Peace in border areas, respecting LAC essential for normalisation of India-China ties: Modi to Xi

New Delhi: In what could be termed as a major ice-breaker in sour India-China relations, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday expressed his concerns to Chinese President Xi Jinping regarding unresolved matters along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh during a conversation on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in South Africa.

Giving details about the development, Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra said in a special press briefing here that PM Modi in his conversation with Xi Jinping, highlighted India's concerns on the unresolved issues along the LAC in the Western sector of the India-China border areas".

He noted that the PM underlined that the maintenance of peace and tranquility in the border areas and observing and respecting the LAC are essential for the normalization of the India-China relationship. "In this regard, both leaders agreed to direct their relevant officials to intensify efforts at expeditious disengagement and de-escalation", FS Kwatra added.

This is the first such face-to-face meeting between the two leaders since the May 2020 Galwan Valley border clash. Ever since the clash broke out at LAC, there have been several high-level meetings at the Defence and Foreign ministers level to resolve the issue but PM Modi and the Chinese Premier Xi Jinping never spoke over a call or sat down for talks.

However, it is pertinent to note that in September 2022, the two leaders stood next to each other and attended a Leaders’ Lunch at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Samarkand, but didn’t hold formal talks.

In November 2022, the two leaders were seen talking at a G-20 banquet in Bali after PM Modi walked up to Xi and exchanged greetings, but it was only in July this year. India and China have been engaged in a border standoff for the last three years and the relations between the two leaders have been at an all-time low due to tensions on the Line of Actual Control (LAC). The two sides have held 19 rounds of talks so far to address the boundary issues in eastern Ladakh since 2020.

Last month, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval conveyed to senior Chinese diplomat Wang Yi that the situation along the LAC in the Western Sector of the India-China boundary since 2020 had eroded strategic trust and the public and political basis of the relationship. Doval met Wang Yi, a Member of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Political Bureau and Director of the Office of the CPC Foreign Affairs Commission on the sidelines of the BRICS NSAs’ Meeting in Johannesburg in July this year.