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In China, EAM S Jaishankar to hold talks with Wang Yi
This will be Jaishankar’s first visit to China since bilateral relations were taken to their lowest point in six decades by the military standoff in Ladakh.
External affairs minister S Jaishankar on Sunday embarked on a visit to China, where he will hold talks with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, on taking forward the process of normalising ties after a four-year Line of Actual Control (LAC) standoff and participate in a meeting of foreign ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) during July 14-15, people aware of the matter said. He is scheduled to arrive in Beijing early Monday.
This will be Jaishankar’s first visit to China since bilateral relations were taken to their lowest point in six decades by the military standoff in the Ladakh sector that began in April-May 2020. The two sides reached an understanding on ending the face-off last October, and since then, Jaishankar has met Wang on the margins of multilateral events several times.
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Efforts to speed up de-escalation and withdrawal of troops to peacetime positions along the LAC and measures to normalise ties in areas such as trade and people-to-people contacts are expected to figure in Jaishankar’s discussions with Wang, the people said. After meeting Wang, Jaishankar is set to travel to Tianjin for the meeting of the SCO foreign ministers.
In a statement on the SCO meeting, the Chinese foreign ministry separately mentioned that Jaishankar “will also pay a visit to China”.
“The Meeting of the Council of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Member States will be held in Tianjin on July 15. At the invitation of Member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, foreign ministers of other SCO member states and heads of SCO’s permanent bodies will attend the meeting… In addition to attending the meeting, India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar will also pay a visit to China,” the statement said.
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The foreign ministers’ meeting will be closely watched to see if it produces a joint communique. The SCO defence ministers’ meeting last month was unable to issue a communique, as India refused to endorse the document when Pakistan insisted that it couldn’t refer to the Pahalgam terror attack.
Earlier on Sunday, Jaishankar met the top leadership of Singapore to review bilateral ties and explore new avenues for collaboration.
Besides his counterpart Vivian Balakrishnan, Jaishankar also met President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and deputy prime minister and trade minister Gan Kim Yong.
The two sides “reviewed progress in the outcomes of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit and the second round of the India-Singapore Ministerial Roundtable last year. This included the areas of investments, industrial parks, semiconductors, infrastructure, skill development and connectivity.
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The two sides also exchanged views on Asean, the Indo-Pacific region, and global developments,” the ministry of external affairs said in a statement. Jaishankar also met Teo Chee Hean, former senior minister and chairman-designate of Temasek Holdings. Their discussions focused on India’s transformation and opportunities for Temasek to expand its investments in India.
“The visit is part of continued high-level exchanges between India and Singapore and reflects the importance New Delhi attaches to its relations with Singapore,” the statement said. He then left for China.
