NEW DELHI: External affairs minister S
Jaishankar
on Wednesday took a jibe at China and said that Beijing has failed to uphold longstanding written agreements with India.
Responding to a question on the current state of India’s relations with China during an interaction with the Indian diaspora in Malaysia, the external affairs minister emphasised on the paramount importance of securing India’s borders
“India, China relationship is difficult.
For reasons which are still not clear to us, the boundary agreements were broken by China in 2020. We actually had violence and bloodshed,” Jaishankar said.
“My first duty to Indians is to secure border. I can never compromise on that. Normalcy in terms of troop deployment at the border will be the basis for the relationship going forward with China,” he added.
The clash in the
Galwan
Valley in June 2020 marked the most serious military conflict between the two countries in decades. India has consistently emphasized that peace in the border areas is essential for normalizing ties with China.
“We’re still negotiating with the Chinese. I talk to my counterpart. We meet from time to time. Our military commanders negotiate with each other. But we are very clear that we had an agreement. There is a Line of Actual Control. We have a tradition of not bringing troops to that line. Both of us have bases some distance away, which is our traditional deployment place. And we want that normalcy,” he said.
Jaishankar, who is in Malaysia on a two-day official visit, met Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and the two leaders exchanged views and discussed cooperation in the areas of trade, science and technology, education, agriculture, tourism, defence and also on regional issues including Myanmar.
Jaishankar, who is in Kuala Lumpur on the third and last leg of his three-nation tour to Singapore, the Philippines and Malaysia, conveyed the warm greetings of Prime Minister
Narendra Modi
.
Malaysia and India share a long-standing and substantive relationship bound by robust economic partnerships and close people-to-people ties.
