It’s a standard practice to discuss matters linked to visits of VVIPs and convey them to the other side to ensure clarity of the schedules and proceedings, people with direct knowledge of the matter told NDTV, following comments by US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor who said the Indian side communicated to them that it would prefer not to hold an interaction with the press before Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Donald Trump met in June on the sidelines of the G7 Summit in France.
Gor made the remarks at a media event . “We were behind the scenes, behind the stage, and at one point it was just the president and I, and he asked me what the Indians are going to raise. We went over some topics. The MEA had one. The two leaders met just days after Indian sailors were killed in a US military strike during its war with Iran. The prime minister had pointed at the human cost of disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz and called for protection of maritime trade routes.
He said he had explained to Trump the request by India ahead of the meeting with PM Modi, but Trump eventually ended up asking the reporters who had gathered there: “Any questions? And he said, ‘do they have any questions? I told the president the Indians prefer no questions. He said, ‘sure, no problem’,” Gor said.
