“Mohd Najib Bin Tun Haji Abdul Razak, the prime minister of Malaysia, will be chairing both the summits, which will be attended by heads of state and government of other ASEAN (Association of Sourheast Asian Nations) and East Asia Summit participating countries respectively”, Wadhwa said.
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“However, we do hope that this exhibition will materialise”, he said, adding that similar events had been organised during Li’s visits to other countries. Another event, which will appeal to the people back home, will be the Prime Minister’s visit to the INA Monument in Singapore, which is a memorial to Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. He said India was for speedy implementation of the declaration of code of conduct and was looking forward to conclusion of a document in this regard between ASEAN and China.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang will witness the signing of memoranda of understanding on bilateral co-operation in wide-ranging fields, including trade, culture and legal, during his visit to Kuala Lumpur this week.
Asean is now India’s fourth largest trading partner, with trade between India at Asean at $76.52 billion in 2014-15. On November 21, the Prime Minister will attend the 13th ASEAN-India Summit and will address the East Asia Summit the next day. Modi will unveil a statue of Swami Vivekananda and gift a bust of Mahatma Gandhi to be installed in Malaysia’s administrative capital Putrajaya.
PM is also expected to have bilateral meetings with Japan, China, New Zealand, Vietnam and Myanmar on the sidelines of the meetings in Kuala Lumpur.
The visit to Malaysia also has a bilateral component which will see Mr Modi hold talks with the top Malaysian leadership on ways to ramp up bilateral cooperation in a range of areas, including defence and security and take bilateral ties to a new level.
There are around five million people of Indian origin in the ASEAN countries, Wadhwa said.
The bilateral trade with Singapore is about United States dollars 17 billion and Singaporean companies are very active in India since early 1990s, including in equity markets. He will also address the Indian community.
In giving further examples, it also noted that Malaysia’s defence minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein had discussed “military cooperation” with China’s defence minister Chang Wanquan on November 5, while also visiting a U.S. aircraft carrier near Sabah on the invitation of U.S. defense secretary Ashton Carter on the same day.
Singapore’s Prime Minister is also expected to be present at the Lecture where the audience would be largely policymakers, think-tanks, academics and diplomatic community.
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“Singapore has agreed to set up a centre in ITI in Udaipur and would set up another skill centre in the North-East”, Wadhwa said.
