India’s Modi to visit US for Quad meeting, UN summit

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi (R) greets US President Joe Biden upon his arrival ahead of the G20 Leaders' Summit in New Delhi on Sept. 9, 2023. (AFP)
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Updated 19 September 2024
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India’s Modi to visit US for Quad meeting, UN summit

NEW DELHI:Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will take part in the Quad Leaders’ Summit hosted by US President Joe Biden and attend the UN’s Summit of the Future in New York as part of his upcoming visit to America, the Ministry of External Affairs said on Thursday.

Modi’s three-day visit to the US will begin on Sept. 21 in Wilmington, Delaware — Biden’s hometown — for the Quad meeting comprising also Japan and Australia.

“The Quad has a very, very full and substantive agenda on this occasion,” India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri told journalists at a press conference in New Delhi.

Misri added that the leaders would also cover health security, climate change, critical and emerging technologies, maritime security and counter-terrorism.

“This upcoming visit offers … the Quad leaders the opportunity to review progress achieved in the last one year and set the agenda for the next year.”

Modi is expected to hold bilateral meetings with Biden, Japanese PM Fumio Kishida and Australian PM Anthony Albanese on the sidelines of the Quad summit.

This is the fourth leaders’ summit of the Quad — a four-state strategic security dialogue — which positions itself against China’s growing-assertiveness in the Asia-Pacific region.

Modi’s US trip will also see the 74-year-old premier attend a gathering organized by the Indian diaspora in Long Island, New York, as well as a business roundtable with leaders of US tech companies.

“The prime minister will also be attending a business roundtable with CEOs of leading US companies in the cutting-edge areas of artificial intelligence, semiconductors, quantum computing and biotechnology,” Misri said, adding that details of attendees are still being finalized.

On his last day in the US, Modi will speak at the UN’s Summit of the Future, where world leaders are expected to address current and emerging global challenges.

India’s foreign ministry did not confirm that Modi would meet with former US President Donald Trump as a part of the visit, after the Republican presidential nominee announced it on Wednesday.

In 2019, Trump joined Modi at a “Howdy Modi” rally in Houston, Texas, that drew about 50,000 people and was billed as one of the largest receptions of a foreign leader in the US.

When Trump made his inaugural visit to India in February 2020, Modi hosted him in his home state of Gujarat, where the “Namaste Trump” welcome event was attended by around 100,000 people.


Two family members of Mexico’s education secretary killed in shooting

Updated 33 min 20 sec ago
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Two family members of Mexico’s education secretary killed in shooting

MEXICO CITY: Authorities in the western Mexican state of Colima said they killed three people suspected in the shooting deaths of two family members of Mexico’s secretary of education on Saturday.
Colima, located on Mexico’s Pacific coast, is one of the country’s most violent states. It recorded the highest homicide rate in Mexico in 2023 and 2024, according to the US State Department.
The local prosecutor’s office said officers killed three suspects in the 4:30 am (1030 GMT) shooting of two women, whom Mexico’s Secretary of Public Education Mario Delgado later identified as his aunt and cousin.
They did not identify a motive in the shooting or say whether they were searching for other suspects.
“Deep shock, outrage, and sorrow over the events that occurred this morning in Colima, where my aunt Eugenia Delgado and my cousin Sheila were brutally murdered in their home,” Delgado wrote on X on Saturday.
Officials tracked the suspects’ vehicle to a Colima home on Saturday afternoon and killed three people in a gunfight, according to the prosecutor’s office.
Investigators found weapons and clothing in the suspects’ home linked to the double shooting.
Delgado was appointed education secretary by President Claudia Sheinbaum in 2024. He previously served as national president of the ruling Morena party.