Mongolia and India – an unusual but ambitious partnership
Boris Kushhov (Борис Кушхов)
Aiming for the sweet spot: PM Narendra Modi tries his hand at
archery at the mini Naadam Festival, tweets MEA spokesperson
Vikas Swarup. Photograph: @MEA/Twitter
Mongolia [was] putting the finishing touches to its preparations for a visit by the Speaker of the House of the People, the lower house of India’s Parliament, which [took] place from July 6-9 this year. The visit was announced in a meeting between India’s ambassador to Mongolia and the speaker of the State Great Khural, Mongolia’s unicameral parliament.
The two countries have a long history of mutual relations, despite the geographical distance separating them. Both countries consider that their diplomatic relations can be traced back to the contacts between the Hunnic Empire (to which Mongolia sees itself as a successor state) and Indian monks and traders back in the first millennium BC.
One important link between the two countries is religion – Buddhism, which is central to Mongolian culture and national philosophy, was introduced to Mongolia from India via Tibet in several waves, most recently in the 15-16th Centuries.
But today the relations between India and Mongolia are no longer merely a reflection of the “religious and cultural affinities between the two nations,” and are in fact developing into a political and economic partnership.
In this article the author will attempt a brief assessment of the current state of relations between Mongolia and India, and also look at some global processes in the area of international relations.