Vowing to boost bilateral trade, S Jaishankar holds wide ranging talks with Uzbekistani Foreign Minister

New Delhi, January 15: External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and his Uzbekistani counterpart Abdulaziz Kamilov held wide-ranging talks in New Delhi yesterday vowing to boost bilateral trade and investment and explore possibilities for a preferential trade agreement.

 

 

Emphasizing on the need to boost bilateral trade and investment, the two Ministers agreed to work towards early conclusion of the feasibility study to be jointly conducted by the two sides to begin negotiations for a preferential trade agreement.

 

The External Affairs Minister reiterated the need for early operationalization of the 200 million US dollars of Line of Credit extended by India to Uzbekistan for which Uzbek side is in the process of finalizing necessary details of the identified projects.

 

Referring to the strategic partnership of the two countries, both the Ministers emphasized the need to maintain the momentum of high-level exchanges and implement the agreements reached during the visits of President of Uzbekistan to India in October 2018 and January last year.

 

 

Foreign Minister Kamilov reiterated the invitation extended by President of Uzbekistan to the Prime Minister to visit Uzbekistan. Kamilov briefed Jaishankar on Uzbekistan's efforts to liberalize its economy, create business friendly conditions and attract foreign investment, including that from Indian companies.

 

The Ministers agreed to strengthen cooperation in the fields of defence, counter-terrorism and security, information and communication technology, development partnership and promote cultural exchanges, the statement said. Cooperation in the multilateral fora, including the United Nations and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization was also discussed during the meeting.

 

Later Jaishankar also met Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics and Foreign Minister of Czech Republic Tomas Petricek.