This development was announced on Wednesday after talks in Beijing between National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who also serve as the Special Representatives (SRs).
India and China have agreed to promote the resumption of the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra for Indian pilgrims, following years of border tensions, during a special representative meeting between the two sides. The Kailash Mansarovar Yatra is a pilgrimage to Mount Kailash and the Mansarovar Lake in Tibet, sacred for Hindus, Jains, Tibetans, and followers of the Bon religion.
This development was announced on Wednesday after talks in Beijing between National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who also serve as the Special Representatives (SRs).
In a statement, the Ministry of External Affairs said the SRs “provided positive directions for cross-border cooperation and exchanges including resumption of the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra, data sharing on trans-border rivers and border trade”. According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Wang Yi said the first formal meeting of the SRs in five years was “hard-won and worth cherishing”.
The tensions between India and China escalated in June 2020, when a border clash broke out in the Ladakh region—the deadliest since the 1962 war. The clash along the border between Ladakh and Chinese-controlled Aksai Chin resulted in the first known fatalities in more than four decades, with at least 20 Indian soldiers and four Chinese soldiers killed.
The SRs' meeting came less than two months after the announcement of a border patrolling arrangement on October 21, followed by a meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit in Kazan, Russia, on October 23.
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Doval, leading the Indian delegation, arrived in Beijing on Tuesday for the 23rd round of SR talks. The last meeting took place in 2019 in Delhi. The meeting followed the agreement on disengagement and patrolling on October 21. To resolve the border issue, the two countries agreed on six points at the SRs' meeting, according to a press release by the Chinese Foreign Ministry.
Both sides agreed to continue to take measures to maintain peace and tranquillity in the border area and promote the healthy and stable development of bilateral relations, it said.
The two sides reiterated their commitment to continue seeking a fair, reasonable and mutually acceptable package solution to the boundary issue in accordance with the political guidelines agreed upon by the Special Representatives of the two countries on resolving the boundary issue in 2005, and to take positive measures to promote this process, it said.
The two sides assessed the border situation and agreed to further refine the management and control rules in the border area, strengthen confidence-building measures, and achieve sustainable peace and tranquillity on the border, it said.
The two sides agreed to continue to strengthen cross-border exchanges and cooperation, and promote the resumption of Indian pilgrims' pilgrimage to Tibet, China, cross-border river cooperation and Nathula border trade, it said.
Both sides also agreed to further strengthen the Special Representatives' mechanism, bolster diplomatic and military negotiation coordination and cooperation, and requiring the Working Mechanism for Consultation & Coordination on China-India Border Affairs (WMCC) to do a good job in the follow-up implementation of the decisions reached special representatives' meeting, it said.
The two sides agreed to hold a new round of Special Representatives' meetings in India next year, and the specific time will be determined through diplomatic channels.