Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli | CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon

14/10/2019

Xi returns to Beijing after informal meeting with Indian PM, visit to Nepal

NEPAL-KATHMANDU-CHINA-XI JINPING-FAREWELL CEREMONY

Nepali President Bidya Devi Bhandari hosts a grand farewell ceremony for Chinese President Xi Jinping at the airport in Kathmandu, Nepal, Oct. 13, 2019. Nepali Vice President Nanda Bahadur Pun, Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli, Chairman of the National Assembly Ganesh Prasad Timilsina, cabinet members and senior army generals also attended the ceremony. Chinese President Xi Jinping returned to Beijing from Kathmandu on Sunday. (Xinhua/Gao Jie)

BEIJING, Oct. 13 (Xinhua) — Chinese President Xi Jinping returned to Beijing Sunday evening after his second informal meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in India and a state visit to Nepal.

Xi’s entourage, including Ding Xuexiang, member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, member of the Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee, and director of the General Office of the CPC Central Committee; Yang Jiechi, member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the CPC Central Committee; State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi; and He Lifeng, vice chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and head of the National Development and Reform Commission, also returned to Beijing on the same plane.

As Xi and his entourage were leaving Kathmandu on Sunday noon local time, people of Nepal flocked to both sides of a road leading to the airport, waving flags and playing music to see the Chinese guests off.

Nepali President Bidya Devi Bhandari hosted a grand farewell ceremony for Xi at the airport. Nepali Vice President Nanda Bahadur Pun, Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli, Chairman of the National Assembly Ganesh Prasad Timilsina, cabinet members and senior army generals also attended the ceremony, which featured a 21-gun salute and the playing of national anthems of China and Nepal.

Calling his visit to Nepal a “very successful” one, Xi told Bhandari that upon his arrival, he had been warmly welcomed by the Nepali government and people.

Xi said he was convinced that the China-Nepal friendship enjoyed lasting popularity among the two peoples and will be unbreakable.

Expressing his appreciation for the arrangements made by the Nepali president, government and people, Xi said he was very satisfied with the visit that had resulted in the upgrading of bilateral relations.

He called for joint efforts to further develop the friendly relations between the two countries.

Bhandari said Xi’s successful and fruitful visit has become a milestone in the history of bilateral ties.

The Nepal-China relationship has entered a new era and stepped on a new height, Bhandari said, adding that Nepal will resolutely work with China to promote friendly and good neighborly relations and strategic cooperative partnership.

Source: Xinhua

Posted in 21-gun salute, Airport, attended, Beijing, cabinet members, ceremony, Chairman of the National Assembly, China alert, China-Nepal friendship, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Ding Xuexiang, director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the CPC Central Committee, flags, Ganesh Prasad Timilsina, General Office of the CPC Central Committee, He Lifeng, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Kathmandu, member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, member of the Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee, music, Nanda Bahadur Pun, national anthems, National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), National Development and Reform Commission, National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), Nepal, Nepali President Bidya Devi Bhandari, Nepali Vice President, Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the CPC Central Committee, Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli, senior army generals, State visit, strategic cooperative partnership, Uncategorized, Yang Jiechi | Leave a Comment »

13/10/2019

Xi, Modi agree to trim trade deficit, boost mutual trust amid US-China tensions

The leaders agreed to set up a mechanism to boost economic ties and tackle India’s trade deficit with China after their second informal summit
As 2020 is the 70th anniversary of diplomatic ties between both countries, India and China will hold 70 events next year to promote relations

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping during their meeting in Mamallapuram, Chennai. Photo: EPA

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minster Narendra Modi concluded their second informal summit on Saturday by pledging to overcome trade differences and appreciate “each other’s autonomous foreign policies”, signalling an effort to focus on mutual interests rather than on long-standing contentious issues.

