Foreign Secy Misri to begin two-day China visit on January 26 to revive bilateral ties

Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri will embark on a two-day visit to China on January 26-27, marking the third high-level contact between the two nations in over two months. This development comes after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval held separate meetings with Chinese officials in November and December last year.

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Misri’s visit aims to revive the bilateral mechanism at the Foreign Secretary-level between India and China. The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) stated that this visit follows the ‘agreement at the leadership level’ to discuss the next steps for India-China relations, encompassing political, economic, and people-to-people domains.

The ‘agreement at the leadership level’ was announced in October last year, following a bilateral meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the 16th BRICS summit at Kazan, Russia.

Notably, the armies of both nations had been engaged in a military standoff since April 2020, hindering talks at all levels. However, after officials worked out a ‘patrolling arrangement’ for troops along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Eastern Ladakh, the Modi-Xi meeting paved the way for resuming bilateral discussions. It was coupled with a plan to disengage troops from the two remaining friction spots — Depsang and Demchok — along the LAC.

The leadership has outlined a plan to reinvigorate the stalled bilateral relationship by tasking special representatives to oversee peace and tranquillity in border areas and work towards a ‘fair, reasonable, and mutually acceptable’ solution to the pending boundary question.

In recent months, Jaishankar and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi met on the sidelines of the G20 Leaders Summit, while NSA Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met in Beijing to discuss the boundary dispute and promote bilateral relations.

Both nations have also discussed resuming Kailash Mansarovar Yatra, data sharing on trans-border rivers, and border trade. However, India and China still lack a demarcated boundary, with Beijing resisting proposals for a proper boundary. The 3,448-km long LAC serves as a de-facto boundary, but its alignment remains disputed.