Shri Randhir Jaiswal, Official Spokesperson: Namaste and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I welcome you to this Special Briefing on Prime Minister's historic visit to Guyana. We have with us, Secretary (East), Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, to brief us on the visit of the Prime Minister to Guyana. As also, we are joined by Additional Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs, Shri G. V. Srinivas. With that, I invite Secretary (East) to make his opening remarks.
Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, Secretary (East): Thank you, Randhir, and a very good afternoon to all of you. As you know, Prime Minister is currently on the third leg of his foreign tour. He's paying a State visit to Guyana. This is after 56 years that an Indian Prime Minister has paid a visit to Guyana, and therefore, the visit assumes great significance.
India-Guyana relations have been marked by a significant uptick in the last year and a half or so, with several high-level visits. And the present visit, we have no doubt, will really set the stage for a far more broad and deep relationship between the two countries.
Upon his arrival in Georgetown, Prime Minister was warmly received by President, His Excellency, Dr. Mohamed Irfaan Ali and Prime Minister, His Excellency, Mark Anthony Phillips. And almost the entire cabinet of Guyana was present, both at the airport and at the hotel, to receive Prime Minister. He was accorded a ceremonial reception at the airport, and on arrival at the hotel. He was received by the President again, by the Prime Minister of Grenada, Prime Minister Dickon, and Prime Minister Mia Mottley of Barbados, and several cabinet ministers. He was also given great honor by being presented with the key to the city of Georgetown by the Mayor of Georgetown. It was remarkable that so many people had turned up at the hotel, even despite the lateness of the hour. It was nearly midnight by the time Prime Minister had reached the hotel, and he was given a tumultuous welcome to Georgetown.
Yesterday, President Mohamed Irfaan Ali welcomed Prime Minister at the State House with a ceremonial guard of honor. The two leaders held restricted meeting, as well as delegation-level talks. During the interactions, they discussed the entire gamut of India-Guyana relations. Ten agreements were exchanged between the two sides, and these covered areas such as hydrocarbons and energy, health and pharmaceuticals, agriculture, digital cooperation, culture, defence and security studies, etc.
Today, Prime Minister and President, together, planted a sapling in honor of President Ali's mother at the State House as part of the initiative of ‘Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam’, highlighting the shared commitment to sustainability between India and Guyana. President Irfaan Ali, in a very heartwarming gesture, hosted Prime Minister over a traditional 7-curries meal.
After holding bilateral engagements with Guyana, Prime Minister co-chaired the 2nd India-CARICOM Summit, along with Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell of Grenada, the current Chair of CARICOM. The Summit was attended by Heads of States and Government of 11 member States; Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Guyana, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, and the foreign ministers of Belize, Jamaica and St. Kitts and Nevis. The Secretary-General of the Caribbean Community, Dr. Carla Barnett, was also present.
The leaders witnessed a fly past of the recently acquired HAL 228 aircraft, two of which Guyana has received from India and have been commissioned. This is to further strengthen the India-CARICOM partnership. Prime Minister put forward seven pillar proposals as C-A-R-I-C-O-M, as CARICOM, standing for C for Capacity building, A for Agriculture and food security, R for Renewable energy and climate change, I for Innovation, technology and trade, C for Cricket and culture, O for Ocean economy and maritime security, and M for Medicine and health care.
CARICOM leaders in one voice applauded these initiatives from India. They highly appreciated Prime Minister's special efforts to strengthen relations with the Group. His seven pillars encompassing all the issues of relevance to CARICOM nations was highly appreciated. These include issues facing CARICOM countries, such as high incidence of non-communicable diseases such as cancer and diabetes, shortage of skilled manpower, climate resilience and sustainable development, energy security including exploitation of renewable energy, national security including coastal surveillance, connectivity, particularly inter-island maritime connectivity for both goods and passengers, and women empowerment and the promotion of women's cricket.
The leaders were highly appreciative of all the initiatives that have been taken by the Prime Minister, and they in particular appreciated the fact that at the height of COVID pandemic, India had come to the assistance of the CARICOM countries by donating vaccines and also providing other forms of medical assistance. They also appreciated the fact that Prime Minister's initiatives correctly matched the felt need of the CARICOM countries and the leader after leader expressed a view that India is like a family member of the CARICOM community. They thanked Prime Minister for the visit and commended India's efforts for proposing a roadmap to further our ties.
The Commonwealth of Dominica conferred upon Prime Minister the highest national award, Dominica Award of Honour. Prime Minister was deeply appreciative of this moving gesture, including the special effort made by the President of Dominica to travel to Guyana to confer the award. The Prime Minister of Barbados, Her Excellency Mia Mottley, also announced a decision to confer the nation's highest award, the Honorary Order of Excellence of Barbados on Prime Minister.
