Modi to leave for Vietnam tour, G-20 summit today
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will leave on Friday for a bilateral visit to Vietnam and to attend the annual G-20 summit in China’s Hangzhou.
Modi’s first stop will be Vietnam from where he will leave for Hangzhou on September 3 to attend the summit on September 4 and 5.
The Prime Minister will return to India on September 5 and will again leave for Laos on a two-day visit to attend the annual India-ASEAN and East Asia Summits.
Modi will hold wide-ranging talks with the top leadership of the resource-rich country to deepen ties in key areas of defence, security and trade, and oil exploration.
India’s ONGC Videsh Limited is engaged in oil exploration projects in Vietnam for over three decades and there will be announcements about new projects in the sector during the visit.
At the G-20 Summit, India is likely to raise a host of issues ranging from choking terror funding and checking tax evasion to cutting transaction cost of remittance.
On the sidelines of the summit, Modi will have a bilateral meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping and attend a BRICS leaders’ meet on September 4.
Secretary (west) in the ministry of external affairs, Sujatha Mehta, said issues such as global tax reform, climate-friendly financing and market access for antibiotics are some of the issues likely to be discussed at the meetings.
Niti Aayog vice-chairman Arvind Panagariya is India’s sherpa for the G-20.
There are likely to be detailed deliberations on automatic exchange of tax information at G-20, besides discussion on ways to tackle slowdown in the global economy.
India has already agreed to the Automatic Exchange of Information Convention of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), an intergovernmental economic organisation.