India wary of China arms firm’s invite to Sharif

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s invitation to China North Industries Corporation (NORINCO) to ostensibly help Islamabad in energy infrastructure development has raised eyebrows in South Block given the company’s alleged involvement in supplies to India’s northeast insurgent groups, Shishir Gupta reports.

Updated on: Jun 17, 2013, 01:59:48 IST

Hindustan Times | By Shishir Gupta, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s invitation to China North Industries Corporation (NORINCO) to ostensibly help Islamabad in energy infrastructure development has raised eyebrows in South Block given the company’s alleged involvement in supplies to India’s northeast insurgent groups.

One of the largest state run companies, NORINCO makes toys to short range ballistic missiles and was sanctioned by Bush administration in 2003 for missile related supplies to Iran.

India formally raised the NORINCO issue with China and asked it to desist from dabbling in the northeast.

NORINCO chairman Wang Yitong met PM Sharif in Islamabad last Friday and invited him to tap solar energy in Baluchistan and set up new power plants in Thar, Baluchistan and Punjab.

Pakistan watchers say that NORINCO is looking beyond infrastructure development and is poised to supply A-100 multi-rocket launchers to Islamabad.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shishir Gupta
Shishir Gupta is Executive Editor at Hindustan Times and one of India's top journalists covering national security, strategic affairs, foreign policy and geopolitics. Over the past three decades, he has extensively reported on India's military, diplomatic and security landscape, covering every major conflict and national security challenge, from the 1999 Kargil War and the 2020 East Ladakh standoff to Operation Sindoor in 2025. He has also covered major terror attacks, including the IC-814 hijacking, the 26/11 Mumbai attacks and the 2025 Pahalgam terror strike, along with numerous Pakistan-backed terrorist incidents in the Kashmir Valley and across India. He has reported on national and state elections for more than three decades. A recognised authority on strategic affairs, Gupta has covered India's nuclear programme since the Pokhran-II (Shakti series) tests in May 1998 and has written extensively on global nuclear issues, Indian diplomacy and the country's expanding global outreach. He has also reported widely on international conflicts and terrorism, with a special focus on the Indian subcontinent. Gupta has interviewed Prime Minister Narendra Modi more than four times, including Modi's first interview with the print media after becoming Prime Minister in May 2014. His other interviews include three with the Dalai Lama, as well as conversations with Benjamin Netanyahu, Amit Shah, Yogi Adityanath, S. Jaishankar, Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal. He is the author of Indian Mujahideen: The Enemy Within (Hachette, 2011) and Himalayan Face-off: Chinese Assertion and Indian Riposte (Hachette, 2014). He was awarded the Chevening-Wolfson Joint Scholarship at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, UK, in 1998 and participated in the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) of the US State Department in 2006. He received the Ben Gurion Prize from Israel in 2011 and the K. Subrahmanyam Prize for Strategic Studies in 2015 from the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA). Since 2024, he has hosted Point Blank, Hindustan Times' weekly YouTube show on global geopolitics.Read More

Catch every big hit, every wicket with Crickit, a one stop destination for Live Scores, Match Stats, Infographics & much more. Explore now!

Stay updated with all top Cities including, Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai and more across India. Stay informed on the latest happenings in World News along with Delhi Election 2025 and Delhi Election Result 2025 Live, New Delhi Election Result Live, Kalkaji Election Result Live at Hindustan Times.