India will “always be” on the side of peace, placing the values of humanity over everything else, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Wednesday after holding talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.Modi met Zelenskyy on the sidelines of the G7 summit in the French commune of Evian-Les-Bains.”Met President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Evian. In recent times, India and Ukraine have been engaging extensively. This has been reflected in different areas of our cooperation,” Modi said in a post on X.”Our talks today were about reviewing different aspects of our cooperation. We both agree that trade ties need to be restored to what they were in the pre-war time. Also reiterated that India will always be on the side of peace, placing the values of humanity over everything else,” he said.India has been consistently calling for an end to the Russia-Ukraine conflict through dialogue and diplomacy.After the meeting, Zelenskyy said that India and Ukraine have “great potential for cooperation”, and are already implementing joint projects.”Today, we discussed how to give them even more substance and expand cooperation across various sectors. Importantly, the Prime Minister is interested in developing mutually beneficial relations with Ukraine and sees that this partnership can make our people stronger.”There are good industrial and other projects that we can implement together. We agreed that our teams would work through all the details,” he said on X.Modi and Zelenskyy last held direct communication when the Ukrainian leader dialled him on August 30 last year.After the phone conversation, Zelenskyy said India is ready to make the necessary efforts and to deliver the appropriate signal to Russia.Modi met Russian President Vladimir Putin two days after the call.In July 2024, Modi travelled to Moscow and told Putin that a solution to the Ukraine conflict is not possible on the battlefield and peace efforts do not succeed in the midst of bombs and bullets.The next month, Modi visited the Ukrainian capital city of Kyiv and conveyed to Zelenskyy that both Ukraine and Russia should sit together without wasting time to end the war.
