The first bilateral meeting in five years between the Chinese and Indian leaders comes as they seek to resolve a border standoff
Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi have held their first bilateral meeting in almost five years on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit in the Russian city of Kazan. The meeting comes days after the two nuclear-powered neighbors announced an agreement on patrolling disputed border areas, which has been a point of contention since Indian and Chinese troops clashed in June 2020.
During the meeting with Chinese leader Xi, which was the pair’s first in five years, Modi welcomed the “agreement for complete disengagement and resolution of issues” stemming from 2020, New Delhi said in a statement. The Indian leader also underscored the importance of “properly handling differences and disputes and not allowing them to disturb peace and tranquility.”
Xi stated that the two sides should strengthen communication and cooperation, and properly manage differences and disagreements, the Xinhua news agency reported. “It is in the fundamental interests of the two countries and peoples for China and India to correctly grasp the trend of history and the direction of development of their relations,” Xi said, according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV.
Prime Minister @narendramodi met with Mr. Xi Jinping, President of the People’s Republic of China, on the sidelines of the 16th BRICS Summit at Kazan, Russia today
Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri, who briefed the media on the meeting on Wednesday, said the two leaders agreed that special representatives on the India-China border question would meet shortly to “oversee” the implementation of the latest agreements “and to explore a fair, reasonable, and mutually acceptable solution to the boundary question.” New Delhi emphasized that the agreements reached by the two neighbors would “create space to return to the normalization of relationships.”
India’s readout also noted that “stable, predictable, and amicable bilateral relations” between the two neighbors, which are also the two most populous nations in the world, “will have a positive impact on regional and global peace and prosperity” and contribute to “a multi-polar Asia and a multi-polar world.”
The relationship between New Delhi and Beijing has been tense since the 2020 incident at the Line of Actual Control (LAC) – the 3,500-kilometer (around 2,100-mile) disputed frontier – which resulted in casualties on both sides. Over the past four years, the two countries held more than 30 rounds of talks, including at both diplomatic and military levels. In September, Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar revealed that there had been “some progress” on India’s border dispute, with around 75% of the “disengagement issues” having been resolved. However, he and army officials clarified later that no agreement had yet been reached regarding matters pertaining to patrolling and the deployment of troops and weapons.
New Delhi announced that both sides agreed on arrangements for patrolling along the border on Monday, on the eve of Modi embarking on his trip to Russia. Beijing confirmed the development on Tuesday.
Despite Xi and Modi holding brief encounters on the sidelines of international events in 2022 and 2023, their meeting in Kazan was the first bilateral engagement that also included their delegations, diplomats emphasized. Answering an RT correspondent’s question on whether the Russia-hosted BRICS Summit being chosen as the venue for such a meeting carried any symbolism, Misri said, “We can thank Russia for providing the venue.”
