India’s foreign minister addressed Chinese students at an elite Peking University yesterday, the second day of a visit aimed at boosting trade and cooperation despite a lingering border dispute and concern in New Delhi over China’s rising assertiveness.
China’s Foreign Ministry barred access to the speech by reporters from the Associated Press, but did not say why.
India’s relations with China have recently entered a sensitive period because of sharpening economic rivalries, lingering arguments about the border and unrest in Tibet, the Chinese-controlled Himalayan region on the Indian border.
India hosts the Dalai Lama’s Tibetan government-in-exile, which is accused by Beijing of orchestrating sometimes deadly rioting in Tibetan areas of China earlier this year. The Dalai Lama, Tibet’s exiled Buddhist leader, denies the accusations.
On Thursday, Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi (楊潔箎) told his visiting Indian counterpart Pranab Mukherjee that relations between the two countries were “at the best period of development in history” and faced “important strategic opportunities,” Xinhua news agency reported. The combined populations of the two countries make up a third of humanity.
Indian diplomats said the sides agreed to exchange data on seasonal water flows in cross-border rivers, including Brahmaputra, one of Asia’s largest rivers and which originates in Tibet, where it is known as the Yarlung Zangbo.
Xinhua made no mention of the rival territorial claims dating from a brief but bloody border war in 1962, although such issues featured heavily in independent Indian media reports on the visit.
Beijing claims India’s northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh.
China occupies a large chunk of territory that India considers part of its Jammu and Kashmir region, and it says its border with the Indian-controlled region of Sikkim has yet to be demarcated.
Eleven rounds of talks on settling the dispute have made scant progress. Chinese officials said earlier that the two foreign ministers would touch on border issues at their meeting, but there was no immediate indication whether it came up.
Mukherjee opened a new Indian consulate in the southern city of Guangzhou on Thursday and was scheduled to meet with Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶) before his three-day visit ends today.
India has repeatedly expressed concerns that Chinese troops have been making incursions over the de facto border, an issue that was discussed during Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Beijing in January, with no apparent result.
China, meanwhile, has expressed dissatisfaction with India’s decision to reopen an air base near the Chinese border in the Ladakh region.
Along with the border dispute, some in India have also expressed concerns about China’s warming ties with neighboring countries on the Indian Ocean, especially Pakistan, India’s traditional rival.
Beijing has sought to soothe the Indian concerns, saying rising trade and exchanges point to an overall improvement in relations.
Two-way trade grew to US$37 billion last year, with the balance heavily in China’s favor, and is targeted to rise to US$60 billion by 2010.
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