India, Russia strongly condemned terrorism in all forms: MEA

Both India and Russia have said no country should provide safe havens to terrorists or extremist ideology, said Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar on Saturday during a media briefing.

"The two (PM Modi-Prez Putin) leaders strongly condemned terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, and emphasised the necessity for comprehensive international collaboration to ensure its eradication and expressed the need to deny safe havens to terrorists and counter the spread of terrorist ideology, stop recruitment, prevent travel of terrorist strengthen border management and essentially have a international legal regime built on the principle of zero tolerance for direct or indirect support of terrorism ," he said.

"We saw Russia more as a friend than as a partner. The sense of the meeting was that the relationship has recorded very substantial progress. Both leaders also noted that the high-level exchanges were essential in taking the relationship forward," Jaishankar added.

On India-Russia business relationship, S Jaishankar said, "We had a very positive meeting with the commerce ministers. We are looking at the north-south corridor via Iran which will cut down the transport time to Russia. Our business relationships will definitely improve with Russia."

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin held delegation-level talks on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Goa. Both leaders later made statements detailing the partnership between the two countries. India and Russia signed a total of 16 agreements mostly in the fields of defence, energy, power, shipbuilding and space. Both PM Modi and President Putin also inaugurated units 3 and 4 of the Kudankulam nuclear plant.