Pakistani and Indian prime ministers to meet in Russian city

UFA (Russia): Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to hold a bilateral meeting with his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif on Friday in Ufa, Russia, in a much anticipated meeting that could likely set off an improvement in bilateral ties.

The BRICS Bank will approve its inaugural investment projects in the first quarter of 2016 and will work closely with the China-led AIIB, said the declaration adopted at the Summit of five countries which are members of the AIIB.

The BRICS nations – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – which represent 40 percent of the world’s population, agreed in 2013 to establish their own development bank, with estimated capital of Dollars 100 billion.

The meeting sent positive signals to the two peoples and the global community that the two major developing nations are committed to cooperating for common development, said Xi.

Russian Federation has been hurting economically in the wake of Western sanctions over its role in the Ukraine crisis and a sharp drop in its chief export, oil.

Referring to Brics New Development Bank, the prime minister said it should fund projects, which have cross-border collaboration among the five member countries. “But by combining our efforts, we will surely overcome all challenges before us”.

Later, at the Plenary session, Modi pitched for closer cooperation and coordination among BRICS nations and proposed a 10-point initiative to further the engagement.

BRICS “augurs the formation of a new world, in which the West will not dominate”, Fyodor Lukyanov, the Kremlin-linked chairman of the Council on Foreign and Defence Policy, wrote in Rossiiskaya Gazeta state daily.

“On Thursday its finance minister said China had bought around $1 billion worth of Russian domestic bonds this year”, reported Reuters.

“The Brics’ Summit in Ufa is probably the most important and nerve-racking than even the year of its launch” said Victoria Panova, Strategy Planning adviser at the National Committee on Brics Research.

Mr Kamath said that the NDB should not be viewed as a tool to help sanctions-hit companies but said the bank will look at requests from Russian companies.

Leaders on Thursday will discuss regional and global issues, including the Syria conflict, threat of the Isis group, the situation in Greece and Iran’s nuclear programme. She also said the other announcements would also be concertised.