Modi told Xi India, China must be sensitive to each other’s core concerns: Govt | India News
PM Narendra Modi raised Indian concerns in ties with China with President Xi Jinping when the leaders met last week on the sidelines of the BRICS summit, saying both sides need to show sensitivity to each other’s core concerns, according to the Indian government.The assertion by MEA was in response to a question about the Chinese readout that quoted Modi as saying India’s position on Tibet and Taiwan had not changed and India does not allow anyone to carry out anti-China activities on its soil.“Prime Minister referred to Indian concerns as well and underlined that both sides should show sensitivity to each other’s core concerns and be guided by the three mutuals, mutual respect, mutual interest and mutual sensitivity,” said spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal. Modi had told Xi that border peace forms an essential basis for taking the relationship forward.Amid repeated cases of border strife with China, India had stopped publicly articulating its One-China policy 16 years ago. However, in practice, India’s position on both Tibet and Taiwan has remained unchanged under successive governments.Government maintains its policy on Taiwan is clear and consistent, as it facilitates and promotes interactions in areas of trade, investment, tourism, culture, education and other such people-to-people exchanges.On Tibet, India continues to recognise that the Tibet Autonomous Region is part of the territory of the People’s Republic of China, as stated in the Declaration on Principles for Relations and Comprehensive Cooperation signed by then PM Atal Behari Vajpayee and Premier Wen Jiabao in 2003. The declaration also stated that India does not allow Tibetans to engage in anti-China political activities in the country.
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According to the Chinese readout, Modi had also told Xi that India followed an independent foreign policy and its approach to China had nothing to do with any third country. Indian side did not mention Tibet or Taiwan in its readout. Interestingly, India on this occasion dropped China’s ‘friends, not rivals’ formulation that it used in its readout of the Modi-Xi meeting in Tianjin last year.After external affairs minister S Jaishankar’s meeting with his counterpart Wang Yi in Manila in July this year, China had attributed similar remarks to Jaishnakar about India respecting China’s sovereignty. The MEA later clarified that Jaishankar had told Wang it was India which should be raising sovereignty issues with Beijing. He said India does not violate China’s sovereignty in any manner, but China remained in illegal occupation of Indian territory in Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh since 1963, where India’s right is officially acknowledged even by China.“Also, there are Chinese projects on territories in Jammu and Kashmir that belong to India, and we object to that,” said Jaiswal, days after Jaishankar-Wang meeting, alluding to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.