Russia has lost the Ukraine war, China made wrong bet: Ex-FS Shyam Saran

Russia has lost the Ukraine war as it would not have achieved any rational objective by the end of it and China had made a "wrong bet" on Moscow, former foreign secretary Shyam Saran said on Monday.

During a discussion after the launch of his new book "How China Sees India and The World", Saran said the Chinese perception and also that of the Russians was that "this is our moment".

"Making that bet with the Russians, that is the bet which I believe has gone wrong (for China). Many people said you should not predict a Russian defeat, I am not predicting a Russian defeat but it is my genuine judgment that Russia has lost this war," he said.

"Why has Russia lost this war, because if it is going to leave Ukraine in a complete rubble, what has that done for Russia. Secondly, if the idea was to prevent further expansion of NATO nearer Russian borders, has not already the opposite been achieved. Sweden and Finland were on the threshold of joining NATO," Saran said.

What could be a rational objective that has been achieved, he asked.

The bet China has made on Russia and on what the new world order would look like has gone wrong, he said.

In the book launched by former vice president Hamid Ansari, Saran writes an account of the India-China relationship and how China perceives our country.

Saran questions, among other things, the Chinese claim that it was the most important and influential civilisation of the ancient world, arguing that it was India who played that role.