China's envoy to India bats for India-Pakistan-China summit at sidelines of SCO

NEW DELHI: China's envoy to India Luo Zhaohui today informally pitched a summit among India, Pakistan and China on the sidelines of a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) to improve regional relations.

"Some Indian friends suggested that India, China and Pakistan may have some kind of trilateral summit on the sidelines of SCO," said Luo, at a seminar in New Delhi titled "Beyond Wuhan: How Far and Fast Can China-India Relations Go". The title of the seminar referred to the meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping had in Wuhan, China in April.

Luo said China, Russia and Mongolia had a similar summit, so he sees no reason why India, Pakistan and China can't. He added that peace along the borders is in the interests of all nations.

"We cannot stand another Doklam incident. Let's make a joint effort to maintain peace along the border," he said referring to last year's 73-day-long border standoff at the India-China-Bhutan trijunction.

Such disputes, Luo tweeted, need a mutually acceptable solution.

"We need to control, manage and narrow differences through expanding cooperation. The boundary question was left over by history. We need to find a mutual acceptable solution through Special Representatives' Meeting while adopting confidence building measures," he tweeted.


Luo then outlined his four-point vision for the future of India-China cooperation.

"Sign a Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, negotiate a bilateral Free Trade Agreement, enhance connectivity and work for early harvest on boundary issues," he explained.



In connection with trade, Luo said China will import more sugar, non-Basmati rice and high-quality medicines from India to reduce trade imbalance.

"A new bilateral trade target has been set for 100 billion USD by 2022," he tweeted.


Last but not least, Luo stressed people-to-people exchanges to enhance friendship and mutual understanding.



Earlier this month, China accepted New Delhi's offer of an informal summit in India as both the sides signed two MoUs during the meeting between PM Modi and Chinese President Xi on the sidelines of the SCO summit that was held in China's Qingdao.

That was the second meeting in three months between the two leaders. In April, Modi and Xi met for the first time since the Doklam border crisis in what the Chinese state media described as a "surprise diplomatic initiative". Modi's two-day visit to Wuhan in China was billed as an "informal" summit with President Xi.

At the SCO meet this month, XI and Modi said they agreed to "cherish" the "positive momentum" generated by their Wuhan meeting and implement the "important consensus" reached at the summit.