Prime Minister Narendra Modi today announced the doubling of India's contribution to the Commonwealth fund for technical cooperation and stressed the need to focus on providing developmental assistance to small island states, the External Affairs Ministry said today.


The prime minister, during his interventions at the executive session of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting here, also highlighted the need for capacity building of small states and small island developing states that are part of the Commonwealth.


India is going to help these small island states and coastal states in capacity building through training programmes at the National Institute Of Oceanography in Goa, Ruchi Ghanashyam, Secretary (West) in the Ministry of External Affairs, told reporters during a briefing.


The main issues discussed at today's session were strengthening democracy and the rule of law, the state of the international trading system, achieving the Sustainable Development Goals and climate action, and security issues faced by the Commonwealth countries.


In his interventions, the prime minister highlighted a number of important issues, including the need for working together for achieving SDGs and cooperation on climate action, Ghanashyam said.


The main announcements made by the prime minister at the summit included doubling India's contribution to the Commonwealth fund for technical cooperation, she said without giving any figures of India's current contribution.


The Prime Minister also said India would also take part in small projects for assisting Commonwealth countries through its permanent mission in New York. -- PTI