India, China hold consultations on agenda of UN Security Council
- India began a two-year stint as a non-permanent member of the Security Council earlier this month.
India and China on Thursday held bilateral consultations on issues on the agenda of the United Nations Security Council, a rare meeting between the two sides amid the dragging military standoff on the Line of Actual Control (LAC).
The Indian delegation used video conferencing to brief the Chinese side “on India’s priorities during its UNSC tenure,” the external affairs ministry said in a brief statement without giving details.
“Both sides discussed a wide range of issues on the UNSC agenda,” the statement said. The two sides also “agreed to continue their engagement on key issues” on the Security Council’s agenda, the statement added.
India began a two-year stint as a non-permanent member of the Security Council earlier this month.
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Last year, the Indian side listed an effective response to global terrorism, reforming the multilateral system, a comprehensive approach to international peace and security, and promoting technology with a human touch among its priorities for its stint in the Security Council.
Prakash Gupta, joint secretary (UNP and summits) in the external affairs ministry, led the Indian delegation that included officials from the East Asia and UN economic and social divisions, the permanent mission of India in New York and the embassy in Beijing.
The Chinese delegation was led by Yang Tao, director-general of the department of international organisations in China’s foreign ministry.
Since the standoff in Ladakh sector of the LAC emerged in the open in May last year, the main interactions between the two countries have been meetings of the Working Mechanism for Consultation and Coordination (WMCC) on border affairs and senior military commanders that focused on taking forward disengagement and de-escalation along the disputed border.
External affairs minister S Jaishankar and defence minister Rajnath Singh met their Chinese counterparts on the margins of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) meetings in Moscow last September. The Special Representatives on the border issue have also held consultations, while Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping have participated in several virtual meetings of multilateral organisations.