Chinese media says hostility is replaced

The meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping is expected to be a landmark in bilateral ties, Chinese state media said on Tuesday, adding that the summit’s significance could emulate the meeting between former Indian leaders Rajiv Gandhi and Deng Xiaoping in the late 1980s.

The meeting has raised expectations of warming ties between the two countries following the extended chill in the aftermath of the Doklam standoff last year.

“The meeting can be as significant as the one in 1988 when Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping and then Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi met, and will set the course for bilateral ties,” nationalistic tabloid Global Times said in an editorial on Tuesday. “Indian academia and political circles have agreed the country needs to develop cooperative ties with China. It appears that India is changing its radical attitude toward China highlighted in the Doklam standoff last year,” the editorial added. The tabloid said Beijing was hoping for friendly ties. “Within China, hostility toward India is being replaced by hopes for friendly ties. The two countries need more communication to enhance mutual trust and eliminate the possibility of another border crisis,” it added.

In a separate article, quoting analysts, the newspaper said the “…meeting between Chinese and Indian leaders this weekend is expected to be a landmark move”.

“How to promote economic cooperation between the two largest developing countries amid the US-driven anti-globalisation trend, and new mechanisms to safeguard peace ... will be on the agenda,” Zhao Gancheng, director of the Shanghai Institute for International Studies’ Center for Asia-Pacific Studies, told the newspaper.

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