China claims India wants to create favourable conditions for high-level exchanges

With Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping likely to come face-to-face in Johannesburg and New Delhi in August and September, China has claimed that India has expressed its willingness to bring the bilateral relations back on track and create favourable conditions for “high-level exchanges” between the two nations.

New Delhi, however, has not yet commented on the claim made by Beijing.

Beijing on Saturday quoted India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar telling China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, that normalization of bilateral relations was in the common interests of both sides.

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Jaishankar had a meeting with Wang, the director of the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee Foreign Affairs Commission, on the sideline of a conclave of the foreign ministers of the East Asia Summit (EAS) nations in Jakarta on Friday.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Chinese Government in Beijing on Saturday issued a statement on the meeting between the two top diplomats. It quoted Jaishankar telling Wang that India was willing to properly deal with the differences between the two sides with an open mind, push the India-China relationship back on track as soon as possible and create favourable conditions for high-level exchanges at the next stage.

The relations between India and China hit a new low since the two sides got engaged in a military stand-off along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh in April-May 2020.

Beijing’s claim about New Delhi’s willingness to create favourable conditions for “high-level exchanges” between the two nations came just a few weeks before the 15th summit of the BRICS (a bloc comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) would take place at Johannesburg in South Africa on August 22 and 24 next. Modi and Xi are likely to come face-to-face during the summit.

Xi is also likely to attend the G20 summit, which Modi will host in New Delhi on September 9 and 10 next.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs has not yet issued any press release on the Jaishankar-Wang meeting. “Discussed outstanding issues related to peace & (and) tranquillity in border areas. Our conversation also covered EAS/ARF (East Asia Summit / ASEAN Regional Forum) agenda, BRICS and the Indo-Pacific,” tweeted the external affairs minister after his meeting with the former foreign minister of China.

Wang told Jaishankar that India and China must focus their energy and resources on their own development, on the improvement of the livelihood of people and accelerated revitalization and “not let specific issues define the overall relationship”. He told the external affairs minister of India that Beijing would expect New Delhi to meet it halfway and find a mutually acceptable solution to the border issue.

He also conveyed to Jaishankar Beijing’s concern over New Delhi’s recent restrictive measures against China’s companies doing business in India.