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First Post
02-07-2025
- Politics
- First Post
PM Modi's 5-nation, 8-day tour: Which nations is he visiting, why they matter
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is beginning his five-nation tour today (June 2). This trip, his longest diplomatic foray in nearly a decade, will see him visit Ghana, Trinidad and Tobago, Argentina, Brazil, and Namibia. But what do we know about the trip? And why are these nations important to India? read more Follow us on Google News Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to undertake a long diplomatic trip overseas. PTI/File Photo Prime Minister Narendra Modi has embarked on a long diplomatic tour today (June 2). Modi's five-nation tour, his longest diplomatic foray in nearly a decade, will see him visit Ghana, Trinidad and Tobago, Argentina, Brazil, and Namibia. The tour, which begins in Ghana, will conclude in Namibia on June 10. But what do we know about the details of the trip? And why are these nations important? Let's take a closer look Ghana Modi's will kick off his trip overseas in Ghana on July 2 and 3. This will be Modi's first visit to the West African nation as prime minister. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD No Indian prime minister has visited Ghana for nearly three decades. Modi will meet Ghana's President John Dramani Mahama, who recently took office after a huge win at the polls. Mahama previously visited India in 2015 for the India-Africa Forum Summit. The two men will discuss how to deepen ties and the possibility of a vaccine hub being created in Ghana. Agriculture, defence and critical minerals will also be on the agenda. A number of Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) are expected to be signed. Modi is also set to address Ghana's Parliament. Ghana's Foreign Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa speaks at Raisina Dialogue on March 18, 2025. India and Ghana have had a long and fruitful relationship. India and Ghana established diplomatic relations in 1957 – immediately after it achieved independence. In fact, India had opened a representative office in Accra in 1953. Ghana is an important trading partner for India and one of West Africa's fastest growing nations. Bilateral trade between the countries was at $3.13 billion in 2024-25. India is the third-largest investor in Ghana. India imports large quantities of gold, petroleum and cashews from Ghana. It exports construction machinery, medicine and cars to Ghana. Trinidad and Tobago Modi will then head to Trinidad and Tobago on July 3. He is making the trip after an invitation from Kamla Persad-Bissessar, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Both Persad-Bissessar and President Christine Carla Kangaloo are of Indian-origin. This will be Modi's first bilateral visit to Trinidad and Tobago as prime minister. An Indian prime minister last visited the nation in 1999. Modi is expected to hold wide-ranging talks with both of them. Pharmaceuticals, renewable energy, digital public infrastructure, agriculture, disaster resilience, education and culture are on the agenda. Trinidad and Tobago last year adopted India's flagship UPI platform Prime Minister Narendra Modi is making the trip after an invitation from Kamla Persad-Bissessar, the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago. Reuters . Here too, Modi is expected to address a joint session of parliament. Trinidad and Tobago is home to a huge Indian population. Nearly half the Indian population of the Caribbean lives in the country. Modi's visit comes on the 180th anniversary of Indian immigrants arriving to Trinidad and Tobago. The two countries established diplomatic relations in 1962. The two nations in 1997 signed a trade deal that accorded each other Most Favoured Nation (MFN) status. Bilateral trade between the two nations touched $341.61 million in 2023-2024. India exports vehicles, rolling stock, parts and accessories, iron and steel, pharma and plastic to Trinidad and Tobago. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD India imports mineral fuels, mineral oils, mineral waxes ores, and aluminium from Trinidad and Tobago. Argentina Modi on July 4 will head to Argentina. Modi is making the trip on the invite of President Javier Milei. This will be the first bilateral visit by an Indian prime minister since 1968. Modi and Milei will hold wide-ranging talks in the areas of food, defence, digital technology, telemedicine, infrastructure, mining, technology, science, green and renewable energy. The two countries have already made strides when it comes to cooperation on mining. The two leaders previously met at the G20 Summit in Rio de Janeiro in November 2024. Argentina's President Javier Milei. AP The two countries elevated their relationship to that of a strategic partnership in 2019. Bilateral trade between India and Argentina touched $6.4 billion in 2022. India that year maintained its status as Argentina's fourth-largest trading partner. India exports petroleum oils, agro chemicals, yarn-fabric-madeups, organic chemicals, bulk drugs and two-wheelers to Argentina. It imports vegetable oils (soybean and sunflower), finished leather, cereals, residual chemicals and allied products and pulses from Argentina. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Brazil Modi will then head to Brazil on July 6. Modi is set to attend the Brics summit in Rio de Janeiro – which will be followed by a state visit. This will be Modi's fourth visit to Brazil. At Brics, the leaders will hold talks on governance, peace, security, climate change and AI. Modi will speak on terrorism including the recent Pahalgam attack and India's response. India will contribute to the Leaders' Declaration and coming up with an outline for climate finance and socially determined diseases. Modi on July 8 will meet President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Brasilia. The two men will discuss how to increase cooperation in a number of fields including energy, defence, agriculture, minerals and digital infrastructure. Prime Minister Narendra Modi (left) with Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (right) during the symbolic tree plantation ceremony at the closing session of the G20 Summit 2023 at the Bharat Mandapam, in New Delhi, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2023. Source: PTI India and Brazil established diplomatic relations in 1948. Bilateral trade between the two countries stands at $12 billion. Brazil is India's largest trading partner in South America. India in 2021 was Brazil's fifth-largest trading partner. India exports petroleum products, agro-chemicals (insecticides, fungicides), chemicals, pharmaceuticals, engineering products, textured filament yarn, and unwrought aluminium to Brazil. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD India imports crude oil, soya oil, gold, cane sugar, cotton, gum, wood and turpentine oils, chemicals (carboxylic acids) and iron ore and concentrates from Brazil. Namibia Modi will then fly to Namibia on July 9. Modi is making this trip at the behest of Namibian President Dr Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah. This will be the first time an Indian prime minister has visited Namibia in nearly three decades. This will also be just the third time an Indian prime minister has visited the country. Modi and Nandi-Ndaitwah will hold bilateral talks on digital fintech. A key item on the agenda is implementing India's Unified Payments Interface (UPI) in Namibia. India's Unified Payments Interface (UPI), one of the world's fastest payment system. The Indian prime minister is also expected to address Namibia's Parliament and pay homage to Dr Sam Nujoma, the Founding Father of Namibia. India was one of the first countries that raised the question of Namibian independence at the UN. Trade between the two countries touched $650 million in 2023. India's top export to Namibia was refined petroleum. Its other exports were petrol, pharmaceuticals and rice. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Its top import from Namibia was diamonds. Its other top imports were bulk minerals, ores, iron and steel. India, which is looking to diversify its energy sector, sees Namibia, which has plentiful supplies of uranium, diamonds, copper, phosphates and other minerals, as a great potential partner. Namibia in 2022 also sent India eight cheetahs that were released in Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh. With inputs from agencies
Al Etihad
17-06-2025
- Politics
- Al Etihad
TRENDS participates in Raisina Mediterranean Dialogue in France, holds high-level meetings
17 June 2025 13:01 ABU DHABI (ALETIHAD)A TRENDS Research & Advisory delegation participated, as part of the World Government Summit Community's official delegation, in the Raisina Mediterranean Dialogue, which was held in the French city of Marseille. A distinguished group of senior decision-makers and experts from various countries participated in this round of dialogue, which constitutes a continuation of the Raisina Dialogue held in India. The TRENDS delegation included Mr. Mohammed Al-Dhahouri, Director of the Advanced Political Studies Department at TRENDS, and Mr. Rashid Al-Hosani, a Research Assistant at the centre. The delegation's participation featured a series of fruitful meetings and substantive discussions that addressed prominent contemporary geopolitical issues and explored opportunities to enhance international cooperation in addressing global the framework of TRENDS' participation in one of the main sessions, Professor Mohamed Al-Dhuhoori, Director of TRENDS Research and Advisory, addressed a direct question to His Excellency Dr. Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, the Indian Minister of External Affairs, regarding India's vision for the role of international multilateralism amid the dynamic transformations occurring on the global stage. The question generated significant engagement from the audience and underscored the importance of research on international TRENDS delegation held a series of high-level meetings with several distinguished individuals: Mehdi Jomaa, former Prime Minister of Tunisia; Mohamed Nasheed, former President of the Maldives; Suleiman bin Mohammed Al-Anbar, Minister Resident at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) of Saudi Arabia; Dr. Nicholas J. A. Bouchaud, global policy expert and Senior Fellow at the Institute of International Studies, New Delhi; Priyanka Chaturvedi, Member of the Indian Parliament; and Arvind Gupta, President and Co-Founder of the Digital India the event, TRENDS delegates met Reem Baggash, Deputy Managing Director of the World Government Summit Organisation, and the accompanying delegation to strengthen cooperation between TRENDS and the World Government Summit Mohammed Al-Dhahouri emphasised that participation in major international events aligns with TRENDS' commitment to maintaining an active presence on global dialogue platforms, keeping pace with developments in the international landscape, and fostering knowledge partnerships with various research institutions and think tanks worldwide. This reinforces the UAE's role in promoting mutual understanding and international cooperation. Raisina Mediterranean Dialogue is an annual multilateral platform that brings together industry leaders and experts from various continents to address shared challenges and formulate strategies contributing toward global security, stability, and sustainable development.
