French President Emmanuel Macron to visit India this year

Prime Minister Narendra Modi meeting the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, in Paris. Pic/PTI

Prime Minister Narendra Modi meeting the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, in Paris. Pic/PTI

Accepting an invitation from Prime Minister Narendra Modi, new French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday said that he will be visiting India by the end of this year.

"I will be travelling to India towards the end of this year and convene a meeting of the world solar alliance," Macron said while addressing the media with Modi after bilateral talks.

He said that both he and Modi were convinced that India and France can do a lot together in the area of environmental transition and climate change.

At the initiative of India, Modi and then French President Francois Hollande had jointly launched the International Solar Alliance (ISA) in Paris at the UN Conference of Parties (CoP) on climate change in Paris on November 30, 2015.

The ISA is conceived as a coalition of solar resource-rich countries to address their special energy needs and provide a platform to collaborate on dealing with the identified gaps through a common, agreed approach.

It is open to all 121 prospective member countries falling between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn.

Macron's remarks came even as US President Donald Trump pulled his country out of the Paris climate agreement.

On his part, Modi thanked Macron for accepting his invitation.

Modi arrived here on Friday on the fourth and final leg of his six-day, four-nation tour of Europe.