Naidu departs for Delhi after NAM Summit in Azerbaijan

Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu on Saturday departed for Delhi after concluding his two-day 18th Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit in Baku.

During the summit, Naidu held "fruitful discussions and deliberations" with several world leaders.

"The Vice president, M Venkaiah Naidu emplaning for Delhi today after fruitful discussions & deliberations at the NAM Summit in Baku. VP delivered the national statement at the Summit and held discussions with a number of leaders on issues of mutual interest," read a tweet from the official twitter handle of the Vice President.

The NAM kickstarted on Friday. The theme of this year's NAM summit was 'Upholding Bandung Principles to ensure concerted and adequate response to the challenges of the contemporary world'.

India is a founding member of NAM, which is one of the largest gatherings of world leaders.

Besides attending the summit, Naidu met several world leaders including Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro, Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani, Vietnamese vice president Dang Thi Ngoc Thinh, Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Nepalese Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli and Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

On Saturday, Naidu visited a fire temple, a signifier of the historical and cultural exchanges between India and Azerbaijan.

In his address at the summit, the Vice President called on all NAM countries to come together to forge a common front against terror in all its forms as there was no justification for violent extremist ideologies and terrorist actions that maim and murder innocents. He also hit out at Pakistan for misusing the summit to justify Islamabad's longstanding policy of conducting cross-border terrorism against its neighbours.