NEW DELHI: National Security Advisor Ajit Doval has held wide-ranging talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Shoigu in St Petersburg and discussed important issues of “mutual interests” amid fresh calls for India’s possible role in finding a solution to the Ukraine conflict.
The Doval-Shoigu meeting on Wednesday evening took place on the margins of a conclave of national security advisors of the BRICS (Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa) nations.
It is understood that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv on August 23 figured in the talks between the two NSAs.
“Both sides reviewed progress in bilateral cooperation and discussed important issues of mutual interest,” the Indian embassy in Russia said on the talks between Doval and Shoigu.
Doval’s visit to Russia comes two-and-half weeks after Prime Minister Modi paid a high-profile trip to Ukrainian capital Kyiv.
In his talks with Zelenskyy, Modi said both Ukraine and Russia should sit together without wasting time to end the ongoing war and that India was ready to play an “active role” to restore peace in the region.
The prime minister said India was on the side of peace since the beginning of the conflict and he would even like to contribute personally for a peaceful resolution of the crisis.
