Manmohan Singh to leave for third BRICS Summit in China tomorrow

New Delhi, Apr 11(ANI): Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh will embark on a four-day tour to Sanya, China, tomorrow to attend the third summit of BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said on Monday.

"Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh would be leaving tomorrow for Sanya in China for the third BRICS Summit. Thereafter, he would be travelling to Astana for the India-Kazakhstan bilateral summit meeting," MEA Official Spokesperson Vishnu Prakash said.

The Prime Minister is visiting Sanya from April 12 to 15 on the invitation of Chinese President Hu Jintao.

Dr. Singh will be accompanied by his wife Gursharan Kaur.

The other senior members of the delegation would include Commerce and Industries Minister Anand Sharma; Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister; National Security Advisor; and other senior officials from the Prime Minister's Office and from the Ministry of External Affairs.

The Prime Minister will also be accompanied by a media delegation, a business delegation including representatives from the FICCI and the CII, and they will be attending the BRICS Business Forum separately.

"The forthcoming BRICS Summit is the third in a row. The first one took place in Yekaterinburg in Russia on June 2009, the second took place in Brasilia in April 2010, and now Sanya," Manbir Singh, Secretary of Economic Relations, said,

The programme will begin on April 14.

"The Prime Minister and the other BRICS leaders will be there. Then there will be a restricted session. In the restricted session there are four main topics that the Chinese hosts have underlined for discussions. These are: (1) the international situation at the present time, (2) international economic and financial issues, (3) the development issues, and (4) the cooperation amongst BRICS countries. This restricted session would be for about 80 minutes and then they will go in for the plenary," Manbir Singh said.

"Plenary will be open to the press and the Plenary theme is, "Broad Vision and Shared Prosperity". Each of the BRICS leaders would be expected to speak for about six or seven minutes on this particular subject - Broad Vision and Shared Prosperity," he added.

Thereafter there will be a joint press conference, where each of the BRICS leaders will be expected to make a short statement of how he has viewed the various agenda items and the discussions that take place," Manbir Singh said.

There would also be a welcome banquet hosted by Chinese President Hu Jintao, he added.

During this BRICS Summit, the Prime Minister will have bilateral meetings with all his counterparts - China, Brazil, South Africa and the Russian Federation. (ANI)