Press statement by EAM Dr. S Jaishankar after meeting with Foreign Minister of Mongolia

Good afternoon to the media, Minister Battsetseg Batmunkh, Foreign Minister of Mongolia, colleagues from both delegations.

Let me say, Minister, what a pleasure it is to be in Mongolia. This is my first time as Foreign Minister. I have been here once before accompanying the Prime Minister.

We have just concluded what I believe was a very warm, very productive, very open meeting. And Before I speak about the meeting, I want to thank you and the Government of Mongolia for the warm welcome that you have accorded me and my delegation, and I really look forward not only to our meetings today but also our visit to the refinery project tomorrow

Friends, India and Mongolia- we are Strategic Partners, we are also Spiritual siblings. Our relationship is rooted in deep civilizational and spiritual linkages, shared democratic values, and strong development aspirations, and strong people-to-people ties.

We celebrated last year the 70th anniversary of establishment of diplomatic relations and we had the privilege of hosting the President of Mongolia in India in October. That visit was highly successful with several outcomes, and one of the purposes of my visit was to sit with my counterpart and review the progress of what was agreed to between our Prime Minister and your President last year.

So in our discussions today, we really reviewed the entire gamut of our bilateral cooperation, including the development partnership of which the Oil Refinery is the most important project, there is also an ICT Center and a school, and a number of Quick Impact Projects, we spoke about capacity building, technology, economic and trade cooperation, supply chain cooperation, education, culture, defence, security, and energy.

We had an exchange of views on more ideas, new opportunities, and preparing an agenda for the next level of our Strategic Partnership, and the Minister cited the English language skills as one example - I think in the coming months, we would probably from our conversation and meetings come out with other projects and shared initiatives as well.

We also discussed ways to strengthen our strategic partnership, the Buddhist heritage links between us and people-to-people exchanges.

We exchanged views on regional and global issues, including cooperation in multilateral forums, and I want to say we very much value your participation in the International Solar Alliance and the International Big Cat Alliance

We reiterated our commitment to work with the Mongolian side to take our Strategic Partnership to even greater heights.

So, Minister, this is my first meeting since arrival earlier in the day, I look forward to calling on the President and other dignitaries in Mongolia, and to visiting the sites of our practical cooperation, whether it is development site or refinery, or the cultural cooperation that we have especially centering around the Gandan monastery.

So once again Thank you very much for the welcome, for the openness and cordiality with which you receiving us, and I want to take the opportunity to express my confidence that our relationship is really moving to even greater heights. Thank you very much.

New Delhi
June 22, 2026