Sutirtho Patranobis   

BEIJING: India and China have agreed to expand bilateral military exchanges involving top generals and young officers in a bid to strengthen communication between their armies, who are deployed along a disputed border.

Reciprocal high-level visits and joint training exercises for the military — two of the largest in the world — will also be enhanced, New Delhi and Beijing have decided.

These issues were in focus when top defence officials of the two sides met for the 9th IndiaChina Annual Defence and Security Dialogue in Beijing this week.

The agreements were needed to build strong military-to-military ties, which, in turn, is “necessary to strengthen political and strategic mutual trust,” officials at the dialogue concluded.

There was no official word on whether India and China had reached an agreement on setting up a hotline between the Indian Army and People’s Liberation Army, and details of the agreements weren’t shared either.

“Both sides agreed to enhance exchanges and interactions through reciprocal high-level visits between the two ministries of defence as well as between military commands, joint training exercises, (and) mutual visits by defence personnel including midlevel and cadet officers...,” said a statement from the Indian embassy. “Both sides reiterated the importance of maintaining peace and tranquillity in the border areas, implementing the consensus of Prime Minister [Narendra] Modi and President Xi Jinping, and specific additional confidence-building measures at the operational level,” it said.

“They emphasised the need to further strengthen military-tomilitary ties in order to strengthen political and strategic mutual trust between the two countries,” it added.

Though the dialogue was instituted as an annual event, the latest round was convened after two years. The intervening period saw Indian and Chinese troops locked in a 73-day standoff at Doklam (referred to by China as Donglang) near the Sikkim border during June-August in 2017.

Since the resolution of the faceoff, bilateral defence ties have apparently improved.

The informal Wuhan summit between Modi and Xi in April laid out a way forward on how to ease military tensions. Both leaders had agreed to expand and implement confidence-building measures between the two militaries to avoid a Doklam-like situation.

The statement from the Indian embassy reflected the easing of defence ties. The dialogue was co-chaired by India’s defence secretary Sanjay Mitra, and Lt Gen Shao Yuanming, deputy chief of the joint staff department of China’s Central Military Commission. Mitra also called on China’s defence minister, Gen Wei Fenghe, on Thursday. Wei had visited India in August and met Modi and defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman.

At that time, defence ministry spokesperson, Col Wu Qian, had said the two sides had talked about setting up an exchange mechanism for visits and a direct confidential phone line between the two defence ministries, as well as strengthening exchanges at all levels.

letters@hinduatantimes.com n

Courtesy: Hindustan Times: 16th Nov, 2018