‘Vaccine Maitri’ a way to build bilateral ties amid India and Myanmar: Indian envoy

India’s initiative of ‘Vaccine Maitri’ with gifting of 1.5 million doses of Covid-19 to Myanmar has been an attempt to strengthen the bilateral ties amid India and Myanmar, said Indian Ambassador to Myanmar, Saurabh Kumar.

While addressing the issue in conversation with journalist, Saurabh said, “Prime Minister Narendra Modi has always said that India’s capacities in the vaccine sector would be shared with partners and neighbours, so this is a part of that. As you know, Myanmar is a close neighbour, a good friend of India and there were discussions at high political level in this connection and what we are seeing is a consequence of that understanding which was reached between our two sides.”

In a telephonic conversation with Myanmar’s State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, PM Modi conveyed that India is all set to provide the required assistance regarding the impact of Covid-19 on health and economy of the country. Myanmar had formalized a contract with Pune based Serum Institute of India for purchase of 30 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine ‘Covishield’.

In October last year, General M M Naravane and Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla had visited Myanmar, when they provided 3,000 vials of Remdesivir as an assistance to Myanmar.

Ambassador Saurabh Kumar stated, “The visit of the foreign secretary and Army chief was a very important visit. The foreign secretary, of course, as you know had foreign office consultations with his counterpart through video conferencing before he came out here, and during the visit out here, he met the State Counselor and along with the Army Chief, he also met Senior General Min Aung Hlaing and the visit of course provided opportunity to to have discussions on the entire gamut of our relationship and what we do in the area of fighting against Covid pandemic was also one of the issues.”

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