20 September 2021

The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Serbia, Nikola Selaković, started his visit to India with the meeting with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.

Selaković stated that the meeting with his Indian colleague had been very good, emphasizing that Minister Jaishankar was an exceptional man and great admirer of Serbia and our country leadership.

“India is traditionally our good friend, someone who supports us in a strong and principled manner when it comes to our territorial integrity and sovereignty”, says Selaković.

The Serbian Foreign Minister says that at this meeting the continuation of political consultations of the two ministries of foreign affairs had been agreed, as well as the initiation of consular consultations and the continuation of the operation of the Joint Committee for Economic Cooperation.

According to the Minister, special attention was dedicated at the meeting to the intensification of the cooperation in the field of economy.

“We want to see examples of our specific cooperation, but we also want Indian investments in Serbia”, says the Minister and stated as an example the presence of Indian investments in four countries of Visegrad group - in the domain of IT, car industry, but also said that there was a series of comparative advantages of seeing these investments in Serbia.

Selaković also said that India was an extraordinary market where we could export our fruit, agricultural products and that a lot of things were now up to us.

The Minister also noted that Minister Jaishankar remembered with great joy his visit to Serbia two years before adding that he hoped that the next visit of the Serbian Foreign Minister to India would be much longer and that it would be an opportunity to have meetings in other cities as well.

Selaković also mentioned discussions on the promotion of the cooperation in the field of tourism, presenting the information that in Serbia in this year there were four times as many Indian tourists as there were in 2019, but that it was necessary to facilitate those connections by the establishment of direct flights.

“We should continue with the cooperation in all fields, we should build our relations and use the traditionally good friendship”, concluded the Minister.