Modi remarked that both sides had agreed to be “sensitive” to each other’s concerns and not let differences escalate into disputes, while Xi called for communication to “alleviate suspicions” and for India and China to enhance strategic mutual trust, according to state news broadcaster CCTV.

Their desire to look beyond irritants in diplomatic ties, including a decades-long border row and China’s close military ties with India’s arch rival, Pakistan, comes as Beijing is embroiled in a tariff war with Washington that has rocked the global economy.

In a sign of China’s willingness to address India’s trade deficit with it, the leaders agreed to launch a “High Level Economic and Trade Dialogue”.

As Xi meets Modi, Chinese in Chennai hope to witness the ‘Wuhan spirit’

Chinese Vice-Premier Hu Chunhua and Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will meet regularly to discuss ways to boost two-way trade and investments, Indian foreign secretary Vijay Gokhale said in a media briefing.

India has a US$53 billion trade deficit with China, which makes up almost a third of its total trade deficit. It is also facing pressure to decide if it will commit to the China-led

Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership

(RCEP), which aims to create the world’s largest trading bloc involving 16 countries before the end of the year.

Narendra Modi exchanges gifts with Xi Jinping. Photo: AFP

Negotiations are ongoing with talks taking place in Bangkok this week, but India’s domestic producers have opposed the agreement over fears of a flood of Chinese imports. On Friday, the Indian government rejected clauses in the agreement related to e-commerce, according to reports.

Gokhale told the media briefing that both leaders, who met in the coastal town of Mamallapuram about 50km away from Chennai, briefly discussed the RCEP.

“PM Modi said India was looking forward to the RCEP but it is important that RCEP is balanced, that a balance is maintained in trade in goods, trade in services and investments,” he said, adding that Xi agreed to further discussions of India’s concerns on the issue.

Narendra Modi with Xi Jinping in Mamallapuram. Photo: EPA

CCTV said Xi had six suggestions for how China and India could further improve ties, including assessing each other correctly and stepping up cooperation between their militaries. Besides economic and trade dialogue, China welcomed Indian pharmaceutical and IT companies to invest there, he said.

“We should look at disputes with a correct mind, and not let disputes affect cooperation.

“Both sides should properly and fairly get a solution for border disputes that are acceptable to each other … [and] cautiously handle each other’s core interests, and take proper measures to control issues that cannot be resolved immediately,” the president reportedly said.

Gokhale told reporters that both countries had agreed to pursue, through special representatives, an ongoing dialogue on their disputed border. China and India have held more than 20 rounds of talks to resolve their boundary dispute, over which they went to war in 1962. Different mechanisms have been set up to maintain peace along the 4,000-kilometre (2,485-mile) so-called Line of Actual Control.

Xi and Modi bank on chemistry as they talk trade and terrorism

Gokhale confirmed that the leaders – who met for a total of seven hours over Friday and Saturday, with the bulk of their time spent in one-on-one talks – did not discuss

Kashmir

, a region that is currently divided between India and Pakistan but which both nuclear-armed rivals claim in full.

Since India revoked the autonomy of the area it controls in August and imposed a lockdown,

Pakistan

has lobbied its allies – including its all-weather friend China – to support its opposition to the move. New Delhi had reacted sharply to Beijing’s move to take the matter to the United Nations, insisting that it was a purely bilateral issue. Two days before the summit, Xi had hosted Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan and had assured him of China’s support on all core issues, a statement that had irked India.

Gokhale said both leaders “emphasised the importance of having independent and autonomous foreign policies”.

“President Xi said that the two countries needed to have more extensive dialogue in order to understand each other’s perspectives on major global and regional issues,” he added.

Narendra Modi exchanges gifts with Xi Jinping. Photo: AFP

The leaders also discussed terrorism, with a statement issued later by New Delhi saying both sides would make efforts to ensure the international community strengthened its framework “against training, financing and supporting terrorist groups throughout the world and on a non-discriminatory basis”.

