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Jaishankar to visit Canada next week to attend G7 foreign ministers’ meet
Jaishankar will likely to have a bilateral meeting with Canada’s foreign minister Anita Anand, as well counterparts from the other countries
Toronto: Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Anita Anand officially announced on Thursday that she has invited her Indian counterpart External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar to participate in the G7 Foreign Ministers’ meet scheduled for next week.
The meet will be held in Niagara, a scenic region of the country near the famous Falls, on November 11 and 12.
In a statement issued on Thursday, Global Affairs Canada (GAC), the country’s foreign ministry, said the Canada is “pleased to host ministers from several outreach countries, reflecting shared global priorities and partnerships”.
The participants will include India, and a senior official confirmed that Jaishankar will be at the meet and is likely to have a bilateral meeting with Anand, as well counterparts from the other countries.
Other than the G7 nations of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, and the European Union, the outreach countries invited are India, Australia, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, South Korea, South Africa and Ukraine.
“This important gathering will provide an opportunity to advance Canada’s G7 agenda on pressing global economic and security challenges, including maritime security and prosperity, economic resilience, energy security and critical minerals,” the statement noted.
Vina Nadjibulla, vice-president, research and strategy at the Asia-Pacific Foundation of Canada, said it was “good to see India among the guests” for the meet where the Indo-Pacific will be well represented. She added, “It will be another opportunity for Canada and India in the repair and rebuilding of the relationship.”
She said the topics of priority listed in the agenda also featured in the joint statement released by India and Canada when Anand travelled for a bilateral visit to New Delhi and Mumbai last month.
Citing the agenda for the meet, she said, “India is an important player on all of those topics.” She pointed to the critical area of maritime security, where India could play a significant role not just with regard to the Indian Ocean but also the South China Sea.
As the host of the G7 FMs’ meeting, Anand is expected to hold bilateral talks with the invitees. If that does occur, it will be the first bilateral between the foreign ministers in Canada since Jaishankar travelled to Ottawa and Toronto in December 2019 and met with François-Philippe Champagne, his counterpart at the time, and currently Minister of Finance and National Revenue.
Prior to that Anand’s visit to India, she met Jaishankar on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York on September 29.
If they were to have another bilateral this month, it would be their third within a span of 45 days.
India has also invited Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney for the AI Impact Summit in New Delhi in February. While the Canadian prime minister’s office has not confirmed whether Carney will attend that global meet, New Delhi is hopeful of having him over for a visit by April next year. But even before that, there is a high likelihood of the two prime ministers holding a bilateral on the margins of the G20 leaders’ summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, later this month.
