European buyers transfer Indian artillery shells to Ukraine, New Delhi ignores Kremlin’s protests – Reuters

European buyers have redirected artillery shells sold by Indian arms manufacturers to Ukraine. Despite the Kremlin's objections, New Delhi has chosen not to intervene and stop the trade.

Reuters reports this.

According to sources and customs data, the transfer of ammunition to support Ukraine's defense against Russia has been taking place for more than a year. According to three Indian officials, the Kremlin raised this issue at least twice, particularly during Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov's July meeting with his Indian counterpart.

For the first time, Reuters has revealed the details of the ammunition supply. Two sources from the Indian government and two sources from the defense industry informed Reuters that Delhi supplied only a minimal quantity of ammunition used by Ukraine. One official's estimate puts this amount at less than 1% of the total weaponry imported by Kyiv during the war.

According to a Spanish and high-ranking Indian official and a former top manager of Yantra India, a state-owned company whose ammunition Ukraine uses, Italy and the Czech Republic are among the European countries sending Indian ammunition. The Czech Republic is leading the initiative to supply Kyiv with artillery shells from outside the European Union.

An Indian government official, speaking anonymously, stated that Delhi is closely monitoring the situation. However, a defense industry executive with direct knowledge of the supply revealed that India has not taken any action to restrict supplies to Europe. This is in line with the statements of most of the 20 individuals interviewed by Reuters, who requested to remain anonymous.

Delhi and Washington, Ukraine's chief security advocate have recently stepped up defense and diplomatic cooperation amid the strengthening of China, which both countries see as their main rival.

India also has warm relations with Russia, its main arms supplier, for decades, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi has refused to join a Western sanctions regime against Moscow.

But Delhi, long the world's biggest arms importer, also sees the protracted war in Europe as an opportunity to boost its nascent arms export sector, six Indian sources familiar with the official position said.

According to data compiled by the Stockholm International Institute for World Studies, between 2018 and 2023, India exported arms worth just over $3 billion.

Defense Minister Rajnath Singh told a conference on August 30 that military exports exceeded $2.5 billion in the last fiscal year and that Delhi wants to increase that figure to about $6 billion by 2029.

Commercially available customs records show that in the two years before the February 2022 invasion, three major Indian munitions manufacturers—Yantra, Munitions India, and Kalyani Strategic Systems—exported a total of $2.8 million worth of munitions components to Italy, the Czech Republic, Spain, and Slovenia, where defense contractors have invested heavily in supply chains for Ukraine.

According to the data, between February 2022 and July 2024, this figure rose to $135.25 million, including finished ammunition, which India has started exporting to four countries.

According to a former high-ranking representative of Yantra, the non-public Italian defense contractor Meccanica per l'Elettronica e Servomeccanismi (MES) was among the companies supplying Ukraine with Indian-made projectiles.

MES is Yantra's largest foreign client. The executive said the Rome-based company buys empty shells in India and fills them with explosives.

According to the manager, several Western firms can fill ammunition with explosive substances but do not have the capacity to mass-produce artillery shells.

Yantra's 2022-2023 annual report said it had struck a deal with an unnamed Italian customer to build a production line for L15A1 projectiles, a former Yantra executive called MES.

According to customs, between February 2022 and July 2024, Yantra supplied $35 million worth of empty 155mm L15A1 rounds.

Customs records also show that in February 2024, the British arms company Dince Hill, whose board of directors includes a high-ranking MES executive, exported $6.7 million worth of ammunition from Italy to Ukraine.

Among the exported goods were 155 mm L15A1 shells, which, according to the customs declaration, were manufactured by MES for the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine and supplied to "increase the defense capability and mobilization readiness of Ukraine."

Furthermore, Spanish Transport Minister Oscar Puente announced on social media that a Czech military official had signed an end-user agreement in May, allowing for transferring 120mm and 125mm ammunition from Munit ions India to the arms dealer Czech Defense Systems.

Pro-Palestinian activists claimed that the Borkum ship, which was carrying Indian-made weapons and docked in a Spanish port, was transporting them to Israel.

In May, the Spanish newspaper El Mundo reported that Ukraine was actually the final destination. A Spanish official and another source familiar with the matter confirmed to Reuters that Kyiv was the end user.

According to customs records dated March 27, Munitions India shipped 10,000 120mm and 125mm mortar shells worth more than $9 million from Chennai to CDS.

Russia's reaction

Russia is a valuable partner for India, supplying more than 60% of Delhi's arms imports. In July, Modi chose Moscow for his first bilateral international trip since being elected to a third term.

In another meeting that same month in Kazakhstan between senior Indian diplomat Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and Lavrov, the Russian minister pressed his counterpart about Indian ammunition used by Ukrainians and complained that state-owned Indian companies produced some of it.

Walter Ladwig, a South Asia security expert at King's College London, said diversifying small ammunition was geopolitically beneficial for Delhi.

"This allows India to show its partners in the West that it is not "on Russia's side" in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict," he said, adding that Moscow has little leverage over Delhi's decisions.

For refrence:

It should be noted that on August 23, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Ukraine on an official visit. This is the first visit of the Indian Prime Minister to Ukraine since the country gained independence in 1991.

During Modi's visit, Ukraine and India reached an agreement on four documents centered on collaboration in medicine, agriculture, humanitarian aid, and culture.

Also, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine [Ukraine's government – ed.] and the Government of the Republic of India signed a Memorandum of Understanding regarding Indian humanitarian grant aid for implementing highly effective community development projects.