Russian activities and Australian interests in the Indo-Pacific

Report

It has been common to characterise Russian foreign and security policy as traditionally
Eurocentric, with much of Moscow’s focus on Europe, Central Asia, and Russia’s
immediate neighbourhood. However, over the past decade, and especially since 2022,
Russia has made more explicit moves to reorient itself toward Asia more broadly,
including in the Indo-Pacific. These activities are set to increase in future. This will bring
Russia – a nation frequently (and erroneously) considered as lying outside Australia’s
arena of strategic geography – more closely into contact, and potential into contest,
with Australian interests, as well as those of Australia’s friends and partners in the
region.
 

The Putin regime’s desire for deeper engagement in the Indo-Pacific has been
accelerated by its unprovoked and illegal February 2022 war of aggression against
Ukraine. Having de facto declared itself as at war with the West, and seeing itself as a
bulwark against what it characterises as a morally decrepit Western political culture,
the Russian government seeks to project itself as a champion of traditional values and
statist norms in the Indo-Pacific. This stance is made all the more hypocritical given its
deliberate attempts to fracture the existing order built on respect for international law,
using a variety of sub-threshold and grey zone tactics. These include attempts to form
new multi-and mini-lateral bodies with the agenda driven by authoritarian states,
political warfare, offensive cyber activities, and are increasingly incorporating violent
acts of sabotage.1
 

This report analyses how these dynamics are playing out, assessing historical legacies,
current trajectories, the types of instruments (economic, military, diplomatic) Russia
uses, and identifies some challenges and prospects. It focuses specifically on Russian
relationships with a number of key actors: the PRC, DPRK, ROK, Japan, India,
Indonesia, and Australia. 

Read the full report here.