Chinese and Indian diplomats call for warmer relations but make no public mention of border dispute

BEIJING (AP) — The top diplomats of China and India called for their nations to provide further mutual support, but avoided publicly mentioning a long-standing border dispute in the Himalayas when they met Monday in Beijing.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told top Indian foreign affairs official Vikram Misri that the sides “should seize the opportunity, meet each other halfway, explore more substantive measures, and strive to understand, support and achieve each other, rather than be suspicious of, alienate and consume each other,” China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported.

It cited Misri as saying the nuclear-armed Asian giants have “properly managed and resolved differences, and promoted the restart of practical cooperation in various fields.”

India’s foreign ministry in a statement said the two sides also agreed to resume trips by Indian pilgrims to Tibet’s Mount Kailash, which is considered as one of the holiest sites in Hinduism and Buddhism. The pilgrimage was stopped in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Ties have been stable since the leaders of the two countries met last year on the sidelines of a multinational summit in Russia. Days before that meeting, India announced the two sides had agreed to a pact on military patrols along their disputed border in the Himalayas after a spike in tensions that began with a deadly clash in 2020. That turned into a long-running standoff in the rugged mountainous area, where each side has stationed tens of thousands of military personnel backed by artillery, tanks and fighter jets.

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Chinese President Xi Jinping and India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi have since limited their joint public comments to pleasantries without openly discussing the border. India said the 2024 agreement would lead to the “disengagement” of troops at the Line of Actual Control, the long shared border in the Himalayas, although it’s unclear whether that meant the withdrawal of the tens of thousands of additional troops stationed along their disputed border in the Ladakh region.

The Line of Actual Control separates Chinese and Indian-held territories from Ladakh in the west to India’s eastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, which China claims in its entirety. India and China fought a deadly war over the border in 1962.

Both India and China have withdrawn troops from face-off sites on the northern and southern banks of Pangong Tso, Gogra and Galwan Valley, but they maintain extra troops at Demchok and Depsang Plains.

The army standoff damaged business ties between the two nations with halted investments from Chinese firms and major projects banned. India also banned Chinese-owned apps, including TikTok, which is operated by Chinese internet firm Bytedance. It cited privacy concerns that it said threatened India’s sovereignty and security.

Chinese products are ubiquitous in India, from toys to smartphones to made-in-China Hindu idols. According to Indian government data, two-way trade has grown by the tens of billions in the past two decades, with the balance strongly favoring China, while China has drawn many Indian specialists and students, particularly in the medical field.