Team News Riveting
New Delhi, August 19
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Ukraine on Friday to boost ties with Kyiv.
The visit comes weeks after Modi’s trip to Moscow in which he rebuked Russian President Vladimir Putin over the war with its neighbour.
Announcing the August 23 trip, the ministry of foreign affairs said it would be a “landmark and historic” visit, the first by an Indian prime minister to Ukraine since diplomatic relations were established over 30 years ago.
The visit would aim to control damage from Modi’s trip last month to Moscow, which coincided with a lethal strike on a children’s hospital in Kyiv, embarrassing Modi and drawing criticism from President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. The ministry said it has substantive and independent ties with both Russia and Ukraine and that the visit builds on continuing interactions between India and Ukraine.
During Modi’s trip to Moscow on July 8-9, old friends India and Russia sought to boost bilateral trade and cooperation in areas ranging from nuclear energy to medicine. But the visit coincided with the strike on the hospital in Ukraine’s capital, prompting the Prime Minister to use emotive language to deliver an implicit rebuke to Putin at their summit.
Modi told Putin the death of innocent children was painful and terrifying, and that Moscow and Kyiv should resolve their conflict through dialogue and diplomacy.
The ministry said the Prime Minister would be undertaking an official visit to Poland this week on 21st and 22nd August on the invitation of Prime Minister Donald Tusk. This is a landmark visit as the Indian Prime Minister is visiting Poland after 45 years. The visit takes place as they also mark the 70th anniversary of the establishment of their diplomatic relations.
