India said today (6) that prime minister Narendra Modi will hold meetings with leaders of countries like the UK, Canada, Japan, and the UK on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Hamburg but ruled out any scheduled bilateral meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
"The prime minister is visiting Hamburg from July 6-8 for G-20 Summit. His pre-planned bilateral meetings on the sidelines of the Summit are with Argentina, Canada, Italy, Japan, Mexico, ROK (Republic of Korea), the UK and Vietnam," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Gopal Baglay said when asked about prime minister Modi's schedule in Hamburg.
"In addition, he will also participate in the BRICS Leaders meeting. There is no change in the prime minister's schedule," he said, suggesting that there was no scheduled bilateral meeting between Modi and Xi.
Comments by Baglay, who is accompanying Modi on his overseas trip, came after Chinese foreign ministry officials also ruled out the possibility of a Xi-Modi meet.
China and India have been engaged in a standoff in the Dokalam area near the Bhutan tri-junction for past 19 days after a Chinese Armys construction party attempted to build a road.
Fighting terrorism, climate change and global trade will be at the core when prime minister Modi and leaders from the worlds other top economies assemble here for a two-day G20 Summit beginning tomorrow.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee said Machado was honoured for her efforts to promote democratic rights and pursue a peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy in Venezuela.
Maria Corina Machado awarded 2025 Nobel Peace Prize for promoting democracy in Venezuela
The Nobel Committee praised her courage and fight for peaceful democratic transition
Machado has been in hiding for a year after being barred from contesting Venezuela’s 2024 election
US President Donald Trump had also hoped to win this year’s Peace Prize
VENEZUELA’s opposition leader and democracy activist Maria Corina Machado has been awarded the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee said she was honoured for her efforts to promote democratic rights and pursue a peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy in Venezuela.
Machado, who has been living in hiding for the past year, was recognised “for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy,” said Jorgen Watne Frydnes, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, in Oslo.
“I am in shock,” Machado said in a video message sent to AFP by her press team.
Frydnes said Venezuela has changed from a relatively democratic and prosperous country to “a brutal authoritarian state that is now suffering a humanitarian and economic crisis.”
“The violent machinery of the state is directed against the country's own citizens. Nearly eight million people have left the country,” he said.
The opposition has been systematically suppressed through “election rigging, legal prosecution and imprisonment,” Frydnes added.
Machado has been “a key, unifying figure in a political opposition that was once deeply divided,” the committee said. It described her as “one of the most extraordinary examples of civilian courage in Latin America in recent times.”
“Despite serious threats against her life, she has remained in the country, a choice that has inspired millions,” it said.
Machado had been the opposition’s presidential candidate ahead of Venezuela’s 2024 election, but her candidacy was blocked by the government. She then supported former diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia as her replacement.
Her Nobel win came as a surprise, as her name had not featured among those speculated to receive the award before Friday’s announcement.
Trump’s hopes for prize
US President Donald Trump had expressed his desire to win this year’s Peace Prize. Since returning to the White House in January for a second term, he has repeatedly said he “deserves” the Nobel for his role in resolving several conflicts — a claim observers have disputed.
Experts in Oslo had said before the announcement that Trump was unlikely to win, noting that his “America First” policies run counter to the principles outlined in Alfred Nobel’s 1895 will establishing the prize.
Frydnes said the Norwegian Nobel Committee is not influenced by lobbying campaigns.
“In the long history of the Nobel Peace Prize, I think this committee has seen every type of campaign, media attention,” he said. “We receive thousands and thousands of letters every year of people wanting to say, what for them, leads to peace.” “We base our decision only on the work and the will of Alfred Nobel,” he added.
Last year, the prize went to the Japanese anti-nuclear group Nihon Hidankyo, a grassroots organisation of atomic bomb survivors from Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The Nobel Peace Prize includes a gold medal, a diploma, and a cash award of $1.2 million. It will be presented at a ceremony in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death in 1896.
The Peace Prize is the only Nobel awarded in Oslo. Other Nobel Prizes are presented in Stockholm.
On Thursday, the Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to Hungarian author Laszlo Krasznahorkai. The 2025 Nobel season concludes Monday with the announcement of the economics prize.
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