Prime Minister Narendra Modi and UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan reviewed bilateral relations and witnessed the signing of eight pacts for greater cooperation in areas such as energy, investments, instant payment platforms, domestic debit/credit cards interlinkage, economic corridor and digital infrastructure, in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday.

On an official two-day visit to the UAE, Indian PM held one-on-one and delegation-level talks with the UAE leader, and welcomed deepening of the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership across sectors, including trade and investment, digital infrastructure, fintech, energy, infrastructure, culture and people to people ties, per an official MEA statement. Discussions also covered regional and global issues.

“The leaders also discussed the strengthening of energy partnership. They appreciated that in addition to the UAE being among the largest sources of crude and LPG, India is now entering into long term contracts for LNG,” the statement noted.

Pacts signed

The pacts exchanged by the two sides include a Bilateral Investment Treaty to further promote investments in both countries, an MoU opening new areas of collaboration in the field of energy security and energy trade, an intergovernmental framework agreement between on the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor building on previous understandings and an MoU on cooperation in Digital Infrastructure Projects to facilitate sharing of technical knowledge, skills and expertise.

The two sides also signed agreements on interlinking of the instant payment platforms — UPI (India) and AANI (UAE) — to facilitate seamless cross-border transactions between the two countries. This follows the MoU on interlinking payment and messaging systems signed in July last year during Modi’s visit to Abu Dhabi. An agreement on inter-linking domestic debit/credit cards — RuPay (India) with JAYWAN (UAE) was also signed. “... An important step in building financial sector cooperation. This will enhance the universal acceptance of RuPay across the UAE,” the release stated.

The UAE is India’s third largest trading partner with bilateral trade of about $85 billion in 2022-23. The country is India’s second largest export destination, the Foreign Secretary pointed out. UAE is also among the top four investors in India in terms of foreign direct investments in 2022-23. About 3.5 million strong Indian community forms the largest expatriate group in UAE.

Modi will visit Doha on Wednesday, after completing his UAE visit, where he will meet the Emir of Qatar, Tamim ibn Hamad Al Thani. Modi’s Doha visit is important as it follows the release of the eight Indian Navy veterans who were imprisoned in the country for over three months.