External Affairs Minister Dr. S. Jaishankar and Chinese Ambassador Xu Feihong during a meeting, in New Delhi.
| Photo Credit: PTI

Chinese Ambassador Xu Feihong called on External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on Tuesday.

The meeting comes days after a U.S. Congressional delegation met Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama in Dharamshala and called for “self-determination” for Tibetans.

“We exchanged views on China-India relations and other issues of common interest. Thanks for his best wishes. Look forward to working with the Indian side to push forward the development of China-India relations towards the right direction,” Mr. Xu said after the meeting. 

Mr. Jaishankar also met a number of other envoys, including High Commissioner of Sri Lanka Kshenuka D. Senewiratne and High Commissioner of New Zealand Patrick John Rata.

He also sent out a message on the meeting with the Chinese envoy, saying, “Discussed our bilateral relationship and our common interest in its stabilisation and progress.”

Also Read | After friction, Chinese Premier Li Qiang greets PM Modi for third term

Mr. Jaishankar hosted the U.S. Congressional delegation last week at the Hyderabad House hours after they spoke in support of Tibetans’s right to “self-determination”.

The Congressional delegation, led by House Committee on Foreign Affairs Chairman Michael McCaul and ex-Speaker Nancy Pelosi, had also called upon China to avoid interfering in the process of finding a successor to the Dalai Lama.

The U.S. lawmakers also met Mr. Modi during their stay. The statements from the U.S. lawmakers had drawn a strong verbal response from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China, which declared that Beijing would take “resolute measures” to firmly defend its territorial sovereignty.

New Delhi:

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Wednesday defended the implementation of Agniveer Scheme in India which abruptly halted the recruitment of military personnel from Nepal and said that New Delhi will reform its policies prioritizing Indian interest, and “an Indian decision cannot be made because somebody else’s interest is at stake.”

“Why did we do Agniveer? We did it for ourselves. We will reform our armed forces, obviously with Indian interests in mind,” EAM Jaishankar said while interacting with students at a session on “Vishwa Bandhu Bharat” at Gargi College in New Delhi.

“Any reform, I’m not talking now, Agniveer, an Indian decision cannot be made because somebody else’s interest is at stake. India will decide on what is India’s interest,” he added.

The Union Cabinet on 14th June 2022 approved an attractive recruitment scheme for Indian youth to serve in the Armed Forces called AGNIPATH and the youth selected under this scheme will be known as Agniveers. AGNIPATH allows patriotic and motivated youth to serve in the Armed Forces for a period of four years.

After it was implemented in September 2022, the scheme stopped or abruptly halted recruitment from Nepal.

EAM Jaishankar also addressed India’s diplomatic row with Maldives and asserted that governments may have different viewpoints but the neighbour countries cannot move away from each other.

“They (Maldives) have their politics. Sometimes you have a government that may have a viewpoint about India, but at the end of the day, we tell them saying, look, we are all neighbours. We can’t move away from each other,” EAM said.

“Example that somebody can give you, I can give you a reverse example, say, in Nepal, you know, for years, Nepal has a tremendous power, ability to generate electricity. We are logical customers, but for political reasons, they never did it. Now they are willing to do it in Sri Lanka, as I said, Sri Lankans know actually who really helped them out. If you go to Bangladesh today, the thinking about India has changed fundamentally,” he asserted India’s strengthening relations with its neighbours.

His remarks came as Maldives Foreign Minister Moosa Zameer departed from Male to pay an official visit to India amid strained ties triggered after Maldives asked India to replace its military personnel from the island nation.

Meanwhile, India has said that it will replace its military personnel from Maldives before May 10.

On May 3, India and Maldives held the 4th meeting of the bilateral High-Level Core Group and reviewed the replacement of Indian military personnel from the Island nation by May 10 and noted that the government will replace military personnel before the noted time. Earlier, the Mohamed Muizzu-led Maldives government formally requested that India withdraw its troops from Male.

Earlier, addressing the controversy surrounding Nepal’s depiction of certain Indian territories on its currency notes, External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar highlighted the complexities of managing relationships with neighbouring countries.

S Jaishankar acknowledged that dealing with neighbouring nations often involves navigating political intricacies.

“Sometimes, dealing with our neighbours involves navigating a bit of politics. It’s about balancing our interests with theirs,” said EAM Jaishankar during a press interaction here on Sunday.

