Russia, India, China must work together to bring aid to Afghanistan

Speaking at the 18th Russia-India-China (RIC) countries meeting at the level of foreign ministers, Jaishankar said it is necessary for the RIC countries to coordinate their perspectives on the threats of terrorism, bigotry and drug trafficking.

The meeting was attended by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov. India took over the chairmanship of RIC in September last year after a tripartite meeting in Moscow.

In his speech, Jaishankar said that as a neighbor and partner of Afghanistan, India was concerned about the recent events in that country, especially the suffering of the Afghan people.

“In line with our commitment to the well being of the Afghan people, we have offered to supply 50,000 metric tonnes of wheat to Afghanistan to tide over the drought situation,” the minister said.

“RIC countries need to work together to ensure that humanitarian aid reaches the Afghan people without interruption and politicization,” he said.

In his remarks, Jaishankar underscored India’s continued commitment to closer dialogue and cooperation between the three largest countries in the Eurasian region under the RIC mechanism.

“I believe that our cooperation in areas such as trade, investment, healthcare, education, science and technology and politics can contribute significantly to global development, peace and stability,” Jaishankar said.

“This would be in line with our common ethos of recognizing ‘the world as one family’. Our approach to global development should be human-centred and leave no one behind,” he said.

The COVID-19 pandemic had highlighted the importance of the interdependence of an interconnected world and the need of the hour was a ‘one earth one health’ approach,” he said.

“This means a timely, transparent, effective and non-discriminatory international response to global health challenges, including pandemics, with equitable and affordable access to medicines and critical health supplies,” the minister said.

“We recognize that reformed multilateralism is needed in a multi-polar and re-balanced world based on the sovereign equality of nations and respect for international law and contemporary realities,” he said.

A joint statement issued after the talks said that the three foreign ministers reiterated that “a multi-polar and rebalanced world based on the sovereign equality of nations and respect for international law and strengthening the multilateral system to reflect contemporary realities”. needs to be done and improved.”

“The Ministers reaffirmed their commitment to uphold international law, including the purposes and principles enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations. The Ministers recognized that existing interconnected international challenges, in particular, the United Nations and its principal organs, and Must be addressed through strengthened and reformed multilateral system of other multilateral institutions such as International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank (WB), World Trade Organization (WTO), World Health Organization (WHO), diverse of our times With a view to enhance our capacity to effectively address the challenges and adapt them to the realities of the 21st century,” the joint statement said.

On Afghanistan, the statement said, Russia, India and China “reaffirmed their support for the basic principle of Afghan-led and Afghan-owned peace and called for the formation of a truly inclusive government,” all major representative of the ethnic and political groups of the country.

“The ministers advocated a peaceful, secure, united, sovereign, stable and prosperous inclusive Afghanistan that exists in harmony with its neighbours. He called on the Taliban to act in accordance with the results of all recently held international and regional forms of negotiations on Afghanistan, including UN resolutions on Afghanistan.