PM leaves for strategic India visit

11 November 2009 | 11:05:58 AM | Source: AAP

Kevin Rudd is on his way to India for his first visit to the subcontinent since becoming prime minister.

Add your comment


Mr Rudd arrives in Mumbai today for a two-day whistlestop tour during which he will meet a range of political and business leaders, including Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

The trip, which also takes in New Delhi, is aimed at boosting Australia's economic and strategic ties with the south Asian superpower.
   
Amongst other things, the creation of a free trade agreement between the two countries is expected to be on the agenda.

It's also hoped Mr Rudd's visit will soothe strained diplomatic relations which arose from a spate of violent attacks on Indian students living in Australia.
   
Mr Rudd is the most senior member of the government to head to India after an outcry over the students' treatment led to fears about a possible backlash affecting Australia's $15 billion a year international education industry.

 

top

Join the Discussion

E.g. Suburb / City
You have characters remaining.
Validation (
) :
This is a captcha-picture. It is used to prevent mass-access by robots.

PLEASE NOTE: All submitted comments become the property of SBS. We reserve the right to edit and/or amend submitted comments. HTML tags other than paragraph, line break, bold or italics will be removed from your comment.