India-Middle East ties: Is IMEC really back on the cards post-Gaza?
Plus, Russia looms large over the Election Tricycle.
This week on the Election Tricycle, the little podcast I co-host with Emily Tamkin and Tom Hamilton where we discuss election-year shenanigans in India, the US and the UK – subscribe on Apple, Spotify, other! – we spoke about complex Parliamentary posturing on the Israel-Gaza situation in the UK, how the Ukraine war turned into a partisan issue in the US, and how Russia-India ties play into the domestic conversation in India.
If you enjoy listening to the show, please do subscribe, share and send us feedback!
IMEC comeback
Reports of the IMEC’s death have greatly been exaggerated.
In the aftermath of the October 7 Hamas attack and subsequent Israeli reprisal on Gaza, it seemed as if the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor might be doomed to go the way of India’s other Eurasian connectivity efforts, like the perennially ‘in-development’ International North-South Transport Corridor, meant to take advantage of India’s Russian and Iranian ties.
IMEC, probably the most noteworthy announcement made at the big G20 summit in India in September 2023 (aside from New Delhi actually managing to pull off the ‘Delhi Declaration’) was deliberately designed to build on the ‘peace dividend’ of the Abraham Accords, wherein Arab nations like the UAE and Saudi Arabia appeared open to building closer trade ties with Israel. At the time, India along with the US, the European Union, France, Germany, Italy, Saudi Arabia and the UAE signed an MoU with the aim of building transit connectivity through this corridor, as well as electric cables for digital connections and ‘green’ hydrogen pipelines.
Even as many questioned the economics of a logistics corridor that involved moving cargo via ships from India to the UAE, putting them onto trains going through the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Israel, and then back onto ships to go from Israel to Europe (primarily via a port in Greece), it was still hailed as a major development, a challenge to China’s BRI and, according to one optimistic reading, “a new model of global interconnectedness and a new ethic for globalisation itself.”
Then came the horror of October 7 and the devastating Israeli response, putting the brakes on any Saudi-Israeli normalisation, and raising questions about the underlying logic of the corridor itself. Was the IMEC dead on arrival? asked one piece, echoing many others.
The answer, at least as far as rhetoric goes, is a clear no.
From just the last few weeks:
Greek Prime Minster Kyriakos Mitostakis (who was chief guest and keynote speaker of the 9th Raisina Dialogue) spoke in New Delhi of his country being “India’s gateway to Europe” through IMEC, adding the caveat that, “in order to achieve this we need peace in the Middle East.”
French President Emmanuel Macron announced a ‘special envoy’ for IMEC, naming Gérard Mestrallet, the former CEO of French energy utility Engie to the role. “I’d like to convene the representatives of other IMEC member states in a gathering in the next two months,” Mestrallet said, soon after the announcement, albeit with no further details.
India and the UAE signed an MoU for the creation of an intergovernmental framework between the two countries for cooperation on the IMEC1 during Modi’s visit to Abu Dhabi, with the aim of working towards “development and management of a logistics platform, including a digital ecosystem, and provision of supply chain services to handle all types of general cargo, bulk, containers and liquid bulk in order to enable IMEEC.” The joint statement notes that this is the “first agreement under the IMEEC initiative.”
As the Hindu’s Suhasini Haidar reported (emphasis added):
[Indian] officials said that in addition to bilateral talks with the Greek delegation, high-level meetings with U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, European Union Secretary-General Stefano Sannino and others on the sidelines of the Raisina Dialogue could yield some progress on the IMEC’s plans as well.
According to diplomatic sources, the visit by Mr. Mitsotakis could kickstart the talks over the next steps for the IMEC, particularly the use of Greek ports like Piraeus for the 3,000 km corridor that starts from India, and is designed to complete connectivity via Israel’s Haifa port to Europe, bypassing other routes like the Suez Canal and the Red Sea.
…
“This is a multilateral effort in which so many countries are involved, but the progress [on the IMEC] so far is very good,” Union Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said in response to a question from The Hindu. “There is clarity that this is a very big insurance against any disruptions in the trade routes,” he said, adding that the alignment of the route and “missing links” had been identified.
…
“This is an inter-generational project, and it would be a mistake to see it through the prism of any one event or conflict. A corridor like this is not just about sending trade from point A to point B, but for building regional economic hubs and zones of prosperity along the way,” an official told The Hindu.
One reason the underlying logic has not been eroded is because the keystone of this entire effort – relatively normal ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel – appears to still be a palatable (albeit much more complex) idea for Riyadh, despite the anger and despair among Arab publics over Israel’s actions in Gaza. The fact that the Abraham Accords, signed initially between Israel, the UAE and Bahrain, have not been ripped up, even as Israel faces accusations of genocide at the International Court of Justice, offer an indication of the thinking in the Gulf capitals.
