President’s visit to New Delhi A point of positive transformation in the relationship: Indian Foreign Secy

• President to visit New Delhi for bilateral discussions on July 20 and 21

By Kelum Bandara   

Visiting Indian Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra said yesterday his discussions with the Sri Lankan leadership and the Foreign Ministry were essentially focused on trying to ensure that the upcoming visit of President Ranil Wickremesinghe is actually a point of positive transformation in the relationship.  

The President is visiting New Delhi for bilateral discussions on July 20 and 21.   

Making his remarks to a group of journalists at India House, he said the purpose of his visit, ahead of the President’s visit to New Delhi, is essentially to prepare for the upcoming visit.   
 “We also discussed the key areas of partnership that we could progress ahead of the visit, going into the visit, priorities of the Sri Lankan leadership, as also shared with this the perspective of our leadership on the relationship, the strength of the relationship, different elements of cooperation in the relationship, elements of our partnership in years ahead across the entire matrix of economic partnership that India and Sri Lanka enjoy.   

As I said, our objective is to ensure that the visit of the President of Sri Lanka to India is a huge success. He is a well-known leader and a very strong supporter of the relationship. We have worked and cooperated very well in the last 14-16 months of various challenges that Sri Lanka went through and I can assure that a very warm welcome awaits him in India. We eagerly look forward to the President’s visit to India.”