China, India FMs call to ensure ‘consensus is implemented’

China’s State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi talked with Indian Minister of External Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar over the phone on Thursday, six days after the two countries held the tenth round of corps commanderlevel talks, in which the two countries had an in-depth exchange of views on issues along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Western Sector, and agreed to follow the consensus of state leaders.

Experts said that the dialogue between Wang and Jaishankar was aimed at ensuring the consensus reached at the tenth round of talks will be fully implemented.

Wang stressed that China and India must cherish the hard-won situation, maintain the momentum of consultation, improve the border control mechanisms, and advance the border negotiation process, to realize peace and tranquility along border areas.

Although it is not clear who initiated the call, it is obvious that both sides want to move forward with the process of disengagement and peace along the border, said Zhao Gancheng, director of the Center for Asia-Pacific Studies at the Shanghai Institute for International Studies.

“In the past 10 rounds of talks, there have been difficulties in the process of implementing the consensus, which shows that the two were quite far apart on the border issues in practice,” Zhao said.

The phone call shows that, with mutual trust between the two sides hurt, the key decisionmakers from the two countries are working hard to heal China-India relations and seek more progress, looking to possibly realize stability and development, said Qian Feng, director of the research department at Tsinghua University.