On Sunday, India and China held the 18th round of their Corps Commander Level Meeting at the Chushul-Moldo border meeting point on the Chinese side to discuss border issues.
Official Statements
India’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said that the meeting focused on resolving issues along the LAC in the Western Sector “so as to restore peace and tranquility in the border areas, which will enable progress in bilateral relations.” It added that the latest discussions followed the meeting between the countries’ respective foreign ministers in March.
“In the interim, the two sides agreed to maintain the security and stability on the ground in the Western Sector,” the statement said. Moreover, they also “agreed to stay in close contact and maintain dialogue through military and diplomatic channels and work out a mutually acceptable resolution of the remaining issues at the earliest.”
Similarly, the Chinese military said that both delegations agreed to “speed up the settlement” of their disputes on the western section of their boundary, and “continue to safeguard the peace and tranquility in the border areas.”
Chinese statement on India China border talks: https://t.co/uZTwhkeQFT pic.twitter.com/SFDls9pxUR
— Sidhant Sibal (@sidhant) April 25, 2023
Changing Dynamics of Border Relations
Qian Feng, director of the research department at the National Strategy Institute at Tsinghua University, told Chinese state mouthpiece Global Times on Monday that the two countries’ border issue “is now gradually shifting from a conflict and a standoff to a normalised management phase,” and “the situation on the border is expected to become steadier and calmer in the future.”
However, the researcher added that the issue “remains complex, so it still requires both sides to further implement mechanisms at all levels and through different channels to meet each other halfway as much as possible, so as to find a fair and reasonable solution.”
Strained Ties
In its Annual Report for 2022 released last month, the MEA said that India’s ties with China have “remained complex.”
It said that since April-May 2020, China “undertook several attempts to unilaterally alter the status quo” along the LAC in the Western Sector, a move that “seriously disturbed the peace and tranquility” in the region.
Further, it noted that although discussions to achieve complete disengagement from all friction points have continued with the Chinese side, China’s “continued unilateral attempts…to change the status quo have impacted the bilateral relationship.”