Analysis | Xi Jinping and Narendra Modi bank on chemistry as they talk trade and terrorism
- One-on-one dinner between leaders, originally scheduled for an hour, lasts nearly 2½ hours
- Indian PM takes Chinese president on personal tour of monuments in coastal town of Mamallapuram, Tamil Nadu
The first part of the Chinese leader’s visit, on Friday evening, stretched on for much longer than scheduled. A one-on-one dinner between the two leaders, originally expected to take an hour, lasted almost 2½ hours.
Indian foreign secretary Vijay Gokhale, briefing the media late on Friday night, said that the talks mostly revolved around trade and terrorism.
“The two leaders spoke on issues of trade, investment and on enhancing both the trade values as well as trade volumes in order to bridge the trade deficit between the two countries,” Gokhale said.
Xi and Modi also discussed “similar challenges that they both face on account of terrorism and radicalisation”, the foreign secretary added.
“Both leaders said that these were large countries and that radicalisation was a matter of concern to both, and that both would work together to see that radicalisation and terrorism did not affect the fabric of our multicultural, multi-ethnic, multi-religious societies,” Gokhale told reporters.