Foreign secretary Gokhale visits Beijing to review Sino-India ties

Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale has paid a visit to Beijing and held talks with top Chinese officials on bilateral ties.

Foreign secretary Vijay Gokhale was in Beijing on Friday and Saturday for diplomatic consultations with senior Chinese officials.

Foreign secretary Vijay Gokhale shakes hands with Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi during a meeting to discuss bilateral agenda, in Beijing on Friday.(PTI)

Gokhale, who was India’s envoy to China before he succeeded S Jaishankar as the foreign secretary last month, held talks with Chinese vice foreign minister Kong Xuanyou, and called on foreign minister Wang Yi and state councillor Yang Jiechi, the statement said.

The visit comes at a time amid uneasy relations between Delhi and Beijing on a range of bilateral and regional issues.

“During the consultations, the two sides reviewed recent developments in bilateral relations, including high level exchanges, and discussed the agenda for bilateral engagement in the coming months. Both sides agreed upon the need to expedite various dialogue mechanisms in order to promote multifaceted cooperation across diverse fields of India-China engagement,” the external affairs ministry said in a statement.

The key theme of the visit was the need to build on the convergences between India and China and address differences on the basis of mutual respect and sensitivity to each other’s concerns, interests and aspirations.

“Both sides underlined that as two major countries, sound development of relations between India and China is a factor of stability in the world today. The two sides also exchanged views on regional and international issues of common interest”, the ministry said.