Following the India-CARICOM Summit, which was only the second such summit held between the two sides, the first one was on the margins of the United Nations General Assembly in New York in 2019. So this was really the very first Summit that was happening in the CARICOM country. Following that, in the evening, there was a colorful cultural program, emphasizing Guyana's motto of ‘One People, One Nation, One Destiny’. And before the State dinner, President, His Excellency, Irfaan Ali, conferred on Prime Minister, Guyana's highest national award, The Order of Excellence. While accepting the award, Prime Minister dedicated the honor to the ties of friendship between the peoples of Guyana and India.
Today, Prime Minister addressed the Special Session of Parliament of Guyana, where he emphasized the power of democracy and humanity to address the world's issues. He was given a standing ovation. Later, Prime Minister paid tributes to the statue of Mahatma Gandhi and the Arya Samaj monument. Prime Minister also visited the Indian Arrival monument and paid homage to the forefathers who arrived in Guyana 186 years ago. He visited the Saraswati Vidya Niketan School, which he had also visited in his first visit to Guyana 24 years ago. He had spent some time at this school at that time.
In short while, Prime Minister will also, in the evening today, address the gathering of the Indian diaspora. Our relations with Guyana, as I've said, date back to more than 185 years, with the first arrival of Indians on the 5th of May, 1838. Today, the Guyanese Indian community comprise roughly 40% or about 300,000 out of Guyana's total population and is a very vital link in our relationship. Prime Minister will also interact with some of the people he met here 24 years ago during his visit and he will also interact with some of the famous cricketers of Guyana, including Clive Lloyd, Alvin Kallicharran, Shiv Narayan Chanderpaul, Devendra Bishoo, Hetmyer and others.
Following the community reception, Prime Minister will wrap up his highly successful visit to Guyana and emplane for New Delhi. If there are any questions, I'd be happy to take them. Thank you.
Shri Randhir Jaiswal, Official Spokesperson: Now the floor is open. Please introduce yourself as you ask a question.
Siddharth Bharadwaj, Doordarshan: Sir, I'm Siddharth Bharadwaj from Doordarshan. Can you please explain, in brief, that what all collaborations were extended when it comes to India and CARICOM?
Sudhakar, DD News: Sir, I'm Sudhakar from Doordarshan News. My question is about jo hydrocarbon ko lekar samjhauta hua hai India energy requirement ko diversify kar raha hai beete dino me aur, to energy security ke lihaaz se ye kitna aage tak jaane wala hai hydrocarbon wala samjhauta?
[Question in Hindi: Approximate Translation] Sir, I'm Sudhakar from Doordarshan News. My question is about the hydrocarbon agreement. India has been diversifying its energy requirements in recent days, so in terms of energy security, how far is this hydrocarbon agreement likely to go?
Speaker: Secretary [Inaudible], can you say first of all, sir, will India be applying to Guyana for an offshore oil concession to hopefully discover and produce its own oil now that the Guyana-Suriname Basin has been de-risked? And secondly, what are the prospects in your estimation for an end to the Russia-Ukraine war under a Trump administration, and relatedly, what is India's view about President Biden's authorization for Ukraine to use American-made long-range missiles?
Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, Secretary (East): Let me take these questions first. On that last question, I will stick to our subject, which is the visit of the Prime Minister of India to Guyana. So I will not take any other questions on any other subjects, I'm afraid.
Regarding the Doordarshan’s question on the various collaborations, I had mentioned to you the broad areas. Now, amongst them, there were specifics in each area as well. And for example, in the area of capacity building, 1,000 new ITEC slots for CARICOM countries over the next five years, CARICOM countries are already highly appreciative of the kind of training programs that we offer them. These are also generic, as well as specific ones that we tailor-make for individual countries based on their needs. And they expressed a desire for a wide range of such capacity-building programs, which we are meeting with the 1,000 new ITEC slots for CARICOM countries.
In the area of food security, we offer them collaboration with the Indian Council for Agricultural Research. There is already a lot of good work happening with ICAR and individual institutions in CARICOM countries. We want to take it further. We've offered to them areas like use of drones, digital farming, farm mechanization, soil testing, and one issue is sargassum seaweed, which poses a major challenge for tourism in the Caribbean region, and Prime Minister offered to tackle this problem. We have scientific ways of tackling this problem, and we would be happy to help convert the seaweed also into fertilizer.
