PM Modi likely to sign free trade agreement during UK visit this week

New Delhi, Jul 20, 2025

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s two-day visit to the United Kingdom (UK) on July 23-24 will focus on increasing bilateral trade, and the signing of the India-UK Free Trade Agreement (FTA) in London on Thursday. The PM will also visit the Maldives while returning from the UK.

In a statement, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said Modi will hold wide-ranging talks with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and the two sides will review the progress of the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership (CSP). Its specific focus, the MEA said, would be on trade and economy, technology and innovation, defence and security, climate, health, education, and people-to-people ties. Modi is also expected to call on King Charles during his fourth visit as PM to the UK.

In the second leg of his visit, the PM will be in the Maldives on July 25 and 26. This will be his third visit to the Maldives, and the first visit by a foreign head of state or government to Maldives during the presidency of Mohamed Muizzu.

The two leaders will take stock of the progress in the implementation of the India-Maldives Joint Vision for a ‘Comprehensive Economic and Maritime Security Partnership’, adopted during Muizzu’s state visit to India in October 2024.

In Kathmandu, Nepal’s foreign ministry said on Sunday that Nepal Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli will pay an official visit to India towards mid-September, a two-day visit starting on September 16. Oli, the chairperson of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist), assumed the office of prime minister for the fourth time last July. He had opted to visit China for his maiden foreign outing, breaking the tradition of visiting India as the first destination after assuming the post of prime minister.

[The Business Standard]