New Delhi, Jul 25 (EFE).- Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval called on China to continue efforts to resolve border disputes between the two countries during a meeting with Wang Yi, the head of the Office of the CPC Foreign Affairs Commission of the Communist Party of China, according to the Indian Foreign Ministry on Tuesday.
Doval “emphasised the importance of continuing efforts to fully resolve the situation and restore peace and tranquility in the border areas,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.
Doval and Yi met Monday on the sidelines of the national security advisors’ meeting of the BRICS nations – a group comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – in Johannesburg.
The 2020 clashes in the disputed Galwan Valley in the western Himalayas left at least 20 soldiers dead and 76 wounded on the Indian side and at least four dead on the Chinese side, which “eroded strategic trust and the public and political basis of the relationship” between Beijing and New Delhi, according to Doval.
The meeting comes after China’s Defense Minister Li Shangfu called for strengthening regional stability and normalizing the situation at the border during a meeting with his Indian counterpart Rajnath Singh in New Delhi in April.
Despite statements from both sides seeking normalcy in ties and numerous rounds of military talks to reduce tension along the current Line of Control – LAC, or the de facto border -, bilateral relations between the world’s two most populous countries are at one of their lowest points in decades.
India and China have a long-standing dispute over some regions of the Himalayas, such as the Aksai Chin, administered by Beijing but also claimed by India.
The latest setback took place in early April, when China unilaterally renamed eleven sites in Arunachal Pradesh, a region claimed by Beijing but under India’s control. EFE
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