The China-led multilateral Financial Action Task Force, which has been investigating Pakistan’s efforts to stamp out the financing of terrorism, is expected to decide soon if it would add Islamabad to its blacklist along with Iran and North Korea, a move that could invite stringent economic sanctions and drive away international financial institutions, both of which could affect Pakistan’s already-indebted economy adversely.

Gokhale added that as 2020 is the 70th anniversary of diplomatic ties between both countries, India and China will hold 70 events next year to promote people-to-people ties, with Modi accepting an invitation by Xi for the next informal summit to be held in China.

Both leaders had struck positive notes on the summit – with Xi describing their discussions as “candid” and between friends and Modi hailing the “Chennai Connect” meeting as marking a new era of cooperation between both countries.

War games, Kashmir and a US$57b question: the issues as Xi meets Modi

But analysts said they would be looking to see how the newly-announced high-level mechanism on trade panned out.

Narayani Basu, a New Delhi-based author, foreign policy analyst and China watcher felt the summit had achieved its purpose of bagging small wins for both sides.

“Discussing contentious issues would have defeated the purpose of the summit. The idea behind such a summit must be that despite the overarching posturing on different divergent issues, the two countries can achieve the easily-achievable wins. That is what the summit seems to have tried doing.”

But in terms of actual outcomes, she said she remained sceptical.

“I don’t think there has been much progress in the ties between the two countries since the last summit in Wuhan. Hence, this time, there is a lot more caution and scepticism towards such a summit,” she said, referring to the first summit last year in the Chinese city of Wuhan.

During Xi’s visit to southern India, which lasted 24 hours in all, Modi took him on a personal tour of temple monuments dating back to the seventh and eighth century in Mamallapuram when regional leaders had trade ties with Chinese provinces. He was also shown local artisan handicrafts and art forms, and gifted a handwoven silk portrait, a lamp and a painting.

Xi gave Modi a porcelain plate with the image of the prime minister’s face printed on it.

Xi Jinping with Narendra Modi in Mamallapuram. Photo: Reuters

On Friday, New Delhi announced that visa rules for Chinese nationals visiting India would be relaxed, with multiple-entry visas with a validity period of five years available from this month onwards. At present, most visas are single-entry and usually for between 30 and 60 days. Visa fees would also be reduced, the government said, with the multiple-entry visa costing US$80.

This was aimed at further enhancing “people-to-people exchanges between the two countries and [encouraging] more Chinese tourists to choose India as a destination for tourism purposes,” it said in a statement.

Xi left Chennai on Saturday afternoon and arrived in Nepal, which lies in between India and China. He will be the first Chinese president to visit Nepal in 22 years and is expected to sign a slew of deals with Nepal’s Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli, including the planned extension of the rail link from remote, mountainous Tibet to Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu.

The link will be part of Beijing’s ambitious infrastructure project to boost trade, the

Belt and Road Initiative

(BRI), that Nepal joined two years ago.

More than 120 countries have signed on to the BRI, including Pakistan, where a series of projects worth US$46 billion are being constructed under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). India has snubbed the BRI and questioned the transparency of funding agreements.

Source: SCMP

Posted in 70th anniversary, ambitious infrastructure project, autonomous foreign policies, “High Level Economic and Trade Dialogue”, Bangkok, Beijing, Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), BRI, CCTV, chemistry, Chennai, China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), Chinese President Xi Jinping, Chinese Vice-Premier, Chinese Vice-Premier Hu Chunhua, diplomatic ties, economic and trade dialogue, Financial Action Task Force, global economy, Imran Khan, India alert, India’s trade deficit, Indian Finance Minister, Indian Foreign Secretary, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, informal summit, iran, IT companies, Kashmir, Kathmandu, major global and regional issues, Mamallapuram, Nepal, Nepal’s Prime Minister, New Delhi, Nirmala Sitharaman, North Korea, Pakistan, Pakistan Prime Minister, pharmaceutical companies, Prime Minister Imran Khan, Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli, rail link from remote, mountainous Tibet, Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), seventh and eighth century, tariff war, temple monuments, terrorism, trade and terrorism, Uncategorized, United Nations, Vijay Gokhale, Washington, Wuhan Spirit | Leave a Comment »

