Jaishankar, Yi meet over LAC row

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 10

External Affairs Minister

S Jaishankar on Thursday talked for over two hours with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Moscow to resolve the worsening situation on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh.

After a lull following the Galwan valley incident on June 15, troops from both sides have come dangerously close to confrontation on two occasions in the last fortnight.

Also read: Army further strengthens dominance in strategic heights in eastern Ladakh

Jaishankar’s interaction follows another one held last week between Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and his Chinese counterpart, also in Moscow, where both ministers set out their respective positions on restoring normalcy on the LAC.

Trilateral held

• Foreign Ministers of Russia, India and China held trilateral talks on the sidelines of SCO
• “Attended the RIC Foreign Ministers Meeting hosted by FM (Sergey) Lavrov in Moscow. Thank him for his warm hospitality. India takes on the Chair of the RIC process,” External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar tweeted

Jaishankar and Wang were holding talks after three rounds of virtual meetings of the working mechanism on the border and several army commander-level meetings failed to stem a series of aggressive actions that culminated in shots being fired at the LAC for the first time in 45 years.

At the time of the going to the press, there was no official word on the meeting between the two. Earlier in the day, Jaishankar and Wang sat together at two multilateral interactions in which bilateral disputes were not discussed. The main show for which Jaishankar had gone to Moscow — the meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation — was held in the morning.