India’s Ministry of External Affairs Ministry (MEA) on Thursday said that Russian President Vladimir Putin is expected to visit India in October for the annual bilateral summit between the two countries.
A number of high-level exchanges between India and Russia have been scheduled in coming days, said MEA Spokesperson Anurag Srivastava. He added that in the recent exchanges between India and Russia, regional and international issues have also been discussed.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had a telephonic conversation with Putin on July 2 during which the Prime Minister had congratulated the Russian President on the successful national vote on constitutional amendments, Srivastava said.
“Then in the last week of June, Raksha Mantri (Rajnath Singh) had visited Moscow. The Indian military contingent had participated in the 75the anniversary of the victory in the 2nd world war,” news agency PTI quoted the MEA spokesperson as saying.
Srivastava further stated that yesterday when foreign secretary (Harsh Vardhan Shringla) and the (Russian) deputy foreign minister spoke, they took stock of all these recent exchanges and the idea is to keep the momentum of these regular exchanges going on because due to the Covid-19 situation, the two sides have not been able to have visited.
“But there is a full calendar of forthcoming high-level exchanges between the two sides. The SCO and BRICS foreign ministers meetings, the NSAs’ meeting, the Defence ministers’ meeting are scheduled. Of course, we have the annual bilateral summit coming up in October when President Putin is expected to visit India,” he added.
LAC standoff
This comes in the backdrop of the de-escalation at the Line of Actual Control (LAC) has stopped for now as disengagement talks between India and China have hit a roadblock amid the military standoff in eastern Ladakh.
Commenting on the issues, the MEA spokesperson today said that India remains committed to de-escalating the tensions along the LAC. “We also expect that the Chinese side will work with us sincerely for complete disengagement and de-escalation and full restoration of peace and tranquillity in the border areas,” he added.
Indian and Chinese armies have been locked in a bitter standoff in multiple locations in eastern Ladakh for the last several weeks. The tension escalated manifold after 20 Indian soldiers were killed in a violent clash in the Galwan Valley on June 15.
Source : timesnownews
