Indo-Russia to hold summit-level talks in New Delhi on December 6
Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and President of Russia Vladimir Putin will hold summit-level talks in New Delhi on December 6. The two countries Indo-Russia will also have the first two-plus-two dialogues on the same day between the Defence and Foreign ministers of their countries. Making an official announcement about Putin’s visit, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said here on Friday the Russian President will pay an official visit to New Delhi for the 21st India-Russia Annual Summit with the Prime Minister.
In an official statement, MEA spokesperson Arindam Bagchi further confirmed that the first meeting of 2+2 dialogue between Foreign and Defence Ministers of India and Russia will be held in Delhi on December 6. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will represent the Indian side. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu will represent their country.
On Putin’s visit, the Ministry said the last India-Russia Annual Summit was held in September 2019 during Modi’s visit to Vladivostok (Russia). The Annual Summit could not take place in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic situation. This will be the first face-to-face meeting between the two leaders after their meeting on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit in Brasilia in November 2019. There have been six telephonic conversations between the two leaders since November 2019 till date apart from virtual meetings for multilateral Summits.
The leaders will review the state and prospects of bilateral relations and discuss ways to further strengthen the strategic partnership between the two countries. The Summit will also afford an opportunity to exchange views on regional, multilateral and international issues of mutual interest. The visit is in continuation of the tradition of Annual Summits alternately in India and Russia. The visit will provide further impetus to the India-Russia Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership.
Meanwhile, on Friday at the 18th meeting of the Russia, India, China (RIC) trilateral dialogue at the Foreign Ministers’ level, India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said as a contiguous neighbor and long-standing partner of Afghanistan, India is concerned about the suffering of the Afghan people.
Participating in the meeting in the virtual format along with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi and Russian Minister Sergey Lavrov, he also said India supports other provisions of UN Security Council Resolution 2593.
India has offered a supply of 50,000 MT of wheat to Afghanistan to address the drought situation and said the RIC countries need to work together to ensure that humanitarian assistance reaches the Afghan people without hindrance and without politicization, Jaishankar said.
In his opening remarks, he said the agenda of the RIC meeting include the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, Reforms of the Multilateral System, and International Hot-spot Issues. Incidentally, he is the chairman of the grouping since September last year and hand over to the Chinese minister after the day-long meet.
Jaishankar reaffirmed India’s continued commitment to foster closer dialogue and cooperation among the three largest nations in the Eurasian region under the RIC mechanism.
“I believe that our cooperation in areas like trade, investment, healthcare, education, science and technology, and politics could significantly contribute to global growth, peace, and stability. This would be in line with our common ethos of recognizing the “World as a Family”. Our approach to global development should be human-centric and not leave anyone behind,” he said.
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