India and China have shown a sudden enthusiasm for improving ties since the withdrawal of troops from the Line of Actual Control a little more than a month ago. Relations between the world’s two most populous countries had been in reverse gear since a military standoff more than four years ago.
However, there has been a reversal of momentum since November and it seems both sides are looking to make up for lost time since 2020. New Delhi and Beijing understand well that lasting peace in Asia requires two Asian giants. Must lead the way. There can be no better start than finding a solution to the border issue. And so, it appears that both sides have given it priority.
National Security Advisor Ajit Doval will meet Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Wednesday for a top-level meeting to discuss the border issue. Although there has been no confirmation of this meeting from New Delhi yet, but Beijing has said so in a statement of the Foreign Ministry.
“Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval will meet in Beijing on Wednesday to discuss the China-India border issue,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said in a statement on Monday.
“In accordance with the consensus of China and India, Wang Yi and Ajit Doval will hold the 23rd meeting of special representatives for the China-India border question in Beijing on December 18,” Chinese Ambassador Xu Feihong said on X.
This will be the first such meeting in five years – the last being held in New Delhi in December 2019.
Since their first meeting more than a decade ago, both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping had attached importance to finding solutions for effective border management, and the meeting in December 2019 led to a series of discussions to find a solution. It was the 22nd meeting. Solution to resolve any differences along the more than 4,000 km long Line of Actual Control or LAC.
The LAC has no clear demarcation and both sides differ over where the border lies in the harsh and arguably most difficult terrain, which extends up to the world’s highest mountain ranges – the Himalayas. Originally the border between India and Tibet, it is now considered the border between India and China following the acquisition of Tibet by China in 1959.
Both sides have, on several occasions, witnessed military face-offs by border patrols, each with an understanding of where the border actually lies – which point on the mountains, valleys or rivers marks or indicates the LAC . Although buffer zones have been created at several points along the LAC, there too, differences often emerge in the way each side demarcates the border.
To find a solution, India and China had started border talks, but it all came to a halt after the deadly clash between Indian and Chinese armies in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley in 2020, which saw troops from both sides. Killed in action.
It took more than four years for the two sides to part ways, and the agreement for which was reached in October this year, following a rare formal meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping – also the first in five years. This meeting took place on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Russia.
