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Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been invited to the ‘Summit of Democracies’ convened by US President Joe Biden next month and he is likely to attend the virtual meet, according to a source close to the development.
The Indian PM will also host his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin at the India-Russia bilateral summit on December 6 where the two are expected to discuss way to further the strategic partnership between the two countries, the Ministry of External Affairs has said. The countries will also simultaneously hold their bilateral 2+2 Summit to be led by the Ministers of External Affairs and Defence.
As many as 110 nations have been invited by Biden for the two-day virtual summit on democracy on December 9-10. The list of invitees excludes China, Turkey and Russia.
“We have received an invitation for the democracy summit from the US and the PM is likely to participate in the virtual event,” the source said.
Putin and Modi will be meeting in-person for the first time after their meeting on the sidelines of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit in Brasilia in November 2019, said MEA Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi. However, there have been six telephonic conversations between the two leaders and the two have attended a number of virtual multilateral summits.
“The leaders will review the state and prospects of bilateral relations and discuss ways to further strengthen the strategic partnership between our two countries,” Bagchi said. “The summit will 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 and we are confident the visit will further provide an impetus to the India-Russia special and privileged strategic partnership,” he added.
2+2 dialogue
On the agenda for the 2+2 dialogue, Bagchi said that it will cover political and defence issues of mutual interest. External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh will represent India while Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and the Russian Defence Minister Sergey Shoigu will be representing their country at the meet.
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