovenia Croatia
Montenegro and North Macedonia they are independent and they are fine so uh so this is this is one part but like I said
there are also countries like Bulgaria Albania Romania and Greece that are some sometimes counted within the Balkans now
the interesting bit for you to understand here is that many of these countries are part of both the EU and
NATO okay and when you get into out of all the countries that I just listed
which are the countries that are part of both the EU and NATO I can give you a list which are Bulgaria Croatia Greece
Romania and Slovenia these countries are members of both the EU and the NATO but
then there are also countries which are part of NATO but not a part of the EU and those countries are Albania
Montenegro and North Macedonia which are only NATO members they are not yet part of the EU and then there are countries
that are part of neither like Bosnia Serbia and Serbia Serbia because playing
all sides you know and sometimes he that is the only country which is really supported by Russia i didn't have the
time to get into the details of it so I would have told you what role uh did Russia play there but Serbia has been
always supported by Russia and now because Russia is so preoccupied with the war in Ukraine which has been a
strategic blunder by Putin because because of that war uh they lost their export base they lost their influence in
um the Balkans they lost their influence in the caucuses why do you think India is sending all the weapons to Armenia
why do you think France is sending all the weapons to Armenia because Russia which has been the biggest weapon supplier is not able to do so so uh long
and short is that Serbia uh has a very unique position out there they want to
play Russia they also want to play the EU sometimes there is a rhetoric of whether they want to get into the EU
whether they not want to get into the EU so that all keeps going now very quickly what is also happening is that uh only
this year because your question is what is India now doing for increasing its participation in the Balkans and it is
interesting why do you think prime minister went to Croatia prime Minister went to Croatia because in May this year
which is last month so in May this year there was the first EU India trade council's conference on Balkans so the
first Balkan conference between EU and India happened in May 2025 and this was
a larger conference that also drew partners from the Gulf partners from you know not just those regional Balkan
players but also the E4 and when I say the E4 I mean UK France Germany and
Italy which are the biggest four economies of and biggest powers of Europe and now many say that we have to
make it E5 because of the rise of Poland which is you obviously cannot miss so that said I think uh what what is India
doing now is that India if you carefully see has been developing more strategic gateways into Europe because India for
the longest time only engaged with the bigger powers okay and now India realizes that there is so much
unrealized potential when it comes to Balkans when it comes to caucuses when it comes to uh you know the
Mediterranean arc of uh the of Europe of Europe so you you can totally see how
India is developing more connectivity projects why do you think prime minister went to Marseilles and called it Mumbai Marseilles connectivity
when you think about IMC now there is so much discussion on the fact that IMC is not some like like a straight line imc
is a concept the idea as to how do you connect India and Europe through Middle East by different strategic gateways so
the the port of Trieste in Italy becomes important the port of Thesaloniki in Greece becomes important because these
ports are directly connected to the central and east European markets and the Balkans etc so what then happens is
that right now India understands that as these smaller countries of Europe um that are not very affluent as their
western neighbors are looking for China plus one diversification and China's you know overpromise and underd delivery is
not really fairing well it is a godsend opportunity for India to cement its outreach in those regions you know they
are looking at infrastructure development India's engagement is not seen as destabilizing India's engagement
is uh welcomed by the smaller parts smaller parties in Europe as well as the bigger players of Europe so most I just
gave you the example of the Balkan conference which happened in 2025 May now this was not just happening between
these small Balkan countries in India like I said that it was supported by the Gulf countries it was supported by the
big powers of Europe it was supported by European Union what does it tell you that everybody has a stake when it comes
to having more of India in uh Europe through these strategic gateways because ultimately our bilateral trade is going
to grow the total trade is already reaching $200 billion of you know in goods and services and there's immense
potential once the FDA is signed so why not only look at Antworp Rotterdam and
Hamburg the traditional routes through which our cargo entered Europe but all develop simultaneously many more uh and
then because India is also looking strategically at these countries so you will see for example that India is doing
a lot when it comes to countries like Albania countries like Bosnia governor you will see the consultations have
risen so India is serious about that and then if you then see it in complimentarity with what India is doing
in nearby caucuses okay or the Baltics our engagement with Baltics have also
deepened so then you get a full picture of how India is looking at developing more strategic gateways into Europe and
something which is welcomed by everybody in the region [Music]