Foreign secretary Vikram Misri on Tuesday asserted that the rest of the world is also dealing with issues that are existential for them, acknowledging the security concerns of Europe vis-à-vis Russia and iterating the need for the world to abandon any "double standard" on energy issues.

Misri was responding to a question on whether the secondary sanctions announced by the EU, UK and the US would be discussed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he meets his British counterpart Keir Starmer in London later this week.

Stating that India would be interested in discussing these evolving issues with the UK, Misri said: “We have not yet seen any actions by the UK so far as matters related to secondary sanctions, etc, are concerned. In any case we have made very clear our view with regard to secondary sanctions.”

He was referring to India’s early response to the EU’s secondary sanctions announced last Friday that targeted a Rosneft refinery in Gujarat.

The external affairs ministry said India did not subscribe to any unilateral sanction measures, maintaining that ensuring energy security is a responsibility of paramount importance to the government to meet the basic needs of citizens. Asserting that India is a responsible actor and fully committed to “our legal obligations”, ministry spokesman Randhir Jaiswal underscored that “there should be no double standard, especially when it comes to energy trade”.