09/10/2019

China Focus: Xi’s trip to India, Nepal to inject new impetus into ties

BEIJING, Oct. 9 (Xinhua) — Chinese President Xi Jinping’s upcoming trip to India and Nepal is expected to inject new impetus into China’s relations with the two countries, an official said here Wednesday.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry announced earlier in the day that at the invitation of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Nepali President Bidhya Devi Bandari, President Xi will attend the second informal meeting with Modi and pay a state visit to Nepal from Oct. 11 to 13.

This will be Xi’s first overseas trip after the grand celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, Vice Foreign Minister Luo Zhaohui told a press briefing.

Xi’s trip will inject new impetus into China-India and China-Nepal relations, even China’s relations with South Asia, Luo said, adding that Xi’s trip will also open up new space for strengthening regional connectivity and economic and trade cooperation, set up new platforms for enhancing mutual trust and friendship among regional people, and make new contributions to world peace and prosperity.

China and India, both as developing countries and emerging economies, are the only two major countries in the world with a population of more than 1 billion, Luo said, stressing that China-India cooperation will not only benefit the development of the two countries, but also help promote world multipolarization and economic globalization, and safeguard the common interests of developing countries.

Since the first informal meeting between Xi and Modi in Wuhan last year, China-India relations have entered a new stage of steady growth, with cooperation and exchanges being carried out in various fields and differences being properly managed, Luo said.

In Chennai, Xi will have an in-depth communication with Modi on issues that have overall, long-term and strategic significance on bilateral relations, set the tune and guide the direction for future development of the ties, and speak to the world in unanimous voice, so as to inject positive energy into the world full of uncertainties.

Regarding Xi’s visit to Nepal, Luo said that Xi will be the first Chinese president to visit the South Asian country after an interval of 23 years.

Nepal, as a friendly neighbor, also serves as an important partner of China in terms of carrying out the Belt and Road cooperation, Luo said.

Since the establishment of diplomatic ties, the two countries have treated each other on an equal footing with mutual respect and support, said Luo, adding that China and Nepal have become a model of mutually beneficial cooperation between countries that are different in social system and size.

“This historic visit will definitely exert historic influence,” Luo said.

He said that Xi will attend the welcome ceremony and banquet hosted by President Bandari, meet with Bandari, hold talks with Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli and jointly witness the signing of cooperation documents with him.

Xi will also meet with co-chairman of the Nepal Communist Party Pushpa Kamal Dahal, also known as Prachanda, and leaders of the country’s Federal Parliament and other political party leaders, Luo added.

Leaders of the two countries will make new plans for the development of bilateral relations, ushering in a new era of fast development for China-Nepal relations, Luo said.

This will also consolidate political mutual trust and foundation of public opinions for friendship between the two countries, push forward high quality construction of the Belt and Road, speed up building an interconnectivity network across the Himalayas, and inject new impetus into pragmatic cooperation in various areas between the two countries, Luo said.

Source: Xinhua

Posted in 70th anniversary of the founding of the PRC, Belt and Road (B&R), Belt and Road Cooperation, Chennai, China-India relations, China-Nepal relations, Chinese foreign ministry, Chinese President Xi Jinping, diplomatic ties, economic globalization, Federal Parliament, grand celebration, Himalayas, India alert, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, multipolarization, Nepal, Nepal Communist Party, Nepali President Bidhya Devi Bandari, overseas trip, Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli, South Asia, South Asian country, Uncategorized, Vice Foreign Minister Luo Zhaohui, Wuhan | Leave a Comment »

CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon

Chindia Alert: You’ll be Living in their World Very Soon

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