China welcomes PM Modi's planned visit to attend SCO Summit

Beijing: China on Friday welcomed Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s planned visit to the Tianjin Summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) to be held later this month, expressing hope that the event will be a "gathering of solidarity, friendship and fruitful results".

PM Modi is expected to travel to China later this month, after a gap of over seven years, to attend the annual summit of the SCO, people familiar with the matter in Delhi said this week.

"China welcomes Prime Minister Modi to China for the SCO Tianjin Summit," Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Guo Jiakun said while responding to a question on reports about Modi's visit to China to attend the Tianjin summit to be held from August 31 to September 1.

"We believe that with the concerted effort of all parties, the Tianjin summit will be a gathering of solidarity, friendship and fruitful results, and the SCO will enter a new stage of high-quality development featuring greater solidarity, coordination, dynamism and productiveness," Guo said.

Guo said that leaders of over 20 countries, including all member states of the SCO and heads of 10 international organisations, will attend relevant events.

"The SCO Tianjin Summit will be the largest summit in scale since the establishment of the SCO," the spokesperson added.

Modi is expected to embark on a visit to Japan around August 29, and after concluding the trip, he will travel to the Chinese city of Tianjin for the SCO summit.

There is no official confirmation yet on Modi's two-nation visit to Japan and China.

Modi last visited China in June 2018 to attend the SCO summit. Chinese President Xi Jinping visited India in October 2019 for the second "informal summit".

However, the relationship came under stress due to the eastern Ladakh border face-off.

The military standoff in eastern Ladakh began in May 2020 and the clashes at the Galwan Valley in June that year resulted in a severe strain in ties.

The face-off effectively ended following completion of the disengagement process from the last two friction points of Demchok and Depsang under an agreement finalised on October 21 last year.

In the last few months, both sides revived the Special Representative dialogue on the boundary question and other dialogue mechanisms.

The decision to revive various dialogue mechanisms was taken at a meeting between Prime Minister Modi and President Xi at Kazan in Russia on October 23, 2024.

The Modi-Xi meeting came two days after India and China firmed up a disengagement pact for Depsang and Demchok.

The two sides also took a number of initiatives to rebuild the ties, which included the resumption of Kailash Mansarovar Yatra and New Delhi restarting issuance of tourist visas to Chinese nationals.

Both sides are also discussing modalities to resume direct flight services between the two countries.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and NSA Ajit Doval visited China in the last two months to attend the SCO meetings.

China is the current chair of the SCO.

It is not immediately clear whether PM Modi and President Xi will hold a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the SCO summit.

It is expected that Russian President Vladimir Putin will be among the top leaders who will participate in the SCO summit.

The SCO, comprising India, China, Russia, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Iran and Belarus, is an influential economic and security bloc that has emerged as one of the largest transregional international organisations.

It was founded at a summit in Shanghai in 2001 by the presidents of Russia, China, the Kyrgyz Republic, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

Pakistan became a permanent member along with India in 2017. Iran joined the grouping in 2023 and Belarus in 2024.