“It is high time for China and India to do big business, big investment and big commitment,” Ambassador Xu wrote on X.
The latest call to strengthen ties comes when India-China diplomatic relationship is at its best in the past five years, with significant efforts to smoothen ties since Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping met in Kazan, Russia in October 2024.
This was followed by a slew of visits by expert and high-level delegations as well as government officials to resolve the border conflict along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Ladakh region bordering China. More recently, leaders of the two Asian giants met on the sidelines of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in Tianjin, China.
Further, these attempts to mend ties have been accelerated as both countries face a common challenge in reciprocal tariffs imposed by US President Donald Trump.
What did FM Sitharaman say?
However, Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman highlighted last week that more concrete steps need to be taken to advance trade and open market access for India and that talks with the Chinese tend to take a long time to yield a conclusive result.
“There’s just a lot of work to be done in this area, there’s no hiding it,” the minister said in an exclusive interview with Network 18 Group Editor Rahul Joshi on Friday, September 5.
“We need to have trade conversations, market access conversations and non-tariff barrier conversations with the Chinese. Unless we do that and unless there’s a true engagement and not a procrastinating engagement — you may talk as much as you want in these issues and I have done it myself — to have a conclusion arrived at takes a lot of time with the Chinese,” she said.
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First Published: Sept 8, 2025 5:24 PM IS
