New Delhi: Chinese President Xi Jinping’s upcoming visit to India for the BRICS summit, his first in seven years, will present a key opportunity to further normalise bilateral ties through expanded trade and investment as Prime Minister Narendra Modi prepares to host him for bilateral talks on Saturday at a time of global geopolitical uncertainty.
Xi’s two-day visit to New Delhi follows a series of recent high-level exchanges, including the Special Representative dialogue in Beijing between National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, even as lingering concerns remain over aggressive Chinese military posturing along the Arunachal Pradesh sector.
Modi is set to hold separate bilateral talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, and several other global leaders on the sidelines of the BRICS summit. The talks with Putin are scheduled to be held at 3.30 pm and those with Pezeshkian at 6.15 pm on Friday.
Xi will be accompanied by a high-level delegation comprising government officials and top business leaders. Both sides have rolled out a series of confidence-building measures over the past year to repair ties frayed by the more than four-and-a-half-year military standoff in eastern Ladakh.
Other key leaders arriving in the national capital for the two-day summit starting Saturday include Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali.
Although Saturday’s Modi-Xi encounter is drawing the primary spotlight, the prime minister’s Friday discussions with Putin and Pezeshkian are emerging as equally critical, given the ongoing West Asia crisis and Moscow’s continuing standoff with Western powers over Ukraine.
In their talks, Modi and Xi are expected to review the overall situation along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) besides exploring more ways, including by expanding trade and investment ties, as part of efforts to normalise bilateral relations, people familiar with the matter said.
The meeting is slated to take place at 6 pm on Saturday, they said. The Chinese president is set to land in New Delhi on Saturday. Modi and Xi held wide-ranging talks on August 31 last year on the margins of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in the Chinese city of Tianjin.
The Modi-Putin meeting is expected to focus on enhancing cooperation in a range of areas, including defence, energy, technology, pharmaceuticals and people-to-people exchanges.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov on Tuesday said both sides are also exploring BrahMos missile upgrades, and that Moscow remains committed to fulfilling its remaining S-400 system deliveries and discussing the proposed supply of Su-57 fighter jets.
The Russian official said the energy ties between the two countries remained robust and that both sides are looking at holding negotiations for India’s plan to set up new civil nuclear reactors.
Modi and Putin previously met on the sidelines of the SCO summit in Bishkek last week, where the prime minister called for an immediate end to the conflict and urged the Russian leader to shift from an “endless war towards the end of war”. The Ukraine conflict and the road map to peace are expected to feature prominently in their upcoming talks. There have been renewed efforts, including by the Trump administration in the US, in the last few days to find a way to resolve the conflict.
The meeting between Modi and Pezeshkian assumes greater significance as it is taking place against the backdrop of sudden escalation in the West Asia conflict after a period of of relative calm. Modi had met the Iranian leader in Bishkek on August 31 and conveyed that India supports all efforts toward ending the conflict.
Pezeshkian, on his part, had urged Modi to use India’s extensive contacts with various parties to help them move away from the path of war and bloodshed and return to the path of dialogue and agreement.
In the upcoming talks, the Indian side is expected to again underline the importance of ensuring the freedom of navigation and the protection of civilians and civil infrastructure in the region.
Global oil supplies have suffered severe disruptions following Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, considered the world’s most critical energy chokepoint, through which roughly 20 per cent of global petroleum flows.
Modi is also likely to hold separate bilateral meetings with South African President Ramaphosa Egyptian President Fattah El-Sisi, Indonesia’s Subianto, Malaysian PM Ibrahim, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Al Nahyan, and Ethiopian PM Ahmed Ali.
UN Secretary General António Guterres, WTO Director General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, WHO Chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, New Development Bank (NDB) President Dilma Rousseff and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank Chief Zou Jiayi will also attend the BRICS summit. However, it is not clear whether PM Modi will have any one-on-one meetings with them.
India is hosting the BRICS summit in its capacity as its current chair.
