PM Modi embarks on two-day visit to Saudi Arabia
PM Modi embarks on two-day visit to Saudi Arabia
PM Modi jets-off to Saudi Arabia on a
two-day visit from April 22-23. This visit is at the invitation of Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Crown Prince and Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
As per the Ministry of External Affairs, the upcoming April 22-23 visit will be the first visit of PM to the desert island in his third term.
Earlier, he has travelled to the Saudi kingdom twice in 2016 and in 2019.
Reportedly, the visit follows the State Visit of Mohammed bin Salman to New Delhi in September 2023 to attend the G20 Summit and co-chair the first meeting of the India-Saudi Arabia Strategic Partnership Council.
Notedly, India and Saudi Arabia share close and friendly ties with a long history of socio-cultural and trade contacts. As strategic partners, the two countries share strong bilateral relations across various areas, including political, defence, security, trade, investment, energy, technology, health, education, culture and people-to-people ties.
India’s relations with the Kingdom have evolved into a stronger and enduring partnership in the past decade, expanding into many strategic domains, with growing investment commitments, broadening of defence cooperation and intensive high-level exchanges across sectors, the MEA statement said.
PM Modi’s visit reflects the importance India attaches to its bilateral relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
According to Ministry of External Affairs, it will provide an opportunity to further deepen and strengthen multi-faceted partnership, as well as to exchange views on various regional and international issues of mutual interest.
Moreover, the PM’s visit comes at a time when the US and Iran are holding talks with Washington seeking a deal on the latter’s nuclear programme and tensions in West Asia with the Hamas-Israeli conflict.
PM’s visit also comes ahead of the expected visit of US President Donald Trump to Saudi Arabia next month.
India and Saudi Arabia established diplomatic relations in 1947.
In 2010, the bilateral relationship was elevated to a Strategic Partnership.
There have been regular high level exchanges between India and Saudi Arabia. Beginning 2024-till date, there have been 11 Ministerial-level visits from India to Saudi Arabia from India to Saudi Arabia. Saudi Foreign Minister and Saudi Minister of Industry and Mineral Resources visited India in November 2024 and February 2025 respectively.
Saudi side extended excellent cooperation during Operation Kaveri for the evacuation of Indian citizens from Sudan via Jeddah.
Riyadh is also seat of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). India and GCC secretariat have maintained good relations and regular dialogues at official level. External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar visited Riyadh in September 2024 to co-chair the first India-GCC Ministerial Meeting.
Notably, Saudi Arabia is India’s fifth largest trading partner and India is Saudi Arabia’s second largest trade partner.
News Edit KV Raman
