The Hindu : Vajpayee to meet Chinese PM

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Sep 30, 2003

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National

Vajpayee to meet Chinese PM

By Amit Baruah

NEW DELHI SEPT. 29. Just three months after a successful visit to Beijing, the Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, is scheduled to meet his Chinese counterpart, Wen Jiabao, again, on the sidelines of the Second ASEAN-India summit in Bali on October 7-8.

Mr. Vajpayee, who will reach Bali on October 6, is also scheduled to meet the South Korean President, Roh Moo Hyun. Meetings are also likely with the Indonesian President, Megawati Sukarnoputri, and the Singapore Prime Minister, Goh Chok Tong, in New Delhi.

The Prime Minister, who returned to the capital on Sunday night after an extended visit to attend the United Nations General Assembly session, has already had a series of meetings with world leaders on the sidelines in New York.

Informed sources in the Ministry of External Affairs told this correspondent that the Vajpayee-Wen meeting was not the only one in the busy India-China calendar this year.

A meeting of Special Representatives to discuss the boundary question will take place in New Delhi in October this year.

While the Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, Brajesh Mishra, meets the Senior Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister, Dai Bingguo, in his capacity as India's Special Representative, the Commerce Minister, Arun Jaitley, will be in Beijing to inaugurate a "Made in India" Exhibition in mid-October.

On the invitation of the Vice-President, Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, the number four man in the Chinese leadership hierarchy, Jia Qinglin, Chairman of the Chinese People's Political Conference, will be in New Delhi in November.

In December, the Chinese Commerce Minister, Lu Fuyuan, will be in the capital on the invitation of Mr. Jaitley.

As per the joint declaration issued in Beijing, annual meetings of Foreign Ministers have also been agreed to — the first one is scheduled to take place early next year.

India and China are also discussing a timetable for the joint "search and rescue" exercises between their navies. Indian naval ships are likely to visit a Chinese port for the exercises, which were agreed to during Mr. Vajpayee's visit to Beijing in June.

The agreement to hold exercises, analysts believe, is quite significant when seen in the backdrop of previous tensions between India and China and incidents involving security personnel on the disputed boundary.

All this, the sources said, points to a marked increase in engagement between India and China. Trade between the two countries, which stood at $5 billion last year, is expected to touch $7 billion this financial year.

The Vajpayee-Wen meeting in Bali will be followed by Mr. Dai's visit to New Delhi to discuss the contentious border issue from a political standpoint. Given the fact that the Prime Ministers' meeting will be followed by that of Special Representatives, further discussion on the boundary issue is quite likely.

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