1st face-to-face meeting will give Trump-Modi chance to assess ties: envoy

WASHINGTON: The first face-to-face meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump will give them an opportunity to look at the entire gamut of Indo-US engagement and to exchange views on issues of global interest, India's envoy here has said.

At the invitation of Trump, the Prime Minister would spend several hours with the US President at the White House on Monday afternoon, which would end with a dinner later that night.

This would be the first working dinner being hosted by Trump for a foreign leader at the White House.

"I think that just shows the amount of care that has gone in on the part of the White House to welcome our Prime Minister and the kind of planning that has gone into make this a very special visit," Indian Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna told PTI on the eve of Prime Minister Modi's visit.

"This (dinner) is a special gesture and it is appreciated," he said.

"I think the first face-to-face meeting will allow the two leaders an opportunity to look at the entire India-US engagement and also to exchange views on issues of global interest," Sarna said.

Responding to a question on the the agenda of the two leaders, Sarna said he would not like to guess what they would be discussing.

"But when they sit across the table and they have a one- on-one discussion or they have an extended delegation that will talk, I would presume that they would cover the wide gamut of relations between India and the US, which is a very strong, strategic partnership, issues between the engagement of two largest democracies, the engagement of two very vibrant economies with tremendous potential for engagement for mutual growths" in the military, security and science and technology sectors, he said.

Any of these and issues of global interests, the challenges that the world is facing today, could come up for discussion, he said.

"But as I said, it would be very much up to the leaders to decide what to talk about," the Indian envoy said.

Sarna said it was a very significant trip because this will be the first face-to-face meeting between Prime Minister Modi and President Trump.

"They have, of course, spoken three times on the telephone. They've had very good, constructive and warm conversations," he said.