Rajiv Gandhi missed opportunity to resolve border issue: Former Chinese diplomat

Rajiv Gandhi missed opportunity to resolve border issue: Former Chinese diplomat

Did former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi miss an opportunity to resolve the Sino-India border dispute in 1988? If a former Chinese career diplomat is to be believed, Gandhi did by not responding to an overture from China’s then paramount leader Deng X...

Rajiv-Gandhi-missed-oppurtunity-to-resolve-border-issue-says-former-Chinese-diplomat-Yang-Wenchang-File-Photo

Updated: Apr 13, 2015 20:53 IST
By Sutirtho Patranobis, Hindustan Times
Did former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi miss an opportunity to resolve the Sino-India border dispute in 1988? If a former Chinese career diplomat is to be believed, Gandhi did by not responding to an overture from China’s then paramount leader Deng Xiaoping.
It was Gandhi’s visit to China in 1988 that had begun a cautious thaw in bilateral relations, the first major breakthrough since ties nosedived after the 1962 border war.
Recalling the meeting between Gandhi and Deng, former diplomat Yang Wenchang said the Chinese leader had even suggested the existing McMahon Line be renamed the China-India line.
Yang, now president of the Chinese People’s Institute of Foreign Affairs (CPIFA), said during an interaction over lunch with Indian journalists at his office on Monday that more could have been achieved during the talks between Gandhi and Deng.
He said: “As a diplomat in the late 1980s, I was witness to a chance to solve the problem with Prime Minister Rajiv and Deng, who was also a strong man. Deng said, ‘We do some compromise on the west wing, you do some on the east wing, then we can have a new border.’
“We offered but Prime Minister Gandhi didn't have a response. After that I felt very sad we lost the chance,” Yang added.
Yang did not provide details about the purported deal but maintained that it was a lost opportunity.
With Prime Minister Narendra Modi expected in China in May, there are expectations of some forward movement on the border issue.
According to India, nearly 3,500 km of the border is disputed. China has laid claim to wide swathes of Indian territory, including the northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh.
Yang said he was hopeful that two the strong leaders of India and China – Modi and President Xi Jinping – could make some headway in addressing the border issue.
“A strong man can make strong decisions,” he said. “I believe if two strong men can have a strong wish to settle, that can make a good deal acceptable to everyone,” he said.
China, Yang remarked, is willing to work with India to have a “new border”.

Comments

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (PART 5)

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Release date 21 June , 2 013 P Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is the fifth book in J. K. Rowling 's Harry Potter book series . It was one of the most widely-anticipated books of the series, since there was a wait of three years between it and the previous book, Goblet of Fire . At 38 chapters, it is also the longest book in the series, having jokingly been labelled as heavier than a refrigerator (by Stephen Fry at the Royal Albert Hall event) and used as a benchmark for the size of the next two books. Dedication " To Neil, Jessica and David, who make my world magical [1] " Dr Neil Murray is Jo's husband, Jessica, her daughter, and David, her son. Book description Harry is in his fifth year at Hogwarts School as the adventures continue. There is a door at the end of a silent corridor. And it's haunting Harry Potter's dreams. Why else would he be waking in the middle of the ...

HARRY POTTER AND THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE(PART 1)

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone "Point me!" This article is about the novel. You may be looking for the object, the film, its soundtrack, the video game or the video game soundtrack. This is a story full of surprises and jokes; comparisons with Dahl are, this time, justified. The Sunday Times Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is the first novel in the Harry Potter series. The book was first published on 26 June, 1997[1] by Bloomsbury in London, and was later made into a film of the same name. Both the book and motion picture were released in the United States under the name Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, because the publishers were concerned that most American readers would not be familiar enough with the term "Philosopher's Stone". However this discussion lead to criticism by the British public who felt as if it shouldn't be changed due to the fact it was an English book. Dedication Cover of the US ed...

Check out the Nokia 2, a budget phone with a monster battery

Android Authority Check out the Nokia 2, a budget phone with a monster battery 19 hours ago HMD Global is slowly building up its portfolio of stock-Android-running smartphones. In addition to the trio of mid-rangers (Nokia 3, 5, and 6) it launched at MWC , the company bolstered its high-end with the Nokia 8 , and now the other side of spectrum is getting some attention. Just leaked by Evan Blass , the Nokia 2 looks… well, like a generic cheap phone. If you have a visceral hate of bezels, you’ll probably want to close this post and move on, but design is hardly the point here. Blass didn’t share any details about the Nokia 2, but we can make some educated guesses based on some other clues we’ve got about the phone. First, you might have noticed that the phones in the leaked renders show October 5 as the date. Dates in renders are often set to match the launch time, but this could be an old render and there’s still time for things to change. Read more Han...

Praveen Lenka Official

Search This Blog