New Delhi, Feb 19 (IANS) The geopolitical distribution of power will see a fundamental shift as a result of the war in Ukraine, GIS Reports said. Traditional political alignments will harden.

Rudolf G Adam, a former vice president of Germany's Federal Intelligence Service wrote in GIS Reports that the world will remain divided into three groups that face each other with suspicion and open hostility:

* Western liberal democracies (US, Canada, EU, UK, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand)

* Russia, Belarus, Iran, Syria, Venezuela and North Korea, with China staying close. Regimes in these countries despise legal constraints both in dealing with other international actors or with their own subjects

* Developing nations of the South Asian subcontinent, the Arab world and South America

Adam said international institutions like the United Nations or the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) are paralyzed; regional associations will gather strength. Pressure for reform of the Security Council will rise but will have even lesser chances of success than 20 years ago.

The main beneficiaries of Russia's war are China, India, Turkey, Iran and North Korea. They exploit trade opportunities that Western sanctions open for them. They profit from Russian oil at discount prices, Adam said.

China's bilateral trade with Russia grew to a record $ 190 billion in 2022, comparable to its trade with Germany. Last year's China-U.S. trade, meanwhile, also grew to a record $ 691 billion. Chinese exports of finished industrial products rose by almost 40 percent.

Russia's protracted war on its western front presents additional opportunities for China to improve its position vis-a-vis Russia's Far East. China profits most as the two superpowers weaken each other and U.S. attention is diverted from the Pacific to the Atlantic, Adam said.

India has been quick in buying cheap Russian fuel and in benefitting from supplying what Moscow can no longer obtain directly from the West.