India has been invited to the G7 Summit as an outreach country. (File)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has left for Italy, and will reach around 2.30 am tomorrow, to attend the G7 summit, in which India is participating for the 11th time and the PM for the fifth. He will meet Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
- The summit will be held between June 13 and 15 at the luxurious Borgo Egnazia resort in Italy's Apulia region. Leaders have already begun flying in from the seven member countries - the US, UK, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, and France. The European Union is a "non-enumerated member".
- India has been invited to the G7 Summit as an outreach country. This will be PM Modi's first overseas visit since he took oath as Prime Minister for the third straight term on Thursday and he is expected to be in Italy for 24 hours.
- Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra said, "This will afford him an opportunity to engage with other world leaders present at the G7 Summit on issues of importance to India, as also to the Global South. This will be India's 11th participation in G7 Summit and Prime Minister Modi's fifth consecutive participation at the G7 Summit,"
- He said PM Modi is also expected to hold a bilateral meeting with Ms Meloni and the two leaders are expected to review the entire gamut of bilateral ties.
- Before leaving for Italy, PM Modi said in a statement, "I am glad that my first visit in the third consecutive term is to Italy for the G-7 Summit. I warmly recall my visit to Italy for the G20 Summit in 2021. Prime Minister Meloni's two visits to India last year were instrumental in infusing momentum and depth in our bilateral agenda."
- "During the discussions at the Outreach session, the focus would be on artificial intelligence, energy, Africa, and the Mediterranean. It will be an opportunity to bring greater synergy between the outcomes of the G20 Summit held under India's Presidency and the forthcoming G7 Summit, and deliberate on issues which are crucial for the Global South... I am also looking forward to meeting other leaders participating in the Summit," the statement added.
- US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said US President Joe Biden and PM Modi are expected to meet during the summit, "He (Biden) expects to see Prime Minister Modi here. It's up to the Indians to formally confirm his attendance, but our expectation is that the two of them will have the opportunity to encounter one another. What the nature of that encounter is still fluid because so much of the schedule is fluid," he said.
- There is also the possibility of a meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, which will be very important given the chill in ties following his claim in September last year that India was involved in the killing of Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar.
- The agenda of the summit is likely to be dominated by the Russia-Ukraine war and the situation in Gaza. There is an expectation that there will be a proposal for increasing the funding for Ukraine, to be funded by seized Russian assets.
- Italy is India's fourth-largest trading partner in the European Union, with bilateral trade worth $15 billion. Mr Kwatra said Italy is also a partner in several global initiatives launched by India, including the International Solar Alliance, Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure, Indo-Pacific Ocean Initiative, Global Biofuel Alliance, and India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEEC).
