Apulia [Italy], June 15
Prime Minister Narendra Modi met his Canadian counterpart Justin Trudeau on the sidelines of the G7 Summit here on Friday (local time).
“Met Canadian PM @JustinTrudeau at the G7 Summit,” PM Modi said, sharing a post on X, after the meeting.
The meeting happened amid strained diplomatic relations between the two countries after Trudeau had accused the “agents of the Indian government” of killing terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Canada last year. However, India has dismissed the accusations as “absurd” and “motivated.”
Nijjar, who was designated a terrorist by India’s National Investigation Agency in 2020, was shot and killed outside a Gurdwara in Surrey in June last year.
The G7 summit is being held from June 13-15 in Italy’s Apulia region, where India has been invited as an ‘Outreach Country’ to the summit and has participation from the seven member countries, the US, UK, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, and France, as well as the European Union.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni received global leaders, including UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, US President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, among others, for the 50th Summit of the Group of Seven (G7).
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni had invited PM Modi to attend the G7 Summit. It is India’s 11th and PM Modi’s fifth consecutive participation at the G7 Summit.
Italy, which has invited Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the G7 Summit Outreach Sessions, is India’s fourth-largest trading partner in the European Union, with bilateral trade currently standing at USD 15 billion.
The two countries have close and friendly relations and celebrated 75 years of diplomatic relations last year.
On January 1, Italy assumed the G7 Presidency for the seventh time.
(ANI)
