Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri to begin 2-day China visit on January 26

Misri is visiting China for a meeting of the foreign secretary-vice minister mechanism, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said on Thursday.

New Delhi: Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri will travel to Beijing on a two-day trip beginning Sunday, in the second such high-profile visit from India to China in less than one-and-a-half months.

Last month, National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval travelled to Beijing and held talks with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi under the framework of Special Representatives (SR) dialogue on the boundary dispute.

"Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri will be visiting Beijing on January 26 and 27 for a meeting of the Foreign Secretary-Vice Minister mechanism between India and China," the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said on Thursday.

"The resumption of this bilateral mechanism flows from the agreement at the leadership level to discuss the next steps for India-China relations, including in the political, economic, and people-to-people domains," it said in a brief statement.

The decision to revive the SR dialogue mechanism and other such formats was taken at a meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Kazan on October 23.

In the nearly 50-minute meeting, Modi underscored the importance of properly handling differences and disputes and not allowing them to disturb peace and tranquillity in border areas.

The Modi-Xi meeting came two days after India and China firmed up a disengagement pact for Depsang and Demchok, the last two friction points in eastern Ladakh.

In the SR dialogue, India pressed for a fair, reasonable and mutually acceptable settlement of the overall boundary dispute between the two countries.

Doval and Wang also focused on "positive" direction for cross-border cooperation including resuming the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra, river data sharing and border trade.

Last week, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said the India-China relationship is trying to disentangle itself from the complications arising from the post-2020 border situation and more thought needs to be given to the longer-term evolution of the ties.

"At a time when most of its relationships are moving forward, India confronts a particular challenge in establishing an equilibrium with China. Much of that arises from the fact that both nations are on the rise," he had said.

The external affairs minister noted that as immediate neighbours and the only two societies with over a billion people, India-China dynamic could never have been easy.

"But it has been further sharpened by a boundary dispute, by some baggage of history and by differing socio-political systems. Misreadings by past policy-makers, whether driven by idealism or absence of realpolitik, has actually helped neither cooperation nor competition with China," he said.

"That has clearly changed in the last decade. Right now, the relationship is trying to disentangle itself from the complications arising from the post-2020 border situation," he added.