As Bernard Haykel explains, in an evaluation of Saudi Arabia under Mohammed bin Salman,
“The Saudis expect that their economic interests, over time, will outweigh more militant ideological commitments…
The Saudis hold the Palestinian leadership in low regard but feel compelled to join the rest of the Arab world in condemning Israel. The Saudi foreign minister and other princes issued statements decrying Israel’s actions as war crimes…
But these statements were milder than the criticism from other regional countries, and the Saudis hope to restart their normalization drive soon.”
Is that hope realistic?
Riyadh has made it evident that it will now require major concessions from Israel on a pathway towards a two-state solution before any potential normalisation, though there appears to be no constituency in Tel Aviv for any such ‘concession’. And while the responses from Riyadh and Abu Dhabi have made it evident that both countries would prefer not to drop the normalisation plans, an actual pathway remains nebulous given that no one seems to have much of an idea of what the ‘day after’ looks like in Gaza. Nor do Arab leaders have a sense of how their populations will react to anything that looks like collaboration with Israel once the bombing ends, if indeed there is a clear ‘end’ to point to.
That hasn't stopped Israeli officials from talking about the possibilities. Standing at the Adani-owned Mundra Port in Gujarat, Israeli transport minister Miri Regev spoke of how – in order to avoid attacks on ships in the Red Sea by the Houthi-led regime in Yemen – cargo from India could reach Israel by being loaded onto trucks in the UAE and transported through Saudi Arabia and Jordan.
Moreover, the attacks by the Houthi-led Yemeni government on ships in the Red Sea, headed to or from the Suez Canal have given IMEC supporters one more argument on behalf of an alternative logistics arrangement, given the otherwise obvious efficiencies of the Canal route.
(The original argument - https://www.isas.nus.edu.sg/papers/indias-arab-mediterranean-corridor-a-paradigm-shift-in-strategic-connectivity-to-europe/ - in favour of IMEC claims it could be 40% faster for goods going from India to Europe than the canal, but this untested calculation depends on extremely efficient processing and transfer across multiple modes and national jurisdictions, including just 24 hours for goods to get from Dubai to Haifa in Israel via rail).
Another reason IMEC remains realistic, though, is the ‘India-Middle East’ part. Or at least, the India-Gulf portion. Because, even if you put aside the question of Saudi-Israeli normalisation and taking goods onward to Europe (or any fanciful notions of competing with the Chinese BRI), the India-Gulf leg of the corridor is full of potential and looking set to thrive. And on this, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration has capitalised on a series of fortunate circumstances to deepen crucial trade and geopolitical relations with the Gulf states, as evidenced by Modi’s recent visit to the UAE – featuring everything from inaugurating a landmark Hindu temple to greeting tens of thousands of NRIs.
From the Economist :
As a flex of India’s newfound geopolitical muscle, it was hard to top. Visiting the Middle East this week Narendra Modi stopped first in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), where he signed an investment treaty, headlined a rally of 40,000 Indian expatriates and opened a vast new Hindu temple. Then India’s prime minister headed to nearby Qatar, having just secured the release of eight Indians jailed there for espionage. All the while, a dozen Indian navy ships were in nearby waters, helping to protect global shipping under threat from pirates and Houthi missiles.
The trip, which began on February 13th, thus neatly entwined some of the key strands—business, migration and security—of a historic shift in India’s approach to the Middle East. Mr Modi is now injecting new momentum into arguably his most important diplomatic initiative since taking office a decade ago: downgrading relations with Iran and aligning India with Israel and the Gulf Arab states.”
What was once primarily an energy-and-labour set of relationships has become much more complex. Trade is a vital part of this picture. India signed a free-trade deal with the UAE in 2022, which it hopes to replicate with other GCC states, and a bilateral investment treaty on Modi’s trip last week.
The Emirates now count as “India’s third largest trading partner, India’s second largest export destination, and fourth largest source of FDI.” Investment too has boomed, with the UAE and Saudi Arabia’s massive sovereign wealth funds promising to put tens of billions into Indian companies. And Indian companies are now bagging major contracts in the region as well, The Economist reports. But ties also include cooperation on terror, digital infrastructure, AI and even military cooperation.
Plus, it is no small matter to have Modi’s inauguration of a large Hindu Temple2 in Abu Dhabi be endorsed by the royal family and attended by the UAE Minister of Tolerance –evidence of the willingness to partner with India and its prime minister even at the cultural and socio-political level:
“Inaugurating first Hindu temple in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi hailed the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for “writing a golden chapter in human history”…
Requesting the audience to give a standing ovation to UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, he said: “When I came to the UAE in 2018, I met Sheikh Al Nahyan and showed him two models of the temple that had been prepared — one that was based on Vedic architecture and another that was a simple model without Hindu religious symbols. His thought was clear: he told me the temple in Abu Dhabi should be built with splendour and glory. He wanted the temple to not only be built, but to also look like a temple.”
