Caption:Attorney-General and Minister for Finance, Hon. Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum meets with Indian Minister for External Affairs Hon. Sushma Swaraj in Delhi, India.Photo:SUPPLIED.
The Attorney-General and Minister for Finance, Hon. Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum and Minister for Industry, Trade and Tourism, Hon. Faiyaz Siddiq Koya with the Fijian High Commissioner to India, H.E. Yogesh Karan, met with the Indian Minister for External Affairs Hon, Sushma Swaraj in Delhi, India.
The Attorney-General stated that the meeting with Hon. Swaraj was to progress talks on a number of key bilateral issues that were discussed during Prime Minister Modi’s recent highly successful visit to Fiji.
“The idea of meeting senior Central Indian Government Ministers is to ensure that the commitments made during Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Fiji and his discussions with our Prime Minister Hon. JV Bainimarama are materialised” said the Attorney-General.
Technical assistance and cooperation and private sector participation in the area of trade, investment, health, agriculture, sugar, and air connectivity between the two countries were the key issues discussed.
“Air connectivity is important for the growth of trade, investment and tourism. Therefore, discussions were initiated at Government level regarding air services agreement and possibility of code-sharing by Indian Airlines with Fiji Airways”, said the Attorney-General.
“We had also discussed training of medical staff to allow for specialised skills to be developed in Fiji. Furthermore, we have sought assistance from India to put in place implementation systems on the supply, procurement methodology and distribution of medicine including drugs under the free medicine scheme” added Mr. Sayed-Khaiyum.
“We have discussed technical assistance and training to improve farming techniques, research for the development of new commodities and mentoring programme for developing new business models in the agriculture sector, to name a few. This is will be further discussed in detail by the Minister for Agriculture, Hon. Inia Seruiratu, during his visit next week” said the Attorney-General.
“We have had very successful discussions and will continue the dialogue to progress on a number of areas. Both Fiji and India want the commitments made during Prime Minister Modi’s visit to be implemented at the soonest” said the Attorney-General.
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