John Kerry to spend two more days in India

NEW DELHI: Visiting US secretary of state John Kerry has extended his stay in India by two days and will now directly leave for China from here to attend the G-20 Summit, postponing his earlier plan to depart on Wednesday evening.

“Due to his travel to China for the G20 this weekend, secretary Kerry will extend his stay in India,” Mark Toner, US state department’s deputy spokesperson who is traveling with Kerry, told ET.

Kerry was scheduled to leave for Germany from here before heading to Hanzhou for the G-20 summit being held on September 4-5. It is not immediately known why Kerry cancelled his trip to Germany.

Also, there is also no information available yet on what would be his engagements in the next two days. Meanwhile, according to a US state department media note, deputy secretary Antony Blinken is travelling to Potsdam, Germany, between August 31 and September 2 for an informal OSCE foreign ministers’ meeting to discuss common challenges in the OSCE region including the Ukraine crisis.

Kerry, who landed in Delhi on Monday night for the second round of strategic and commercial dialogue with India, was scheduled to leave on Wednesday after his meeting with PM Narendra Modi.

According to US State Department list of engagements, Kerry also met Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi here on Wednesday besides officials and families of the US Embassy. Interestingly the meeting with Gandhi was not itinerary announced by MEA for Kerry’s India trip.

While he attended all his official programmes the secretary of state could not visit three religious places in the city due to incessant rain on Wednesday morning.