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After Srinagar, group of foreign envoys to visit Jammu today
The envoys will be meeting several delegations comprising civil society members, District Development Council members and political leaders in Jammu. The delegation will leave for New Delhi in the evening
A group of 23 foreign envoys and senior diplomats will arrive in Jammu on Thursday morning.
Thursday is the second day of the foreign envoys’ visit to Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). Soon after arriving in Jammu, the envoys will meet with the chief justice of J&K high court.
Later they will meet with J&K’s lieutenant governor Manoj Sinha at Raj Bhavan. He is likely to brief the envoys about the development projects in J&K and the situation in the Union territory.
The envoys will be meeting several delegations comprising civil society members, District Development Council (DDC) members and political leaders at a hotel in Jammu. The delegation will leave for New Delhi in the evening.
The group includes European Union (EU) ambassador Ugo Astuto, and envoys from Brazil, Cuba, Estonia, Finland, Tajikistan, France, Ireland, Netherlands, Portugal, EU, Bangladesh, Malawi, Eritria, Cote d’Ivore, Ghana, Senegal, Swedan, Italy, Malaysia, Bolivia, Belgium and Kyrgyzstan.
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In Srinagar, the envoys had an hour-long meeting with DDC and panchayat members on Wednesday.
The diplomats also met different groups at the Sher-e-Kashmir International Conference Centre (SKICC) on the banks of the Dal Lake, including some writers, artisans, businessmen and people running NGOs.
The group also visited the Hazratbal shrine and meet a small group of local journalists in the evening to receive first-hand information about the situation in J&K. They also meet mayor Junaid Mattu and DDC members in Srinagar—mostly from Apni Party and independent candidates.
This is the third batch of diplomats to visit Jammu and Kashmir since the government scrapped the region’s special status in August 2019 and split it into two union territories in an effort to improve governance, boost development and tackle cross-border terrorism.
The first two groups visited Jammu and Kashmir in January and February 2020, and plans to send a batch of envoys from EU states last year were put on hold because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
