India cooperates with other countries of G20: Foreign Secretary on informing China about Global South Summit

New Delhi [India], January 13 (ANI): Indian Foreign Secretary Vinay Mohan Kwatra on Friday said that India has robust cooperation with the other countries of the G20 across all the agenda items that are focused priorities of the G20, in response to a question on why India informed China about the Voice of Global South Summit.

"India has robust cooperation with the other countries of the G20 across all the agenda items that are focused priorities of the G20 and it is under that rubric that we consulted every G20 developing country with whom we have strong development partnership," Kwatra said during a special briefing on Voice of Global South Summit.

Kwatra said that the focus of the global summit was on those countries that do not have the benefit of having a presence in the G20 proceedings but there is still a critical need to pick up their voices, to channel their voices.

On the Centre for Excellence for Global South Scholarship, Kwatra said that India already does a considerable amount of capacity-building operations, and India does it with the whole host of developing countries.

"This is one of our strong areas and it is the prime minister's decision to enlarge the scope of these schemes to include and encompass the entire global south," Kwatra said.

Kwatra said that the Voice of Global South Summit received a strong and positive response from across the world.

"The overall theme of the summit was unity of voice, unity of purpose. A total of 125 countries participated in the initiative. This includes 29 countries from the Caribbean and Latin America, 47 countries from Africa, seven countries from Europe, and 31 countries from Asia, clearly a strong and positive response across the whole world through the summit," Kwatra said during a special online briefing on Voice of Global South Summit.

Kwatra showed infographics of the global participation in the summit.

He said that India has been in close contact with the countries that are G20 members.

India's G20 presidency will be the first G20 presidency that can claim to have captured the sentiments and views of the entire developing world, not just limit itself to the large economy's perspective, Kwatra said during the session.

He said that almost all countries accepted India's invitation and participated in the summit. "Participants thanked Narendra Modi for his personal leadership which was instrumental in conceptualising and crystalising the voice of the global south at a time which is particularly difficult for the developing world facing numerous challenges across the political and economic domain," the Foreign Secretary said. (ANI)