Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping will hold a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Russia’s Kazan on Wednesday, the external affairs ministry said.
“I can confirm that there will be a bilateral meeting held between Prime Minister Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping tomorrow on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit,” foreign secretary Vikram Misri said at a press briefing.
The meeting holds significance as New Delhi and Beijing on Monday announced that they have reached an agreement on patrolling along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh, in a major breakthrough in ending the over four-year-long military standoff.
“In the pending areas under discussion, patrolling and indeed grazing activities, wherever applicable, will revert to the situation as it obtained in 2020…As far as the disengagement agreements reached previously are concerned, those agreements were not reopened in these discussions. The agreement that was reached yesterday was focused on issues that had remained outstanding in the last couple of years,” Misri said, referring to Monday’s agreement.
China on Tuesday also confirmed that it has reached an agreement with India to end the standoff between the two armies in eastern Ladakh.
“Over a recent period of time, China and India have kept close communication through diplomatic and military channels on issues related to the China-India border,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian told a media briefing here.
Earlier on Monday, external affairs minister S Jaishankar said India has maintained peace and tranquillity along the India-China border as a requirement for positive bilateral ties.
“That was our major concern because we always said that if you disturb the peace and tranquillity, how do you expect the rest of the relationship to go forward,” he said at a conference hosted by broadcaster NDTV.
In all negotiations since the standoff began, India has been pressing the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to disengage from the Depsang and Demchok areas.
At the convention, Jaishankar indicated that India will be able to carry out patrolling in Depsang and other areas.
“So what has happened is that we reached an understanding which will allow the patrolling which you spoke about Depsang, that’s not the only place,” he said.
“There are other places also. The understanding to my knowledge is that we will be able to do the patrolling which we were doing in 2020 (prior to the standoff),” he said.
The external affairs minister said both sides have been holding negotiations to end the standoff since September 2020.
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