Indian Express
12-06-2025
- Business
- Indian Express
Jawed Ashraf writes: India and Europe can anchor a multipolar world
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar's second visit to Europe within a month reflects a deepening India-Europe engagement even as the two sides deal with volatile US policies, era-shaping geopolitical shifts, terrorism from Pakistan and escalating conflict in Europe. Highlights include Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to France to co-chair the AI Action Summit and the visit by the re-elected European Commission President, Ursula Von der Leyen, and the college of commissioners to India in February. The MEA-supported Raisina Dialogue also makes a debut this week in the strategic port city of Marseille. Europe faces extraordinary challenges. War has returned. Economic difficulties, concerns over security and immigration, and rising issues of identity and culture are reshaping politics. The European Union's (EU's) many internal stresses and faultlines have made managing the European project more complex, though Brexit has dissuaded even the most nationalist governments from abandoning the EU. The external challenges are greater. Europe must contend with US President Donald Trump's disdain for NATO and near dismantling of long-adrift transatlantic relations, the rupture in relations with Russia, and the geopolitical and economic strain in ties with China. Multilateralism, Europe's refuge for order and its instrument of international influence, is crumbling. Europe risks strategic irrelevance and a rising gap with the US and China in innovation and competitiveness. The world's most open major economy faces an upturned global trade regime. And, as it happens in continental landmasses, to Europe's east, the lines that define the political and cultural geography of what constitutes Europe are perennially contested. But the EU has shown remarkable cohesion and resilience in its response to Covid, the Ukraine war and Trump's onslaught. Its project of horizontal and vertical integration continues. Relations with the UK are improving. Europe is waking up to the need for independence in foreign and security policy, the pursuit of industrial and digital sovereignty, a resilient internal supply chain and a stronger defence industrial base. It has the intellectual, industrial and investment capacity for that. But Europe cannot do it by itself. It needs new patterns of alignment. Equally, global uncertainty has reinforced India's traditional proclivity for a diversified portfolio of partnerships. Engagement with Europe involves two levels. With the EU in its areas of exclusive and shared competences, there is a long tradition of summits, and now, expansion of strategic dialogues, including in trade, technology, security and foreign policy. With older and major member states, ties are strengthening and acquiring new dimensions. The Nordic region is the new frontier and attention has returned to the dynamic east. The EU is a leading and growing trade and investment partner for India. According to a Institut Montaigne study on the EU's ties in the Indo-Pacific, Eurostat data shows that between 2015 and 2022, EU27 FDI stock registered the strongest growth in India at 96 per cent, exceeding Taiwan's 93 per cent and China's 52 per cent. From France alone, the FDI stock grew a whopping 373 per cent. In trade, too, between 2015 and 2023, EU27 exports to India grew 47 per cent, behind 83 per cent to Taiwan and 54 per cent to China. EU imports from India grew by over 100 per cent, second behind Taiwan from the Indo-Pacific. Surveys indicate a trend toward diversification away from China, though less than that of US companies. The EU must conclude the EU-India trade and investment agreements quickly, starting with an early harvest, and also waive the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism for India in view of India's progress in green energy. These will accelerate IMEC, the great new strategic initiative that reprises an old India-Europe corridor, and will survive the current instability in the Middle East. It aims to be not just a trade route but a new global corridor of investment, innovation, enterprise and energy. India must invest more in Europe. India and Europe converge on the public character and purpose of digital technology and in preventing a global duopoly. As Modi said at the AI Action Summit, we can collaborate in innovation, application, regulation, governance, standards and serving public good globally. That also applies to digital public infrastructure. India can benefit from Europe's leadership in deeptech, digital manufacturing, enterprise technologies and key areas of the semiconductor chain. Indeed, science, technology and innovation should drive our partnership — to lead industries of the future and address global priorities, including diverse clean energy sources, climate resilience, health and food security, biodiversity and the sustainability of Earth and its oceans. This also requires a comprehensive mobility programme of higher ambition for students, scholars and scientists. Europe is a significant source of armaments for India. Europe, seeking