Beijing, March 24 – As India and China held the 18th round of talks on the boundary question in New Delhi on Monday, China’s official Xinhua news agency said in a commentary issued in Beijing that the border dispute was no longer an “insurmountable barrier” for bilateral ties.
The commentary said that although the situation in the border does, from time to time, “stir up tens[ion] and concerns”, the two sides’ frequent meetings had shown that China and India would resolve issues through diplomacy.
In China, there has been more than the usual interest in this week’s talks, which are the first between the both countries following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s election victory last year. Xinhua noted that this was the first round since Modi “swept to power”.
The commentary said that “cross-border cooperation” was “far more common than frontier stand-offs today”, calling on both counties to “seize opportunities, remove barriers and strengthen the positive momentum for the advancement of China-India relations.”
The official news agency quoted both sides as agreeing during Monday’s talks to “move forward the process of framework talks in a correct direction on the basis of the existing achievements and consensus, while taking into consideration of the overall bilateral relations and long- term interests of the two peoples”.
The two sides are currently in the second stage of a three-step process, which involves agreeing a framework to settle the border dispute in western, middle and eastern sectors. The first stage was completed in 2005 with an agreement on political parameters and guiding principles. The final stages involves delineating the border in maps and on the ground.
The commentary said the dispute “will not become an insurmountable barrier” for securing the overall stability in the region as both countries were “capable of keeping the disputes under control.”
“Despite all the difficulties, the border talks continue to register progress and the disputes have been brought under control. Mechanisms such as regularly scheduled border talks, military hot-lines and designated meeting areas deep in the Himalayas are installed to prevent unexpected incidents from flaring into warfare,
” Xinhua said, quoting Foreign Minister Wang Yi who said recently of the border talks, “It’s like climbing a mountain: the going is tough, and that is only because we are on the way up.”
-INDIA TODAY
