External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Thursday met his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Indonesia’s Bali and called for an early resolution of all the outstanding issues along the LAC in eastern Ladakh.
The foreign minister recalled the disengagement achieved in some friction areas and reiterated the need to sustain the momentum to complete disengagement from all the remaining areas to restore peace and tranquility in the border areas, according to a statement by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).
Jaishankar reaffirmed the importance of fully abiding by bilateral agreements and protocols, and the understandings reached between the two ministers during their previous conversations. In this regard, the statement said, both ministers affirmed that the military and diplomatic officials of the two sides should continue maintaining regular contact and looked forward to the next round of Senior Commanders’ meeting at an early date.
The EAM also reiterated that India-China relationship is best served by observing the three mutuals – mutual respect, mutual sensitivity and mutual interests.
India and China have been locked in a years-long border row in eastern Ladakh, where Chinese have maintained heavy deployment of troops. The ongoing conflict began after the Chinese side advanced in 2020 in areas claimed by India.
Both the sides have held 15 round of talks to resolve the stalemate, which has now been going on for over two years. In March this year, Wang Yi made a surprise visit to India where he met his Indian counterpart Jaishankar and NSA Ajit Doval.
While Jaishankar said that the relation with China was not normal, New Delhi did not get any assurance from Wang Yi. After meeting with Wang Yi, Jaishankar addressed the media where responding to a question he said: “No, our relationship (with China at present) is not normal, given the presence of a large number of troops in contravention of the 1993-96 agreements.”
“So long there are very large deployments, border situation is not normal. We still have ongoing friction areas, have made progress in resolving some friction areas including Pangong Tso. Our discussion today was how to take this forward. There have been 15 rounds of talks,” he said.
In February, the foreign minister had said that the tense situation at the LAC was due to the disregard by China in 2020 of written agreements with India not to mass forces at the border.
