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- Indian foreign minister S Jaishankar will be visiting Niger and Tunisia next week (January 21-23) to focus more on small African countries, which have received only very little diplomatic and economic engagements so far from New Delhi.
- Jaishankar in Niger will inaugurate a convention center in Niamey, the capital city of the country, which was built by India under its development program. In Tunisia, the foreign minister will open an IT center, which was funded by the Government of India.
Indian foreign minister S Jaishankar will be visiting Niger and Tunisia next week (January 21-23) to focus more on small African countries, which have received only very little diplomatic and economic engagement so far from New Delhi. Incidentally, this is also his first outreach to Africa since taking over the mantle of foreign minister. Jaishankar was India’s foreign secretary and before the country’s envoy to the US, before being inducted as the foreign minister.
Jaishankar in Niger will inaugurate a convention center in Niamey, the capital city of the country, which was built by India under its development program. In Tunisia, the foreign minister will open an IT center that was funded by the Government of India.
New Delhi attaches a lot of importance to these small African countries, since they had helped India in the United Nations as non –permanent members of the UN Security Council. Niger was one of the most stable democracies in the region. But, of late, fundamental Islamist forces are finding support among its citizens. That is all the more reason for countries like India to work hard to keep such forces away from Africa to ensure a dynamic growth path. .
