MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 06th April, 2021) Moscow hopes for high-level bilateral talks with India this year, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with Hindustan Times, ahead of Tuesday talks with his Indian counterpart, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.
"We hope that the epidemiological situation would allow us to organise a bilateral summit in 2021. The dates of next sessions of the Inter-Governmental Commission on Trade, Economic, Scientific, Technical and Cultural Cooperation, Inter-Governmental Commission on Military and Technical Cooperation and Inter-Parliamentary Commission are under consideration," Lavrov said.
He added that considering the need to overcome the consequences of the pandemic, Russia's priorities include intensification of cooperation with India in areas such as trade, energy, agriculture, transport, finance and banking, science and technology, as well as humanitarian ties.
"Russia is satisfied with the vigorous political dialogue with India on all levels that keeps on actively developing despite serious restrictions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2020, we managed to successfully organise several events in face-to-face and online formats," Lavrov said, adding that Russia intends to continue cooperating with India in various formats, on different international platforms.
The minister highlighted last year's summits of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (Brics) that saw "fruitful" Russia-India cooperation.
Lavrov arrived in the Indian capital of New Delhi for an official visit on Monday. It was reported that the Russian foreign minister and his Indian counterpart Jaishankar were expected to discuss bilateral relations, cooperation in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, preparations of the upcoming high-level bilateral meeting, and other issues on the regional and global agenda.
Lavrov and Indian officials are also expected to assess approaches to interaction between Moscow and New Delhi in the international arena, including at the United Nations, BRICS, and SCO.