He also cautioned that there might not be positivity towards India among all its neighbours, citing instances where unfavourable opinions have been voiced. “If you visit places like Sri Lanka, you might hear some unfavourable opinions from government officials or individuals,” he said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said Canada had seen significant amounts of “organised crime relating to secessionist forces. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

In the latest round of sparring between India and Canada over the killing of Khalistani separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia last June, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said the government had told the Canadian Government that it was not its “policy“ to engage in such acts.

He also said that Canada had a “very permissive” environment as far as secessionist activity was concerned.

“We told the Canadians that this is not the Government of India’s policy,” Mr. Jaishankar said about the allegations of India’s involvement in Nijjar’s death. The Canadians were also told that if they had specific information, the government “was open to looking at it”, as per the Minister. 

Also Read | U.S. calls for ‘full and fair investigation’ into Canada’s allegations against India

Mr. Jaishankar was speaking at an event at the Council for Foreign Relations in New York, moderated by former U.S. Ambassador to India, Kenneth Juster.

Canada has a ‘very permissive’ environment: Jaishankar  

Seeking to provide context to the situation, Mr. Jaishankar said Canada had seen significant amounts of “organised crime relating to secessionist forces [i.e., supporters of India-related secessionist movements, such as the cause of Khalistan]”. 

“We have actually been badgering the Canadians,” he said. “We have given them a lot of information about organised crime leadership, which operates out of Canada.”  

The Minister said India had made several extradition requests of Canada. 

“Our concern is that it’s really been very permissive because of political reasons,” Mr. Jaishankar said, adding that India’s diplomats have been threatened and its consulates attacked.

Also Read | Hardeep Singh Nijjar killing | No specific information shared by Canada, says India

He said there was interference in India’s politics, often justified on grounds of democracy.  

Canada and India have exchanged diplomatic fire over the past week, requiring each other to downsize their missions and exchanging words. Canadian Government officials, had, even as recently as Tuesday, said they were concerned about foreign interference in Canada’s politics. 

Asked for a comment on the reported sharing of intelligence between Five Eyes countries on Nijjar’s killing and reports that the FBI had warned certain persons about threats to their lives after the incident, Mr. Jaishankar said, “I’m not part of the Five Eyes.“

“I’m certainly not part of the FBI,” he added.

When asked if he was provided with evidence by the Canadian Government, specifically evidence of intercepted communications (i.e., allegedly linking Indian Government agents to Nijjar’s killing), Mr. Jaishankar did not clearly confirm or deny whether he had seen the documents.  

“Are you asking if the Canadians gave us documents?” he said. 

When asked again if the Canadians had given him [i.e., the government] a document regarding India’s intercepted diplomatic communications, he said, “I have said that if somebody gives us specific or relevant information, we’re prepared to look at it.”

Mr. Jaishankar was again pressed on whether he had received the evidence of purported intercepted communications.

“If I had, would I not be looking at it?” he said.

He was pressed further for a “yes” or “no” at which point the Mr. Juster intervened.

New Delhi:

There are strong links between jobs creation, infrastructure growth and ensuring private capital from abroad can easily access manufacturing opportunities in the domestic market, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar explained Tuesday in an exclusive interview with NDTV.

He said it the government had to build infrastructure and frame policies that make it easy for investors to invest in or run businesses in India, and then took a veiled dig at the opposition, referring to “people blocking infrastructure… business” and accusing them of “blocking employment in this country”.

“From ’14 (when Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power) we have started to rectify policies that made it hard to not just manufacture in this country, but also employ in this country,” Mr Jaishankar responded to a question on making India a more appealing destination for foreign investment.

“… if you were to ask me, ‘Have we done a lot in the last 10 years?’, my answer would be ‘Yes.’ Do we have to do a lot more in the next 10? My answer would be ‘Yes.’ I think there were real mistakes and shortcomings on our part…”

“You know… people often put this in terms of ‘business’. I also put it to you… to me ‘business’ and ’employment’ are two sides of the same coin. The people who are blocking infrastructure… people blocking business… are also people blocking employment.”

Mr Jaishankar stressed on the need to surmount these challenges and said, “Today, I would say, this is how we become more competitive… how we create, bring in jobs” and highlighted the Prime Minister’s June visit to the United States, during which a semiconductor manufacturing firm said it would set up an $825 million plant in Gujarat.

Micron Technology, Inc. said construction of the facility in Gujarat – Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state – will begin this year and the first phase will be operational in late-2024.

The goal, Mr Jaishankar told NDTV, is to make India “the place we (foreign companies) are going to go and put up (manufacturing business)… this is what this is all about.”