External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar Meets Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing

India and China have to make further progress towards normalising their relationship by settling matters arising on the border, such as de-escalating, and they should not adopt any up-tight trade policies and roadblocks, the external affairs minister S Jaishankar told his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on Monday.

Jaishankar, meeting Wang (in Beijing) after landing in China to participate in a meeting of foreign ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), repeated that there is no stronger foundation that can be established to achieve stable bilateral relations than mutual respect, mutual interest and mutual sensitivity.

Apparently referring to the Pakistani support to cross-border terrorism, Jaishankar informed to Wang that at the SCO meeting the issue of common concern that is needed to be upheld is of zero toleration to terrorism.

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In previous days, Jaishankar held discussions with Chinese vice president Han Zheng where he informed him that further normalisation of bilateral relations can bring positive results to both sides. This is the first visit of Jaishankar to China since the bilateral ties were affected by border clashes in April-May 2020 but he had met Wang a few times on the sidelines of multi-lateral events since the two powers had struck an accord on resolving a stand-off along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) last October.

“We have made good progress in the past nine months for the normalisation of our bilateral relations. It is a result of the resolution of friction along the border and our ability to maintain peace and tranquillity there,” Jaishankar said in televised opening remarks at the meeting with Wang.

“This is the fundamental basis for mutual strategic trust and for smooth development of bilateral relations. It is now incumbent on us to address other aspects related to the border, including de-escalation,” he said.

Although the two sides had pulled front line troops out of the LAC on the two remaining points of friction Demchok and Depsang last year, the de-escalation process and troops back to pre-peacetime positions are yet to be concluded.

Jaishankar observed that the interactions between large economies like India and China have many aspects and achieving the normalisation of people-to-people interaction can lead to positive cooperation between the two countries. He added: "It is also crucial in this regard so that no restrictive trade measures together with roadblocks are used."

He seemed to be talking about export restrictions in China on rare earth minerals, which are in a variety of products including smartphones, an electric vehicle, and in most of which Beijing enjoys almost exclusive possession, and fertilisers. India has formally challenged the restrictions on exports of rare earths using diplomatic means particularly considering the implication to producers of electric vehicles.

Maintaining constant and positive relations between India and China that can be beneficial to the two nations and the rest of the world should be achieved by "treating relations in terms of mutual respect, mutual interest and mutual sensitivity, said Jaishankar."

He added, “We have also earlier agreed that differences should not become disputes, nor should competition ever become conflict. On this foundation, we can now continue to develop our ties along a positive trajectory.”

With a reference to the meeting of SCO foreign ministers to be held Tuesday, Jaishankar noted that the mandate of this eight-member group active since 2001 is to aim at fighting terrorism, separatism and extremism. “This is a shared concern and India hopes that zero tolerance for terrorism will be strongly upheld,” he said.

The comments by Jameshankar become important since not so long ago a meeting of SCO defence ministers had failed to pass a unified communique because Pakistan had opposed the mentioning of the terrorist attack at Pahalgam in that text. Rajnath Singh, India defence minister had declined to sign the communique.

A similar period of four days of hostilities was witnessed between Pakistan and India in May triggered by the Operation Sindoor which was initiated by New Delhi to strike terror infrastructure on the territories held by Islamabad, and was supported by China.

Jaishankar said that India and China must embrace a far-seeing relation toward each other. The ties had been drifting towards positive direction since October 2024 when the relationship began to normalize between prime minister of India Narendra Modi and president of China Xi Jinping in the Russian city Kazan. “Our responsibility is to maintain that momentum,” he told Wang.

Meetings during international events recently provided a better avenue of strategic communication and Jaishankar revealed that henceforth, this move will be normal and shall take place in each other countries.

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India and China are also celebrating the 75th year of diplomatic relations and the restarting of the Kailash Manasarovar Yatra after a period of five years, that too with the help of the Chinese side, according to Jaishankar, who also thanked the Chinese side on the revival of the pilgrimage to one of holy mountains and a lake in Tibet.

Speaking at his meeting with vice president Han, Jaishankar said that bilateral relations are on a steady improvement ever since the bilateral meeting between Modi and Xi in Kazan last October. Jaishankar said, continued normalisation of our ties will generate win-win situations and that his talks in this visit will ensure that the relationship has a positive direction.

According to Chinese state-owned news agency Xinhua, Han said, China and India are two significant members of the Global South and they must be the partners in making one another successful. Han added that it was in the interests of both parties to continue the gradual improvement of practical cooperation, to consider each other and their concerns asking to develop bilateral relations on a new basis on the basis of sustainability and continuity.

India and China had agreed last October to resolve the four-year military standoff in Ladakh sector of LAC. Two days after the realization, both Modi and Xi met in Russia and they decided to restart a number of mechanisms to normalise bilateral relations and to find a solution to the decade old territory dispute. Since then, a series of high level meetings between the foreign and defence ministers as well as NSAs of both the countries have taken place.

The stand-off on the LAC and deadly clashes in 2020 June in the Galwan Valley took the bilateral relations to their lowest point in 6 decades, killing 20 Indian and at least 4 Chinese soldiers.

But before that, the spokesperson of the Chinese embassy in New Delhi stated on Sunday ahead of Jaishankar visit that the issue of Tibet including the reincarnation of Dalai Lama is one of the thorn in bilateral relations. These are the statements of the spokesperson immediately after Dalai Lama had made it clear that no other organisation other than the type of trust that he has established will present him with the face of his reincarnated person.

Beijing has demanded that the Chinese government must approve the new Dalai Lama while the New Delhi has stated that it does not have any position when it comes to matters regarding practices in religious aspects.

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