Then, in the area of renewable energy, we offered the expertise from the International Solar Alliance and the disaster relief for the disaster-resilient infrastructure and membership of the Global Biofuel Alliance, as well as Mission LiFE and how CARICOM countries can adopt Mission LiFE for their sustainable future.
One specific area which was of great interest for many CARICOM countries, and in which we have offered them our digital stack, the India stack for digital public infrastructure, cloud-based DigiLockers, and the Unified Payment Interface, UPI, also to augment their public services delivery. So this was also highly appreciated.
We will be also training young women cricketers from each Caribbean country in India. This was also an area that was highly appreciated by the member states. We will be organizing a Days of Indian Culture event next year. This is what the Prime Minister proposed, to bring people-to-people relations even closer. And in the maritime domain, we have offered maritime domain mapping and hydrography in the region, and also maritime security in terms of patrolling, HADR. So you saw the two aircrafts. They can be used for patrolling, they can be used for evacuation during disasters, they can be used for island-to-island transport as well. This was an area that some of the countries expressed special interest in.
We also, like we have offered to Guyana, and which is already functional, ocean-going ferries, the countries of the region felt that this was really something that they could make use of, because inter-island transportation amongst the countries, trade as well as passenger, is hampered because they don't have access to ocean-going ferries. So these were some of the things.
And in the area of health, there were specifics in terms of offer of our linear accelerators for radiotherapy in cancer care, because the countries of the Caribbean said that certain non-communicable diseases such as cancer, diabetes, hypertension, were areas that of particular concern for them, for their populations. So we offered dialysis machines to the countries, sea ambulances for connecting outer islands with tertiary hospitals, and also online yoga programs for tackling issues like hypertension as well as diabetes. So these were also warmly welcomed by the member countries.
So that is as far as collaboration goes. It's not an exhaustive list, I've just touched upon some of the major ones. In the hydrocarbon sector, you're right, Guyana has proven, as well as estimated reserves of oil and gas, which are very promising. We would be interested in participating in the exploration and production phase as well. Our oil companies are certainly looking at this, and if they do get an opportunity, they would be willing to invest, as we have invested in many countries of the world, far from the shores of India. That is on offshore oil concessions.
Kim Oking, Reuters: Thank you, good afternoon, my name is Kim Oking and I'm here on behalf of Reuters. Given the Guyana government's position on the question of a long-term oil sale deal with Guyana, it's actually said that it prefers to have the competitive rates that it would typically get from publicly marketing its crude. Did the Indian government on this visit or anytime recently include any new element intended to sweeten or incentivize this proposal that you've been making for some time? I note your comment just now on the purpose of this press conference, but I'd just like to put these questions on the record. What is the Indian government's reaction to the indictment by the U.S. of Gautam Adani and seven others in a scheme to pay about $265 million in bribes to Indian government officials to obtain power contracts expected to yield $2 billion of profit over 20 years? Does the Indian government know of Adani's whereabouts and how does it respond to long-time allegations by the Opposition that Adani and his conglomerate have been treated favorably by the Modi government and will Indian prosecutors also investigate Adani or his alleged government ties? Thank you.
Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, Secretary (East): And also for the record, let me repeat that this is a press conference for the visit of the Prime Minister of India to Guyana and for the India-CARICOM Summit and I'm not in a position to respond to questions beyond that mandate.
As far as long-term contracts are concerned, yes, this is something that we have flagged to the Guyanese side in the past and they are aware of it. I would expect that as the volumes available to the Guyanese side in terms of crude and gas availability rise, they would be in a position to enter into longer-term contracts because those are things that will help us to off-take larger volumes in a more predictable way and make our transportation of such large volumes also economically feasible.
Speaker 2: Sir, there was some MoU sign, around 10. Can you please explain what exactly is there in agriculture and UPI; as well as were there any talks to further strengthen ties in terms of cricket, because Prime Minister expressed his happiness, because India contributed in building of cricket stadium there, so any talks regarding cricket?
Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, Secretary (East): Let me just respond to that quickly. On agriculture, it is an umbrella MoU which offers expertise available in India for Guyana. You know, Guyana was one of the countries that took to millet farming, for example, in a very big way from day one when we proposed millets as an energy food, as an environmentally friendly food, as a robust crop that does not need much water, is best resistant, at the same time highly nutritious. So Guyana has been really a star in using millets to address its food security needs. So that is one area where we continue our collaboration. We also, you know, in areas like germplasm or seeds for sugarcane, for example, that is also an area that will be covered under the MoU and all kinds of capacity building in terms of scientific personnel training as well as capacity building in that.
