Chinese ambassador Xu Feihong
Credit: X/@DrSJaishankar
New Delhi: The relations between China and India are standing at a new starting point, with new development opportunities, Xu Feihong, Beijing’s envoy to New Delhi, said in Kolkata, just a week after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping had a bilateral meeting on the sideline of the BRICS summit at Kazan in Russia.
“China stands ready to work with India to lift bilateral economic and trade cooperation to a new height,” Xu said at an event held by the Merchant Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Kolkata.
The Modi-Xi meeting at Kazan in Russia was the first between the two leaders in five years and it followed an agreement between the two sides on the arrangement of patrolling by the Indian Army and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in Depsang and Demchok areas along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) – the de facto boundary between the two nations – in eastern Ladakh.
Beijing’s envoy to New Delhi said that the meeting between the leaders of India and China in Russia was “very important”.
“The meeting was constructive and carried great significance. The two sides reached a series of common understandings, including strengthening communication and cooperation, enhancing strategic mutual trust, holding talks between our foreign ministers and officials at various levels to bring the relationship back to sound and steady development,” he told journalists in Kolkata.
The deal between New Delhi and Beijing on the arrangement of patrolling in Depsang and Demchok marked the end of the military stand-off, which started along the LAC in eastern Ladakh in April-May 2020 and continued for more than four years.
The relations between the two nations hit a new low as the Indian Army soldiers deployed a large number of troops to resist the Chinese PLA’s aggressive moves to alter the status quo and push the LAC westward to assert China’s claim on the territories of India.
“I hope that under the guidance of this consensus, relations will be moving forward smoothly in the future and not be restricted and interrupted by specific disagreements between the two sides. The most important thing is how to handle the differences,” said Xu.
He said that China had become India's largest trading partner, and the bilateral trade had crossed the $100-billion mark. “Imposing tariffs and restrictions on Chinese products are not conducive to the development of downstream industries and interests of consumers in India," he said.