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| 'It is natural that BRIC leaders should sit together' | | Excerpts from Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon's briefing on the eve of the PM?s visit to Russia |
| Shiv Shankar Menon / Jun 14, 2009, 00:20 IST |
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As far as the Shanghai Cooperation organisation (SCO) is concerned, India has participated in all the Heads of State and the Heads of Government meetings of the organisation since 2005. This is the first time that the Prime Minister will be leading the delegation himself. At the last Summit in 2008 in Dushanbe, the SCO had decided to lift the involvement of Observer States to a qualitative new level. And this time, for the first time, the Observer States and the Member States will be meeting together in both a restricted format and then in an expanded plenary where they will be considering all the issues together.
It is a measure of how important we think the SCO is that the Prime Minister is going himself, also because we think it is particularly important that regional cooperation in Asia should be encouraged at a time when the world economy is under considerable stress and when there are major issues which need to be discussed at the summit level.
In the afternoon of June 16, there will be a meeting of the BRIC leaders – Brazil, Russia, India and China – where again there will be a restricted meeting of the leaders followed by delegation-level talks, after which I believe the media will be addressed by the BRIC leaders themselves.The BRIC leaders are supposed to, are anticipated to, exchange views on a range of views such as the global financial and economic crisis; its implications for the world economy, for security; progress in the G-20 summits; food and energy security; development and climate change issues; and on regional developments.
As you know, BRIC actually came into existence because of the combined economic strength of these four countries. If you look at it today, the BRIC constitutes 25.9 per cent of the total land area of the world; 40 per cent of global population; and about 40 per cent of global GDP as well. So, it is a sizeable grouping in any sense of the word. These also have been, for some time, among the fastest growing economies in the world with tremendous potential. So, I think it is natural that the leaders of these four countries should sit together. It is the first time we are doing a summit level meeting. We have had other level meetings of the BRIC, ministerial and other levels. And BRIC leaders have also met on the sidelines of other meetings but now they are doing a stand-alone summit. So, in that sense it is a progression on what we have had in the past.
Maybe I will leave the rest to questions, if there are any that you would like to ask about this.
Foreign Secretary, since you have said that he will be attending the SCO meeting, is there any chance that he would meet the Pakistani Prime Minister or President during this meeting?
Well, they will be in the same room, same place, same time. I am sure there will be a meeting. But what sort of meeting, it is very difficult to say. The time is very limited. PM is arriving there only on the evening of June 15. June 16, as you can see, is taken up with the meetings. They will I am sure meet, shake hands, but more than that it is hard to predict at this stage. There are several leaders who will be there at the same time and there will be, I am sure, opportunities for meetings. But it would not, I think, be easy to organise a structured programme in quite the same way.
Mr. Menon, are we looking at more bilateral meetings, say with the Chinese President?
As I said, the prime minister essentially has one day there, June 16. He has the SCO in the morning, the BRIC through the afternoon and evening. So, there will certainly be meetings. At this meeting together they will have social occasions to meet. But we cannot give you a list of scheduled bilateral meetings. They will meet certainly. They will have a conversation. But more than that, I cannot tell you at this stage.
Just one follow-up question. Talking about the Zardari-PM meeting, they will meet you say?
They will be in the same room at the same time.
Does our position on resumption of the dialogue stay the same? Is there no change in our position, or there would not be any?
I think there can be nothing more authoritative than what the Prime Minister said on the floor of Parliament earlier this week.
There are reports emanating from Islamabad, even from India and from Washington, that resumption of talks between the two countries is around the corner. What is your response?
That we do not negotiate or discuss these things through the media. What we had to say the Prime Minister has said on the floor of the House. As I said, you cannot be more authoritative than that.
Excerpts from the briefing by Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon on the eve of the Prime Minister’s visit to Russia, June 12, 2009, New Delhi
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