Guwahati: A high-level meeting has been conducted for the second day in a row on the ongoing crisis in Ukraine. The meeting was chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the priority of the meeting is to evacuate the Indian nationals from Ukraine.
Following the discussions in the meeting, the panel decided that Union Ministers Hardeep Singh Puri, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Kiren Rijiju and Gen VK Singh would be going to Ukraine’s neighbouring nations to coordinate evacuation operations.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla, NSA Ajit Doval, Minister of Civil Aviation Jyotiraditya Scindia and Minister of Law and Justice Kiren Rijiju were among those present at the meeting.
The move comes in the wake of a concerning development in Ukraine, in which Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered nuclear deterrent forces to be placed in a “special regime of combat duty,” perhaps alluding to tactical nuclear troops.
Ukraine’s embattled President Volodymyr Zelensky has accepted to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin as Russian troops and tanks pushed deeper into the country, closing in on the capital Kyiv despite heavy resistance from the country’s defence forces.
PM Modi presided over a two-hour meeting on Sunday to assess the situation in Ukraine and the progress achieved in securely evacuating Indian residents. During the discussion, the prime minister stated that the government’s first concern is securing the safety of Indian students and removing them.
It may be mentioned that a large number of Indians, mostly students, are stranded in Ukraine following Russia’s attack on the country.