China pushes for trade link with India via Nepal

THE CORRIDOR COULD BE ONE OF THE LAST PIECES TO FIT INTO THE NETWORK OF ROAD, RAIL LINKS IT IS TRYING TO PUT IN PLACE IN S ASIA.

BEIJING: China has proposed an economic corridor as well as a rail line with India through Nepal and Delhi had responded positively to the trade route plan, a senior Chinese official has said.

The trade link proposal, which was put forward by President Xi Jinping when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the country in May, was discussed again in Kathmandu where Indian foreign minister Sushma Swaraj met her Chinese counterpart Wang Yi at a donors’ conference for quake-hit Nepal on June 25. “We are happy it (corridor plan) was positively received and responded by the Prime Minister (Modi),” Huang Xilian, a top official from Asian department of the ministry of foreign affairs, told Indian journalists on Wednesday.

The two sides were considering a joint study group on the project, Huang said.

“There is no proposal before us on the railway link,” a source in Delhi said, denying comment on the economic corridor proposal.

For China, the corridor could be one of the last pieces to fit into the intricate network of road and rail links it is trying to put in place in south Asia.

The Bangladesh, China, India, Myanmar corridor, which aims to connect Kolkata with Kunming, capital of the Yunnan province in China, is already far into the discussion stage.

In Kathmandu, the foreign ministers agreed that India and China needed to work together towards the reconstruction of Nepal and set up a joint study group on the corridor initiative, Hang said.

A devastating 7.9-magintude quake on April 25 flattened large parts of the impoverished Himalayan nation, killing about 9,000 people and injuring around 23,000 and destroying more than 500,000 houses.

The corridor would not only seek development of China and India but also Nepal and strengthen connectivity in the region, he said.

Both Modi and Xi have been pushing for closer ties between the two countries. New Delhi has also been calling for an early resolution of the vexed border issue, while Beijing sees improved economic ties as the way forward.

A railway link between the three countries through mountain passes in the Himalayas would “materialise a dream”, he said. “We need to have a feasibility study on it. We need to have consultations among the three. If India shows some interest we can respond positively,” he said.

Both India and China have been competing for influence in strategically important Nepal. Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Nepal on June 15 signed an agreement to allow free movement of passenger and cargo vehicles as part of Delhi’s plan of greater regional integration.