In the view of C Raja Mohan, “the new terms of endearment with the Arabian Gulf constitute one of the most significant gains for Indian diplomacy in recent decades.”
Even if the rest of the IMEC plan struggles to bear fruit, this element remains full of promise for India – and one that Modi’s administration has done well to develop, given China’s growing footprint in the region.
Two more notes on the India-West Asia “love-in” as the Economist put it:
One, many have included Modi’s visit to Qatar as part of this broader narrative of Delhi’s growing influence, not least because the PM went straight to Doha from the UAE. Does it actually fit, though?
The Indian PM was warmly received in Doha, right after Qatar announced it would release 8 Indians who had been sentenced to death in 2023. Getting the eight released is indeed a testament to the sort of quiet diplomacy that isn’t necessarily a hallmark of the Ministry of External Affairs under Modi and S Jaishankar. But it represents more of reset with Doha, rather than the all-out embrace that is India-UAE ties.
The eight Indian nationals, all retired naval personnel, were working with a company that was building Qatar’s military capacity, and reportedly advising Qatar’s navy on a program to obtain Italian-made submarines. The charges against them were never made public, but the Financial Times alleged that they were convicted for spying for another country in the region, though this has been denied. It’s likely no coincidence that the release of the Indian nationals came days after India signed a $78 billion deal with Petronet LNG and Qatar Energy to extend the annual supply of LNG for 20 years after 2028, when the current contract was set to expire.
Nirupama Subramanian has a useful read on why the Dahra affair was first a sign of confidence in India’s role in the region, before it turned into a fiasco. As Subramanian writes, “the concern is about the reputation costs that the Dahra fiasco may carry for India's defence cooperation with other countries… The surest sign that Qatar and India have buried the events of the last 18 months will come with the restoration of the office of the Indian Defence Advisor at India’s diplomatic mission in Doha.”
Two, what would it mean for Indian-made drones to be used by Israel? Shepard Media, a defence industry tracker, reported that a joint venture between the Adani group and Israel’s Elbit systems delivered the first 20 of its drones to Israel. That particular drone model has been used extensively in Israel’s Gaza strikes.
As I wrote in Himal last year, India has grown much closer to Israel over the past decade, with Modi’s administration not just willing to acknowledge this proximity in a way that previous Indian governments were uncomfortable with, but actually terming the earlier reticence as a grievous error. Still, it has sought to build this relationship without upsetting its Arab partners – who as discussed above are grappling with their own ties to Tel Aviv – or allowing Indians to become closely identified with the Israeli state, in the way certain Western nationalities are. Will stories like this drone export, and the export of Indian labour to Israel, tip the balance on that tightrope strategy?
As it happens, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar gave what counts as the most pointed comments yet from an Indian official on Israel’s conduct at this week’s Munich Security Conference, saying “it is important that Israel should be, should have been very mindful of civilian casualties, that it has an obligation to observe international humanitarian law.”3
For more from India Inside Out on this, read these interviews from last year. I’m hoping to get back to speaking to more experts (including historians) on India-West Asia relationship over the course of this year, though it may only happen properly following election season:
India Outside In #1: Why the 'Pakistan factor' no longer impedes India's growing ties to the Gulf
India Outside In #4a: What does Modi's 'unprecedented' outreach to the Gulf and Israel mean for India?
India Outside In #4b: Why India-US ties are central to Delhi's expanding West Asia presence
The joint-statement refers to it as IMEEC, rather than IMEC, even though the Indian Ministry of External Affairs uses the latter in its briefing. Given that the title is India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, it could even plausibly by IMEEEC. Though, if we were to stick to proper naming conventions, it ought to be the much more unwieldy IWAEEC (India-West Asia-Europe Economic Corridor) given that India otherwise prefers to not use the Euro-centric ‘Middle East’ label.
From the Indian Express report: "Several elements have been included in the temple to bring the two nations and cultures together. For instance, it has seven shikhars or spires, representing the seven Emirates that come together to form the UAE. At the entrance, eight idols symbolise universal values such as faith, charity and compassion…
To give equal representation to the host country, the falcon, which is the UAE’s national bird, has also been given space.”
This was also where he said, “I think it’s important today to make a distinction between being non-West and anti-West. I’d not only characterise India as a country which is non-West but which has an extremely strong relation with the Western countries, getting better by the day. Not everybody necessarily in that grouping might qualify for that description, but the contribution the BRICS has made, if one looks at G7 and how it evolved into the G20… I think, in a way, of those additional 13 members who came into this bigger grouping, 5 of them are BRICS members. The fact that there was another group which was meeting regularly and discussing at the meeting, I think certainly was input into the expansion of G7 into the G20. So, I think we did our service to the world.”