Putin to discuss 'privileged partnership' with Modi on India visit next week

MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russian President Vladimir Putin and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will discuss all aspects of their countries' "privileged strategic partnership" when Putin visits New Delhi next week, the Kremlin said.

India, a major buyer of Russian oil, has also bought its weapons for decades, though a top defence official said the country had bought U.S. arms worth nearly $30 billion in the past decade and aims to produce more of its own equipment.

"They (the Russians) have been our friends through both fair and foul weather, and we are not going to sort of stop our defence cooperation with them anytime soon, but I do want to stress that India follows a policy of strategic autonomy," Defence Secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh said in New Delhi on Friday.

India was diversifying its suppliers, he told an industry event, adding: "But more than anything else we are trying to ensure that we increasingly do spend the bulk of our money within the country."

Putin last visited India in December 2021, just a few months before Russia went to war in Ukraine the following February.

"This visit is of great importance, providing an opportunity to comprehensively discuss the extensive agenda of Russian-Indian relations as a particularly privileged strategic partnership," the Kremlin said in a statement.

U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly urged Modi to stop India's buying of oil from Russia. In August, he imposed an additional tariff of 25% on Indian goods in what Moscow said amounted to illegal trade pressure on New Delhi.

Trade and refining sources said this week that India's December oil imports from Russia were set to hit their lowest in at least three years, off November's multi-month highs, as refiners sought options to avoid breaching Western sanctions.

During his state visit from December 4 to 5, Putin will hold talks with Modi and have a separate meeting with President Droupadi Murmu, the Kremlin said, saying a number of unspecified intergovernmental and commercial documents would be signed.

(Reporting by Reuters in Moscow and Manoj Kumar in New Delhi; Writing by Mark Trevelyan and Gleb Stolyarov)

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