Jaishankar Meets Russian President Vladimir Putin

External Affairs Minister, S. Jaishankar on Thursday met with Russian President Vladimir Putin, news agency ANI learned from officials. This follows the meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

Jaishankar's visit to Russia comes at a time when India has been hit with additional tariffs by the US over its purchase of crude from Moscow.

"We are not the biggest purchaser of Russian oil, that is China. We are not the biggest purchaser of LNG, that is the European Union," Jaishankar said during the press briefing in Moscow after his meet with Lavrov.

Over the last few years, Americans have asked India to do "everything to stabilise the world energy market". This also includes buying oil from Russia, according to the external affairs minister.

During the meeting, both the ministers reaffirmed the goal to expand bilateral trade in a balanced and sustainable manner, including by increasing India’s exports to Russia.

Russia also said that it will support India's Make in India goals, including through joint production and technology transfer.

In the meeting, Jaishankar also discussed the issue of Indians serving in the Russian army. While many have been released, there are still some pending cases and some missing persons, and he hopes that the Russian side would expeditiously resolve these matters.

"We believe that relations between India and Russia have been among the steadiest of the major relationships in the world after the Second World War," he said after the meeting.