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Belt and Road Initiative
This Week in AsiaOpinion
Ananth Krishnan
Ananth Krishnan

Opinion | The awkward elephant in the room when Xi and Modi meet

  • India’s opposition to China’s Belt and Road Initiative is likely to complicate President Xi Jinping’s visit to India next month
  • This comes as India grapples with the challenge posed by the initiative in the region

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India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Wuhan, China. Photo: AFP
Ananth Krishnan
Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to India next month might look like a landmark moment in the warming of relations between the two countries. But look a little closer and one seemingly intractable obstacle remains: Xi’s signature Belt and Road Initiative.

The plan remains a thorny issue in relations. In the past two weeks alone, this has manifested in two ways. First, during Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s September 7 visit to Pakistan, when both countries reiterated their objective of expanding the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a flagship belt and road project.

China also expressed its support to Pakistan on the Kashmir issue and said it was against any unilateral action to complicate the dispute. This comes after India’s move to revoke Article 370 of the Indian constitution and split the state of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories, Jammu-Kashmir and Ladakh.

The expression of support brought a sharp response from India, which said it “reject[s] the reference to Jammu and Kashmir in the joint statement issued by China and Pakistan after the recent visit of the Chinese foreign minister” and “consistently expressed concerns to both China and Pakistan on the projects in [the] so-called China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, which is on the territory of India that has been illegally occupied by Pakistan since 1947”.

Second, India skipped a September 10 meeting of the Eurasian Economic Forum organised by the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in Xian. India and Pakistan both joined the SCO in 2017.

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