Jaishankar meets Wang Yi for second time in July; suggests urgency in resolution of pending issues

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar met with Communist Party of China Politburo member and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Vientiane (Laos) on Thursday and pushed for resolution of pending issues along the Line of Actual Control with a sense of purpose and urgency.“Continued our ongoing discussions about our bilateral relationship. The state of the border will necessarily be reflected on the state of our ties. Agreed on the need to give strong guidance to complete the disengagement process. Must ensure full respect for the LAC and past agreements,” Jaishankar wrote on X following his second meeting with Wang in July.

“It is in our mutual interest to stabilize our ties. We should approach the immediate issues with a sense of purpose and urgency,” Jaishankar emphasised. The two met on the sidelines of the East Asia Summit and India ASEAN Foreign Ministers meet in Vientiane.

Earlier this month the two Ministers had met in Astana on the sidelines of the SCO Meeting of the Council of Heads of State and decided to “redouble efforts to achieve complete disengagement from the remaining areas in Eastern Ladakh”.

The two Ministers then decided that the Working Mechanism on Consultation and Coordination on India-China Border Affairs (WMCC) should hold an early meeting towards the process to achieve complete disengagement.

China is yet to agree to a pre-Galwan situation as the remaining friction points in Ladakh delaying normalization of ties. In February India and China held a fresh round of high-level military talks to resolve the over three-and-half-year-old border row in eastern Ladakh that saw both sides agreeing to maintain “peace and tranquillity” on the ground but there was no indication of any breakthrough.