EAM S Jaishankar concludes two-day Bangkok visit, meets 18 FMs

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New Delhi: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Friday wrapped up his two day Thailand visit during which he had eighteen bilateral meetings, five pull asides and took part in four multilateral meets. The focus during his bilateral and multilateral meets was on Indo Pacific, terror and India's Act East policy. 

The four big meetings in which he took part were ASEAN-India Ministerial Meeting, the 9th East Asia Summit Foreign Ministers’ Meeting (EAS FMM), 26th ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) and 10th Mekong Ganga Cooperation (MGC) Ministerial Meeting. 

At the meetings, EAM called for a "collective action to secure the Indo-Pacific, where terrorism remains a common scourge" while underlining "ASEAN centrality in free, open and inclusive regional architecture." 

The focus on Indo Pacific in Bangkok meet got more steam this year as ASEAN earlier this year released its outlook on the evolving concept which China views suspiciously.  

At the ASEAN-India Ministerial Meeting, Jaishankar said, India seeks "greater ‘connected-ness’ with the ASEAN region, " envisions "connectivity with the region in very broad terms, including physical, economic, political connectivity and close contact at the people-to-people level." 

While his meeting with US Secretary of state Mike Pompeo remained much talked about in the backdrop of Trump's Kashmir remarks, he also met Chinese FM Wang Yi, Malaysian FM Datuk Saifuddin Abdullah, the new British foreign secretary Dominic Raab and Foreign minister of neighbouring countries like Sri Lankan FM Tilak Marapana and Bangladeshi FM Dr AK Abdul Momen. 

He met Chinese FM even as his next visit is due to China on 12th August. The visit is seen as a preparatory visit for the 2nd Indo-China informal summit that will happen by the end of this year.