Prime Minister Narendra Modi will embark on a five day visit to Italy and the United Kingdom tonight to attend the 16th G-20 Summit and the World Leaders’ Summit of COP-26. During the first leg of his visit, Mr. Modi will reach Rome to participate in the G-20 Summit from 30th to 31st of this month at the invitation of Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi. The summit will be attended by Heads of State of G-20 Member Countries, the European Union, and other invited countries and International Organizations.
Mr. Modi will also hold several bilateral meetings including with the Prime Minister of Italy on the sidelines.Following this, Prime Minister Modi will leave for Glasgow to attend the World Leader’s Summit of the 26th Conference of Parties (COP-26) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. COP-26 is being held from 31st of this month to 12th of next month under the Presidency of the UK partnering with Italy. The high-level segment of COP-26, titled the World Leaders’ Summit will be held on 1st and 2nd of next month.
It will be attended by Heads of State of more than 120 countries. COP-26 was originally slated to be held in 2020, but was deferred to 2021 in view of the Covid-19 pandemic. Mr. Modi will also hold several bilateral meetings on the sidelines of COP-26 including with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
The grouping of the world’s 20 major economies has emerged as the premier global forum for international economic cooperation and this will be the 8th G-20 Summit that Prime Minister Modi will be attending. This summit under the Italian Presidency is centred around the theme People, Planet, Prosperity. It focuses on the areas of recovery from the pandemic and strengthening of global health governance, economic recovery and resilience, climate change and energy transition and sustainable development and food Security.
India is scheduled to host the G-20 Summit in 2023 for the first time. At COP-26 in Glasgow, the Parties will work to achieve the completion of Paris Agreement implementation guidelines, the mobilization of climate finance, actions to strengthen climate adaptation, technology development and transfer, and keeping in reach the Paris Agreement goals of limiting the rise in global temperatures. The periodic Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change have emerged as global climate summits, providing an opportunity for stocktaking and for charting the way forward.