External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar is likely to visit China for the first time after 2020 standoff between two countries at the Line of Actual Control (LAC). He will travel there in the third week of July to attend a Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) foreign ministers’ meeting and for bilateral meetings with key Chinese leaders, it was learnt.
Since India and China reached an understanding on ending the face-off last October, Jaishankar has met his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on the margins of multilateral events several times.
Jaishankar is expected to travel to Beijing for a bilateral meeting with Wang before going to Tianjin for the meeting of the SCO Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs on July 14 and 15, sources said. The bilateral meeting will be part of an ongoing series of meetings between senior Indian and Chinese officials to normalise relations and find a solution to the long-standing border dispute.
Efforts to speed up de-escalation and withdrawal of troops to peacetime positions along the LAC and measures to normalise ties in areas such as trade and people-to-people contacts are expected to figure in Jaishankar’s discussions with Wang.
National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval visited China last December and in June to attend a meeting of the SCO Security Council Secretaries in Beijing. Doval and Wangalso held a bilateral meeting.
This was followed by a visit by defence minister Rajnath Singh to attend a meeting of the SCO defence ministers in Qingdao. At a meeting with his Chinese counterpart Dong Jun, Singh called for a structured roadmap for “permanent engagement and de-escalation” and pushed for a “permanent solution of border demarcation”.