India and the UAE will look to take their already strong strategic partnership to an all-time high when External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and his counterpart Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan meet in Delhi today for a comprehensive strategic dialogue.
Shri Jaishankar and Sheikh Al Nahyan will review the entire gamut of relations between India and the UAE and focus on enhancing the strategic partnership. This meeting is also important because it is close to the change of power in Syria.
West Asia, popularly called the Middle East by Western countries, is at a turning point, tensions between Israel and Iran are rising, the situation in Syria is extremely unstable, and Turkey also launched attacks on Syria. Are. Bashar al-Assad has been granted asylum in Moscow and Russia has lost access to the Mediterranean Sea and the Tartus naval base in Syria is no longer under its control.
The two leaders will discuss the crisis in the Middle East in detail. Apart from geopolitics and strategic relations, Mr Jaishankar and Sheikh Al Nahyan will hold wide-ranging talks on other aspects of bilateral relations between India and the UAE, including trade and commerce, investment, cultural and scientific ties.
Sheikh Al Nahyan, who is also the Deputy Prime Minister of the UAE, will then meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
It was Prime Minister Modi’s historic visit to the UAE in August 2015 that elevated bilateral relations between the two countries to a comprehensive strategic partnership.
The two countries also signed the historic Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement or CEPA in 2022, resulting in a massive increase in trade and investment between the two sides. The trade agreement eliminated many tariffs and significantly reduced other charges. This increased market access in various sectors.
Today, India and the UAE are among each other’s top trading partners, and bilateral trade between the two countries was projected to be around US$85 billion in 2022-23. The UAE was also among the top four investors in India in terms of foreign direct investment or FDI in 2022-23.
When the two leaders meet tomorrow in New Delhi, their aim will be to take these forward and expand economic ties. Mr Jaishankar is also likely to raise the issue of visa applications being reportedly refused to Indians after the new rules came into force in the UAE.
Dubai’s Emigration Department has recently introduced stricter requirements for tourist visas, making it mandatory for travelers to provide hotel booking documents with QR codes and a copy of their return tickets. For travelers staying with relatives, additional proof of residence is required. This has reportedly led to a significant increase in visa applications being rejected.
(Inputs from PTI)
