Context: India and Uzbekistan upgraded ties to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, with cooperation expanding to uranium, critical minerals, defence, connectivity and digital payments.
- Trade target: $5 billion/year by 2030; current trade >$1 billion.
- Uranium: Framework for long-term uranium supply from Uzbekistan to India for civil nuclear cooperation.
- Critical minerals: Joint projects in geological exploration, mining, mineral processing and integrated value chains.
- Defence: Focus on direct linkages, co-production and co-development between defence industries.
- UPI–UZQR:NPCI International Payments Ltd (NIPL) + Uzbekistan’s National Interbank Processing Centre JSC to enable Indian UPI apps to scan Uzbekistan’s UZQR for merchant payments.
- Buddhist heritage: Conservation of Fayaz Tepa and Kara Tepa, ancient Buddhist monastic sites in southern Uzbekistan, associated with the Silk Road.
- Aral Sea: India announced a $1 million grant for afforestation in the Aral Sea region.
- Institutional mechanism: India–Uzbekistan Joint Commission to be elevated from Secretary-level → Ministerial-level.
- 15 years: 2026 marks 15 years of the India–Uzbekistan Strategic Partnership.
- Uzbekistan: Central Asian, landlocked and doubly landlocked country; borders Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan.