In the area of UPI, both sides signed an agreement on India Stack, which is the entire system for all the digital applications, both for delivery of public services to the people as well as for payment interface, as well as identity. So this is something that will help both sides in building up the infrastructure of the digital economy in Guyana.
On cricket, nothing specific apart from the offer that we have made for training of women cricketers in India.
So, there is, as I mentioned, I mean I did touch upon it, the objective of the MoU is to enter into a deployment of a UPI-like real-time payment system in Guyana. And we have a similar agreement with Trinidad and Tobago as well.
Marcelle Thomas, Stabroek News: Marcelle Thomas from the Stabroek News. Specifically on agriculture, I wanted to know in the MoU, what areas focus on the sugar sector, Guyana sugar sector, and as that relates to factory or if it's field or if it's both? And on the same payment system, Guyana is also discussing a payment system with Afreximbank. Is there going to be… is it separate to that or is it going to be like some kind of interfacing with that system and how is it going to work? And in the start, just bear with me, for the start of the payment system, it's going to start in country and branch off to regional and international, or do you have… or is it tied into just Guyana and CARICOM?
Vahnu Manikchand, Guyana Times: Good afternoon, Vahnu Manikchand from the Guyana Times. Just to follow up to your comments on the millets, Guyana has started cultivation. I just wanted to know what has been the feedback and are you satisfied with the development of that product here? And one of the agreement was for the establishment of a Jan Aushadhi Kendra here. I just wanted you to explain a little bit about that, how it will work, what are the benefits Guyana will get from that.
Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, Secretary (East): Okay, on the sugar sector, it's more on the productivity side, on the plant side rather than on the industry side, so we will assist in improving the yield of sugarcane.
On the payment system, you know, the UPI is really a kind of a, it says what it is, it is a unified payment system, so different payment systems can be onboarded into it. You could use your different banks, have their own payment systems online, so all of them can be integrated into it. You can have Google Pay integrated into it, so it is a very, very versatile payment system. It is also an open source system, so, it's not something that you have to pay royalty on it, you can basically adapt it to whatever you want to do with it. So, this is a system that could be used in Guyana. It could also be used within CARICOM. We have, for example, in India, we have integrated our payment system with Singapore, with France, with our neighboring countries. We are in talks with Malaysia to integrate the payment system, so when, you know, tourists, for example, visit each other's countries, they have one uniform payment system. They don't have to incur excess charges for making cross-border payments. So it's very useful for people moving within countries. So it could be, well be, ultimately CARICOM-wide, but even if it is CARICOM-wide, it will also help you to make transactions in India as well. So it is much broader than that, than a purely single country payment system.
On millets, as I said, Guyana has really been a success story. You started off with a target of 400 acres of millets, and now you have a target of 5,000 acres, so, you know, it is really something that Guyana has taken to in a very big way. So it's really a success story as far as Guyana is concerned.
On the Jan Aushadhi which is basically ‘people's pharmacy’, Guyana has taken a very important step forward in this by signing or recognizing the Indian Pharmacopoeia. It is important because this will make available high-quality, low-cost medicines in these centers, which are the low-cost pharma centers, and at least for people who cannot afford non-generic medication, generic medication as well as low-cost non-generic medication can be made available at these pharmacies, the low-cost pharmacies throughout the country. So that will be a big step forward in human security and health security for people all over. This has been very successful in India, and we are expanding it to some other countries as well. Guyana will be one of those when it comes about.
Vahnu Manikchand, Guyana Times: So, it will there be a series of pharmacies, or is it one facility where people can go to access the low-cost medicine?
Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, Secretary (East): So, the way it works is that the importation of the pharmaceuticals is done, and not just pharmaceuticals, it can be other equipment, etc, accessories, which are delivered in bulk to a country, and then they distribute it according to how they wish to, in individual pharmacies.
Speaker 3: Sir, with respect to the plans for oil exploration, can you explain whether it will have to go through the auction system, and secondly, have you got an idea about when, what volume of Guyana's oil production will it be, before you'll be able to engage in a concrete long-term exclusive agreement?
Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, Secretary (East): Well, these are really questions for Guyana to decide, and it's hard for me to say at what volume Guyana would be ready to discuss larger volumes. So, we would like to have long-term commitments, we would like to have G2G commitments as well, that brings in greater predictability, but it's really for the government of Guyana to decide when they are comfortable doing this.
Speaker 3: [Inaudible]
Shri Jaideep Mazumdar, Secretary (East): I'm afraid that would certainly also be something for the government of Guyana to decide.
Shri Randhir Jaiswal, Official Spokesperson: We are sorry, we are running short of time, so please bear with us. With that, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for your presence here, and thank you very much for your questions. Thank you.