The foreign ministers exchanged national experiences and lessons learned from the cross-border management measures in response to Covid-19

Strengthening of international cooperation across borders in the wake of Covid-19 pandemic was the focus of discussion when the G-20 Foreign Minister held an extraordinary meeting on Thursday.

India was represented by External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar at the virtual meet which was called by Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Prince Faisal Bin Farhan Al-Saud.

The Ministers also exchanged national experiences and lessons learned from the cross-border management measures taken in response to the Covid-19 pandemics.

In his remarks, the EAM commended Saudi Arabia for its proactive approach in bringing G20 countries together for dealing with this Covid-19 pandemic.

The EAM highlighted the steps taken by India in the wake of the pandemic. He apprised the G20 Foreign Ministers about the steps taken by India including the ‘Vande Bharat Mission’ and creation of ‘travel bubbles’ for the welfare and protection of foreign citizens stranded here as well as its own citizens abroad.

The EAM called on governments around the world to ensure that interests of foreign students are protected and movement of stranded seafarers back to their home country is facilitated.

The EAM also proposed development of voluntary ‘G20 Principles on Coordinated Cross-Border Movement of People’ with three elements: a) Standardisation of testing procedures and universal acceptability of test results; b) Standardisation of ‘Quarantine procedures’; c) Standardisation of ‘movement and transit’ protocols.