India may be among a handful of countries to have official consultations with the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria just before it fell to the Islamist rebels. The sixth round of foreign ministry consultations between the two countries happened on November 29 even as the rebels, led by the forces of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) chief Abu Muhammad al-Jawlani, were planning their final assault on Damascus.
New Delhi is now tasked with approaching the drawing board to understand the unfolding situation in West Asia and tune its response to the new leadership in Damascus.
The situation seems to be a déjà vu of the 2021 fall of Kabul all over again, when the Taliban grabbed power after the Americans left the country. Over the years India has also seen how after the Arab Spring, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Syria witnessed tumultuous changes. Libya could not handle the Arab Spring experiment after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi and was consumed by chaos. The Muslim Brotherhood continued to rear its head in the middle east region. Street protests increased considerably in Syria only to be put down forcibly by Assad.
India has reasons to wish for a secure West Asia, especially to keep Islamist Jihadist elements at bay, and also to prevent the China-Pakistan axis to use their influence to cause trouble for India. It also has economic stakes in many of these countries and unlike some members of the international community India has not tried to watch the chaos from a safe distance. In the last decade, it has actively reasoned with the warring sides to come to the talking table.
The best example is Afghanistan. India does not recognise the Taliban ‘government’. But it has not closed its embassy. Only, it is not an ambassador-level arrangement there. In late 2023, India’s Foreign Minister S Jaishankar told a gathering at the India International Centre: “At this time in Afghanistan we have what we had. So, we have decided that we would maintain an embassy not at an ambassador level yet. A lot of other countries have done it, but I should tell you that a lot of countries have sent back their ambassadors, we have not done so, and we have focused on areas which we believe will impact the Afghan people and will be recognized by the Afghan people.”
The Afghan people recognised this, as also India’s efforts to supply humanitarian aid. It was mostly in the form of food and medical supplies, to complement the efforts of the United Nations and WHO.
The Taliban leadership requested India to activate its embassy in Afghanistan, guaranteeing that both the Indian representation and its staff in Afghanistan will not be in danger.
Some time ago, Ikramuddin Kamil was appointed as the ‘Acting Consul’ at the Afghan mission in Mumbai, the Bakhtar News Agency said. Days before this, J P Singh, the head of India’s diplomatic division for Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran (PAI), met Afghanistan’s “acting defense minister” Mullah Muhammad Yaqoob — the son of the Taliban’s late founder Mullah Muhammad Omar — as well as former President Hamid Karzai and other senior ministers during his visit.
A spokesman for India’s Foreign Ministry said the talks had focused on “India’s humanitarian assistance that we are providing to people in Afghanistan” and the ways “the business community in Afghanistan” could use Iran’s Chabahar port for international trade. India views the port as a strategic location, and it signed a deal with Iran earlier this year to develop and operate the site over the next ten years.
India also took part in the Regional Cooperation Initiative meeting convened by the Taliban in Kabul that included representatives from several countries, including China, Russia, Pakistan, and Iran.
India has been the beacon to many other countries on how to handle Afghanistan. It appears to have adopted a policy of engaging with the Islamic Emirate without officially recognising it.
Also Read: Syria Is Khamenei’s Worst Setback Since Oct 7 Attack
That is one way of trying to gradually regain the strategic influence in Kabul that it lost when the Taliban took power in August 2021. Morever, India sees the big picture in the region. The relations between Taliban and Pakistan are strained while China and Iran, with whom India has contrasting relations but which are critical to India’s aspirations in the region, have permitted the Taliban to keep its embassies open in their countries.
Thus, India’s policy on Afghanistan since 2021 has steadily evolved in a matter to arouse confidence and trust in that country. At the same time, India has acted out in national interest, irrespective of what the West thinks of New Delhi’s moves. After the changes in Syria, India has adopted a wait and watch attitude. That is understandable because the situation is still dynamic.
Rebel HTS leader al-Jawlani has, so far, tried to assuage the fears of the minorities and even told the western media just before the Assad fled that “Syria deserves a governing system that is institutional, no one where a single ruler makes arbitrary decisions.”
He is borrowing phrases which are soothing for liberal nations to hear, and probably he seeks acceptance of the world community with such words. India, of course, remembers that the Taliban had originally promised not to persecute women and girls, something they quickly forgot.
While re-tuning its Syria policy in light of current developments, India can fall back on a historical relationship with that country. Though New Delhi has not shied away from condemning the violence perpetrated by the Assad regime, bilateral exchanges at the top level continued regularly.
India supported Syria on several international issues, including the Palestinian cause and Syria’s claim over the Golan Heights. Conversely, Syria has supported India’s position on the Kashmir conflict, maintaining that it is an internal issue for India to resolve.
At the United Nations, India refused to support sanctions against Syria and, during the Covid pandemic, called for the relaxation of sanctions, citing humanitarian concerns. During the civil war that began in 2011, India adopted a stance favouring conflict resolution through a non-military, inclusive, Syrian-led political process. Even at the peak of the civil war, when several nations isolated Syria, and it was expelled from the Aran league, India continued its relations and maintained its embassy in Damascus.
Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, India renewed its bilateral ties with Syria after the country rejoined the Arab League in 2023 following the deadly civil war. In July 2023, then-Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan embarked on a significant ministerial-level visit to Damascus.
At present, India has two big investments in Syria’s oil sector: a 2004 agreement between ONGC and IPR International for oil and natural gas exploration, and another joint investment by ONGC and China’s CNPC to acquire a 37 per cent stake in a Canadian firm operating in Syria.
According to a media report, the $240 million Line of Credit for the Tishreen Thermal Power Plant project, restructured to address challenges, and investments in IT and the fertiliser sector are among India’s key commercial engagements in Syria. India is also reportedly aiming to invest heavily in building an India-Gulf-Suez Canal-Mediterranean/Levant-Europe corridor, which includes Syria, the report said.
But for the sudden political change in Syria, India’s close engagement with Damascus was poised to give New Delhi an opportunity to further leverage its relations with other Middle East states more broadly. It will now take a while for India to come up with a revised policy.
