New Delhi: A hotline between New Delhi and Beijing and deeper trade engagement are likely to be the two takeaways when PM Narendra Modi and China President Xi Jinping meet for their second informal summit this week in the Tamil Nadu resort town of Mamallapuram.
The complicated issue of the Line of Actual Control (LAC) is expected to come up too, ThePrint has learnt.
The meeting, scheduled for 11-12 October, takes place amid tensions between New Delhi and Beijing over the scrapping of Jammu & Kashmir’s special status and bifurcation of the state into two union territories. Aksai Chin, a part of Ladakh, which is now a union territory, is under Chinese occupation, and Beijing has made its displeasure on the move fairly clear.
The hotline, sources told ThePrint, may be established between the two foreign ministries in an effort to establish regular contact between New Delhi and Beijing.
According to the sources, the hotline may not be announced during the Modi-Xi summit, but will be established in the coming months.
Sources in the Indian government said additional confidence-building measures and a number of defence-level engagements will be discussed when Modi and Xi meet. The hotline, the sources added, can be among the enhanced confidence-building measures between the two economic giants.
“Political relations between both countries, trade deficit, defence and security and peace and tranquility will be discussed at the informal meeting while priority will be given to enhancing confidence-building measures and people-to-people exchanges,” said a top official.
“In terms of greater confidence-building measures, both sides will be discussing if the present mechanism is adequate or it has to be expanded, especially on the subject of the border.”
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Confidence-building measures
Until now, confidence-building measures between India and China centre on three pacts that primarily deal with affairs pertaining to their 3,488-km boundary.
The first one,‘Maintenance of Peace and Tranquility along the Line of Actual Control in the India-China Border Areas’, was signed on 7 September 1993, while the second one, ‘Confidence-Building Measures in the Military Field Along the Line of Actual Control in the India-China Border Areas’, was signed on 29 November 1996.
In 2005, another agreement, ‘Political Parameters and Guiding Principles for the Settlement of the India-China Boundary Question’, was signed that was aimed at maintaining the 1993 and 1996 pacts.
China expert Swaran Singh, a professor at JNU’s School of International Studies, said a hotline between the two sides was “highly required”.
“India and Pakistan also have such a hotline between the DGMOs (director-generals of military operations). This should have happened earlier,” added Singh.
“But, hopefully, this will be in place in the next five to six months. This will not only help in having regular contact between both the countries but also in coordinating positions and negotiations on complex matters because, frankly, it is the External Affairs Ministry now that has taken centrestage in the country’s security matter,” he said.
The hotline, according to him, may be established between Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale and China’s Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Luo Zhaohui, the former Chinese envoy to India.
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Line of Actual Control on agenda
Both leaders will also be discussing contentious issues concerning the LAC, the disputed border between the two nations.
Since both sides do not have “an agreed, common perception of the Line of Actual Control (LAC)”, the two leaders will touch upon the subject and direct their special representatives (SRs) on border talks to discuss the matter in detail, said the official.
India’s SR is National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval and China’s is Wang Yi, the country’s foreign minister. The last round of special representative talks got cancelled following India’s decision this August to scrap Article 370.
However, according to sources, both leaders will discuss the need to maintain peace and tranquillity in border areas and whether “additional supplementary measures are required” over and above what are present now.
“It is in the interest of both sides to find a fair, reasonable and a mutually acceptable settlement” on the border question, the official said, adding that the main issue is having a common perception of the LAC.
“Also, we need to understand that the boundary issue is entirely different from LAC clarification,” the official added, pointing out that there were swathes of the border that were not in dispute.
The dates for the next round of SR talks will be decided during the informal summit. The two SRs will also hold an annual dialogue on counterterrorism in December.
Trade and visa relaxation
Another major issue on the agenda will be the trade deficit between India and China, amid New Delhi’s concerns that Beijing doesn’t give Indian goods and services a wide enough market.
“Trade deficit remains a matter of concern. There is a trade deficit and we have to bridge it,” said the aforementioned official. “This has to be addressed both in terms of volume as well as value,” the official added, saying the issue of greater services trade will be taken up as well.
One of the main bones of contention between both countries is that China has not really opened up its markets to Indian professionals, as a result of which trade in services remains abysmal.
“There is not adequate understanding between the people of the two countries… what the other country is doing, what are the economic opportunities in each other’s country, in terms of science, education and technology,” the official said.
Singh, meanwhile, suggested that a relaxation in work visas may be likely too as China begins to accept more foreigners in the country. This could mean more opportunities for Indian doctors, teachers and media professionals in the coming years, he said.
Both sides will also discuss enhanced trade in items such as basmati rice, rape seeds, soybean meal and tobacco leaves, among others.
Trade-related discussions will also centre on ongoing negotiations for the proposed mega free trade pact, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which members hope to conclude by November.
The RCEP is being negotiated between the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and their trading partners China, Japan, India, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand.
The Indian industry and the farming community are vehemently opposed to the deal as it will entail wider access for international goods to Indian markets.
Under the proposed agreement, according to official sources, India is expected to reduce or eliminate duties on about 74-80 per cent of goods imported from China.
RCEP trade ministers are scheduled to meet this week, from 10-12 October, in Bangkok. So far, 28 rounds of talks have taken place over seven years.
‘Readiness to maintain contact’
This will be Prime Minister Modi’s third meeting with President Xi since coming to power for the second time this year in May. Both leaders met in Bishkek and then in Osaka in June.
Since the last informal summit in Wuhan, in 2018, this will be their sixth meeting.
“This shows that this is a fairly frequent contact. There is a readiness on both sides to maintain and to advance such contacts and to build a personal connect besides the connect between the two countries,” the official said.
Modi will be accompanied at the summit by External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and Doval, while President Xi will have Foreign Minister Wang Yi by his side. The ministers may hold a separate dialogue track on the sidelines of the informal summit.
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The task of foreign policy is to enlarge a nation’s possibilities, while reducing its vulnerabilities. I was very impressed to see Ms Jyoti Malhotra’s interview with Shri Gowher Rizvi, Advisor to PM Sheikh Hasina. Although Bangladesh is a much smaller country, does not have the complex foreign policy challenges that India does, it has created a conducive, enabling environment for its economic development.