Prime Minister Narendra Modi was briefed by Russian President Vladimir Putin on his recent meeting with US President Donald Trump at the Alaska summit last week.
Mr Putin briefed Mr Modi about his conversation with his American counterpart while dropping him off in his Russian-built Aurus limousine on Monday.
There is no secret. I told him what we discussed in Alaska," the Russian President replied during a press conference in China, referring to the discussion.
The two heads of state were in Tianjin on August 31 for a two-day visit to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit.
Mr Putin and Mr Modi spent one hour chatting inside the limousine on Monday. PM Modi arrived about 10 minutes late for President Putin to leave. Though the ride to their meeting point took around 15 minutes, they kept talking in the vehicle for another 45 minutes.
"The two leaders continued their one-to-one dialogue on the way to the hotel, where they were to be joined by members of their teams. However, on reaching the hotel, they did not deboard the Russian president's limousine and continued their conversation for a further 45 minutes," Russian national radio station VestiFM reported.
Later, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that the leaders had a private chat in the car that lasted around an hour. "He didn't want to cut the significant conversation short. But the 'home walls' of the car also came into play," Mr Peskov said.
Moscow analysts pointed out that Mr Putin's presidential limousine is very secure against wiretapping, probably making it easy to engage in discussions on sensitive bilateral issues.
Mr Putin is likely to come to India in December for summit-level talks with Mr Modi.
The Alaska summit had been held last month, with Mr Trump extending the red carpet to Mr Putin to talk about the Russia-Ukraine war, though no breakthrough was made.
President Trump made it clear that "there is no deal until there is a deal", indicating the absence of any proper resolution during the meeting, while President Putin described the talks as "thorough and useful". Mr Putin also said Russia was "sincerely interested in putting an end" to the conflict in Ukraine but flagged "legitimate concerns" to be taken into account.
They were made during a joint press conference after three hours of negotiations on Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which started in February 2022. The war has caused thousands of casualties and seen Moscow make quick territorial gains ahead of the summit. The two leaders, however, did not take questions from the media.
Before the Alaska summit, halting hostilities immediately was a primary requirement of Mr Trump, who had threatened Russia with "severe consequences," as did European leaders, such as Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky, who took Washington in stride shortly thereafter.
Read also| Global ChatGPT Outage Causes Glitches and Lost Conversations for Users
