Shajil Kumar

IN THE first-ever visit to Ukraine by an Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi arrived in the war-torn country on Friday after a train journey from Warsaw to Kyiv.

Modi will hold both one-on-one and delegation-level talks with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy with a focus on ways to find a negotiated settlement to the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

“PM @narendramodi arrived in Kyiv this morning on a landmark official visit. This is the first-ever visit by an Indian Prime Minister to Ukraine since the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries,” Randhir Jaiswal, Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson posted on X.

“Reached Kyiv earlier this morning. The Indian community accorded a very warm welcome,” Prime Minister Modi wrote on X.

The prime minister arrived in Kyiv from Poland onboard a ‘Rail Force One’ train that took around 10 hours, in the second and final leg of his two-nation trip.

The prime minister’s visit to Kyiv comes nearly six weeks after his high-profile trip to Moscow during which he held extensive talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin largely with a focus on ending the conflict.

Following talks with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, Modi said on Thursday that the ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and West Asia are a matter of “deep concern” and that “dialogue and diplomacy” is the way forward to restore peace.

“This is India’s firm belief that no problem can be solved on the battlefield. In any crisis, the loss of lives of innocent people has become the biggest challenge for the whole of humanity,” he said.

“We support dialogue and diplomacy for the early restoration of peace and stability. For this, India, along with its friendly countries, is ready to provide all possible support,” he said in a media statement in Warsaw.

Modi held talks with Zelenskyy in June on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Italy’s Apulia.

In the meeting, Modi conveyed to the Ukrainian President that India would continue to do everything within its means to support a peaceful solution to the Ukraine conflict and that the way to peace is through “dialogue and diplomacy”.

Modi also told Zelenskyy that India believes in a “human-centric” approach to find a solution to the conflict in Ukraine.

In the meeting, the Ukrainian president invited the prime minister to visit Kyiv.