Russia hoping to bypass sanctions in trade with ‘friend’ India

NEW DELHI, April 1 Reuters- Russia will increase its use of non-Western currencies for trade with countries such as India, its Foreign Minister said on Friday, as he hailed New Delhi as a friend that was not taking a “one-sided view” on the Ukraine war.   

“We are friends,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told a news conference after meeting his Indian counterpart, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, adding India saw the Ukraine crisis in the “entirety of facts and not just in a one-sided way”.  

Lavrov visited India to shore up support from a country Russia has long regarded as an ally a day after U.S. and British officials pressed India to avoid undermining the dollar-based financial system and sanctions imposed on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.  Russia is the biggest supplier of defence equipment to India and Lavrov said the two countries would use a rupee-rouble mechanism to trade oil, military hardware and other goods.  Russia’s central bank had several years ago established a system for the communication of financial information and India had a similar system.  

“It is absolutely clear that more and more transactions would be done through this system using national currencies, bypassing dollar, euro and other currencies,” Lavrov said.  

India and China are the only major countries that have not condemned what Russia calls its “special military operation” on Ukraine. After Lavrov visited China this week, Beijing said it was “more determined” to develop ties with Russia.