Describing India’s G20 presidency as its diplomatic achievement of the year, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Sunday said that the country was able to get the most powerful nations of the world to show a new commitment to sustainable development and promoting green growth.
“The G20 in many ways has been the diplomatic achievement of this year. Not just because we could get everybody to agree but on what we agreed on,” the EAM said, while addressing a function in Bengaluru.
Terming the G20 as the World Cup of diplomacy, where the biggest and strongest players come together, he noted that the most influential, powerful, and consequential countries of the world had gathered round the table at the G20 Summit in New Delhi in September.
“When we took the presidency, people did not have many expectations. Through our G20, we bridged all the divides, found a common ground for countries which were otherwise arguing among themselves, who found it very difficult to reconcile. But, we were able to bridge it,” Jaishankar said.
The G20 Summit in New Delhi saw the unanimous adoption of the G20 New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration, which demonstrated the commitment of the G20 leaders to address global challenges in an inclusive, decisive and action-oriented manner.
Jaishankar said that what India has done in the past decade is actually the foundation of what lies ahead. “So, there is a direct connection between our achievements, capabilities, aspirations and dreams,” he said.
He said that in the last 10 years, there have been some “challenges, some opportunities and some achievements.”
“So in many ways, they represent all-round progress, they also tell us what lies ahead of us,” he said.
The EAM also talked about the COVID-19 pandemic. He said: “It was called a once-in-a-century happening. I saw the rapidity of the Indian health system. As a society, as a nation, we were able to cope with it and meet the challenging capacities at a very rapid pace.”