S Jaishankar to meet Russian counterpart after China foreign min's India visit

Hindustan Times

2 days ago

Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi is set to visit India next week for talks on the border issue, days before external affairs minister S Jaishankar travels to Moscow for a trade and economic dialogue with his counterpart Sergey Lavrov, with both meetings crucial for New Delhi's ties with Beijing and Moscow amid strains in the relationship with Washington. Within days of Wang's visit, Jaishankar will travel to Moscow during August 21-23 for talks with Lavrov.(PTI File Photo)
Wang is expected to be in New Delhi on August 18 for talks with National Security Adviser Ajit Doval under the mechanism of Special Representatives for the border issue, people familiar with the matter said on condition of anonymity. This will be a follow-up to Doval's trip to Beijing last December and part of preparations for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to China at the end of this month for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit, they said.
A meeting between Wang and Jaishankar is not being ruled out, the people said. Within days of Wang's visit, Jaishankar will travel to Moscow during August 21-23 for talks with Lavrov and to co-chair a meeting of the India-Russia Inter-Governmental Commission on Trade, Economic, Scientific, Technological and Cultural Cooperation (IRIGC-TEC), they said.
This is the main mechanism overseeing trade and economic cooperation between the two sides and the meeting will be an opportunity to discuss matters such as the impact of US President Donald Trump's punitive tariff on India's purchases of Russian crude, the people said.
The visits by Wang and Jaishankar are yet to be formally announced by China or India, though preparations have been underway for quite some time, the people said. Talks in the Special Representatives format resumed after Modi and President Xi Jinping met in the Russian city of Kazan on October 23 last year – two days after India and China reached an understanding on ending the military standoff on the Line of Actual Control – and agreed to revive several mechanisms to normalise bilateral ties and address the long-festering border dispute.
However, both visits have assumed greater significance in light of a downturn in India-US relations in recent weeks on trade-related issues, primarily due to Trump slapping a tariff on Indian goods and an additional penalty for Russian oil purchases.
The two Special Representatives are expected to consider confidence-building measures to bolster peace and tranquillity in the border areas and to take forward efforts aimed at seeking a mutually acceptable framework for settling the border issue, the people said. At their last meeting in December, Doval and Wang had 'resolved to inject more vitality into this process', according to an Indian readout.
There have been several signs of a thaw in India-China ties following the chill caused by the border face-off, which saw both sides amassing nearly 50,000 troops each in Ladakh sector of LAC. In April, the two sides resumed the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra to the Tibet region after a gap of five years, and this was followed by India resuming tourist visas for Chinese nationals in July.
India and China are also in advanced negotiations on resuming direct flights and trade through selected border posts, and there has been 'forward movement' on restrictions imposed by China on fertiliser exports to India.
The Special Representatives are also expected to review cross-border cooperation and data-sharing on cross-border rivers. India's concerns about China's construction of what is set to be the world's largest hydropower dam on the upper reaches of the Brahmaputra river too could figure in the talks, the people said. The Indian side formally raised the construction of the $167-billion dam on Yarlung Tsangpo river in Tibet with China and called for transparency and consultations on the project.
Wang's meetings in New Delhi will also prepare the grounds for PM Modi's planned visit to China to participate in the SCO Summit in Tianjin on August 31 and September 1. Modi is expected to hold a bilateral meeting with Xi on the margins of the summit, the people said.
On Wednesday, Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Alexey Fadeev confirmed Jaishankar will hold talks with Lavrov on August 21 before participating in the 26th session of the IRIGC-TEC. The trade and economic dialogue is co-chaired by Jaishankar and Russian first deputy prime minister Denis Manturov, and it was last held in New Delhi in November 2024.
The upcoming dialogue will be an opportunity for India to discuss various trade-related issues, including the current imbalance in trade and greater trade settlement in national currencies in the face of Western sanctions and tariffs, the people said.
India-Russia trade reached a record high of $68.7 billion in FY 2024-25, though Indian exports accounted for only $4.88 billion. India has repeatedly raised issues such as greater access to Russian markets and diversification of trade, which has been dominated by increased uptake of Russian crude in the past three years.
As part of measures to bolster rupee-ruble trade, the Reserve Bank of India on August 5 allowed authorised dealer (AD) category-1 banks to open special rupee vostro accounts for their foreign correspondent banks, and this was followed a week later by the easing of rules to allow funds in these accounts to be invested in government securities and treasury bills.
The meeting of the IRIGC-TEC will be followed by a meeting of the India-Russia Inter-Governmental Commission on Military Technical Cooperation (IRIGC-MTC), for which the Russian defence minister will travel to New Delhi, the people said. The meeting of these bodies is part of preparations for a planned visit to India by President Vladimir Putin for the annual bilateral summit later this year.