Narendra Modi’s visit to Lahore great news for Indo-Pak relationship, feels

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday hosted Prime Minister Modi who is on a two-day visit to Moscow in order to attend the 16th India-Russia annual summit talks.

Terming Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Lahore as welcome step, Jammu and Kashmir Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh today said only talks can resolve outstanding issues between two nations and further strengthen ties.

Ahead of the trip to Moscow, Modi said he aimed to “deepen the cooperation between India and Russian Federation in the economic, energy and security spheres” and called Russian Federation “one of India’s most valued friends in the world”.

He said various indices of the economy, including Current Account Deficit (CAD) and flow of foreign investment, have been impressive and the aim of his government was to make India a global manufacturing hub.

On the basis of the deal, Russia’s state-owned Almaz-Antey will manufacture S-400 air defence systems jointly with Reliance Defence for the Indian armed forces.

Meanwhile, the Reliance Defense, an Indian conglomerate, said on Thursday it had signed a manufacturing and maintenance deal potentially worth United States dollars 6 billion with Russia’s Almaz-Antey, an arms firm.

“Met President Putin and discussed India-Russia ties”.

Describing India-Russia relations as “deep-rooted”, he said that Russia has stood like a rock behind India in hours of crisis and also at the worldwide fora on various issues.

Modi held annual summit talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin and underlined the need for the world to unite against terrorism “without distinction and discrimination”.

“Russia assists in building several power generating units at the Kudankulam nuclear plant”, he said, recalling that the first unit there was commissioned in June 2014 and the second unit was to come on stream in several weeks’ time.

Modi is seeking to ramp up the country’s nuclear energy use to meet the rising energy needs, with a programme for at least 12 new reactors, as well as reduce its heavy dependency on coal, the worst greenhouse gas producing fuel.

India and Russian Federation plan to boost their trade from around $10 billion to $30 billion annually over the next decade.

Putin conveyed Russia’s “strong support” to India’s bid for permanent membership in the UN Security Council.

The prime minister stressed on the necessity for a dialogue for an early political settlement in West Asia.