Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi have held their first bilateral meeting in almost five years on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit in the Russian city of Kazan. The meeting comes days after the two nuclear-armed neighbors announced an agreement on patrolling disputed border areas, which has been a point of contention since Indian and Chinese troops clashed in June 2020.
During the meeting with Xi, Modi welcomed the “agreement for complete disengagement and resolution of issues” stemming from 2020, New Delhi said in a statement. The Indian leader also underscored the importance of “properly handling differences and disputes and not allowing them to disturb peace and tranquility.”
Xi stated that the two sides should strengthen communication and cooperation, and properly manage differences and disagreements, the Xinhua news agency reported. “It is in the fundamental interests of the two countries and peoples of China and India to correctly grasp the trend of history and the direction of development of their relations,” Xi said, according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV.
Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri, who briefed the media on the meeting on Wednesday, said the two leaders agreed that special representatives on the India-China border question would meet shortly to “oversee” the implementation of the latest agreements “and to explore a fair, reasonable, and mutually acceptable solution to the boundary question.” New Delhi emphasized that the agreements reached by the two neighbors would “create space to return to the normalization of relationships.”
India’s readout also noted that “stable, predictable, and amicable bilateral relations” between the two neighbors, which are also the two most populous nations in the world, “will have a positive impact on regional and global peace and prosperity” and contribute to “a multi-polar Asia and a multi-polar world.”
The relationship between New Delhi and Beijing has been tense since the 2020 incident at the Line of Actual Control (LAC) – the 3,500-kilometer (around 2,100-mile) disputed frontier – which resulted in casualties on both sides. Over the past four years, the two countries held more than 30 rounds of talks, including at both diplomatic and military levels.
In September, Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar revealed that there had been “some progress” on the border dispute, with around 75% of the “disengagement issues” having been resolved. However, he and army officials clarified later that no agreement had yet been reached on the deployment of troops and weapons and patrolling the zone.
New Delhi announced a breakthrough on the latter issue on Monday, on the eve of Modi's departure to Russia for the BRICS Summit. Beijing confirmed the development on Tuesday.
Despite Xi and Modi holding brief encounters on the sidelines of international events in 2022 and 2023, their meeting in Kazan was the first bilateral engagement that also included their delegations, diplomats emphasized.
Responding to a question from RT on whether choosing the Russia-hosted BRICS Summit for such a meeting carried any symbolism, Misri said, “We can thank Russia for providing the venue.”