External Affairs Minister S M Krishna will pay a four-day visit to China from tomorrow during which he will hold talks with the Chinese leadership on the entire gamut of bilateral relations.
"The leaders will also discuss regional and international matters of mutual interest. It goe without saying that we are keen on build on the positives," Mr Vishnu Prakash, the official spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs, told reporters here yesterday.
This will be the firt official bilateral visit by Mr Krishna as the External Affairs Minister to China and the highest level political visit from India to China during the second term of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government.
The last visit to China by the External Affairs Minister of India was in June, 2008.
Mr Prakash said Mr Krishna's visit assumed added significance as it coincides with the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between India and China.
He said developing friendly relations with China, partnership with China, had been one of the topmost priorities of the Indian foreign policy. He said there was an overarching consensus across the political spectrum in India to have good, cooperative and friendly ties with China.
"A significant landmark in the relationship has been the establishment of the Strategic and Cooperative Partnership for Peace and Prosperity between India and China during the visit of Premier Wen Jiabao to India in April 2005," he said.
Mr Krishna will be accompanied on the visit by Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao, Joint Secretary (East) Asia Gautam Bambawale and Mr Prakash.
Apart from holding wide-ranging talks with his counterpart Yang Jiechi, Mr Krishna will also call on Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao. He will deliver an address at the China Institute of International Studies.
The Minister will participate in a reception to mark the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries, jointly organised by the Indian Embassy in Beijing and the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries.
Mr Krishna will also inaugurate the Festival of India in China, which will be held over a period of six months. The Festival of China in India will commence in the second half of April.
Mr Krishna and Mr Yang have met several times in recent months, including on the margins of the East Asia Summit Ministerial meeting in July last year. Mr Yang had also visited Bangalore last October for the RIC (Russia, India and China) Ministerial meeting.
"In fact, high-level exchanges characterise our bilateral relationship. We intend to not only maintain but further enhance this momentum. It is these high-level exchanges, the focus at the highest level which has been imparting momentum to the ties," Mr Prakash said.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had met Chinese President Hu Jintao at Yekaterinburg in Russia last June and Mr Wen during the East Asia Summit at Hua Hin in October 2009 and then in Copenhagen during the UN Climate Change Summit in December 2009. President Pratibha Patil is likely to visit China later this year.
Mr Prakash said both sides had, over the years, established a comprehensive architecture of dialogue which had helped in imparting momentum to the ties.
"We have, as you are aware, the Special Representatives (SR) Dialogue on the boundary question. The Thirteenth Round was held in New Delhi in August last year. We have the strategic dialogue at the level of Foreign Secretaries. We have the annual defence dialogue, the expert-level mechanism on trans-border rivers and other such mechanisms. This is just to give an idea of the breadth and the sweep of the dialogue architecture that is already in place," he said.
He said bilateral trade had gone up from just $ 1.8 billion in 2000 to more than $ 43 billion in 2009. In the first two months of 2010, bilateral trade had grown at more than 50 per cent as compared to the same period last year, he said. The two countries have set a trade target of $ 60 billion by the end of 2010.
In 2009, India faced a trade deficit of $ 15.8 billion as compared to $ 11.17 billion in 2008.
"We are having constructive discussions with our Chinese friends on greater market access to Indian commodities and easing of other hurdles, including non-tariff barriers," Mr Prakash said.
He pointed out that Chinese companies had been very active in bidding for infrastructue development projects in India. As of end of 2009, about $ 25 billion worth of projects were secured by Chinese companies in areas such as highways, metro, steel plants and power.
India is participating in a big way in the Shanghai World Expo beginning in May this year.
"It is indeed satisfying that our bilateral relations have become multifaceted. They cover a diverse area. Not only within the bilateral framework but also in the regional and the global context the relationship has been expanding. We have good functional cooperation in areas such as culture, tourism, people-to-people contacts, energy, defence, science and technology, agriculture, education, trans-border rivers, parliamentary exchanges - just to indicate a few key sectors," Mr Prakash said.
He said there were also areas of divergence, including the boundary issue. "I mentioned that we have already a mechanism of SR talks in place to address the boundary issue. There is also the issue of Chinese construction activities in ***************** Kashmir which is an area of concern, as well as the issuance of stapled visas to those who are domiciled in Jammu and Kashmir. Our position is very clear that there should be uniformity in the practice of issuance of visas regardless of the ethnicity or the domicile of an Indian national. However, I must say that both sides have the maturity and the confidence to address all such issues in a spirit of friendship, peacefully and to narrow our areas of divergence, which we have been doing very successfully," he said.
Mr Prakash said there were increasing areas of convergences between the positions of the two countries not only on bilateral matters but also on regional and international issues including important matters for both countries like climate change, international financial crisis, the Doha round of trade talks and so on.
India and China are both members of G20, the East Asia Summit, the ASEAN+6 Dialogue, BRIC, BASIC, and so on, he said.
In reply to a question, Mr Bambawale said India had raised the issue of stapled visas with the Chinese Government at different levels.
"This is a matter of core concern for India because it goes to the very heart of India’s national sovereignty and territorial integrity. We have asked the Chinese side to do away with this dual visa policy, of issuing visas stamped on Indian passports for a certain segment of Indian people and giving them a separate stapled visa which is issued on a separate sheet of paper and stapled to the passport. So, this dual visa policy we have asked the Chinese to do away with. We will continue to press them on this issue because it is a matter of core concern to India," he said. Mr Prakash said India hoped that China would take this "very important concern of ours" on board.
In response to another question, Mr Bambawale said the case of the 21 Indians arrested in China on the charges of smuggling diamonds would figure during the talks between the two Foreign Ministers.
He said 20 of the 21, who were arrested in Shenzhen in South China on January 8, were charged with diamond smuggling and one with money-laundering. He said the investigations were expected to be completed in about two months and the case was likely to be brought to the courts in a few weeks after that.
He said the Consulate General of India in Guangzhou had had consular access to the 21 Indians thrice already and India had asked for yet another round in early April.
"We find that the 21 Indians are in good health. There were some complaints about the quality of the food because they are all vegetarians and they were not getting food which was adequate. I think this has now been addressed. More importantly we have insisted that the family of those Indians, at least the immediate family members, should be allowed to meet with them," he said.
"The Chinese authorities have now accepted this. There is likely to be a meeting between the immediate family members and the 21 Indians who are in jail in Shenzhen very soon. In the meantime, of course, the law will take its course. We have tried to assist these 21 Indians in finding legal redress in the sense of hiring a lawyer who has a good track record. We hope that they will get the best of legal assistance in this case," he said.
