Thailand, October 24: Seeking to put behind the recent verbal spat between India and China over Arunachal Pradesh, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his counterpart Wen Jiabao on Saturday agreed to build trust and understanding and strengthen the bilateral strategic ties.
However, issues like Arunachal Pradesh and the Dalai Lama did not figure during the talks between the two Prime Ministers who met on the sidelines of the ASEAN summit in this Thai beach resort, highly-placed sources said.
The two leaders began their meeting at Dusit Thani hotel with a warm handshake. The scheduled 45-minute meeting spilled over to almost an hour.
In his opening remarks, Mr. Wen said “we want to have a healthy and steady relationship with India,” according to the sources.
Mr. Wen described Dr. Singh as an “old friend” and recalled their several previous meetings. “In the years ahead we are confident that we will have good relations,” he said.
Terming his meeting with Mr. Wen as productive, Dr. Singh said it was a “good discussion” and the two sides agreed to further promote strategic and cooperative partnership and seek to build trust and understanding.
Mr. Wen was quoted as saying at the beginning of his talks with Dr. Singh by China’s official Xinhua news agency that “we have reached important consensus on promoting bilateral ties, and I believe that our two countries could maintain a good relationship in the future, which conforms with the interests of the two countries and I have confidence about that.”
Dr. Singh congratulated Mr. Wen on the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, massive celebrations for which were held on October one.
Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma, Prime Minister’s Principal Secretary T.K.A Nair and Joint Secretary (East Asia) N. Ravi attended the meeting from the Indian side.
Ahead of the meeting, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao said last night that the relationship between the two countries is a “complex one” though it has “developed in many areas” in recent years.
In the last few days conciliatory tones were heard from both New Delhi and Beijing. Senior functionaries of both the countries said the border issue could be resolved by dialogue.
—PTI