S Jaishankar To Meet Vladimir Putin Today: Kremlin

Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Wednesday, the Kremlin has announced.

“Tonight, the president plans to receive Mr. Jaishankar, India’s foreign minister,” Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters here.

Mr Jaishankar is on a five-day official visit to Russia.

Mr Peskov noted that the top Indian diplomat had already met with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov.

According to the Kremlin spokesman, India is an important partner of Russia, so the ministers will talk about the contacts held and the course of their discussion.

“It’s always good to be in Moscow. So, I agree with you that our relationship has been very strong, very steady, and I think we have lived up to the responsibilities of a special and privileged strategic partnership,” Mr Jaishankar told Mr Lavrov.

On Tuesday, Mr Jaishankar held a “comprehensive and productive” meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Manturov on the bilateral economic cooperation during which they witnessed the signing of some “very important” agreements related to the construction of the future power-generating units of the Kudankulam nuclear power plant in Tamil Nadu.

The ties between India and Russia remained strong notwithstanding Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. India has not yet condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine and it has been maintaining that the crisis must be resolved through diplomacy and dialogue.