Blitz Bureau
NEW DELHI: India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on October 27, met the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Kuala Lumpur and discussed bilateral ties between the two countries. The meeting comes amid the ongoing trade talks between the two countries. In a post on his official X account, Jaishankar wrote: “Glad to meet @SecRubio this morning in Kuala Lumpur. Appreciated the discussion on our bilateral ties as well as regional and global issues.”
“We are in dialogue with the United States of America. Our teams are engaged. We recently had the commerce secretary visit the US, and he met with his counterparts. We continue to engage with them, and talks are progressing. We hope to work towards a fair and equitable agreement in the near future,” Union Minister Piyush Goyal said last week. Earlier, Rubio dismissed growing concerns that Washington’s growing strategic ties with Pakistan are meant to sideline India. He noted that the relationship with Islamabad would not undermine the US’ “deep, historic, and important” partnership with New Delhi.
Earlier, Rubio while addressing the press en route to Doha, Qatar, on Saturday, asserted that New Delhi understands the necessity of engaging multiple nations in a mature diplomatic framework. “I don’t think anything we’re doing with Pakistan comes at the expense of our relationship or friendship with India, which is deep, historic, and important,” Rubio told reporters when asked about India’s apprehensions over the recent surge in the US-Pakistan relationship.
