Wednesday, June 1 2005 16:01 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Vladivostok (Russia): Foreign Ministers of India, China and Russia will meet in Vladivostok tomorrow (June 2, 2005) for the first stand-alone meeting among them to explore possibilities of trilateral cooperation in trade, economic and other diversified fields.

External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh, who arrived in this far eastern Russian city today (June 1, 2005), will hold discussions on a wide range of regional and international issues with his counterparts from Russia Sergei Lavrov and Li Zhaoxing from China.

The three leaders will exchange their assessments on UN reforms, including expansion of the Security Council and issues like international terrorism, environment as also revival of multilateral approaches to global issues.

Indian officials said the three countries attached special importance to strengthening mechanisms to jointly combat the scourge of terrorism and trafficking in narcotics.

At the trilateral meeting, Singh, Lavrov and Li will seek to build on convergences and commonalities among the three countries, they said.

The Foreign Ministers of the three countries have met thrice in the past, twice on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in 2002 and 2003 and the next year in Almaty when they gathered for the meeting of the Confidence-building Measures in Asia (CICA).

But this is the first occasion when they are assembling together especially for the trilateral meeting. It reflects the upgradation of the status of these meetings, the officials said.