to rearm itself, and India pursuing atmanirbharta, must prioritise collaboration and full transfer of technology in joint design, development and manufacturing of defence equipment. We have robust cooperation in the areas of maritime, underwater, space and cyber security, as also in counter-terrorism with many European partners. Beyond technical and intelligence cooperation, Europe, hit by Islamist terrorism, and sometimes with the provenance of Pakistan, needs to do more to penalise Pakistan for terrorism. Great powers believe they can bend the world to their will but often cause chaos. Middle powers need to leverage partnerships and institutions to resist and maximise their roles. India and the EU have a broader global agenda that rises beyond differences on Ukraine or Pakistan. India and a united, cohesive Europe, with an independent voice and capabilities, can build a stable multipolar world, anchored in international law, underpinned by the discipline of multilateralism and free from territorial ambitions. India and Europe approach challenges through coalitions, not unilateral initiatives or the use of asymmetric bilateral power. That calls for collaboration, not the EU's prescriptive approach on its norms. For the Global South, partnerships can protect our interests against mounting competition and also mitigate global fragmentation. In the Indo-Pacific region, while France is a key security partner for India, working with others and the EU, India can help countries avoid coercion by one hegemon or a forced choice between two major powers. Attention and time, imagination and ambition, and sensitivity to each other's concerns transform relationships. Europe and India need more of that despite other immediate preoccupations in Brussels, Delhi and European capitals. We must involve all stakeholders and also reshape media stereotypes and public perceptions. The author is a retired Indian ambassador
The Print
10-06-2025
- Politics
- The Print
Defence ministry plans own Raisina Dialogue-style conference—Ran Samvad, likely to be held in August
The sources added the event will be conducted by each service—the Army, the Navy and the Air Force—in rotation, with the tri-services think-tank Centre for Joint Warfare Studies (CENJOWS) being the permanent feature. Defence sources said the initiative will be called 'Ran Samvad' and the plan over the next 3 years is to bring it on par with, or make it better than the two initiatives mentioned above. New Delhi: The Defence Ministry is planning its own seminar or global event in line with the Raisina Dialogue and the Shangri-La Dialogue, focusing purely on military matters and warfare. The first dialogue by the Army is planned at Mhow, Madhya Pradesh, from 26 to 27 August this year, sources said, adding the first edition would be held on a small scale but will have all defence attachés posted in India in attendance. This dialogue will primarily focus on warfighting and, over the next 2 years, will focus on having important foreign dignitaries like the US Secretary of Defence, among others. The sources said the aim is to make India a prominent part of the global defence dialogue and be the voice of the Global South in furthering a collaborative approach. The Raisina Dialogue is held by the Ministry of External Affairs along with private think-tank Observer Research Foundation which was founded with the donation of Dhirubhai Ambani. The sources said that while Raisina Dialogue does have a defence element, it is not comprehensive. It was started in 2016 and is held every year. The Shangri-La dialogue, held in Singapore, is organised by independent think-tank International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). Founded in 1958 in London, the IISS' first director was defence journalist Alastair Buchan while its first president was former Labour prime minister Clement Attlee. (Edited by Ajeet Tiwari) Also Read: CDS speaks out on Op Sindoor—from nuclear to losses & disinformation to Chinese role
Time of India
04-06-2025
- General
- Time of India
Lavrov may visit next week, boost security ties
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov plans to visit India in near future eyeing to expand security partnership including on cross-border terror, defence partnership and prepare for Russian President Vladimir Putin's visit here for the annual summit. While the dates of Lavrov's visit are yet to be announced there are indications that the Russian Foreign Minister could visit next week. He was earlier scheduled to visit for the Raisina Dialogue but had to postpone it for personal reasons. Lavrov's trip will be the first visit by a Foreign Minister of a P5 state since the Pahalgam terror attacks , Operation Sindoor and the subsequent conflict. The Russian Foreign Minister and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar spoke over phone following the Pahalgam terror attacks. This was followed by a phone call from Russian President Vladimir Putin to PM Narendra Modi and the veteran leader backed any action that India would undertake against terror infrastructure. Russia has maintained that India-Pakistan dispute is completely bilateral in nature.
