Focus on stranded Indians as PM chairs high-level meet on Ukraine

New Delhi, March 4

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday chaired a high-level meeting on the Ukraine crisis and ongoing evacuation efforts by India, with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar in attendance.

Commerce minister Piyush Goyal also attended along with principal secretary to the PM PK Mishra, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla.

Shringla briefed the meeting about the status of evacuations a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed 3,000 Indian hostages with Ukraine despite India earlier rejecting competing claims to this end by both Russia and Ukraine.

The PM’s meeting also came hours after Russia and Ukraine agreed to set up humanitarian corridors to enable evacuations.

Out of nearly 20,000 Indians in Ukraine, 7,000 have been evacuated since February 22 and 7,400 more will return by flights over the next two days, the government has said.