Jaishankar kicks off engagements in New York on sidelines of UNGA

India’s external affairs minister S Jaishankar commenced his 11-day visit to the United States (US) with a range of meetings on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York on Monday.

With a focus on cementing strategic partnerships, institutionalising new and strengthening old mechanisms of plurilateral cooperation, sending a message of solidarity to the global south, and pushing the agenda of United Nations (UN) reform, India’s external affairs minister S Jaishankar commenced his 11-day visit to the United States (US) with a range of meetings on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York on Monday.

External affairs minister S Jaishankar at the India-Presidency Pro Tempore CELAC meeting, in New York, on Monday. (PTI)

Over the course of the week in New York, the minister will participate in over 50 meetings in all formats. He will address the UNGA for the first time as foreign minister, attend a special event with a focus on India’s partnership with the UN, and give public remarks at Columbia University, among other engagements.

Latin American focus

Jaishankar started his day with a meeting with the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), a grouping of 33 countries in the region. He met the ministers of Argentina, which holds the pro tempore presidency of the grouping, Guatemala, Colombia and Trinidad and Tobago.

A ministry of external affairs (MEA) statement said that the two sides discussed issues such as the post-pandemic economic recovery and agreed to work closely on “trade and commerce, agriculture, food and energy security, health, vaccine production, traditional medicine and logistics.”

The statement added, “They also discussed regional and multilateral issues of mutual interests. Both sides acknowledged their cooperation in UN and other multilateral bodies, and agreed to work together on global issues like UN reforms and Climate Change.”

India was one of the first countries to have started a dialogue mechanism with the regional body a decade ago, but the forum got revitalised after a gap of five years. As China’s influence in the region grows, New Delhi is making a bid to increase its footprint in the region, leveraging traditional strengths such as the diaspora in the Caribbean and newer initiatives such as the provision of vaccines and growing economic engagement and investments. Just this year, from the Indian side, the former President of India (Ram Nath Kovind), EAM Jaishankar and minister of state Meenakshi Lekhi have visited eight countries in the region.

After the meeting, Jaishankar tweeted, “Started the #UNGA meetings in New York with the India-CELAC Quartet. Both sides appreciated how much our economic and political cooperation has grown in the last few years.” He added that both sides had exchanged views on global challenges and “saw great value in intensifying out cooperation.”

A person familiar with the relationship said that Latin America’s geographical position, abundance of natural resources and critical minerals, agricultural potential, and common concerns on food, energy security and climate gave India’s ties with the region substance.

UNSC: Present and future partners

The minister then met the Olta Zhacka, the foreign minister of Albania. Albania is currently a member of the UN Security Council, has been an important voice on debates in Ukraine, and has supported India’s efforts on counterterrorism in relevant UN bodies, including on the issue of listing of Pakistani terrorists blocked by China. After the meeting, Jaishankar tweeted that both sides valued their cooperation in UNSC and discussed strengthening the bilateral relationship. “Exchanged views on Ukraine and energy.”

Jaishankar then met Malta’s foreign minister, Ian Borg. Malta will become a non-permanent member of the UNSC from January 2023 and the meeting was an opportunity to share India’s view of the UN process with Malta and get a sense of its priorities. The minister said after the meeting that India had “warmly congratulated” Malta on its election to UNSC and both sides agreed to deepen cooperation in the UN and Commonwealth, and explored strengthening bilateral economic ties.

After the meeting, Borg told HT, “We have a very good bilateral relationship with India. We received minister Lekhi in Malta recently. In this meeting, we reiterated our excellent relations and how we can work together, be it in Commonwealth and sharing of our experiences at the SC. You have important investments in Malta, and we would like to step up investments in Indian market.” Borg said he looked forward to additional consultations with India in the coming weeks on technical issues.

First India-France-UAE trilateral

Later on Monday, Jaishankar was scheduled to hold bilateral meetings with foreign ministers of Egypt, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Cuba, Indonesia, Ethiopia and the president of the 77th UN General Assembly, Csaba Korosi.

Jaishankar will also participate in first India-France-UAE trilateral. The grouping is a sign of the strong bilateral ties between India and France, and India and the UAE, and represents yet another institutional architecture in the Indo-Pacific.

After a meeting of focal points of the three countries in July, the MEA had said that the three sides “exchanged perspectives on the Indo-Pacific region and explored the potential areas of trilateral cooperation including Maritime Security, Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR), Blue Economy, Regional Connectivity, Cooperation in Multilateral Fora, Energy and Food Security, Innovation and Startups, Supply Chain Resilience and Cultural and People-to-People Cooperation”.