NEW DELHI: A day after former US President Donald Trump said he was looking forward to meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the latter's upcoming visit to the US from September 21-23, the Indian government said a meeting between the two has not yet been scheduled.
"PM Modi is a fantastic man and is coming to meet me next week," Trump had said two days back.
"We are currently trying to schedule several meetings of Prime Minister, based on the time available for the meetings. So at this moment I cannot specifically tell you whether meetings have been fixed or not. We are looking from all viewpoints, considering how much time we have with whom the meetings can be arranged. We will update once the meeting are fixed," said Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri on Thursday.
PM Modi will take part in the Quad Summit during his visit to the US. The White House said China is going to be high on the agenda of the summit.
"All regional, international, geopolitical situations will be on the agenda before the Quad leaders and the essence from the discussions will be reflected in the joint statement that would be issued. All key challenges confronting the international community in so far as aspects related to development, peace, security will be discussed by the leaders," said Misri in response to a query by The New Indian Express.
A number of bilateral meetings will be held between PM Modi and other world leaders. PM Modi will not be meeting the Bangladesh interim government chairman Prof Mohammad Yunus. The MEA also denied that they had received any request from Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy for a meeting with PM Modi.
PM Modi will be leaving for the US on September 21 and will first attend the Quad Summit in Delaware where he would meet the other Quad leaders -- US President Joe Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
This will be President Biden and PM Kishida’s last Quad Summit. India will host the next Quad Summit in 2025 with the next US President – which could either be Donald Trump or Kamala Harris.
On September 22, PM Modi will attend a diaspora event at Nassau Coliseum in New York. The arrangements for this event have been made privately by the diaspora, so there is no clarity on who will be invited. On September 23, PM Modi will address the Summit of the Future at New York.