India, China should work for mutual understanding: Chinese foreign minister
Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi met foreign secretary Vikram Misri ahead of talks with vice foreign minister Sun Weidong, the latest in a series of engagements
India and China should work towards mutual understanding and avoid “suspicion” and “alienation”, Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi told foreign secretary Vikram Misri on Monday. Misri met Wang ahead of talks with vice foreign minister Sun Weidong, the latest in a series of engagements since the two sides reached an understanding last October aimed at reducing tensions on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) after a military standoff of over four years.
Wang said the two sides should “meet each other halfway” and “commit to mutual understanding [and] mutual support”, and avoid “mutual suspicion [and] mutual alienation”, according to a readout in Mandarin from China’s foreign ministry. There was official word on the meeting from the Indian side.
Wang said the “improvement and development of China-India relations is fully in line with the fundamental interests of the two countries” and is “conducive to safeguarding the legitimate rights and interests of the Global South” countries.
Since India and China reached an understanding on the disengagement of forces at the two remaining “friction points” of Demchok and Depsang on October 21 and Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping met two days later in Russia, the two sides have revived several mechanisms to address their long-standing border dispute and normalise relations that had plunged to a six-decade low.
In recent weeks, the foreign and defence ministers of the two sides met on the margins of multilateral meetings and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval travelled to Beijing in December for a meeting of the Special Representatives on the border issue. Wang is also the Special Representative for the Chinese side, and this was their second meeting in less than five months.
India has adopted a more cautious and nuanced approach to these meetings in the face of Chinese demands for easing visa restrictions and resumption of direct flights suspended since 2020. China has called for putting the border issue in its “appropriate place” in the overall relationship, a signal that the two sides should take forward trade and investment ties.
At the meeting of the Special Representatives, the two sides agreed to focus on cross-border cooperation and exchanges, including the resumption of the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra, data sharing on trans-border rivers, and border trade.
The Kailash-Mansarovar pilgrimage, stopped for the past four years, is expected to figure in Misri’s talks on Monday with the Chinese vice foreign ministry, alongside measures to bolster trust and facilitate de-escalation in Ladakh sector of the LAC, people familiar with the matter said.
